The Essential Ellison: A 50 Year Retrospective


Harlan Ellison - 1998
    But his range is much broader than that, encompassing stories, novels, essays, reviews, reminiscences, plays, even fake autobiographies. The Essential Ellison, a special limited edition personally signed and numbered by Ellison, contains 74 unabridged works, including such classics as "A Boy and His Dog," "Xenogenesis," and "Mefisto in Onyx."

Machine of Death: A Collection of Stories About People Who Know How They Will Die


Ryan NorthArryn Diaz - 2010
    It didn't give you the date and it didn't give you specifics. It just spat out a sliver of paper upon which were printed, in careful block letters, the words DROWNED or CANCER or OLD AGE or CHOKED ON A HANDFUL OF POPCORN. It let people know how they were going to die." Machine of Death tells thirty-four different stories about people who know how they will die. Prepare to have your tears jerked, your spine tingled, your funny bone tickled, your mind blown, your pulse quickened, or your heart warmed. Or better yet, simply prepare to be surprised. Because even when people do have perfect knowledge of the future, there's no telling exactly how things will turn out. Featuring stories by: * Randall Munroe* Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw* Tom Francis* Camille Alexa* Erin McKean* James L. Sutter* Douglas J. Lane* and many others.Featuring illustrations by: * Kate Beaton* Kazu Kibuishi* Aaron Diaz* Jeffrey Brown* Scott C.* Roger Langridge* Karl Kerschl* Cameron Stewart* and many others

Subterranean Scalzi Super Bundle


John Scalzi - 2012
    Subterranean Press bundles together all of their John Scalzi titles into one easy-to-buy special this November:How I Proposed To My Wife: An Alien Sex StoryAn ElectionJudge Sn Goes GolfingQuestions for a SoldierThe Sagan DiaryThe Tale of the WickedThe God EnginesYou're Not fooling Anyone When You Take Your Laptop to the Coffee Shop

Hollow World


Michael J. Sullivan - 2014
    All his life he has played it safe and done the right thing, but when faced with a terminal illness, he’s willing to take an insane gamble. He’s built a time machine in his garage, and if it works, he’ll face a world that challenges his understanding of what it means to be human, what it takes to love, and the cost of paradise. He could find more than a cure for his illness; he might find what everyone has been searching for since time began…but only if he can survive Hollow World. Welcome to the future and a new sci-fantasy thriller from the bestselling author of The Riyria Revelations.BEST OF & MOST ANTICIPATED LISTS• 2014 Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Science Fiction• 2014 The Qwillery's Brannigan Cheney’s Top 3 books• 2014 The Fictional Hangout’s Best Books of the Year• 2014 Ranting Dragon’s Ten Fantasy and Science-Fiction Novels worth reading in April• 2014 Barnes and Noble Top Fantasy and Science Fiction Picks for April• 2014 Ranting Dragon’s 30 Most Anticipated Science Fiction and Fantasy Novels• 2014 The Book Probe’s Most Anticipated Sci-Fi Novels• 2013 The BiblioSanctum’s Top 10 Reads• 2013 Fantasy Review Barn’s Barney Award for Outstanding Reads

Qualify


Vera Nazarian - 2014
    You die, or you Qualify. The year is 2047. An extinction-level asteroid is hurtling toward Earth, and the descendents of ancient Atlantis have returned from the stars in their silver ships to offer humanity help.But there’s a catch.They can only take a tiny percent of the Earth’s population back to the colony planet Atlantis. And in order to be chosen, you must be a teen, you must be bright, talented, and athletic, and you must Qualify.Sixteen-year-old Gwenevere Lark is determined not only to Qualify but to rescue her entire family.Because there’s a loophole.If you are good enough to Qualify, you are eligible to compete in the brutal games of the Atlantis Grail, which grants all winners the laurels, high tech luxuries, and full privileges of Atlantis Citizenship. And if you are in the Top Ten, then all your wildest wishes are granted… Such as curing your mother’s cancer.There is only one problem.Gwen Lark is known as a klutz and a nerd. While she’s a hotshot in classics, history, science, and languages, the closest she’s come to sports is a backyard pool and a skateboard.This time she is in over her head, and in for a fight of her life, against impossible odds and world-class competition—including Logan Sangre, the most amazing guy in her class, the one she’s been crushing on, and who doesn’t seem to know she exists.Because every other teen on Earth has the same idea. You Qualify or you die. * * *EXCERPT!Now you can read Chapter One in its entirety (click here)!* * *

Wonderbook: The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction


Jeff VanderMeer - 2013
    Employing an accessible, example-rich approach, Wonderbook energizes and motivates while also providing practical, nuts-and-bolts information needed to improve as a writer. Aimed at aspiring and intermediate-level writers, Wonderbook includes helpful sidebars and essays from some of the biggest names in fantasy today, such as George R. R. Martin, Lev Grossman, Neil Gaiman, Michael Moorcock, Catherynne M. Valente, and Karen Joy Fowler, to name a few.Praise for Wonderbook: “Jammed with storytelling wisdom.” —Fast Company’s Co.Create blog“This is the kind of book you leave sitting out for all to see . . . and the kind of book you will find yourself picking up again and again.” —Kirkus Reviews online“If you’re looking for a handy guide to not just crafting imaginative fiction like sci-fi, fantasy, and horror, but to writing in general, be sure to pick up a copy of Steampunk Bible author Jeff Vandermeer’s lovingly compiled Wonderbook."  —Flavorwire“Jeff Vandermeer and Jeremy Zerfoss have created a kaleidoscopically rich and beautiful book about fiction writing.”  —Star Tribune“Because it is so layered and filled with text, tips, and links to online extras, this book can be read again and again by both those who want to learn the craft of writing and those interested in the process of others.” —Library Journal

The World Inside


Robert Silverberg - 1971
    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).

