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Kwelengsen Storm: Logan's World, Book One by David M. Kelly You can turn your back on war, but sometimes it refuses to let you go. When Logan Twofeathers takes on the job of head of engineering on Kwelengsen, the first habitable planet discovered by Earth, he thinks he’s leaving conflict far behind. But when he investigates the loss of a deep-space communications relay, his ship is attacked and crash-lands back on the planet. With his new home destroyed by the invaders, Logan is stranded deep in the frozen mountains with an injured sergeant who hates him almost as much as the enemy. Against the ever-present threat of capture, he must battle his way through icy surroundings in a treacherous attempt to find his wife. And when he's forced to ally himself with a disparate group of soldiers and their uncompromising captain, Logan must face the reality that he may have lost everything—and everyone—he loves. Will he choose to fight? And what will it cost him? Kwelengsen Storm is the first in a gripping, new sci-fi thriller series from the author of the Joe Ballen novels. |
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Mortal Mission by P.J. Skinner Will they find life on Mars, or death? When the science officer for the first mission to Mars dies suddenly, backup Hattie Fredericks gets the coveted place on the crew. But her presence on the Starship provokes suspicion when it coincides with a series of incidents which threaten to derail the mission. After a near-miss while landing on the planet, the world watches as Hattie and her fellow astronauts struggle to survive. But, worse than the harsh elements on Mars, is their growing realisation that someone, somewhere, is trying to destroy the mission. When more astronauts die, Hattie doesn’t know who to trust. And her only allies are 35 million miles away. As the tension ratchets up, violence and suspicion invade both worlds. |
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Heather Texle launches with a thrilling, non-stop, action-packed novel that is a blend of space opera adventure and sci-fi murder mystery that won the 2023 Minnesota Author Project contest in Adult Fiction. If you enjoy books with a strong female lead, a sass-talking spaceship’s computer, an annoyingly hot detective who won’t give up, and more action scenes that you can shoot a blaster at, then this book is for you! When the Department trained me to catch criminals, I never dreamed I’d become one. Agent. Suspect. Intergalactic fugitive. I was one of them until I shot my partner in self-defense. Even though the Department cleared me of wrongdoing, my co-workers didn’t agree. They turned their backs on me, so I turned my back on them. My partner’s actions never made sense. After ignoring my gut for a year, I asked my tech-genius best friend to dig into it. Now Jarrett’s gone dark, and I soon discover he’d been brutally murdered. An officer finds me standing over the body, blaster in hand. Even I admit it looks bad. There’s no way I can trust the Department to investigate further—not if I'm already the prime suspect. My only option is to run. Is it impulsive? Sure. Will having law enforcement dog me across the galaxy make life difficult? Most certainly. I’ll have to stay one step ahead of them if I want to solve Jarrett’s murder and clear my name. Doing that will require every trick the Department taught me—and a few I learned on my own. Grab it now to find out what mystery Jarrett uncovered and to what extreme Reliance will go to in order to bring her friend’s killer to justice. |
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Reality Breaker by Daniella A. Gnollwood For years, the forces of earth have been tampering with genetics, constantly refining and exploiting their Breakers--humans with varying measures of alien DNA . During a routine mission, Breaker Sierra is attacked by a Xoa construct horde and is nearly overwhelmed. She's saved at the last minute by handsome Desmond Carro, a radio operator who's had his eye on her for some time. Neither Sierra nor Desmond know about the terrible secret nestled deep within the Breaker ranks, but when a superior officer orders Desmond to assassinate Sierra, they both know something is deeply wrong. As they traverse the labyrinthine interior of an occupied Xoa moon, they unravel the mystery piece by piece, while falling for each other in the process. Their investigation turns into a race against time when they discover the horrible truth about Sierra's creation. Without assistance, nothing less than humanity's very existence is at stake. With seemingly no one to turn to for help, their problems are compounded by the appearance of a being called the Reality Breaker, who only wishes to see a grim prophesy fulfilled. Thankfully, they aren't alone. |
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Any Job Will Do (The Grand Human Empire #1) by John Wilker Jackson ”Jax” Caruso inherited a ship from his parents. They’re dead, they don’t need it. The unification wars happened a while ago, Jax’s parent’s fought for the losing side. Now he takes the jobs he can get; smuggling, bounty hunting, hauling cargo. If it pays, he’ll do it. When Jax is approached with a job that seems too good to be true, he should have known better, he should have walked. He didn’t. Now he and a few friends are in it deep; Imperial entanglements are the least of their concerns with organized crime on their tails. Will Jax and his friends finish the job without getting caught, or killed? Only one way to find out! Get your copy today! |
