H. Beam Piper’s Lone Star Planet (1958, co-written with John J. McGuire) is a sharp and satirical science fiction novella set on New Texas, a frontier world whose constitution enshrines the right to shoot politicians — making diplomatic posting there the most dangerous job in the galaxy. A new Terran ambassador must navigate this lawless culture while preventing an interstellar war. Piper’s wit and world-building economy are on full display.
This free EPUB brings Piper’s political satire to any e-reader in a freshly reformatted edition. Readers who enjoy Piper’s Terro-Human Future History series, or the wry science fiction of Eric Frank Russell, will find Lone Star Planet a fast and genuinely funny read with more intellectual substance than its premise suggests.