World Publishing Company: later printing hardcover (copyright 1954.) No indication of printing date(s) on credits page - unless the code "8wp67" has meaning; books listed on the back of DJ date as late as 1959, and a $3.95 price might be about right for 1967 (first-edition price was $2.75.) Cover art by Virgil Finlay, 237 pages, $3.95 cover price. Condition is only Good in a VG (-) dustjacket: book is still "tight", has 1/8" to 1/4" spinal tilt; moderate overall wear including light wear and fading to top edges of boards, bottom edges show heavier wear; age tanning is mild and uniform (a reasonable grade of paper was used.) Bump-trace on lower left corner of back cover; faded/discolored area at lower left side of front cover next to spine (see spine/front scan.) Dustjacket has noticeable wear: scuffing and impressions that got through the DJ protector - which was glued to the book, and left traces/thinness at edges of flaps when it was removed (it had heavy wear and was discarded.) Small 1/2" corner gone from bottom corner of back flap; some neat tape repairs are found inside the dustjacket at top of spine and flap-bends. This is an ex-library copy (stamps on title page, sticker-traces on spine) that was discarded by the library and bought by a private collector (his bookplate left a faint shadow on right first-endpaper), then sold to a used bookstore - and then to me. Just finding any copy of this (early) well-known book by a popular author will be very difficult. if you want a really nice copy - expect to pay a lot more.

Here's the first of Andre Norton's "Astra" books: The Stars Are Ours! (1954.) For some sort of plot summary/set-up, I once again rely on P. Schuyler Miller, and use excerpts from a review in Astounding (March 1955):

"This is the story of the end of the Twenty-fifth century, when anti-science has driven the Earth's scientists and their descendants into hiding. Dard Nordis is the hero: his biologist brother has found the secret of frozen sleep which makes escape to the stars possible for the last large community of Free Scientists. Lars is killed, but Dard escapes with his six-year-old niece, Dessie.

Dard's story is broken in two parts: his escape to the Free Scientists, his trip to the city of the Peacemen to use their great computer, the battle to get the starship away - then the awakening on another world and the adventure of discovering its creatures, its dangers, its history and its people. ...it's the kind of book that will win science fiction a lot of friends and maybe bring back some old ones." [P. Schuyler Miller]

There is a sequel set on Astra:

Star Born (1957.)