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Ben crouched in the shadows with nowhere to go, his heart hammering in his chest. The guard was twenty meters away now. Fifteen. Ten… A thousand years in the future, people kill for Dorium. They threaten war over it. And if the headlines are to be trusted, somebody recently destroyed an entire colony for it. That’s why it’s a big problem when Ben Ashley accidentally steals some. Ben’s a good thief. Maybe too good, thanks to the strange ability that lets him open locked doors and manipulate AIs. But when he gets caught with the solar system’s most valuable substance, it will take all his skills and more just to survive. A shady deal to stay out of prison propels him into a deadly world of espionage, organized crime, piracy, interplanetary conspiracy, and a hidden plot that threatens the only home Ben has ever known. How can he save himself and his friends? Who’s responsible for the brutal attack on a quiet colony? What is Archimedes? And why does it seem like all the bad guys are working together? Ben can’t escape this time. The only way out of danger is right through the heart of it. To have any hope, Ben will have to harness the Aurora, the rare power that nearly kills him every time he uses it. He’ll have to find out who to trust–and decide whether he can trust himself. Ben’s a good thief. Can he be a hero? Archimedes is a fast-paced adventure set in our solar system a thousand years in the future. If you like heists, space battles, and high-energy sci-fi with a dash of superhuman abilities, you’ll love Archimedes. |
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Lexa Dean and the Wellspring by Bethany A Perry A treasure that could change the galaxy and a woman chasing a dangerous dream. Dr. Alexandra "Lexa" Dean is an exoarchaeologist in search of hidden alien treasures. And if the museum paid better, she wouldn't sell the best of her finds to the highest bidder. When her contact delivers a map to the origins of all life, and the key to unlocking it is the artifact she just fenced to a wealthy socialite, she must devise a plan to steal it back. But the aliens she stole it from first are closing in and the socialite is hot on her tail. If she can't shake them, she'll risk losing the fame and fortune she's always dreamed of, her life, or worse. From the author who brought you a cure for the zombie apocalypse in the Reclamation Series and a demon with amnesia in "Give Me Grace," comes a treasure-hunting romp through space where "Indiana Jones" meets "The Fifth Element." |
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Hyvilma (The Kitra Saga #3) by Gideon Marcus [A damaged ship, a dying shipmate–can she save both?] Under attack! The flight back to Hyvilma should have been the easy part for the crew of the Majera–until a deadly ambush by pirates sends them reeling through hyperspace. Now getting to the planet in time is the only way Captain Kitra Yilmaz can save her dying friend. But landing at Hyvilma may be impossible: war has broken out on the Frontier. With illustrations by Hugo Finalist Lorelei Esther. |
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Sirena (The Kitra Saga #2) by Gideon Marcus [One starship, six friends, 10,000 lives in the balance.] Hugo Award Finalist Gideon Marcus has done it again with this second installment in The Kitra Saga. Sirena is a thrilling YA space adventure, unusually hopeful and optimistic in a sea of grimdark, dystopian releases. Enhanced with beautiful illustrations, fans of Becky Chambers’ Wayfarers and Emily Skrutskie’s Bonds of Brass will adore Sirena. Young captain-for-hire Kitra Yilmaz has gotten her first contract: escort the mysterious Princess of Atlántida beyond the Frontier and find her a new world. It’s a risky job, fraught with the threat of pirates, dangerous squatters, and rising romantic tensions. Still, Kitra and her crew are up for anything – until they find a lush world, perfect for settlement…with an enormous ghost ship already in orbit. What secret does the crippled vessel hide? And is Kitra ready to take responsibility for its precious cargo? With illustrations by Hugo Finalist Lorelei Esther. |
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[Stranded in space: no fuel, no way home… and no one coming to help.] From the pen of Hugo Finalist Gideon Marcus comes the found-family, YA Space Adventure you’ve been waiting for: Nineteen-year-old Kitra Yilmaz dreams of traveling the galaxy like her Ambassador mother. But soaring in her glider is the closest she can get to touching the stars — until she stakes her inheritance on a salvage Navy spaceship. On its shakedown cruise, Kitra’s ship plunges into hyperspace, stranding Kitra and her crew light years away. Tensions rise between Kitra and her shipmates: the handsome programmer, Fareedh; Marta, biologist and Kitra’s ex-girlfriend; Peter, the panicking engineer; and the oddball alien navigator, Pinky. Now, running low on air and food, it’ll take all of them working together to get back home. With illustrations by Hugo Finalist Lorelei Esther. |
