Welcome to the Galaxy is an urban science fiction story set in the very near future and begins when a travelling, snake-oil-style, junk dealer named Quane, who is so afraid of humans that he hand sews a ragged dog costume as a disguise, arrives at Earth to illegally sell a dilapidated stardrive engine to the gullible inhabitants. Of course, the derelict engine breaks down shortly after departure of the inaugural human expedition to the stars, maroons the crew in a gravitational dimension known as Dark Space, and sets off a chain of human blunders, alien misunderstandings, and evolutionary coincidences which combine to raise Earth's status from a jerk-water planet in the galactic backwater to one of the richest and most influential in the galaxy. Welcome to the Galaxy is written with enough attention to scientific detail to satisfy hard core science fiction readers, but in a humorous style that makes the science easily accessible to all. Welcome to the Galaxy also establishes a fundamentally new and novel method for interstellar travel that does not involve warp drives or wormholes.