Lester Del Rey 44 min read

Amid the blaring Heroes' March and parade drill of the rocket grounds, Captain Thomas Murdock feels the old pull of destiny, the drumbeat that once sent his cadet class out to the stars.

Lester del Rey's 1957 story is an atmospheric social-SF space opera. Thoughtful, evocative golden-age SF. Read it for a reflective story of the space service, its rituals and its costs, where the ceremonial music of departure carries the weight of duty and sacrifice, in a well-turned golden-age tale from a genre stalwart.

In its time

Published in 1957, during the 1950s, post-war optimism meets cold war anxiety.

Reading it

44 min read (a novelette, room for a turn or two).

Illustrated by

John Schoenherr