An anthology of 18 exhilarating journeys into Rush-inspired worlds. Each writer chooses a Rush song as the spark for a new story. Included are Kevin J. Anderson, Michael Z. Williamson, David Mack, David Farland, Dayton Ward, and Mercedes Lackey; award winners Steven Savile, Brad R. Torgersen, Ron Collins, David Niall Wilson, and Brian Hodge, as well as many others.

The humans and Ildirans are desperate to find a way to combat the black cloud of antimatter of the Shana Rei. The mysterious alien Gardeners, who had helped them previously, turn out to be a disaster in disguise and because of them, the world tree forests are again in danger. The allies believe they have found a way to stop their dreaded enemies, a new weapon is tested, but it's a horrible failure, throwing the human race and its allies to the brink of extinction.

Byrne is a member of the Watch, investigating a series of murders. Fray's expertise with magic is needed to catch the killer, but working with the Watch destroyed his father, years before. Choss is a champion fighter, trying to diffuse a war in the underworld that threatens to turn the streets red with rivers of blood. And Katja is a spy from a foreign land, attempting to prevent a massacre that will topple two dynasties and destroy the fragile peace in the city for ever.

On the planet of Per Ardua, alien artifacts were discovered, hatches that allowed humans to step across light-years of space as if they were stepping into another room. As humanity discovers the real nature of the universe, a terrifying truth comes to light. We all have countless pasts converging in this present and our future is terrifyingly finite. There are minds in the universe that are billions of years old and now we are vulnerable to their plans for us...

In the last inhabited city, clone Echo Hunter 367's duty is to hunt down rebellious citizens who challenge the authority of the Church, lest civil war can tumble the city back into the dark. But Echo hides a deadly secret - doubt. And when Echo's mission leads her to Lia, a rebel leader who has a secret of her own, Echo is forced to face that doubt. For Lia holds the key to the city's survival, and Echo must choose between the woman she loves and the purpose she was born to fulfill.

His third collection of stories.

In the magical confrontation that ends BLACKVEIL, Karigan G'ladheon, a Green Rider, is jolted out of Blackveil forest and wakes in a darkness blacker than night. She's in a sealed stone sarcophagus, some unknown tomb, and the air is becoming thin. Is this to be her end? And if she should win free of her prison, will she be walking straight into a trap?

The rapacious Confederation has taken their war to our solar system. Now that the human and PAC forces won a decisive battle on the moon, they need to try to head off the coming armada before their overpowering strength is amassed and the Icarus Corps is once again on the front line.

Fellside is a maximum security prison on the edge of the Yorkshire Moors. It's not the kind of place you'd want to end up. But it's where Jess Moulson could be spending the rest of her life. It's a place where even the walls whisper. And one voice belongs to a little boy with a message for Jess. Will she listen?

Falco, a young man from the country, arrives in the port city of Tardocco with the ambition of becoming an apprentice to a master shadow thief. Maestro Astolfo, whose mysterious powers of observation would rival those of Sherlock Holmes, sees Falco's potential and puts him through a grueling series of physical lessons and intellectual tests. Falco's adventures coalesce into one overarching story of con men, monsters, ingenious detection, cats, and pirates.

Bren's current ambition is to keep himself and his bodyguard out of harm's way, and to shepherd the aiji-dowager's daring new trade agreement through the appropriate legislative committees. Combined with Tabini-aiji's recent appointment of his young son Cajeiri as his official heir, Bren's workload is challenging, but at least things on the "atevi "world seem to be on the right track. Something is coming, however, quietly, stealthily, just the first ominous twinkle of a new star in the heavens...

The human and atevi inhabitants of Alpha Station have picked up a signal from an alien kyo ship as it approaches. Many of the human inhabitants are refugees from Reunion Station, a station destroyed in a single pass by a kyo ship that approached just like this. Bren Cameron, emissary of the atevi Tabini-ajii is the obvious choice to deal with both the kyo and the panicked human refugees.

Zack glances out the window of his high school math class and spots a flying saucer. It is straight out of the videogame he plays every night, a hugely popular online flight simulator called Armada in which gamers just happen to be protecting the earth from alien invaders. His skills - as well as those of millions of gamers across the world - are going to be needed to save the earth from what's about to befall it. Yet even as he and his new comrades scramble to prepare for the alien onslaught, Zack can't help wonder. Doesn't something about this scenario seem a little too...familiar?

A legion of dark sorcerers has descended on Phoenix, wreaking havoc in the blistering desert heat. With the next moon phase approaching, Jay has to figure out what connects a billionaire financier and a vicious drug kingpin to an attempted terrorist attack, a spate of ritual killings, and the murder of a powerful runemyste. And he has to do it fast. Because these same dark sorcerers have nearly killed the woman he loves and have used their spells to torment Jay's father.

Javelin. A code denoting the loss of a national security asset with strategic impact. Rain. A code indicating a crisis of existential proportions. Jim Schweitzer's escape from the government who raised him from the dead has been coded "Javelin Rain." Schweitzer and his family are on the run from his former unit, the Gemini Cell, and while he may be immortal, his wife and son are not.

Syl Hellais and Paul Kerr, trapped in a dimension beyond their own, return to find that Civil War rages among the Illyri. It is whispered that the Earth is lost, prey to the alien parasites known as the Others, and more worlds will soon follow. Most shocking of all, the sinister Archmage Syrene of the Nairene Sisterhood has disappeared into the bowels of the Sisterhood's lair. But before she cloistered herself, Archmage Syrene chose her replacement. The Sisterhood has a new leader, with her own plans for the future of her race.

The guy who saved Lark's life needs her to repay the favour. He and his friends have been marked for death by the malevolent spirit of a vicious and long-dead serial killer, and the twins - who should know better than to mess with the dead - may be their only hope of staying alive.

Lark's sister Wren meets and fall for Noah, the spirit of a young man who died a century ago. But Noah has a dark influence on Wren, and Lark's distrust of him drives the sisters apart for the first time in their lives. As Halloween approaches and the veil between the worlds thins, bringing the dead closer to the world of the living, Lark must find a way to stop whatever deadly act Noah is planning, even if it means going through her sister to do so.

2162. Thirty-eight years after first contact, Lord Commander Grayson St. Clair leads the Tellus Ad Astra on an unprecedented expedition to the Galactic Core, carrying more than a million scientists, diplomats, soldiers, and AIs. But they are sucked into a black hole and spat out four billion years in the future. As the ship's Marines search for allies amid ancient ruins and strange new planetary structures, St. Clair must wrap his mind around an enemy capable of harnessing a weapon of incomprehensible power: space itself.

Stories by various alternate historians, edited by Flint, that detail the aftermath of the cosmic accident which set the modern West Virginia town of Grantville down in war-torn 17th century Europe.

The Event Group becomes involved in a secret war centered around a mountaintop inside the Ottoman Empire, possible location of the remnants of a prized ship. The battles will rage at sea, upon land, and across time - and engage enemies both past and future. Colonel John Henry Thomas of the Union Army will come face to face with his mortal foes in the South and a dark entity that has been trapped on top of God's Mountain for a millennium.

In a world beset by amassing forces of darkness, one organization, the Regional Office and its coterie of super-powered female assassins, protects the globe from annihilation. At its helm, the mysterious Oyemi and her oracles seek out new recruits and root out evil plots. Then a prophecy suggests that someone from inside might bring about its downfall. And now, the Regional Office is under attack. On the day that the Regional Office is attacked, the stories of two opposing assassins, Rose and Sarah, will overlap, their lives collide, and the world as they know it just might end.

When Riley and Asha finally reached the planet Terminal and found the Transcendental Machine, a matter transmission device built by an ancient race, they chose to be "translated." Now in possession of intellectual and physical powers that set them above human limitations, the machine has transported them to two, separate, unknown planets among a possibility of billions. Riley and Asha know that together they can change the galaxy, so they attempt to do the impossible - find each other.

A thousand years after the fall of civilization, conflict between city states is constant, superstition rife, and machine relics, mutant creatures and resurrected prehistoric beasts trouble the land. Watching over all are the silent Dreaming Cities. Homes of the angels, bastion outposts of heaven on Earth. Or so the church claims. Very few go in, and nobody ever comes out. Until now...

With the lines between worlds more blurred than ever, Finn's friend Moth returns from Sombrus, the magical house once owned by Seth Lot, with terrible news. Something evil something that resembles Jack has escaped Sombrus. Now Fair Hollow is at risk from this Jack-like creature that will not stop until it gets what it wants... And it wants Finn.

Even in a town full of secretive people, Olivia Charity is an enigma. She lives with the vampire Lemuel, but no one knows what she does. They only know that she's beautiful and dangerous. Psychic Manfred Bernardo finds out just how dangerous when he goes on a working weekend to Dallas and sees Olivia there with a couple who are both found dead the next day.

Peri Reed is a drafter, possessed of a rare, invaluable skill for altering time, yet destined to forget both the history she changed and the history she rewrote. When Peri discovers her name is on a list of corrupt operatives, she realizes that her own life has been manipulated by the agency. Her memory of the previous three years erased, she joins forces with a mysterious rogue soldier in a deadly race to piece together the truth about her fateful final task.

When Historian Calvin McCauley is invited to study a massive and unique alien structure found on the borders of Terran and Ilaxi space, he quickly becomes embroiled in a conspiracy to exploit the artifact for sinister purposes.

First Apprentice Torbidda is now in absolute control, plotting the final battle that will pacify Etruria ...permanently. Contessa Sofia Scaligeri could rally her people once again, but she is far away in the Crusader Kingdom of Akka, trapped with her son, in thrall to the tyrant Queen Catrina. Darkness is falling. The final battle must be fought and the tide must be turned, lest evil reign forever.

When one of the Argent Aces, Abby Trent, asks for the help of Missy Masters - aka the legendary superhero Mr Mystic - in retrieving a Shadow Realms artefact, she figures this will help her pay down at least one of her debts. The problem is that Abby is just as good at getting into trouble as Missy, and before they can recover the artefact, it's stolen by Abby's arch-nemesis (and half-sister), the djinni Asha.They follow Asha to the Divan of the Djinn, a twilight court of Shadow Realms exiles and freedom fighters on the border between Pakistan and India... and Missy and Abby are not welcome there.

Jane is keeping the peace between visiting groups of witches and vamps in the city, but then trouble comes knocking on her doorstep. When her house is magically attacked, the wild chase to find her assailants unearths a mystery that has literally been buried deep. A missing master vampire, presumed long deceased, is found chained in a pit...undead, raving mad, and in the company of two human bodies.

Diviner Alex Verus finally made one too many enemies on the Council of Mages, and now one of them is angry enough to have him executed. Fighting for his life is nothing new, but this kill order also calls for the death of Alex's dependents - and there's no way that he'll let Luna, Anne, and Vari take the heat. And saving himself is going to bring him into direct opposition with his former master and the Dark mages surrounding him.

The RAGE tournaments are virtual fights to the death broadcast to millions. Every player is a modern gladiator leading a life of ultimate fame, responsible only for entertaining the masses. And though their weapons and armor are digital, the pain is real. Chosen to be the first female captain in RAGE tournament history, Kali Ling is at the top of the world until one of her teammates overdoses. Now, she must confront the truth about the tournament.

