The Mile-Long Spaceship was Kate Wilhelm's first published story, and it made the list of the top science fiction short stories of 1957, according to Isaac Asimov and Martin H. Greenberg. These two compiled and edited the successful Isaac Asimov Presents: The Great SF Stories, spanning the period of short fiction in this genre from 1939 through 1963. Kate Wilhelm's story was one of the first I read from this series...I now have all 25 volumes...
In The Mile-Long Spaceship...only about twelve pages long, the time is in the not-to-distant future and a young man is recovering from brain surgery caused by a near-fatal traffic accident. While recovering in the hospital, he has recurring dreams of outer space...and of visiting a huge spaceship. Its crew seems benign to him and he wonders what their mission is. As it turns out, they are not at all benign and the future of humanity may be at stake. And this story, as are many short stories, has a surprise ending that turns everything on its head...
Kate Wilhelm went on to become a successful science fiction and mystery writer, preferring the less-financially lucrative short stories and novellas to novels. She is still alive...around age 88 or 89...I wish her the best. The book that contains her story, now out of print, is Isaac Asimov Presents: The Great SF Stories #19 (1957). It contains several other noteworthy tales, some of which I may discuss in future articles...
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