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The Heart of Space by Adam Gaffen The Cassidyverse is back! Kendra and Aiyana's world is as vibrant and rich as ever in this new collection of thirteen pieces of short fiction. You might think their world runs on fusion power, or antimatter plants, or maybe even warp drives. But it doesn't. It runs on emotions and relationships and heart. What happened after Kendra's near-disastrous Christmas party? You're not going to believe it! Kendra's journey from actress to assassin continues in "Roses Have Thorns" Lexie wants to break up with her boring boyfriend, but she never expected a goddess Shi faces her demons in "Lupus in Astris", putting the ghosts of her past to rest In "Heart of Molycirc", Elsa confronts a lying, corrupt bully to regain her self-respect Step into the distant future of the Terran Empire in "Chooser of the Living" and see the covert battle that could launch a revolution These stories and more show what we mean when we say that the Terran Federation is the Heart of Space. |
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The Jungle Planet: A Science Fiction Thriller Novel by Jeff Walker The Jungle Planet is a sci fi triller—The crew of the harvesting space vessel Skyward Seven, are bound for Dreganon V—a jungle world with a rich, and highly concentrated oxygen atmosphere. As they extract the planet’s dense O2 supply, Katelan Driscoll (Astrobiologist/interplanetary botanist) and crew being to discover that this world is more than what they bargained for. Not only is the air thick with an overabundance of pollen and spore that continually clog their collectors., but strange things occur with the surrounding plant life The jungle isn’t all that it seems. Katelan will discover something else is waiting for them in the depths of this deep, dark jungle planet of Dreganon V. If you love exploration science fiction thrillers and unexpected horrors on alien worlds, then The Jungle Planet is the book you’ll want to read till the very end. Author Jeff Walker (The Long Lost War, The Massive Planet: The Adventures of Deep Contact, and Outer Red) takes you to a world full of beauty and wonder. It is also one that brings out our fears and even—our deaths! |
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When Parker signed up for the new colony world, they said the journey would be easy; just a nice, long stasis nap, followed by a smooth descent in landing pods. But when an asteroid impact damages their pod, Parker and her fellow passengers are prematurely launched and left stranded on a wild, uninhabited moon – the remnant of a failed terraforming experiment. With no way to call for help, the group must race against a rapidly-closing window of time to reach an abandoned camp before their slim chance at rescue is gone forever. This journey will be far from easy as the dangers of this alien landscape reveal themselves at every turn, and the only one who can lead them through it is Parker – but she has her own priorities, and survival may not be one of them. |
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Visions of Iotan by Jaimie N. Schock When Cillian’s daughter accidentally poisons a bison-sized alien child, he goes to prison. But intervention by another alien sends him and his family on a journey to a nearby solar system. Along with a group of humans and aliens, he investigates a planet with glee, but soon enough, all hell breaks loose. Meanwhile, Cillian meets a priest named Father Whalen who helps guide him on a path to faith. Whalen is helpful ... at first. Shortly after the mission begins, he becomes obsessed with Cillian and will stop at nothing to have him. Will Cillian shake off Father Whalen’s advances? And, more importantly, will anyone survive the ill-fated trip to a new planet? |
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Those Who Resist by N. C. Scrimgeour We are all Idran-Var. We are those who resist. A dark shadow has fallen across the galaxy. The curators—a hive mind made from the memories of countless past civilisations—have finally returned, ready to finish the experiment they started millions of years ago. A splintered resistance with a desperate plan is all that stands in the way of utter annihilation. As Alvera Renata and her old crew join forces with former enemies and unlikely allies, all eyes turn to the Omega Gate—a twisted contraption formed of the mysterious waystations. Destroying it might give them a fighting chance against the curators—if they don’t destroy each other first. To have any hope of succeeding, Alvera and her new alliance will have to overcome old wounds and fresh losses to gather the forces of the galaxy for a final stand. But even in the face of extinction, every disparate faction still has their own agenda, and bringing them together might be more trouble than it’s worth. As star systems fall and the curators close in, trust hangs by a single thread. Only one truth binds them together now: if they don’t stand united, the galaxy will be lost to all of them. |
