Three Books of Known Space

Three Books of Known SpaceCollection of Known Space stories by Larry Niven. Includes the novels World of Ptavvs and A Gift From Earth, and the stories of Tales of Known Space with Madness Has Its Place replacing The Borderland of Sol.

  • The Jigsaw Man, 1967: Chilling implications of human organ transplant technology. The story was first published in Harlan Ellison’s anthology Dangerous Visions, and is included in Niven’s collections All the Myriad WaysTales of Known Space and Three Books of Known Space
  • The Warriors, 1966: Man’s first encounter with aliens of Kzinti species. Kzinti’s have vastly superior technology, but heroic men beat them in the little war in deep space! Originally published in Worlds of If. Later republished in the collections The Shape of Space (1969), Tales of Known Space (1975), The Man-Kzin Wars, Three Books of Known Space and The Best of All Possible Wars.
  • How the Heroes Die, 1966: Only one of the two men can live. First appearance in Galaxy Science Fiction, October 1966. Republished in the collections The Shape of Space (1969, collection), Inconstant Moon (1973, coll), Tales of Known Space: The Universe of Larry Niven (1975, collection), Three Books of Known Space (1996, coll)
  • Intent to Deceive, 1968: A software bug creates major chaos at a fully automated restaurant. First published in Galaxy Magazine, April 1968. Republished in the collections Tales of Known Space and Three Books of Known Space.
  • Becalmed in Hell, 1965: An accident on Venus. First appearance in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, July 1965. Republished  in several collections: All the Myriad Ways (1969, coll), Inconstant Moon (1973, coll), Tales of Known Space: The Universe of Larry Niven (1975, coll), Playgrounds of the Mind (1991, coll), Three Books of Known Space (1996, coll)
  • At the Bottom of a Hole, 1966: Human explorers to Mars are killed by the natives. Short story first published in Galaxy Science Fiction, December 1966. Republished in several collections: The Shape of Space (1969, collection), Inconstant Moon (1973, coll), Tales of Known Space: The Universe of Larry Niven (1975, collection), Three Books of Known Space (1996, coll)
  • Wait it Out, 1968: An accident on Pluto puts a man in natural semi-stasis, awaiting & hoping eventual rescue. First published in1968. Published in the collections All the Myriad Ways (1971), Tales of Known Space: The Universe of Larry Niven (1975), Playgrounds of the Mind (1990) and Three Books of Known Space (1996)
  • Eye of an Octopus, 1966: Humans dig up a Martian’s grave. First published in Galaxy, February 1966.
  • The Coldest Place, 1964: Hunt for alien creatures on “the dark side of” Mercury. First published in Worlds of If, December 1964. Republished in the collections Tales of Known Space (1975) and Three Books of Known Space (1996).
  • Safe at Any Speed, 1967: A man is eaten by a huge bird along with his air car, & survives! On an new colony world. First published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction 1967. Later published in collections The Shape of Space (1969), Tales of Known Space (1975) and Three Books of Known Space (1996).
  • There Is a Tide, 1968: An alien cons a human on an extra-Sol world, & regrets it because of an unexpected development. First printed in Galaxy, June 1968. The reprinted in the collections A Hole in Space 1974, Tales of Known Space 1975 and Three Books of Known Space 1996.
  • Cloak of Anarchy, 1972: An experiment in an anarchy-based society where there is no government. First published in Analog, March 1972. Reprinted in the collections Tales of Known Space and N-Space.
  • Madness Has Its Place, 1990: Larry Niven paints a picture of the peace-loving Sol system in the years before 2375, when the Kzin make their appearance known with a devastating attack. Published in the collections N-Space (1990), Three Books of Known Space (1996) and in the anthology Man-Kzin Wars III (1990).

All of the short stories take place in the Known Space Universe.

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