The Time Takers


Saxon Andrew - 2014
    Throughout history, humans have been saved a moment before they died. Those that are taken, awake to find themselves in a strange new world different from anything they had ever seen. They discover that some agency has taken them out of the time they lived and dropped them into the early Cretaceous Age. They are now faced with surviving in a world that was called the Golden Age of the Dinosaurs. Not only must they learn how to survive the giant carnivores but also survive other humans. They are challenged to build a civilization ninety million years before the first Homo sapiens appeared on Earth. The humans struggling to survive wonder if the Time Takers are a larger danger than any they face in the prehistoric world they now inhabit. One of them is determined to find out why they were taken and his quest could endanger everyone. Excerpt from: The Time Takers Suddenly, the cave was filled with a deafening roar. Everyone in the cave turned, grabbed their ears and looked to the left, where they saw an opening in the cave wall at the end of a short corridor. Something was filling the opening. Andy was stunned at what he saw. This was a nightmare that could only come from an overdose of bad drugs. Everyone fled across the cave to the wall furthest from the opening. The Romans broke formation and ran with the others. The Roman Leader held his ground and Andy saw he was shocked and frightened out of his wits. It was easy to see why. Andy sprinted across the cave and moved into the short corridor leading to the opening where a giant head with rows of sharp teeth was being pushed further into the cave. He stopped twenty feet from the head, raised the bow and fired an arrow directly into the open mouth of the huge Allosaurus. The giant reptile screamed and jerked its head back out of the opening but not before Andy had notched another arrow and hit it between the eyes with an arrow that buried itself to the fletching. The giant’s roar was silenced as it straightened up and then fell backwards. Andy put the bow over his shoulder and ran toward the entrance. He saw a large stone wheel on the right side of the opening designed to block the entrance and he ran behind it and tried to push it forward. The roars from outside the cave were getting louder…and numerous; everyone inside could hear that there were more of the nightmares that had stuck its head in the cave outside the opening. He pushed as hard as he could but the wheel was just too heavy to move. There was a channel cut into the floor for it to roll in; but it was just too massive to budge. The Roman Leader sprinted over and started pushing with Andy. They looked out of the opening as they struggled to move the stone wheel and saw ten of the giant carnivores were just outside the entrance surrounding the dead Allosaurus,. They appeared to be trying to determine what killed it. One of them looked at the cave opening and started moving toward it. Ten Samurai and five Vikings arrived at that moment and began pushing with Andy and the Roman. The wheel started moving and then rolled over the entrance just before the dinosaur arrived. The men gathered at the wheel felt it lean into the cave for a moment…and then fall back against the opening. This book is dedicated to my brother, Wayne. I wish you could have read this one. Thanks for reading Science Fiction to me when I was five years old. You started me on the path that led me to all the stories that spring from my imagination, I miss you and love you. Visit us on face book at www.facebook.com/SaxonAndrewsUniverse or our website at www.annihilationseries.com. You may contact me directly at saxonandrew@msn.com

Year Million: Science at the Far Edge of Knowledge


Damien Broderick - 2008
    This volume of fifteen new, specially commissioned essays by notable journalists and scholars such as Rudy Rucker, Jim Holt, and Gregory Benford presents a series of speculations on the most radical but well-grounded ideas they can conceive, projecting the universe as it might be in the year 1,000,000 C.E. Their collective effort--first attempted by H. G. Wells in his 1893 essay "The Man of the Year Million"--is an exploration into a barely conceivable distant future, where the authors confront far-flung possibilities, at times bordering on philosophy of science. How would the galaxy look if it were redesigned for optimal energy use and maximized intelligence? What is a universe bereft of stars? Contributors include Amara D. Angelica, Catherine Asaro, Gregory Benford, Robert Bradbury, Sean M. Carroll, Anne Corwin, Dougal Dixon, Robin Hanson, Steven B. Harris, Jim Holt, Lisa Kaltenegger, Wil McCarthy, Rudy Rucker, Pamela Sargent, and George Zebrowski.

