Happy Christmas Charles (Short Story) - 11/18/2014 8:58:24 AM
Ron's review misses one salient story detail; each one of Charles' trips lasts two and a half years with another few months for refit and turnaround at each end; so five years per trip overall. This is why my character looks forward to getting paid so well, and his slight autistic tendency makes him ideal for long periods alone without going crazy. Which is a prerequisite of being a Starship cargo pilot. The unwritten but alluded to story detail is that Charles's cargo Starship is an FTL vessel built for capacity, not speed. Maybe I should have made certain points about the FTL capability of Charles' cargo carrier and the distances to and from extrasolar colony worlds a little better.
However, points taken. Will try harder.
Happy Christmas Charles (Short Story) - 11/18/2014 7:49:59 AM
"Ground Control to Maj. Tom…" I like the ambience of this. And I get the point. Earthside holidays have even become meaningless for me in my daily routine that doesn't even consider weekends any different from any other day. While we all need a bit of time off and a change of venue, "holy days," have become rather obsolete except for the fervently religious. They have become economic motivators and marketing strategies. Is there shopping in interstellar space?
Other than this little bit of revelation, I don't see the story having any real impact and the idea of a starship pilot staying awake and delivering people who don't, seems a bit preposterous… Is this pilot immortal?
Ron
