Welcome to Urban Monad 116. A lofty spire reaching nearly two miles into the sky, the one thousand stories of this building are home to over eight hundred thousand people living in peace and harmony. In the year 2381, nearly all of Earth's 75 billion live in the hundreds of monolithic structures scattered across the globe, with the exception of the small agricultural communes that supply the Urbmons with food. Life in Urbmon 116 is highly regulated, life is cherished, and the culture of procreation is seen as the highest pinnacle of god's plan. Conflict is abhorred, and any who disturb the peace face harsh punishment, to risk being labeled a flippo, for whom there is only one punishment, being sent "down the chute" to be recycled as fertilizer. But inside their glorious world are a few who dare to doubt and dream:Aurea Holston, a beautiful young bride who fears leaving the only world she's ever known.Jason Quevedo, a historian, searches records of the twentieth century hoping to find the root of his discontent with the perfection of Urbmon life.Siegmund Kluver, a young and ambitious administrator, strives to reach the top levels of the Urbmon?s government and discovers the civilization's dark truths.Michael Statler, a computer engineer, harbors a forbidden desire. He dreams of leaving the building, of walking in the open air and visiting the far-off sea. This is a dream he must keep secret. If anyone were to find out, he'd face the worst punishment imaginable.The World Inside is a fascinating exploration of society and what makes us human, told by a master of speculative fiction. This novel consists of a number of shorter works linked together. Fixup of the following stories: All the Way Up, All the Way Down (1971), We Are Well Organized (1970). The Throwbacks (1970), The World Outside (1970), A Happy Day in 2381 (1970), and In the Beginning (1970).

    Now, after twenty-one annual collections, comes the ultimate in science fiction anthologies, The Best of the Best: 20 Years of the Year's Best Science Fiction, in which legendary editor Gardner Dozois selects the very best short stories for this landmark collection. Contributors include: * Stephen Baxter * Greg Bear * William Gibson * Terry Bisson * Pat Cadigan * Ted Chiang * John Crowley * Tony Daniel * Greg Egan * Molly Gloss * Eileen Gunn * Joe Haldeman * James Patrick Kelly * John Kessel * Nancy Kress * Ursula K. Le Guin * Ian R. MacLeod * David Marusek * Paul McAuley * Ian McDonald * Maureen F. McHugh * Robert Reed * Mike Resnick * Geoff Ryman * William Sander * Lucius Shepard * Robert Silverberg * Brian Stableford * Bruce Sterling * Charles Stross * Michael Swanwick * Steven Utley * Howard Waldrop * Walter Jon Williams * Connie Willis * Gene WolfeWith work spanning two decades, The Best of the Best stands as one of the ultimate science fiction anthologies ever published.Contents xi • Foreword (The Best of the Best: 20 Years of the Year's Best Science Fiction) • essay by Robert Silverbergxvii • Preface (The Best of the Best: 20 Years of the Year's Best Science Fiction) • essay by Gardner Dozois1 • Blood Music • (1983) • novelette by Greg Bear19 • A Cabin on the Coast • (1984) • shortstory by Gene Wolfe28 • Salvador • (1984) • shortstory by Lucius Shepard42 • Trinity • (1984) • novella by Nancy Kress78 • Flying Saucer Rock and Roll • (1985) • novelette by Howard Waldrop (aka Flying Saucer Rock & Roll)93 • Dinner in Audoghast • (1985) • shortstory by Bruce Sterling103 • Roadside Rescue • (1985) • shortstory by Pat Cadigan109 • Snow • (1985) • shortstory by John Crowley121 • The Winter Market • (1985) • novelette by William Gibson137 • The Pure Product • (1986) • novelette by John Kessel152 • Stable Strategies for Middle Management • (1988) • shortstory by Eileen Gunn162 • Kirinyaga • [Kirinyaga • 2] • (1988) • novelette by Mike Resnick177 • Tales from the Venia Woods • [Roma Eterna] • (1989) • shortstory by Robert Silverberg191 • Bears Discover Fire • (1990) • shortstory by Terry Bisson199 • Even the Queen • (1992) • shortstory by Connie Willis213 • Guest of Honor • (1993) • novelette by Robert Reed238 • None So Blind • (1994) • shortstory by Joe Haldeman246 • Mortimer Gray's History of Death • (1995) • novella by Brian Stableford (aka Mortimer Gray's "History of Death")293 • The Lincoln Train • (1995) • shortstory by Maureen F. McHugh303 • Wang's Carpets • (1995) • novelette by Greg Egan328 • Coming of Age in Karhide • [Hainish] • (1995) • novelette by Ursula K. Le Guin342 • The Dead • (1996) • shortstory by Michael Swanwick352 • Recording Angel • (1996) • shortstory by Ian McDonald363 • A Dry, Quiet War • (1996) • novelette by Tony Daniel380 • The Undiscovered • (1997) • novelette by William Sanders400 • Second Skin • (1997) • shortstory by Paul J. McAuley418 • Story of Your Life • (1998) • novella by Ted Chiang454 • People Came from Earth • (1999) • shortstory by Stephen Baxter464 • The Wedding Album • [Cathy] • (1999) • novella by David Marusek502 • 10 to 16 to 1 • (1999) • novelette by James Patrick Kelly (aka 1016 to 1)520 • Daddy's World • (1999) • novelette by Walter Jon Williams541 • The Real World • [Silurian Tales] • (2000) • shortstory by Steven Utley561 • Have Not Have • (2001) • novelette by Geoff Ryman577 • Lobsters • [Macx Family] • (2001) • novelette by Charles Stross597 • Breathmoss • (2002) • novella by Ian R. MacLeod647 • Lambing Season • (2002) • shortstory by Molly Gloss