Hard Drop


Will van der Vaart - 2013
    Their objective is classified, marked only by coordinates leading them into a deserted city at the heart of the fighting. From the beginning, everything possible goes wrong. A missile strike rocks the carrier mid-launch, and only a fraction of the unit reaches the surface alive.Outmanned, outgunned, and scattered, with a hard deadline to orbital bombardment looming, it is up to Drop Commander Tyco Hale to rally his troops and reach their objective. But what they find, hidden deep in the tunneled passages under the city, will change everything about what he fights for and what he believes in. With the unit in tatters and loyalties divided, the choice he makes in the dark will seal all of their fates - and much more besides.

Life on Mars


Tracy K. Smith - 2011
    What Would your life say if it could talk?                                                            —from “No Fly Zone”With allusions to David Bowie and interplanetary travel, Life on Mars imagines a soundtrack for the universe to accompany the discoveries, failures, and oddities of human existence. In these new poems, Tracy K. Smith envisions a sci-fi future sucked clean of any real dangers, contemplates the dark matter that keeps people both close and distant, and revisits the kitschy concepts like “love” and “illness” now relegated to the Museum of Obsolescence. These poems reveal the realities of life lived here, on the ground, where a daughter is imprisoned in the basement by her own father, where celebrities and pop stars walk among us, and where the poet herself loses her father, one of the engineers who worked on the Hubble Space Telescope.

Elite Dangerous: Premonition


Drew Wagar - 2017
    Disturbing encounters with unknown ships. Three great superpowers manoeuvre against each other. But are their destinies their own, or are they merely the puppets of some greater power? Since the loss of the Prism system in 3300, Lady Kahina Tijani Loren has operated on the fringes of Imperial society. Led by clues from a woman once thought dead, she is drawn into a conspiracy at the heart of humanity. To uncover the truth she must contend with dangerous enemies, navigate murky political waters, and – with the help of her friends – uncover the secret of the Formidine Rift. Premonition is the new story set in the Elite: Dangerous galaxy, shaped by player actions in the game.

The Tenth Awakens


Michael Chatfield - 2018
     What can a broken ex-trooper really do? What are they good for if they’ve gone through the EMF and been tossed out the other side? If you were to ask Mark... Maybe, doing what the enemy couldn’t and following his brothers and sisters. Mark wakes up to a nightmare, to an unfamiliar place with unknown faces. A planet under attack, an enemy he’s never seen before, he just wants to escape, but when he sees others in danger, a trooper stands for something, they stand to protect their own. No matter the cost.

Modernism: A Guide to European Literature 1890-1930


Malcolm Bradbury - 1978
    An exploration of the ideas, groupings and the social tensions that shaped the transformation of life caused by the changes of modernity in art, science, politics and philosophy

Flight Path: A Search for Roots beneath the World's Busiest Airport


Hannah Palmer - 2017
    Having uprooted herself from a promising career in publishing in her adopted Brooklyn, Palmer embarks on a quest to determine the fate of her lost homes—and of a community that has been erased by unchecked Southern progress. Palmer's journey takes her from the ruins of kudzu-covered, airport-owned ghost towns to carefully preserved cemeteries wedged between the runways; into awkward confrontations with airport planners, developers, and even her own parents. Along the way, Palmer becomes an amateur detective, an urban historian, and a mother. Lyrically chronicling the overlooked devastation and beauty along the airport’s fringe communities in the tradition of John Jeremiah Sullivan and Leslie Jamison, Palmer unearths the startling narratives about race, power, and place that continue to shape American cities. Part memoir, part urban history, Flight Path: A Search for My Roots beneath the World's Busiest Airport is a riveting account of one young mother's attempt at making a home where there’s little home left.

