Noon: 22nd Century is a 1961 science fiction book by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky that was expanded in 1962 and further in 1967 and translated into English in 1978. It is sometimes considered an episodic novel, a collection of linked short stories or a fix-up since some parts had been published as independent short stories. The novel relates several stories of the 22nd century and provides the background "feeling" for the style of life which gave birth to the Noon Universe. The title was chosen by the authors to imitate the postapocalyptic Daybreak: 2250 AD by Andre Norton. The Noon Universe has been given its name by the fans after this book.

Plot summary

The book is a collection of short stories describing various aspects of human life on Earth in the 22nd century. The plots of the stories are not closely connected but feature a shared set of characters. The most commonly recurring characters are Evgeny Slavin and Sergei Kondratev, who, as a result of a lengthy journey through interstellar space at near the speed of light, are thrown over a century into the future and must reintegrate into the society of their great-grandchildren. The book includes the following stories:

Publication history

Noon: 22nd Century has been published several times, with different contents.