In Chapter 1, Ricardo Nansen, future Captain of Envoy, is a pilot in the system of Epsilon Eridani.
In 2, Jean Kilbirnie, future second pilot, and Tim Cleland, future planetologist, are on Harbor while exploring the Tau Cetian system.
In 3, Yu Wenji, future engineer, explores the Sirian system.
In 4, Selim ibn Ali Zeyd, future biochemist, visits Osman Tahir, in hospital in Istanbul.
In 5, Hanny Dayan, future physicist, visits Nansen at his mansion in Paraguay.
In 6, Lajos Ruszek, future mate and first pilot, and Mamphela Mokoena, future biologist and physician, watch Alvin Brent, future second engineer, on television.
In 7, Ajit Nathu Sundaram, linguist and semantician, meets the rest of the crew in Envoy during a shakedown cruise within the Solar System.
In 8, the crew has six weeks' liberty before the voyage.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I don't think Hanny Dayan, if she hadn't gotten the Cosmosophists so lethally enraged at her, would have joined the crew of "Envoy." She had a bright future ahead of her, after all, if Dayan had not made Earth and the Solar System too hot for her!
Ad astra! Sean
That’s a scratch crew - all intelligent and able, but not psychologically very well-matched and as I mentioned earlier the gender balance was asking for trouble, which duly arrived. If I were picking the crew I’d have gone for a few more women even if it meant taking people a little less qualified.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I think the major difficulty was that most people would not want to go on a STL relativistic journey which on Earth would last ten thousand years or more. But I agree with the other difficulties you mentioned. Of course, I think this was deliberate on Anderson's part, because it would make for a more interesting story than it would have been if a few more women had been in the crew.
Ad astra! Sean
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