In Cabin Six the half-dozen men and women--and one stowaway--who are passengers on the first American space shuttle for civilians are entering the space age as we all are, with our personal histories at our backs.

Tom Gilpin, social reformer and cult hero; Veronica, the sexual explorer; Mulenberg, the businessman; William Wert, the diplomat who will be head man on arrival; Soraya, survivor of Iran's revolution; Lievering, possible survivor of the death camps--share all their secret histories.

"Reader," says Tom Gilpin, "ride with us. Not for our sake alone, not for yours...(but) for the sake of that once gentle brown humus from which we all come."