Noninterference

By Harry Turtledove

Some edge wear, front and back covers have a spine edge crease, but spine has no creasing. Inside front page has a store stamp. No marks other marks than stated, clean and tight. Ships very quickly... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0345343387
• ISBN13: 9780345343383
• Release Date: December 1987
• Publisher: Del Rey Books
• Length: 213 Pages
• Weight: 0.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 4.2" x 6.8"

Customer Reviews

Brilliant piece of science fiction

Harry Turtledove is mostly known nowadays for massive Alternative History works, but he has also written some spellbinding science fiction. I'm surprised this doesn't have a lot more five star reveiws: IMHO this is one of his most entertaining SF books. Set in a future universe in which a human survey service charts the galaxy and the most important principle on which they operate, exactly akin to the "Prime Directive" from Star Trek, is that of non-interference - pre spaceflight civilisations must be left to develop in their own ways. And where Jim Kirk seems to find an excuse to break the Prime Directive every episode, in this book the principle of Noninterference is strictly enforced, at least until David Ware boards a survey ship. Because the universe is so vast, even a civilisation with faster then light travel only gets around to visiting the more remote planets every few hundred years. David Ware, an idealist on a survey ship exploring a remote and very backward planet on the fringe of the explored area of space, tries to persuade his shipmates to make a very minor exception to the principle of noninterference. The case becomes a cause celebre back home, but even so it is hundreds of years before a human ship returns to that planet. When they do, they discover that an apparently insignificant action has had consequences vastly beyond what anyone could possibly have imagined ....

A good, solid read

Turtledove's take on the "Prime Directive" philosophy is well worth reading. Good characters and an interesting story keep this book moving along.