Bordered in Black

Overview:

• Title: Bordered in Black
• Author: Larry Niven
• Year: 1966
• Type: Short Fiction

Synopsis:

Two men are sent in the first FTL ship to explore an Earth-like planet of Sirius B; only one returns, and destroys the ship. Slowly he recounts how they saw all shores of a bare continent surrounded by a black heat-emiting mass, found the ocean full of a sterile monoculture of engineered algae, and when they landed to investigate...

Notes:

In the notes to Convergent Series, Niven says: "Bordered in Black does not belong to the Known Space universe. [...] When I wrote Bordered in Black, Known Space had not taken form. I was playing with some preliminary ideas, and one of these - the 'Blind Spot' effect of this form of faster-than-light travel - was later incorporated into Known Space. But it's a different timeline entirely. Similar statements hold for One Face".

Awards:

• 1966. Bordered in Black Nebula, Short Story (Nomination below cutoff)

Editions/Publications:

• 1966. The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, April 1966 (1966, Edward L. Ferman, $0.50, 130 pages, Magazine)
• 1969. The Shape of Space (September 1969, Larry Niven Ballantine, Catalog ID: #01712, $0.75, 244 pages, Paperback, Collection)
• 1971. SF: Authors' Choice 3 (1971, Harry Harrison G. P. Putnam's, Hardcover, Anthology)
• 1973. Inconstant Moon (1973, Larry Niven Gollancz, Hardcover, Collection)
• 1974. Inconstant Moon (1974, Larry Niven Sphere, ISBN-10: 0722163835, 40p, Paperback, Collection)
• 1974. Inconstant Moon (1974, Larry Niven Sphere Books Limited, ISBN-10: 0722163940, £0.65, 200 pages, Paperback, Collection)
• 1977. Inconstant Moon (1977, Larry Niven Sphere, ISBN-10: 0722163819, £0.85, 199 pages, Paperback, Collection)
• 1979. Convergent Series (1979, Larry Niven Ballantine, ISBN-10: 0345277406, $1.95, viii+227 pages, Paperback, Collection)
• 1984. Convergent Series (1984, Larry Niven Orbit, ISBN-10: 0708880622, £1.95, viii+227 pages, Paperback, Collection)
• 1990. N-Space (September 1990, Larry Niven Tor, ISBN-10: 0312850891, $19.95, 529 pages, Hardcover, Collection)
• 1990. N-Space (September 1990, Larry Niven Tor/SFBC, Catalog ID: #17755, 529 pages, Hardcover, Collection)
• 1998. N-Space (1998, Larry Niven Orbit, ISBN-10: 1857230035, £6.99, 617 pages, Paperback, Collection)

Resources:

• Wikipedia article on Bordered in Black