22000 B.C. A beautiful, ambitious angel reaches into his pocket for the instrument of humanity's doom. Must be in the other pocket. Then he frantically begins to pat himself down. Dejected, he realizes he has lost the object. 2015. A thief named Coop - a specialist in purloining magic objects - steals and delivers a small box to the mysterious client who engaged his services. Coop doesn't know that his latest job could be the end of him - and the rest of the world.

On Angel's sixteenth birthday, she is about to wed Leth, a man she likes but does not love. But Angel's brother, Kalo, interrupts the wedding ceremony. He wants her dowry, and he also believes Angel can lead him to the Book of Forbidden Wisdom. Trey, who has secretly loved Angel, rescues both Angel and Angel's sister Silky. With an itinerant singer, the three set off in search of the Book, pursued all the way by Kalo.

A breed of monsters as smart as vampires but who behave like zombies has been sighted in Kansas. Ava can't believe these zompires are back. She thought she'd kicked their asses for good when she first battled them in a Nazi death camp. Now, they are spreading their infection across America's heartland thanks to a nasty piece of business named Cain. To stop him, Ava must form an unholy alliance with some old foes.

Teenager Staci has been relegated to the run-down and dying Maine town of Silence and the custody of her alcoholic mother. The only bright spots in the whole place are a friendly waitress at the diner, and a bookstore where she meets a gaggle of geeks and gamers. But all is not as it seems in Silence.There are strange things moving beneath the shabby surface, terrible plots in play, and deadly players in the game, and Staci is about to find herself caught up in the middle of it all.

Excommunicated cleric Saker returns from exile in the Spice Islands to find his homeland in chaos. A dark sorcerer controls the ear of the King, turning him against his own son and heir, while a corrupted army gathers in the shadows. With the illusionist Sorrel and islander Ardhi, armed with magic from Ardhi's homeland, Saker now must stand between his city and the corruption that threatens to cripple it, before it is too late.

After dealing with killer whales, evil scientists, the return of her long-lost mother and, certainly not least of all, the challenges of breastfeeding, Elvie Nara has just about had it. And then the Jin Kai (along with the aforementioned estranged mom) kidnap her baby. And before she knows it, another Jin Kai attack puts her on the run again, but not before discovering that Olivia was implanted with a genetic tracking device.

Dev Harmer, reluctant agent of Interstellar Security Solutions, has travelled to an ocean world where settlements belonging to the Terran Diaspora have been coming under attack by members of the planet's sub-aquatic indigenous race. Involvement of the AI civilization Polis is suspected. As the violence escalates, Dev finds himself battling to restore order - but he has only seventy-two hours before his genetically engineered host form breaks down irreversibly. And all as an ancient god-beast rises from the depths to usher in an apocalypse...

Foreign invaders, a legendary dark mage and vengeful immortals fight Blaine's battered forces for control of the continent, and Blaine's weary army is the only thing standing between a kingdom struggling to rise from the ashes and a descent into fury and darkness.

Cast out by his family and exiled from the Rimward Commonwealth, Simon Forrester must make a new life for himself as an apprentice to the powerful Commerce Guild. But others aboard the merchant vessel Stacked Deck have a hidden agenda that might lead directly to interstellar war. Now the rising tensions between the Commonwealth and the neighbouring League of Democracies forces Simon to choose between old and new loyalties, with the fate of an empire at stake.

Mike Wood is unwittingly recruited into a secret cell of magicians by a fellow student at his unprestigious Catholic school in Manhattan, and his role as a steadfast soldier begins. These magicians don't use ritualized rote to work their magic, they use willpower in their clandestine war with the establishment: The Assholes.

Tahn Junell remembers friends who despaired in a place left barren by war. One of the few who have actually faced the unspeakable horde in battle, Tahn sees something else at work. He chooses to go to a place of his youth, a place of science, daring to think he can find a way to prevent slaughter, prevent war. His choices may reshape a world.

Runaway Beth Bradley, a sixteen-year-old graffiti artist, stumbles into a hidden city and meets Filius Viae, London's asphalt-hued crown prince. And her timing couldn't have been more perfect. An ancient enemy is stirring under St. Paul's Cathedral, determined to stoke the flames of a centuries-old war, and Beth and Fin find themselves drawn into the depths of the mysterious urban wonderland, hoping to prevent the destruction of the city they both know and love.

2045-2059. Lobsang, now an elderly and somewhat over-complex AI, seems to have suffered a breakdown of sorts. With Agnes, he now lives, in disguise, in an exotic High-Meggers world determined to lead a 'normal' life as a human colonist. They even adopt a child, a son. But it seems that Sally Linsay guided them there for a reason. For it's at New Springfield that the Long Earth chain of worlds has become 'entangled' with another Long world - an alien planet. Strange haunted-house sightings in a cellar reveal this alien world to be inhabited by voracious colonising cyborgs - 'silver beetles' - who seem to be modifying this world for their own terrifying purposes.

David Ribault agrees to a 4:30 a.m. meeting with the slick developer who has been buying up property in his coastal Outer Carolina Banks town. But while he waits, the population of Kraven Island, including the developer, vanishes. Something just lifted everybody - the woman he loves, her fanatical father, and kid brother, and all - out of this space and time and dropped them in a mysterious new place. The question is where.

With a major Vril offensive imminent, the Nazis step up their own project to exploit Vril weapons and technology. Leo Davenport finds himself fighting with the Greek resistance as he struggles to solve an ancient mystery. Major Guy Pentecross must travel to the ruined deathtrap of the most dangerous city in the world to track down the one man who can help.

For ages Noah has sailed the seas, seeking out all of God's mistakes and imprisoning them on his ark. Noah is not humanity's saviour but is instead God's jailer. But he has grown increasingly mad over the centuries, and now he is determined to end the world by raising the mysterious Sunken City. Only one person can stop him: Cross.

Rome, 799 AD. Pope Leo is viciously attacked in the street, by unknown assailants. Sigwulf, a Saxon prince who has been banished to the court of King Carolus in Frankia, is sent to Rome as a spy to discover who was responsible. There, he discovers a web of lies - the only clue to the attackers' identity is an intricate gold buckle, which Sigwulf links with a mysterious gold warrior flagon he finds in the home of the Pope's chamberlain.

The exorcism was meant to publicize the thriving paranormal investigation business of exorcist John Fogg and his wife, psychic medium Theodora Knight. But something went wrong, leading to an on-air massacre that unleashed a malicious host of demons and left Theodora catatonic, possessed by countless spirits. John soon learns that her possession is only one piece of a deadly plot that is threatening the entire world.

When Simara Ying crash-lands on the desert planet Bali, she finds herself trapped in a cave-dwelling culture with no social network for support. Her rescuer, Zen Valda, is yanked into a new universe of complications he can scarcely grasp and into an infinite network of data he never knew existed. When brash V-net anchorman Roni Hendrik starts investigating how Simara became the subject of an interplanetary manhunt, he finds a dangerous emergence in the network that threatens all human life.

As his companions struggle to keep the city Cier'Djal from destroying itself, Lenk travels to the Forbidden East in search of the demon who caused it all. But even as he pursues Khoth-Kapira, dark whispers plague his thoughts. Khoth-Kapira promises him a world free of war where Lenk can put down his sword at last. And Lenk finds it hard not to listen. When gods are deaf, demons will speak.

Alexander Moore, equipped with a supercarrier spacecraft and lots of armoured AI-assisted Marines, is hunting down remnant weaponry platforms left by the brilliant, mad AI known as Copernicus, the being ultimately responsible for the Solar System wide civil war. Yet Moore is about to uncover far more sinister threats to the survival of the human race.

First ever critical study of Tolkien's little-known essay, which reveals how language invention shaped the creation of Middle Earth.

Humans have arrived on Tau Ceti G, their new home - but it was already inhabited by the g'tel.The first offical meeting ceremony between humans and the g'tel ends in disaster, with deaths on each side. Now Constable Benson is brought out of retirement and paired with a g'tel 'truth-digger' to crack the case so the humans and g'tel have a chance to learn to live together.

Join is a revolutionary technology that allows small groups of minds to unite, forming a single consciousness that experiences the world through multiple bodies. But best friends Chance and Leap are jolted out of their professional routines by a terrifying stranger - a remorseless killer who freely manipulates the networks that regulate life in the post-Join world. They are taken to the scarred heart of an environmentally ravaged North American continent in their search for answers.

Since the Big Bubble popped in 1929, life in the United States hasn't been the same. Hotshot wizards will tell you nothing's really changed, but then again, hotshot wizards aren't looking for honest work in Enid, Oklahoma. No paying jobs at the mill, because zombies will work for nothing. The diner on Main Street's seeing hard times as well, because a lot fewer folks can afford to fly carpets in from miles away. Jack Spivey's just another down-and-out trying to stay alive, doing a little of this and a little of that. Sometimes that means making a few bucks playing ball with the Enid Eagles, against teams from as many as two counties away. And somethimes it means roughing up rival thugs for Big Stu, the guy who calls the shots in Enid.

When Suyana, Face of the United Amazonia Rainforest Confederation, was secretly meeting Ethan of the United States for a date that could solidify a relationship for the struggling UARC, the last thing she expected was an assassination attempt. Daniel, a teen runaway turned paparazzi out for his big break, witnessed the first shot hit Suyana, and before he could think about it, he jumped into the fray, telling himself it's not altruism, it's the scoop. Now Suyana and Daniel are on the run - and if they don't keep one step ahead, they'll lose it all.

An expedition of groundlings from the Empire of Kish have traveled through the Three Worlds to the Indigo Cloud court of the Raksura, shape-shifting creatures of flight that live in large family groups. They seek help getting inside a sealed ancient city they believe to be the last home of their ancestors. A small group of warriors agree to help investigate. But the predatory Fell have found the city too.

The Dead Letters Office: the final repository of the undelivered. Love missives unread, gifts unreceived, lost in postal limbo. Dead Letters Anthology features new stories from China Mieville, Adam Nevill and Michael Marshall Smith.

Otto Behr is a German agent, fighting his Russian counterparts across three millennia, manipulating history for moments in time that can change everything. Only the remnants of two great nations stand and for Otto, the war is life itself, the last hope for his people. But in a world where realities shift and memory is never constant, nothing is certain, least of all the chance of a future with his Russian love.

Violence explodes, treachery abounds, and the words are as deadly as the weapons in this rogue's gallery of side-shows, back-stories, and sharp endings from the world of the First Law.

Two-and-a-half miles below the Antarctic ice cap is Vostok, a six thousand square mile liquid lake, over a thousand feet deep, left untouched for more than fifteen million years. Now, marine biologist Zachary Wallace and two other scientists aboard a submersible tethered to a laser will journey 13,000 feet beneath the ice into this unexplored realm to discover Mesozoic life forms long believed extinct - and an object of immense power responsible for the evolution of modern man.

Reddy and his crew are exhausted, far from reinforcements, and wildly outnumbered, so the odds seem greater than ever before. As for the fate of the Americas, Don Hernan and the evil Dominion have gathered to annihilate the forces behind the walls of Fort Defiance as a shadowy power with an agenda all its own rises with chilling resolve.

