King David's Spaceship
First UK edition
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| Author | Jerry Pournelle |
|---|---|
| Original title | A Spaceship for the King |
| Cover artist | Peter Jones |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Series | CoDominium |
| Genre | Science fiction novel |
| Publisher |
Simon & Schuster (US) Orbit Books (UK) |
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Publication date
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1980 |
| Media type | |
| Followed by | The Mote in God's Eye |
King David's Spaceship is a science fiction novel by American writer Jerry Pournelle. It was originally published in 1980. Another version appeared as 3-part serial in Analog as A Spaceship for the King from December 1971 to February 1972.
The novel forms part of Pournelle's Future History known as the CoDominium Series. Chronologically, it is second to last in the series, contemporaneous with events in The Mote in God's Eye.
In content it resembles Pournelle's military fiction series Falkenberg's Legion, also from the CoDominium series: both depict a capable military leader undertaking a campaign on a backward planet. In this case the leader is from a planet that has recovered technologically to the steam, steel and coal stage, who visits a planet of city states surrounded by barbarians, fighting with medieval weapons.
The story shows the conflicting motives of the different factions without demonizing any of them, save possibly the merchants' faction whose motives are to use the forces of the Imperial Space Navy to enhance their own profits.
A planet called 'Prince Samual's World' had been bombed heavily during the Secession Wars and had spent about 400 years in isolation. As a result, much of the technological knowledge of the First Empire was lost on the planet; when Second Empire ships found the planet, its technological level was somewhere around that of 19th century Europe.
For years, Colonel Nathan "Iron" MacKinnie had been famous on the planet for his masterful defense of the city-state republic of Orleans against the expansionist kingdom of Haven (ruled by King David). After allying with the Second Empire, Haven embarked on a new unification campaign, and MacKinnie set up a decisive battle that, had Orleans won, would have broken Haven. However, unknown to MacKinnie, the new Haven campaign was a lure to get Orleans' forces into the field, so that the Second Empire's more advanced weaponry (including spaceships) could destroy them. These weapons quickly killed most of Orleans' troops, as well as MacKinnie's fiancée. After the loss of its army, Orleans was forced to surrender, and MacKinnie was then pensioned off by the Haven authorities.
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Wikipedia