Eon


Greg Bear - 1985
    NASA, NATO, and the UN sent explorers to the asteroid's surface...and discovered marvels and mysteries to drive researchers mad.For the Stone was from space--but perhaps not our space; it came from the future-but perhaps not our future; and within the hollowed asteroid was Thistledown. The remains of a vanished civilization. A human--English, Russian, and Chinese-speaking--civilization. Seven vast chambers containing forests, lakes, rivers, hanging cities...And museums describing the Death; the catastrophic war that was about to occur; the horror and the long winter that would follow. But while scientists and politicians bickered about how to use the information to stop the Death, the Stone yielded a secret that made even Earth's survival pale into insignificance.

The Other End of Time


Frederik Pohl - 1996
    Author of The World at the End of Time, his latest novel features Dan Dannerman, a poorly paid government agent in the not-too-distant future. Dannerman discovers aliens on an abandoned space station and is drawn into a conflict that encompasses the universe. According to one of its protagonists, the war Dannerman blunders into centers on what "ordinary people have been used to calling 'Heaven.'" A sequel is promised.

A World Out of Time


Larry Niven - 1976
    Once he was outbound, where the Society that ruled Earth could not reach him, he headed his starship toward the galactic core, where the unimaginable energies of the Universe wrenched the fabric of time and space and promised final escape from his captors.Then he returned to an Earth eons older than the one he'd left...a planet that had had 3,000,000 years to develop perils he had never dreamed of -- perils that became nightmares that he had to escape...somehow!

Federation


Judith Reeves-Stevens - 1994
    Captain Kirk and the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701 are faced with their most challenging mission yet—rescuing renowned scientist Zefram Cochrane from captors who want to use his skills to conquer the galaxy. Meanwhile, ninety-nine years in the future on the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701-D, Picard must rescue an important and mysterious person whose safety is vital to the survival of the Federation. As the two crews struggle to fulfill their missions, destiny draws them closer together until past and future merge—and the fate of each of the two legendary starships rests in the hands of the other vessel...

The Final Encyclopedia, 2 of 2


Gordon R. Dickson - 1984
    Dickson's future history of humankind and its ultimate destiny. Now one of its central novels return to print in a two-volume corrected edition.In The Final Encyclopedia the human race is split into three Splinter cultures: the Friendlies, fanatic in their faith; the truth-seeking Exotics; and the warrior Dorsai. But now humanity is threatened by the power-hungry Others, whose triumph would end all human progress.Raised to a destiny as humanity's champion, Hal Mayne must journey deep within his soul to gather the strength he needs to face his ultimate opponent: Bleys Ahrens, the shadowy, powerful leader of the Others. On Hal's success depends nothing less than the future of the human race...A towering landmark of future history, The Final Encyclopedia is a novel every SF fan needs to own.

Singularity Sky


Charles Stross - 2003
    It pushed Earth through the greatest technological evolution ever known, while warning that time travel is forbidden, and transgressors will be eliminated.Distant descendants of this ultra high-tech Earth live in parochial simplicity on the far-flung worlds of the New Republic. Their way of life is threatened by the arrival of an alien information plague known as the Festival. As forbidden technologies are literally dropped from the sky, suppressed political factions descend into revolutionary turmoil.A battle fleet is sent from Earth to destroy the Festival, but Spaceship engineer Martin Springfield and U.N. diplomat Rachel Mansour have been assigned rather different tasks. Their orders are to diffuse the crisis or to sabotage the New Republic's war-fleet, whatever the cost, before the Eschaton takes hostile action on a galactic scale.

Privateers


Ben Bova - 1985
    The U.S. has abandoned its quest for the stars, and old enemy, Soviets, moved in to fill the void. The potential wealth of the universe is now in malevolent army hands. Rebel billionaire Dan Randolph, possessor of the largest privately owned company in space, intends to weaken the stranglehold the new despotic masters of the solar system have on the lucrative ore industry. But when the mineral-rich asteroid he sets in orbit around the Earth is commandeered by the enemy, and his unarmed workers are slaughtered in cold blood, the course of Randolph's life is changed forever. Now cataclysm is aimed at the exposed heart of America -- a potential catastrophe that Randolph himself inadvertently set in motion. The maverick entrepreneur must use his skills, cunning, and vast resources to strike out at his foes hard, fast, with ruthless precision -- and wear proudly the mantle that fate thrust upon him -- space pirate .