Major Bhaajan, a former military officer with Imperial Space Command, is now a hard-bitten P.I. with a load of baggage to deal with, and clients with woes sometimes personal, sometimes galaxy-shattering, and sometimes both. Bhaajan must sift through the shadows of the dark and dangerous Undercity - the enormous capital of a vast star empire - to find answers.

Company Town is a city-sized oil rig off the east coast of Canada, now owned by the wealthy Lynch family. Hwa is one of the few there to forgo bio-engineered enhancements. Still, when the youngest Lynch needs training and protection, the family turns to Hwa, known for her expertise in the martial arts. Meanwhile, a series of interconnected murders threatens the city's stability. All signs point to a nearly invisible serial killer, but all of the murders seem to lead right back to Hwa's front door.

In an unnamed but alarmingly familiar Egyptian city, an authoritarian organization known as "the Gate" has just quashed a popular uprising and is now requiring its citizens to obtain permits for even the most basic activities - eating, drinking, even window-shopping. But the Gate never opens, and the queue before it grows and grows.

Ken MacLeod edits and introduces this selection of poems from the late Iain Banks.

Bo-Kate Wisby and her lover Jefferson Powell were cast out, stripped of their ability to make music, and cursed to never be able to find their way back to Needsville. But now Bo-Kate is back, with rockabilly singer Byron Harley who has passed the last sixty years trapped in a bubble of faery time. He's ready to take revenge on any Tufa he finds. The only one who can stop Bo-Kate is Jefferson Powell.

As the science advisor to a newly-elected freshman senator, Dr. Jake Ross has crafted a comprehensive energy plan that employs innovative new technologies to make America the world's leader in energy production while simultaneously boosting the economy and protecting the environment. But his plan soon runs afoul of entrenched special interests, well-funded lobbies, cynical bureaucrats, pork-barrel politics, and one very powerful U.S. Senator. Jake needs a crash course in the way Washington "really" works.

In a distant corner of the Four Lands, the magic of the wishsong has been detected. Paxon Leah must accompany a Druid emissary to find its source - and ensure the formidable power is not wielded by the wrong hands. But danger is already afoot in the village of Portlow. Gentle traveling minstrel Reyn Frosch possesses the uncanny gift, and curse, of the wishsong. And now his coveted abilities have captured the malevolent interest of none other than Arcannen - whose quest for power is exceeded only by his thirst for vengeance.

In the early 2020s, two young, genius computer hackers, Elizabeth Santiago and David Schwartz, meet at MIT, and have a brief affair. Now, a decade later, the two are opponents. There is money to be made in space piracy - deflecting ore shipments coming from space to pirate territory. One is assisting the deflections, the other attempting to prevent them.

Pisa, May 1364. Father Pierre is gathering men across Europe for a crusade, and as a donat of the order, Sir William is pledged to serve him. But before setting out for the Holy Land, Sir William and his companions face deadly adversaries closer to home. In the labyrinthine politics of Italy, not only would some cities rather side with the Saracen than their fellow Christians, but there are powerful princes of the church - the Count D'Herblay, husband of the woman who still holds Sir William's heart - whose ambitions would be better served if the crusade failed.

A fleet controlled entirely by a malfunctioning AI has turned on its creators and attacked Alliance space. Geary's fleet is no match for the firepower of the machine-piloted armada. With the help of the Dancer species of aliens, Geary has tracked the A.I. ships to their secret base in the supposedly mythical Unity Alternate star system where his fleet, the last hope of the Alliance's future, will end the conflict at any cost...

An enigma warship has appeared and vanished near a Syndic colony. If the aliens are capable of jumping into other human-occupied star systems, then billions of people could be vulnerable to a hostile invasion fleet anywhere they choose to strike. But an even greater vulnerability lies with Iceni and Drakon, as a once-trusted adviser-turned-saboteur plans revenge...

[Vancouver author]. A stray zombie turns up outside Kincaid's neighbourhood bar with no recollection of how he died or who raised him. Not only is it dangerous for Kincaid to be caught with an unauthorized zombie, she soon realizes he's tied to a spate of murders. Someone is targeting the zombies and voodoo practitioners in Seattle's infamous Underground City, a paranormal hub.

Kes is a professional dominatrix who has become a celebrity attraction at a palatial dungeon called Tryst. One of Kes's most devoted clients is the infamous interplanetary political operative Janus, the last man standing when his business fell apart on Selmun III, and now a major cog in Lyndir's political machine. When a highpowered imperial authority decides she wants Janus out of the way, the seductive domna Kes is the most logical avenue. Imprisoned, altered against her will, and turned into a brutal weapon by the highly experimental Splintegrate cloning technology, Kes is at war with herself as everything she holds dear falls apart around her.

James Griffin-Mars is a chronman - a convicted criminal recruited for missions into Earth's past to recover resources and treasure without altering the timeline. On a final mission that is to secure his retirement, James meets scientist Elise Kim, who is fated to die during the destruction of an oceanic rig. Against his training and his common sense, James brings her back to the future with him. Now they are both fugitives, fleeing into the wild and poisonous wastes of Earth.

Phoenix has become ground zero in a magical war, and an army of werecreatures, blood sorcerers, and necromancers has made Jay its number one target. When he is hired to track down a woman who has gone missing with her two young children, he has a hunch that the dark ones are to blame. But then he's also brought in by the police to help with a murder investigation, and all the evidence implicates this same woman.

Following his unlikely but decisive (and immensely popular) 1876 victory over Sitting Bull and the Sioux at the Little Big Horn, George Armstrong Custer is propelled into the White House in 1880. Two years later, he finds himself bored and seeks new worlds to conquer. He and his wife Libbie fixate on Spain's decaying empire as his source for immortality. What President Custer doesn't quite comprehend is that the U.S. military isn't up to such a venture. When a group of Americans on a ship headed for Cuba is massacred, war becomes inevitable - and unless calmer, patriotic citizens and soldiers can find a way to avoid debacle, this war may be America's last stand!

A thousand worlds have opened, and the greatest land rush in human history has begun. But Ships are disappearing without a trace. Private armies are being secretly formed. The sole remaining protomolecule sample is stolen. Terrorist attacks previously considered impossible bring the inner planets to their knees. And as a new human order is struggling to be born in blood and fire, James Holden and the crew of the" Rocinante" must struggle to survive and get back to the only home they have known.

King Alfred's son Edward and formidable daughter, Aethelflaed, rule Wessex, Mercia and East Anglia. But the restless Northmen, eyeing the rich lands and wealthy churches, are mounting raids. Uhtred of Bebbanburg, the kingdoms' greatest warrior, controls northern Mercia from the strongly fortified city of Chester. But forces are rising up against him. Northmen allied to the Irish, led by the fierce warrior Ragnall Ivarson, are soon joined by the Northumbrians, and their strength could prove overwhelming.

He is the last to wake. The label on his sleeper pad identifies him as an admiral of the Evagardian Empire, a surprise as much to him as to the three recent recruits now under his command. He wears no uniform, and he is ignorant of military protocol, but the ship's records confirm he is their superior officer. Whether he is an Evagardian admiral or a spy will be of little consequence if the crew members all end up dead. They are marooned on a strange world, their ship's systems are failing one by one and they are not alone.

[Vancouver author]. The horrifying murder of a duke and his family sends Falcio val Mond, swordsman and First Cantor of the Greatcoats in a deadly pursuit to capture the killer. But Falcio soon discovers his own life is in mortal danger from a poison administered as a final act of revenge by one of his deadliest enemies. As chaos and civil war begin to overtake the country, Falcio has precious little time left to stop those determined to destroy his homeland.

Sherlock Holmes is an unparalleled genius who uses the gift of deduction and reason to solve the most vexing of crimes. Warlock Holmes, however, is an idiot. A good man, perhaps; a font of arcane power, certainly. But he's brilliantly dim. Frankly, he couldn't deduce his way out of a paper bag. The only thing he has really got going for him are the might of a thousand demons and his stalwart flatmate. Thankfully, Dr. Watson is always there to aid him through the treacherous shoals of Victorian propriety... and save him from a gruesome death every now and again.

The grueling Minerva Sierra Challenge is the cyborg's Tour de France, a day long race across the Sierra Nevada. Marmeg Guinto lacks the funding and support of the rich thrill-seekers with corporate sponsorships, extensive support teams, and top-of-the-line exoskeletal and internal augmentations. She cobbled her gear together from parts she found in rich people's garbage and spent the money her mother wanted her to use for nursing school to enter the race. But it is her family's only chance for a better life.

This year's selection of the authors to be the best, the brightest, the truest emerging stars in the field.

The fourth collection of Grantville tales edited and introduced by Eric Flint, and inspired by his now-legendary 1632. Stories by Eric Flint, David Brin, David Carrico, Virginia DeMarce, Charles E.Gannon and more.

Exoethnologist Sara Callicot joins a team of scientists sent to investigate a strange new habitable planet, to keep an eye on an unstable crewmate. Upon arrival, the team finds an extraordinary crystalline planet, laden with dark matter. Then a crew member is murdered and the unstable Thora mysteriously disappears. Thought to be uninhabited, the planet is in fact home to a blind, sentient species whose members navigate their world with a bizarre vocabulary and extrasensory perceptions.

The King in Red hires Elayne Kevarian of the Craft firm Kelethres, Albrecht, and Ao to fix the god wards, but the Skittersill's people have their own ideas. A protest rises against Elayne's work, led by Temoc, a warrior-priest turned community organizer who wants to build a peaceful future for his city, his wife, and his young son. As Elayne drags Temoc and the King in Red to the bargaining table, old wounds reopen, old gods stir in their graves, civil blood-bonds break under new mutiny, and profiteers circle in the desert sky.

Anita Blake is the go-to expert for zombie issues, and right now the FBI is having one hell of a zombie issue. Someone is producing zombie porn. Anita has seen her share of freaky undead fetishes, so this shouldn't bother her. But the women being victimized aren't just mindless, rotting corpses. Their souls are trapped behind their eyes, signaling voodoo of the blackest kind.

At Midnight's local pawnshop, weapons are flying off the shelves only to be used in sudden and dramatic suicides right at the main crossroads in town. Who better to figure out why blood is being spilled than the vampire Lemuel, who, while translating mysterious texts, discovers what makes Midnight the town it is.

Beset on all sides by the forces of the merchant emperor Talquist, the Cymrian Alliance finds itself in desperate straits. Rhapsody herself has joined the battle, wielding the Daystar Clarion, leaving her True Name in hiding with her infant son. Ashe tries to enlist the aid of the Sea Mages. Within their Citadel of Scholarship lies the White Ivory tower, a spire that could hold the key to unraveling the full extent of Talquist's machinations. Achmed journeys to the reportedly unassailable palace of Jierna Tal to kill emperor Talquist - all the while knowing that even if he succeeds, it may not be enough to stop the momentum of the war.

A future lord is dispossessed of his birthright by a scheming uncle, a mountain sorcerer imbues a mask with the spirit of a great stag for a lost young man, a stubborn father forces his son to give up his wife to his older brother, and a powerful priest meddles in the succession to the Lotus Throne, the child who is the rightful heir to the emperor barely escaping the capital in the arms of his sister. And that is just the beginning.

