''Postmarked the Stars'' is a science fiction novel by American writer

Andre Norton Andre Alice Norton (born Alice Mary Norton, February 17, 1912 – March 17, 2005) was an American writer of science fiction and fantasy, who also wrote works of historical and contemporary fiction. She wrote primarily under the pen na ...

, first published in the United States in 1969 by Harcourt, Brace & World. It is part of the series about the adventures of the interstellar tramp freighter ''

Solar Queen These works were written or edited by the American fiction writer Andre Norton (Andre Alice Norton, born Alice Mary Norton, 1912–2005). Before 1960 she used the pen name Andrew North several times and, jointly with Grace Allen Hogarth, Allen Wes ...

'' and her crew.

Plot

Sick from being drugged, Dane Thorson staggers out of a

flophouse A flophouse (American English) or doss-house (British English) is a place that has very low-cost lodging, providing space to sleep and minimal amenities. Characteristics Historically, flophouses, or British "doss-houses", have been used for ove ...

on the planet Xecho and gets back to his ship, the Free Trader (i.e. tramp freighter) Solar Queen, just in time for the ship's blastoff on its first mail run to Trewsworld. Once the ship is secured, Dane and the crew find a man made up to look like Dane lying dead in Dane's bunk. After storing the corpse in a freezer, the crew discovers that part of their cargo, creatures called brachs, has become

sentient Sentience is the ability to experience feelings and sensations. It may not necessarily imply higher cognitive functions such as awareness, reasoning, or complex thought processes. Some writers define sentience exclusively as the capacity for ''v ...

. They find a

radiation In physics, radiation is the emission or transmission of energy in the form of waves or particles through space or a material medium. This includes: * ''electromagnetic radiation'' consisting of photons, such as radio waves, microwaves, infr ...

source that seems to be responsible for the change and which may have also changed the lathsmer

embryos An embryo ( ) is the initial stage of development for a multicellular organism. In organisms that reproduce sexually, embryonic development is the part of the life cycle that begins just after fertilization of the female egg cell by the male spe ...

that they are carrying. For the nonce, until they can solve the mystery of the dead man and the radiation source, they put the brachs and the lathsmers into Solar Queen's lifeboat and Dane, astrogator Rip Shannon and engineer Ali Kamil land it on Trewsworld away from the starport to wait. The usually bird-like lathsmers are hatching and looking more like dragons. They manage to escape into the wild and Dane and Ali go looking for them. During the hunt, with the male brach assisting with his

telepathic Telepathy () is the purported vicarious transmission of information from one person's mind to another's without using any known human sensory channels or physical interaction. The term was first coined in 1882 by the classical scholar Frederic ...

ability, Dane finds a crawler with the crew murdered and robbed of their cargo. Returning to the lifeboat, the two men find

Medic A medic is a person trained to provide medical care, encompassing a wide range of individuals involved in the diagnosis, treatment, and management of health conditions. The term can refer to fully qualified medical practitioners, such as physic ...

Tau waiting there with Ranger Wim Meshler, who tells them that the crew have all been arrested on a long list of charges, including the murder of the dead man they found. After explaining the situation to Meshler, the men note that the dragon-like lathsmers are still on the loose. Using Meshler's flitter, Meshler, Tau, Dane and the brach find the dragons and capture them. As they attempt to return to the lifeboat a control beam pulls the flitter to an enemy camp. There the men are captured and the flitter destroyed. With the aid of the brach, Meshler, Tau, Dane, and the brach escape into the night. Following a crawler track, they find the enemy's main base with monsters, mutated animals, in force-field pens. They also discover that they are inside one of the pens and must evade two monsters. The brach turns off the force-field, allowing the men to escape but also releasing the monsters. The men and the brach steal a flitter and escape, flying it to Cartl's holding, a large farmstead where they can call the authorities in Trewsport. Another holding is being attacked by the released monsters, so Dane, Meshler and the brach go to help the evacuation. The enemy brings down the flitter, but can't use it, so they plan to use Dane and Meshler as bait to draw in a rescue flitter which they can then steal. The rescue flitter brings a team of Stellar Patrolmen, Trewsport Police, and the rest of Solar Queen's crew and they defeat the crooks. Dane guides the rescue party to the crooks' base and the Patrol captures it before the crooks' spaceship can blast off. Thus begins the unraveling of a

galaxy A galaxy is a Physical system, system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar medium, interstellar gas, cosmic dust, dust, and dark matter bound together by gravity. The word is derived from the Ancient Greek, Greek ' (), literally 'milky', ...

-wide criminal empire. The crew of the Solar Queen are allowed to acquire the crooks' spaceship cheaply and they will use it for interplanetary cargo runs in the Trewsworld system.

Sources

*Clute, John. "Norton, Andre". ''The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction''. Eds. John Clute, David Langford, Peter Nicholls and Graham Sleight. Gollancz, 28 May 2016. Web. 23 June 2016. . *Schlobin, Roger C. & Irene R. Harrison, "Andre Norton: A Primary and Secondary Bibliography", Pg 10, 1994, NESFA Press (Framingham, MA), . {{Andre Norton 1969 American novels 1969 science fiction novels American science fiction novels Novels by Andre Norton