JOURNEY BETWEEN WORLDS

by Sylvia Louise Engdahl ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 8, 1970

Good-by H. G. Wells, hello Mars Hilton. . . or space wide open to capital gains. Reluctantly rocketing toward Mars with her businessman father (his firm would start a branch there) is eighteen-year-old Melinda Ashley, sort of engaged to stuffy Ross and very much tied to the family homestead on Maple Beach. Early and late she's importuned by Colonial-born Alex to ""give my planet a chance"" and for sure they're ""no different from anyone else""--under the plastic domes of New Terra Melinda is ""welcomed into Colonial society"" with formal dinners and within their windowless apartments Alex's folks are just folks, overcoming inconveniences like the lack of water to approximate life on earth (little changed since 1970 either). Explicitly, the journey between worlds is but an extension of Manifest Destiny, New Terra being the land of opportunity ""only it takes capital."" For Melinda, still straggling along with Ross and her preconceptions, it takes the death of her father in an accident, postponing her departure for earth, and a frightening moment on uninhabited Phobos with Alex (a few seconds of true sci fi) to convince her that New Terra is her future too. Girlish tremors and, honest, the Mars Hilton.

Pub Date: Sept. 8, 1970

ISBN: 1440684324

Page Count: -

Publisher: Atheneum

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1970

Categories: FICTION