Seventeen of them had not developed interstellar travel. Those were destroyed by the species that did reach the stars. That space-faring eighteenth decimated the human colony on the Semi-Autonomous World Troy. A Marine Force Recon platoon sent to investigate is wiped out almost to the last man. In reaction, the North American Union assembles the largest army seen since the major wars of the 20th Century. A Marine Corps Combat Force is sent to "kick in the door," backed up by a four-division Army corps to take the planet back. The initial landing is unopposed. It isn't until the fleet carrying the Army corps is approaching Troy that the enemy strikes, with devastating effect.

    The Ironclads are 100-foot-long (30 m) machines with remote controlled guns and accommodation for 42 soldiers, including 7 officers.The story is one of those responsible for Wells' reputation as a "prophet of the future", as the eponymous machines seem to anticipate the tanks of World War I. His rather sketchy battle between countrymen and townsmen also carries echoes of the Boer War and his 1898 novel The War of the Worlds, which also features a struggle between technologically uneven protagonists.***The story opens with a war correspondent and a young lieutenant surveying the calm of the battlefield and reflecting upon the war. The two opposing sides are dug into trenches, each waiting for the other to attack, and the men on the war correspondent's side are confident in their coming victory. They believe that they will win because they are all strong outdoor-types - men who know how to use a rifle and fight - while their enemies are towns people ... "a crowd of devitalized townsmen ... They're clerks, they're factory hands, they're students, they're civilized men. They can write, they can talk, they can make and do all sorts of things, but they're poor amateurs at war." The men agree that their "open air life" produces men better suited to war than their opponents' "decent civilization".In the end, however, it is shown that the "decent civilization", with its men of science and engineers, triumphs over the "better soldiers" who, instead of developing land ironclads of their own, had been practicing shooting their rifles from horseback, a tactic which became obsolete the second the land ironclads appeared on the battlefield. The story ends with the entire army captured by a dozen or so of the land ironclads, and the last scene is of the correspondent comparing his countrymen's "sturdy proportions with those of their lightly built captors", and thinking of the story he is going to write about the experience, noting both that the captured officers are thinking of ways they will defeat what they call the enemy's "ironmongery" with their already-existing weaponry, rather than developing their own land ironclads to counter the new threat, and also noting that the "half-dozen comparatively slender young men in blue pajamas who were standing about their victorious land ironclad, drinking coffee and eating biscuits, had also in their eyes and carriage something not altogether degraded below the level of a man."

    Now at last, thanks to the tireless efforts of the Klingon Language Institute, this powerful drama by the legendary Klingon playwright, Wil'yam Shex'pir, can be appreciated in the elegance and glory of its original tongue. This invaluable volume contains the complete text of the play, along with an English translation for easy consultation and comparison. In addition, an incisive introduction explains the play's crucial importance in Klingon culture, while copious notes illustrate how the debased English version diverges from the original, often distorting and even reversing the actual meaning of the verses.Khamlet, the Restored Klingon Version, is a work that belongs in the library of every human who hopes truly to understand what it means to be Klingon.

    -- Presents the most important 20th-century criticism on major works from The Odyssey through modern literature-- The critical essays reflect a variety of schools of criticism-- Contains critical biographies, notes on the contributing critics, a chronology of the author's life, and an index

    (It was free on our web site on Free Ebook Tuesday on the Tuesday before Halloween). Here are:THE WHITE CAT OF DRUMGUNNIOL, by J. Sheridan Le FanuTHURNLEY ABBEY, by Perceval LandonSPIDER MANSION, by Fritz LeiberTHE GREEN THING, by Manly Banister (writing as Gregg Powers)THE ROMAN LADY, by H. B. Fyfe and John Gregory BetancourtIf you enjoy this ebook, don't forget to search your favorite ebook store for "Wildside Press Megapack" to see more of the 260+ volumes in this series, covering adventure, historical fiction, mysteries, westerns, ghost stories, science fiction -- and much, much more!