Neuroscientist Chuck Brenton has discovered the crucial combination of practice and conditioning that will access the incredible power dormant in our brains. But in an age of increasing militarization, corporate exploitation, and explosive technological discovery, a group of influential power brokers are determined to control Brenton's new superbeings for their own manipulative ends - and their motives may be far from peaceful.

Powerful prince Malcolm is facing ruin in the wake of a curse that has destroyed his harvest. He blames the nomadic band Mondyalitko who summer in the meadow below his castle - and he is determined to root out the people who caused the blight by any means necessary. When Celine and Amelie Fawe, descended from the Mondyalitko, learn that their mother's people are under suspicion of sabotage and treason, they set out to use their magical gifts to save their estranged relatives and learn about their own origins.

Alexander, Macedon's sixteen-year-old heir, is on the brink of discovering his fated role in conquering the known world. Katerina must navigate the dark secrets of court life while keeping hidden her own mission: kill the queen. Jacob will go to unthinkable lengths to win Katerina, even if it means having to compete with Hephaestion, a murderer sheltered by the prince. And far across the sea, Zofia, a Persian princess, seeks the deadly Spirit Eaters to alter her destiny.

Black Spring is a seemingly picturesque Hudson Valley town haunted by the Black Rock Witch, a 17th century woman whose eyes and mouth are sewn shut. The elders of Black Spring have virtually quarantined the town by using high-tech surveillance to prevent their curse from spreading. Frustrated with being kept in lockdown, the town's teenagers decide to break their strict regulations and go viral with the haunting. But, in so doing, they send the town spiraling into dark, medieval practices of the distant past.

This eighth volume of the year's best science fiction and fantasy features over thirty stories, including John Barnes, Elizabeth Bear, C.C. Finlay, Yoon Ha Lee, Kelly Link, Ian McDonald, Seanan McGuire, Vonda N. McIntyre, Geoff Ryman, Catherynne M. Valente, Genevieve Valentine, and many others.

If Jacob Carneham can lure the invaders into the mountain he can kill them all. If he does, there may never be peace again. If he doesn't, Weyland will never be free of the threat of invasion. The northern horse lords are planning an attack. A future Empress is fighting to save her daughter. Jacob's son is trying to restore peace and stability to Weyland, alongside the rightful King. And behind it all is a greater struggle, which may spell the end for them all.

The Merdrun, cruel warriors blooded by thousands of years of slaughter, are gathered in the void between the worlds. Their summon stone is waking, corrupting good people as well as bad, and turning arcane places into magically polluted wastelands. Sulien, a nine-year-old girl endowed with untold gifts, sees the Merdrun leader in a nightmare - and he sees her. Karan and Llian must stop the greatest warrior in the void, to save their daughter and their world.

The world is on the brink of war. Fisk and Shoe - mercenaries, very much not wanting to get caught in the middle of a political whirlwind - must deliver a very important message, and find a very dangerous man. And the Emperor has decreed that Livia Cornelius, pregnant with Fisk's child, must travel to the far lands of the Autumn Lords on a diplomatic mission.

When someone kidnaps the last surviving descendant of the Grandmaster of the Knights Templar, it's bad news. When the baby is the key to the tenuous alliance between a large werewolf pack and the knights, it's even worse news. They're at each other's throats before they've even begun to look for baby Constance. But whoever kidnapped Constance didn't count on one thing. She is also the goddaughter of John Charming, modern-day descendant of a long line of famous dragon slayers, witch finders, and wrong righters.

After killing the witch Anushka, Cecile and Tristan must negotiate a tenuous political situation and find a way to forge a life once their struggles come to an end.

He was born an outsider, like the rest of his family. Poor yet resilient, he lives in the shadows with his aunt Libby and uncle Darren, folk who stubbornly make their way in a society that does not understand or want them. For ten years they have lived a life of late-night exits and narrow escapes always on the move across the South to stay one step ahead of the law. But the time is drawing near when Darren and Libby will finally know if their nephew is like them or not. And the close calls they ve been running from for so long are catching up fast now. Everything is about to change.

The Dragons of Talon, once hunted nearly to extinction, are now poised to take over the world. But the legendary dragonslayers of the Order of St. George will stop at nothing to wipe dragons from the face of the earth. Young dragon Ember Hill must prove she can hide her true nature and blend in with humans. But a chance meeting with a rogue dragon will soon challenge everything Ember has been taught. As Ember struggles to accept her future, St. George soldier Garret Xavier Sebastian is tasked with hunting her down.

Ember Hill left the dragon organization Talon to take her chances with rebel dragon Cobalt and his crew of rogues. Ember is determined to save Garret, the soldier of the dragonslaying Order of St. George who saved her from a Talon assassin. She must somehow convince Cobalt to help her break into the Order's headquarters to release Garret before he can be executed.

As Ember and Riley hide and regroup to fight another day, Garret journeys alone to the United Kingdom, birthplace of the ancient and secret Order of St. George, to spy on his former brothers and uncover deadly and shocking secrets that will shake the foundations of dragons and dragon-slayers alike and place them all in imminent danger as Talon's new order rises.

From the small coastal town of Senjan, notorious for its pirates, a young woman sets out to find vengeance for her lost family. That same spring, from the wealthy city-state of Seressa, famous for its canals and lagoon, come two very different people: a young artist travelling to the dangerous east to paint the grand khalif at his request - and possibly to do more - and a fiercely intelligent, angry woman, posing as a doctor's wife, but sent by Seressa as a spy. The trading ship that carries them is commanded by the accomplished younger son of a merchant family, ambivalent about the life he's been born to live. And further east, a boy trains to become a soldier in the elite infantry of the khalif - to win glory in the war everyone knows is coming.

The fantastical appears in the middle of 1920's Oxford as a young refugee looking to escape her grim reality rubs shoulders with two of the founding fathers of modern fantasy, Tolkien and Lewis.

The sudden reappearance of a long-forgotten adversary turns out to be the tip of the iceberg. New robots and androids attacking, old enemies making new alliances, and new aliens with interesting abilities almost overshadow the fact that the U.S. still has to host a peace summit at Camp David between Israel and Iraq. It's clear that while the Mastermind may be down, there are plenty of others ready to take his place and all that stands between them and success are Kitty and Company.

Action moves to Norman England and the Harrowing of the North. An immortal wolf and an immortal woman are on the run, fighting for their lives. They carry a magic within them, runes which flare with power when brought together. But others hold runes of their own, and the runes desire to be united. And when they are, Ragnarok will come.

This year's Nebula winners are Ursula Vernon, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Nancy Kress, and Jeff VanderMeer, with Alaya Dawn Johnson winning the Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy Book.

Featuring all of the permutations of the superhero genre. The Tesseracts anthology series is Canada's longest running anthology.

Stolen from her people as a child and raised as a citizen of the Tyranian Empire, Ligea Gayed is the obvious choice to despatch to her homeland, occupied Kardiastan, with orders to root out a rebel conspiracy. But blood will out, and with each day she spends among her parents' people, her disciplined self-image crumbles a little. And there are secrets in Kardiastan, secrets that will inevitably force Ligea to choose between her upbringing and her birthright. Secrets that will shape the destiny of two nations.

Death and destruction follow the demon wherever he treads, and Gabriel is rarely far behind, waiting for his chance to extinguish the creature known as Temple once and for all.But in Singapore during the Second World War, a lone soldier in possession of a shattering secret gets caught up in their battle. The knowledge he holds could change the course of their ancient conflict and the fate of the world.

Maia's peaceful life is shattered when the Summer Dragon - one of the rare and mythical High Dragons - makes an appearance in her quiet valley. Political factions vie for control of the implied message, threatening her aspirations, her aerie, her entire way of life. The bond between dragons and their riders is deep and life-long, and Maia's desire for a dragon of her own to train, ride, fly, and love drives her to take a risk that puts her life at stake.

Thomas Weatherby, now captain of the seventy-four-gun Fortitude, helps destroy the French fleet at the Nile and must chase an escaped French ship from Egypt to Saturn, home of the enigmatic and increasingly unstable aliens who call themselves the Xan. Meanwhile, in Egypt, alchemist Andrew Finch has ingratiated himself with Napoleon's forces - and finds the true, horrible reason why the French invaded Egypt in the first place.

As a new Initiate with the Alchemists' Council, Jaden is trained to maintain the elemental balance of the world, while fending off interference by the malevolent Rebel Branch. Bees are disappearing from the pages of the ancient manuscripts in Council dimension and from the outside world, threatening its very existence. Jaden navigates alchemy's complexities, but the more she learns, the more she begins to question Council practices.

A few are on the edges of a vast plan, one which will span decades and light years: a woman living a quiet secluded life, with only her dog and her demons for company; the dissolute heir to a powerful merchant family; the laminated brain of the woman who led us into the universe; a policeman, seemingly working for the Jackaroo. A piece of alien code has awakened, and the end of our species may be happening around us. And we may finally discover if the aliens really are here to help us.

Sequel to A DIRTY JOB. Something really strange is happening in San Francisco. People are dying, but their souls are not being collected. Someone or something is stealing them and no one knows where they are going, or why, but it has something to do with that big orange bridge. To get to the bottom of this abomination, a motley crew of heroes will band together: the seven-foot-tall death merchant Minty Fresh; retired policeman turned bookseller Alphonse Rivera; the Emperor of San Francisco and his dogs, Bummer and Lazarus; and Lily, the former Goth girl.

The power that was hidden in the Mounds is on the move, seeking a final confrontation with the very entities that kept it locked away since the Cataclysm. Andover Lashk has finally come to accept his destiny and prepares to journey back to Fellein. The Sa'ba Taalor continue their domination over each country and people they encounter, but the final conflict is coming. The Great Wave of the Sa'ba Taalor stands to destroy an empire and the Silent Army prepares to stop them in their tracks.

Women from around the world delve into Lovecraftian depths, penning and illustrating a variety of weird horrors. The pale and secretive Lavinia wanders through the woods, Asenath is a precocious teenager with an attitude, and the ancient Egyptian pharaoh Nitocris has found a new body in distant America.

17 years ago Rose Franklin was riding her new bike near her home in Deadwood, South Dakota, when she fell through the earth -- into a bizarre artifact. Now a physicist leading a secret team, Rose is attempting to crack the artifact's code. And along with her colleagues, she is being interviewed by a nameless interrogator whose power and purview are as enigmatic as the provenance of the artifact.

In the south, the Breach stirs. Gamma's sword, the Malice, wakes, calling to be taken to battle once more. But the Vagrant has found a home now, made a life and so he turns his back, ignoring its call. The sword cries out, frustrated, until another answers. Her name is Vesper.

She is the girl the world forgets. It started when she was 16 - a slow declining, an isolation, one piece at a time. A father forgetting to drive her to school. A mother setting the table for three, not four. A teacher who forgets to chase her missing homework. A friend who looks at her and sees a stranger. It makes her life tricky. It also makes her dangerous...

In 1976 Andre Norton was invited to play a new sort of adventure game by its creator. It was the game that launched the role-playing game industry, Dungeons & Dragons. The creator, E.Gary Gygax, was the head of TSR Industries, the company he formed to sell his game. Gygax played the game with Andre, introducing her to his world of Greyhawk where she took part in an imaginative session of world building, role playing, and fantasy adventuring, after which she returned home and wrote the novelQuag Keep, a tale of six adventurers from our world who journey from our world to the city of Greyhawk in order to aid a wizard and unlock the secrets of the stronghold of Quag Keep.