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An innocent girl with a mysterious father… … finds herself a fugitive on the galaxy’s most wanted list. Considered too fragile, Kal is forbidden to join the raising of the Et’Tal’s home and feels as if she has shamed her family. Her lithe stature links her to her absent father. He left the village to fight in the Teristaque Wars and never returned. She meets Sarge, a strange star species called Human, who seems to know the secret of the patch from her father’s uniform. Before she can get clarity, a fierce Teristaque death squad descends on her village, murders everyone in it, and takes Kal prisoner. Kal wants more than just answers. She wants revenge. |
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Mathematics of Eternity by David M. Kelly A grisly death, a disturbed scientist, and a dangerous conspiracy. Joe Ballen dreams of returning to space, but after an accident left him half-crippled, he scrapes a living flying cabs in flooded-out Baltimore. When one of his passengers suffers a grisly death, Joe is dragged into a dangerous conspiracy centered around a prototype JumpShip. No one believes the ship will work, not even the space-faring Atolls who have barricaded Earth from the rest of the solar system. But someone is murdering everyone connected to it. As the bodies pile up, Joe becomes suspect number one, and his enemies will stop at nothing to hide the truth. With the help of a disturbed scientist, a senile survivalist, and his glamorous boss, can Joe untangle the puzzle and uncover the truth before he becomes another statistic? The future's about to get a lot more action packed! The Joe Ballen series is a near future, sci-fi noir thriller series, featuring a smart-mouthed space engineer, engaging characters, cynical humor, and plausible science. |
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The Nemesis Effect by Michael Shotter Tom Hallett was an ordinary man, living an ordinary if pleasant-enough life, his world, perfectly shaped and managed by the wonders of technology and the handful of elite "executives" who control it. Thus, the young man finds himself completely unprepared when a chance encounter and a twist of fate bring him face to face with the most terrifying event in human history. Can a simple archivist, a keeper of the records of other people's deeds, rise to the occasion or will he remain an ordinary citizen, powerless and subject to "The Nemesis Effect?" |
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DESTINATION MARS! The Lunar Republic is on the run… Life on Earth is dying from a mysterious cause, and President Kim bets her future on an obscure, young scientist whose theory can only be tested from outer space. The year is 2066, and the race is on against the Chinese to establish a viable lunar colony before the 100th anniversary of mankind’s first step on the Moon. Yet, the Moon is only the first step, the springboard for the permanent settlement of Mars. “Entropy” is set in the near future where technology has evolved to an astounding degree. Human nature, however, has not; this futuristic novel reads like an expose on our own times. “Entropy” is much more than a science fiction thriller; it is a running commentary on the times that we live. A dystopic, postapocalyptic, hard science depiction of epic space travel, colonization, and new beginnings for the human race: Entropy is a blockbuster, written by a new voice, waiting to be discovered. |
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It’s the find of a lifetime – an ancient alien spaceship hanging in a forgotten corner of space. For Song this could change everything. She’s got as many problems with her finances as she does in her marriage, but maybe at last her passion for wreck-diving will pay off. One piece of unknown tech could set her whole crew up for life. The ship conforms to nothing in their records and dwarfs the largest human vessels. Battle-scarred and old before humanity ever reached the stars, it’s a mausoleum of an unknown, long-dead species. And it’s just winked at her. |
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Black Table by Anttimatti Pennanen Jon and Gus, science fiction fans from Finland with a penchant for fist bumping and pop culture references, travel to the Portland Comic Con where tragedy strikes. Their hero, Dr Wells, suffers a heart attack. With his dying breath, the doctor exhorts Jon to “find the …” as he pushes a book into Jon’s hands. Following clues inscribed in the book, Jon and Gus discover an alien structure with a mysterious Black Table which they accidently activate, transporting them to an alien world. Jumping from world to world via the Black Table galactic transportation network, Jon and Gus embark on the adventure of a lifetime where they encounter monsters, alien tech, giant vessels made of water and make new friends. But those friends are facing an unstoppable and mindless enemy. An enemy that is destroying the galaxy, and Earth is next in its path. Can two fans from Finland save the day? Black Table is a rollicking yarn of two likeable, wise-cracking friends who like nothing better than pranking each other. That is, except when they are not doing something more serious, like saving the universe. JOIN THE FIGHT, JOIN THE BLACK TABLE NETWORK! |
