Farmer in the Sky
1951 Retro Hugo Award Winner
Narrative Synopsis
Facing severe food rationing on an overpopulated Earth, young Bill Lermer and his family emigrate to Ganymede aboard the colony ship Mayflower. On the Jovian moon, colonists must blast volcanic rock, pulverize soil, and seed bio-matter by hand to create arable farmland, facing catastrophe when a planetary alignment causes a catastrophic heat-trap failure.
Soil is not dirt. Soil is a living engine that takes stone and sun and turns it into bread.
Notable Passage
Historical & Editorial Context
Serialized in Boys' Life as "Satellite Scout". Celebrated for its uncompromisingly realistic hard-science depiction of terraforming and agrarian biology.