Highways in Hiding

Infobox Book
name = Highways in Hiding
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption = Dust-jacket from the first edition
author = George O. Smith
illustrator =
cover_artist = Ed Emshwiller
country = United States
language = English
series =
genre = Science fiction novel
publisher = Gnome Press
release_date = 1956
english_release_date =
media_type = Print (Hardback)
pages = 223 pp
isbn = NA
oclc = 1808176
preceded_by =
followed_by =

"Highways in Hiding" is a science fiction novel by author George O. Smith. It was published in 1956 by Gnome Press in an edition of 4,000 copies. The novel was originally serialized in the magazine "Imagination" in 1955. An abridged version was published by Avon Books in 1957 under the title "Space Plague".

Plot introduction

The novel concerns ESP and a disease that turns men into supermen.

References

*cite book | last=Chalker | first=Jack L. | authorlink=Jack L. Chalker | coauthors=Mark Owings | title=The Science-Fantasy Publishers: A Bibliographic History, 1923-1998 | location=Westminster, MD and Baltimore | publisher=Mirage Press, Ltd.| pages=304-305 | date=1998
*cite book | last=Tuck | first=Donald H. | authorlink=Donald H. Tuck | title=The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy | location=Chicago | publisher=Advent | pages=399-400 | date=1978|id=ISBN 0-911682-22-8

The book is interesting in that it contains multiple plot lines concerning the interactions of people that can sense things (espers) and people that can read thoughts (telepaths). This is set against the plot of a secret society that is harboring people that are infected with a space born disease called Mekstrom's disease. The disease is the point on which the plot turns. People get infected and it slowly turns them into a sort of rock. The hardening begins at one of the extremeties such as a finger or toe and slowly begins to creep up the infected limb. Eventually all the extremeties are hardening and the disease makes its way to the body proper. At this point in time, the body is hardened until the vitals fail and the patient dies. The plot turns on a secret society that has found a cure for the infected. To hide themselves from the public at large they have devised a hidden highway program that leads the infected to "Mekstrom safehouses" of sorts.