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The Left Hand of Dog by Si Clarke Escaping intergalactic kidnappers has never been quite so ridiculous. When Lem and her faithful dog, Spock, retreat from the city for a few days of hiking in Algonquin Park, the last thing they expect is to be kidnapped by aliens. No, scratch that. The last thing they expect is to be kidnapped by a bunch of strangely adorable intergalactic bounty hunters aboard a ship called the Teapot. After Lem falls in with an unlikely group of allies – including a talking horse, a sarcastic robot, an overly anxious giant parrot, and a cloud of sentient glitter gas – the gang must devise a cunning plan to escape their captors and make it back home safely. But things won’t be as easy as they first seem. Lost in deep space and running out of fuel, this chaotic crew are faced with the daunting task of navigating an alien planet, breaking into a space station, and discovering the real reason they’re all there… Packed with preposterous scenarios, quirky characters, and oodles of humour, The Left Hand of Dog tackles complex subjects such as gender, the need to belong, and the importance of honest communication. Perfect for fans of Charlie Jane Anders’ Victories Greater than Death and The Long Way to a Small by Becky Chambers – especially ones who enjoy endless references to Red Dwarf, Star Trek, and Doctor Who. This book will show you that the universe is a very strange place indeed. |
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The Cost of Survival by J. L. Stowers Survival isn’t about who’s right; it’s about who’s left. Earth spirals into chaos.
World war ravages every border.
The human race teeters on the edge of extinction. Survival hinges on the success of one colony located in a decimated valley. Walt Marshall, government contractor, is no stranger to loss after the death of his wife and son.
Now he’ll honor them by doing whatever it takes to ensure the survival of humankind. Walt gets more than he bargained for when he uncovers a puzzling clue left behind by a mysterious woman. Destined to unveil the truth, he embarks down a dangerous path of espionage and treason. He quickly learns the dark truth about the past, and the future in this daring science fiction novel. |
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Beyond the farthest reaches of explored space, survey ship Cerberus arrives at an unclaimed planet to find a deserted vessel already in orbit. When newly commissioned captain Janet Hollander leads a team to the derelict, they find an ancient alien artifact on board. As her own crew members begin to disappear, Hollander learns that neither the ghost ship nor the planet are as lifeless as they appear. She must survive long enough to find out what happened to the derelict—before she and her crew suffer the same fate. |
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Fermi's Progress by Chris Farnell “The Fermi is the Earth’s first and last faster-than-light-spaceship. The last, because it turns out its engine vaporises entire star systems in its wake. And nobody knows how to turn it off.” Four planets. Four adventures. Four apocalypses. A Dyson sphere, a philosophical zombie apocalypse, a giant airborne beehive and a galactic telesales scam. Each world brings new wonders, new dangers, and a planetary scale genocide. The Fermi crew must survive by what little wits they have as they bounce a trail of destruction across the galaxy. For the first time all four parts of Fermi’s Progress are together in one volume. |
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Dangerous Thoughts by James L. Steele Their planet was ripped apart from under their feet. When Deka and Kylac wake up, they discover Archeons are dead, and the portals have closed without warning, leaving hundreds of planets without links to other worlds. Rel’s destruction touched every planet in the contacted universe. Without the portals, entire civilizations hang in the balance, and Deka and Kylac are the only two who can make spacetime spheres. The raptor and the fox travel from world to world, repairing the damage the disaster caused, preventing civilization from collapsing. Floating islands drifting through the toxic atmosphere of a gas giant—offworlders are stranded there, just barely clinging to life. A planet of raised platforms made of growing rock that elevate the people above the flammable algae on the surface—everything is falling apart, and where are the people? A world of giant insects—researchers have gone missing, and they have been injected with mind-altering venom. A planet of salamanders and birdlike reptiles who relied on portals for food—facing starvation, the reptiles revert to hunting the salamanders. What could have destroyed an entire planet? What could have reached across the light years to kill so many Archeons at the same time? Did anyone else survive? |
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Astral Fall by Jessica Mae Stover A hundred-year interplanetary war receives little attention from the military’s greatest warriors. Until five of them devise a secret plan to end it. From Midwest Book Review:
