Book picks similar to
A Mankind Witch by Dave Freer


fantasy
alternate-history
heirs-of-alexandria
fiction

The Dragon Done It


Eric FlintRon Goulart - 2008
    Pity the poor private eye (or official investigator, for that matter), who has to solve a case which may involve death by black magic, evidence that may have been altered or planted by an itinerant sorcerer, and supernatural entities.

Time Spike


Eric Flint - 2008
    They thought it was an earthquake until they found that the Mississippi river had disappeared, along with all signs of civilization. Then the sun came up -- in the wrong direction. And a dinosaur came by and scratched its hide against the wall of the prison... Something had thrown the prison back in time millions of years. And they were not alone. Other humans from periods centuries, even millennia apart had also been dropped into the same time. Including a band of murderous conquistadores. But the prison had its own large population of murderers. They couldn't be turned loose, but what else could be done with them? Death walked outside the walls, human savagery was planning to break loose inside, and Stephens and the other men and women of the prison's staff were trapped in the middle.

The Otherworld


Mercedes Lackey - 2000
    But this time the endangered child Amanda has incredible powers and in her fear might destroy Earth and Faerie both!

Digital Knight


Ryk E. Spoor - 2003
    The a body with two holes in its neck and no blood left turned up at his back door, and he found himself dealing with the kind of information that can get a man killed, or worse, much worse.Being chased by things out of myth and nightmare, Jason has only two weapons: his best friend, and his won quick wits.In a battle against darkness, the brightest weapon is the light of reason.

A Logic Named Joe


Murray Leinster - 1946
    He succeeds beyond anyone's wildest expectations, becoming not just a pirate, but the deadliest do-gooder in the galaxy.Gateway to Elsewhere - Suppose that in another dimension, the world of the Arabian Nights is real, including very powerful and very dangerous djinns, who are nothing like Aladdin's big blue pal. A man from our world wouldn't have a chance against them ... or, would he?The Duplicators - A planet with a machine which can duplicate anything would be the wealthiest world in the galaxy, right? Wrong. And unless the hapless voyager who's trapped on the planet can find a solution to its problem, he isn't going to live to leave again. Plus three short stories, including "A Logic Named Joe," an uncannily prophetic story of home computers and the internet - written in 1946.

Pandora's Legions


Christopher Anvil - 2002
    And in spite of their more advanced weapons, the Centrans weren't sure just who had conquered who.

Warp Speed


Travis S. Taylor - 2004
    Neal Anson Clemons, brilliant physicist and martial arts expert, was born at the very moment that men first landed on the moon, and his dream had always been to find a way to travel to the stars. And now he and his team have achieved a breakthrough, both in building a warp drive, and finding a new energy source powerful enough to make the drive more than an interesting theoretical concept. With the help of a beautiful Air Force Major and astronaut, Tabitha Ames, the US Government has funded the project, including assembly in orbit of the first faster-than-light probe. Unfortunately, forces working behind the scenes have much darker dreams, and they do not hesitate to blow up a space shuttle, attempt to kill Neal and Tabitha, and use the stolen warp technology to start what they expect to be a short victorious war with the United States. But Neal has ideas for using warp drive completely unsuspected by America's enemies, and repelling the all-out attack is only the beginning of a titanic struggle to reach the stars.

A Plague of Demons & Other Stories


Keith Laumer - 1965
    A Plague of Demons: One man found out the secret behind the aliens who controlled the world, harvesting "dead" soldiers to fight wars on distant worlds-and only he could stop them, if he could keep from getting harvested himself. Thunderhead: An officer has manned an outpost on a lonely planet for years, watching for the alien enemy that may never come, forgotten by the bureaucracy which sent him there-and then the enemy came! Test to Destruction: Aliens are testing a human prisoner to determine how serious a foe the human race might be-and they have chosen the wrong man to Test to Destruction. And much more.

Agent of Vega & Other Stories


James H. Schmitz - 2001
    After the Galactic Empire crumbled, the Vegan Confederacy was too weak to survive, yet it prospered because of its secret weapon--telepathy. Not all of the Agents of Vega were human, but all were the most powerful telepaths in the Galaxy.Contains:1 "That was an epiphany...." by Mercedes Lackey9 Agent of Vega84 The Illusionists149 The Second Night of Summer184 The Truth About Cushgar233 The Custodians281 Gone Fishing338 The Beacon to Elsewhere422 The End of the Line467 Watch the Sky495 Greenface532 Rogue Psi

Brain Ships


Anne McCaffrey - 2003
    Includes PartnerShip by Anne McCaffrey with Margaret Ball and The Ship Who Searched by Anne McCaffrey with Mercedes Lackey complete with a cover by Tom Kidd.

