Mission of Gravity by Hal Clement

A stalwart trader sets out to recover a lost probe on behalf of
feeble space giants.

https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/fair-trade
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--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

That?s the one where humans discover an alien species living on the
surface of a neutron star, somehow managing to stay on their feet
under 100,000 ? Earth gravity. (They were small and had a lot of legs,
as I recall.)

I remember the description of what happened when they dropped
something: it fell so fast that they never saw it actually fall: it
simply disappeared and instantaneously reappeared on the ground.
Completely flattened, of course.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

In article <10s3kl1$aab5$4@dont-email.me>,
Lawrence D?Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

That?s the one where humans discover an alien species living on the
surface of a neutron star, somehow managing to stay on their feet
under 100,000 ? Earth gravity. (They were small and had a lot of legs,
as I recall.)

You may be thinking of Forward's Dragon's Egg.

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My tor pieces at https://www.tor.com/author/james-davis-nicoll/
My Dreamwidth at https://james-davis-nicoll.dreamwidth.org/
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--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Sun, 19 Apr 2026 23:52:46 -0000 (UTC), James Nicoll wrote:

You may be thinking of Forward's Dragon's Egg.

I may indeed ...

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 4/19/2026 7:52 PM, James Nicoll wrote:

In article <10s3kl1$aab5$4@dont-email.me>,
Lawrence D˜Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

Thatƒ??s the one where humans discover an alien species living on the
surface of a neutron star, somehow managing to stay on their feet
under 100,000 ?? Earth gravity. (They were small and had a lot of legs,
as I recall.)

You may be thinking of Forward's Dragon's Egg.

Definitely Dragon's Egg. The natives in that book were made from
degenerate matter, and had about the same mass as a
human, but compressed to about a tenth of a cubic
centimeter.

The falling object scene does occur in MoG - in the
high-gravity zone.

Dragon's Egg was in some way a homage to Mission of Gravity.


pt

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)