 Dragon 's Egg is a hard science fiction novel written by Robert L. Forward and published in 1980 . In the story , Dragon 's Egg is a neutron star with a surface gravity 67 billion times that of Earth , and inhabited by cheela , intelligent creatures the size of a sesame seed who live , think and develop a million times faster than humans . Most of the novel , from May to June 2050 , chronicles the cheela civilization beginning with its discovery of agriculture to advanced technology and its first face @-@ to @-@ face contact with humans , who are observing the hyper @-@ rapid evolution of the cheela civilization from orbit around Dragon 's Egg . 