Fanged Noumena: Collected Writings, 1987-2007


Nick Land - 2011
    Garbage time is running out.Can what is playing you make it to Level 2?Fanged Noumena assembles for the first time the writings of Nick Land, variously described as 'rabid nihilism', 'Deleuzian Thatcherism', 'accelerationism', and 'cybergothic'. Wielding weaponised, machinically-recombined versions of Deleuze and Guattari, Reich and Freud, in the company of fellow 'werewolves' such as Nietzsche, Bataille, Artaud, Trakl, and Cioran, to a cut-up soundtrack of Bladerunner, Terminator, and Apocalypse Now, Land plotted a rigorously schizophrenic escape route out of academic philosophy, and declared all-out war on the Human Security System. Despite his 'disappearance', Land's output has been a crucial underground influence both on recent Speculative Realist thought, and on artists, writers, musicians, and filmmakers invigorated by his uncompromising and abrasive philosophical vision.Beginning with Land's radical rereadings of Heidegger, Nietzsche, and Kant, and ending with Professor Barker's cosmic theory of geo-trauma and neo-qabbalistic attempts to formulate a numerical anti-language, Fanged Noumena rescues from obscurity papers, talks and articles some of which have never previously appeared in print. Long the subject of rumour and vague legend, Land's turbulent post-genre theory-fictions of cybercapitalist meltdown smear cyberpunk, philosophy, arithmetic, poetics, cryptography, anthropology, grammatology, and the occult into unrecognisable and gripping hybrids.Fanged Noumena is a dizzying trip through Land's rigorous, incisive, and provocative work, establishing it as an indispensable resource for radically inhuman thought in the twenty-first century.

Orb Station Zero


Dan Davis - 2016
    An alien space station, a threat to the Sol System and a gateway to the galactic civilization. For the last hundred years, humanity has sent a champion to fight for our future. Every one has lost. Now, monstrous aliens have designs on the Sol System itself. The winner of a single bout of deadly combat inside the Orb Station will be granted the rights to conquer Earth and all of her fledgling colonies. This is the final chance for victory before humanity is destroyed. Rama Seti is a professional gamer, a hero of the virtual world. He has not left his apartment in years, he is morbidly obese and has no real world combat experience. But, when the tactical surgeon from the United Nations Orb Project breaks into his home and cuts off his head, Rama is transplanted onto a giant, genetically engineered body designed to be the perfect weapon. Success in this mission means humanity will finally take its place as a member of the galactic network of alien empires. Failure will mean our destruction. If you enjoyed Ender's Game, Starship Troopers, The Forever War, and Old Man's War, you'll love Orb Station Zero, the first in a new military science fiction series.

Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy


Isaac AsimovRobert A. Heinlein - 1991
    Award-winning writers such as John Barnes, James Patrick Kelly, Norman Spinrad, Connie Willis, and Jane Yolen reveal some of their secrets of crafting believable stories, while Grand Masters Isaac Asimov and Robert A. Heinlein provide timeless advice for beginners and veterans alike. The editors also provide valuable insights into the process by which stories get published and they offer helpful hints on getting your story out of the slush pile and into print. Contents Seeing Your Way to Better Stories • essay by Stanley SchmidtYou and Your Characters • essay by James Patrick KellyLiving the Future: You Are What You Eat • (1976) • essay by Gardner DozoisDialog • [Asimov's Editorials] • (1985) • essay by Isaac AsimovPlotting • [Asimov's Editorials] • (1989) • essay by Isaac AsimovOn the Writing of Speculative Fiction • (1947) • essay by Robert A. HeinleinTurtles All the Way Down • essay by Jane YolenLearning to Write Comedy or Why It's Impossible and How to Do It • essay by Connie WillisGood Writing is Not Enough • essay by Stanley SchmidtThe Creation of Imaginary Worlds: The World Builder's Handbook and Pocket Companion • (1974) • essay by Poul AndersonThe Creation of Imaginary Beings • (1974) • essay by Hal ClementHow to Build a Future • (1990) • essay by John BarnesBuilding a Starfaring Age • essay by Norman SpinradThe Ideas That Wouldn't Die • essay by Stanley SchmidtThe Mechanics of Submission • essay by Sheila WilliamsRevisions • [Asimov's Editorials] • (1982) • essay by Isaac AsimovWriting for Young People • [Asimov's Editorials] • (1986) • essay by Isaac AsimovNew Writers • [Asimov's Editorials] • (1987) • essay by Isaac AsimovAuthors vs. Editors • essay by Stanley SchmidtMarket Listings • essay by Ian Randal Strock

