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The Colors of Space

Marion Zimmer Bradley

Book Overview: 

Bart Steele, Space Academy graduate, is on his way home to his father’s business – he runs a fleet of spaceships for interstellar travel. The secret for fast interstellar travel though is still tightly kept by the alien race Lhari. An agreement between humans and Lhari has been made that permits humans only to travel in cold sleep as passengers aboard Lhari vessels as to not reveal the secret.

Some humans – the Mentorians – have had a slight genetic shift which enhanced their vision to withstand the light levels that the aliens Lhari use and live in. Mentorians perceive a wider optical spectrum than ordinary humans – some can see the ‘eighth color’. Mentorians act as translators, middleman and interpreters between the two races. But their ability sets them apart from the rest of humanity. Bart, half Mentorian, has this ability.

Bart, surgically altering his appearance to hire as a Lhari on a homeworld bound Lhari vessel, attempts to steal the secret of the Warp Drive – an attempt on which countless humans spies have failed before.

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Book Excerpt: 
. . .Glad to know you, Dave." With undiscourageable friendliness, Tommy stuck out a hand. "Say, that bell means dinner, why don't we go down together? I don't know a soul on the ship, and it looks like luck—running into a fellow who could be my best friend's twin brother."

Bart felt warmed and drawn, but sensibly he knew he could not keep up the pretense. Sooner or later, he'd give himself away, use some habitual phrase or gesture Tommy would recognize.

Should he take a chance—reveal himself to Tommy and ask him to keep quiet? No. This wasn't a game. One man was already dead. He didn't want Tommy to be next.

There was only one way out. He said coldly, "thank you, but I have other things to attend to. I intend to be very busy all through the voyage." He spun on his heel and walked away before he could see Tommy's eager, friendly smile turn hurt and defensive.

Back in his cabin, he gloomily dialed some synthetic jellies, thinking . . . Read More

Community Reviews

Yes, the characterisation is wafer-thin. The world-building is dodgy-as, the narrative is held together with coincidence gum and deus ex machina wire, and the plot point that is the fulcrum of the whole story is one of the more ludicrous bits of pseudoscience in Space Opera history. Nevertheless, I

I love when I find little novella gems like this one. With a book that’s only about 100 pages long, I worry that I’m giving away the entire story by telling the basic plot, so I’ll have to be careful. The setting is a future when we’ve encountered another intelligent race in the universe, and they’v

This is not a well known book by MZB. In point of fact, it was one of her first novels before she became a big name author. And it was originally marketed as a juvenile--but I read and enjoyed it as adult.

It is a perfectly good space adventure novel==disregard the reviews on the back and read it. It

When I read this book as a child, I thought I was reading the H.P. Lovecraft title, and was upset that it wasn't what my friends said it was about. That goes to show how dopey I was as a kid. Still am, actually.

But at least I am a little wiser, and so reading it again as an adult really made me appr

This is one of MZB's early books (she began publishing in 1958.) It is a stand alone, not part of any series. Sometimes considered to be a young adult novel, it features a young man just graduated from college.

Bart Steele, the recent graduate of the Space Academy on Earth, learns that his father h

Excellent example

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This review is from: The Colors of Space (Kindle Edition)

Excellent example of Bradley's juvenile fiction. I read it as a child and found it still interesting as an adult. We now know that despite her ability as an author, Bradley's personal life was less than exempl

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