Venus is a science fiction novel by American writer Ben Bova, part of the Grand Tour novel series and first published in the year 2000. The story follows Van Humphries, the son of the ruthless tycoon Martin Humphries, and his experiences on Venus.
Plot summary
Martin Humphries is the head of the giant Humphries Space Systems and at his 100th birthday party announces a prize of ten billion dollars to anyone who can recover any remains of his eldest son Alex. Alex was killed two years previously on a mission to Venus. Van Humphries, Martin's son and younger brother to Alex takes up the challenge despite, and because of, a mutual dislike between son and father.
Van assembles a ship and crew and heads off to Venus, shadowed by the mysterious Lars Fuchs. Upon entering the Venusian atmosphere they find the clouds are alive with bacterial life which, unfortunately, takes a liking to the ship. The ship is soon in trouble as it is eaten away by the bacteria. Van's more conservative ship is quickly eaten away by the bacteria, while Lars's bulky ship manages to survive. Van is rescued by Lars Fuch's ship but most of his crew are lost.
Van finds Lars a brutal yet intelligent man who rules his ship with a rod of iron. The heat builds as they descend through the Venusian atmosphere. Lars has to deal with mutiny and they find out that Lars Fuchs is Van Humphries' real father. At the end of the novel the intense heat, Lars's and Van's health and volcanic activity conspire to produce a climactic finale, in which a sulfur-based lifeform is revealed to exist on Venus. Alex's remains are recovered and the money claimed.
This article about a 2000s science fiction novel is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.
Venus is the second planet from the Sun and is named after the Roman goddess of love and beauty. As the brightest natural object in Earth's night sky after the Moon, Venus can cast shadows and can be visible to the naked eye in broad daylight. Venus's orbit is smaller than that of Earth, but its maximal elongation is 47°; thus, at latitudes with a day-night cycle, it is most readily visible for up to a few hours following the start of sunset or before sunrise. At times, it has been seen in a completely dark sky. Venus orbits the Sun every 224.7 Earth days. It has a synodic day length of 117 Earth days and a sidereal rotation period of 243 Earth days. Consequently, it takes longer to rotate about its axis than any other planet in the Solar System, and does so in the opposite direction to all but Uranus. This means that the Sun rises from its western horizon and sets in its east. Venus does not have any moons, a distinction it shares only with Mercury among the planets in the Solar System.
The Venera program was the name given to a series of space probes developed by the Soviet Union between 1961 and 1984 to gather information about the planet Venus. Ten probes successfully landed on the surface of the planet, including the two Vega program and Venera-Halley probes, while thirteen probes successfully entered the Venusian atmosphere. Due to the extreme surface conditions on Venus, the probes could only survive for a short period on the surface, with times ranging from 23 minutes to two hours.
Space Patrol is a British science-fiction television series featuring marionettes that was produced in 1962 and broadcast beginning in 1963. It was written and produced by Roberta Leigh in association with ABC Weekend TV.
Galaxina is a low-budget 1980 American science fantasy-comedy film written and directed by William Sachs. The film stars 1980 Playboy Playmate of the Year Dorothy Stratten, who was murdered by her husband shortly after the film's release.
Lucky Starr and the Oceans of Venus is the third novel in the Lucky Starr series, six juvenile science fiction novels by Isaac Asimov that originally appeared under the pseudonym Paul French. The novel was first published by Doubleday & Company in 1954. Since 1972, reprints have included a foreword by Asimov explaining that advancing knowledge of conditions on Venus have rendered the novel's descriptions of that world inaccurate.
Pirates of Venus is a science fantasy novel by American writer Edgar Rice Burroughs, the first book in the Venus series, the last major series in Burroughs's career. It was first serialized in six parts in Argosy in 1932 and published in book form two years later by Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. The events occur on a fictionalized version of the planet Venus, known as "Amtor" to its inhabitants.
The terraforming of Venus or the terraformation of Venus is the hypothetical process of engineering the global environment of the planet Venus in such a way as to make it suitable for human habitation. Terraforming Venus was first proposed in a scholarly context by the astronomer Carl Sagan in 1961, although fictional treatments, such as The Big Rain of The Psychotechnic League by novelist Poul Anderson, preceded it. Adjustments to the existing environment of Venus to support human life would require at least three major changes to the planet's atmosphere:
Reducing Venus's surface temperature of 737 K
Eliminating most of the planet's dense 9.2 MPa (91 atm) carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide atmosphere via removal or conversion to some other form
The addition of breathable oxygen to the atmosphere.
