The Science Fiction Hall of Fame: Volume II A


Ben BovaH.G. Wells - 1973
    There is no better anthology that captures the birth of science fiction as a literary field. Published in 1973 to honor stories that had come before the institution of the Nebula Awards, The Science Fiction Hall of Fame introduced tens of thousands of young readers to the wonders of science fiction and was a favorite of libraries across the country. This volume contains novellas by: Ray Bradbury, James Blish, Algis Budrys, Theodore Cogswell, E. M. Forster, Frederik Pohl, James H. Schmitz, T. L. Sherred, Wilmar H. Shiras, Clifford D. Simak, and Jack Vance.Contents: Introduction · Ben Bova · in · Call Me Joe · Poul Anderson · nv Astounding Apr ’57 · Who Goes There? [as by Don A. Stuart] · John W. Campbell, Jr. · na Astounding Aug ’38 · Nerves · Lester del Rey · na Astounding Sep ’42 · Universe [Hugh Hoyland] · Robert A. Heinlein · na Astounding May ’41 · The Marching Morons · C. M. Kornbluth · nv Galaxy Apr ’51 · Vintage Season [as by Lawrence O’Donnell] · Henry Kuttner & C. L. Moore · na Astounding Sep ’46 · ...And Then There Were None · Eric Frank Russell · na Astounding Jun ’51 · The Ballad of Lost C’Mell · Cordwainer Smith · nv Galaxy Oct ’62 · Baby Is Three · Theodore Sturgeon · na Galaxy Oct ’52 · The Time Machine [Time Machine] · H. G. Wells · na The New Review Jan, 1895 (+4) · With Folded Hands... [Humanoids] · Jack Williamson · nv Astounding Jul ’47

Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm: A New English Version


Philip Pullman - 2012
    Now, at a veritable fairy-tale moment—witness the popular television shows Grimm and Once Upon a Time and this year’s two movie adaptations of “Snow White”—Philip Pullman, one of the most popular authors of our time, makes us fall in love all over again with the immortal tales of the Brothers Grimm.From much-loved stories like “Cinderella” and “Rumpelstiltskin,” “Rapunzel” and “Hansel and Gretel” to lesser-known treasures like “Briar-Rose,” “Thousandfurs,” and “The Girl with No Hands,” Pullman retells his fifty favorites, paying homage to the tales that inspired his unique creative vision—and that continue to cast their spell on the Western imagination.

The Girl with All the Gifts


M.R. Carey - 2014
    Dr. Caldwell calls her "our little genius."Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant Parks keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don't like her. She jokes that she won't bite, but they don't laugh.Melanie loves school. She loves learning about spelling and sums and the world outside the classroom and the children's cells. She tells her favorite teacher all the things she'll do when she grows up. Melanie doesn't know why this makes Miss Justineau look sad.The Girl with All the Gifts is a sensational thriller, perfect for fans of Stephen King, Justin Cronin, and Neil Gaiman.

Unnatural Creatures


Neil GaimanGahan Wilson - 2013
    Nesbit, Diana Wynne Jones, Gahan Wilson, and other literary luminaries. Sales of Unnatural Creatures benefit 826DC, a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting students in their creative and expository writing, and to helping teachers inspire their students to write.

Alien: Out of the Shadows


Tim Lebbon - 2013
    But in deep space, he found only darkness and isolation. Then on planet LV178, he and his fellow miners discovered a storm-scoured, sand-blasted hell - and trimonite, the hardest material known to man.When a shuttle crashed into the mining ship Marion, the miners learn that there was more than trimonite deep in the caverns. There was evil, hibernating - and waiting for suitable prey.Hoop and his associates uncover a nest of Xenomorphs, and hell takes on new meaning. Quickly they discover that their only hope lies with the unlikeliest of saviors...Ellen Ripley, the last human survivor of the salvage ship Nostromo.

