Operation: Outer Space

Leinster, Murray, 1896-1975Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.4

Word count: 343K words
Chapters: 35

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Operation: Outer Space by Murray LeinsterAuthor: Leinster, Murray, 1896-1975,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: May 10, 2006

Editor's review

Murray Leinster was a major American science fiction author, and this book takes space exploration as its subject, carrying the practical imagination and adventurous spirit common to his work. From the available information, it is a science fiction narrative aimed at general readers, with its main appeal lying in how the author organizes space operations into comprehensible mission procedures rather than piling up abstruse technical settings. The value of reading this book lies in experiencing the narrative pleasure of mid-twentieth-century science fiction: technological optimism coexisting with unknown risks, and characters solving problems under limited conditions. It suits science fiction beginners or casual reading, and also readers interested in early English-language science fiction who want a feel for the style of the era. One caveat: early science fiction bears the marks of its writing era in scientific details and social attitudes, and readers can treat it as a sample for understanding the evolution of the genre rather than measuring it point by point against contemporary technological standards.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Science fiction readers who enjoy space adventure and mission-driven narratives
Beginning readers who want to understand the style of mid-twentieth-century English-language science fiction
Readers with some English proficiency looking for light original-language reading
Hobbyist readers interested in the development of the science fiction genre

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking hard scientific detail and contemporary technical accuracy
Literary readers hoping for deep psychological characterization
Beginners with limited English reading experience who need extensive annotations

Reading tips

Read the book as a genre sample and note how the author handles space missions
After each mission stage, briefly retell the problems the characters encounter and how they solve them
Don't worry about whether outdated technological ideas are right or wrong; just record their period characteristics
Read it alongside contemporary space science fiction to appreciate how the genre's pleasures have changed

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book in Chinese or English?

This is the original English-language work, a public-domain ebook from Project Gutenberg, with the main text in English. It suits readers with some English reading ability who want to encounter early science fiction in the original.

What is Murray Leinster's place in science fiction history?

Murray Leinster (1896–1975) was an American science fiction writer active during the golden age of science fiction magazines, known for ingenious short stories and novellas. His work often combines technological ideas with adventure plots and has had some influence on later science fiction.

Do I need to pay to read this ebook?

No. The book is published by Project Gutenberg as a free public-domain ebook and can be downloaded and read at no cost from its website or mirror sites.

Is this book suitable as English learning material?

It can serve as extensive reading material, but it is a mid-twentieth-century science fiction novel whose sentence patterns and vocabulary bear the marks of its era; it was not written specifically for language learning. It is better to read it after building some vocabulary, and when encountering unfamiliar words, focus on understanding the plot rather than looking up every word.

Comments

Find this book

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Leinster, Murray, 1896-1975 Author

Murray Leinster (1896–1975) was an American science fiction writer whose real name was William Fitzgerald Jenkins. He was a prolific author of short stories and novels, and this site holds thirty-nine of his works, including The Mad Planet, The Pirates of Ersatz, The Machine That Saved The World, The Forgotten Planet, The Wailing Asteroid, The Invaders, The Runaway Skyscraper, and Scrimshaw. His science fiction often deals with interstellar adventure, strange planets, and technological speculation, with tightly plotted, boldly imaginative narratives that also reflect on human society and the conditions of survival; some works are also categorized as inspirational growth. Public information is limited, making biographical details difficult to describe, but the surviving works show his important place in twentieth-century American popular science fiction and his influence on later writers in the genre.