Returning Home

In 2077, Tony Waltrop goes for a short assignment on Octula, a planet of continual winter. Here he meets and marries Anna, a vivacious human. Anna and her father, an important merchant on Octula, are unaware of Tony’s life on Earth, where another wife and family await his return.

Things are never easy for humans on Octula. Unsettled differences between the Science Party and the Military Party cause Tony’s assignment to be lengthened, and he is soon involved in a Great War. His assignment to create the government’s commerce policy is abandoned so he can run the budget affairs of the Science Party’s war effort.

Anna’s brothers travel back and forth to Earth frequently. Surely they will find out about his past.