The Mammoth Book of Steampunk


Sean WallaceAliette de Bodard - 2012
    Contributors include: Jeff VanderMeer, Caitlín Kiernan, Mary Robinette Kowal, Jay Lake, Cherie Priest, Cat Rambo, Catherynne M. Valente, Genevieve Valentine, and many more.Contents:Steampunk : looking to the future through the lens of the past / Ekaterina Sedia --Fixing Hanover / Jeff VanderMeer --The Steam Dancer (1896) / Caitlin R. Kierman --Icebreaker / E. Catherine Tobler --Tom Edison and his amazing telegraphic harpoon / Jay Lake --The Zeppelin Conductors' Society Annual Gentlemen's Ball / Genevieve Valentine Clockwork fairies / Cat Rambo --The mechanical aviary of Emperor Jala-ud-din Muhammad Akbar / Shweta Narayan --Prayers of forges and furnaces / Aliette de Bodard --The effluent engine / N.K. Jemisin --The clockwork goat and the smokestack magi / Peter M. Ball --The armature of flight / Sharon Mock --The anachronist's cookbook / Catherynne M. Valente --Numismatics in the reigns of Naranh and Viu / Alex Dally MacFarlane --Zeppelin City / Eileen Gunn & Michael Swanwick --The people's machine / Tobias S. Buckell --The hands that feed / Matthew Kressel --Machine maid / Margo Lanagan --To follow the waves / Amal El-Mohtar --Clockmaker's requiem / Barth Anderson --Dr Lash remembers / Jeffrey Ford --Lady Witherspoon's solution / James Morrow --Reluctance / Cherie Priest --A serpent in the gears / Margaret Ronald --The celebrated carousel of the Margravine of Blois / Megan Arkenberg --Biographical notes to ''A discourse on the nature of causality, with air-planes'' by Benjamin Rosenbaum / Benjamin Rosenbaum --Clockwork chickadee / Mary Robinette Kowal --Cinderella suicide / Samantha Henderson --Arbeitskraft / Nick Mamatas --To seek her fortune / Nicole Kornher-Stace --The ballad of the last human / Lavie Tidhar.

Touch


Claire North - 2015
    But when reaching out to the murderer for salvation in those last dying moments, a sudden switch takes place.Now Kepler is looking out through the eyes of the killer himself, staring down at a broken and ruined body lying in the dirt of the alley.Instead of dying, Kepler has gained the ability to roam from one body to another, to jump into another person’s skin and see through their eyes, live their life — be it for a few minutes, a few months or a lifetime.Kepler means these host bodies no harm — and even comes to cherish them intimately like lovers. But when one host, Josephine Cebula, is brutally assassinated, Kepler embarks on a mission to seek the truth — and avenge Josephine’s death.

The New Dead: A Zombie Anthology


Christopher GoldenRick Hautala - 2010
    They hide in back yards, car lots, shopping malls. They devour neighbors, dogs and police officers. And they are here to stay. The real question is, what are you going to do about it? How will you survive?How will the world change when the dead begin to rise? Stoker-award-winning author Christopher Golden has assembled an original anthology of never-before-published zombie stories from an eclectic array of today's hottest writers. Inside there are stories about military might in the wake of an outbreak, survival in a wasted wasteland, the ardor of falling in love with a zombie, and a family outing at the circus. Here is a collection of new views on death and resurrection.With stories from Joe Hill, John Connolly, Max Brooks, Kelley Armstrong, Tad Williams, David Wellington, David Liss, Aimee Bender, Jonathan Maberry, and many others, this is a wildly diverse and entertaining collection... the last word on The New Dead.

The Island of Dr. Moreau


H.G. Wells - 1896
    G. Wells was greeted in 1896 by howls of protest from reviewers, who found it horrifying and blasphemous. They wanted to know more about the wondrous possibilities of science shown in his first book, The Time Machine, not its potential for misuse and terror. In The Island of Dr. Moreau, a shipwrecked gentleman named Edward Prendick, stranded on a Pacific island lorded over by the notorious Dr. Moreau, confronts dark secrets, strange creatures, and a reason to run for his life.While this riveting tale was intended to be a commentary on evolution, divine creation, and the tension between human nature and culture, modern readers familiar with genetic engineering will marvel at Wells’s prediction of the ethical issues raised by producing “smarter” human beings or bringing back extinct species. These levels of interpretation add a richness to Prendick’s adventures on Dr. Moreau’s island of lost souls without distracting from what is still a rip-roaring good read.

