Mercury (planet) Mercury (planet) Mercury is the smallest and innermost planet in the Solar System. Its orbital period around the Sun of 87.97 days is the shortest of all the planets in the Solar System. It is named after the Roman deity Mercury, the messenger of the gods. Like Venus, Mercury orbits the Sun within Earth's orbit as an "inferior planet", and never exceeds 28° away from the Sun. When viewed from Earth, this proximity to the Sun means the planet can only be seen near the western or eastern horizon during the early evening or early morning. At this time it
Dark Is the Sun to escape. Thomas M. Disch found himself unable to finish reading the novel, describing it as "meant for speed readers whose high-speed attention will construct from the asphalt of the prose a world of low resolution and high escapist involvement; not a novel but a daydream in remedial-reading." Dark Is the Sun Dark Is The Sun is a science fiction novel by American writer Philip José Farmer, first published in 1979. It tells the story of the people and creatures left on Earth when the Sun is dead and the universe is heading towards the Big Crunch. By the year