Aware of his weakened position, Napoleon is enlisting the dragons of every country - and the ferals - with promises of vast new rights and powers. Even the dragons of England, who have long rankled at their disrespectful treatment, are accepting. But Laurence and his faithful dragon soon discover that the wily Napoleon has one more gambit at the ready, one that may win him the war, and the world.

Prequel to WHO FEARS DEATH. Phoenix is an "accelerated woman" - only two years old but with the body and mind of an adult. Still innocent and inexperienced in the ways of the world, she is content living in her room speed reading e-books, running on her treadmill, and basking in the love of Saeed, another biologically altered human of Tower 7. Then one evening, Saeed witnesses something so terrible that he takes his own life. Phoenix finally begins to realize that her home is really her prison, and she becomes desperate to escape.

For his crimes Mycroft Canner must wander the world, being as useful as he can to all he meets. Carlyle Foster is a sensayer - a spiritual counselor in a world that has outlawed the public practice of religion. The pair have stumbled on the wild card that may destablize their 25th century technological utopia: the boy Bridger, who can effortlessly make his wishes come true. Who can, it would seem, bring inanimate objects to life...

These fifteen supercharged all-new tales reimagine Canadian historical events, explore other Canadas, and gather inspiration from the northern landscape to make us wonder what if history had gone a different way?

A daring hostage rescue by the Outriders leads to the discovery of an imminent terrorist attack. But the terrorist attack goes off unhindered. And when they learn the reasons why, the Outriders find themselves tasked with stopping a war before it can ever start. A dangerously cunning woman who most assuredly should be dead has seemingly returned. And her plans aren't just devastating, they might be unstoppable.

A group of heroes makes dangerous bargains in order to overthrow the dragonlords and their Dragon Engines.

This is humanity's first voyage beyond the solar system, as told by the Ship itself. It left Earth generations ago, so long ago that its equipment is now starting to break down and those aboard now wonder what they're doing here, even as they make final approach to their destination, their new home, Aurora.

The world has fallen into war. Ciri, the child of prophecy, has vanished. Hunted by friends and foes alike, she has taken on the guise of a petty bandit and lives free for the first time in her life. But the net around her is closing. Geralt, the Witcher, has assembled a group of allies determined to rescue her. Both sides of the war have sent brutal mercenaries to hunt her down. Her crimes have made her famous. There is only one place left to run. The tower of the swallow is waiting...

Zavcka Klist has reinvented herself. No longer the ruthless gemtech enforcer determined to keep the gems they created enslaved, she's now all about transparency and sharing the fruits of Bel'Natur's research to help gems and norms alike. Then confiscated genestock disappears from a secure government facility, and the more DI Varsi investigates, the closer she comes to the dark heart of Bel'Natur and what Zavcka Klist is really after-not to mention the secrets of Aryel Morningstar's own past...

The gillungs - waterbreathing, genetically modified humans - have established a colony on the Thames. There a biohazard scare fuels fears about the gillung impact on normal business and the environment. But was it an accident, or was it sabotage? Detective Sharon Varsi has her suspicions, but her investigations are compromised by family ties. And now there is a new threat. Zavcka Klist is about to be released from prison - and she wants her company back.

In the far future, strength is the only way to survive. And the most vicious man alive has a new con in mind. In the present a man with unnatural powers hunts down a killer with impossible abilities. And long ago, the last tribes of Northern Britain confront demons who rise from the sea, absorbing and twisting everything they touch. And all of these times are connected.

After the Loss of Earth, war has begun and an unknowable alien race has awakened, intent on the destruction of everything. And the only way our species will survive is if two augmented humans can fight their way through apocalypse to a faint glimmer of hope. Long ago, the seeds of that apocalypse were resisted by the warrior tribes of Britain, with devastating consequences for them and their lands. And all three of these times will meet on another world.

A catastrophic event renders the Earth a ticking time bomb. A plan is devised to ensure the survival of humanity in space. But the enterprise runs into the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers, until only a handful of survivors remain. 5000 years later, their progeny - seven distinct races now three billion strong - embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown - back to Earth.

S. M. Stirling invites the most fertile minds in science fiction to join him in expanding his rich Emberverse canvas. These adventures revisit beloved people and places from Stirling's fantastic universe, introduce us to new ones.

The best of the year's science fiction and fantasy stories as selected by the multiple award-winning editor Jonathan Strahan.

When Kali falls off the edge of her kingdom and miraculously survives, she is shocked to discover there are still humans on the earth. Determined to get home, Kali entrusts a rugged monster-hunter named Griffin to guide her across a world overrun by chimera, storm dragons, basilisks and other terrifying creatures. But the more time she spends on earth, the more dark truths she begins to uncover about her home in the sky, and the more resolute she is to start burning for herself.

Deep in the heart of history's most infamous concentration camp, a man lies dreaming. His name is Shomer, and before the war he was a pulp fiction author. Now, to escape the brutal reality of life in Auschwitz, Shomer spends his nights imagining another world - a world where a disgraced former dictator now known only as Wolf ekes out a miserable existence as a low-rent PI in London's grimiest streets.

When Boris Chong returns to Tel Aviv from Mars, much has changed. Boris's ex-lover is raising a strangely familiar child who can tap into the datastream of a mind with the touch of a finger. His cousin is infatuated with a robotnika damaged cyborg soldier who might as well be begging for parts. His father is terminally-ill with a multigenerational mind-plague. And a hunted data-vampire has followed Boris to where she is forbidden to return.

Adolf Hitler wakes up in 2011 to a changed Germany. He is immediately recognized - as an impersonator of uncommon skill. The public assumes the fulminating leader of the Nazi party is a performer who is always in character, and soon his inevitable viral appeal begets YouTube stardom, begets television celebrity on a Turkish-born comedian's show. His bigoted rants are mistaken for a theatrical satire-exposing prejudice and misrepresentation-and his media success emboldens Hitler to start his own political party, and set the country he finds a shambles back to rights.

Kenstibec is a Ficial - a genetically engineered artificial life form; tough, skilled, hard to kill. Or at least he was. He's lost the nanotech that constantly repaired him. And now Kestibec must take a trip to the pinnacle of our failed civilization. The Steeple is a one thousand storey tower that looms over the wreckage of London. It is worshipped, feared and haunted by attack droids and cannibals. And the location of a secret that just might save Kenstibec's life. The only way is up.

In a futuristic London where technological body modification is the norm, Ecko stands alone as a testament to the extreme capabilities of his society. Driven half mad by the systems running his body, Ecko is a criminal for hire. No job is too dangerous or insane. When a mission goes wrong and Ecko finds himself catapulted across dimensions into a peaceful and unadvanced society living in fear of 'magic', he must confront his own perceptions of reality and his place within it.

Kenhodan has no last name, because he has no past - or not one he remembers, anyway. What he does have are a lot of scars and a lot of skills, some exhilarating and some terrifying, and a purpose. He is key to the outcome of the final confrontation with the Dark Lords of fallen Kontovar. No one knows exactly what his past and purpose are - except an 11 year old girl with a heart of harp music, and she dares not share them with anyone, even the ancient wild wizard who loves her more dearly than life itself.

If the Sleepers wake, the city will not survive--and the Sleepers are waking. To save the city--and the House over which she rules--Jewel must go to face the Oracle. In her hands, she carries the only hope of the Winter Queen. But the path she must travel was old when the gods ceased to walk the world. Ancient creatures stalk winter skies at the behest of the demons who mean to ensure that she will never reach the Oracle's side. Secrets, long hidden from all but the firstborn, will finally be brought to light. Choices will be made, and paths chosen, from which there will be no return.

Young Adam Fisk takes the suite of tests to see if he qualifies for any of the twenty two Affinities, and finds that he's a match for one of the largest, the one called Tau. It's utopian - at first. Problems in all areas of his life begin to simply sort themselves out, as he becomes part of a global network of people dedicated to helping one another - to helping him. But as the differing Affinities put their new powers to the test, they begin to rapidly chip away at the power of governments, of global corporations, of all the institutions of the old world. Then, with dreadful inevitability, the different Affinities begin to go to war - with one another. What happens next will change Adam, and his world, forever.

The Broom clan of Cobra warriors finds itself pressed between two star empires headed for war. On the planet Aventine, the Broom's homeworld, pater familia Paul Broom has been taken prisoner by Commodore Santeros, an implacable operative of the Dominion of Man. Paul is due to have his memories sifted through by the dreaded and often destructive Dominion MindsEye in order to root out the location of the legendary Qasamaa planet where huge advances in military hardware might give the Dominion of Man an edge in a coming war with the alien Troft. Santeros hopes to strike a deal with Qasama - but if a deal cannot be struck then Santores is prepared to take what he wants.

Where the Marble Arch stands today in London was once the Tyburn gallows - also known as the Hanging Tree. The walk toward those gallows along Oxford Street and past the Mayfair mansions has a bloody and haunted history as the last trip of the condemned. Some things never change. For both blood and ghosts have returned to those mansions of the super-rich. And it's up to Peter Grant - England's last wizard and the Metropolitan Police's reluctant investigator of all things supernatural - to get to the bottom of the sinister doings.

The second of a new series featuring the best stories of the year from the top magazines and online venues with a military and adventure science fiction theme.

Thirty-five miles off the Massachussetts coast, a small research ship is attacked. All but one of its crew is killed by the massive serpentine horror that rises from the sea. Responding to a distress signal, fishboat captain Brian Hawkins arrives in time to save the ship's last survivor. But the nightmare is just beginning. A casino cruise ship carrying high-stakes passengers - and a top-secret cargo - becomes the creature's bloodsoaked hunting ground. Desperate but determined, Hawkins goes after the biggest catch of the century.

With the Walker in desperate need of repairs just as the Grik's First General is poised to strike, the crew needs new allies. That means combing the lethal wilds of Madagascar to find the Lemurians' fabled ancestors, as well as the enigmatic dwellers east of the Pass of Fire. But what they unearth may be more than they can handle. And Reddy's greatest adversary is from his past: a madman named Kurokawa whose single-minded mission of revenge will shake the Alliance to its core and raise the stakes to the most personal and terrifying levels Reddy has ever faced.

As Spear and Sverl hunt Penny Royal, all roads seem to lead to a long-missing War Factory station. Penny Royal seems set on returning to the factory that produced its twisted intelligence. And the AI's enemies will follow it to the bitter end. Their very sanity and a possible war depend on it.

Three Robert Asprin novels - The Cold Cash Wars, The Bug Wars, and Tambu - in one volume.

Sequel to Arthur C. Clarke's MEETING WITH MEDUSA. Howard Falcon almost lost his life in an accident as the first human astronaut to explore the atmosphere of Jupiter and a combination of human ingenuity and technical expertise brought him back. But he is no longer himself. Instead, he has been changed into an augmented human: part man, part machine, and exceptionally capable.

