Murray Leinster 3 hr 39 min read

An Earth party wanders miles of rock-hewn corridors inside an asteroid that is plainly a mighty fortress, stocked with weapons beyond understanding, yet lifeless and abandoned for untold centuries.

Murray Leinster's 1960 novel is an atmospheric, wonder-filled first-contact space opera. Vivid, mysterious, engaging. Read it for a haunting mystery of a signal from space and a deserted alien stronghold, as humanity races to learn what enemy it was built against, in a classic Leinster tale of cosmic dread and discovery.

In its time

Published in 1960, during the 1960s, new wave revolutionizes the genre.

Reading it

3 hr 39 min read (a novel-length work, settle in).