Dances With Words  | 11 Feb 2014 9:07 a.m. PST |
YEARS ago, I saw a book/story about some sort of 'federation'/star-league-type system…that had a fleet of ships that each carried ONE 'nova-bomb'…in a special vault on board. Anyway, one of these ships 'crashed' on a dreary planet, most of the crew survived, but the VAULT for the nova bomb was 'empty'….most of the novel was about efforts to find out who now had 'the bomb'….(it was eventually revealed that there were NO 'nova bombs'….but a 'fortuitious' nova of a rebelling system was used to 'prove' that the folks in power had Nova bombs…)…to keep others in line, etc. The crew had 'Go' champions…some game they all played…and the ship had landing craft, because it wasn't designed to 'land'…etc. Anyway….the COVER on the book shows the REALLY cool design of the ship…(although it's 'back' is broken from crashing)….and THAT's what I'm trying to find…the name of the book/author or whatever, so I can find the art from the cover! I don't remember any more about it than that….but I thought SOMEONE might know? Slishfully,
Sgt DWW-btod |
| tberry7403 | 11 Feb 2014 10:55 a.m. PST |
I was initially thinking of the movie "Dark Star". Only the bombs were "real". |
 Parzival  | 11 Feb 2014 11:44 a.m. PST |
Hmmm… the fake bomb sounds familiar, but I'm coming up blank. |
| TNE2300 | 11 Feb 2014 3:54 p.m. PST |
sounds like the Traveller backstory for the Darrians
(secret of the star trigger) had a similar outline
but I have no memory of a cover with a crashed ship |
| MHoxie | 12 Feb 2014 3:03 a.m. PST |
I was thinking the same thing, about Traveller. Maybe look for books by E. C. Tubb, H. Beam Piper, and Poul Anderson (especially the "Ensign Flandry" series) as these are usually cited as the biggest literary inspirations for Traveller. The quest for a fake bomb missing from an empty hold linked to a real explosion sounds a bit like Philip K. Dick… |
| elsyrsyn | 12 Feb 2014 5:02 a.m. PST |
I did some googling, because it sounds like an interesting book (I'm currently reading a lot of Piper, since much of his work is now Public domain and available on Gutenberg, so I'm sort of in a '60s SF mode), and all I could find was that the ship might have been called the Canopus. Maybe that will ring a bell with someone. Doug |
| TNE2300 | 12 Feb 2014 7:02 p.m. PST |
Timothy Zahn's Conquerors saga? …the human Circe superweapon. It is kept hidden and unused until the last possible moment due to its extremely devastating effects. …it comes out that Circe does not in fact exist. |
| Shorr Khan | 13 Feb 2014 5:03 p.m. PST |
The Book is "The Programmed Man" by Jean and Jeff Sutton. I just found it online, as the authors' heirs have released their works into the public domain. |
| Parzival | 13 Feb 2014 6:34 p.m. PST |
Timothy Zahn's Conquerors saga?…the human Circe superweapon. It is kept hidden and unused until the last possible moment due to its extremely devastating effects. …it comes out that Circe does not in fact exist. Well, that's probably not the OP's book, but that's where I remember the idea from! |
| Parzival | 13 Feb 2014 6:36 p.m. PST |
Here's the cover from the OP:
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| elsyrsyn | 20 Feb 2014 12:07 p.m. PST |
The Book is "The Programmed Man" by Jean and Jeff Sutton. I just found it online, as the authors' heirs have released their works into the public domain. Cool! I hope they show up on Gutenberg. Doug |