The Time Traveller has abandoned his charming and helpless Eloi friend Weena to the cannibal appetites of the Morlocks, the devolved race of future humans from whom he was forced to flee. He promptly embarks on a second journey to the year AD 802,701, pledged to rescue Weena. He never arrives. The future was changed by his presence...

Angels watch over us, watching our lives unfold and analyzing us for repeating patterns and redundancies. When they find them, the angels simplify those patterns and remove the redundancies, and the problem that is "you" gets solved. Carey doesn't much like that idea. As a punk living in New York City, 1977, Carey is sick and tired of watching strange kids with unnoticeable faces abduct his friends.

A crew of thieves and con artists take on a job that could pay off a lot of debts in a corrupt galaxy where life is cheap and criminals are the best people in it. The Keiko is a ship of smugglers, soldiers of fortune, and adventurers travelling Earth's colony planets searching for the next job. And they never talk about their past until now. Captain Ichabod Drift is being blackmailed. He has to deliver a special cargo to Earth, and no one can know they're there. It's what they call a dark run And it may be their last.

A demon's murderous rampage at a peace summit leaves the political opponents of the Druids dead, casting new suspicions upon the order and forcing them to flee from enemies both mortal and monstrous. Paxon Leah, the order's appointed protector, knows that blame lies with Arcannen Rai, the vile sorcerer he has battled and defeated before. But there's no time to hunt his nemesis, if he is to lead the wrongfully accused Druids to their sanctuary.

Two years ago, the Suicide Motor Club left a witness in the mangled wreck of her family car, her husband dead, her son taken. She remembers their awful faces, despite their tricks and glamours. And she's coming for them - her thirst for vengeance even more powerful than their hunger for blood. On the deserted highways of America, the hunters are about to become the hunted...

Novella. On his way to his betrothal, young Lord Penric comes upon a riding accident with an elderly lady on the ground, her maidservant and guardsmen distraught. As he approaches to help, he discovers that the lady is a Temple divine, servant to the five gods of this world. Her avowed god is the Bastard, "master of all disasters out of season", and with her dying breath she bequeaths her mysterious powers to Penric. From that moment on, Penric's life is irreversibly changed, and his life is in danger from those who envy or fear him.

Alchemy allows the Great Library to deliver the content of the greatest works of history instantly - but the personal ownership of books is expressly forbidden. Jess Brightwell believes in the value of the Library, but the majority of his knowledge comes from illegal books obtained by his family. Jess has been sent to be his family's spy, but his loyalties are tested in the final months of his training to enter the Library's service. When his friend inadvertently commits heresy by creating a device that could change the world, Jess discovers that those who control the Great Library believe knowledge is more valuable than any human life - and soon both heretics and books will burn....

After he bungles yet another mission, spy Kangaroo gets sent away on a mandatory vacation: an interplanetary cruise to Mars. While he tries to make the most of his exile, two passengers are found dead, and Kangaroo has to risk blowing his cover. It turns out he isn't the only spy on the ship and he's just starting to unravel a massive conspiracy which threatens the entire Solar System. Now, Kangaroo has to stop a disaster which would shatter the delicate peace that's existed between Earth and Mars ever since the brutal Martian Independence War.

Half a century after the Doomsday Battle, the uneasy balance of Dark Forest Deterrence keeps the Trisolaran invaders at bay. Earth enjoys unprecedented prosperity due to the infusion of Trisolaran knowledge. Cheng Xin, an aerospace engineer from the early 21st century, awakens from hibernation in this new age. She brings with her knowledge of a long-forgotten program dating from the beginning of the Trisolar Crisis, and her very presence may upset the delicate balance between two worlds.

A new yearly anthology compiled by Hugo and World Fantasy award-winning editor Neil Clarke. Clarke, publisher and editor in chief of the magazine "Clarkesworld," has selected the short science fiction (and only science fiction) best representing the previous year's writing.

For the first time in her life, fifteen-year-old Rose Elmsworth is alone. Her father, David, has been imprisoned and disgraced, a death sentence almost certain. She has been rejected by the Department, the amoral law-enforcement agency in which she grew up. Most dangerous of all is the terrible secret she and her father have been keeping all her life. If exposed, it has the power to destroy her. But Rose cannot stay hidden forever.

Irene works for the Library, a shadowy organization that collects important works of fiction from all of the different realities. Most recently, she and her enigmatic assistant Kai have been sent to an alternative London to retrieve a particularly dangerous book. But by the time they arrive, it's already been stolen. London's underground factions are prepared to fight to the death to find the tome before Irene and Kai do.

Lieutenant Katja Emmes is a platoon commander, leader of the 10-trooper strike team aboard the fast-attack craft Rapier. Although fully trained, she has never led troops in real operations before, and lives in the shadow of her war-hero father. Sublieutenant Jack Mallory is fresh out of pilot school, daydreaming about a fighter pilot position in the space fleet and in for a rude awakening. Lieutenant Commander Thomas Kane uses a six-month deployment in command of Rapier to secure his rise to stardom within the military. As violence erupts, each will be tested as never before. How they respond may decide the fate of Terra, and Earth. [Canadian author].

When the post-human Next suddenly re-appear in a solar system that banished them, humans are threatened. Their reactions vary from disgust and anger to yearning to live forever like the powerful Next, who are casually building a new city out of starships in the heart of the re-wilded planet Lym. The first families of Lym must deal with being invaded while they grapple with their own inner fears.In the meantime, the Next's motives remain inscrutable.

With the Twelve destroyed, the citizens of Kerrville are moving on with life, settling outside the city limits, certain that at last the world is safe enough. But the gates of Kerrville will soon shudder with the greatest threat humanity has ever faced, and Amy - the Girl from Nowhere, the One Who Walked In, the First and Last and Only, who lived a thousand years - will once more join her friends to face down the demon who has torn their world apart.

The year's best horror stories.

The Dukes were already looking for ways out of their agreement to put Aline on the throne, but with the Saints turning up dead, rumours are spreading that the Gods themselves oppose her ascension. Now churches are looking to protect themselves by bringing back the military orders of religious soldiers, assassins, and (especially) Inquisitors - a move that could turn the country into a theocracy. The only way Falcio can put a stop to it is by finding the murderer. He has only one clue: a terrifying iron mask which makes the Saints vulnerable by driving them mad. But even if he can find the killer, he'll still have to face him in battle.

With the wizard Psander as their patron, five refugees from a plague-stricken island cross the mountains, brave the territory of their sworn enemies, confront a hostile ocean and even traverse the world of the fairies in search of magic powerful enough to save themselves - and Psander's library - from the wrath of the gods. All they need to do is to rescue an imprisoned dragon and unleash a primordial monster upon the world. How hard could it be?

AD 1203: The fate of the embattled duchy of Normandy is in the hands of the weak and untrustworthy King John. Facing disaster, he calls for help from a former outlaw - Robin Hood. As King Philip II's army rips through the Norman defences, Robin - the Earl of Locksley - leads a savage mercenary force into battle under the English banner, supported by his loyal lieutenant Sir Alan Dale. At the Iron Castle, the most powerful fortress in Christendom, Robin and Alan must stand against the overwhelming force of the French. If the Iron Castle falls, Normandy will fall with it.

Authors - including John Scalzi, Tad Williams, Elizabeth Bear, and many more - get inspiration for short stories from the first lines of famous works of literature.

Those who want Daniel and Adele to become involved in the Tarbell Stars claim that only they can prevent a war between the Republic of Cinnabar and its great rival, the Alliance of Free Stars. The conflict is political, but at the sharp end it means blazing warfare and cold-blooded murder. The odds in ships and guns are badly in the enemy's favor. Daniel, Adele, and the crew of the "Princess Cecile" will do everything humanly possible, but that may not be enough against an enemy battleship. And even if Daniel and his companions succeed in battle, they can't be sure whether their employers "really" wanted them to win or whether they even want them alive.

To prevent the pairs of gods known as the Twins from rising again, all twins in the land must be killed at birth, a safeguard that has worked until now. Now they are gathering their latent powers to break free. To prevent that cataclysm Joros, a mysterious and cunning priest, has been gathering a team of disparate fighters. These warriors must learn to stand together against the unfathomable power of vengeful gods, to stop them from tearing down the sun - and plunging their world into darkness.

A boy is sent to stay with his grandmother for the summer in a serene fishing village. Their tranquility is shattered by the crash of a bullet-riddled enemy plane, the arrival of grandmother's friend Mr. Girandole, a man who knows the true story of Cinderella's slipper and the discovery of a riddle in the sacred grove of ruins behind grandmother's house. In a sumptuous idyllic setting and overshadowed by the threat of war, four unlikely allies learn the values of courage and sacrifice.

Li Heng has been guided and warded for centuries by the powerful sorceress known as the "Protectress" and she allows no rivals. She and her cabal of five mage servants were enough to repel the Quon Tali Iron Legions. Yet under the new and ambitious King Chulalorn the Third, Itko Kan is on the march from the south. He sends his own assassin servants, the Nightblades, against the city, and there are hints that he also commands inhuman forces out of legend.

The queen of Steelhaven has grown in strength. Taking up her dead father's sword, she must defend the city from the dread warlord Amon Turgha and his bloodthirsty army now at the gates. A vicious, unrelenting four day battle ensues, the most perilous yet. No side is immune from danger as all hell breaks loose, with the threat of coups and the unleashing of the deadliest and darkest magick. Loyalty, strength and cunning will be put to test in the quest for victory.

Lia Johansen was created for only one purpose: to slip onto the strategically placed New Sol Space Station and explode. But her mission goes to hell when her clock malfunctions, freezing her countdown with just two minutes to go. Lia starts learning what it means to live and love, and to be human. It is only when her countdown clock begins sporadically losing time that she realizes "even duds can still blow up." If she wants any chance at a future, she must find a way to unlock the secrets of her past and stop her clock.

1778: France declares war on Great Britain, the British army leaves Philadelphia, and George Washington's troops leave Valley Forge in pursuit. At this moment, Jamie Fraser returns from a presumed watery grave to discover that his best friend has married his wife, his illegitimate son has discovered (to his horror) who his father really is, and his beloved nephew, Ian, wants to marry a Quaker. Meanwhile, Jamie's wife, Claire, and his sister, Jenny, are busy picking up the pieces. The Frasers can only be thankful that their daughter Brianna and her family are safe in twentieth-century Scotland. Or not.

A collection of Gaiman's nonfiction essays on a myriad of topics - from art and artists to dreams, myths, and memories.

New technology developed by the corporate giant NovusPart has allowed them to transport much of the population of ancient Pompeii - minutes before the volcanic eruption - to a replica town in Central Asia. Post-grad historian Nick Houghton has been hired to study the Romans - but he soon realises that the corporation is underestimating its captives. The Romans may be ignorant of modern technology - for now - but city boss Manius Barbatus wasn't born yesterday. The stage is set for the ultimate clash of cultures in which time itself is a weapon...

Earth has fallen to alien invasion. The Tabit Genesis and her crew are the last hope for our race's survival. Settled around a distant star, the human race is expanding and colonizing once again, still fearing the arrival of the aliens who destroyed Earth. But does the greatest threat to humanity come from the depths of space or within?

Collected here for the first time is every piece of short fiction from the Newsflesh series, with two new never-before-published novellas and all eight short works.