Surrealist Women: An International Anthology


Penelope RosemontGisèle Prassinos - 1998
    Indeed, few artistic or social movements can boast as many women forebears, founders, and participants-perhaps only feminism itself. Yet outside the movement, women's contributions to surrealism have been largely ignored or simply unknown. This anthology, the first of its kind in any language, displays the range and significance of women's contributions to surrealism. Letting surrealist women speak for themselves, Penelope Rosemont has assembled nearly three hundred texts by ninety-six women from twenty-eight countries. She opens the book with a succinct summary of surrealism's basic aims and principles, followed by a discussion of the place of gender in the movement's origins. She then organizes the book into historical periods ranging from the 1920s to the present, with introductions that describe trends in the movement during each period. Rosemont also prefaces each surrealist's work with a brief biographical statement.

Star Brigade: Quartet (Star Brigade Books 1-4)


C.C. Ekeke - 2018
    Ekeke's bestselling Star Brigade Series At the dawn of the 25th century, Star Brigade was an elite military unit in the Galactic Union, and Habraum Nwosu one of its best soldiers. Until a deadly ambush massacred his team and Star Brigade’s reputation. BUT THE UNION STILL NEEDS HEROES Extremist threats and old enemies return from the fringes of space to threaten the Galactic Union’s inhabitants. FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTION Now Habraum must rebuild the Brigade from scratch with a dwindling roster of untested recruits, all while fighting to protect the Union he serves with his own shoot-first, punch-next brand of justice. The Star Brigade Quartet contains the FIRST FOUR books in the series, a prequel novella and several exclusive short stories for a discounted price. 300+ five-star reviews, 1500+ pages of space battles, supersoldier combat, and heart-pounding intergalactic intrigue. Find out why readers are so enthralled by this riveting science fiction saga.

Danger Stalks the Land: Alaskan Tales of Death and Survival


Larry Kaniut - 1999
    This one-of-a-kind anthology captures the spine tingling adventures of daring men and women who venture into Alaska's vast wilderness and look death in the eye. Danger Stalks the Land relates gripping episodes of animal attacks, avalanches, aircraft disasters, fishing, hunting, and skiing accidents, and chronicles risky climbs and reckless mountaineering amid Alaska's fantastic peaks. Through exhaustive research and interviews, author Larry Kaniut has captured in one volume, the terror and beauty of man's attempt to explore a vast and unforgiving land.

Illuminations: Essays and Reflections


Walter Benjamin - 1955
    Illuminations includes Benjamin's views on Kafka, with whom he felt the closest personal affinity, his studies on Baudelaire and Proust (both of whom he translated), his essays on Leskov and on Brecht's Epic Theater. Also included are his penetrating study on "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction," an illuminating discussion of translation as a literary mode, and his thesis on the philosophy of history. Hannah Arendt selected the essays for this volume and prefaces them with a substantial, admirably informed introduction that presents Benjamin's personality and intellectual development, as well as his work and his life in dark times. Reflections the companion volume to this book, is also available as a Schocken paperback.Unpacking My Library, 1931The Task of the Translator, 1913The Storyteller, 1936Franz Kafka, 1934Some Reflections on Kafka, 1938What Is Epic Theater?, 1939On Some Motifs in Baudelaire, 1939The Image of Proust, 1929The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, 1936Theses on the Philosophy of History, written 1940, pub. 1950