Now he offers us a superb quintet of novellas -- five dazzling masterworks of speculative fiction, including "Orphans of the Helix," his award-winning return to the Hyperion Universe -- that demonstrates the unique mastery, breathtaking invention, and flawless craftsmanship of one of contemporary fiction's true greats.Human colonists seeking something other than godhood encounter their long-lost "cousins"...and an ancient scourge.A devastated man in suicide's embrace is caught up in a bizarre cat-and-mouse game with a young woman possessing a world-ending power.The distant descendants of a once-oppressed people learn a chilling lesson about the persistence of the past.A terrifying ascent up the frigid, snow-swept slopes of K2 shatters preconceptions and reveals the true natures of four climbers, one of whom is not human.At the intersection of a grand past and a threadbare present, an aging American in Russia confronts his own mortality as he glimpses a wondrous future.

    It is said a race of shapeshifters once lived here, only to perish when men came. But one man believes they can still be found, somewhere in the back of the beyond.In The Fifth Head of Cerberus, Wolfe skillfully interweaves three bizarre tales to create a mesmerizing pattern: the harrowing account of the son of a mad genius who discovers his hideous heritage; a young man's mythic dreamquest for his darker half; the bizarre chronicle of a scientists' nightmarish imprisonment. Like an intricate, braided knot, the pattern at last unfolds to reveal astonishing truths about this strange and savage alien landscape.

    For the first time in one volume: every word Bruce Sterling has ever written on the Shapers-Mechanists Universe.In the last decade, Sterling has emerged a pioneer of crucial, cutting-edge science fiction. Now Ace Books is proud to offer Sterling's stunning world of the Schismatrix--where Shaper revolutionaries struggle against aristocratic Mechanists for ultimate control of man's destiny. This volume includes the classic full-length novel, Schismatrix, plus thousands of words of mind-bending short fiction.

    But mankind is too busy hating, stealing, scheming, and killing to care. As luminous green trails of cosmic dust and vapor stream across the heavens, blood flows beneath: nations wage all-out war, bitter strikes erupt, and jealous lovers plot revenge and murder. The earth slips past the comet by the narrowest of margins, but all succumb to the gases in its tail. When mankind wakes up, everyone is completely and profoundly different. An ill-fated romance between Willie Leadford and Nettie Stuart unfolds in a world buried in misery and bent on its own destruction. After the earth passes through the comet's tail, suffering, pettiness, and injustice melt away. Willie, Nettie, and everyone around them are reborn. They now see themselves and their world in a dramatically new and wonderful way.