Eddie Drood's girl Molly and his parents, among others who owe supernatural powers a debt, have been kidnapped and forced to participate in the "Big Game." The rules are simple: get from one side of the pocket dimension to the other and kill your competitors. The winner's debt is paid in full, and the losers get themselves permanently lost, body and soul, forever. To save his loved ones, Eddie must become a ringer in this deadly contest that's undoubtedly rigged by the Powers That Be...

Dr. DOA specializes in removing the problems from other people's lives, by killing the people who cause those problems. No one knows who he is, just his nomme du muerte. Dr. DOA. Somehow, he poisoned Eddie Drood - whatever is coursing through Eddie's veins seems to be immune to magic cures and treatments. But that's not going to stop Eddie from finding Dr. DOA and whoever hired him and giving them both a taste of their own medicine...

New fiction that traverses terrain created by Lovecraft and creates new eldritch geographies to explore. Laird Barron, Amanda Downum, Brian Hodge, Caitlin R. Kiernan, Silvia Moreno, Norman Partridge, Michael Shea, and John Shirley are among the contributors.

More than 500 pages of 2015's best dark fantasy and horror stories.

When Damian - Anita's sometimes lover, servant, and friend - is kidnapped, Anita heads to Ireland. There she must face off against the vampire who created him. M'Lady, Moroven, Nemhain...under every name she brings terror and destruction. But Anita brings her own weapon to the party: Edward, the man known as Death itself...

When the brutal death of a dear friend catapults the kingdom to the brink of civil war, Rhapsody finds herself in an impossible situation. She is forced to choose between her beloved husband, Ashe, and her two oldest friends, Grunthor and Achmed. Choosing her husband will mean the death of thousands of innocents. Siding against him will cost Rhapsody the other half of her soul, both in this life and the next.

A self-assured warrior stumbles into a game of Go that turns fatal. An ambitious lord leaves his nephew for dead and seizes his lands. A woman of the Old People seeks five fathers for her five children, who will go on to found the Spider Tribe and direct the fate of the country.

The Alfar Sinthoras and Caphalor watch as the hidden land - the home of the dwarves - falls to their army of trolls, barbarians and Alfar. And now the lands of the hated elves are within their grasp. But the alliance is beginning to crumble. And now another enemy, one thought defeated, has resurfaced. And while their best warriors fight in the hidden land, the Alfar homeland lies almost defenseless.

Aren Bendis is a Captain in the Obsidian Army who has seen enough of what a world without Virtue looks like and is willing to do whatever it takes to establish a lasting peace. But after finding a magical sword that only he can wield, a sword his trusted scout, Syenna, claims is a blade once used by the legendary Avatars, Aren is thrown into a far more unfamiliar battle.

Technologically enhanced superspy Peter Caswell has been dispatched on a top-secret assignment unlike any he's ever faced. A spaceship that vanished years ago has been found, along with the bodies of its murdered crew - save one. Peter's mission is to find the missing crew member, who fled through what appears to be a tear in the fabric of space. Cut off from all support, and with only days to complete his operation, Peter must track his quarry alone on an alien world. But he's unprepared for what awaits on the planet's surface, where his skills will be put to the ultimate test - and everything he knows about the universe will be challenged.

Stuck with arrows and close to death, a man is pulled from the icy waters of the Gulf of Nahl. Winter, a seemingly quiet young fisherman's daughter, harbours a secret addiction that threatens to destroy her. A young priestess, Cinzia, must face a long journey home to protect her church from rebellion. A rebellion sparked by her sister. Three characters on different paths will be brought together by fate.

Charley Davidson is living in New York City as Jane Doe, a girl with no memory of who she is or where she came from. So when she begins to realize she can see dead people, she's more than a bit taken aback. Then she is confronted by a man who claims to have been sent to kill her - by the darkest force in the universe, an enemy that will not stop until she is dead. Thankfully, she has a Rottweiler.

The High Queen trusts librarian Dafne Mailloux's ability with languages, her way of winnowing the useful facts from a dusty scroll, and even more important, the subtlety and guile that three decades under the thumb of a tyrant taught her. Dafne never thought to need those skills again. But she accepts her duty. Until her journey drops her into the arms of a barbarian king. He speaks no tongue she knows but that of power, yet he recognizes his captive as a valuable pawn. Dafne must submit to a wedding of alliance, becoming a prisoner-queen in a court she does not understand.

Sixteen years after her fabled escape from the tower she was locked away in, Giselle has lived an isolated life. Her adoptive mother is an Earth Master, and uses her expertise to train Giselle in her own Air magic. But when a charming man appears to woo her, Giselle's sheltered view of the world is shattered. For the deceitful stranger is far from a shining knight, a lesson learned after her mother saves Giselle from his attempted assault. Deciding that she will never be vicitmized, Giselle enters shooting contests disguised as a young man to discover the whereabouts of her attacker. And when she finds him, she will make him pay...

Psychics Sarah and Nan (from Wizard of London and Home From The Sea), are sent to be interviewed by a famous consulting detective. When they arrive at the highly eccentric bachelor's flat, he asks them all manner of questions about their bona-fides and experience in a most offensive manner. Eventually, the man gives up and passes them over to physician Dr. John Watson and his wife Mary, both Elemental Masters. Sarah and Nan are to help with investigations that the famous "consulting detective" cannot (or will not) take himself, because they are tainted with "mumbo-jumbo."

Ligea Gayed has been lied to once too often. Now she has turned against her former employer, the secretive Brotherhood of the Tyrans Empire, and must evade Favonius and his Jackals while also recruiting others to fight with her. Yet, despite her best efforts, a rebellion is hard to come by. Except within her own family, of course. Ligea's son, Arrant, is prey to feelings of inadequacy, and is angry about his mother's relationship with a man who is not his father.

Prince Jalan Kendeth and the Viking Snorri ver Snagason are now in possession of Loki's Key, an artefact capable of opening any door, and sought by the most dangerous beings in the Broken Empire - including the Dead King. Jal wants only to return home to his wine, women, and song, but Snorri has his own purpose for the key: to find the very door into death, throw it wide, and bring his family back into the land of the living.

All the horrors of Hell stand between Snorri Ver Snagason and the rescue of his family, if indeed the dead can be rescued. For Jalan Kendeth, getting back out alive and with Loki's key is all that matters. Fate however has other plans, larger plans. The Wheel of Osheim is turning ever faster, and it will crack the world unless it's stopped.

Now relocated to the free-for-all world of Surebleak, the Dragon is under contract to keep the Port Road open to all traffic, and to back the New Bosses in imposing law and order on a society originally based on larceny and assassination. This modest project is going surprisingly well, until Korval discovers that the enemy they'd sought to destroy. . .wasn't "quite" destroyed, and is more determined than ever to eradicate Korval.

Captain Kel Cheris of the hexarchate is disgraced for using unconventional methods in a battle against heretics. Kel Command gives her the opportunity to redeem herself by retaking the Fortress of Scattered Needles, a star fortress that has recently been captured by heretics. Cheris's best hope is to ally with the undead tactician Shuos Jedao. The good news is that Jedao has never lost a battle, and he may be the only one who can figure out how to successfully besiege the fortress. The bad news is that Jedao went mad in his first life and massacred two armies, one of them his own.

When an expedition returns from Cairo to exhibit their finds at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gabriel takes a keen interest. His old friend and lover Ginny was part of the expedition and now something's not right with her. Something happened to her out on the dig. Something that's related to a strange cult known as the Circle of Thoth, a baboon with a clockwork eye, dust devils on Fifth Avenue, robed assassins, sacrificial rites, a 'resurrection machine' and a ghostly figure clad in trailing bandages, seen floating over the rooftops of the city.

Stories featuring Jonmarc Vahanian, a blacksmith's son in a small fishing village before raiders killed his family. Then a dangerous bargain with a shadowy stranger goes wrong, and Jonmarc finds himself on the run, with nothing ahead but vengeance, and nothing behind him but blood.

The Jackaroo have given humanity 15 worlds and the means to reach them. These worlds are littered with ruins and artifacts left by the Jackaroo's previous clients. Chloe Millar works in London, mapping changes caused by imported scraps of alien technology. When she stumbles across a pair of orphaned kids possessed by an ancient ghost, she must decide whether to help them or to hand them over to the authorities. And on one of the Jackaroo's gift-worlds, the murder of a man who has just arrived from Earth leads policeman Vic Gayle to a war between rival gangs over possession of a remote excavation site. Something is coming through. Something linked to the visions of Chloe's orphans, and Vic Gayle's murder investigation.

Featuring three brand-new stories and an original introduction by Peter S. Beagle, author of The Last Unicorn.

28 of his stories.

A world made by the Eight Creators on which to play out their games of passion and power, Paradise is a sprawling, diverse, often brutal place. Men and women live on Paradise as do dogs, cats, ferrets, goats, and horses. Here vast armies of dinosaur-mounted knights engage in battle. During the course of one of these epic battles, the enigmatic mercenary Dinosaur Lord Karyl Bogomirsky is defeated through betrayal and left for dead. He wakes, naked, wounded, partially amnesiac-and hunted. And embarks upon a journey that will shake his world.

Business is slow for M.Y.T.H., Inc., and its president, Bunny, is getting nervous that the company might not meet its quarterly goal. So when a job comes in that's worth an absurd amount of gold - and also happens to take them to Winslow, the most luxurious vacation resort in any dimension - the team jumps at the opportunity to recoup some cash and maybe catch some R&R. Only, someone in Winslow is messing with the magic lines and working hard to ensure that the M.Y.T.H. crew gets nowhere near the powerful relic that they've been hired to find.

With the threat of war arriving at the Floating Cities, Zaifyr's trial will become the center of political games. However, Zaifyr is intent on using his trial to begin a new war. Ayae, a young girl cursed with the gift of fire, sees a chance to learn more of her powers here in the Floating City, but she is weighed down by her new responsibilities regarding the safety of the Mireean people. And across the far ocean, exiled Baron Bueralan and cartographer Orlan have arrived in the city of Ooila with some chilling cargo: the soul of a dead man.

A collection of all-original stories set in Ringo's Black Tide Rising series. Stories by John Ringo, Eric Flint, John Scalzi, Dave Klecha, Sarah Hoyt, Jody Lynn Nye, Michael Z.Williamson and more.

Evanrute Saarien, fresh out of prison, has just fabricated a new religion, positioning himself as its holy leader. He's telling his congregation to go on strike, to fight the system. And unfortunately, they're listening to him. Now Padma's summoned by the Union president to help stop this strike from happening. The problem is, she's out of practice. And, the more she digs, the more she realises this whole strike business is more complicated than the Union president let on...

The cryptic message originated seventy light-years away from the planet Crucible, where Ndege Akinya lives under permanent house arrest for her role in the catastrophe that killed 417,000 people. Could it be from her mother, Chiku, who vanished during a space expedition decades earlier? Ndege's daughter Goma, a biologist, joins the crew of the Travertine, dispatched to Gliese 163 to uncover the source behind the enigmatic message.

