Can the Alien Hunters, a group of underdog heroes, stop them? 3 books + nearly 1000 pages of alien invasion and space adventure readers are calling "thrilling," "quirky," and "as action-packed as Star Wars." From a USA Today bestselling author. BOOK 1: Alien Hunters -- The skelkrins. Predators from deep space. Creatures of claws, fangs, and malice. Riff and his crew are the Alien Hunters, ragtag mercenaries who travel the galaxy, trapping and removing cosmic critters. They're just galactic pest controllers, not an army. When the skelkrins attack, will the Alien Hunters be the ones hunting aliens . . . or will aliens hunt them? BOOK 2: Alien Sky -- The Singularity. The day the machines gained awareness. The day they turned cruel. The robotic fleet swarms across the galaxy, slaying all in its path. The Alien Hunters--outgunned, outsmarted, outclassed--fly up to meet these killer robots. The battle between life and machine begins. BOOK 3: Alien Shadows -- On a dead planet orbiting a black hole, shadows stir. Some call them ghosts, others merely figments of the imagination. As these astral beings spread across the cosmos, the Alien Hunters stare into the darkness of deepest space . . . and find terror. Here's what people are saying about Alien Hunters: "A fun, fast-paced space adventure, Alien Hunters introduces a fresh new universe as action-packed as Star Wars or Battlestar Galactica and as quirky as Futurama." -- Jeff Bryan, author of Ellie Jordan, Ghost Trapper "Arenson has brought fun back to space opera. Alien Hunters grab you from the first page and don't let go until the very end. If you love Firefly or Guardians of the Galaxy, you'll dig this." -- Colin F. Barnes, author of Hollow Space "A rollicking good ride! One part Star Wars, a large dollop of Hitchhiker, a pinch of Fifth Element, just a taste of Star Trek, all mixed well with a brilliant imagination and you have one whale of a good space adventure!" -- Linda, an Amazon reviewer

    But the Great Healer of Tranquil Repose is far from benign. Under his command, Daleks guard the catacombs where sickening experiments are conducted on human bodies. The new life he offers the dying comes at a terrible cost – and the Doctor and Peri are being lured into a trap that will change them forever. At last, the only classic-era Doctor Who adventure never to be novelised is here, and by the author of the original script, Eric Saward.

    His work is deeply perceptive, often outrageously funny and always compulsively readable.'Thus the judges of the British Press Awards, in naming Clive James Critic of the Year for 1981. The Crystal Bucket offers a further selection of his inimitable 'visions before midnight ...''C.J. didn't get where he is today just by being funny. He is humane, liberal and compassionate ... What he writes is always pertinent and always witty ... We own him a deep debt of gratitude.' —Gavin Ewart, Listener'Few critics have a more unerring ear for woolliness and doubletalk or a more scathing and entertaining way of dealing with it.' —Lesley Garner, Good Housekeeping'He is one of the most remarkable figures in British cultural life at the moment: a poet and gifted literary critic who is also genuinely liked by the mass audience.' —Michael Mason, London Review of Books'One of the few columnists who make you laugh aloud ... if there were angels he would be on their side: and that would certainly include Charlie’s Angels.' —Melvyn Bragg, Sunday Times

    Her Mam running a still-frozen turkey under the hot tap at ten. Great-Grandma Miller half-cut on cooking sherry by eleven. Her Dad and her uncle arguing hammer and tongs about who was the best James Bond all through dinner. And in the afternoon, Aunty Pat, haring up to the house on the back of a moped weighed down with ridiculous presents.Christmas 2009 didn't turn out like that.Christmas 2009, the Doctor turned up...

