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"It was my preferred entertainment when I was a kid, so when I set out to be a writer, it was perfectly natural that I should write the sort of stories that I used to enjoy reading."
- John Brunner
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| Launching Cradle | ||
| A place for a spherical space craft to sit in gravity. |
| The Killiver was sitting in its launching cradle at the far side of the ten-mile-square Grand Port of Kandoris. Roysland didn't bother to take the tubeway; he flashed his credentials and commandeered a surface jeep. Bilford had already taken charge of the crew, but Roysland wasn't worried about them; he wanted a look at the ship.
 (Launching Cradle from Needler by Randall Garrett) |
| Technovelgy from Needler,
by Gordon Randall Garrett. Published by Astounding Science Fiction in 1957 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the flywheel launcher from The Brick Moon, by Edward Everett Hale, published by Atlantic Monthly in 1869, the Artificial Island For Ocean Rocket Launch from Between Earth and Moon by Otfrid von Hanstein, published by Wonder Stories Quarterly in 1930 and the Landing-Grid launch system from Sand Doom, by Murray Leinster, published by Astounding Science Fiction in 1955.
Compare also to splashdown from From the Earth to the Moon (1867) by Jules Verne,
landing stage from Atomic Fire (1931) by Raymond Z. Gallun,
landing on an asteroid from Murder on the Asteroid (1933) by Eando Binder,
docking cradle from They Never Came Back (1941) by Fritz Leiber,
landing-grid from Sand Doom (1955) by Murray Leinster and
landing pit from The Stars My Destination (1956) by Alfred Bester.
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'Space-sickness is one of the most unpleasant sensations that a human being can experience. Not all are subject to it...'
'...I saw a nice black heavy-looking cloud sailing by just now, and I can get the electrical machine out in five minutes to draw it down.'
'From a distance it could resolve the cosmic rays reflected from various substances.'
'The answer to the dumb student's prayer.'
'He had travelled the space-lanes of the solar system for the greater part of his life...'
'The dinner was excellent. It was completely vegetarian — grown in specially prepared gardens in this Moon base...'
'Telepaths had their sensitiveness enlarged to an immense range by the pin-sets, which were telepathic amplifiers adapted to the mammal mind.'
'It was a relief to enter one of the comfortable autos, whisper a direction down the tube, and just know that you would be taken to your destination in the quickest, safest, and cheapest manner.'
'But he didn't get very far with it before another noise in his ear radio scattered his thoughts. George winced...'