Project Hail Mary


Andy WeirAndy Weir - 2021
    He can't even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it.All he knows is that he's been asleep for a very, very long time. And he's just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company.His crewmates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, he realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Hurtling through space on this tiny ship, it's up to him to puzzle out an impossible scientific mystery—and conquer an extinction-level threat to our species.And with the clock ticking down and the nearest human being light-years away, he's got to do it all alone.Or does he?An irresistible interstellar adventure as only Andy Weir could imagine it, Project Hail Mary is a tale of discovery, speculation, and survival to rival The Martian—while taking us to places it never dreamed of going.

Gutted: Beautiful Horror Stories


Doug MuranoPaul Tremblay - 2016
    Awe meets ache. Terror becomes transcendence. Regret gives way to rebirth. Fifteen short stories and one poem span nearly every twisted corner of the horror and dark fiction genres:A woman experiences an emotional reckoning inside a haunted house. A father sees his daughter rescued after a cold case is solved, only to learn the tragic limits of his love. A man awakens a vengeful spirit and learns the terrible price of settling scores. A boy comes of age into awareness of a secret universe of Lovecraftian scale. A young woman confronts the deathly price of existence inside a German concentration camp during the Holocaust. And much, much more…Gutted: Beautiful Horror Stories features the most celebrated voices in dark fiction, as well as a number of exciting, new talents, including: Clive Barker, Neil Gaiman, Ramsey Campbell, Paul Tremblay, John F.D. Taff, Lisa Mannetti, Damien Angelica Walters, Josh Malerman, Christopher Coake, Mercedes M. Yardley, Brian Kirk, Stephanie M. Wytovich, Amanda Gowin, Richard Thomas, Maria Alexander and Kevin Lucia. With a foreword from Cemetery Dance magazine founder Richard Chizmar.

Zoo


James Patterson - 2012
    This is James Patterson's best book ever.TotalFor 36 years, James Patterson has written unputdownable, pulse-racing novels. Now, he has written a book that surpasses all of them. ZOO is the thriller he was born to write.WorldAll over the world, brutal attacks are crippling entire cities. Jackson Oz, a young biologist, watches the escalating events with an increasing sense of dread. When he witnesses a coordinated lion ambush in Africa, the enormity of the violence to come becomes terrifyingly clear.DestructionWith the help of ecologist Chloe Tousignant, Oz races to warn world leaders before it's too late. The attacks are growing in ferocity, cunning, and planning, and soon there will be no place left for humans to hide.

Legends


Robert SilverbergOrson Scott Card - 1998
    Each of the writers was asked to write a new story based on one of his or her most famous series. Stephen King tells a tale of Roland, the Gunslinger, in the world of The Dark Tower, in "The Little Sisters of Eluria."Terry Pratchett relates an amusing incident in Discworld, of a magical contest and the witch Granny Weatherwax, in "The Sea and Little Fishes"Terry Goodkind tells of the origin of the Border between realms in the world of The Sword of Truth, in "Debt of Bones."Orson Scott Card spins a yarn of Alvin and his apprentice from the Tales of Alvin Maker, in "Grinning Man."Robert Silverberg returns to Majipoor and to Lord Valentine's adventure in an ancient tomb, in "the Seventh Shrine."Ursual K. Le Guin adds a sequel to her famous books of Earthsea, portraying a woman who wants to learn magic, in "Dragonfly."Tad Williams tells a dark and enthralling story of a great and haunted castle in the age before Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn, in "The Burning Man."George R.R. Martin sets his piece a generation before his epic, A Song of Ice and Fire, in the adventure of "The Hedge Knight."Ann McCaffrey, the poet of Pern, returns once again to her world of romance and adventure in "Runner of Pern."Raymond E. Feist's Riftwar Saga is the setting of the tale of "The Wood Boy."Robert Jordan, in "New Spring," tells of crucial events in the years leading up to The Wheel of Time, of the meeting of Lan and Moiraine and the beginning of the search for the child who must grow to lead in the Last Battle.

Amped


Daniel H. Wilson - 2012
    When the United States Supreme Court rules that implanted individuals are no longer a protected class, Owen's life is changed forever, as he discovers that his implant has a very dangerous secret.

Other Worlds Than These


John Joseph AdamsAlastair Reynolds - 2012
    From The Wizard of Oz to The Dark Tower, from Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass to C. S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia, there is a rich tradition of this kind of fiction, but never before have the best parallel world stories and portal fantasies been collected in a single volume—until now.