    The introduction is by Doctor Who and Torchwood star John Barrowman, and his sister and frequent collaborator, Carole E Barrowman (Anything Goes, Torchwood: Exodus Code). The book’s cover art is by Colleen Coover (Small Favors).Essay contributors to this collection include Tanya Huff (Blood Ties), Melissa Scott (Trouble and Her Friends), John Richards (Outland), Paul Magrs (Hornets’ Nest), Gary Russell (Doctor Who script editor), Rachel Swirsky (Through the Drowsy Dark), Hal Duncan (Ink: The Book of All Hours), Amal El-Mohtar (The Honey Month), Brit Mandelo (Beyond Binary), Nigel Fairs (In Conversation with an Acid Bath Murderer), David Llewellyn (Night of the Humans), Susan J. Bigelow (Extrahumans), Jennifer Pelland (Machine), Mary Anne Mohanraj (Bodies in Motion), and Jed Hartman (Strange Horizons).

    Every year, 130,000 people flock to San Diego for a five-day marathon of Hollywood star power, sensory overload, gigantic shopping bags, grand feats of imagination, tacky nostalgia, very long lines, and people dressed up as Princess Leia. It's the place where people who love the fantastic side of culture go to express that love, and where the companies that want to sell them fantasies in every possible medium try desperately to woo them. Douglas Wolk (author of the Eisner Award-winning "Reading Comics: How Graphic Novels Work and What They Mean") plunges into Comic-Con's bizarre collision of fans and franchises, and looks at what happens when the marketers of movies, TV shows, comics and games meet their most devoted, most demanding consumers.

    Just for fun.Amar always seems so happy, so why is he trying to jump to his death from the school roof?Some of the students of Coal Hill School are not themselves. Some of them are dying. Ram has just woken up in a body he doesn't recognise, and if he doesn't figure out why he may well be next.

    The science-fiction television series Battlestar Galactica is known for raising thought-provoking questions concerning martial law, artificial intelligence, power and corruption, and ultimately what it means to be human. What ethical complexities come into play when one mistake could mean the anihilation of the human race? How do you maintain faith in the Gods when you're involved in an Armageddon of your own creation? What is the distinction between a terrorist and a freedom fighter? These questions are given an intelligent and insightful examination in this engaging collection of essays.

    Posted to newsgroup rec.arts.sf.written on August 10th, 1994 by Ken MacLeod on behalf of Iain M. Banks.Available from www.vavatch.co.uk as A Few Notes on the Culture or from the (defunct) "culture data repository" as A Few Notes on the Culture (Part 1) A Few Notes on the Culture (Part 2)

    "Twilight," "True Blood," "Being Human," "The Vampire Diaries," "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," "Blade," "Underworld," and the novels of Anne Rice and Darren Shan--against this glut of bloodsuckers, it takes an incredible film to make a name for itself. Directed by Tomas Alfredson and adapted for the screen by John Ajvide Lindqvist, The Swedish film "L't den r?tte komma in" (2008), known to American audiences as "Let the Right One In," is the most exciting, subversive, and original horror production since the genre's best-known works of the 1970s. Like "Twilight," "Let the Right One In" is a love story between a human and a vampire--but that is where the resemblance ends. Set in a snowy, surburban housing estate in 1980s Stockholm, the film combines supernatural elements with social realism. It features Oskar, a lonely, bullied child, and Eli, the girl next door. "Oskar, I'm not a girl," she tells him, and she's not kidding--she's a vampire. The two forge an intense relationship that is at once innocent and disturbing. Two outsiders against the world, one of these outsiders is, essentially, a serial killer. What does Eli want from Oskar? Simple companionship, or something else? While startlingly original, "Let the Right One In" could not have existed without the near century of vampire cinema that preceded it. Anne Billson reviews this history and the film's inheritence of (and new twists on) such classics as "Nosferatu" (1979) and "Dracula" (1931). She discusses the genre's early fliration with social realism in films such as "Martin" (1977) and "Near Dark" (1987), along with its adaptation of mythology to the modern world, and she examines the changing relationship between vampires and humans, the role of the vampire's assistant, and the enduring figure of vampires in popular culture.