The Door Through Space


Marion Zimmer Bradley - 1961
    It is a peaceful reign, held by compact and not by conquest. Again and again, when rebellion threatens the Terran Peace, the natives of the rebellious world have turned against their own people and sided with the men of Terra; not from fear, but from a sense of dedication. There has never been open war. The battle for these worlds is fought in the minds of a few men who stand between worlds; bound to one world by interest, loyalties and allegiance; bound to the other by love. Such a world is Wolf. Such a man was Race Cargill of the Terran Secret Service… At one time Race Cargill had been the best Terran Intelligence agent on the complex and mysterious planet of Wolf. He had repeatedly imperiled his life amongst the half-human and non-human creatures of the sullen world. And he had repeatedly accomplished the fantastic missions until his name was emblazoned with glory. But that had all seemingly ended. For six long years he'd sat behind a boring desk inside the fenced-in Terran Headquarters, cut off there ever since he and a rival had scarred and ripped each other in blood-feud. But when The Door Through Space swung suddenly open, the feud was on again—and with it a plot designed to check and destroy the Terran Empire.

Cold as Ice


Charles Sheffield - 1992
    It was a suicidal spasm in which terrible weapons were created and used; in which nine billion people were killed. The rivalries that led to the war are not gone. And a few of those deadly weapons remain--some still orbiting the sun in the debris of destroyed ships,s some deliberately placed in storage.Now Cyrus Mobarak, the man who perfected the fusion engine, is determined to bring human settlement to the protected seas of Europa. Opposing him is Hilda Brandt, Europa's administrator. And caught between them are three remarkable young people: Jon Perry, Camille Hamilton, and Wilsa Sheer.

For Us, the Living: A Comedy of Customs


Robert A. Heinlein - 2003
    

Sisterhood of Dune


Brian Herbert - 2012
    Great changes are brewing that will shape and twist all of humankind. The war hero Vorian Atreides has turned his back on politics and Salusa Secundus. The descendants of Abulurd Harkonnen Griffen and Valya have sworn vengeance against Vor, blaming him for the downfall of their fortunes. Raquella Berto-Anirul has formed the Bene Gesserit School on the jungle planet Rossak as the first Reverend Mother. The descendants of Aurelius Venport and Norma Cenva have built Venport Holdings, using mutated, spice-saturated Navigators who fly precursors of Heighliners. Gilbertus Albans, the ward of the hated Erasmus, is teaching humans to become Mentats…and hiding an unbelievable secret. The Butlerian movement, rabidly opposed to all forms of “dangerous technology,” is led by Manford Torondo and his devoted Swordmaster, Anari Idaho. And it is this group, so many decades after the defeat of the thinking machines, which begins to sweep across the known universe in mobs, millions strong, destroying everything in its path. Every one of these characters, and all of these groups, will become enmeshed in the contest between Reason and Faith. All of them will be forced to choose sides in the inevitable crusade that could destroy humankind forever….

The Engineer Reconditioned


Neal Asher - 1998
    Mysterious aliens, ruthless terrorists, androids with attitude, genetic manipulation, punch-ups with lasers and giant spaceships! What more do you want?Reprint of The Engineer with three additional stories.The EngineerSpatterjay The OwnerThe Tor-beast's Prison Tiger Tiger

The Tar-Aiym Krang


Alan Dean Foster - 1972
    The planet attracted unwary travelers, hardened space-sailors, and merchant buccaneers -- a teeming, constantly shifting horde that provided a comfortable income for certain quick-witted fellows like Flinx and his pet flying snake Pip. With his odd talents, the pickings were easy enough so that Flinx did not have to be dishonest ... most of the time.In fact, it hardly seemed dishonest at all to steal a starmap from a dead body that didn't really need it anymore. But Flinx wasn't quite smart enough. He should have wondered why the body was dead in the first place...

Strangers from the Sky


Margaret Wander Bonanno - 1987
    But when an alien spacecraft crash-lands in the South Pacific bearing visitors from another world, the Vulcans, Earth must decide whether to extend the hand of friendship, or the fist of war. In the distant future, horrible dreams torment Admiral James T. Kirk, dreams prompted by his reading of Strangers from the Sky, a book about that historic first contact. He dreams of an alternate reality where he somehow changed the course of history, and destroyed the Federation before it began.

The Prefect


Alastair Reynolds - 2007
    His force is Panoply, and his beat is the multi-faceted utopian society of the Glitter Band, that vast swirl of space habitats orbiting the planet Yellowstone. These days, his job is his life.A murderous attack against a Glitter Band habitat is nasty, but it looks to be an open-and-shut case - until Dreyfus starts looking under some stones that some very powerful people would really rather stayed unturned. What he uncovers is far more serious than mere gruesome murder...