    London is devastated. New worlds are being explored. And the aliens have arrived...The aliens are here. And they want to help. The extraordinary new project from one of the country's most acclaimed and consistently brilliantly SF novelists of the last 30 years.The Jackaroo have given humanity 15 worlds and the means to reach them. They're a chance to start over, but they're also littered with ruins and artifacts left by the Jackaroo's previous clients.Miracles that could reverse the damage caused by war, climate change, and rising sea levels. Nightmares that could for ever alter humanity - or even destroy it.Chloe Millar works in London, mapping changes caused by imported scraps of alien technology. When she stumbles across a pair of orphaned kids possessed by an ancient ghost, she must decide whether to help them or to hand them over to the authorities. Authorities who believe that their visions point towards a new kind of danger.And on one of the Jackaroo's gift-worlds, the murder of a man who has just arrived from Earth leads policeman Vic Gayle to a war between rival gangs over possession of a remote excavation site.Something is coming through. Something linked to the visions of Chloe's orphans, and Vic Gayle's murder investigation. Something that will challenge the limits of the Jackaroo's benevolence...

    Le Guin—selected with an introduction by the author, and combined in one volume for the first time.The Unreal and the Real is a collection of some of Ursula K. Le Guin’s best short stories. She has won multiple prizes and accolades from the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters to the Newbery Honor, the Nebula, Hugo, World Fantasy, and PEN/Malamud Awards. She has had her work collected over the years, but this is the first short story volume combining a full range of her work. Stories include: -Brothers and Sisters -A Week in the Country -Unlocking the Air -Imaginary Countries -The Diary of the Rose -Direction of the Road -The White Donkey -Gwilan’s Harp -May’s Lion -Buffalo Gals, Won’t You Come Out Tonight -Horse Camp -The Water Is Wide -The Lost Children -Texts -Sleepwalkers -Hand, Cup, Shell -Ether, Or -Half Past Four -The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas -Semely’s Necklace -Nine Lives -Mazes -The First Contact with the Gorgonids -The Shobies’ Story -Betrayals -The Matter of Seggri -Solitude -The Wild Girls -The Flyers of Gy -The Silence of the Asonu -The Ascent of the North Face -The Author of the Acacia Seeds -The Wife’s Story -The Rule of Names -Small Change -The Poacher -Sur -She Unnames Them -The Jar of Water

    China has been devastated by the Formic's initial efforts to eradicate Earth life forms and prepare the ground for their own settlement. The Scouring of China struck fear into the other nations of the planet; that fear blossomed into drastic action when scientists determined that the single ship that wreaked such damage was merely a scout ship.There is a mothership out beyond the Solar System's Kuiper Belt, and it's heading into the system, unstoppable by any weapons that Earth can muster.Earth has been reorganized for defense. There is now a Hegemon, a planetary official responsible for keeping all the formerly warring nations in line. There's a Polemarch, responsible for organizing all the military forces of the planet into the new International Fleet. But there is an enemy within, an enemy as old as human warfare: ambition and politics. Greed and self-interest. Will Bingwen, Mazer Rackam, Victor Delgado and Lem Juke be able to divert those very human enemies in time to create a weapon that can effectively defend humanity in the inexorable Second Formic War?

    The society is an anarchy, with disputes mediated through the Machiavellian Committee for the Revolution. Mars, Venus and the Moon support flourishing colonies of various political stripes. On the fringes of the solar system, in the Gas Planets, a strange, new, violent kind of human has evolved. In this unstable system the anarchist Paula Mendoza, an agent of the Committee, works to make peace, and ultimately protect her people, in a catastrophic clash of worlds that destroys the order she knows.

