The Stars, Like Dust

The Stars, Like Dust is a science fiction novel by the American writer Isaac Asimov, published in 1951.

Biron Farrell is young and naive when the book opens. A radiation bomb planted in his dormitory room at the University of Earth changes that at once, turning him from an innocent student into a marked man who is fleeing from an assassin he cannot identify.

He then discovers that his father, the highly respected Rancher of Widemos, has been murdered many light-years away. Stunned, grieving and angry, Biron decides that he is going to find out why his father died.

What he uncovers instead is an intricate business of rebellion, political intrigue and espionage. The search takes him deep into space, where he becomes locked in a struggle with the power-hungry despots who rule Tyrann, and the conflict turns into a question of who governs the galaxy. By the end of it the stakes are no longer Biron's own life, or his own safety, but whether the galaxy will be free of them.