After fighting back from the brink of death, Queen Lyrna is determined to repel the invading Volarian army and regain the independence of the Unified Realm. Victory rests on the shoulders of Vaelin Al Sorna, now named Battle Lord of the Realm. But the Volarian enemy has a new weapon on their side, one that Vaelin must destroy if the Realm is to prevail, a mysterious ally with the ability to grant unnaturally long life to her servants. And defeating one who cannot be killed is a nearly impossible feat, especially when Vaelin's blood-song, the mystical power which has made him the epic fighter he is, has gone ominously silent.

Having survived their ordeal on Helios, Harris and his elite Simulant Operations team are now leading a large-scale mission to the perilous, unexplored region of the Damascus Rift. There, another Artefact has been discovered. It is the product of an ancient alien life form - and a possible weapon to be used against the Krell. This Artefact could finally help humanity win the war. But what Harris and the Lazarus Legion will discover there is from their worst nightmares.

A direct sequel to THE HUMAN DIVISION. CDF Lieutenant Harry Wilson and the Colonial Union diplomats he works with race against the clock to discover who is behind attacks on the Union and on alien races, to seek peace with a suspicious, angry Earth, and keep humanity's Union intact...or else risk oblivion, and extinction - and the end of all things.

As Prefect Cato and Centurion Macro tramp the hillsides of western Britannia dreaming of their eventual return to Rome, the officers face daily threats that will test their courage to the full as they fight to protect their men and the Empire

Imagine sports in intergalactic, Olympic-like competitions of the future. 18 stories, 18 sports. Contributors include George R.R. Martin, Larry Correia, Mercedes Lackey, Gene Wolfe, Robert Silverberg, Mike Resnick, Seanan McGuire, and David Farland.

Determined to stop her spoiled stepdaughter's betrayal from upsetting the balance of power within the Peterwald Empire, the Empress is leading her own armada to St. Petersburg, intent on killing Vicky and every soul on the planet that gave her refuge. But Vicky is her father's daughter, and it would be a grave mistake to underestimate her...

Things start to go wrong for a team testing a biosphere deep within the heart of Cheyenne Mountain. When the blast doors hiss open, Winston's team finds a changed world outside. Humans are gone, vanished without a trace, and they aren't the only thing missing. The planet's water is gone, too. As the team explores their surroundings, they find thousands of luminous blue orbs lining the streets. It isn't until they uncover what's inside that they realize the nightmare that lies ahead.

When his beloved is killed in a terrorist atrocity committed by the sinister Bookman, young poet Orphan becomes enmeshed in a web of secrets and lies. His quest to uncover the truth takes him from the hidden catacombs of a London on the brink of revolution, through pirate-infested seas, to the mysterious island that may hold the secret to the origin, not only of the shadowy Bookman, but of Orphan himself.

England. A century ago, give or take a few years. An England where people who are wicked in thought or deed are marked by the Smoke that pours forth from their bodies, a sign of their fallen state. The aristocracy do not smoke, proof of their virtue and right to rule, while the lower classes are drenched in sin and soot. At an elite boarding school where the sons of the wealthy are groomed to take power as their birthright, teachers have mysterious ties to warring political factions at the highest levels of government. Here three young people will learn that everything they've been taught is a lie - knowledge that could cost them their lives.

Shock Pao is the best. In the virtual world the Slip there's nothing he can't steal for the right price. Outside the Slip, though, he's a Fail - no degree, no job. So when his ex offers him a job, breaking into a corporate databank, he accepts - it's either that, or find himself a nice bench to sleep under. Amiga works for psychotic crime lord Twist Calhoun so when Shock's war comes to her, it's her job to bring him to Twist, dead or alive.

Five iconoclastic hackers are coerced into serving the U.S. government. They are an Anonymous-style rabble rouser, an Arab spring hactivist, a black-hat hacker, an old-school cipherpunk, and an online troll. Each is offered a choice - go to prison or help protect the United States, putting their brains and skills to work for the government for one year. But the would-be cyberspies discover that behind the scenes lurks a sinister NSA program, an artificial intelligence code-named Typhon, that has origins and an evolution both dangerous and disturbing.

As the hidden hand of the Sworn Church brings all the powers of the continent to war against Vordan, the enigmatic and brilliant general Janus bet Vhalnich offers a path to victory. But the enemy is not just armed with muskets and cannon. Dark priests of an ancient order, wielding forbidden magic, have infiltrated Vordan to stop Janus by whatever means necessary.

For German Time Agent Otto Behr, the endless cycle of war against the Russians, across three millennia, has changed. Love, a family and home in the real world never seemed possible, until now. But family are a danger no agent can risk, for their very existence gives the enemy leverage where none can be allowed to exist, and a mysterious third power has entered the fight, and Otto is their target. The great Game is changing, and the war for history itself has become personal.

In the aftermath of an atomic war, a new international movement of pacifism has arisen. Multitudes of young men have chosen to curb their aggressive instincts through voluntary amputation - disarmament in its most literal sense. Those who have undergone this procedure are highly esteemed in the new society. But they have a problem - their prosthetics require a rare metal to function, and international tensions are rising over which countries get the right to mine it.

First mass market edition. Things are finally looking up for Captain Frey and his crew. The Ketty Jay has been fixed up good as new. They've got their first taste of fortune and fame. And, just for once, nobody is trying to kill them. Even Trinica Dracken, Frey's ex-fiancee and long-time nemesis, has given up her quest for revenge. In fact, she's offered them a job - one that will take them deep into the desert heart of Samarla, the land of their ancient enemies. To a place where the secrets of the past lie in wait for the unwary. Secrets that might very well cost Frey everything.

Mankind in the Galactic Age had finally conquered war, so what was left for the military to do but drink and barbecue? That's the kind of military that Sergeant R. Wilson Rogers lived in before he left the fleet to become a smuggler. But it turns out that smuggling is hard. Like getting-arrested-for-dealing-with-pirates-and-forced-back-into-service kind of hard. He was only away for a year, but something has changed. Now these are actual soldiers doing actual soldier things like preparing for a war that Rogers is sure doesn't exist. Rogers vows to put a stop to all this nonsense even if it means doing actual work.

The Starfleet task force commanded by Captain Malcolm Reed continues its fight against the deadly Ware technology, but one of the task force ships is captured, its Andorian crew imprisoned by an interstellar Partnership that depends on the Ware for its prosperity. Worse, the Partnership has allied with a renegade Klingon faction, providing it with Ware drone fleets to mount an insurrection against the Klingon Empire.

Sumptuous hardback gift edition combining the best of the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings Location Guides, plus brand new photography unique to this book.

Illidan has escaped his 10,000-year imprisonment and fled his home on Azeroth for Outland, an alien world dominated by the Burning Legion. Along with new demon hunter recruit Vandel, Illidan begins gathering an army, though who he plans to strike with his newfound might remains unclear.

The story of Jack Joyce, who, with his newly gained superpowers, fights the nefarious Monarch corporation to stop the end of time.

Drizzt is going home. But not to Mithral Hall. Not to Icewind Dale. He's going to Menzoberranzan. Bruenor is ready to march with him - bringing along an army of dwarves - to end the scourge of Menzoberranzan, but Drizzt needs to see what's happening there. The dwarf army may not be necessary. The City of Spiders might already have fallen to the demons and their wicked prince. But even if that's true, what's to say the demons will stop there?

The second Death Star is destroyed. The Emperor and Darth Vader are rumored to be dead. The Galactic Empire is in chaos. Across the galaxy, some systems celebrate, while in others Imperial factions tighten their grip. Optimism and fear reign side by side. And while the Rebel Alliance engages the fractured forces of the Empire, a lone Rebel scout uncovers a secret Imperial meeting.

The CFO of a secretive NYC hedge fund is found murdered - stabbed through the eye with an expensive fountain pen. Sherlock Holmes and Joan Watson discover a link between the victim and a charismatic touring management guru with a doubtful past. But is the solution so clear-cut or is the guru being framed?

In the world of Draenor, the strong and fiercely independent Frostwolf Clan are faced with increasingly harsh winters and thinning herds. When Gul'dan, a mysterious outsider, arrives in Frostfire Ridge offering word of new hunting lands, Durotan, the Clan's chieftain, must make an impossible decision: Abandon the territory, pride and traditions of his people, or lead them into the unknown.

From his birth on the USS Kelvin, his youth spent on Tarsus IV, his time in the Starfleet Academy, his meteoric raise through the ranks of Starfleet, and his illustrious career at the helm of the Enterprise, this in-world memoir uncovers Captain Kirk in a way Star Trek fans have never seen. Kirk's singular voice rings throughout the text, giving insight into his convictions, his bravery, and his commitment to the life - in all forms - throughout this Galaxy and beyond. Excerpts from his personal correspondence, captain's logs, and more give Kirk's personal narrative further depth.

Underworld kingpins, treacherous politicians, and Imperial loyalists are sowing chaos in the galaxy. Senators are calling for the election of a First Senator, in the hope that this influential post will bring strong leadership to a divided galaxy. Leia Organa distrusts such concentration of power, even though she has been suggested for the post. But at the edges of the galaxy, a mysterious threat is growing...

The third book of original fiction based on the hit CW show Beauty & the Beast.

In a dark and dangerous future, the mutant-hunting machines known as the Sentinels rule America with an iron fist. Only a handful of imprisoned mutants remain to fight against their oppressive robotic overseers! Now Kate Pryde, former X-Man, must travel back in time and warn her present-day teammates of the coming danger - and hopefully prevent this horrible future from ever taking place!

The ALIENS VS PREDATOR action begun in INCURSION continues as Colonial Marines units are being wiped out - and not by the Predators. This is an attack by organized armies of Aliens.

Three brand new novellas based on the TV series Heroes and Heroes Reborn. One each from Kevin Anderson, Keith R. DeCandido, and Duane Swierczynski.

The Arctic Circle, 1845: Escaping the tyranny under which their people have lived for generations, aliens from a distant planet crash land on Earth's inhospitable frozen wastes. San Francisco, 2283: Admiral James Kirk is dispatched by Starfleet to meet an emissary from the Iramahl, a previously unknown alien race who have come in search of their brothers and sisters thought to have gone missing in this area of space centuries earlier.

The peaceful realm of Azeroth stands on the brink of war as its civilization faces a fearsome race of invaders: Orc warriors fleeing their dying home to colonize another. As a portal opens to connect the two worlds, one army faces destruction and the other faces extinction. From opposing sides, two heroes are set on a collision course that will decide the fate of their family, their people and their home.

The official novelization of the new, all-female lead Ghostbusters movie starring Melissa McCarthy and Kristin Wiig.

Using recovered alien technology, the nations of Earth have collaborated on an immense defense program to protect the planet. But nothing can prepare us for the aliens' advanced and unprecedented force. Only the ingenuity of a few brave men and women can bring our world back from the brink of extinction.

In the days following the alien invasion, the international community recovers and builds up Earth's defenses using technology salvaged from remains of the enemy forces. However, pockets of aliens still must be located and eliminated, and the bizarre technology proves as dangerous as its creators. Then it's discovered that the aliens were able to send a distress signal before their final defeat...

20 years ago Captain Benjamin Maxwell was court-martialed for the destruction of a Cardassian warship and a supply vessel, killing more than six hundred crew members. Now he is out of prison and working as a maintenance engineer on the private science station "Robert Hooke," home to crackpots, fringe researchers, and, possibly, something much darker and deadlier.