Overlapping Stories

Poul Anderson's Trader To The Stars collects:

"Hiding Place"

"Territory"

"The Master Key"

- three stories about Nicholas van Rijn, not the first three and not necessarily three consecutive instalments of Anderson's Technic History either.

Sandra Miesel's CHRONOLOGY OF TECHNIC CIVILIZATION shows us that, to summarize, in the 2420s:

"A Sun Invisible"

"The Season of Forgiveness"

The Man Who Counts

"Esau"

"Hiding Place"

- overlap and that, in the 2430s:

"Territory"

"The Trouble Twisters"

"Day of Burning"

"The Master Key"

- overlap. The dates can be debated but the main point here is that these are successive decades.

The Technic Civilization Saga exactly reflects these chronological relationships. Volume I ends with the five instalments from "A Sun Invisible" to "Hiding Place" and Volume II begins with the four instalments from "Territory" to "The Master Key." Between "Territory" and "The Master Key," Saga, Volume II, inserts two trader team stories, the first from The Trouble Twisters and the second from The Earth Book of Stormgate. A future history series has come to life before our eyes.