Grantville Gazette, Volume I


Eric FlintRick Boatright - 2004
    A religious conference has been called in nearby Rudolstadt which will determine doctrine for all the Lutherans in the nation. The hard-fought principle of religious freedom is at stake, threatened alike by intransigent theologians and students rioting in the streets.As if that weren't bad enough:* the up-time American Lutherans are themselves divided;* a rambunctious old folk singer is cheerfully pouring gasoline on the flames;* and a Calvinist "facilitator" from Geneva is maneuvering to get the U.S. involved with the developing revolutionary movement in Naples.Stories include:* Portraits by Eric Flint* Anna's Story by Loren Jones* Curio and Relic by Tom Van Natta* The Sewing Circle by Gorg Huff* The Rudolstadt Colloquy by Virginia DeMarce* Radio in the 1632 Universe by Rick Boatright* They've Got Bread Mold, So Why Can't They Make Penicillin? by Robert Gottlieb* Horse Power by Karen Bergstralh

Transgalactic


A.E. van Vogt - 2006
    A caste of scientists arose who knew how to repair and operate the ancient machines, but not how they worked, and worshipped at the altars of the atomic gods who were said to make the machines run. Society was a strange mix of the modern and the medieval, with armies riding on horseback into huge spaceships, then flying to human colonies on other planets to wage war with swords and arrows. Then came the mutant Clane, who would have been put to death for his deformities had he not been born into the ruling family. Though his body was twisted, his mind was brilliant, and he not only recovered the lost science behind the ancient machines, but found the truth behind the legends of civilisation's downfall. Alien invaders, not human war, had reduced humanity to barbarism as a prelude for a later return in force to colonize the Solar System. And that return would happen soon, unless Clane could find a way to stop it. . . . For the first time, the entire Clane saga, told in the two novels Empire of the Atom and The Wizard of Linn, is complete in one volume.Mission to the Stars, Van Vogt's sweeping novel of interstellar adventure, is also included, along with the two short novels in the Ezwal series, chronicling the struggle of one man to convince a feral but intelligent species to join with humanity in the battle against a mutual enemy, but first he must convince the lone Ezwal who is trapped with him in a deadly jungle to co-operate, or neither will survive.

The Cobra Trilogy


Timothy Zahn - 2004
    Outnumbered and on the defensive, Earth made a desperate decision. It would attack the aliens not from space, but on the ground-with forces the Trofts did not even suspect. Thus were created the Cobras, a guerilla force whose weapons were surgically implanted, invisible to the unsuspecting eye, yet undeniably deadly. But power brings temptation . . . and not all the Cobras could be trusted to fight for Earth alone. Jonny Moreau would learn the uses-and abuses-of his special abilities, and what it truly meant to be a Cobra.

The Warslayer: The Incredibly True Adventures of Vixen the Slayer, the Beginning


Rosemary Edghill - 2002
    The wizards of Erchanen have been searching all the worlds to find a hero, and Vixen the Slayer is the last name on their list.The Warmother, imprisoned a thousand years before by Ginnas the Warkiller, has broken free of her ancient chains. If a hero can't be found somewhere in all the universes to fight for them, the people of Erchanen are toast. But is it Glory they're looking for... or Vixen?It all seemed to be a perfectly straightforward misunderstanding when Belegir was explaining it in Glory's dressing room. The reality—if you could call it that—isn't just fighting for her life. Faced with a challenge like that, what can a girl do but pick up her magic sword and her stuffed elephant and give her trademark battle cry:"Hi-yi-yi-yi! Come, Camrado! Evil wakes!"At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (DRM Rights Management).Can be found online at Baen Free Library

An Oblique Approach


David Drake - 1998
    Only three things stand between the Malwa and the conquest of Earth: Byzantium, the empire of Rome in the East; a crystal that urges mankind to fight; and Belisarius, general of the Byzantine Empire, and arguably the greatest commmander the Earth has ever known.