Light


M. John Harrison - 2002
    John Harrison’s dangerously illuminating new novel, three quantum outlaws face a universe of their own creation, a universe where you make up the rules as you go along and break them just as fast, where there’s only one thing more mysterious than darkness.In contemporary London, Michael Kearney is a serial killer on the run from the entity that drives him to kill. He is seeking escape in a future that doesn’t yet exist—a quantum world that he and his physicist partner hope to access through a breach of time and space itself. In this future, Seria Mau Genlicher has already sacrificed her body to merge into the systems of her starship, the White Cat. But the “inhuman” K-ship captain has gone rogue, pirating the galaxy while playing cat and mouse with the authorities who made her what she is. In this future, Ed Chianese, a drifter and adventurer, has ridden dynaflow ships, run old alien mazes, surfed stellar envelopes. He “went deep”—and lived to tell about it. Once crazy for life, he’s now just a twink on New Venusport, addicted to the bizarre alternate realities found in the tanks—and in debt to all the wrong people.Haunting them all through this maze of menace and mystery is the shadowy presence of the Shrander—and three enigmatic clues left on the barren surface of an asteroid under an ocean of light known as the Kefahuchi Tract: a deserted spaceship, a pair of bone dice, and a human skeleton.

Redliners


David Drake - 1996
    They had too many screaming memories to be fit for combat again, but they were far too dangerous to themselves and others to be returned to civilian life.The bureaucracy that administered human affairs arranged a final mission with the same ruthless efficiency as it conducted the war against the Kalendru. C41 would guard a colony being sent to a hell planet. If the troops succeeded, they might be ready to return to human society.When the mission went horribly wrong, Art Farrell and his troops found their lives on the line as never before, protecting civilians to whom bureaucratic injustice was a new experience. And there was one more thing...A story of soldiers and civilians,of hope and, possibly, redemption.

The Chimera Vector


Nathan M. Farrugia - 2012
    They run our militaries. They run our governments. They run our terrorist cells.Recruited as a child, Sophia is a deniable operative for the Fifth Column. Like all operatives, Sophia's DNA has been altered to augment her senses and her mind is splintered into programmed subsets.On a routine mission in Iran something goes catastrophically wrong. Bugs are beginning to appear in Sophia's programming and the mission spins out of control.High-speed chases, gun fights, helicopter battles, immortal psychopaths, super soldiers and mutant abilities are all in the mix in this edge-of-your-seat action-packed techno-thriller.Perfect for fans of Matthew Reilly, The Chimera Vector melds sci-fi with sizzling espionage action.

The Child Garden


Geoff Ryman - 1989
    Information, culture, law and politics are biological functions. But Milena is different: she is resistant to viruses and an incredible musician, one of the most extraordinary women of her age. This is her story and that of her friends, like Lucy the immortal tumour and Joseph the Postman whose mind is an information storehouse for others, and Rolfa, genetically engineered as a Polar Bear, whose beautiful singing voice first awakens Milena to the power of music.

Metropolis


Thea von Harbou - 1925
    It contains bits of the story that got lost on the cutting-room floor; in a very real way it is the only way to understand the film. Michael Joseph of The Bookman wrote about the novel: "It is a remarkable piece of work, skillfully reproducing the atmosphere one has come to associate with the most ambitious German film productions. Suggestive in many respects of the dramatic work of Karel Capek and of the earlier fantastic romances of H. G. Wells, in treatment it is an interesting example of expressionist literature. ... Metropolis is one of the most powerful novels I have read and one which may capture a large public both in America and England if it does not prove too bewildering to the plain reader."

Gridlinked


Neal Asher - 2001
    Unfortunately Cormac is nearly burnt out, "gridlinked" to the AI net so long that his humanity has begun to drain away. He has to take the cold-turkey cure and shake his addiction to having his brain on the net.Now he must do without just as he's sent to investigate the unique runcible disaster that's wiped out the entire human colony on planet Samarkand in a thirty-megaton explosion. With the runcible out, Cormac must get there by ship, but he has incurred the wrath of a vicious psychopath called Arian Pelter, who now follows him across the galaxy with a terrifying psychotic killer android in tow. And deep beneath Samarkand's surface there are buried mysteries, fiercely guarded.This is fast-moving, edge-of-the-seat entertainment, and a great introduction to the work of one of the most exciting new SF talents in years.

Reunion


Michael Jan Friedman - 1991
    Stargazer," on an incredible twenty-two year voyage. Now Picard is reunited with his old crew for the first time in over a decade, on a mission to see his former first officer installed as ruler of the Daa'Vit Empire. The reunion turns deadly when a ruthless assassin begins eliminating the "U.S.S. Stargazer" crew one by one. Picard's present and former shipmates must join forces to solve the mystery of the Captain's past, before the killer strikes again.

Cosmonaut Keep


Ken MacLeod - 2000
    Against his better judgment, he accepts an assignment to crack the Marshall Titov, a top-secret orbital station operated by the European Space Agency. But what Matt will discover there will propel him on an extraordinary and quite unexpected journey.Gregor Cairns is an exobiology student and descendant of one of Terra Nova's first families. Hopelessly infatuated with a lovely young trader's daughter, he is unaware that his research partner, Elizabeth, has fallen in love with him. Together, Gregor and Elizabeth confront the great work his family began three centuries earlier-to rediscover the secret of interstellar travel.Ranging from a gritty near-future Earth to a distant alien world, Cosmonaut Keep is contemporary science fiction at its highest level, a visionary epic filled with daring individuals seeking a place for themselves in a vast, complex, and enigmatic universe. Cosmonaut Keep is a 2002 Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel.