SOLVED. Old sci fi - heavyworlder uses FTL ship to find out what happened to galactic civilization [s]

[Aura]

Stuff I can remember about it:
-Read it in the mid 90's but am pretty sure it was much older. Pretty sure it was around 200 pages or less.
-Thought it was named Skyship but can find no record of it under that name (it's definitely not on Goodreads by that name)
-A man from a heavy gravity world (he's dwarf-like) finds/gets a ship that has an FTL drive. It is odd in that it is just platforms/no walls or fusilage. He flies off to find out what happened to the galactic community.
-He poops in a corner until he figures out how to talk to the ship so it can remove his waste.
-On earth(?) he finds a guy who is maybe a prince(?). The guy has hemophilia. There is something about him having (accidentally?) been bred for luck through lotteries over many generations.
-Something is wrong with the prince guy so they go to a (frozen?) planet with psychics and get one named Aura who dies at the end.
-I think it might end with the ship having an existential crises and Aura dies to keep it from flying into a star.

That's all I can think of beyond vague mental pictures like "one place he went feels green in my memory, so maybe it had a jungle".

Any help would be awesome!!

[Brittany]

Could it be Space Skimmer? There's also Space Skimmer: Book One, but I think that might be a new version. A review says the main character is Mass, and he comes from a world with twice the gravity of Earth. He has trouble with a spaceship and meets a prince with hemophilia who is a good luck symbol.

[Aura]

That's it! THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!!!!

Ironically I am already following the author on Facebook because of his excellent write ups on the recent Hugo's debacle. Tiny book world is tiny!

[Brittany]

You're welcome :) It was fate that you followed him then.