    He’s playing by Moscow rules now.It’s not the grim Moscow of Soviet times but a new Moscow, where power resides once more behind the walls of the Kremlin and critics are ruthlessly silenced. A Moscow where new Stalinists are plotting to reclaim an empire lost and challenge the dominance of its U.S. enemy.Ivan Kharkov, a former KGB colonel, is an arms dealer—and he is about to deliver Russia’s most sophisticated weapons to al-Qaeda. Unless Allon can learn the time and place of the delivery, the world will see the deadliest terror attacks since 9/11. The Defector Six months after Moscow Rules, Allon has resumed his honeymoon with wife, Chiara. But his world is again thrown into turmoil with news from London. Former Russian intelligence officer Grigori Bulganov, who saved Allon’s life in Moscow, has vanished. British intelligence thinks was a double agent all along, but Allon knows better. He also knows he made a promise.In the days to come, Allon and his team of operatives find themselves in a deadly duel with the ruthless Ivan Kharkov. It will take Allon from a quiet mews in London to the snowbound forests of Russia. Faced with losing the one thing he holds most dear, Allon will be tested in ways he never imagined possible. And his life will never be the same.

    

    Despite the warnings, Aenarion rides out upon his dragon Indraugnir to seek the prize in order to save his homeland of Ulthuan. The journey is fraught with danger, and Aenarion must confront daemons, spirits and the elemental forces of nature itself if he is to succeed. But in drawing the blade from the Black Anvil, he will unleash the ancient and malevolent force that will tear the elven race apart.The events in this story form the underpinnings of the entire Warhammer mythos. What Aenarion does here changes the face of the world in ways that won't be resolved until the End Times themselves...This story is also available in the anthology Age of Legend.

    Ludlum's recent book, The Icarus Agenda, sold nearly one million copies.

    With The Testaments, the wait is over. Margaret Atwood's sequel picks up the story more than 15 years after Offred stepped into the unknown, with the explosive testaments of three female narrators from Gilead. The Handmaid's Tale: Offred is a Handmaid in The Republic of Gilead, a religious totalitarian state in what was formerly known as the United States. She is placed in the household of The Commander, Fred Waterford - her assigned name, Offred, means 'of Fred'. She has only one function: to breed. If Offred refuses to enter into sexual servitude to repopulate a devastated world, she will be hanged. Yet even a repressive state cannot eradicate hope and desire. As she recalls her pre-revolution life in flashbacks, Offred must navigate through the terrifying landscape of torture and persecution in the present day, and between two men upon which her future hangs.

    He never saw them again. Their bodies were never found, and Adam himself was discovered with his back pressed against an oak tree and his shoes filled with blood. The Likeness: Still traumatised by her brush with a psychopath, Detective Cassie Maddox transfers out of the Murder squad and starts a relationship with fellow detective Sam O'Neill. When he calls her to the scene of his new case, she is shocked to find that the murdered girl is her double. Faithful Place: The course of Frank Mackey's life was set by one defining moment when he was nineteen. The moment his girlfriend, Rosie Daly, failed to turn up for their rendezvous in Faithful Place, failed to run away with him to London as they had planned. Broken Harbour: In Broken Harbour, a ghost estate outside Dublin - half-built, half-inhabited, half-abandoned - two children and their father are dead. The mother is on her way to intensive care. Scorcher Kennedy is given the case because he is the Murder squad's star detective. The Secret Place: Even in her exclusive boarding school, in the graceful golden world that Stephen has always longed for, bad things happen and people have secrets. The previous year, Christopher Harper, from the neighbouring boys' school, was found murdered on the grounds. The Trespasser: Being on the Dublin Murder squad is nothing like Detective Antoinette Conway dreamed. Her working life is a stream of thankless cases and harassment. Antoinette is tough, but she's getting close to the breaking point.

    This is edge-of-the-seat, page-turning reading.