    Selected by a vote of the membership of the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA), these 26 reprints represent the best, most important, and most influential stories and authors in the field. The contributors are a Who's Who of classic SF, with every Golden Age giant included: Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury, Arthur C. Clarke, John W. Campbell, Robert A. Heinlein, Fritz Leiber, Cordwainer Smith, Theodore Sturgeon, and Roger Zelazny. Other contributors are less well known outside the core SF readership. Three of the contributors are famous for one story--but what stories!--Tom Godwin's pivotal hard-SF tale, "The Cold Equations"; Jerome Bixby's "It's a Good Life" (made only more infamous by the chilling Twilight Zone adaptation); and Daniel Keyes's "Flowers for Algernon" (brought to mainstream fame by the movie adaptation, Charly). The collection has some minor but frustrating flaws. There are no contributor biographies, which is bad enough when the author is a giant; but it's especially sad for contributors who have become unjustly obscure. Each story's original publication date is in small print at the bottom of the first page. And neither this fine print nor the copyright page identifies the magazines in which the stories first appeared. Prefaced by editor Robert Silverberg's introduction, which describes SFWA and details the selection process, The Science Fiction Hall of Fame: Volume One, 1929-1964 is a wonderful book for the budding SF fan. Experienced SF readers should compare the table of contents to their library before making a purchase decision. Fans who contemplate giving this book to non-SF readers should bear in mind that, while several of the collected stories can measure up to classic mainstream literary stories, the less literarily-acceptable stories are weighted toward the front of the collection; adult mainstream-literature fans may not get very far into The Science Fiction Hall of Fame: Volume One, 1929-1964. --Cynthia Ward· Introduction · Robert Silverberg · in · A Martian Odyssey [Tweel] · Stanley G. Weinbaum · nv Wonder Stories Jul ’34 · Twilight [as by Don A. Stuart; Dying Earth] · John W. Campbell, Jr. · ss Astounding Nov ’34 · Helen O’Loy · Lester del Rey · ss Astounding Dec ’38 · The Roads Must Roll · Robert A. Heinlein · nv Astounding Jun ’40 · Microcosmic God · Theodore Sturgeon · nv Astounding Apr ’41 · Nightfall · Isaac Asimov · nv Astounding Sep ’41 · The Weapon Shop [Isher] · A. E. van Vogt · nv Astounding Dec ’42 · Mimsy Were the Borogoves · Lewis Padgett · nv Astounding Feb ’43 · Huddling Place [City (Websters)] · Clifford D. Simak · ss Astounding Jul ’44 · Arena · Fredric Brown · nv Astounding Jun ’44 · First Contact · Murray Leinster · nv Astounding May ’45 · That Only a Mother · Judith Merril · ss Astounding Jun ’48 · Scanners Live in Vain · Cordwainer Smith · nv Fantasy Book #6 ’50 · Mars Is Heaven! · Ray Bradbury · ss Planet Stories Fll ’48 · The Little Black Bag · C. M. Kornbluth · nv Astounding Jul ’50 · Born of Man and Woman · Richard Matheson · vi F&SF Sum ’50 · Coming Attraction · Fritz Leiber · ss Galaxy Nov ’50 · The Quest for Saint Aquin · Anthony Boucher · ss New Tales of Space and Time, ed. Raymond J. Healy, Holt, 1951; F&SF Jan ’59 · Surface Tension [Lavon] · James Blish · nv Galaxy Aug ’52 · The Nine Billion Names of God · Arthur C. Clarke · ss Star Science Fiction Stories #1, ed. Frederik Pohl, Ballantine, 1953 · It’s a Good Life · Jerome Bixby · ss Star Science Fiction Stories #2, ed. Frederik Pohl, Ballantine, 1953 · The Cold Equations · Tom Godwin · nv Astounding Aug ’54 · Fondly Fahrenheit · Alfred Bester · nv F&SF Aug ’54 · The Country of the Kind · Damon Knight · ss F&SF Feb ’56 · Flowers for Algernon · Daniel Keyes · nv F&SF Apr ’59 · A Rose for Ecclesiastes · Roger Zelazny · nv F&SF Nov ’63

    This edition contains an Introduction written for the 1974 edition and updated for the 1983 edition. This collection was among Ellison's first and it shows a writer with a wide-ranging imagination, ferocious creative energy, devastating wit and an eye for the wonderful and terrifying and tragic. Among the gems are "All The Sounds of Fear", "The Sky is Burning", "The Very Last Day of a Good Woman" and "In Lonely Lands". Though they stand tall on their own merits they also point the way to the sublime stories that followed soon after and continue to come even now, more than forty years later.

    Hugo and Nebula award-winning author David Brin is one of the most eloquent, imaginative voices in science fiction.  Now he returns with a new novel rich in texture, universal in theme, monumental in scope--pushing the genre to new heights.Young Maia is fast approaching a turning point in her life.  As a half-caste var, she must leave the clan home of her privileged half sisters and seek her fortune in the world.  With her twin sister, Leie, she searches the docks of Port Sanger for an apprenticeship aboard the vessels that sail the trade routes of the Stratoin oceans.On her far-reaching, perilous journey of discovery, Maia will endure hardship and hunger, imprisonment and loneliness, bloody battles with pirates and separation from her twin.  And along the way, she will meet a traveler who has come an unimaginable distance--and who threatens the delicate balance of the Stratoins' carefully maintained, perfect society....Both exciting and insightful, Glory Season is a major novel, a transcendent saga of the human spirit.

    Disch- The Little Black Box (1964)- The War With the Fnools (1964)- A Game of Unchance (1964)- Precious Artifact (1964)- Retreat Syndrome (1965)- A Terran Odyssey (1987)- Your Appointment Will Be Yesterday (1966)- Holy Quarrel (1966)- We Can Remember It for You Wholesale (1966)- Not by Its Cover (1968)- Return Match (1967)- Faith of Our Fathers (1967)- The Story to End All Stories (1968)- The Electric Ant (1969)- Cadbury, the Beaver Who Lacked (1987)- A Little Something for Us Tempunauts (1974)- The Pre-Persons (1974)- The Eye of the Sibyl (1987)- The Day Mr. Computer Fell Out of Its Tree (1987)- The Exit Door Leads In (1979)- Chains of Air, Web of Aether (1980)- Strange Memories of Death (1984)- I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon (1980, variant of Frozen Journey)- Rautavaara's Case (1980)- The Alien Mind (1981)- NotesFront cover illustration by Chris Moore

    Forget minor hazards like nuclear bombs. The discovery of time travel means that everything we know, anyone we know, might not only vanish, but never even have existed. Against that possibility stand the men and women of the Time Patrol, dedicated to preserving the history they know and protecting the future from fanatics, terrorists, and would-be dictators who would remold the shape of reality to suit their own purposes. But Manse Everard, the Patrol's finest temporal trouble-shooter, bears a heavy burden. The fabric of history is stained with human blood and suffering which he cannot, must not do anything to alleviate, lest his tampering bring disastrous alterations in future time. Everard must leave the horrors of the past in place, lest his tampering or that of the Patrol's opponents, the Exaltationists, erase all hope of a better future, and instead bring about a future filled with greater horrors than any recorded by past history at its darkest and most foul. Contents: * Time Patrol [Time Patrol • 1] (1955) / novelette by Poul Anderson: In the mid-20th century Manse Everard answers a job ad and gets hired as a time cop. Time travel will be invented centuries in the future; untold centuries beyond that mankind has evolved into a species called the Danellians, who persuaded the early time travellers to set up the Time Patrol with the aim of protecting all of time from any alteration by interfering temponauts that might risk the Danellians' existence. Manse's first mission is to go back to the late 19th century to correct the circumstances that led to the appearance of an anachronistic item in an old burial mound * Brave to Be a King [Time Patrol • 2] (1959) •/ novelette by Poul Anderson: A Time Patrol friend of Manse's, Keith, has gone missing in 6th-century Iran, and Keith's wife begs Manse to go find him. Trouble is, Manse has always had the serious hots for the wife, despite her somewhat whiny voice, so it's very tempting not to try very hard -- to assume that Keith has landed on his feet and is happy where he is, sort of thing. But his honourable self knows better. He discovers Keith has been forced to adopt the persona of Cyrus the Great; rescuing him while preserving the course of history proves to be a far more tortuous business than one might imagine. * Gibraltar Falls [Time Patrol • 3] (1975) / short story by Poul Anderson: What must have been the most remarkable spectacle of known prehistory, the collapse of the isthmus at the Gates of Hercules and the inundation of the basin that is now the Mediterranean Sea by the waters of the Atlantic * The Only Game in Town [Time Patrol • 4] (1960)/ novelette by Poul Anderson: Manse and a friend manage to head off the Chinese colonization, pre-Columbus, of the Americas. 8 Delenda Est [Time Patrol • 5] (1955) / novelette by Poul Anderson: Manse and a friend return from a holiday in the Pleistocene to their own time, only to discover it considerably changed; clearly there's been an unauthorized change to history. Eventually they trace it to an incident during the Punic Wars, which incident made it possible for Hannibal to defeat Rome. They succeed in reversing the change, but know that in so doing they're wiping out all the people they've befriended in the alternative 1950s. They succeed, though, in saving the laughing-eyed Hoirish colleen whom Manse's friend has fallen for. * Ivory, and Apes, and Peacocks [Time Patrol • 6] (1983) / novella by Poul Anderson: Tells of the Exaltationists, the 23rd-century cult whose obsessive pursuit of hedonism renders them unimpressed by the effects their vicious power-and pleasure-seeking could do to the timestream, including the possibility of their wiping the existence of their own culture out of history. Pummairam, a youth who takes Manse under his wing when first the patrolman arrives in Tyre, engineers much of the tricksterism Manse must use to thwart the baddies. * The Sorrow of Odin the Goth [Time Patrol • 7] (1983) / novella by Poul Anderson: A history prof, Carl Farness, has allowed himself to become the personification of the god Odin to a 4th-century tribe of Goths; he has also allowed himself to become far too personally involved with the people whom he's there to study, marrying one of them (with the knowledge of his 20th-century wife) and keeping an eye on the usually somewhat messy fates of his children, grandchildren, etc. Manse gets involved because incarnations of gods are the kind of thing that cause history to be altered; in fact, as Carl points out, all kinds of Goth tribes were convinced they'd been visited by various deities, and their stories were usually quickly dismissed as myths, then forgotten. Still, he must extract himself from the situation with care. * Star of the Sea [Time Patrol • 8] (1991) / novella by Poul Anderson: Europe in the 1st century, and various peoples, led by the likes of Civilis, are rebelling against corrupt Roman rule -- with the violence continuing even after it becomes clear that an honourable peace could be struck. A major factor keeping them at war is the zeal of a visionary/prophetess called Veleda, who for reasons unknown has had a far greater and longer influence in a revealed timeline than she had in the known history of the period. Manse and a historian called Floris, who becomes his first real love, manage to sort out the situation. * The Year of the Ransom [Time Patrol • 9] (1988) / novel by Poul Anderson: Heroine Wanda Tamberley's Uncle Steve, living among Pizarro's brutal conquistadors at the time of the ransoming of Atahuallpa, is attacked by the Exaltationists and then abducted into a very distant past by a quick-witted Spanish soldier who believes him to be a demon. Manse and Wanda to the rescue, of course. * Death and the Knight [Time Patrol] (1995) / novelette by Poul Anderson: how to rescue an errant time agent without changing history. Hugues Marot, a time traveler from the future who towers over most men with his great height, is a member of the Templars. He has accurately predicted some future events: when he is arrested and detained by his fellow Templars, he grasps a crucifix which is a "...symbol and source of help from beyond this world". A source of help indeed, as it conceals his Time Patrol communicator..

    This brilliant collection, often cited as the first of its kind, explores fundamental questions about ourselves and our treatment of the universe (and other beings) around us and ultimately what it means to be human.Contents: * Cordwainer Smith: The Shaper of Myths (1975) • essay by John J. Pierce [as by J. J. Pierce] * The Instrumentality of Mankind (timeline) (1975) • essay by John J. Pierce * Scanners Live in Vain [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1950) / novelette by Cordwainer Smith: meet Martel, a human altered to be part machine-a scanner-to be able withstand the trauma space travel has on the body. Despite the stigma placed on him and his kind, he is able to regrasp his humanity to save another; Fantasy Book #6 ’50 * The Lady Who Sailed The Soul [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1960) / novelette by Cordwainer Smith, Genevieve Linebarger; Galaxy Apr ’60 * The Game of Rat and Dragon [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1955) / short story by Cordwainer Smith; Galaxy Oct ’55 * The Burning of the Brain [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1958) / short story by Cordwainer Smith; If Oct ’58 * Golden the Ship Was - Oh! Oh! Oh! [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1959) / short story by Cordwainer Smith, Genevieve Linebarger; Amazing Apr ’59 * The Crime and the Glory of Commander Suzdal [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1964) / short story by Cordwainer Smith; Amazing May ’64 * The Dead Lady of Clown Town [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1964) / novella by Cordwainer Smith: get to know the underpeople-animals genetically altered to exist in human form, to better serve their human owners-and meet D'Joan, a dog-woman who will make readers question who is more human: the animals who simply want to be recognized as having the same right to life, or the people who created them to be inferior; Galaxy Aug ’64 * Under Old Earth [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1966) / novelette by Cordwainer Smith; Galaxy Feb ’66 * Mother Hitton's Littul Kittons [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1961) / novelette by Cordwainer Smith; Galaxy Jun ’61 * Alpha Ralpha Boulevard [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1961) / novelette by Cordwainer Smith; Galaxy Jun ’61 * The Ballad of Lost C'mell [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1962) / novelette by Cordwainer Smith: the notion of love being the most important equalizer there is, is put into action when an underperson, C'mell, falls in love with Lord Jestocost. Who is to say her love for him is not as valid as any true-born human? She might be of cat descent, but she is all woman!; Galaxy Oct ’62 * A Planet Named Shayol [The Instrumentality of Mankind] (1961) / novelette by Cordwainer Smith: it is an underperson of bull descent, and beings so mutilated and deformed from their original human condition to be now considered demons of a hellish land, who retain and display the most humanity when Mankind commits the most inhumane action of all; Galaxy Oct ’61aka: Paul M. A. Linebarger, Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger, Paul Linebarger, Felix C. Forrest, Carmichael Smith, Kordvejner Smit..

