Sandra Foster studies fads - from Barbie dolls o the grunge look - how they start and what they mean. Bennett O'Reilly is a chaos theorist studying monkey group behaviour. They both work for the HiTek corporation, strangers until a misdelivered package brings them together. It's a moment of synchronicity - if not serendipity - which leads them into a chaotic system of their own, complete with a million-dollar research grant, caffe latte, tattoos, and a series of unlucky coincidences that leaves Bennett monkeyless, fundless, and nearly jobless. Sandra intercedes with a flock of sheep and an idea for a joint project. (After all, what better animal to study both chaos theory and the herd mentality that so often characterizes human behaviour?) But scientific discovery is rarely straightforward and never simple, and Sandra and Bennett have to endure a series of setbacks, heartbreaks, dead ends, and disasters before they find their ultimate answer...
It's the 21st century, and all is right with the world. Or so it seems. Vice President Charlie Haskell, who will travel anywhere for a photo op, is about to cut the ribbon for the just-completed American Moonbase. The first Mars voyage is about to leave high orbit, with a woman at the helm. Below, the world is marveling at a rare solar eclipse. But all that is right is about to go disastrously wrong when an amateur astronomer discovers a new comet. Named for its discover, Tomikois a "sun-grazer,"an interstellar wanderer with a hundred times the mass and ten times the speed of other comets. And it is headed straight for our moon. In less than five days, if scientists' predictions are right, Tomiko will crash into the moon, shattering it into a cloud of superheated gas, dust, and huge chunks of rock that will rain down on the earth, causing chaos and killer storms, possibly tidal waves inundating entire cities...or worse: a single apocalyptic worldwide "extinction event." In the meantime, the population of Moonbase must be evacuated by a hastily assembled fleet of shuttle rockets. There isn't room, or time enough, for everyone. And the vice president, who rashly promised to be last off ("I will lock the door and turn off the lights"), is trying to figure out how to get away without eating his words. In Moonfall,McDevitt has created a disaster thriller of truly epic proportions, featuring a cast of unforgettable characters: the reluctant Russian rocket jockey entrusted with the lives of squabbling refugees; the woman chosen to be first on the moon; the scientist who must deflect the "possum" (POSSible IMpactors) knocked from orbit or witness the end science itself. And at the center of it all is Charlie Haskell, the career politician who discovers his own unexpected reserves of only himself and his country, but for all humankind. Moonfall,is a spellbinding tale of heroism and hope, cowardice and passion played against the awesome spectacle of human history's darkest night.
A generation after the South won the first American civil War, America writhes once more in the bloody throes of battle. Furious over the annexation of key Mexican territory, the United States declares total war against the Confederate States. And so, in 1881, the fragile peace is shattered. But this is a new kind of war, fought on a lawless frontier where the Blue and the Grey battle not only each other but the Apache, the outlaw - and even the British Redcoat. For along with France, Britain enters the fray on the Confederate side. 'The wizard of If.' Chicago Sun-Times 'The standard-bearer for alternate history.' USA Today
Bent on avenging the execution of his godfather by a duplicitous count, master criminal Nicholas is diverted by a series of eerie events that forces him to confront an ancient evil. By the author of The Element of Fire. Reprint.
Geoffrey A. Landis had been a major figure in hard SF for over a decade before delivering this a novel-length work of SF - an epic of human tenacity and survival in the early days of manned Mars exploration. After a treacherous failed landing, one crew's only hope of survival lies in trekking halfway across the surface of Mars itself... a journey to the limits of human endurance. And in the process, what was unknown about each of them will be revealed and only the truth will save them from a terrible death far from home.
'"Cosmonaut Keep" is a portal to a deeply imagined future history that parlays X-Files paranoia about Area 51 and alien Greys into a vast interstellar community watched over by microcosmic gods.' - Paul McAuley, INTERZONE 'Science fiction's freshest new writer' - Salon After the Ural Caspian Oil War, nobody really trusted the EU government. So why should their extraordinary announcement of first contact with alien intelligence be believed? Matt Cairns thinks he can discover the truth. It is out there, but much, much further away than he could have imagined. Thousands of light-years from Earth, a human colony is struggling for survival. The world on which they have settled, however, has already been inhabited by humans - and other intelligent species from Earth - for millennia. In that ancient division of labour, humans do have a place. But where is it? Twenty-first-century political intrigue becomes space opera on an epic scale in Ken MacLeod's first book in a dazzling new series. His most ambitious novel to date, it will take one of Britain's most exciting new science fiction authors to even greater heights of success and critical acclaim. Books by Ken MacLeod: Fall Revolution The Star Fraction The Stone Canal The Cassini Division The Sky Road Engines of Light Cosmonaut Keep Dark Light Engine City Corporation Wars Trilogy Dissidence Insurgence Emergence Novels The Human Front Newton's Wake Learning the World The Execution Channel The Restoration Game Intrusion Descent
The Flying Dutchman of the stars! Rigger and star pilot Renwald Legroeder undertakes a search for the legendary ghost ship Impris—and her passengers and crew—whose fate is entwined with interstellar piracy, quantum defects in space-time, galactic coverup conspiracies, and deep-cyber romance. Can Legroeder and his Narseil crewmates find the lost ship in time to prevent a disastrous interstellar war? An epic-scale novel of the Star Rigger Universe, and a finalist for the Nebula Award, from the author of The Chaos Chronicles. Now with the original cover art by Stephen Youll. REVIEWS: “True love, cognitive dissonance, divisions among the enemy, ambitious schemes, another mission—this one deeper than anyone has ever gone before into the substrata of the Flux—and a final resolution that leaves the reader both breathless and satisfied.” —Analog “You don’t want to wait for the paperback.” —Science Fiction Chronicle “A mesmerizing tale of human perseverance and courage under pressure that updates the legend of the Flying Dutchman.” —Library Journal “Carver never runs out of new plot twists to keep the reader coming back for more.” —The Washington Post
When a Komarran merchant fleet is impounded at Graf Station after a bloody incident involving a security officer from the convoy's military escort, Miles Vorkosigan and his wife are called in to untangle the diplomatic snafus, treachery, and dark secrets.
Nebula Award Finalist: A team of physicists trying to develop fusion power via a new development in plasma physics, a Sonomak, accidentally stumbles on a method to create picoverses, which replicate everything in our universe but on a smaller scale. A disastrous test of the Sonomak machine shakes things up and a new project director, previously unknown to the group, is appointed. Alexandra has her own secret priorities and one of them is to escape from her superiors into one of the picoverses. To do this, she needs the researchers to execute her plan. Unfortunately, things go amiss and the team finds itself stuck in a picoverse duplicating 1920s Earth, but with its own version of a Sonomak, vacuum tubes and all. On the local team are Werner Heisenberg and Albert Einstein. As the pace of the story accelerates, the original team races from one picoverse to another, trying to return to their home base and thwart Alexandra’s plans. In a clash of alternate realities, the fate of Earth and the entire universe hangs in the balance. Cosmic rabbits need to be pulled from alternate-universe hats before this tale comes to a satisfying—and scientifically rigorous—end. Robert Metzger writes classic hard science fiction, but he does so in a way that emphasizes excitement and adventure, and shows the science in a way that makes it accessible and fascinating.
Utilisant une technologie quantique qu'ils ne comprennent pas totalement, les scientifiques des complexes de Crossbank et Blind Lake observent des planètes extraterrestres dis-tantes de la Terre de plusieurs dizaines d'années-lumière. A Blind Lake, Minnesota, Marguerite Hauser s'intéresse tout particulièrement à un extraterrestre qu'elle appelle "le Sujet ", mais que tout le monde surnomme "le homard", à cause de sa morphologie. Et voilà qu'un jour, personne ne sait pourquoi, le Sujet entreprend un pèlerinage qui pourrait bien lui être fatal. Au même moment, l'armée américaine boucle Blind Lake et instaure une quarantaine qui tourne à la tragédie quand un couple qui tentait de s'échapper en voiture est massacré par des drones de combat. Que se passe-t-il à Blind Lake ? Avec ses personnages débordant d'humanité, Blind Lake prouve une fois de plus l'immense talent de Robert Charles Wilson.
Sixty years after the disappearance of the passengers and crew of the luxury space yacht Polaris, found empty and adrift in space, Alex Benedict sets out to uncover the truth about the Polaris and to reveal the fate of its passengers.
“Gene Wolfe is the smartest, subtlest, most dangerous writer alive today, in genre or out of it. This book [is] important and wonderful.” —Neil Gaiman on The Knight A novel in two volumes, The Wizard Knight is in the rare company of works of fantasy like The Once and Future King, or The Wizard of Earthsea, that drink directly from the wellspring of myth. Now it appears in a single-volume edition for the first time. A young man in his teens is transported from our world to a magical realm consisting of seven levels of reality. Transformed by magic into a grown man of heroic proportions, he takes the name Sir Able of the High Heart and sets out on a quest to find the sword that has been promised to him, the blade that will help him fulfill his ambition to become a true hero—a true knight. Inside, however, Sir Able remains a boy, and he must grow in every sense to survive what lies ahead... “[Wolfe] should enjoy the same rapt attention we afford to Thomas Pynchon, Toni Morrison, and Cormac McCarthy.” —The Washington Post on The Knight “Wolfe’s version of Faerie is both allusive and elusive, beautiful and fatally glamorous.” —Tad Williams on The Knight With a new introduction by Yves Meynard, acclaimed author of The Book of Knights. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Amusement park rides are the ultimate battleground in this Locus Award–winning dystopian sci-fi novel by the acclaimed author of Little Brother. In the near-future world of the Bitchun Society, scarcity is a thing of the past, death has been conquered, and a constant internal interface allows everyone to monitor their ultimate pursuit: the esteem of others. At barely a century old, Jules is still a young man when he realizes his dream of living and working at Disney World. He devotes himself to keeping the classic attractions intact, with only minor adjustments to their original twentieth-century designs. But when the Hall of Presidents is overtaken by a rival group, the old animatronic designs are replaced with a new, direct-to-brain immersive experience. For Jules, this assault on the artistic purity of Disney World cannot stand. And it only upsets him more when someone has him killed. After rebooting in a new body, Jules is ready for war. “A black-comedic sci-fi prophecy on the dangers of surrendering our consensual hallucination to the regime. Fun to read, but difficult to sleep afterwards.” —Douglas Rushkoff, author of Cyberia
THE WIZARD KNIGHT springs from the myths, legends and literature of times past. A teenager passes from Earth to a magical realm of seven worlds, where he is given a hero's adult body and named Able. Though forced to act as a man, inside he is still a boy, even as he sets off to find his destined sword and become a knight. In his quest he battles giants, meets gods, heroes and a sorceress (who repeatedly tries to seduce him), and serves the mercurial dragon king Arnthor in a was that could end everything.
