He is employed by Freeground station as a port traffic controller, a job he took after completing a tour in the military. His only real joy in life is his participation in true-to-life military simulations with a cadre of friends who come together regularly to defeat challenges made to test the brightest military cadets and officers alike. These restricted scenarios stand as an addictive preoccupation that is so enticing that they ignore the potential repercussions of breaking in to participate. When someone betrays their identities to the Freeground Fleet Admiralty, Jonas and his friends are faced with a far greater challenge: to venture out into the more populated regions of the galaxy to acquire technology and knowledge. They are tasked with laying the groundwork for the Freeground Nation in their efforts to reconnect with the rest of humanity, and to secure the armaments they might need to defend themselves from encroaching enemies. Spinward Fringe Broadcast 0: Origins is a collected trilogy that chronicles the early adventures of an ambitious crew. Their leader, Jonas Valent, has the least to lose and everything to gain as he tells the tale of his first tour as Captain of a ship tasked with making allies and discovering new technologies for the good of his people. This simple mission becomes more complicated as the crew ventures further into the settled fringes of the galaxy. This trilogy spawned the best selling Spinward Fringe eBook series. This is where it all began, when one man was challenged to aspire for more than an idle life. A Space Opera Adventure enjoyed across the globe by all ages.

    The fascination with cosmic mysteries that had led her to become an astronomer in the first place, and a glimmer of professional ambition, still existed somewhere deep inside. But opportunity wasn't exactly pounding down her door.Then it came blazing out of the sky: a huge meteor that crashed in the remote Amazon jungle.It was the scoop of the century for the CNN team covering the event. They wanted an expert with them on the scene, and Lori's boss picked her for the assignment. Only it turned out to be an even more incredibly story than anyone bargained for.The meteor was no ordinary hunk of rock. It held a gateway through space that led to the Well World—a world originally created by a vanished race for a complex, long-term experiment...research now possibly tainted.Lori and the news team weren't the only new variables on the Well World. But their presence was more disruptive because they inadvertently got involved with a centuries-old woman named Mavra Chang, whose association with an even more ancient fellow named Nathan Brazil—the guardian of the Well—had reached a critical point. It was up to Nathan to restart the universe when things went awry. The question was, what had gone awry this time? And did the universe really have to end again to put it right?If either Mavra or Nathan had known about the alien entity that had arranged for the meteor to land on Earth—the first phase of its plan to disrupt the Well World—they'd have had a least one of the answers to those disturbing questions...

    The group’s leader, Naomi Perrault, is a beautiful geneticist who Jack believes conspired to kill his friend, and is claiming that a major international conglomerate developing genetically engineered crops is plotting a sinister transformation of our world that will lead humanity to extinction. As Jack is drawn into a quietly raging war that suddenly explodes onto the front pages of the news, he discovers that her claims may not be so outrageous after all. Together, the two of them must battle a horror Jack could never have imagined, with the fate of all life on Earth hanging in the balance…

    He was just another researcher in a jumpsuit until he saw something that didn't fit. At the time, it was nothing but a blip on a sensor read-out, an asteroid that wasn't an asteroid, but it became his obsession. He named it Zebra-1, and now he's hurtling through the solar system on a mission to see it in person.Meanwhile, the Earth has its own visitors. Seven massive vessels appear out of nowhere and rain hell down from orbit, reducing civilization to a pile of ashes and rubble. Our world is conquered before anyone even knows we're under attack.Enter Jack Hernandez, a search & rescue specialist and true blue everyday hero. After crash-landing in the wasted ruins of China, he links up with the scattered resistance and begins to fight back. Having witnessed the invaders' cruelty first hand, he's driven to do whatever it takes to make them pay in blood.Neither Jack nor Marcus ever could have predicted it, but humanity's future now depends on them both. One will be bonded to an ancient warship and asked to lead, while the other is imprisoned, tortured and forced to submit; before it's over, they'll each face challenges beyond imagination in a savage war as old as time.When the stars rain down from the sky, who will rise up to meet them?

    but what if you could? Most people believe their souls outlive their bodies. Most people would find an organization that tracks their souls into the future and passes on their banked money and memories compelling. Scott Waverly isn't like most people. He spends his days finding and fixing computer security holes. And Scott is skeptical of his new client's claim that they have been calculating and tracking soul identities for almost twenty-six hundred years. Are they running a freaky cult? Or a sophisticated con job? Scott needs to save Soul Identity from an insider attack. Along the way, he discovers the importance of the bridges connecting people's lives.

    But as the Skins invade bucolic Thallspring, Z-B's strategy is about to go awry, all because of: Sgt. Lawrence Newton, a dreamer whose twenty years as a Skin have destroyed his hopes and desires; Denise Ebourn, a school teacher and resistance leader whose guerrilla tactics rival those of Che Guevara and George Washington and Simon Roderick, the director who serves Z-B with a dedication that not even he himself can understand. Grimly determined to steal, or protect, a mysterious treasure, the three players engage in a private war that will explode into unimaginable quests for personal grace...or galactic domination

    It was Avluela the Flier's scarlet and ebony wings that lead the Watcher to the seven hills of the ancient city, leaving the skies and deep space unguarded. And so the invaders came and conquered and Avluela became lost in the turmoil.

    But now, one man believes Sim was a fraud, and Alex must follow the legend into the heart of the alien galaxy to confront a truth far stranger than any fiction.

    1 RefugeeCALIGULA OF THE STARSThough he was later accused of every crime and sexual perversion in the galaxy, Hope Hubris began as an innocent. Because he defended his older sister against the violent lusts of a wealthy scion, Hope and his peasant family were forced to flee Callisto, one of the moons of Jupiter. Pursued by the bloodthirsty scions across the airless desert, they barely escaped with their lives. The illegal space bubble was overcrowded with refugees, all hoping to reach Jupiter for asylum.But the space travelers had not reckoned on the terrible threat of high space-the pirates, barbaric men who rape, rob, and murder, with no thought but to satisfy their bestial appetites. It will take all Hope's ingenuity to survive, but the atrocities he witnesses will never die. There is only one way he can be rid of them . . . REVENGE

    There are some who want to improve it. There are some who want to eradicate it. And there are others who just want to exploit it.When a young scientist is caught improving Nexus, he’s thrust over his head into a world of danger and international espionage – for there is far more at stake than anyone realizes.From the halls of academe to the halls of power, from the headquarters of an elite US agency in Washington DC to a secret lab beneath a top university in Shanghai, from the underground parties of San Francisco to the illegal biotech markets of Bangkok, from an international neuroscience conference to a remote monastery in the mountains of Thailand – Nexus is a thrill ride through a future on the brink of explosion.

    . . Alastair Reynolds burst onto the SF scene with the Arthur C. Clarke Award-shortlisted REVELATION SPACE, British Science Fiction Award-winning CHASM CITY, and REDEMPTION ARK. Now experience the phenomenal imagination and breathtaking vision of 'The most exciting space opera writer working today' (Locus) in these two tales of high adventure set in the same universe as his novels. The title story, 'Diamond Dogs', tells of a group of mercenaries trying to unravel the mystery of a particularly inhospitable alien tower on a distant world; 'Turquoise Days' is about Naqi, who has devoted her life to studying the alien Pattern Jugglers.

    Set in the aftermath of the Dominion War, Avatar heralds both a new threat and a discovery which will profoundly affect the lives of all the crew. Meantime in Abyss, Dr. Julian Bashir faces his darkest nightmare when Section 31, the black ops division of Starfleet, tries to compel him to eliminate one of their own. And in Demons of Air and Darkness, Colonel Kira Nerys and some unexpected allies fight to close down the alien Gateways and avert destruction on a planetary scale. Dark secrets, divided allegiances, treachery and, ultimately, hope - these four tales are Deep Space Nine at its best.

    Joe Bailey is the Spirit Basher. Formerly a professional magician, he's become an ace police detective in Atlanta, debunking phony psychics and spiritualists who prey on the gullible. And he's just caught his first sensational murder case.The victim is someone Joe knew. Dr. Robert Nelson was a professor at Landwyn University, head of the parapsychology program. He was killed in his own home, a sculpture of massive chrome spikes driven through his body and into a wall. A sculpture that no one could possibly have lifted. But Nelson's girlfriend claims to know the murderer: an eight-year-old boy. Jesse Randall is not just any child. Some people say he can move objects using nothing more than his will. Nelson had been studying the boy, and Jesse's anger at the professor was erupting in "shadow storms" — violent telekinetic activity — while Jesse slept. Nelson's girlfriend swears that one of these episodes was responsible for Nelson's brutal death. Joe is far from convinced. He's certain that Jesse's power is a hoax and Nelson's killer is a master of deception. Driven to seek out the truth that surely lies behind the psychic fakery, Joe must rely on his wits to separate what's real from what's illusion — even if it means drawing Jesse's anger on himself. Soon mysterious incidents thrust him and his own child into grave peril. Are they examples of Jesse's shadow storms? Or deadly warnings from someone who cannot allow the Spirit Basher to discover the truth? Joe cannot abandon his search for answers. And he'd better find them fast before whoever — or whatever — impaled Robert Nelson like an insect does the same to him and his daughter.

    The war of words between Right and Left has collapsed into a shooting war, though most people just want to be left alone. The battle rages between the high-technology weapons on one side, and militia foot-soldiers on the other, devastating the cities, and overrunning the countryside. But the vast majority, who only want the killing to stop and the nation to return to more peaceful days, have technology, weapons and strategic geniuses of their own. When the American dream shatters into violence, who can hold the people and the government together? And which side will you be on?Orson Scott Card is a master storyteller, who has earned millions of fans and reams of praise for his previous science fiction and fantasy novels. Now he steps a little closer to the present day with this chilling look at a near future scenario of a new American Civil War.

    They have been the subject of films, radio dramatizations and have even been presented on ice Read the originals now and one of the world's greatest ever story tellers will give you hours of pleasure and enjoyment.Stories included are: "Around the World in 80 Days, The Clipper of the Clouds, Journey to the Centre of the Earth, From the Earth to the Moon" and "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea."