Book picks similar to
Voice of the Elders by Greg Ripley


dnf
ll
political-thriller
alien-first-contact-adapt-culture

Anomaly


Hugo Navikov - 2018
     An Above-Top-Secret project brings military brass, elite commandos, ice-drilling experts, and abducted scientists to investigate a 100-mile-long 'gravitational anomaly' half a mile under the West Antarctic Ice Shelf. Their target: a spaceship buried for millions of years, home to a menagerie of alien and prehistoric horrors that could be unleashed on Earth and end every life on it.

Trashlands


Alison Stine - 2021
    Dick Award, comes a resonant, visionary novel about the power of art and the sacrifices we are willing to make for the ones we loveA few generations from now, the coastlines of the continent have been redrawn by floods and tides. Global powers have agreed to not produce any new plastics, and what is left has become valuable: garbage is currency.In the region-wide junkyard that Appalachia has become, Coral is a “plucker,” pulling plastic from the rivers and woods. She’s stuck in Trashlands, a dump named for the strip club at its edge, where the local women dance for an endless loop of strangers and the club's violent owner rules as unofficial mayor.Amid the polluted landscape, Coral works desperately to save up enough to rescue her child from the recycling factories, where he is forced to work. In her stolen free hours, she does something that seems impossible in this place: Coral makes art.When a reporter from a struggling city on the coast arrives in Trashlands, Coral is presented with an opportunity to change her life. But is it possible to choose a future for herself?Told in shifting perspectives, Trashlands is a beautifully drawn and wildly imaginative tale of a parent's journey, a story of community and humanity in a changed world.“A harrowing tale that is a natural extension of our current climate crisis.... Highly recommended.” –Booklist, starred review

The Four Patriots


Sumit Agarwal - 2016
    Salman, CEO of Coffee Moments, loves Mahi.Raghav, a virtuous politician, loves Neha.Aditya, an altruist businessman, is married to Prachi.Destiny invites them to step out of their comfort zones and fight the devil that holds their country captive. Will they choose country over love, comfort and success? Will they enter the Chakravyuh, intricately laid down to ensure their destruction? Will they come out of it alive and win back our lost pride?Buckle up for a roller-coaster ride into the lives of these four young men who are out to change the system which could not be changed in the last 70 years of independence. A story fraught with romance and patriotism. The story unveils how the four patriots ( our protagonists ) fight against terrorism, corruption, naxalites, poverty and many other problems, apart from the web spun for their destruction by their rivals ( the villians ). Against all odds, they come out victorious, ultimately bringing glory and pride to our country.Also pick this book if you are a patriot and do not believe that “ is desh ka kuch nahin ho sakta.” If you do, all the more reason to read it !

Invasion Day


Scott Moon - 2020
    One night he saddles himself with a hitchhiker, a nuisance who’s more than she seems. And that’s when everything changes.No one was ready for an alien invasion. Death is raining from the sky and the only question left is do you run, fight, or submit.For David Osage and his family, answering is as easy as giving the alien invaders the finger.

Her Royal Runner


Joey Anderle - 2016
    He is selected to act as her bodyguard during a political crisis in her land. Which isn't part of our Earth. Although tasked with keeping her out of trouble for forty-eight hours, Booker is finding Her Royal Princess Auralee to be a little more adventurous than he had expected. Join Runner Sterling Booker Wells as he attempts to keep the Elven Princess out of harm's way.

Something New Under the Sun


Alexandra Kleeman - 2021
    But California is not as he imagined: drought, wildfire, and corporate corruption are omnipresent, and the company behind a mysterious new brand of synthetic water seems to be at the root of it all. Partnering with Cassidy--after having been her reluctant chauffeur for weeks--the two of them investigate the sun-scorched city's darker crevices, where they discover that catastrophe resembles order until the last possible second.In this poised and all-too-timely story, Kleeman grapples with an issue that is very much front-of-mind: the corruption of our environment in the age of alternative facts. She does so with a meticulous and deeply felt accounting of our very human anxieties, liabilities, dependencies, and ultimately, our responsibility to truth.

The End We Start From


Megan Hunter - 2017
    Days later, the family are forced to leave their home in search of safety. As they move from place to place, shelter to shelter, their journey traces both fear and wonder as Z's small fists grasp at the things he sees, as he grows and stretches, thriving and content against all the odds.This is a story of new motherhood in a terrifying setting: a familiar world made dangerous and unstable, its people forced to become refugees. Startlingly beautiful, Megan Hunter's The End We Start From is a gripping novel that paints an imagined future as realistic as it is frightening. And yet, though the country is falling apart around them, this family’s world – of new life and new hope – sings with love.

Ship's Log


Lawrence P. White - 2019
     The Harbok: a star-faring civilization that shoots on sight and refuses to communicate with anyone. Scouts from both civilizations encounter each other in the skies over Earth. Greg Hamilton, a retired special operations soldier who is minding his own business, stumbles into the detritus of that meeting: She struggled for each word. “No . . . hospital.” He reached a hand out and caressed her cheek. “Of course you’re going to a hospital. I’ll be as easy on you as I can, but we can’t delay.” Visibly gathering strength from somewhere, she lifted blue eyes to look directly into his own. She spoke slowly and clearly, “I . . . am . . . not . . . of . . . this . . . Earth.” Though he knows nothing about aliens nor space travel, Greg knows first-hand the ugliness of war. Rather than fight a war, he chooses to end a war. To begin the process, he has to keep an injured An’Atee pilot, the sole survivor of the encounter, alive long enough to get her back to her own doctors. If he plays his cards right though, saving her might include a ride into space.

Mercenary Warden


Miles Rozak - 2020
    Betrayal will make him a legend. Eleven years after the invasion, the galaxy lives in an uneasy peace and Chandler Vail has been changed by war. A killing machine with no battlefield, now he works for a PMC in Special Operations. But when he’s sent to extract a runaway, and the kid dies at the hands of mysterious hitmen, he tracks the killers to a utopian mega-ship built for the galaxy’s wealthy. What he discovers onboard is nothing short of terrifying. Passengers and crew alike show up dead in gruesome, unexplained ways. Outside access to its hatches are sealed, and all contact with the flight deck’s been lost. The ship is flying to a heading unknown… And every person onboard wants him dead. Descending into a fight for survival, soon he discovers an enemy onboard with shocking ties to his past… And a stranglehold on the galaxy. Mercenary Warden is the first scifi thriller in the Shadow Empire series. If you like the gritty combat of The Last Reaper, the camaraderie of Galaxy's Edge, or the fun of The Mandalorian, you won’t be able to stop reading this new action-packed scifi adventure.

Neither Here nor There


Mackey Chandler - 2018
    So many scientific discoveries have been serendipity rather than a goal to which someone worked as a logical progression. Instead, it was a spill or a misplaced item. An ingredient measured out in error or from the wrong bottle. Often, a mistake over which someone was bright enough or curious enough to say: “Oops, but that’s interesting, isn’t it?” Uranium ore left next to photo plates, adhesive that wasn’t as permanent as hoped for, but still usefully tacky, or foreign growths in a Petri dish acting strangely… A major revelation could be a blessing indeed, or if it was big enough to be a life changing development, one might have a tiger by the tail. Wouldn’t that be interesting?

Mother Ship


Scott Bartlett - 2019
     A ship for every city. An invasion force beyond our comprehension. Max Edwards has always felt like something was wrong with the world. Like something was…off. Like his entire life was a lie being told by the people around him. Then, it begins. From his friend’s acreage outside Oklahoma City, he witnesses a giant saucer descend from the sky to hover over the city. Countries all around the world report the same thing – mysterious vessels that refuse all attempts to communicate. As the world comes apart at the seams, Max realizes everything that’s ever happened to him was leading up to this. And as impossible as it seems, he may be the only one with the ability to save humanity. Mere survival won't be enough. Humanity stands to lose everything. To fight the invaders, Max must forget everything he thought he knew.

Interim


P.K. Lentz - 2015
    The crew of the sub-light freighter Lady of Chaos wants nothing to do with it. But when two fugitives, one a scientist, the other a rogue agent of the Social Engineering Service, the Interim's death squad, come aboard, Lady becomes the most wanted ship in the galaxy. And that's even before the Interim learns the true identity of her captain. The hunt is on, and its outcome will leave the universe forever changed. Interim is non-wartime, character driven space opera with plenty of action in the vein of Peter F. Hamilton, Charles Sheffield, Frederick Pohl, David Brin, and others.

Kazan


Ava York - 2020
    A woman determined to get back to her life.They'll fight the match, but can they fight fate?A mate is the last thing on my mind.Especially one as sassy as the human female they say is my match.Even if her lush curves call for my touch, and her fiery spirit is equal to my own.I will endure the thirty days demanded by the Protocol.But with every look, every word, I can feel us bound closer together.Will I be able to leave her, even for her own safety?Kazan is the first book of the Jorkan Protocol Mates. Spend the night with this perfect steamy, funny science fiction romance escape. There's no cheating, and a guaranteed HEA for each alien warrior and his mate! Hot, steamy alien yumminess!

Fringe Runner


Rachel Aukes - 2016
    Too far away to be governed under Earth law, the Collective was formed. Several hundred years later, the Collective has expanded to a thriving system of six inhabited worlds.Old captain Aramis Reyne and his ragtag crew on the Gryphon are runners, part of the Collective's interplanetary postal service. They deliver mail and supplies to the farthest, darkest reaches of the system known as the fringe. After a warship captain confiscates one of his packages, Reyne discovers a galactic conspiracy involving military leaders, secret organizations, fringe rebels, and pirates…with the Gryphon’s crew stuck in the middle. The only way out is for Reyne to make an impossible delivery, and the entire Collective is at stake if he fails.

The Cloud Seeders


Jamie Zerndt - 2012
    This is the slogan of the Sustainability Unit and of a country gone eco-hysterical. After nearly twelve months without rain and the hinges of the world barely still oiled, Thomas and his younger brother, Dustin, set out across a drought-ridden landscape in search of answers. What they discover along the way will change their lives, and their country, forever.