# SciFi novels - has this been done? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 1, 2017, 11:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096 "2017-03-01T11:36:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Future\_Londonite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/9dc877/32.png) [@Future\_Londonite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Future_Londonite)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 11:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/1 "2017-03-01T11:36:04Z")
hi all, Are there any Scifi novels that have the following as the main theme? Various colonization ships are launched within the near future to, let’s say, habitable planets 40 lightyears away. Given it took ‘New Horizons’ 11yrs to get to Pluto as per my calculations it would take about 2156yrs to go 40lightyears…of course technology would advance a lot in those two millennia. Technology actually advances so much that mankind has discovered ways of travelling faster then light and ends up colonizing said planets years/centuries before the original ships arrive… ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 11:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/2 "2017-03-01T11:38:06Z")
I don’t know about as a main theme (though I’m pretty sure it has been), but that’s shown up at least in the background in a significant number of works. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 11:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/3 "2017-03-01T11:42:14Z")
[Marvel Comics did it](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vance_Astro). ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/4 "2017-03-01T11:51:09Z")
The first part of the idea is called “Generation Ships.” The second part shows up in the **Old Man’s War** series by Scalzi, I think. ---
**Author:** ![Stanislaus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stanislaus/32/3391_2.png) [@Stanislaus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stanislaus)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/5 "2017-03-01T11:55:16Z")
Douglas Adams uses it in the intro to Mostly Harmless, to explain why writing Galactic history is basically impossible: > [@Douglas Adams](#): > > So, by and large, the peoples of the Galaxy tended to languish in their own local muddles and the history of the Galaxy itself was, for a long time, largely cosmological. > > Which is not to say that people weren’t trying. They tried sending off fleets of spaceships to do battle or business in distant parts, but these usually took thousands of years to get anywhere. By the time they eventually arrived, other forms of travel had been discovered which made use of hyperspace to circumvent the speed of light, so that whatever battles it was that the slower-than-light fleets had been sent to fight had already been taken care of centuries earlier by the time they actually got there . > > This didn’t, of course, deter their crews from wanting to fight the battles anyway. They were trained, they were ready, they’d had a couple of thousand years’ sleep, they’d come a long way to do a tough job and by Zarquon they were going to do it. > > This was when the first major muddles of Galactic history set in, with battles continually re-erupting centuries after the issues they had been fought over had supposedly been settled. However, these muddles were as nothing to the ones which historians had to try and unravel once time-travel was discovered and battles started pre-erupting hundreds of years before the issues even arose. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/6 "2017-03-01T12:05:56Z")
> [@Future\_Londonite](#): > > Are there any Scifi novels that have the following as the main theme?Various colonization ships are launched within the near future to, let’s say, habitable planets 40 lightyears away. > > … > > Technology actually advances so much that mankind has discovered ways of travelling faster then light and ends up colonizing said planets years/centuries before the original ships arrive… [Many](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LightspeedLeapfrog), [many](http://www.centauri-dreams.org/?p=915), [many](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wait_Calculation), times. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/7 "2017-03-01T12:18:18Z")
“Far Centaurus” by A. E. Can Vogt used the concept in 1944: the crew is using suspended animation, and when they get to alpha Centauri, humans are waiting for them. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/8 "2017-03-01T12:21:59Z")
I was trying to remember a fairly recent instance of the plot, and found it on the TV Tropes page. The short story _The Shoulders of Giants_ by Robert J. Sawyer. Available on-line [here](http://www.sfwriter.com/stshould.htm). ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/9 "2017-03-01T12:24:21Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > “Far Centaurus” by A. E. Can Vogt used the concept in 1944: the crew is using suspended animation, and when they get to alpha Centauri, humans are waiting for them. If A.E. can Vogt, so can you! ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/10 "2017-03-01T12:29:15Z")
> [@Future\_Londonite](#): > > Given it took ‘New Horizons’ 11yrs to get to Pluto as per my calculations it would take about 2156yrs to go 40lightyears BTW, I’m getting 738,000 years for New Horizions to travel 40 light-years. To go 40 light-yers in 2156 years would require an average speed of more than 5,500 kilometers per second. At that speed, Pluto is around 9 days away. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/11 "2017-03-01T12:34:25Z")
