TOMORROW IS TOO FAR

Corgi paperback, 1973. Cover credit: Solution.

THE ESCAPE ORBIT

Ace books, 1965. Cover by Jack Gaughan.

FUTURES PAST

Orbit paperback, 1988. Cover artist uncredited.

"FUTURES PAST - a superb new collection of science fiction stories from the bestselling author of the famous Sector General series. 

Custom Fitting - For George L. Hewlitt, a law-abiding and traditional tailor, things will never be the same again. Approached be the Foreign Office, he's given a most unusual task; to clothe Scrennagle of Dutha, a centaur-like alien, for presentation at Court. But will Hewlitt's skill stand up to the challenge? 

Commuter - Mr Smith is arrested for loitering with intent to rob an old lady. But when Inspector Michaelson discovers that Smith avoids red tape, sells stamps - but apparently never buys any, copies sheet music over and over again, and collects old street maps, his investigations take a different turn. Who is Smith, what is he doing and where does he come from? 

Curtain Call - Mitchell is alone on the moon - well almost alone. A deeply-respected news reporter, Mitchell is about to witness the Earth's most spectacular fireworks display ever - Operation Last Blast, Earth's attempt to rid itself of all weapons simultaneously. But it could go disastrously, irrevocably wrong... 

Plus eight more compelling stories from master storyteller, James White."

Contents:

Custom Fitting

Commuter

Assisted Passage

Curtain Call

Boarding Party

Patrol

Fast Trip

Question of Cruelty

False Alarm

Dynasty of One

Outrider

HOSPITAL STATION

Ballantine Books paperback, 1962. Cover artist uncredited.

"SECTOR GENERAL is the home of many strange creatures, including humans. It is a vast, sectionalized hospital, set up in space to care for all kinds of extra-terrestrials including those that 'breathe' methane gas, or live under water, or come from planets with pressures and gravities altogether different from those of Earth. 

Each section of the hospital is rigged to duplicate the living requirements of its various patients. But the doctors, human and otherwise, must of necessity shift to one kind of space-suit to another in the course of their rounds. How to devise a working spacesuit for a delicately expert surgeon with eight legs so fragile that mere earth gravity would crush them? How discover what is ailing the incommunicable, elephant-sized infant offspring of some vast behemoth before "baby" wrecks the joint? How get close enough to teat a mangled crew-member whose life-force is hard radiation? 

These and many other problems - funny, dangerous, dramatic - are the daily bread of Sector General. But above all there is the job of keeping the hospital going, maintaining harmony and discipline among a wildly disparate group of aliens - this is the job that falls to a human."