    Their charter was for a Class III uninhabited planet, which Zarathustra was, and it meant they owned the planet lock stock and barrel. They exploited it, developed it and reaped the huge profits from it without interference from the Colonial Government. Then Jack Holloway, a sunstone prospector, appeared on the scene with his family of Fuzzies and the passionate conviction that they were not cute animals but little people.

    It warranted a big dig, one that could lead to the mother lode, and professional immortality. But, what Dr Helen Sutter didn't realise was that it would take her all the way to Mars!

    150 years later, planet Darien hosts humans at peace with indigenous scholarly Uvovo. Buried on the forest moon are secrets of an epic battle between ancient races. In a galactic war, what will Uvovo choose, when their nature is revealed, and the enemy comes?

    All tech was concealed and the animals (and the humans brought to live there) were bioengineered to help the guests enjoy their stay…But the Empire was shattered in a horrific war; centuries later humanity has lost much of the advanced technology, and Artemis is a fable told to children. Until young archeologist Griffin Dane finds intriguing hints that send him on a quest to find the lost world. After crashing his ship, he encounters Adara the Huntress and her psych-linked companion, the puma Sand Shadow. Their journey with her will lead Dane to discover the planet's secrets…and perhaps provide a key to give unimagined power back to mankind.

    Despite her family's concerns, Binti's talent for mathematics and her aptitude with astrolabes make her a prime candidate to undertake this interstellar journey.But everything changes when the jellyfish-like Medusae attack Binti's spaceship, leaving her the only survivor. Now, Binti must fend for herself, alone on a ship full of the beings who murdered her crew, with five days until she reaches her destination.There is more to the history of the Medusae--and their war with the Khoush--than first meets the eye. If Binti is to survive this voyage and save the inhabitants of the unsuspecting planet that houses Oomza Uni, it will take all of her knowledge and talents to broker the peace.Collected now for the first time in omnibus form, follow Binti's story in this groundbreaking sci-fi trilogy.

    As the founder of Biogineers, he is on the cusp of revolutionizing brain therapies with microscopic nanorobots that will make certain degenerative diseases become a thing of the past. But after his research is stolen by an unknown enemy, seventy thousand people die in Las Vegas in one abominable moment. No one is more horrified than Peter, as this catastrophe sets in motion events that will forever change not only his life but also the course of human evolution.Peter’s company is torn from his grasp as the public clamors for his blood. Desperate, he turns to an old friend, who introduces him to the Phoenix Club, a cabal of the most powerful people in the world. To make himself more valuable to his new colleagues, Peter infuses his brain with experimental technology, exponentially upgrading his mental prowess and transforming him irrevocably.As he’s exposed to unimaginable wealth and influence, Peter’s sense of reality begins to unravel. Do the club members want to help him, or do they just want to claim his technology? What will they do to him once they have their prize? And while he’s already evolved beyond mere humanity, is he advanced enough to take on such formidable enemies and win?

    But they do watch over us. They watch our lives unfold, analyzing us for repeating patterns and redundancies. When they find them, the angels simplify those patterns, they remove the redundancies, and the problem that is you gets solved.Carey doesn’t much like that idea. As a punk living in New York City, 1977, Carey is sick and tired of watching the strange kids with the unnoticeable faces abduct his friends. He doesn’t care about the rumors of tarmonsters in the sewers, or unkillable psychopaths invading the punk scene—all he wants is drink cheap beer and dispense asskickings.Kaitlyn isn’t sure what she’s doing with her life. She came to Hollywood in 2013 to be a stunt woman, but last night a former teen heartthrob tried to eat her, her best friend has just gone missing, and there’s an angel outside her apartment.Whatever she plans on doing with her life, it should probably happen in the few remaining minutes she has left of it.There are angels. There are demons. They are the same thing. It’s up to Carey and Kaitlyn to stop them. The survival of the human race is in their hands.We are, all of us, well and truly screwed.

    As the secrets of the artifact are revealed, Sparta uncovers a mystery that may lead her to the truth about her own identity.

    After falling in with Natalie, an ultra-rich heiress trying to escape the clutches of her repressive father, the two decide to give up fully on formal society—and walk away.After all, now that anyone can design and print the basic necessities of life—food, clothing, shelter—from a computer, there seems to be little reason to toil within the system.It’s still a dangerous world out there, the empty lands wrecked by climate change, dead cities hollowed out by industrial flight, shadows hiding predators animal and human alike. Still, when the initial pioneer walkaways flourish, more people join them. Then the walkaways discover the one thing the ultra-rich have never been able to buy: how to beat death. Now it’s war – a war that will turn the world upside down.Fascinating, moving, and darkly humorous, Walkaway is a multi-generation SF thriller about the wrenching changes of the next hundred years…and the very human people who will live their consequences.At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.