Uller Uprising

Transcriber's Note:
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
The Table of Contents is not a part of the original book.
This Ace Science Fiction Book contains the complete text of the original hardcover edition. It has been completely reset in a typeface designed for easy reading, and was printed from new film.
PRINTING HISTORY Twayne edition/ 1952 Ace edition/ June 1983
Copyright © 1952 by Twayne Publishers, Inc. Copyright © renewed 1983 by Charter Communications, Inc. Introduction © 1952, 1983 by Dr. John D. Clark New Introduction © 1983 by John F. Carr Cover art by Gino D'Achille

With the publication of this novel, Uller Uprising , all of H. Beam Piper's previously published science fiction is now available in Ace editions. Uller Uprising was first published in 1952 in a Twayne Science Fiction Triplet—a hardbound collection of three thematically connected novels. (The other two were Judith Merril's Daughters of Earth and Fletcher Pratt's The Long View .) A year later it appeared in the February and March issues of Space Science Fiction , edited by Lester Del Rey.
The magazine version, which was abridged by about a third, was believed by many bibliographers to be the only version—and as a novella it was too short for book publication. The Twayne version had a small print run and is so scarce that few people have seen it. Those bibliographers who knew of its existence assumed that both versions of Uller were the same. It was through a telephone conversation with Charles N. Brown, publisher of Locus and correspondent with Piper, that I learned about the Twayne edition and its greater length. Brown allowed me to photocopy his original, for which we owe him a debt of thanks; because the Twayne version is not only novel length, but far better than the shorter one that appeared in Space Science Fiction .
Probably the most surprising and interesting thing about the Twayne edition is the essay that forms the introduction to that volume, and is reprinted here. The essay is by Dr. John D. Clark, an eminent scientist of the forties and fifties and one of the discoverers of sulfa, the first miracle drug. It describes in great detail the planetary system of the star Beta Hydri, and gives the names of those planets: Uller and Niflheim. A publisher's note states that Clark's essay was written first, and given to the contributors as background material for a novel they would then write.