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The Federation of the Hub is a science fiction setting featured in many stories by James H. Schmitz. The Hub is an interstellar federation in the far future located toward the center of the galaxy.

The most prominent recurring characters are Telzey Amberdon, an independently-minded psychic Action Girl, and Trigger Argee, a secret agent. There are several stories in which the two team up, set after their respective solo adventures. Other recurring characters include Intrepid Reporter Keth Deboll, the various agents of the Kyth Interstellar Detective Agency, and Adventure Biologist Nile Etland.

Baen Books have brought his work back into print in recent years. The reissue attracted some controversy among long-standing fans because of the editor's decision to tighten up a few of the stories, a process that in some cases more closely resembled major surgery. There were also some kinks in the release order: it was decided to release all the Telzey Amberdon stories first, with the result that every Telzey team-up story appears before the story introducing the character she's teaming up with. This doesn't really matter for the lesser recurring characters, whose stories don't have strong continuity or chronology; but volume 2, containing the Telzey and Trigger team-up stories, is definitely set after, and contains significant spoilers for, the solo Trigger stories in volume 3.

Baen's collections (in publication order) are:

  1. Telzey Amberdon
  2. TNT: Telzey and Trigger
  3. Trigger and Friends
  4. The Hub: Dangerous Territory
Tropes used in Federation of the Hub include:


Cquote1

 I must emphasize strongly the oppressively accumulating effect these events produced on the Parahuans during the relatively short period in which they occurred. As related by the survivors, there was a growing sense of shock and dismay, the conviction finally of having challenged something like an indestructible supernatural power. At the time they were questioned, the survivors still seemed more disturbed by this experience than by the practical fact of their own impending demise on orders of Porad Anz, of which they were aware.

Cquote2
  • Mugging the Monster: In Lion Game two street thugs stalk Telzey...very briefly.
  • New Powers as the Plot Demands: Telzey is rather prone to this.
  • Precursors: Their remnants feature in several of the Trigger Argee stories.
  • Private Detective: The agents of Kyth Interstellar Detective Agency, who appear in starring or supporting roles in several of the Hub stories.
  • Proud Warrior Race Guy: The Elaigar in Lion Game.
  • Psychic Block Defense: Mind shield devices were commercially available, and creatures known as Old Galactics could provide them to their symbionts (such as humans).
  • Psychic Powers
  • Reasonable Authority Figure: Although the Federation's Psychology Service originally comes on like Psi-Corps, we rapidly see that if a psi shows a reasonable measure of self-control and responsibility the Psychology Service is entirely willing to leave them free to live their own life, even if their actions were technically illegal. The Psychology Service's motto might as well be "Every case is on a 'case-by-case basis'."
    • An example is that despite the fact that Telzey originally fought for her freedom by blackmailing the Psychology Service, they've been entirely willing to help with the damage control on other crises she's helped bring to their attention, no strings attached, to the point of temporarily giving her official status as a Psychology Service field agent and then cutting her loose again rather than forcing her to stay when the case was over (despite the fact that they have the legal authority to draft her at any time). Then again, her case manager seems to be taking the tack of 'When Telzey finishes growing up, she'll probably come to me willingly... after all, she does enjoy the work.'
  • Really Seven Hundred Years Old: Pilch, possibly to the point of being a Time Abyss.
  • Red Oni, Blue Oni: When Telzey & Trigger team up, the calmly cerebral and ruthless Telzey plays a classic blue oni to Trigger's cheerful, outgoing, and Hot-Blooded red oni.
  • Screw the Rules, I Have Money: Averted. Telzey's father is a highly wealthy and influential man, and her mother is on the Federation High Council... and vs. the forces she's been up against, both official and otherwise, neither one would have been able to do a damn thing to help.
    • Well, her dad comes in handy on one of her early cases by introducing her to the Kyth Detective Agency... and paying their bill.
  • Sexy Walk: Trigger apparently has one.
  • Smart People Play Chess: Telzey Amberdon is a superpowered Teen Genius telepath, introduced in one story playing in the planetary championship games. (Made it to the semifinals, then had to drop out due to being interrupted by a case.)
  • Spank the Cutie: In Legacy, the threat of spanking is unsucessfully used (by her allies, no less) to keep Trigger Argee from making escape attempts. Trigger later uses the same trick on a captured Villain with Good Publicity, and records the conversation for blackmail fodder. Yowls and all.
  • The Spymaster: Senior Commissioner Holati Tate
  • Stealth Expert: Corvin Wergard of the Kyth Agency
  • Sugary Malice: The default state of being for Telzey's Aunt Halet in "Novice".
  • Superweapon Surprise: In The Tuvela
  • Taking You with Me: In The Demon Breed, Ticos Cay's collection of biological specimens was assembled with this in mind, if he ever outlived his usefulness to the alien invaders.
  • Teen Genius: Telzey starts out as one.
  • Tele Frag: In "Sleep No More"
  • Touched by Vorlons: How Telzey gets her powers. More precisely, Telzey was born with her powers but didn't consciously realize she had them until telepathic contact with an alien race "unlocked" them for her. However, the "unlocking" procedure went on for longer than it was supposed to, meaning that she gained access to some powers most humans didn't or couldn't.
  • Transhuman Treachery: “The Machmen” claim they have this rather than brainwashing.
  • Uplifted Animal: Nile Etland's hunting otters.
  • World of Badass: This is a deliberate policy of the federation goverment, which permits private wars to keep the people prepared for outside menaces.
  • You Gotta Have Blue Hair
  • Zeroth Law Rebellion: In Child of the Gods.