Winer of the Hugo and Nebula AwardsIn order to develop a secure defense against a hostile alien race's next attack, government agencies breed child geniuses and train them as soldiers. A brilliant young boy, Andrew "Ender" Wiggin lives with his kind but distant parents, his sadistic brother...  more

Winer of the Hugo and Nebula AwardsIn order to develop a secure defense against a hostile alien race's next attack, government agencies breed child geniuses and train them as soldiers. A brilliant young boy, Andrew "Ender" Wiggin lives with his kind but distant parents, his sadistic brother Peter, and the person he loves more than anyone else, his sister Valentine. Peter and Valentine were candidates for the soldier-training program but didn't make the cut—young Ender is the Wiggin drafted to the orbiting Battle School for rigorous military training.Ender's skills make him a leader in school and respected in the Battle Room, where children play at mock battles in zero gravity. Yet growing up in an artificial community of young soldiers Ender suffers greatly from isolation, rivalry from his peers, pressure from the adult teachers, and an unsettling fear of the alien invaders. His psychological battles include loneliness, fear that he is becoming like the cruel brother he remembers, and fanning the flames of devotion to his beloved sister. Is Ender the general Earth needs? But Ender is not the only result of the genetic experiments. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway for almost as long. Ender's two older siblings are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. Between the three of them lie the abilities to remake a world. If, that is, the world survives.

Opposing forces struggle for control of the universe when the arch-enemy of the cosmic emperor is banished to a barren world where savages fight for water. Set on the desert planet Arrakis, Dune is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, who would become the mysterious man known as Muad'Dib. He...  more

Opposing forces struggle for control of the universe when the arch-enemy of the cosmic emperor is banished to a barren world where savages fight for water. Set on the desert planet Arrakis, Dune is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, who would become the mysterious man known as Muad'Dib. He would avenge the traitorous plot against his noble family and would bring to fruition humankind's most ancient and unattainable dream. A stunning blend of adventure and mysticism, environmentalism and politics, Dune won the first Nebula award, shared the Hugo award, and formed the basis of a grand epic in science fiction.

This is the epic saga of an earthling, Valentine Michael Smith, born and educated on Mars, who arrives on our planet with many psi powers, including the ability to take control of the minds of others—and ignorance of the morals of man.

For twelve thousand years the Galactic Empire has ruled supreme. Now it is dying. But only Hari Sheldon, creator of the revolutionary science of psychohistory, can see into the future--to a dark age of ignorance, barbarism, and warfare that will last thirty thousand years. To preserve knowledge...  more

For twelve thousand years the Galactic Empire has ruled supreme. Now it is dying. But only Hari Sheldon, creator of the revolutionary science of psychohistory, can see into the future--to a dark age of ignorance, barbarism, and warfare that will last thirty thousand years. To preserve knowledge and save mankind, Seldon gathers the best minds in the Empire--both scientists and scholars--and brings them to a bleak planet at the edge of the Galaxy to serve as a beacon of hope for a fututre generations. He calls his sanctuary the Foundation. But soon the fledgling Foundation finds itself at the mercy of corrupt warlords rising in the wake of the receding Empire. Mankind's last best hope is faced with an agonizing choice: submit to the barbarians and be overrun--or fight them and be destroyed.

The three laws of Robotics: 1) A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. 2) A robot must obey orders given to it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. 3) A robot must protect its own existence as long...  more

The three laws of Robotics: 1) A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. 2) A robot must obey orders given to it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. 3) A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law. With this, Asimov changed our perception of robots forever when he formulated the laws governing their behavior. In I, Robot, Asimov chronicles the development of the robot through a series of interlinked stories: from its primitive origins in the present to its ultimate perfection in the not-so-distant future--a future in which humanity itself may be rendered obsolete. Here are stories of robots gone mad, of mind-read robots, and robots with a sense of humor. Of robot politicians, and robots who secretly run the world--all told with the dramatic blend of science fact & science fiction that became Asmiov's trademark.

Finally together in one volume, the first three books in the world's most beloved science fiction series, THE DRAGONRIDERS OF PERN, by Anne McCaffrey, one of the great science fiction writers of all time: DRAGONFLIGHT, DRAGONQUEST, THE WHITE DRAGON. Those who know these extraordinary tales will...  more

Finally together in one volume, the first three books in the world's most beloved science fiction series, THE DRAGONRIDERS OF PERN, by Anne McCaffrey, one of the great science fiction writers of all time: DRAGONFLIGHT, DRAGONQUEST, THE WHITE DRAGON. Those who know these extraordinary tales will be able to re-visit with Lessa, F'lar, Ruth, Lord Jaxon, and all the others. And for those just discovering this magical place, there are incomparable tales of danger, deceit, and daring, just waiting to be explored..

Case was the best interface cowboy who ever ran in earth's computer matrix. Then he doublecrossed the wrong people ... Case was the hottest computer cowboy cruising the information superhighway -- jacking his consciousness into cyberspace, soaring through tactile lattices of data and...  more

Case was the best interface cowboy who ever ran in earth's computer matrix. Then he doublecrossed the wrong people ... Case was the hottest computer cowboy cruising the information superhighway -- jacking his consciousness into cyberspace, soaring through tactile lattices of data and logic, rustling encoded secrets for anyone with the money to buy his skills. Then he double-crossed the wrong people, who caught up with him in a big way -- and burned the talent out of his brain, micron by micron. Banished from cyberspace, trapped in the meat of his physical body, Case courted death in the high-tech underworld. Until a shadowy conspiracy offered him a second chance -- and a cure -- for a price ...

Private William Mandella is a hero in spite of himself -- a reluctant conscript drafted into an elite military unit, and propelled through space and time to fight in a distant thousand-year conflict. He never wanted to go to war, but the leaders on Earth have drawn a line in the interstellar...  more

Private William Mandella is a hero in spite of himself -- a reluctant conscript drafted into an elite military unit, and propelled through space and time to fight in a distant thousand-year conflict. He never wanted to go to war, but the leaders on Earth have drawn a line in the interstellar sand -- despite the fact that their fierce alien enemy is unknowable, unconquerable, and very far away. So Mandella will perform his duties without rancor and even rise up through the military's ranks . . . if he survives. But the true test of his mettle will come when he returns to Earth. Because of the time dilation caused by space travel the loyal soldier is aging months, while his home planet is aging centuries -- and the difference will prove the saying: you never can go home. . .

Leaving behind a world on the brink of destruction, man came to the Red planet and found the Martians waiting, dreamlike. Seeking the promise of a new beginning, man brought with him his oldest fears and his deepest desires. Man conquered Mars—and in that instant, Mars conquered him. ...  more

Leaving behind a world on the brink of destruction, man came to the Red planet and found the Martians waiting, dreamlike. Seeking the promise of a new beginning, man brought with him his oldest fears and his deepest desires. Man conquered Mars—and in that instant, Mars conquered him. The strange new world with its ancient, dying race and vast, red-gold deserts cast a spell on him, settled into his dreams, and changed him forever. Here are the captivating chronicles of man and Mars—the modern classic by the peerless Ray Bradbury.

A farm is taken over by its overworked, mistreated animals. With flaming idealism and stirring slogans, they set out to create a paradise of progress, justice and equality. Thus the stage is set for one of the most telling satiric fables ever penned--a razor-edged fairy tale for grown-ups that...  more

A farm is taken over by its overworked, mistreated animals. With flaming idealism and stirring slogans, they set out to create a paradise of progress, justice and equality. Thus the stage is set for one of the most telling satiric fables ever penned--a razor-edged fairy tale for grown-ups that records the evolution from revolution against tyranny to a totalitarianism just as terrible. When Animal Farm was first published, Stalinist Russia was seen as its target. Today it is devastatingly clear that wherever and whenever freedom is attacked, under whatever banner, the cutting clarity and savage comedy of George Orwell's masterpiece have a meaning and message still ferociously fresh.

Student Edition With more than five million copies sold, Flowers for Algernon is the beloved, classic story of a mentally disabled man whose experimental quest for intelligence mirrors that of Algernon, an extraordinary lab mouse. In poignant diary entries, Charlie tells how a brain operation...  more

Student Edition With more than five million copies sold, Flowers for Algernon is the beloved, classic story of a mentally disabled man whose experimental quest for intelligence mirrors that of Algernon, an extraordinary lab mouse. In poignant diary entries, Charlie tells how a brain operation increases his IQ and changes his life. As the experimental procedure takes effect, Charlie's intelligence expands until it surpasses that of the doctors who engineered his metamorphosis. The experiment seems to be a scientific breakthrough of paramount importance--until Algernon begins his sudden, unexpected deterioration. Will the same happen to Charlie? An American classic that inspired the award-winning movie Charly.

For Kivrin, preparing an on-site study of one of the deadliest eras in humanity's history was as simple as receiving inoculations against the diseases of the fourteenth century and inventing an alibi for a woman traveling alone. For her instructors in the twenty-first century, it meant...  more

For Kivrin, preparing an on-site study of one of the deadliest eras in humanity's history was as simple as receiving inoculations against the diseases of the fourteenth century and inventing an alibi for a woman traveling alone. For her instructors in the twenty-first century, it meant painstaking calculations and careful monitoring of the rendezvous location where Kivrin would be received. But a crisis strangely linking past and future strands Kivrin in a bygone age as her fellows try desperately to rescue her. In a time of superstition and fear, Kivrin -- barely of age herself -- finds she has become an unlikely angel of hope during one of history's darkest hours. Five years in the writing by one of science fiction's most honored authors, Doomsday Book is a storytelling triumph. Connie Willis draws upon her understanding of the universalities of human nature to explore the ageless issues of evil, suffering and the indomitable will of the human spirit.

Not since DUNE has a science fiction novel generated as much enthusiasm and excitement as THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS. Discover for yourself this thought-provoking tale of an alien planet where all the people are of one sex, and the lone earthman is forced into a subtle planetary intrigue where he...  more

Not since DUNE has a science fiction novel generated as much enthusiasm and excitement as THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS. Discover for yourself this thought-provoking tale of an alien planet where all the people are of one sex, and the lone earthman is forced into a subtle planetary intrigue where he is the pawn and his future is the prize.

Writing separately, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle are responsible for a number of science fiction classics, such as the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Ringworld, Debt of Honor, and The Integral Trees. Together they have written the critically acclaimed bestsellers Inferno, Footfall, and The...  more

Writing separately, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle are responsible for a number of science fiction classics, such as the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Ringworld, Debt of Honor, and The Integral Trees. Together they have written the critically acclaimed bestsellers Inferno, Footfall, and The Legacy of Heorot, among others. The Mote In God's Eye is their acknowledged masterpiece, an epic novel of mankind's first encounter with alien life that transcends the genre. Aliens -- Moties -- were first contacted in AD3017 in the region of space known as the Coalsack. The eponymous mote in his eye, which has winked out, much to the distress of pious Himmists, just might have been Motie laser light. It might even indicate the position of their home planet.

Cat's Cradle is Vonnegut's  satirical commentary on modern man and his madness.  An apocalyptic tale of this planet's ultimate fate,  it features a midget as the protagonist; a  complete, original theology created by a calypso...  more

Cat's Cradle is Vonnegut's  satirical commentary on modern man and his madness.  An apocalyptic tale of this planet's ultimate fate,  it features a midget as the protagonist; a  complete, original theology created by a calypso singer;  and a vision of the future that is at once blackly  fatalistic and hilariously funny. A book that left  an indelible mark on an entire generation of  readers. Cat's Cradle is one of this  century's most important works... and Vonnegut at  his very best.

A new place is being built, a world of huge dimensions, encompassing millions of miles, stronger than any planet before it. There is gravity, and with high walls and its proximity to the sun, a livable new planet that is three million times the area of the Earth can be formed. We can start again!

A Princess of Mars is an Edgar Rice Burroughs science fiction novel, the first of his famous Barsoom series.  John Carter is prospecting in Arizona when he finds himself on the run from Apaches.  He hides in a cave and is mysteriously transported to Mars!  There he meets the...  more

A Princess of Mars is an Edgar Rice Burroughs science fiction novel, the first of his famous Barsoom series.  John Carter is prospecting in Arizona when he finds himself on the run from Apaches.  He hides in a cave and is mysteriously transported to Mars!  There he meets the Tharks, green martians who stand fifteen feet tall and have six arms.  Carter discovers he has incredible strength on Mars because of the lesser gravity, and soon becomes a respected warrior.  Carter meets Dejah Thoris, a princess of Mars from the red martian race, and a prisoner of the fierce green giants who held him captive, as well.  He rescues her and falls in love, but must fight to protect her.  Her oval face was beautiful in the extreme, her every feature finely chisled and exquisite, her eyes large and lustrous and her head surmounted by a mass of coal black, waving hair, caught loosely into a strange yet becoming coiffure.  Similar in face and figure to women of Earth, she was nevertheless a true Martian!

Gateway opened on all the wealth of the Universe...and on reaches of unimaginable horror. When prospector Bob Broadhead went out to Gateway on the Heechee spacecraft, he decided he would know which was the right mission to make him his fortune. Three missions later, now famous and permanently...  more

Gateway opened on all the wealth of the Universe...and on reaches of unimaginable horror. When prospector Bob Broadhead went out to Gateway on the Heechee spacecraft, he decided he would know which was the right mission to make him his fortune. Three missions later, now famous and permanently rich, Robinette Broadhead has to face what happened to him and what he is...in a journey into himself as perilous and even more horrifying than the nightmare trip through the interstellar void that he drove himself to take!  

