The biggest scandal in human history

The author's first book in the sci-fi genre, and also one of his most famous, as evidenced by the total print run of its book editions to date (45,000 copies). It is a collection of short stories that reflect on current (and possible future) problems. For the book, the author travelled to the future, to one of the interstellar spaceports in the Milky Way, where pilots and their friends would tell their most interesting stories in the shadow of a launch pad – much like how, once upon a time, people would tell the most remarkable tales “in the shade of the linden tree” that they were destined to experience in their lives in space... This “mini-Decameron” of stories, full of twists and turns, remains part of the golden fund of Czech sci-fi to this day. This collection of stories includes the renowned short story 'New Star', also known in other languages, which gave its title to a German anthology. This was the story with which the author entered the sci-fi genre, and it is still considered one of his best. It was selected by the Association of Austrian Writers, and the author was invited to present it at his author reading in Vienna.

An excerpt from the book:

“I had the impression that it was a dream. In one dream, I was flying through space in a small rocket, nice and slow, carefree, and suddenly a rocket was hurtling towards me from the front – I try to escape it – left, right, but the rocket follows me, it’s bound to hit me – it occurs to me to fly backwards – it’s an excellent idea, I’ll surely escape it that way – but then another rocket hurtles towards me from behind – I'm trapped between them – both are hurtling towards me – That's how I felt now. The rocket in front was the future. The one behind was the past.”