The Stars, Like Dust

 Although it is not a great novel, Asimov's The Stars, Like Dust succeeds as an entertaining space opera from 1950. As a product of its time, it follows many of the conventions of the genre and its era, including the singular one-dimensional female character and numerous double-crossings and plot twists. This one, however, hints at many of the themes of the Foundation series. The Nebular kingdoms suffer under the yoke of the Tyrannian Khanate, but the seed of rebellion has been sown. 

The main character, Biron, finds himself thrust in the position of searching for this hidden base. Like the Foundation series and its enigmatic Second Foundation, the rebel base plotting to overthrow the Khanate are hiding where one would least expect. Clearly, Asimov recycled and reused some of the same plotlines and character types in some of his 1950s novels. But it oddly kinda works in this lesser novel, too. Needless to say, Artemisia and Biron end up together and the plot twist at the end hints at a completely different type of political revolution that will eventually replace the despotic Khanate and the interstellar colonial regimes. 

As a novel from the 1950s written by someone like Asimov, who believed in rationalism, the Enlightenment and science, the long-lost document that will guide this future revolution is the US Constitution. Cheesy, right? But almost predictable. Like the Foundation series, this novel hints at alternative ecumenical political alignments. Something to reunite the dispersed human populations of various points of the Galaxy. Was the institution hinted at by the leader of the rebel forces in this novel the future Galactic Empire in Foundation? If so, at what point did the Galactic Empire forget their origins in Earth and the ideals of the US Constitution?