The Sardonyx Net


Elizabeth A. Lynn - 1981
    There could be crueler masters than Rhani Yago, the beautiful and powerful aristocrat. Dana forges a dangerous bond with his master--and discovers that on a world where drugged criminals are used as slaves, rebellion may be the highest form of love.

Tales of the Dying Earth


Jack Vance - 1998
    Jack Vance is one of the most remarkable talents ever to grace the world of science fiction. His unique, stylish voice has been beloved by generations of readers. Some of his enduring classics are the 1950 novel The Dying Earth and its sequels, The Eyes of the Overworld, Cugel's Saga, and Rialto the Marvelous.

The Stars, Like Dust


Isaac Asimov - 1951
    A radiation bomb planted in his dorm room changed him from an innocent student at the University of Earth to a marked man, fleeing desperately from an unknown assassin.He soon discovers that, many light-years away, his father, the highly respected Rancher of Widemos, has been murdered. Stunned, grief-stricken, and outraged, Biron is determined to uncover the reasons behind his father’s death, and becomes entangled in an intricate saga of rebellion, political intrigue, and espionage.The mystery takes him deep into space where he finds himself in a relentless struggle with the power-mad despots of Tyrann. Now it is not just a case of life or death for Biron, but a question of freedom for the galaxy.

A Passage of Stars


Kate Elliott - 1990
    Born to a powerful clan on the storm-wracked colony world of Unruli, she'd grown up willful, independent, strong. The only person who held her respect was the enigmatic man called Heredes, who tutored her in history and the martial arts.So when alien bounty hunters kidnapped Heredes, she threw away her heritage and set out after him on an awesome odyssey through the unknown reaches of space.

The Martian Tales Trilogy


Edgar Rice Burroughs - 2003
    In the first installment, Carter wins the affections of the "princess of Mars" and the respect of the Martian warlords whom he befriends. The excitement continues in The Gods of Mars when Carter engages the Black Pirates in airborne combat above the dead seas of Mars and leads a revolt to free the Martian races from a religion that thrives on living sacrifices. In the third book, Warlord of Mars, Carter overcomes the forces of evil that would destroy the planet. By the end of the trilogy the Martians all clamor for a triumphant John Carter to be their king.About the Author:Born in Chicago, Illinois, on September 1, 1875, Edgar Rice Burroughs grew to maturity during the height of the Industrial Revolution and witnessed the emergence of the United States as a twentieth-century world power. Hailing from a well-to-do family, Burroughs was given an aristocratic education steeped in Latin and Greek, but he was drawn more to an itinerant life of adventure than to a life in the boardroom. The author of Tarzan of the Apes (1912), Burroughs did not confine himself to a single genre; he also wrote medieval romances (The Outlaw of Torn, 1914), westerns (The War Chief of the Apaches, 1927), and mainstream novels (The Girl from Hollywood, 1922).

Battlefield Earth: A Saga of the Year 3000


L. Ron Hubbard - 1982
    Earth has been 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 tenuous balance.

The Great Dune Trilogy


Frank Herbert - 1979
    This volume includes the titles Dune, Dune Messiah and Children of Dune.

The Forever Man


Gordon R. Dickson - 1986
    The voice of its pilot still survives - a mind merged with the ship itself.Now, Earth's scientists attempt to duplicate the feat. Pilot Jim Wander has been chosen for the dangerous mission. His spirit transferred from his body to his own ship, Wander must make peace with the Laagi...Or lose his ship and his mind.

The Price of the Stars


Debra Doyle - 1992
    Beka pilots spacecraft -- as far from her famous family as possible.Then Beka's mother is assassinated on the Senate floor, and her father offers her the title to Warhammer, prize ship from his own freebooting youth -- if she agrees to deliver the assassins to him "off the books."Looking for assassins has a tendency to make assassins look for you. In doing so, Beka's arranged her own very public death and adopted a new identity; now all she has to do is leave a trail of kidnappings and corpses across five star systems, and blow the roof off the strongest private fortress in the galaxy.

Imperial Earth


Arthur C. Clarke - 1975
    Titan, an independent republic, was originally colonized from Earth three generations earlier. Duncan's initial challenge is to prepare, physically and intellectually, for the 500-million-mile trip to Earth. Once there, he is caught up in a sweep of new experiences, including the social and political whirl in Washington, a strange visit to a carefully preserved ancient city once prominent in the 20th century, and a search for and meeting with a woman he loved since she visited Titan years before.

Nerilka's Story & The Coelura


Anne McCaffrey - 1987
    Everyone, holder and dragonrider alike, pitched in to help -- except Nerilka's father, who refused to share Fort Hold's bounty with the other Holds. So, ashamed of her family and determined to do her part, Nerilka packed up medicines and supplies and sneaked off to aid her people.Her quest to help wherever she was most needed led her finally to RuathaHold, where Lord Alessan was frantically preparing the precious serumneeded for mass inoculations against the dread plague.Nerilka had long ago abandoned the hope of marriage and a home of her own. Now she found happiness in being useful and appreciated -- first the Healers and then Alessan made very clear that they were grateful for her help.She had no idea that her new path would change the course of her life forever!

House Atreides


Brian Herbert - 1999
    By his death in 1986, Herbert had completed six novels in the series, but much of his vision remained unwritten. Now, working from his father's recently discovered files, Brian Herbert and bestselling novelist Kevin J. Anderson collaborate on a new novel, the prelude to Dune—where we step onto the planet Arrakis…decades before Dune's hero, Paul Muad'Dib Atreides, walks its sands.Here is the rich and complex world that Frank Herbert created, in the time leading up to the momentous events of Dune. As Emperor Elrood's son plots a subtle regicide, young Leto Atreides leaves for a year's education on the mechanized world of Ix; a planetologist named Pardot Kynes seeks the secrets of Arrakis; and the eight-year-old slave Duncan Idaho is hunted by his cruel masters in a terrifying game from which he vows escape and vengeance. But none can envision the fate in store form them; one that will make them renegades—and shapers of history.

The Phoenix in Flight


Sherwood Smith - 1993
    As a 20-year-long plot for revenge comes to fruition, the sons of the ruler of the Thousand Suns are murdered, and he is taken prisoner. But the usurper's vengeance is incomplete. For one son was missing at the ceremony where the fatal blow was struck. And now the hope of the Thousand Suns rests in his hands.

Shadow & Claw


Gene Wolfe - 1994
    Shadow & Claw brings together the first two books of the tetralogy in one volume.

In the Days of the Comet


H.G. Wells - 1906
    But mankind is too busy hating, stealing, scheming, and killing to care. As luminous green trails of cosmic dust and vapor stream across the heavens, blood flows beneath: nations wage all-out war, bitter strikes erupt, and jealous lovers plot revenge and murder. The earth slips past the comet by the narrowest of margins, but all succumb to the gases in its tail. When mankind wakes up, everyone is completely and profoundly different. An ill-fated romance between Willie Leadford and Nettie Stuart unfolds in a world buried in misery and bent on its own destruction. After the earth passes through the comet's tail, suffering, pettiness, and injustice melt away. Willie, Nettie, and everyone around them are reborn. They now see themselves and their world in a dramatically new and wonderful way.