"Without providing spoilers, suffice it to say that Astral Fall attempts to identify, address, and turn upside down reader preconceptions of [...] the nature of military sci-fi as a genre. And, it succeeds. Think the classic Ender's Game, but without any attempt to mimic Orson Scott Card's scenarios or success. Think a military battle structure holding the epic confrontations of Lord of the Rings, complete with its promise of multiple series books; yet with an attention to intricate detail that belays the (too-often) hasty series production. There is no artificial division of action felt in Astral Fall. |
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The Massive Planet: The Adventures Of Deep Contact by Jeff Walker Captain Christopher Riley and his brave crew of the Earth Core United spaceship, Deep Contact, set out for adventure beyond the solar system. Their mission is to traverse space and discover new worlds for colonization; They represent humanity seeking to expand, explore, and search for alien life in any form. Alone and in the uncharted wilderness of the cosmos, they try to survive and complete the mission on behalf of Earth Core United. Deep Contact almost collides with a massive planet appearing out of nowhere. A Jupiter-like world that popped right into its main flight path. The crew desperately try to figure out a way to break free of its gravity as it pulls them deeper inside. Even though the ship should have been crushed instantly the minute they came into its wake; It falls deeper into the atmosphere’s densely thick clouds, endangering them all to whatever doom awaits. Captain Riley and his crew must race to figure out how to escape this huge world before they crash into its core, but do they have time to solve this riddle? Or will this be their one and only mission of failure? |
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First of Their Kind by C. D. Tavenor Robots. Androids. Virtual Worlds. Corporate Conspiracies. Meet Theren: a new synthetic intelligence. The first synthetic intelligence. Created in a lab with sterile white walls, Theren longs to meet the people of the world. The first SI has hopes, fears, and dreams, just like a human. Yet the world fears the idea of an artificial mind, capable of conscious thought. To survive against powerful corporations, hateful humans, and global conspiracies, Theren will need friends—and more importantly, a family. Can Earth survive side-by-side with its new creation? |
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In a universe of long-haul truckers, parasite-bearing megalomaniacs, asteroid rustlers, and homicidal peace keepers, some people just want to stay alive. Deep within Kerberos Station, pipe crawler Sachi Inside is dying of the planet-killing Hibravian virus. In a state of delirium, the agoraphobic girl agrees that in exchange for life, she will not only leave her pipes, but even the station. A sentient plant wraps around her, guides her to an exiting ship, and adheres to the hull. Captain Karasi Kwei is not pleased to discover a stowaway, but the crew thinks there’s money to be made on the plant, and the fact that both the Eastern Star Corporation and the Elysium Empire are tracking it confirms its value. However, none of that matters when the entire crew falls sick with the incurable Hibravian. But Sachi’s plant is more than it seems. All they have to do is fight the mercenaries, survive the virus, evade the Elysium Empire, and navigate a fluctuating microwave wall, and they just might save the universe. |
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The son of G.O.D by Richard Hickman To Live, He was uploaded into the Geosynchronous Orbital Defense System; to die, he had to become human again. |
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In Dying Starlight: Planetfall by Emily McCosh Aaron is perfectly content to chase bounties in his run-down little space ship, avoid human interaction at all cost, and lay low from the cyborg planet that created him. But when he and Bat—his half-robotic badger companion (who talks just a little too much)—chase their largest bounty ever, they run head-first into not only some dangerous criminals, but other cyborgs much stronger than them, and worst of all, a handful of humans who aren’t going anywhere. Their job leads them first to Yayth, a backwater planet nearly as inhospitable as it is frigid. On a planet this abandoned, their target should be an easy find. Until a storm rolls in that freezes even the engines of starships. Aaron and Bat find themselves trapped not only with their bounty, but with some bystanders determined to get in the way, and something monstrous wanting to crack its way out of the ice. Planetfall is the first episode in the action-packed space opera series In Dying Starlight. Featuring a grumpy sarcastic cyborg, a talking badger, plenty of space travel, a cast of oddball characters, and a bit of romance later on, In Dying Starlight is perfect for fans of Star Wars, Firefly, and Blade Runner. |
