James Henry Schmitz is a science fiction writer known in our country only to true connoisseurs of the genre (since his Russian publications were limited to a dozen stories and short stories), however, in reality it is VERY popular - primarily due to the magnificent cycle of works about the Center - an interplanetary federation, which includes ALL the reasonable races of the Galaxy - works that cannot be denied either AMAZING fascination, or in the workshop of intrigue, or in SCALE and DETAILED WRITING OUT of the world of the distant future. A world in which the reader literally plunges headlong