Winner of the 1961 Hugo Award for Best Novel and widely considered one of the most accomplished, powerful, and enduring classics of modern speculative fiction, Walter M. Miller, Jr.'s A Canticle for Leibowitz is a true landmark of twentieth-century literature -- a chilling and...  more

Winner of the 1961 Hugo Award for Best Novel and widely considered one of the most accomplished, powerful, and enduring classics of modern speculative fiction, Walter M. Miller, Jr.'s A Canticle for Leibowitz is a true landmark of twentieth-century literature -- a chilling and still-provocative look at a post-apocalyptic future. In a nightmarish ruined world slowly awakening to the light after sleeping in darkness, the infant rediscoveries of science are secretly nourished by cloistered monks dedicated to the study and preservation of the relics and writings of the blessed Saint Isaac Leibowitz. From here the story spans centuries of ignorance, violence, and barbarism, viewing through a sharp, satirical eye the relentless progression of a human race damned by its inherent humanness to recelebrate its grand foibles and repeat its grievous mistakes. Seriously funny, stunning, and tragic, eternally fresh, imaginative, and altogether remarkable, A Canticle for Leibowitz retains its ability to enthrall and amaze. It is now, as it always has been, a masterpiece.

In the literature of our time, CHILDHOOD'S END will surely stand as a landmark. ANd it is not any accident that it is science fiction. For science fiction, more than any other literat form, truly expresses the ambience of the twentieth century. The authors of books like 2001: A Space Odyssey,...  more

In the literature of our time, CHILDHOOD'S END will surely stand as a landmark. ANd it is not any accident that it is science fiction. For science fiction, more than any other literat form, truly expresses the ambience of the twentieth century. The authors of books like 2001: A Space Odyssey, Fahrenheit 451, A Clockwork Orange, More than Human, Stand on Zanzibar, A Case of Conscience, and many another brilliantly perceptive novel, write from an awareness and sensitivity that illumniate the human condition.

A masterpiece ahead of its time, a prescient rendering of a dark future, and the inspiration for the blockbuster film Blade Runner By 2021, the World War has killed millions, driving entire species into extinction and sending mankind off-planet. Those who remain covet any living...  more

A masterpiece ahead of its time, a prescient rendering of a dark future, and the inspiration for the blockbuster film Blade Runner By 2021, the World War has killed millions, driving entire species into extinction and sending mankind off-planet. Those who remain covet any living creature, and for people who can’t afford one, companies built incredibly realistic simulacra: horses, birds, cats, sheep. They’ve even built humans. Immigrants to Mars receive androids so sophisticated they are indistinguishable from true men or women. Fearful of the havoc these artificial humans can wreak, the government bans them from Earth. Driven into hiding, unauthorized androids live among human beings, undetected. Rick Deckard, an officially sanctioned bounty hunter, is commissioned to find rogue androids and “retire” them. But when cornered, androids fight back—with lethal force.  

This book is comprised of two parts, Shards of Honor and Barrayar. Together they form the continuous story following the life of Cordelia Vorkosigan nee Naismith from the day she met her then-enemy Lord Aral Vorgosigan through the boyhood of her son Miles. Barrayar won the Hugo Award for best...  more

This book is comprised of two parts, Shards of Honor and Barrayar. Together they form the continuous story following the life of Cordelia Vorkosigan nee Naismith from the day she met her then-enemy Lord Aral Vorgosigan through the boyhood of her son Miles. Barrayar won the Hugo Award for best science fiction novel of the year. In her first trial by fire, Cordelia Naismith captained a throwaway ship of the Betan Expeditionary Force on a mission to destroy an enemy armada. Discovering deception within deception, treachery within treachery, she was forced into a separate peace with her chief opponent, Lord Aral Vorgosigan - he who was called "The Butcher of Komarr" - and would consequently become an outcast on her own planet and the Lady Vorgosigan on his. Sick of combat and betrayal, she was ready to settle down to a quiet life, interrupted only by the occasional ceremonial appearances required of the Lady Vorgosigan. But when the Emperor died, Aral became guardian of the infant heir to the imperial throne of Barrayar - and the target of high-tech assassins in a dynastic civil war that was reminiscent of Earth's Middle Ages, but fought with up-to-the-minute biowar technology. Neither Aral nor Cordelia guessed the part that their cell-damaged unborn would play in Barrayar's bloody legacy.

Contains two classics by H. G. Wells, The Time Machine and The Invisible Man.

HONOR IN TROUBLE — Having made him look the fool, she's been exiled to Basilisk Station in disgrace and set up for ruin by a superior who hates her. — Her demoralized crew blames her for their ship's humiliating posting to an out-of-the-way picket station. — The...  more

HONOR IN TROUBLE — Having made him look the fool, she's been exiled to Basilisk Station in disgrace and set up for ruin by a superior who hates her. — Her demoralized crew blames her for their ship's humiliating posting to an out-of-the-way picket station. — The aborigines of the system's only habitable planet are smoking homicide-inducing hallucin... more »ogens. Parliament isn't sure it wants to keep the place; the major local industry is smuggling; the merchant cartels want her head; the star-conquering, so-called "Republic" of Haven is Up To Something; and Honor Harrington has a single, over-age light cruiser with an armament that doesn't work to police the entire star system. But the people out to get her have made one mistake. They've made her mad.

Ray Bradbury: Master of Miracles At the furthest limits of the imagination, in worlds upon worlds of time and space, and on the green hills of future earth, these are tales to set you shivering, gasping, gaping with terror and with wonder... The Illustrated Man Nineteen incomparable...  more

Ray Bradbury: Master of Miracles At the furthest limits of the imagination, in worlds upon worlds of time and space, and on the green hills of future earth, these are tales to set you shivering, gasping, gaping with terror and with wonder... The Illustrated Man Nineteen incomparable stories that blend weird fantasy and chilling truth in the magic manner of a master. "Beautifully written....Intensely real... There is no writer quite like Ray Bradbury." - The New York Times

Jules Gabriel Verne (1828-1905) was a French author who pioneered the science-fiction genre. He is best known for novels such as Journey to the Centre of the Earth (1864), Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1870), and Around the World in Eighty Days (1873). Verne wrote about space, air and...  more

Jules Gabriel Verne (1828-1905) was a French author who pioneered the science-fiction genre. He is best known for novels such as Journey to the Centre of the Earth (1864), Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1870), and Around the World in Eighty Days (1873). Verne wrote about space, air and underwater travel before air travel and practical submarines were invented, and before practical means of space travel had been devised. He is the third most translated author in the world, according to Index Translationum. Some of his books have been made into films. Verne, along with Hugo Gernsback and H. G. Wells, is often popularly referred to as the "Father of Science Fiction". Amongst his other works are From the Earth to the Moon (1867), Five Weeks in a Balloon (1869), The Fur Country; or, Seventy Degrees North Latitude (1873), The Blockade Runners (1874), The Field of Ice (1875), The Mysterious Island (1875), Facing the Flag (1879), and An Antarctic Mystery (1899).

In his most ambitious project to date, award-winning author Kim Stanley Robinson utilizes years of research and cutting-edge science in the first of three novels that will chronicle the colonization of Mars. For eons, sandstorms have swept the barren desolate landscape of the red planet....  more

In his most ambitious project to date, award-winning author Kim Stanley Robinson utilizes years of research and cutting-edge science in the first of three novels that will chronicle the colonization of Mars. For eons, sandstorms have swept the barren desolate landscape of the red planet. For centuries, Mars has beckoned to mankind to come and conquer its hostile climate. Now, in the year 2026, a group of one hundred colonists is about to fulfill that destiny. John Boone, Maya Toitavna, Frank Chalmers, and Arkady Bogdanov lead a mission whose ultimate goal is the terraforming of Mars. For some, Mars will become a passion driving them to daring acts of courage and madness; for others it offers and opportunity to strip the planet of its riches. And for the genetic "alchemists, " Mars presents a chance to create a biomedical miracle, a breakthrough that could change all we know about life...and death. The colonists place giant satellite mirrors in Martian orbit to reflect light to the planets surface. Black dust sprinkled on the polar caps will capture warmth and melt the ice. And massive tunnels, kilometers in depth, will be drilled into the Martian mantle to create stupendous vents of hot gases. Against this backdrop of epic upheaval, rivalries, loves, and friendships will form and fall to pieces--for there are those who will fight to the death to prevent Mars from ever being changed. Brilliantly imagined, breathtaking in scope and ingenuity, Red Mars is an epic scientific saga, chronicling the next step in human evolution and creating a world in its entirety. Red Mars shows us a future, with both glory and tarnish, that awes with complexity and inspires with vision.

The once-utopian Chasm City -- a domed human settlement on an otherwise inhospitable planet -- has been overrun by a virus known as the Melding Plague, capable of infecting any body, organic or computerized. Now, with the entire city corrupted - from the people to the very buildings they inhabit...  more

The once-utopian Chasm City -- a domed human settlement on an otherwise inhospitable planet -- has been overrun by a virus known as the Melding Plague, capable of infecting any body, organic or computerized. Now, with the entire city corrupted - from the people to the very buildings they inhabit -- only the most wretched sort of existence remains. For security operative Tanner Mirabel, it is the landscape of nightmares through which he searches for a low-life postmortal killer. But the stakes are raised when his search brings him face to face with a centuries-old atrocity that history would rather forget. Of my books to date, five are set in the same universe. The reading order isn't that critical, in my view, but it probably improves things to read REVELATION SPACE, REDEMPTION ARK and ABSOLUTION GAP in that sequence. The other related books, CHASM CITY and THE PREFECT, as well as the collections DIAMOND DOGS, TURQUOISE DAYS and GALACTIC NORTH, can be read at any point (or in fact, not read at all).  

Author of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Childhood's End, The City and the Stars, and the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke is the most celebrated science fiction author alive. He is—with H. G. Wells, Isaac Asimov, and Robert A. Heinlein—one of the writers...  more

Author of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Childhood's End, The City and the Stars, and the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke is the most celebrated science fiction author alive. He is—with H. G. Wells, Isaac Asimov, and Robert A. Heinlein—one of the writers who define science fiction in our time. Now Clarke has cooperated in the preparation of a massive, definitive edition of his collected shorter works. From early work like "Rescue Party" and "The Lion of Comarre," through classics like "The Star," "Earthlight," "The Nine Billion Names of God," and "The Sentinel" (kernel of the later novel, and movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey), all the way to later work like "A Meeting with Medusa" and "The Hammer of God," this immense volume encapsulates one of the great SF careers of all time. Contents: Travel by wire -- How we went to Mars -- Retreat from Earth -- Reverie -- The awakening -- Whacky -- Loophole -- Rescue party -- Technical error -- Castaway -- The fires within -- Inheritance -- Nightfall -- History lesson -- Transience -- The wall of darkness -- The lion of Comarre -- The forgotten enemy -- Hide and seek -- Breaking strain -- Nemesis -- Guardian angel -- Time's arrow -- A walk in the dark -- Silence please -- Trouble with the natives -- The road to the sea -- The sentinel -- Holiday on the moon -- Earthlight -- Second dawn -- Superiority -- If I forget Thee, Oh Earth ... --All the time in the world -- The nine billion names of God -- The possessed -- The parasite -- Jupiter five -- Encounter in the dawn -- The other tiger -- Publicity campaign -- Armaments race -- The deep range -- No morning after -- Big game hunt -- Patent pending -- Refugee -- The star -- What goes up -- Venture to the moon -- The pacifist -- The reluctant orchid -- Moving spirit -- The defenestration of Ermintrude Inch -- The ultimate melody -- The next tenants -- Cold war -- Sleeping beauty -- Security check -- The man who ploughed the sea -- Critical mass -- The other side of the sky -- Let there be light -- Out of the sun -- Cosmic Casanova -- The songs of distant Earth -- A slight case of sunstroke -- Who's there? -- Out of the cradle, endlessly orbiting -- I remember Babylon -- Trouble with time -- Into the comet -- Summertime on Icarus -- Saturn rising -- Death and the Senator -- Before Eden -- Hate -- Love that universe -- Dog star -- Maelstrom II -- An ape about the house -- The shining ones -- The secret -- Dial F for Frankenstein -- The wind from the sun -- The food of the gods -- The last command -- Light of darkness -- The longest science-fiction story ever told -- Playback -- The cruel sky -- Herbert George Morley Roberts Wells, Esq. -- Crusade -- Neutron tide -- Reunion -- Transit of Earth -- A meeting with Medusa -- Quarantine -- "siseneG" -- The steam-powered word processor -- On golden seas -- The hammer of God -- The wire continuum (with Stephen Baxter) -- Improving the neighbourhood.

In the twenty-fifth century, humankind has spread throughout the galaxy, monitored by the watchful eye of the U.N. While divisions in race, religion, and class still exist, advances in technology have redefined life itself. Now, assuming one can afford the expensive procedure, a person's...  more

In the twenty-fifth century, humankind has spread throughout the galaxy, monitored by the watchful eye of the U.N. While divisions in race, religion, and class still exist, advances in technology have redefined life itself. Now, assuming one can afford the expensive procedure, a person's consciousness can be stored in a cortical stack at the base of the brain and easily downloaded into a new body (or "sleeve") making death nothing more than a minor blip on a screen. Ex-U.N. envoy Takeshi Kovacs has been killed before, but his last death was particularly painful. Dispatched one hundred eighty light-years from home, re-sleeved into a body in Bay City (formerly San Francisco, now with a rusted, dilapidated Golden Gate Bridge), Kovacs is thrown into the dark heart of a shady, far-reaching conspiracy that is vicious even by the standards of a society that treats "existence" as something that can be bought and sold. For Kovacs, the shell that blew a hole in his chest was only the beginning... 2003 winner of the Philip K. Dick Award

In a future universe in which no species can reach sentience without being 'uplifted' by a patron race, the greatest mystery of all remains unsolved: who uplifted humankind? The Terran exploration vessel Streaker, the first starship designed and crewed by dolphins, has crashed in the...  more

In a future universe in which no species can reach sentience without being 'uplifted' by a patron race, the greatest mystery of all remains unsolved: who uplifted humankind? The Terran exploration vessel Streaker, the first starship designed and crewed by dolphins, has crashed in the uncharted water world of Kithrup, bearing one of the most important discoveries in galactic history, a derelict ancient armada with evidence of the first sentient species ever, the Progenitors, the fabled First Race who seeded wisdom throughout the stars.  Trapped on a hostile planet, a handful of her human and dolphin crew battles armed rebellion.  Overhead, six alien fleets battle to decide their fate as Streaker's crew seeks some way to escape, safeguard her secret and return to Earth.

