Dean Hurt: Thank you for the kind words. As for where to buy Pioneer, I always suggest people buy it direct from ebookit, as I get a larger cut and get it quicker.

And you don’t feed amazon.

The “science” of his propulsion system was a kind of explosive that didn’t go “BOOM” all at once. Rather it provided a constant thrust over time.

We now have a propulsion system that operates in a similar fashion. Although it was a big deal in —–, much information on it has faded into a fog of “tech speak” making it hard to grasp. but,… er… um… n.a.s.a.

It was a great mission in 1998. I had never even heard of until I saw this documentary. The documentary “documents” the connection between the pioneering mission “Deep Space 1” and “Dawn”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlTwI1A1PmA

Now stuff gets old and disappears from You Tube, giving a lie to the notion that data doesn’t die.

If you want to have a higher resolution copy, you can get in on, of course, Amazon, here.
https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Space-One-n/dp/B07DCZ97ZC. At three bucks I think it’s worth it.

Deep Space one laid the groundwork by demonstrating actual “autonomous” navigation that did not use human input. Given how prominent the idea of “autonomous” drones is these days. It might be cool to see some of it’s roots.

But the ION Drive that was built for this satellite is that constant thrust drive. The Mission director Mark Rayman details how he was inspired by a Star Trek episode that mentioned an Ion Drive, beginning at 6:10.

If this critter can be scaled up. This will most likely be the first Space Ship Drive that will take us to another star. It will be a huge long voyage, that might involve cryogenics, but this is the Drive that could do it.

And it all worked. Even when it failed, they were able to “fix” it on the fly.

Janyuary: If it is not too late, buy the book from ebookit, rather than Amazon. I make more money, and sooner, and you don’t feed the beast.

Robert, though I loathe ebooks, I have decided to use the household kindle to read Pioneer.

Its title exemplifies the power of language.

It is so very cold-bloodedly, evilly regressive to require humans to submit to livestock status in the control of the state for “the greater good.” It is evil to require one person to work to support another who is too lazy or cowardly to support himself.

The elephant that obliterates the living room and occupies the universe now, is that any human being who claims the right to liberty and self-ownership, when asked “Who says?” must accept the right answer, and must accept that atheism is the path to bondage. The atheist’s rights are bequeathed by the atheist himself and mean zip. OUR rights are bequeathed by God, the Creator, and He outranks any atheists (communism requires atheism, it is why it must outlaw religion) or any other force that wants to relieve us of our right to self-ownership.

The Constitution, the United States of America, the concepts that built it, stand as THE MOST TRULY PROGRESSIVE of human concepts ever. Courage will become a lot stronger once we decide to address the elephant in the universe.

I am SO disappointed in my fellow Americans – less so with ROW; aren’t most of them second-raters anyway? – and their response to this joke of a “pandemic” (somewhere in the world, some pathetic excuse for a human just had a pleasurable shiver imagining my demise from said virus). But I do believe we’ve passed the point of no return regarding corporations running society, and for all of the negative connotations that entails, one of the few bright spots will be that space exploration will not only continue, but most likely expand, possibly in unexpected directions. All hail the IBM Stellar Sphere, the Microsoft Galaxy…Planet Starbucks.

Warren W. James; Thank you for your support. It is very much appreciated.

Ad Astra,

Warren

Skunk Bucket: I work with Amazon as little as possible. My past experience trying to sell paperbacks published by others through Amazon was horrendous. They are a corrupt company, through and through. If I could drop them as a dealer of my ebooks I would. Unfortunately, I can’t.

BTW, I really enjoyed reading Pioneer on my Kindle and ended up finishing it at like 3 AM. If you have any interest in having the book out in dead tree format, Amazon does a trade paperback version where they print each book to order. You do have to format it to their specs, but it doesn’t cost the author any money. I did that for both of my own novels, in addition to having them in Kindle format.

https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/help/topic/G200635650

mkent: Only a ebook at this time. I need more sales to justify a paperback.

About your book Pioneer — is it only available as an e-book? I guess I’m a little old-fashioned in that I still prefer paperback.