Spoiler Heinlein had apparently planned to do it, but never wrote the novel. Heinlein fan/writer Spider Robinson completed the “unfinished juvenile novel” _Variable Star_ from Heinlein’s notes in 2006, which uses the idea. To me, it feels much more like a Robinson novel than a Heinlein novel, despite his evident attempts to follow Heinlein’s structure and style. When he departed from Heinlein, I can’t help but think that he must have been aware of it, but couldn’t help himself. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/12 "2017-03-01T13:44:41Z")
There was one story - I don’t remember the author - about a lone spaceman, probably in suspended animation, on a long journey to a distant planet. When he arrives, there’s a huge welcoming committee, parades, bands, the entire planet is expecting him and celebrating his arrival. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/13 "2017-03-01T13:55:47Z")
Don’t have time to read the Tv Tropes page but has it ever been subverted, i.e. starship goes on a hundreds or thousands-year-long journey, only to be _picked up_ halfway through by the faster ships that have caught up with them and have kindly stopped for the stragglers? (Then the rest of the story can proceed as usual with culture shocks and space adventures etc.) ---
**Author:** ![K364](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k364/32/5_2.png) [@K364](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/K364)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/14 "2017-03-01T14:32:19Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Spoiler > Heinlein had apparently planned to do it, but never wrote the novel. Heinlein fan/writer Spider Robinson completed the “unfinished juvenile novel” _Variable Star_ from Heinlein’s notes in 2006, which uses the idea. > > To me, it feels much more like a Robinson novel than a Heinlein novel, despite his evident attempts to follow Heinlein’s structure and style. When he departed from Heinlein, I can’t help but think that he must have been aware of it, but couldn’t help himself. In Heinlein’s “Time For The Stars” there is a variant of the concept: initial explorations take place in Torch Ships that can accelerate at one G. Years of exploration by a number of ships take place while back on Earth decades pass due to relativistic effects. Then FTL ships are developed and go out to return the Torch Ship’s crews to Earth. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/15 "2017-03-01T14:40:25Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > Don’t have time to read the Tv Tropes page but has it ever been subverted, i.e. starship goes on a hundreds or thousands-year-long journey, only to be _picked up_ halfway through by the faster ships that have caught up with them and have kindly stopped for the stragglers? (Then the rest of the story can proceed as usual with culture shocks and space adventures etc.) That’s in _Variable Star_ ---
**Author:** ![mlees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/16 "2017-03-01T14:42:50Z")
> [@Future\_Londonite](#): > > hi all, > > Are there any Scifi novels that have the following as the main theme? > Various colonization ships are launched within the near future to, let’s say, habitable planets 40 lightyears away. Given it took ‘New Horizons’ 11yrs to get to Pluto as per my calculations it would take about 2156yrs to go 40lightyears…of course technology would advance a lot in those two millennia. Technology actually advances so much that mankind has discovered ways of travelling faster then light and ends up colonizing said planets years/centuries before the original ships arrive… In the Weber-verse, early colonization ships from Earth were hibernation style slower than light ships (with expected flight times of a few centuries). After a couple hundred years, mankind discovers FTL, and the promising exoplanets targeted by the sleeper ships are snapped up by colonists using hyperdrive equipped ships. Several different outcomes were the result (some happy endings, some bad). ---
**Author:** ![Future\_Londonite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/9dc877/32.png) [@Future\_Londonite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Future_Londonite)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/17 "2017-03-01T14:51:10Z")
Thanks everybody… ---
**Author:** ![mlees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/18 "2017-03-01T14:53:45Z")
P.S.: The Weber-verse does not focus on the colonization. That’s just briefly mentioned in back-story exposition. ---
**Author:** ![YamatoTwinkie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/cc9497/32.png) [@YamatoTwinkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YamatoTwinkie)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/19 "2017-03-01T15:13:44Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > There was one story - I don’t remember the author - about a lone spaceman, probably in suspended animation, on a long journey to a distant planet. When he arrives, there’s a huge welcoming committee, parades, bands, the entire planet is expecting him and celebrating his arrival. I remember this story too, but I’ve been through the tvtropes page to no avail, and google doesn’t appear to help either. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2017, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096/20 "2017-03-01T15:26:52Z")
> [@Future\_Londonite](#): > > of course technology would advance a lot in those two millennia. Of course? Remember that there have been long periods in history when technological progress was stagnant. Equally, technology may indeed advance elsewhere, but not in that field. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-novels-has-this-been-done/781096.md?page=2)