Now at last in one volume, Michael Crichton's Jurassic Park and The Lost World--the two incomparably suspenseful, supremely scary, utterly unputdownable, worldwide best-selling return-of-the-dinosaurs novels, which together constitute Jurassic World.

FIRST BOOK FEATURING CORDELIA NAISMITH. Journey back to where it all started, from multiple New York Times best selling author, Hugo Award winner, Lois McMaster Bujold.  Cordelia Naismith, Betan Survey Captain, was expecting the unexpected: hexapods, floating creatures, odd parasites... She...  more

FIRST BOOK FEATURING CORDELIA NAISMITH. Journey back to where it all started, from multiple New York Times best selling author, Hugo Award winner, Lois McMaster Bujold.  Cordelia Naismith, Betan Survey Captain, was expecting the unexpected: hexapods, floating creatures, odd parasites... She was not, however, expecting to find hostile humans on an uninhabited planet. And she wasn't really expecting to fall in love with a 40-plus barbarian known to cosmopolitan galactics as the Butcher of Komarr. Will Mother ever understand? And can such an odd beast as love survive an interplanetary war? Shards of Honor is the novel in which Lois McMaster Bujold introduced the SF world to Barrayar and Aral Vorkosigan, Beta Colony and Cordelia Naismith. From this beginning the author has created a multi-generational saga spanning time as well as space. Bujold is generally recognized as the current exemplar of the character-based SF adventure story. Contents: Shards of Honor [Cordelia Vorkosigan • 1]  (1986) / novel by Lois McMaster Bujold Barrayar [Cordelia Vorkosigan • 2]  (1991) /novel by Lois McMaster Bujold Author's Afterword (Cordelia's Honor) • essay by Lois McMaster Bujold Miles Vorkosigan/Naismith: His Universe and Times (1996) • essay by Lois McMaster Bujold and Michael Bernardi

Two hundred years ago, humans made a stunning discovery in the far reaches of the solar system: a huge statue of an alien creature, with an inscription that defied all efforts at translation.  Now, as faster-than-light drive opens the stars to exploration, humans are finding other relics of...  more

Two hundred years ago, humans made a stunning discovery in the far reaches of the solar system: a huge statue of an alien creature, with an inscription that defied all efforts at translation.  Now, as faster-than-light drive opens the stars to exploration, humans are finding other relics of the race they call the Monument-Makers, each different, and each heartbreakingly beautiful.  But except for a set of footprints on Jupiter's moon Iapetus, there is no trace of the enigmatic race that has left them behind. Then a team of scientists working on a dead world discover an ominous new image of the Monument-Makers.  Somehow it all fits with other lost civilizations, and possibly with Earth's own future.  And distant past.  But Earth itself is on the brink of ecological disaster, there is no time to search for answers.  Even to a question that may hold the key to survival for the entire human race.

Kesrith They were the mri-tall, secretive, bound by honor and the rigid dictates of their society. For aeons this golden-skinned,golden-eyed race had provided the universe mercenary soldiers of almost unimaginable ability. But now the mri have faced an enemy unlike any other -- an enemy...  more

Kesrith They were the mri-tall, secretive, bound by honor and the rigid dictates of their society. For aeons this golden-skinned,golden-eyed race had provided the universe mercenary soldiers of almost unimaginable ability. But now the mri have faced an enemy unlike any other -- an enemy whose only way of war is widespread destruction. These "humans" are mass fighters, creatures of the herb, and the mri have been slaughtered like animals. Now, in the aftermath of war, the mri face extinction. It will be up to three individuals to save whatever remains of this devastated race: a warrior -- one of the last survivors of his kind; a priestess of this honorable people; and a lone human -- a man sworn to aid the enemy of his own kind. Can they retrace the galaxy-wide path of this nomadic race back through millennia to reclaim the ancient world which first gave them life? Shon'Jir Sten Duncan had saved the lives of the last two of humanity's deadliest enemies, during the takeover of their planet Kesrith. Sten therefore felt responsible for them and for their future -- if any. For though the two mri were brother and sister, they represented different power-castes of their ancient warrior-race. Niun was the last of the bred samurai. Melein, though young, was perforce the last priestess-queen. But struggle and mutual danger had sealed Sten Duncan to their loyalty. As their blood-brother, he would have to help them flee mankind and take the long, long evasion-route across the cosmos to a legendary lost planet which might afford the mri one more chance. Kutath This is the story of three people: Sten Duncan, a soldier of humanity; Niun, last warrior of the mri, humanity's enemies; Melein, priestess-queen of the final fallen mri stronghold. This is the story of two mighty species fighting for a galaxy: humanity driving out from Earth, and the enigmatic regul struggling to hold their stars with mri mercenaries. This is a story of diplomacy and warfare, of conspiracy and betrayal, and of three flesh-and-blood people who found themselves thrown together in a life-and-death alliance.    

Deciding he's finally had enough abuse from his drunken father and determined to get away-any way he can-Davy discovers he has the ability to teleport anywhere he wants. Fleeing to New York but desperately short of cash he "jumps" into a bank vault. While living the high life in the Big City on...  more

Deciding he's finally had enough abuse from his drunken father and determined to get away-any way he can-Davy discovers he has the ability to teleport anywhere he wants. Fleeing to New York but desperately short of cash he "jumps" into a bank vault. While living the high life in the Big City on the stolen money and testing the limits of his power, Davey makes another startling discovery: the mother he thought had abandoned him. But a new tragedy and a pledge to avenge the loss will plunge Davy into a dangerous and mysterious world of terrorists and government espionage. This time there may be no safe place for the Jumper.

When the legendary Special Corps finally corners the one man in the Universe that no prison can hold, they have two choices: either kill him (no easy task)--or hire him for one-way assignments to the weirdest and deadliest planets in the galaxy! This is an omnibus of three books: The...  more

When the legendary Special Corps finally corners the one man in the Universe that no prison can hold, they have two choices: either kill him (no easy task)--or hire him for one-way assignments to the weirdest and deadliest planets in the galaxy! This is an omnibus of three books: The Stainless Steel Rat, The Stainless Steel Rat's Revenge, and The Stainless Steel Rat Saves the World.

Long ago, in a distant part of the galaxy, two alien races met -- and fought a war of mutual extinction.  The sole legacy of that war was the weapon that ended it: the death machines, the BERSERKERS.  Guided by self-aware computers more intelligent than any human, these world-sized...  more

Long ago, in a distant part of the galaxy, two alien races met -- and fought a war of mutual extinction.  The sole legacy of that war was the weapon that ended it: the death machines, the BERSERKERS.  Guided by self-aware computers more intelligent than any human, these world-sized battlecraft carved a swath of death through the galaxy -- until they arrived at the outskirts of the fledgling Empire of Man. These are the stories of the frail creatures who must meet this monstrous and implacable enemy -- and who, by fighting it to a standstill, become the saviors of all living things.

In this novel, Niven presents a fully-fleshed culture of evolved humans who live without gravity in the gas cloud surrounding a neutron star. In this Smoke Ring, free-floating life forms flourish, and all of them, from fish to fowl, can fly...

In a world devastated by nuclear war with humanity on the edge of extinction, aliens finally make contact. They rescue those humans they can, keeping most survivors in suspended animation while the aliens begin the slow process of rehabilitating the planet. When Lilith Iyapo is...  more

In a world devastated by nuclear war with humanity on the edge of extinction, aliens finally make contact. They rescue those humans they can, keeping most survivors in suspended animation while the aliens begin the slow process of rehabilitating the planet. When Lilith Iyapo is "awakened," she finds that she has been chosen to revive her fellow humans in small groups by first preparing them to meet the utterly terrifying aliens, then training them to survive on the wilderness that the planet has become. But the aliens cannot help humanity without altering it forever. Bonded to the aliens in ways no human has ever known, Lilith tries to fight them even as her own species comes to fear and loathe her. A stunning story of invasion and alien contact by one of science fiction's finest writers.

Next in line to become archangel in the angel-led dominion of Samaria, Gabriel must lead the next chorale praising the god Jovah, which means he needs a wife -- fast -- to sing beside him. Guided by the local oracle and the light emanating from the Kiss of the Gods (a homing device in his...  more

Next in line to become archangel in the angel-led dominion of Samaria, Gabriel must lead the next chorale praising the god Jovah, which means he needs a wife -- fast -- to sing beside him. Guided by the local oracle and the light emanating from the Kiss of the Gods (a homing device in his wrist), he finds his Jovah-selected fiancée in a common Edori slave girl named Rachel. The marriage proves, however, anything but romantic. Far from rejoicing in the sudden freedom that her marriage brings, Rachel quickly becomes a thorn in Gabriel's side, using her newfound influence to help her downtrodden Edori brethren. Displaying sure command of characterization and vividly imagined settings, Shinn absorbs us in the story of how Rachel and Gabriel eventually unite in true love and respect. With place-names such as Gaza and Jordana, she tantalizingly hints at her Samaria's connection to an ancient Israeli past, and she tempers the angelic milieu with talk of her angels' technological heritage in an entertaining sf-fantasy blend that should please fans of both genres.

In the tradition of the greatest cyberpunk novels, Blood Music explores the imminent destruction of mankind and the fear of mass destruction by technological advancements. Blood Music follows present-day events in which the fears concerning the nuclear annihilation of the world subsided after...  more

In the tradition of the greatest cyberpunk novels, Blood Music explores the imminent destruction of mankind and the fear of mass destruction by technological advancements. Blood Music follows present-day events in which the fears concerning the nuclear annihilation of the world subsided after the Cold War and the fear of chemical warfare spilled over into the empty void of nuclear fear. An amazing breakthrough in genetic engineering made by Vergil Ulam is considered too dangerous for further research, but rather than destroy his work, he injects himself with his creation and walks out of his lab, unaware of just quite how his actions will change the world.  

Adventure in Space In 1955, Norton introduced Dane Thorson, an apprentice cargo-master who signed on with the independent cargo ship Solar Queen looking for a career in off-world trade. Here are the first two star-spanning tales of Dane Thorson and the Solar Queen. SARGASSO IN SPACE...  more

Adventure in Space In 1955, Norton introduced Dane Thorson, an apprentice cargo-master who signed on with the independent cargo ship Solar Queen looking for a career in off-world trade. Here are the first two star-spanning tales of Dane Thorson and the Solar Queen. SARGASSO IN SPACE (Space Queen, Bk 1) In Sargasso of Space, the free-traders of the Solar Queen win exclusive rights to all tradeble goods discovered on the planet Limbo. The crew arrives to find the planet's surface charred, signs of life sparse. Worse yet, a strange pulse emanating from the planet itself may keep the Queen from lifting off. The traders find a secret valley with life, but others may still lurk in rocky caves below. The traders must solve the mysteries of Limbo if they hope to escape the planet, let alone come away with some saleable goods. PLAGUE SHIP (Space Queen, Bk 2) In Plague Ship, the Queen travels to Sargol, homeworld to a race of sentient felines, the Salariki. Sargol promises a wealth of exquisite gems to trade-if the crew can overcome the natives' mistrust. But their troubles have only just begun. When a mysterious illness soon overtakes all the crew except the four youngest, the Galactic Patrol labels the Queen plagued and orders it destroyed on sight. The apprentices discover alien beings aboard the Queen, and realize the illness may be connected to the aliens. With every ship in the galaxy searching for them, the crew has one chance to save the Solar Queen: broadcast their plight throughout the galaxy. But the one station able to do this is on Earth, at Patrol headquarters, which ordered the Solar Queen's destruction!

A terrifying thriller that will crawl beneath your skin . . . and leave fresh blood on every page. A mysterious disease is turning thousands of ordinary Americans into raving, paranoid murderers who inflict brutal horrors on strangers, their own families, and even themselves. And one morning,...  more

A terrifying thriller that will crawl beneath your skin . . . and leave fresh blood on every page. A mysterious disease is turning thousands of ordinary Americans into raving, paranoid murderers who inflict brutal horrors on strangers, their own families, and even themselves. And one morning, ex-football star Perry Dawsey awakens to find mysterious welts growing all over his body. Soon Perry finds himself acting and thinking strangely, hearing voices, fighting uncontrollable rage . . . he is infected. Worse, the disease wants something from him, something that could alter the fate of the human race.

During a perfect spring evening on Nantucket a violent storm erupts and a dome of crawling, colored fire blankets the island. When the howling winds subside and the night skies clear, the stars appear to have shifted. The mainland has become a wilderness of unbroken forest, where tools of bronze...  more

During a perfect spring evening on Nantucket a violent storm erupts and a dome of crawling, colored fire blankets the island. When the howling winds subside and the night skies clear, the stars appear to have shifted. The mainland has become a wilderness of unbroken forest, where tools of bronze and stone litter the beaches, and primitive natives scatter in terror. A staling phenomenon has occurred: The island of Nantucket has been swept into the long-ago past. With its inhabitants adrift in the year 1250 B.C., there is only one question to be answered: Can they survive?

