Astounding Science Fiction, British Edition

About this issue

This issue of Astounding Science-Fiction (June 1944) contains three named novelettes and two short stories of speculative fiction. The featured novelette "Off the Beam" by George O. Smith concerns Don Channing, a communications engineer aboard the interplanetary ship Solar Queen. Thirty hours from Mars bound for Terra, a catastrophic coincidence occurs: a meteor penetrates the ship during a critical relay failure, destroying the pilot's greenhouse and primary systems. The crippled vessel accelerates uncontrollably at 10-G for ten hours, killing most crew and passengers. Channing, the sole survivor conscious from protective injections, must navigate the disabled, spinning ship to find the medical officer and determine how to prevent the Solar Queen from overshooting Terra entirely. The narrative combines hard technical detail with dramatic survival stakes.