The Grand Tour is a series of novels written by American science fiction author Ben Bova.
The atmosphere of Venus is the layer of gases surrounding Venus. It is composed primarily of supercritical carbon dioxide and is much denser and hotter than that of Earth. The temperature at the surface is 740 K, and the pressure is 93 bar (1,350 psi), roughly the pressure found 900 m (3,000 ft) underwater on Earth. The Venusian atmosphere supports opaque clouds of sulfuric acid, making optical Earth-based and orbital observation of the surface impossible. Information about the topography has been obtained exclusively by radar imaging. Aside from carbon dioxide, the other main component is nitrogen. Other chemical compounds are present only in trace amounts.
Sacred Hunger is a historical novel by Barry Unsworth first published in 1992. It shared the Booker Prize that year with Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient.
Larklight, or the Revenge of the White Spiders! or to Saturn's Rings and Back! is a young adult novel written by Philip Reeve and illustrated by David Wyatt. It is the first book in the Larklight Trilogy.
Milcząca Gwiazda, literal English translation The Silent Star, is a 1960 East German/Polish color science fiction film based on the 1951 science fiction novel The Astronauts by Polish science fiction writer Stanisław Lem. It was directed by Kurt Maetzig, and stars Günther Simon, Julius Ongewe and Yoko Tani. The film was first released by Progress Film in East Germany, running 93 min. Variously dubbed and cut versions were also released in English under other titles: First Spaceship on Venus, Planet of the Dead, and Spaceship Venus Does Not Reply.
The Sky People is an alternate history science fiction novel by American writer S. M. Stirling. It was first published by Tor Books in hardcover in November 2006, with a book club edition co-published with the Science Fiction Book Club following in December of the same year. Tor issued paperback, ebook, and trade paperback editions in October 2007, April 2010, and May 2010 respectively. Audiobook editions were published by Tantor Media in January 2007.
Doomsday Machine, also known as Escape from Planet Earth, is an American science fiction film filmed in 1967 but completed without the original cast or sets in 1972.
The possibility of life on Venus is a subject of interest in astrobiology due to Venus's proximity and similarities to Earth. To date, no definitive evidence has been found of past or present life there. In the early 1960s, studies conducted via spacecraft demonstrated that the current Venusian environment is extreme compared to Earth's. Studies continue to question whether life could have existed on the planet's surface before a runaway greenhouse effect took hold, and whether a relict biosphere could persist high in the modern Venusian atmosphere.
Planeta Bur is a 1962 Sovcolor Soviet science fiction film scripted by Alexander Kazantsev from his novel, and co-scripted and directed by Pavel Klushantsev.
2-Headed Shark Attack is an American low-budget survival horror film with an ensemble cast by The Asylum, released on January 31, 2012 in the United States. Directed by Christopher Ray, the film stars Carmen Electra, Charlie O'Connell, Brooke Hogan, Christina Bach, David Gallegos and Corinne Nobili. The film premiered on September 8, 2012 on Syfy.
"Brake" is a science fiction short story by American writer Poul Anderson, first published in 1957 in Astounding Science Fiction and reprinted in the collections Beyond the Beyond (1969) and The Psychotechnic League (1981). As a component of the Psychotechnic League future history / alternate history, "Brake" takes place in 2270, as the civilization built up in the aftermath of the 1958 Third World War is being torn between mutually antagonistic factions, on the verge of collapsing into "the day of genocide and the night of ignorance and tyranny".
Five Against Venus, written by Philip Latham, is a science-fiction novel first published in the United States in 1952 by the John C. Winston Company. Philip Latham was the nom de plume of Robert S. Richardson, a professional astronomer who also provided technical assistance on movies such as Destination Moon and wrote scripts for the Captain Video television series.
High Altitude Venus Operational Concept (HAVOC) is a set of crewed NASA mission concepts to the planet Venus. All human portions of the missions would be conducted from lighter-than-air craft or from orbit.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