    This volume, The Weapon Shops of Isher, includes the first three parts of the saga and introduces perhaps the most famous political slogan of science fiction: The Right to Buy Weapons is the Right to Be Free. Born at the height of Nazi conquest, the Isher stories suggested that an oppressive government could never completely subjugate its own citizens if they were well armed. The audience appeal was immediate and has endured long beyond other stories of alien invasion, global conflict and post war nuclear angst.

    Gathered into one volume by intrepid chrononauts and world-renowned anthologists Ann and Jeff VanderMeer, this book compiles more than a century's worth of literary travels into the past and the future that will serve to reacquaint readers with beloved classics of the time travel genre and introduce them to thrilling contemporary innovations.This marvelous volume includes nearly seventy journeys through time from authors such as Douglas Adams, Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury, William Gibson, Ursula K. Le Guin, George R. R. Martin, Michael Moorcock, H. G. Wells, and Connie Willis, as well as helpful non-fiction articles original to this volume (such as Charles Yu's "Top Ten Tips For Time Travelers").In fact, this book is like a time machine of its very own, covering millions of years of Earth's history from the age of the dinosaurs through to strange and fascinating futures, spanning the ages from the beginning of time to its very end. The Time Traveler's Almanac is the ultimate anthology for the time traveler in your life.

    It was edited by Harlan Ellison, illustrated by Ed Emshwiller. Like its predecessor, Again, Dangerous Visions and the 46 stories within it received many awards. The Word for World Is Forest, by Ursula K. Le Guin, won a Hugo for Best Novella. When It Changed by Joanna Russ won a Nebula Award for Best Short Story. For a 2nd time, Ellison received a special Hugo for editing the anthology. Again, Dangerous Visions was to be followed by a 3rd anthology, The Last Dangerous Visions. At this point, Ellison has said that it will probably never see the light of day.Introduction: An Assault of New Dreamers by Harlan Ellison The Counterpoint of View by John Heidenry Ching Witch! by Ross Rocklynne The Word for World Is Forest by Ursula K. Le Guin For Value Received by Andrew J. Offutt Mathoms from the Time Closet: 1/Robot's Story, 2/Against the Lafayette Escadrille, 3/Loco Parentis by Gene Wolfe Time Travel for Pedestrians by Ray Nelson Christ, Old Student in a New School (poem) by Ray Bradbury King of the Hill by Chad Oliver The 10:00 Report Is Brought to You by... by Edward Bryant The Funeral by Kate Wilhelm Harry the Hare by James B. Hemesath When It Changed by Joanna Russ The Big Space Fuck by Kurt Vonnegut Bounty by T.L. Sherred Still-Life by K.M. O'Donnell (Barry N. Malzberg) Stoned Counsel by H.H. Hollis Monitored Dreams & Strategic Cremations: 1/The Bisquit Position, 2/The Girl with Rapid Eye Movements by Bernard Wolfe With a Finger in My I by David Gerrold In the Barn by Piers Anthony Soundless Evening by Lee Hoffman [█] by Gahan Wilson The Test-Tube Creature, Afterward by Joan Bernott And the Sea Like Mirrors by Gregory Benford Bed Sheets Are White by Evelyn Lief Tissue: At the Fitting Shop & 53rd American Dream by James Sallis Elouise and the Doctors of the Planet Pergamon by Josephine Saxton Chuck Berry, Won't You Please Come Home by Ken McCullough Epiphany for Aliens by David Kerr Eye of the Beholder by Burt K. Filer Moth Race by Richard Hill In re Glover by Leonard Tushnet Zero Gee by Ben Bova A Mouse in the Walls of the Global Village by Dean R. Koontz Getting Along by James Blish & Judith Ann Lawrence Totenbüch by Parra y FiguéredoThings Lost by Thomas M. Disch With the Bentfin Boomer Boys on Little Old New Alabama by Richard A. Lupoff Lamia Mutable by M. John Harrison Last Train to Kankakee by Robin Scott Empire of the Sun by Andrew Weiner Ozymandias by Terry Carr The Milk of Paradise by James Tiptree, Jr.

    Twenty astonishing stories from acclaimed author Ursula K. Le Guin that carry us to worlds of wonder and horror, desire and destiny, enchantment and doom.

    Mysterious aliens, ruthless terrorists, androids with attitude, genetic manipulation, punch-ups with lasers and giant spaceships! What more do you want?Reprint of The Engineer with three additional stories.The EngineerSpatterjay The OwnerThe Tor-beast's Prison Tiger Tiger