After his time as a war hero in some OLD MAN'S WAR, Harry Creek enjoys the anonymity of being a minor State Department employee who works with alien ambassadors assigned to Earth. However, a monstrous blunder has occurred when an earth diplomat kills a representative of the technologically...  more

After his time as a war hero in some OLD MAN'S WAR, Harry Creek enjoys the anonymity of being a minor State Department employee who works with alien ambassadors assigned to Earth. However, a monstrous blunder has occurred when an earth diplomat kills a representative of the technologically superior Nidu race. They demand reparations or else they will turn earth into a wasteland for this affront. Harry is assigned to meet the Nidu demand of finding and delivering the Android's Dream, an electric-blue sheep needed for their coronation ceremony. The military on both sides wants the mission to fail so they can obtain an increase in funding at the cost of a few million or billion lives and be recognized as heroes. Department of Defense snipers and Nidu marines try to assassinate Harry, who has found one clue to the whereabouts of the blue Android's Dream. Pet store owner Robin Baker contains sheep DNA in her genes. Now all they have to do is escape earth, avoid space marines and the followers of the Church of the Evolved Lamb, and land on Nidu where he is unwanted and she is the guest of honor.

They challenged the ancient laws of the matrix towers. Andrew Carr: A Terran, Andrew had been employed by the Space Service for ten years when he first came to Darkover. Though he had served on eight planets, Darkover mesmerized and drew him in a way he had never experienced. And when his...  more

They challenged the ancient laws of the matrix towers. Andrew Carr: A Terran, Andrew had been employed by the Space Service for ten years when he first came to Darkover. Though he had served on eight planets, Darkover mesmerized and drew him in a way he had never experienced. And when his mapping plane crashed in the snowy Hellers, his life was saved by the specter of a woman who would draw him into a world beyond imagining. Callista Lanart-Alton: Trained as Keeper, she had been kidnapped at age twenty during the height of the Catmen's War to prevent her from interfering with the Catmen's use of an illegal matrix weapon. Rescued from certain death by Andrew Carr, and her cousin Damon Ridenow, consummation of her marriage could prove fatal to the only man she'd ever loved. Damon Ridenow: Fostered in the Kilghard Hills, he possessed the Ridenow Gift of empathy. Had he been born a woman, he could have been a Keeper, but as a man his laran had brought him nothing but failure and misery -- for he had been dismissed from Arilinn Tower due to his extreme sensitivity. Summoned to Armida during the Catmen's War, he forged a bond with Ellemir which would change the very nature of matrix technology on Darkover. Ellemir Lanart-Alton: Twin sister of the powerful Callista, she believed the old folklore that twins, though linked, had unequal amounts of laran, and that she was the inferior of her gifted sister. But unless she proved this adage wrong, her sister would pay with her life.

In the year 2301, the wealthiest man in the universe is determined to commit murder in a world in which telepaths are used to detect possible crimes before they can happen.

The Skolian Empire rules a third of the civilized galaxy through its mastery of faster-than-light communication. But war with the rival empire of the Traders seems imminent, a war that can only lead to slavery for the Skolians or the destruction of both sides. Destructive skirmishes have already...  more

The Skolian Empire rules a third of the civilized galaxy through its mastery of faster-than-light communication. But war with the rival empire of the Traders seems imminent, a war that can only lead to slavery for the Skolians or the destruction of both sides. Destructive skirmishes have already occurred. A desperate attempt must be made to avert total disaster.

The epic story of the first manned mission to Mars, told by Hugo Award-winning author of science and science fiction. Ben Bova is also the author of "Cyberbooks", "Voyagers" and "Colony".

All those who ever lived on Earth have found themselves resurrected--healthy, young, and naked as newborns--on the grassy banks of a mighty river, in a world unknown. Miraculously provided with food, but with no clues to the meaning of their strange new afterlife, billions of people from every...  more

All those who ever lived on Earth have found themselves resurrected--healthy, young, and naked as newborns--on the grassy banks of a mighty river, in a world unknown. Miraculously provided with food, but with no clues to the meaning of their strange new afterlife, billions of people from every period of Earth's history--and prehistory--must start again. Sir Francis Bacon would be the first to glimpse the incredible way-station, a link between worlds. This forbidden sight would spur the renowned 19th-century explorer to uncover the truth. Along with a remarkable group of compatriots, including Alice Liddell Hargreaves (the Victorian girl who was the inspiration for Alice in Wonderland), an English-speaking Neanderthal, a WWII Holocaust survivor, and a wise extraterrestrial, Burton sets sail on the magnificent river. His mission: to confront humankind's mysterious benefactors, and learn the true purpose--innocent or evil--of the Riverworld . . .

The national bestselling story of Earth's first interstellar colonists-and the mysterious planet that becomes their home.

A world where the future of commerce is the past.  In the twenty-fourth century, the Company discovered time travel and immortality and preserves works of art and extinct forms of life (for profit of course).  It recruits orphans from the past, renders them all but immortal, and...  more

A world where the future of commerce is the past.  In the twenty-fourth century, the Company discovered time travel and immortality and preserves works of art and extinct forms of life (for profit of course).  It recruits orphans from the past, renders them all but immortal, and trains them to serve the Company, Dr. Zeus. As a child, in 16th century Spain, Mendoza was sold by her parents to a group of pagans. When her captors are arrested, she is snatched up by the Spanish Inquisition. However, one of the Inquisitors is the cybernetic Joseph, who transforms Mendoza into a cyborg and trains her to be his agent.   Mendoza, the botanist, is offered immortality if she saves a cancer-curing plant from extinction. The job takes her to the botanical garden of Sir Walter Iden in Elizabethan England where she has to make a difficult choice - love for a man, Nicholas Harpole, or her mission.   And that love sounds great bells of change that will echo down the centuries.

On the sixteen colonized worlds, mankind had changed, evolved into something that was slightly more than human...and slightly less. Men of War on the Dorsai worlds, men of Faith on the Friendly Worlds of Harmony and Association, men of Science, the Exotics of Kultis and Mara, and the Splinter...  more

On the sixteen colonized worlds, mankind had changed, evolved into something that was slightly more than human...and slightly less. Men of War on the Dorsai worlds, men of Faith on the Friendly Worlds of Harmony and Association, men of Science, the Exotics of Kultis and Mara, and the Splinter cultures which had produced even stranger new talents. Those who knew said it was the Dorsai who supplied soldiers to the sixteen worlds. The Friendlies supplied cannon fodder, common soldiers who could be relied on to obey orders at all times. But even cannon fodder can sometimes produce genius. Jamethon Black is a true soldier, and a true man of faith. Now he must face a deadly enemy--an enemy whose defeat will forever separate Black from the only woman he has ever loved.

One of the many humans who have been genetically modified never to require sleep, extraordinarily intelligent Leisha Camden and her kind become outcasts in a campaign designed to drive the 'Sleepless' from human society.

It was many years ago that humans came and settled the world of Newholme-cruelly bending the planet to their will; setting down roots and raising up cities and farms and a grand temple to their goddess.But now the ground itself is shaking with ever-increasing violence. And the Great Questioner,...  more

It was many years ago that humans came and settled the world of Newholme-cruelly bending the planet to their will; setting down roots and raising up cities and farms and a grand temple to their goddess.But now the ground itself is shaking with ever-increasing violence. And the Great Questioner, official arbiter of the Council of Worlds, has come to this isolated orb to investigate rumors of a terrible secret that lies buried deep within Newholme's past--a past that is not dead, not completely. And it will fall to Mouche, a beautiful youth of uncommon cleverness and spirit, to save his imperiled home by dicovering and embracing that which makes him unique among humans. For every living thing on newholme is doomed, unless Mouche can appease something dark and terrible that is coiled within...and surrender to the mysterious ecstatic revelry taht results when the six moons join.

Over a summers weekend in 1949 -- but not our 1949 -- the upper-crust "Farthing set," the group that overthrew Churchill and negotiated peace with Hitler eight years before, enjoys a country retreat. Lucy is a minor daughter of two politicians in the group; since her marriage to a...  more

Over a summers weekend in 1949 -- but not our 1949 -- the upper-crust "Farthing set," the group that overthrew Churchill and negotiated peace with Hitler eight years before, enjoys a country retreat. Lucy is a minor daughter of two politicians in the group; since her marriage to a London Jew, relations have been strained. So shes surprised when she and husband David are invited for the weekend. Then, overnight, a different member of the set is found murdered, with abundant signs that the killing was ritualistic. As the authorities begin to investigate, it becomes clear to Lucy and David that they were invited in order to pin the murder on David. But whoever devised this conspiracy didn't reckon on the man from Scotland Yard being someone with his own private reasons for sympathizing with outcasts and looking beyond the obvious. As the trap slowly shuts on Lucy and David, they begin to see a way out -- a way fraught with peril in a darkening world. More than an alternate-history story, more than a drawing-room mystery, Farthing is a compelling story of encroaching darkness and the people who ultimately decide to resist it.

A galactic revolution has toppled the Starfire dynasty, and swept into power the harsh Democratic Republic. To support the murdered king is now punishable by death. But on distant worlds, the few surviving Guardians carry a dangerous secret: Somewhere in the galaxy, they shield the rightful heir...  more

A galactic revolution has toppled the Starfire dynasty, and swept into power the harsh Democratic Republic. To support the murdered king is now punishable by death. But on distant worlds, the few surviving Guardians carry a dangerous secret: Somewhere in the galaxy, they shield the rightful heir to the throne. Stalking the hidden king is the warlord, a ruthless Republican general who wields the bloodsword. Only a few brave rebels dare to oppose him: young Dion who fights to find his destiny: the mercenary Tusk, the outlaw commander Dixter, and the beautiful Lady Maigrey, the only person alive who can match the the Warlord's cunning. Theirs is the ultimate battle against a star-spanning corruption -the ultimate sacrifice for the glory of the lost king's throne.

Jeremy Solter is a teenager growing up in the late 21st century. During the school year, his family lives in Southern California--but during the summer the whole family lives and works on the frontier of the Roman Empire. Not the Roman Empire that fell centuries ago, but a Roman Empire that...  more

Jeremy Solter is a teenager growing up in the late 21st century. During the school year, his family lives in Southern California--but during the summer the whole family lives and works on the frontier of the Roman Empire. Not the Roman Empire that fell centuries ago, but a Roman Empire that never fell: a parallel timeline, one of an infinity of possible worlds.For in our timeline, we now have the technology to move among these. Some are uninhabitable; some are ghastly, such as the one where Germany won World War II. But many are full of resources and raw materials that our world can use. So we send traders and businesspeople--but to keep the secret of crosstime traffic to ourselves, these traders are trained, in whole-family groups, to pass as natives.But when Jeremy's mother gets sick--really sick, the kind you can't cure with antibiotics. Both parents duck out through the gateway for a quick visit to the doctor. But while they're gone, the gateways stop working. So do the communications links to their home timeline. The kids are on their own, and things are looking bad. The Lietuvans are invading. The city is besieged. The kids are doing their best to carry on business and act like everything's normal, but there's only so much you can do when cannonballs are crashing through your roof. And in the meantime, the city government has gotten suspicious, and is demanding a *full* report on how their family does business, where they get their superior merchandise, why they want all that wheat ...exactly the questions they don't want to answer.

When all hope is lost -- for the terminally ill, for the condemned criminal, for the victim who cannot be saved -- there comes one final choice. You can choose life -- as a cyborg soldier in the Legion. Both more and less than human, these steel warriors with determined human minds are the...  more

When all hope is lost -- for the terminally ill, for the condemned criminal, for the victim who cannot be saved -- there comes one final choice. You can choose life -- as a cyborg soldier in the Legion. Both more and less than human, these steel warriors with determined human minds are the most elite fighting force in the Empire. They are fearsome-and expendable. They are the Legion of the Damned... God help them.

In a universe where humans and aliens co-exist and have formed a loose government called the Earth Alliance, treaties guarantee that humans are subject to alien laws when on alien soil.  But alien laws often make no sense, where murder is sanctioned, and where no one can find safe haven,...  more

In a universe where humans and aliens co-exist and have formed a loose government called the Earth Alliance, treaties guarantee that humans are subject to alien laws when on alien soil.  But alien laws often make no sense, where murder is sanctioned, and where no one can find safe haven, and the punishments vary from loss of life to loss of a first-born child.  One group of private detectives is willing to help the "Disappeared".  Meet the Retrieval Artists, private detectives who help the lost return home.  Meet Miles Flint.   His occupation: Retrieval Artist.  His job: Hunt down the Disappeared, outlaws on the run, wanted for crimes against alien cultures.  The catch: Flint isn't working on the side of the law.  Miles becomes embroiled in a bizarre case involving a stolen spaceyacht filled with dead bodies...a triple murder, the kidnapping of two human children, and a woman on the run. Flint must enforce the law, giving the children to aliens, solving the murders, and arresting the woman for trying to save her own life.  But how is a man supposed to enforce laws that are unjust?  How can he sacrifice innocents to a system he's not sure he believes in?  How can Miles Flint do the right thing in a universe where the right thing is very, very wrong?

