The Omnibus Collection

What It's About

This omnibus gathers fifteen novels and stories spanning science fiction, historical adventure, and Civil War fiction. The bulk is science fiction: The Time Traders, The Defiant Agents, and Key Out of Time follow agents who use recovered alien technology to travel through time in a covert struggle against a rival power; Plague Ship and Voodoo Planet follow the Free Traders of the merchant ship Solar Queen; Storm Over Warlock finds a stranded outpost under threat from a native species with strange gifts; Star Born and Star Hunter are standalone tales of colonisation and interstellar intrigue; and All Cats Are Gray is a short story of first contact aboard a derelict ship. Alongside these sit two Civil War novels, Ride Proud, Rebel! and Rebel Spurs, following young Confederate scout Drew Rennie; Ralestone Luck, Norton's first novel, a family adventure and mystery set in the American South; and two early pulp adventures originally published under the pen name Andrew North, The Gifts of Asti and The People of the Crater.

Key Concepts

Running through the collection are resourceful young protagonists thrown into hostile or unfamiliar territory, first contact between species, and loyalty tested by duty. The science fiction stories share Norton's recurring interest in lost or alien technology and in history itself as a battleground between rival human factions. The Civil War novels, by contrast, focus on divided loyalty and the personal cost of war rather than its politics.

About the Author

Andre Norton, born Alice Mary Norton in Cleveland, Ohio, worked for nearly two decades as a librarian before turning to full-time writing. In 1934 she adopted the pen name Andre Norton, believing a male-sounding name would suit the boys' adventure market she was writing for, and went on to publish more than 130 novels over a seventy-year career. She was named a Grand Master by both the fantasy and science fiction communities and was inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame.