Secret Agent of Terra is a 1962 science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

 by John Brunner

John Brunner (novelist)

John Kilian Houston Brunner was a prolific British author of science fiction novels and stories. His 1968 novel Stand on Zanzibar, about an overpopulated world, won the 1968 Hugo Award for best science fiction novel. It also won the BSFA award the same year...

. It is the first book of the Zarathustra Refugee Planets series. The other books are Castaways' World (1963) and The Repairmen of Cyclops (1965). Secret Agent of Terra was first published as Ace Double F-133, with The Rim of Space by A. Bertram Chandler

A. Bertram Chandler

Arthur Bertram Chandler was a British-Australian science fiction author. He also wrote under the pseudonyms George Whitley, George Whitely, Andrew Dunstan, and S.H.M....

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Brunner later reworked the story for his 1969 novel The Avengers of Carrig.

Plot summary

Planet 14 was just a speck on a spacial stereo map, just a world inhabited by a group of barbaric refugees. But to Belfeor, it was instant cash. All he needed was an iron hand and a means to dig out its radioactive resources for export to his own world. To Maddalena it was a final exam: this would be her last chance to prove herself worthy of Corps Galactica membership. To Saikmar, it was a nation and a people stolen from him by cruel treachery. To Gus Langenschmidt, it was part of a job he had, watching the skies and helping men who were being enslaved. But how do you help people who don't know you exist and who must not be told?