In this sequel to Dawn, Lilith Iyapo has given birth to what looks like a normal human boy named Akin. But Akin actually has five parents: a male and female human, a male and female Oankali, and a sexless Ooloi. The Oankali and Ooloi are part of an alien race that rescued humanity from a...  more

In this sequel to Dawn, Lilith Iyapo has given birth to what looks like a normal human boy named Akin. But Akin actually has five parents: a male and female human, a male and female Oankali, and a sexless Ooloi. The Oankali and Ooloi are part of an alien race that rescued humanity from a devastating nuclear war, but the price they exact is a high one--the aliens are compelled to genetically merge their species with other races, drastically altering both in the process. On a rehabilitated Earth, this "new" race is emerging through human/Oankali/Ooloi mating, but there are also "pure" humans who choose to resist the aliens and the salvation they offer. These resisters are sterilized by the Ooloi so that they cannot reproduce the genetic defect that drives humanity to destroy itself, but otherwise they are left alone (unless they become violent). When the resisters kidnap young Akin, the Oankali choose to leave the child with his captors, for he--the most "human" of the Oankali children--will decide whether the resisters should be given back their fertility and freedom, even though they will only destroy themselves again. This is the second volume in Octavia Butler's Xenogenesis series, a powerful tale of alien existence.

This conclusion to the Xenogenesis series (Dawn and Adulthood Rights) focuses on Jodahs, the child of a union between humans, alien Oankali, and the sexless ooloi. The Oankali and ooloi are part of an extraterrestrial species that saved humanity from nuclear oblivion, but many humans feel the...  more

This conclusion to the Xenogenesis series (Dawn and Adulthood Rights) focuses on Jodahs, the child of a union between humans, alien Oankali, and the sexless ooloi. The Oankali and ooloi are part of an extraterrestrial species that saved humanity from nuclear oblivion, but many humans feel the price for their help is too high: the Oankali and ooloi intend to genetically merge with humanity, creating a new species at the expense of the old. Even though the Oankali have -- against their better judgment -- created a human colony on Mars so that humanity as a species can continue unaltered, many human "resisters" either have not heard of the Mars colony or don't believe the Oankali will allow them to live there. Jodahs, who was thought to be a male but who is actually maturing into the first ooloi from a human/Oankali union, finds a pair of resisters who prove that some pure humans are still fertile. These humans may be his only hope to find successful mates, but they have been raised to revile and despise his species above all else.

Scout-Officer John Leeming knew from the very start that his reconnaissance mission deep into enemy territory would likely be a one-way trip. But, after he crash-lands on a far distant planet and becomes a prisoner of ruthless aliens, he knows he can't just give up. Armed with only a piece of...  more

Scout-Officer John Leeming knew from the very start that his reconnaissance mission deep into enemy territory would likely be a one-way trip. But, after he crash-lands on a far distant planet and becomes a prisoner of ruthless aliens, he knows he can't just give up. Armed with only a piece of wood, a coil of copperlike wire, his quick wits, and an imaginary ally called Eustace, Leeming embarks on a brilliant campaign to gain his freedom--and undermine the alien war effort, too. This original, full-length version of one of Russell's most popular stories, "Plus X," is amusing, adventurous, fast moving, and razor sharp. Poking fun at bone-headed and inflexible bureaucrats and institutions, it ranks among his very best work.

A towering masterwork of science fiction adventure and one of the best-selling science fiction novels of all time. L. Ron Hubbard's "Battlefield Earth" opens with breathtaking scope on an Earth dominated for 1,000 years by an alien invader--and man is an endangered species. From...  more

A towering masterwork of science fiction adventure and one of the best-selling science fiction novels of all time. L. Ron Hubbard's "Battlefield Earth" opens with breathtaking scope on an Earth dominated for 1,000 years by an alien invader--and man is an endangered species. From the handful of surviving humans a courageous leader emerges--Jonnie Goodboy Tyler, who challenges the invincible might of the alien Psychlo empire in a battle of epic scale, danger and intrigue with the fate of the Earth and of the universe in the tenouos balance.

Dana, a modern black woman, is celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday with her new husband when she is snatched abruptly from her home in California and transported to the antebellum South. With more than 100,000 copies in print, Kindred is a classic timetravel novel by an acclaimed...  more

Dana, a modern black woman, is celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday with her new husband when she is snatched abruptly from her home in California and transported to the antebellum South. With more than 100,000 copies in print, Kindred is a classic timetravel novel by an acclaimed African-American science fictionwriter.

A legend among sci-fi readers, C.J. Cherryh's Union-Alliance novels, while separate and complete in themselves, are part of a much larger tapestry-a future history spanning 5,000 years of human civilization. Downbelow Station is the book that won Cherryh a Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1982....  more

A legend among sci-fi readers, C.J. Cherryh's Union-Alliance novels, while separate and complete in themselves, are part of a much larger tapestry-a future history spanning 5,000 years of human civilization. Downbelow Station is the book that won Cherryh a Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1982. A blockbuster space opera of the rebellion between Earth and its far-flung colonies, it is a classic science fiction masterwork.

The universe has been explored -- and humanity has all but given up on finding other intelligent life. Then an alien satellite orbiting a distant star sends out an unreadable signal. Is it the final programmed gasp of an ancient, long-dead race? Or the first greeting of an undiscovered life...  more

The universe has been explored -- and humanity has all but given up on finding other intelligent life. Then an alien satellite orbiting a distant star sends out an unreadable signal. Is it the final programmed gasp of an ancient, long-dead race? Or the first greeting of an undiscovered life form?  

In Old Earth’s clandestine world of ambassador-spies, Michelangelo Kusanagi-Jones and Vincent Katherinessen were once a starring team. But ever since a disastrous mission, they have been living separate lives in a universe dominated by a ruthless Coalition—one that is about to...  more

In Old Earth’s clandestine world of ambassador-spies, Michelangelo Kusanagi-Jones and Vincent Katherinessen were once a starring team. But ever since a disastrous mission, they have been living separate lives in a universe dominated by a ruthless Coalition—one that is about to reunite them.The pair are dispatched to New Amazonia as diplomatic agents Allegedly, they are to return priceless art. Covertly, they seek to tap its energy supply. But in reality, one has his mind set on treason. And among the extraordinary women of New Amazonia, in a season of festival, betrayal, and disguise, he will find a new ally—and a force beyond any that humans have known….

This landmark collection gathers four groundbreaking fantasy classics from the acclaimed author of Light. Set in the imagined city of Viriconium, here are the masterworks that revolutionized a genre and enthralled a generation of readers: The Pastel City, A Storm of Wings, In Viriconium, and...  more

This landmark collection gathers four groundbreaking fantasy classics from the acclaimed author of Light. Set in the imagined city of Viriconium, here are the masterworks that revolutionized a genre and enthralled a generation of readers: The Pastel City, A Storm of Wings, In Viriconium, and Viriconium Nights. These singular tales of a timeless realm and its enigmatic inhabitants are now reborn and compiled to captivate a whole new generation. Stories include: The pastel city A storm of wings In Viriconium The lamia & Lord Cromis Viriconium knights The luck in the head Strange great sins Lords of misrule The dancer from the dance A young man's journey to Viriconium

Kyreol's small world begins at the Face, a high rock cliff, and ends at Fourteen Falls, a series of rapids. Each year, her people celebrate Moon-Flash-a spark of light that seems to come from and go into the moon, a symbol of life and joy. When a mysterious stranger arrives, Kyreol wants to...  more

Kyreol's small world begins at the Face, a high rock cliff, and ends at Fourteen Falls, a series of rapids. Each year, her people celebrate Moon-Flash-a spark of light that seems to come from and go into the moon, a symbol of life and joy. When a mysterious stranger arrives, Kyreol wants to know more about him, as well as the Moon-Flash, and soon she and her childhood friend Terje leave their home to look for answers. Those answers will pluck Kyreol from Riverworld and transform her life forever-by fast-forwarding her into a future she can barely comprehend. This omnibus edition combines the acclaimed Patricia A. McKillip's two science-fiction novels, Moon-Flash and The Moon and the Face-at the request of Firebird readers.

These 18 darkly complex short stories and novellas touch upon human nature and perception, metaphysics and epistemology, and gender and sexuality, foreshadowing a world in which biological tendencies bring about the downfall of humankind. Revisions from the author's notes are included, allowing...  more

These 18 darkly complex short stories and novellas touch upon human nature and perception, metaphysics and epistemology, and gender and sexuality, foreshadowing a world in which biological tendencies bring about the downfall of humankind. Revisions from the author's notes are included, allowing a deeper view into her world and a better understanding of her work. The Nebula Award?winning short story Love Is the Plan, the Plan Is Death, the Hugo Award?winning novella The Girl Who Was Plugged In, and the Hugo and Nebula Award?winning novella Houston, Houston, Do You Read? are included.

Timothy Zahn, Hugo Award-winning author of The New York Times best-selling Star Wars trilogy, blazes a spectacular new path across the sky in an epic original novel of star-spanning action adventure, mystery and intrigue.  A long era of peace and prosperity in the interstellar...  more

Timothy Zahn, Hugo Award-winning author of The New York Times best-selling Star Wars trilogy, blazes a spectacular new path across the sky in an epic original novel of star-spanning action adventure, mystery and intrigue.  A long era of peace and prosperity in the interstellar Commonwealth has suddenly come to an end.  Four alien starships of unknown origin have attacked, without provocation, an eight-ship Peacemaker task force, utterly destroying it in six savage minutes.  The authorities claim there were no survivors.  But Lord Stewart Cavanaugh, a former member of Parliament, has learned through back channels that one man may have survived to be captured by the aliens: his son, Commander Pheylan Cavanaugh.  A large-scale invasion appears imminent, and the strictest security measures are in effect . . . measures that Lord Cavanaugh has no choice but to defy.  He recruits Adam Quinn, who once flew with the elite Copperheads -- fighter pilots whose minds are literally one with their machines -- to rescue his son.  Quinn assembles a crack force of Copperheads to steal out of the Commonwealth security zone and snatch Pheylan Cavanaugh from the conquerors. Depending on the outcome, Quinn and his men will retum home as heroes or as the galaxy's most despised traitors -- if they come home at all.

Powerful. Beautiful. Seductive. Cleopatra had it all. And soon, through genetic "blending," any woman will be able to share her secrets, her wiles, her way with men. First, though, her genetic material must be found. Forensic anthropologist Leda Hubbard jumps at the chance to be the first person...  more

Powerful. Beautiful. Seductive. Cleopatra had it all. And soon, through genetic "blending," any woman will be able to share her secrets, her wiles, her way with men. First, though, her genetic material must be found. Forensic anthropologist Leda Hubbard jumps at the chance to be the first person to find Cleopatra's final resting place. And the chase is on-for whomever gets access to Cleopatra's genetic material will also gain access to all of her knowledge. And though some want to channel Cleopatra for love, others have far more sinister motives.

The Shadowmoon is a small, unobtrusive wooden schooner whose passengers and crew are much more than they seem: Ferran, the Shadowmoon's lusty captain who dreams of power; Roval, the warrior-sorcerer; Velander and Terikel, priestesses of a nearly extinct sect; and the chivalrous vampyre Laron,...  more

The Shadowmoon is a small, unobtrusive wooden schooner whose passengers and crew are much more than they seem: Ferran, the Shadowmoon's lusty captain who dreams of power; Roval, the warrior-sorcerer; Velander and Terikel, priestesses of a nearly extinct sect; and the chivalrous vampyre Laron, who has been trapped in a fourteen-year-old body for 700 years.They sail the coast, gathering useful information, passing as simple traders. But when they witness the awful power of Silverdeath, an uncontrollable doomsday weapon of awesome power, they realize they must act. But every single king, emperor and despot covets Silverdeath's power. It will take all of their wits and more than a little luck if they hope to prevent one of these power hungry fools from destroying the world. Their only advantage? The Shadowmoon. While it seems to be little more that a small trading vessel--too small for battle, too fat for speed-it is actually one of the most sophisticated vessels in the world, one that allows them to travel to places where no others would dare. They can only hope it will be enough to save them all before Silverdeath rains destruction across their entire world.

Treachery and wizardry run rampant under the reign of the mighty Pontifex, as both the rightful and the unworthy heirs to the throne anxiously await his demise. Korsibar, son of the current Coronal, plots with his twin sister and ambitious companions to seize the power of the Coronal when his...  more

Treachery and wizardry run rampant under the reign of the mighty Pontifex, as both the rightful and the unworthy heirs to the throne anxiously await his demise. Korsibar, son of the current Coronal, plots with his twin sister and ambitious companions to seize the power of the Coronal when his father ascends to the throne of the Pontifex. But the burdens of the crown and scepter exact a higher price than Korsibar is prepared to pay. His rival fights to take his appointed place as keeper of his beloved Majipoor... and to restore order to the utter chaos that has befallen their world.

THE TIMES, THEY ARE A CHANGIN' Utopia was achieved in the 21st century. But even in a world of prosperity and freedom there were malcontents. They called themselves Overlord, and their possession of time travel gave them the ability to change the past and shape the future according to...  more

THE TIMES, THEY ARE A CHANGIN' Utopia was achieved in the 21st century. But even in a world of prosperity and freedom there were malcontents. They called themselves Overlord, and their possession of time travel gave them the ability to change the past and shape the future according to their twisted desires. They built a time gate, then picked a crucial turning point in the previous century and traveled back to transmute an obscure figure on the lunatic fringe of German politics into an invincible conqueror. His name: Adolph Hitler. By the 1970s, only North America and Australia remained free, but time was running out and both would soon be faced with a choice of surrender or nuclear annihilation. Then a ray of hope arose: American agents learned of the 1 time gate, and smuggled technical information and defecting experts out of Europe. By 1975, the crash project -- code name `Proteus" -- ordered by President John F. Kennedy had successfully built a second time gate. Threatened with annihilation at any time, the Americans take the desperate measure of sending a team back to 1939. Their mission: stop Overlord before its agents can give Hitler the weapons that will hand him the world on a silver platter!

A doorway that leads to all time and all space; and four travelers who dare enter.

Spin is Robert Charles Wilson's Hugo Award-winning, stunning combination of a galactic "what if" and a small-scale, very human story.   One night in October when he was ten years old, Tyler Dupree stood in his back yard and watched the stars go out. They all flared into...  more

Spin is Robert Charles Wilson's Hugo Award-winning, stunning combination of a galactic "what if" and a small-scale, very human story.   One night in October when he was ten years old, Tyler Dupree stood in his back yard and watched the stars go out. They all flared into brilliance at once, then disappeared, replaced by a flat, empty black barrier. He and his best friends, Jason and Diane Lawton, had seen what became known as the Big Blackout. It would shape their lives.   The effect is worldwide. The sun is now a featureless disk -- a heat source, rather than an astronomical object. The moon is gone, but tides remain. Not only have the world's artificial satellites fallen out of orbit, their recovered remains are pitted and aged, as though they'd been in space far longer than their known lifespans. As Tyler, Jason, and Diane grow up, a space probe reveals a bizarre truth: The barrier is artificial, generated by huge alien artifacts. Time is passing faster outside the barrier than inside -- more than a hundred million years per year on Earth. At this rate, the death throes of the sun are only about forty years in our future.   Jason, now a promising young scientist, devotes his life to working against this slow-moving apocalypse. Diane throws herself into hedonism, marrying a sinister cult leader who's forged a new religion out of the fears of the masses.   Earth sends terraforming machines to Mars to let the onrush of time do its work, turning the planet green. Next they send humans…and immediately get back an emissary with thousands of years of stories to tell about the settling of Mars. Then Earth's probes reveal that an identical barrier has appeared around Mars. Jason, desperate, seeds near space with self-replicating machines that will scatter copies of themselves outward from the sun—and report back on what they find.   Life on Earth is about to get much, much stranger.  

A searing, post-apocalyptic novel destined to become Cormac McCarthy's masterpiece. A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is...  more

A searing, post-apocalyptic novel destined to become Cormac McCarthy's masterpiece. A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don?t know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food ... and each other. The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, "each the other's world entire," are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.

In the middle of the twenty-first century, the multinational crew of scientists stationed on Halley's Comet set aside personal prejudices and unite to survive in the bleak, ice-covered environment and transform it into a source of life.   Exiles from a world devastated by fear...  more

In the middle of the twenty-first century, the multinational crew of scientists stationed on Halley's Comet set aside personal prejudices and unite to survive in the bleak, ice-covered environment and transform it into a source of life.   Exiles from a world devastated by fear and political strife, heroes who first must conquer their own conflicts before the greater goal can be won, and pioneers, hundreds of men and women, chosen to seek a new future, to chart a new destiny.  They soared to the heart of a comet, led by three remarkable and very human people:  Carl Osborn: the troubled leader of an increasingly improbable mission. Silently, he calls upon his bottomless strength to carry the weight of hundreds of frightened, tormented lives;  Saul Lintz: the brilliant biologist who works feverishly to heal a stricken crew. Ultimately, he undertakes a desperate experiment to delve into the very essence of life-and death; Virginia Herbert; the gifted cybernetics technician, the woman both men love. She breaks the barrier of artificial intelligence and must now go one step beyond into a melding of mind and machine.

“One of the foremost science fiction writers of our generation”(SF Site) comes to Ace with a trilogy of the Web’s awakening. Caitlin Decter is young, pretty, feisty, a genius at math—and blind. Still, she can surf the net with the best of them, following its complex...  more

“One of the foremost science fiction writers of our generation”(SF Site) comes to Ace with a trilogy of the Web’s awakening. Caitlin Decter is young, pretty, feisty, a genius at math—and blind. Still, she can surf the net with the best of them, following its complex paths clearly in her mind. But Caitlin’s brain long ago co-opted her primary visual cortex to help her navigate online. So when she receives an implant to restore her sight, instead of seeing reality, the landscape of the World Wide Web explodes into her consciousness, spreading out all around her in a riot of colors and shapes. While exploring this amazing realm, she discovers something—some other—lurking in the background. And it’s getting more and more intelligent with each passing day…

Webmind is an emerging consciousness that has befriended Caitlin Decter and grown eager to learn about her world. But Webmind has also come to the attention of WATCH -- the secret government agency that monitors the Internet for any threat to the United States -- and they're fully aware of...  more

Webmind is an emerging consciousness that has befriended Caitlin Decter and grown eager to learn about her world. But Webmind has also come to the attention of WATCH -- the secret government agency that monitors the Internet for any threat to the United States -- and they're fully aware of Caitlin's involvement in its awakening. WATCH is convinced that Webmind represents a risk to national security and wants it purged from cyberspace. But Caitlin believes in Webmind's capacity for compassion -- and she will do anything and everything necessary to protect her friend.  

Webmind-the vast consciousness that spontaneously emerged from the infrastructure of the World Wide Web-has proven its worth to humanity by aiding in everything from curing cancer to easing international tensions. But the brass at the Pentagon see Webmind as a threat that needs to be...  more

Webmind-the vast consciousness that spontaneously emerged from the infrastructure of the World Wide Web-has proven its worth to humanity by aiding in everything from curing cancer to easing international tensions. But the brass at the Pentagon see Webmind as a threat that needs to be eliminated. Caitlin Decter-the once-blind sixteen-year-old math genius who discovered, and bonded with, Webmind-wants desperately to protect her friend. And if she doesn't act, everything -Webmind included- may come crashing down.

Calculating God is the new near-future SF thriller from the popular and award-winning Robert J. Sawyer. An alien shuttle craft lands outside the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. A six-legged, two-armed alien emerges, who says, in perfect English, "Take me to a paleontologist." It seems that...  more

Calculating God is the new near-future SF thriller from the popular and award-winning Robert J. Sawyer. An alien shuttle craft lands outside the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. A six-legged, two-armed alien emerges, who says, in perfect English, "Take me to a paleontologist." It seems that Earth, and the alien's home planet, and the home planet of another alien species traveling on the alien mother ship, all experienced the same five cataclysmic events at about the same time (one example of these "cataclysmic events" would be the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs). Both alien races believe this proves the existence of God: i.e. he's obviously been playing with the evolution of life on each of these planets.From this provocative launch point, Sawyer tells a fast-paced, and morally and intellectually challenging, SF story that just grows larger and larger in scope. The evidence of God's universal existence is not universally well received on Earth, nor even immediately believed. And it reveals nothing of God's nature. In fact. it poses more questions than it answers.When a supernova explodes out in the galaxy but close enough to wipe out life on all three home-worlds, the big question is, Will God intervene or is this the sixth cataclysm:?Calculating God is SF on the grand scale.

Hominids examines two unique species of people. We are one of those species; the other is the Neanderthals of a parallel world where they became the dominant intelligence. The Neanderthal civilization has reached heights of culture and science comparable to our own, but with radically different...  more

Hominids examines two unique species of people. We are one of those species; the other is the Neanderthals of a parallel world where they became the dominant intelligence. The Neanderthal civilization has reached heights of culture and science comparable to our own, but with radically different history, society and philosophy. Ponter Boddit, a Neanderthal physicist, accidentally pierces the barrier between worlds and is transferred to our universe. Almost immediately recognized as a Neanderthal, but only much later as a scientist, he is quarantined and studied, alone and bewildered, a stranger in a strange land. But Ponter is also befriended -- by a doctor and a physicist who share his questing intelligence, and especially by Canadian geneticist Mary Vaughan, a woman with whom he develops a special rapport. Ponter’s partner, Adikor Huld, finds himself with a messy lab, a missing body, suspicious people all around and an explosive murder trial. How can he possibly prove his innocence when he has no idea what actually happened to Ponter?

Robert J. Sawyer’s award-winning science fiction has garnered both popular and critical acclaim. The New York Times called Frameshift “filled to bursting with ideas, characters, and incidents.” His novels are fixtures on the Hugo and Nebula ballots. Now, his award-winning...  more

Robert J. Sawyer’s award-winning science fiction has garnered both popular and critical acclaim. The New York Times called Frameshift “filled to bursting with ideas, characters, and incidents.” His novels are fixtures on the Hugo and Nebula ballots. Now, his award-winning novel Flash Forward is becoming a network TV series, expected to air in the fall of 2009. In pursuit of an elusive nuclear particle, an experiment goes incredibly awry, and, for a few moments, the consciousness of the entire human race is thrown ahead by about twenty years. As the implications truly hit home, the pressure to repeat the experiment builds. Everyone wants a glimpse of their future, a chance to flash forward and see their successes…or learn how to avoid their failures.

Arienrhod. As beautiful as she was ancient, she ruled Tiamat, whose twin suns circled the Stargate that linked her world with the galaxy-spanning Empire. But the Stargate was closing, the offworlders who both enriched and dominated Tiamat would leave soon, the rule of the Winter folk would give...  more

Arienrhod. As beautiful as she was ancient, she ruled Tiamat, whose twin suns circled the Stargate that linked her world with the galaxy-spanning Empire. But the Stargate was closing, the offworlders who both enriched and dominated Tiamat would leave soon, the rule of the Winter folk would give way to that of the semi-civilized Summers, and Arienrhod's reign -- and her arcanely prolonged life -- would end. The Snow Queen had planned against this time, secretly cloning an heir to be brought up among the Summer people. Moon Dawntreader grew up ignorant of her heritage, yet was drawn to fulfill her destiny in the ancient city where Arienrhod held court -- contending with the Queen for the body and soul of the man who loved them both. Astonishing, lyrical, and vast, The Snow Queen is certain to be among the most celebrated fantasy masterworks of the decade. Hugo-winner Vinge has fashioned a world as intricately realized as Herbert's Dune, as resonant as LeGuin's Winter. Rich in the smells and songs of a planet as real as our own, it is a brilliant tapestry of idea, character, and adventure that stands firmly in the tradition of today's bold "worldcraft" science fiction.

Somewhere within our crowded sky, a crew of wormhole builders hops from planet to planet, on their way to the job of a lifetime. To the galaxy at large, humanity is a minor species, and one patched-up construction vessel is a mere speck on the starchart. This is an everyday sort of ship, just...  more

Somewhere within our crowded sky, a crew of wormhole builders hops from planet to planet, on their way to the job of a lifetime. To the galaxy at large, humanity is a minor species, and one patched-up construction vessel is a mere speck on the starchart. This is an everyday sort of ship, just trying to get from here to there. But all voyages leave their mark, and even the most ordinary of people have stories worth telling. A young Martian woman, Rosemary Harper doesn't expect much when she joins the crew of the aging Wayfarer. While the patched-up ship has seen better days, it offers her a bed, a chance to explore the far-off corners of the galaxy, and most importantly,put some distance between herself and the life she's left behind some distance from her past. An introspective young woman, she's never met anyone remotely like the ship's diverse crew, including Sissix, the exotic reptilian alien pilot, navigating life without her own kind;  chatty engineers Kizzy and Jenks, who keep the ship running; and Ashby, their noble pacifist captain, awaiting the return of a loved one at war.. Life aboard the Wayfarer is chaotic and crazy-exactly what Rosemary wants. It's also about to get extremely dangerous when the crew is offered the job of a lifetime. Tunneling wormholes through space to a distant planet is definitely lucrative and will keep them comfortable for years. But risking her life wasn't part of the plan. In the far reaches of deep space, the tiny Wayfarer crew will confront a host of unexpected mishaps and thrilling adventures that force them to depend on each other. To survive, Rosemary's got to learn how to rely on this assortment of oddballs-an experience that teaches her about love and trust, and that having a family isn't necessarily the worst thing in the universe. .

Lovelace was once merely a ship's artificial intelligence. When she wakes up in an new body, following a total system shut-down and reboot, she has to start over in a synthetic body, in a world where her kind are illegal. She's never felt so alone. But she's not alone, not...  more

Lovelace was once merely a ship's artificial intelligence. When she wakes up in an new body, following a total system shut-down and reboot, she has to start over in a synthetic body, in a world where her kind are illegal. She's never felt so alone. But she's not alone, not really.  Pepper, one of the engineers who risked life and limb to reinstall Lovelace, is determined to help her adjust to her new world.  Because Pepper knows a thing or two about starting over. Together, Pepper and Lovey will discover that, huge as the galaxy may be, it's anything but empty.  The stand-alone sequel to The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, which introduced the incredible world of Rosemary Harper, a young woman with a restless soul and secrets to keep. When she joined the crew of the Wayfarer, an intergalactic ship, she got more than she bargained for -- and learned to live with, and love, her rag-tag collection of crewmates.

Loup Garron was born and raised in Santa Olivia, an isolated, disenfranchised town next to a US military base inside a DMZ buffer zone between Texas and Mexico.  A fugitive "Wolf-Man" who had a love affair with a local woman, Loup's father was one of a group of men...  more

Loup Garron was born and raised in Santa Olivia, an isolated, disenfranchised town next to a US military base inside a DMZ buffer zone between Texas and Mexico.  A fugitive "Wolf-Man" who had a love affair with a local woman, Loup's father was one of a group of men genetically-manipulated and used by the US government as a weapon. The "Wolf-Men" were engineered to have superhuman strength, speed, sensory capability, stamina, and a total lack of fear, and Loup, named for and sharing her father's wolf-like qualities, is marked as an outsider. After her mother dies, Loup goes to live among the misfit orphans at the parish church, where they seethe from the injustices visited upon the locals by the soldiers. Eventually, the orphans find an outlet for their frustrations: They form a vigilante group to support Loup Garron who, costumed as their patron saint, Santa Olivia, uses her special abilities to avenge the town. Aware that she could lose her freedom, and possibly her life, Loup is determined to fight to redress the wrongs her community has suffered. And like the reincarnation of their patron saint, she will bring hope to all of Santa Olivia.

Because the immortal Emperor can grant a form of eternal life-after-death, creating an elite known as the Risen, he has ruled the eighty worlds unchallenged for sixteen hundred years. He and his sister, the Child Empressforever a little girlare worshipped as living gods. No one can touch...  more

Because the immortal Emperor can grant a form of eternal life-after-death, creating an elite known as the Risen, he has ruled the eighty worlds unchallenged for sixteen hundred years. He and his sister, the Child Empressforever a little girlare worshipped as living gods. No one can touch them.... ...no one but the Rix, machine-augmented humans who worship very different gods: AI compound minds encompassing entire planets. The Rix are cool, relentless fanatics, and their only goal is to propagate such AIs throughout the galaxy. They seek to end, by any means necessary, the Emperors prolonged rule and supplant it with a cybernetic dynasty of their own. They begin by assaulting the Imperial Palace on Legis XVand taking hostage the Child Empress. Tasked with her rescue, brilliant tactician Captain Laurent Zai of the Imperial Frigate Lynx is well aware that failure constitutes an Error of Blood. Yet when the mission goes badly wrong, he declines to commit ritual suicide, and instead takes on a suicide mission: stopping the next thrust of the Rix invasion with just his own ship. While combat rages among the stars, the newborn Rix compound mind expands through the global net on Legis XV and works to break the Imperial blockade. And light-years away, Captain Zais lover, Senator Nara Oxham, suspects that the mind has discovered the Emperors hidden weakness: a dangerous secret for which he is willing to countenance the killing of worlds.

In the year of grace 1345, as Sir Roger Baron de Tourneville is gathering an army to join King Edward III in the war against France, a most astonishing event occurs: a huge silver ship descends through the sky and lands in a pasture beside the little village of Ansby in northeastern...  more

In the year of grace 1345, as Sir Roger Baron de Tourneville is gathering an army to join King Edward III in the war against France, a most astonishing event occurs: a huge silver ship descends through the sky and lands in a pasture beside the little village of Ansby in northeastern Lincolnshire. The Wersgorix, whose scouting ship it is, are quite expert at taking over planets, and having determined from orbit that this one was suitable, they initiate standard world-conquering procedure. Ah, but this time it's no mere primitives the Wersgorix seek to enslave-they've launched their invasion against Englishmen! In the end, only one alien is left alive-and Sir Roger's grand vision is born. He intends for the creature to fly the ship first to France to aid his King, then on to the Holy Land to vanquish the infidel!

From the acclaimed author of Infected comes an epic and exhilarating story of humanity's secret battle against a horrific enemy. Across America, a mysterious pathogen transforms ordinary people into raging killers, psychopaths driven by a terrifying, alien agenda. The human race fights...  more

From the acclaimed author of Infected comes an epic and exhilarating story of humanity's secret battle against a horrific enemy. Across America, a mysterious pathogen transforms ordinary people into raging killers, psychopaths driven by a terrifying, alien agenda. The human race fights back, yet after every battle the disease responds, adapts, using sophisticated strategies and brilliant ruses to fool its pursuers. The only possible explanation: the epidemic is driven not by evolution but by some malevolent intelligence. Standing against this unimaginable threat is a small group, assembled under the strictest secrecy. Their best weapon is hulking former football star Perry Dawsey, left psychologically shattered by his own struggles with this terrible enemy, who possesses an unexplainable ability to locate the diseases hosts. Violent and unpredictable, Perry is both the nation's best hope and a terrifying liability. Hardened CIA veteran Dew Phillips must somehow forge a connection with him if they're going to stand a chance against this maddeningly adaptable opponent. Alongside them is Margaret Montoya, a brilliant epidemiologist who fights for a cure even as she reels under the weight of endless horrors. These three and their team have kept humanity in the game, but that's not good enough anymore, not when the disease turns contagious, triggering a fast countdown to Armageddon. Meanwhile, other enemies join the battle, and a new threat - one that comes from a most unexpected source - may ultimately prove the most dangerous of all. Catapulting the reader into a world where humanity's life span is measured in hours and the president's finger hovers over the nuclear button, rising star Scott Sigler takes us on a breathtaking, hyper-adrenalized ride filled with terror and jaw-dropping action. Contagious is a truly grand work of suspense, science, and horror from a new master.

From the acclaimed author of Infected comes an epic and exhilarating story of humanity's secret battle against a horrific enemy. Across America, a mysterious pathogen transforms ordinary people into raging killers, psychopaths driven by a terrifying, alien agenda. The human race fights...  more

From the acclaimed author of Infected comes an epic and exhilarating story of humanity's secret battle against a horrific enemy. Across America, a mysterious pathogen transforms ordinary people into raging killers, psychopaths driven by a terrifying, alien agenda. The human race fights back, yet after every battle the disease responds, adapts, using sophisticated strategies and brilliant ruses to fool its pursuers. The only possible explanation: the epidemic is driven not by evolution but by some malevolent intelligence. Standing against this unimaginable threat is a small group, assembled under the strictest secrecy. Their best weapon is hulking former football star Perry Dawsey, left psychologically shattered by his own struggles with this terrible enemy, who possesses an unexplainable ability to locate the diseases hosts. Violent and unpredictable, Perry is both the nation's best hope and a terrifying liability. Hardened CIA veteran Dew Phillips must somehow forge a connection with him if they're going to stand a chance against this maddeningly adaptable opponent. Alongside them is Margaret Montoya, a brilliant epidemiologist who fights for a cure even as she reels under the weight of endless horrors. These three and their team have kept humanity in the game, but that's not good enough anymore, not when the disease turns contagious, triggering a fast countdown to Armageddon. Meanwhile, other enemies join the battle, and a new threat - one that comes from a most unexpected source - may ultimately prove the most dangerous of all. Catapulting the reader into a world where humanity's life span is measured in hours and the president's finger hovers over the nuclear button, rising star Scott Sigler takes us on a breathtaking, hyper-adrenalized ride filled with terror and jaw-dropping action. Contagious is a truly grand work of suspense, science, and horror from a new master.  

Across America a mysterious disease is turning ordinary people into raving, paranoid murderers who inflict brutal horrors on strangers, themselves, and even their own families.  Working under the government’s shroud of secrecy, CIA operative Dew Phillips crisscrosses the country...  more

Across America a mysterious disease is turning ordinary people into raving, paranoid murderers who inflict brutal horrors on strangers, themselves, and even their own families.  Working under the government’s shroud of secrecy, CIA operative Dew Phillips crisscrosses the country trying in vain to capture a live victim. With only decomposing corpses for clues, CDC epidemiologist Margaret Montoya races to analyze the science behind this deadly contagion. She discovers that these killers all have one thing in common -- they’ve been contaminated by a bioengineered parasite, shaped by a complexity far beyond the limits of known science. Meanwhile Perry Dawsey -- a hulking former football star now resigned to life as a cubicle-bound desk jockey -- awakens one morning to find several mysterious welts growing on his body. Soon Perry finds himself acting and thinking strangely, hearing voices...he is infected.  The fate of the human race may well depend on the bloody war Perry must wage with his own body, because the parasites want something from him, something that goes beyond mere murder.

Across America, a mysterious pathogen transforms ordinary people into raging killers, psychopaths driven by a terrifying, alien agenda. The human race fights back, yet after every battle the disease responds, adapts, using sophisticated strategies and brilliant ruses to fool its pursuers. The...  more

Across America, a mysterious pathogen transforms ordinary people into raging killers, psychopaths driven by a terrifying, alien agenda. The human race fights back, yet after every battle the disease responds, adapts, using sophisticated strategies and brilliant ruses to fool its pursuers. The only possible explanation: the epidemic is driven not by evolution but by some malevolent intelligence. Standing against this unimaginable threat is a small group, assembled under the strictest secrecy. Their best weapon is hulking former football star Perry Dawsey, left psychologically shattered by his own struggles with this terrible enemy, who possesses an unexplainable ability to locate the disease's hosts. Violent and unpredictable, Perry is both the nation's best hope and a terrifying liability. Hardened CIA veteran Dew Phillips must somehow forge a connection with him if they're going to stand a chance against this maddeningly adaptable opponent. Alongside them is Margaret Montoya, a brilliant epidemiologist who fights for a cure even as she reels under the weight of endless horrors. These three and their team have kept humanity in the game, but that's not good enough anymore, not when the disease turns contagious, triggering a fast countdown to Armageddon. Meanwhile, other enemies join the battle, and a new threat -- one that comes from a most unexpected source -- may ultimately prove the most dangerous of all. Catapulting the reader into a world where humanity's life span is measured in hours and the president's finger hovers over the nuclear button, rising star Scott Sigler takes us on a breathtaking, hyper-adrenalized ride filled with terror and jaw-dropping action. Contagious is a truly grand work of suspense, science, and horror from a new master. Read by the author.  Unabridged: 12 sound discs (15 hr.)

Deep below a desolate Utah mountain lies the largest platinum deposit ever discovered. A billion-dollar find, it waits for any company that can drill a world's record, three-mile-deep mine shaft. EarthCore is the company with the technology, the resources and the guts to go after the mother...  more

Deep below a desolate Utah mountain lies the largest platinum deposit ever discovered. A billion-dollar find, it waits for any company that can drill a world's record, three-mile-deep mine shaft. EarthCore is the company with the technology, the resources and the guts to go after the mother lode. Young executive Connell Kirkland is the company's driving force, pushing himself and those around him to uncover the massive treasure. But at three miles below the surface, where the rocks are so hot they burn bare skin, something has been waiting for centuries. Waiting ...and guarding. Kirkland and EarthCore are about to find out first-hand why this treasure has never been unearthed.

“The ancestors are out there … you have to believe me”.   Acclaimed author Scott Sigler offers a chilling tale of what can happen when hubris, greed, and madness drive scientific experimentation past the brink of reason. Every five minutes, a transplant candidate dies...  more

“The ancestors are out there … you have to believe me”.   Acclaimed author Scott Sigler offers a chilling tale of what can happen when hubris, greed, and madness drive scientific experimentation past the brink of reason. Every five minutes, a transplant candidate dies while waiting for a compatible heart, a liver, a kidney.  Imagine a technology that could provide those life-saving transplant organs for a nominal fee, and imagine what a company would do to monopolize that technology. On a remote island in the Canadian Arctic, PJ Colding leads a group of geneticists who have discovered this holy grail of medicine.  By reverse-engineering thousands of animal genomes, Colding’s team has dialed back the evolutionary clock and re-created the progenitor of all mammals.  The method?  Illegal.  The result?  A computer-engineered living creature, an animal whose organs can be implanted in any person, with no chance of transplant rejection.  There’s just one problem: these ancestors are not the docile herd animals that Colding’s team envisioned.  Instead, the work has given birth to something big, something evil… something very, very hungry. As creators become prey in an ultimate battle for survival, Colding and the woman he loves must fight to survive, even as government agents close in to shut the project down, and the deep-pocketed company backing this research reveals its own cold-blooded agenda. .

From the bestselling author of INFECTED now comes CONTAGIOUS. "When the seeds landed on Chelsea Jewell, they made her seven-year-old body and mind the incubator for the worst plague ever to attack the planet. Mankind's best hope of defense is Perry Dawsey: host-turned-hunter, bloodthirsty...  more

From the bestselling author of INFECTED now comes CONTAGIOUS. "When the seeds landed on Chelsea Jewell, they made her seven-year-old body and mind the incubator for the worst plague ever to attack the planet. Mankind's best hope of defense is Perry Dawsey: host-turned-hunter, bloodthirsty psychotic, and - with his strange new ability - a key member of the black-ops team leading a deadly battle against the mysterious disease that is spreading across America. Now Dawsey and the rest of the black-ops team are in a desperate race to find and destroy Chelsea and her 'family' - before it's too late."

"This novel's got it all: cutting-edge science; a perfectly-realized setting; terror both plausible and profoundly unsettling. EARTHCORE is more exciting than a thriller has any right to be!" Lincoln Child co-author of: Relic, Riptide, Mount Dragon & The Ice Limit BOOK JACKET COPY: Deep below...  more

"This novel's got it all: cutting-edge science; a perfectly-realized setting; terror both plausible and profoundly unsettling. EARTHCORE is more exciting than a thriller has any right to be!" Lincoln Child co-author of: Relic, Riptide, Mount Dragon & The Ice Limit BOOK JACKET COPY: Deep below a desolate Utah mountain lies the largest platinum deposit ever discovered. A billion-dollar find, it waits for any company that can drill a three-mile shaft below a desolate Utah mountain. EarthCore is the company with the resources and the guts to go after the mother lode. Young executive Connell Kirkland is the company's driving force, pushing himself and those around him deep into the earth to uncover the massive treasure. But at three miles below the surface, where the rocks are so hot they burn bare skin, something has been waiting for centuries. Waiting ... and guarding. Kirkland and EarthCore are about to find out firsthand why this treasure has never been unearthed.

The great Calculor of Libris was forced to watch as Overmayor Zarvora had four of its components lined up against a wall and shot for negligence. Thereafter, its calculations were free from errors, and that was just as well-for only this strangest of calculating machines and its two thousand...  more

The great Calculor of Libris was forced to watch as Overmayor Zarvora had four of its components lined up against a wall and shot for negligence. Thereafter, its calculations were free from errors, and that was just as well-for only this strangest of calculating machines and its two thousand enslaved components could save the world from a new ice age. And all the while a faint mirrorsun hangs in the night sky, warning of the cold to come. In Sean McMullen's glittering, dynamic, and exotic world two millennia from now, there is no more electricity, wind engines are leading-edge technology, librarians fight duels to settle disputes, steam power is banned by every major religion, and a mysterious siren "Call" lures people to their death. Nevertheless, the brilliant and ruthless Zarvora intends to start a war in space against inconceivably ancient nuclear battle stations. Unbeknownst to Zarvora, however, the greatest threat to humanity is neither a machine nor a force but her demented and implacable enemy Lemorel, who has resurrected an obscene and evil concept from the distant past: Total War. Souls in the Great Machine is the first volume of Sean McMullen's brilliant future history of the world of Greatwinter

World-renowned paleontologist Richard Leyster's universe changed forever the day a stranger named Griffin walked into his office with a remarkable job offer . . . and an ice cooler containing the head of a freshly killed Stegosaurus. For Leyster and a select group of scientific colleagues an...  more

World-renowned paleontologist Richard Leyster's universe changed forever the day a stranger named Griffin walked into his office with a remarkable job offer . . . and an ice cooler containing the head of a freshly killed Stegosaurus. For Leyster and a select group of scientific colleagues an impossible fantasy has come true: the ability to study dinosaurs up close, in their own era and milieu. But tampering with time and paradox can have disastrous effects on the future and the past alike, breeding a violent new strain of fundamentalist terror -- and, worse still, encouraging brilliant rebels like Dr. Gertrude Salley to toy with the working mechanisms of natural law, no matter what the consequences. And when they concern the largest, most savage creatures that ever walked the Earth, the consequences may be too horrifying to imagine . . .

When Murdoch was summoned to his grandfather's isolated Scottish castle, he had no idea of the old man's latest discovery -- nor where it would lead him. Sir Charles, a genius in far-out physics, had found a flew in the law of conservation of energy; in any process, an incredibly tiny increment...  more

When Murdoch was summoned to his grandfather's isolated Scottish castle, he had no idea of the old man's latest discovery -- nor where it would lead him. Sir Charles, a genius in far-out physics, had found a flew in the law of conservation of energy; in any process, an incredibly tiny increment of energy escaped -- back through time! Using this "tau" radiation, he could send messages into the past.But Murdoch discovered records of messages he knew he had never sent. Were many futures possible? Could a message from Future X alter the past -- and thus wipe out Future X? But who would be foolish enough to send a message that could eliminate his own existence?Then disaster struck. An advanced fusion reactor threatened to destroy all Earth. Grimly, Murdoch sat down to send back the words that would destroy everything he had learned to love.

Gully Foyle is my name And Terra is my nation Deep space is my dwelling place The stars my destination Gully Foyle, Mechanic's Mate 3rd Class, is the only survivor on his drifting, wrecked spaceship. When another space vessel, the Vorga, ignores his distress flares and sails by,...  more

Gully Foyle is my name And Terra is my nation Deep space is my dwelling place The stars my destination Gully Foyle, Mechanic's Mate 3rd Class, is the only survivor on his drifting, wrecked spaceship. When another space vessel, the Vorga, ignores his distress flares and sails by, Gully Foyle becomes a man obsessed with revenge. He endures 170 days alone in deep space before finding refuge on the Sargasso Asteroid and then returning to Earth to track down the crew and owners of the Vorga. But, as he works out his murderous grudge, Gully Foyle also uncovers a secret of momentous proportions...  

Four students discover a manuscript, The Book of Skulls, which reveals the existence of a sect, now living in the Arizona desert, whose members can offer immortality to those who can complete its initiation rite. To their surprise, they discover that the sect exists, and is willing to accept...  more

Four students discover a manuscript, The Book of Skulls, which reveals the existence of a sect, now living in the Arizona desert, whose members can offer immortality to those who can complete its initiation rite. To their surprise, they discover that the sect exists, and is willing to accept them as acolytes. But for each group of four who enter the rite, two must die in order for the others to succeed.

In the first book of the "World of Tiers" series, Robert Wolf accidentally transports himself to a parallel universe, meets Paul Janus Finnegan, also known as Kickaha, and gradually becomes a hero.

HUMANITY IS RUNNING OUT OF TIME THE SETTLED UNIVERSE IS FILLED WITH TERRAFORMED WORLDS LINKED BY TIMESHAFTS -- TEMPORAL WORMHOLES IN DEEP SPACE. THESE TIMESHAFTS ARE THE ONLY WAY TO TRAVEL THE VAST DISTANCES BETWEEN THE STARS. The Chronologic Patrol is charged with guarding the timeshaft...  more

HUMANITY IS RUNNING OUT OF TIME THE SETTLED UNIVERSE IS FILLED WITH TERRAFORMED WORLDS LINKED BY TIMESHAFTS -- TEMPORAL WORMHOLES IN DEEP SPACE. THESE TIMESHAFTS ARE THE ONLY WAY TO TRAVEL THE VAST DISTANCES BETWEEN THE STARS. The Chronologic Patrol is charged with guarding the timeshaft wormholes and preventing time paradoxes at all costs. But one critical mission ends in disaster, turning Anton Koffield, captain of the Upholder, into a dark legend.... As ships carrying relief supplies to a crippled planet approach a timeshaft, they are mercilessly set upon by mysterious attackers -- their crews are murdered, the sanctity of time itself is at risk. In response, Koffield is forced to do the unthinkable: he must stop the invasion by destroying the timeshaft. Marooned eighty years in the future, he lives as a cursed figure, the villain who killed a world. And his odyssey through time has only just begun...

When Renie Sulaweyo's younger brother, Stephen, returns from the Net after visiting Mister J's, a virtual reality equivalent of the Hellfire Club, she's worried about him. When his next Net trip leaves him in a coma, Renie is terrified and angry. Soon she discovers evidence that other children...  more

When Renie Sulaweyo's younger brother, Stephen, returns from the Net after visiting Mister J's, a virtual reality equivalent of the Hellfire Club, she's worried about him. When his next Net trip leaves him in a coma, Renie is terrified and angry. Soon she discovers evidence that other children have lapsed into comas under similar circumstances. A professor of computer science and an adept user of the Net, Renie retraces Stephen's trail and enters Mister J's but barely escapes with her own mind intact. After her adventure, she discovers that someone has downloaded into her computer the impossibly complex image of a fantastic golden city. Then her apartment is fire-bombed, she loses her job and another professor whom she has recruited to help her decipher the mystery is murdered. It's clear that Renie has angered someone with almost unlimited power, but she remains determined to save her brother.

This 2005 SFBC Edition contains all 5 of the stories previously printed in Vols 1 & 2 : 'The Star King' , 'The Killing Machine' , 'The Palace of Love' , 'The Face ' , 'The Book of Dreams'

The Vendetta In Space...had started centuries before "Mouse" Storm was born...with his grandfather's raid on the planet Prefactias, the blood bath that freed the human slaves from their Sangaree masters. But one Sangaree survived-the young Norbon heir, the man who swore vengenace on the Storm...  more

The Vendetta In Space...had started centuries before "Mouse" Storm was born...with his grandfather's raid on the planet Prefactias, the blood bath that freed the human slaves from their Sangaree masters. But one Sangaree survived-the young Norbon heir, the man who swore vengenace on the Storm family and their soldiers, in a carefully mapped plot that would take generations to fulfill. Now Mouse's father Gneaus must fight for an El Dorado of wealth on the burning half of the planet Blackworld. As the great private armies of all space clash on the narrow Shadowline that divides inferno from life-sheltering shade, Gneaus' half-brother Michael plays his traitorous games, and a man called Deeth pulls the deadly strings that threaten to entrap them all-as the Starfishers Trilogy begins.

In the Hugo-Award winning Hominids, Robert J. Sawyer introduced a character readers will never forget: Ponter Boddit, a Neanderthal physicist from a parallel Earth who was whisked from his reality into ours by a quantum-computing experiment gone awry -- making him the ultimate stranger in a...  more

In the Hugo-Award winning Hominids, Robert J. Sawyer introduced a character readers will never forget: Ponter Boddit, a Neanderthal physicist from a parallel Earth who was whisked from his reality into ours by a quantum-computing experiment gone awry -- making him the ultimate stranger in a strange land. In that book and in its sequel, Humans, Sawyer showed us the Neanderthal version of Earth in loving detail -- a tour de force of world-building; a masterpiece of alternate history. Now, in Hybrids, Ponter Boddit and his Homo sapiens lover, geneticist Mary Vaughan, are torn between two worlds, struggling to find a way to make their star-crossed relationship work. Aided by banned Neanderthal technology, they plan to conceive the first hybrid child, a symbol of hope for the joining of their two versions of reality. But after an experiment shows that Mary's religious faith -- something completely absent in Neanderthals -- is a quirk of the neurological wiring of Homo sapiens brains, Ponter and Mary must decide whether their child should be predisposed to atheism or belief. Meanwhile, as Mary's Earth is dealing with a collapse of its planetary magnetic field, her boss, the enigmatic Jock Krieger, has turned envious eyes on the unspoiled Eden that is the Neanderthal world . . . Hybrids is filled to bursting with Sawyer's signature speculations about alternative ways of being human, exploding our preconceptions of morality and gender, of faith and love. His Neanderthal Parallax trilogy is a classic in the making, and here he brings it to a stunning, thought-provoking conclusion that's sure to make Hybrids one of the most controversial books of the year.

Robert J. Sawyer, the award-winning and bestselling writer, hits the peak of his powers in Humans, the second book of The Neanderthal Parallax, his trilogy about our world and parallel one in which it was the Homo sapiens who died out and the Neanderthals who became the dominant intelligent...  more

Robert J. Sawyer, the award-winning and bestselling writer, hits the peak of his powers in Humans, the second book of The Neanderthal Parallax, his trilogy about our world and parallel one in which it was the Homo sapiens who died out and the Neanderthals who became the dominant intelligent species. This powerful idea allows Sawyer to examine some of the deeply rooted assumptions of contemporary human civilization dramatically, by confronting us with another civilization, just as morally valid, that has made other choices. In Humans, Neanderthal physicist Ponter Boddit, a character you will never forget, returns to our world and to his relationship with geneticist Mary Vaughan, as cultural exchanges between the two Earths begin. As we see daily life in another present-day world, radically different from ours, in the course of Sawyer's fast-moving story, we experience the bursts of wonder and enlightenment that are the finest pleasures of science fiction. Humans is one of the best SF novels of the year, and The Neanderthal Parallax is an SF classic in the making.

The president of the United States is shot in the head by a would-be assassin. Rushed to hospital and barely saved from death, he discovers that he has new memories - memories that are not his own. A scientific experiment has gone awry, and a small group of people now remember each other's...  more

The president of the United States is shot in the head by a would-be assassin. Rushed to hospital and barely saved from death, he discovers that he has new memories - memories that are not his own. A scientific experiment has gone awry, and a small group of people now remember each other's lives. And when one of those people's lives involves access to the most secret and dangerous information in the world, everything will change.

The first book in Kate Elliott's acclaimed Jaran series-the groundbreaking story of a young woman coming of age on an alien planet...and her effect on the human race's survival.

All eyes were watching the eclipse of the Moon when the Wanderer--a huge, garishly colored artificial world--emerged. Only a few scientists even suspected its presence, and then, suddenly and silently, it arrived, dwarfing and threatening the Moon and wreaking havoc on Earth's tides and weather....  more

All eyes were watching the eclipse of the Moon when the Wanderer--a huge, garishly colored artificial world--emerged. Only a few scientists even suspected its presence, and then, suddenly and silently, it arrived, dwarfing and threatening the Moon and wreaking havoc on Earth's tides and weather. Though the Wanderer is stopping in the solar system only to refuel, its mere presence is catastrophic. A tense, thrilling, and towering achievement. Winner of the Hugo Award for Best SF Novel of the Year!

The devastating Food and Fuel Wars have turned once-powerful nations into isolated farming communities. Barter has replaced currency, and scientists-considered responsible for the world's misery-are burned at the stake. Hidden in the Idaho hills, astronomer Allen Chandliss secretly monitors his...  more

The devastating Food and Fuel Wars have turned once-powerful nations into isolated farming communities. Barter has replaced currency, and scientists-considered responsible for the world's misery-are burned at the stake. Hidden in the Idaho hills, astronomer Allen Chandliss secretly monitors his radiotelescope, listening for signs of intelligent life, hoping that aliens will come and improve things on Earth. For seventeen years he has waited patiently. His patience is about to pay off. . . .

The first human interstellar civilization was destroyed by the Mizari-alien Sterilizers from a black star in the Ursa Major cluster. Sixty thousand years later, humanity's far-flung remnants have reunited to form a new galactic empire. The Unified Worlds are vibrant, restless, outward...  more

The first human interstellar civilization was destroyed by the Mizari-alien Sterilizers from a black star in the Ursa Major cluster. Sixty thousand years later, humanity's far-flung remnants have reunited to form a new galactic empire. The Unified Worlds are vibrant, restless, outward bound-and haunted by the ever-present threat of the shadowy Mizari. A system of Sentinels and Shields monitors the frontier, while mighty Defender ships protect the home worlds. But are they enough to counter the Sterilizers? Defense Director Wells thinks not. He spearheads the development of the world-wrecking Triad weapon to battle the enemy. Chancellor Janell Sujata opposes his plan, and pits herself against the Nines, the elitist secret society of which Wells is a leading member. But visionary Merritt Thackery will decide the fate of both races, alien and human. The aged explorer races his stolen ship toward the Mizari system, hurling into the unknown risks of imminent contact-or intergalactic extermination...