In fact, one natural take-away from the novel is that if technological barriers to space-colonization can be overcome (and it is not obvious it's worth the money and risks), it's much preferable over settler-colonization on Earth. It’s compared to religion in ways unflattering to both UFOs and religion. Interestingly enough (given Clarke's own non-fictional views), the possibility of encountering extra-terrestrial life is actually minimized and ridiculed throughout the novel. I leave it at that (some of the evidence is quoted below). (It's the great age of decolonization in which he was writing.) And while there is some evidence that the Soviet Union is culturally significant, the novel offers plenty of suggestions that ordinary market capitalism is not extinguished yet. There is some evidence that the United Nations is politically influential and that some of the balance of power in it has shifted to Africa-we'll see evidence of what one might call 'post-colonial subaltern solidarity' that Clarke expects. Clarke leaves the exact political details underspecified, and even the institutional contents of global peace is left unclear (especially compared to his slightly earlier Childhood's End). The novel, which is set in the future, is oriented around a kind of settler-colonial mission to the Moon, and the possibility of developing a tourism industry on it. What follows does not contain any spoilers. But because Clarke's characterizations are flimsy (and marred by gendered stereotypes) it's best read as an adventure story with occasionally comic touches. What's neat is that there is no unique hero in the story, but that many kinds of contributions are valued. While it plays some role in the development of the genre of 'hard science fiction' (or scientific science fiction), the novel is primarily a study, from multiple angles, of group dynamics and leadership under great stress and time constraints.

Anyway, the main action of the book is the rescue mission of a group of passengers on a sightseeing tour on the Moon, who are trapped under a kind of lunar dustbowl caused by a lunar Earthquake.

It's easy to forget how famous Clarke once was not just as a science fiction author, but in wider discussions of science policy and search for extraterrestrial life. This digression is devoted to an extended aside in A Fall of Moondust a slender 1961 novel by Arthur C.

Good as Dead by Susan Walter