THE BOOK BEHIND THE FOURTH SEASON OF THE ACCLAIMED HBO SERIES GAME OF THRONES Few books have captivated the imagination and won the devotion and praise of readers and critics everywhere as has George R. R. Martin’s monumental epic cycle of high fantasy. Now, in A Feast for Crows, Martin delivers the long-awaited fourth book of his landmark series, as a kingdom torn asunder finds itself at last on the brink of peace . . . only to be launched on an even more terrifying course of destruction. A FEAST FOR CROWS It seems too good to be true. After centuries of bitter strife and fatal treachery, the seven powers dividing the land have decimated one another into an uneasy truce. Or so it appears. . . . With the death of the monstrous King Joffrey, Cersei is ruling as regent in King’s Landing. Robb Stark’s demise has broken the back of the Northern rebels, and his siblings are scattered throughout the kingdom like seeds on barren soil. Few legitimate claims to the once desperately sought Iron Throne still exist—or they are held in hands too weak or too distant to wield them effectively. The war, which raged out of control for so long, has burned itself out. But as in the aftermath of any climactic struggle, it is not long before the survivors, outlaws, renegades, and carrion eaters start to gather, picking over the bones of the dead and fighting for the spoils of the soon-to-be dead. Now in the Seven Kingdoms, as the human crows assemble over a banquet of ashes, daring new plots and dangerous new alliances are formed, while surprising faces—some familiar, others only just appearing—are seen emerging from an ominous twilight of past struggles and chaos to take up the challenges ahead. It is a time when the wise and the ambitious, the deceitful and the strong will acquire the skills, the power, and the magic to survive the stark and terrible times that lie before them. It is a time for nobles and commoners, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and sages to come together and stake their fortunes . . . and their lives. For at a feast for crows, many are the guests—but only a few are the survivors.
John C. Wright burst onto the SF scene with the Golden Age trilogy. His next project was the ambitious fantasy sequence, The Last Guardians of Everness. Wright's new fantasy is a tale about five orphans raised in a strict British boarding school who begin to discover that they may not be human beings. The students at the school do not age, while the world around them does. The children begin to make sinister discoveries about themselves. Amelia is apparently a fourth-dimensional being; Victor is a synthetic man who can control the molecular arrangement of matter around him; Vanity can find secret passageways through solid walls where none had previously been; Colin is a psychic; Quentin is a warlock. Each power comes from a different paradigm or view of the inexplicable universe: and they should not be able to co-exist under the same laws of nature. Why is it that they can? The orphans have been kidnapped from their true parents, robbed of their powers, and raised in ignorance by super-beings no more human than they are: pagan gods or fairy-queens, Cyclopes, sea-monsters, witches, or things even stranger than this. The children must experiment with, and learn to control, their strange abilities in order to escape their captors. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Blindsight is the Hugo Award–nominated novel by Peter Watts, "a hard science fiction writer through and through and one of the very best alive" (The Globe and Mail). Two months have past since a myriad of alien objects clenched about the Earth, screaming as they burned. The heavens have been silent since—until a derelict space probe hears whispers from a distant comet. Something talks out there: but not to us. Who should we send to meet the alien, when the alien doesn't want to meet? Send a linguist with multiple-personality disorder and a biologist so spliced with machinery that he can't feel his own flesh. Send a pacifist warrior and a vampire recalled from the grave by the voodoo of paleogenetics. Send a man with half his mind gone since childhood. Send them to the edge of the solar system, praying you can trust such freaks and monsters with the fate of a world. You fear they may be more alien than the thing they've been sent to find—but you'd give anything for that to be true, if you knew what was waiting for them. . . . At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