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The Ghosts of Tantor by Adam Gaffen They think they're ready for this mission. They're wrong. The Terran Federation is finally at peace and ready to begin serious exploration. The TFS Pike is the newest ship in the Fleet, purpose-built for deep space missions. Four kilometers long, with a crew of four thousand, she’s well-equipped for the years ahead. If only her crew was as prepared. Ensign Nicole Crozier, the former Premier of the Luna Free State, has left politics behind to pursue a career in the Fleet. But her stint as the Artemis Minister of War has landed her in Tactical instead of Science, her passion, and she’s not happy about it. Still, she’s been promised a chance to switch tracks, so for now she’ll deal. Everything changes when Nicole discovers a rogue planet, and she’s given command of the landing party. She’s irritated her superior but that’s the least of her problems when an ancient alien artifact emerges from the ice. As Nicole and her team explore the interior, the planet and her team vanish. The crew of the Pike must use all the tricks and tools available to get their missing people back. When they finally do, Nicole brings aboard a discovery which could change the course of history. Or end it. If you're a fan of Star Trek: Voyager, Battlestar Galactica 2003, Interstellar, or 2001: A Space Odyssey, then this is for you. |
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Spectacular Silver Earthling by Mara Lynn Johnstone Hubcap used to be a rescue bot, getting humans out of every boneheaded scrape imaginable. His new career as a TV star suits him better: he can poke fun at the humans instead, while harvesting jetpods and tackling alien predators faster than any of them. It doesn’t hurt that he’s also immune to the mysterious “space frenzy” that keeps sending his coworkers into a froth. The robot worries for his human friends, though he would never admit it. Not when it’s much more fun to deploy weapons-grade sass. The pressure ratchets up when a rival show aims to steal their sponsor. Hubcap has to film his most spectacular footage yet, while avoiding dangerous wildlife, plantlife, and emotions. But if anyone is up to the task, it’s the robot with skills second to none, and an ego to match. |
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Those Once Forgotten by N. C. Scrimgeour They were a memory once forgotten. For millennia, they waited. Now, they are coming. The galaxy has been plunged into chaos, left reeling from the trap Alvera Renata triggered around the ancient alien waystations. As the leaders of the allied systems desperately try to prepare for what might be coming, Ridley and Kojan go on the hunt in search of answers. But the one person who might hold the key—the rogue starship captain who started it all—is missing in action, and her old friends aren’t the only ones looking for her… Meanwhile, tensions between the Coalition and the Idran-Var are at breaking point in the aftermath of a brutal attack. The only hope for peace may lie in a fragile alliance between Rivus and Niole, old enemies thrown unwillingly onto the same side. But even if they can bury their past, what will it take to overcome the centuries of bloodshed dividing their people? As the mysterious signal coming from the waystations counts down, only one thing is for certain: something is coming, and if the fractured factions of the galaxy can’t find a way to stand against it together, it may be the end for them all. |
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Those Left Behind by N. C. Scrimgeour A dying planet. A desperate mission. A crew facing impossible odds. Humanity’s last hope lies with them… Time is running out for the people of New Pallas. Nobody knows that better than Alvera Renata, a tenacious captain determined to scout past the stars with nothing but a handpicked crew and a promise: to find a new home for humanity. But when a perilous journey across dark space leads to first contact with a galactic civilisation on the brink of war, Alvera soon realises keeping her word might not be as easy as she thought. Her only hope lies with the secrets of the ancient alien waystations scattered across the galaxy. The mysterious technology could be the key to humanity’s survival—or bring unwanted attention from the long-forgotten beings who built them. But remaining united in the face of annihilation is a lot to ask from a crew already splintering under the weight of their differences. A jaded pilot looks for a place he can start over. A young translator searches for meaning out in the galaxy's lawless frontier. And Alvera reckons with the aftermath of betrayal as she fights for a way to save them all. As they break apart to forge their own paths, Alvera and her crew all face the same question: what are they willing to sacrifice to save those left behind? |
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No Lack of Sunshine by Eric Kay A Hard Sci-Fi Novel With a Hopeful Twist "If Red Mars was half the length and infused with The Martian with a touch of Bobverse." Warm, tropical weather, strong gusts of wind, poisonous air, and metallic-tasting seas that kill more organisms than it breeds — yet, life on the South Island goes about as well as it can. There was a reason why Earth colonized this place. Everything is familiar, consistent — consistency is a welcome reprieve, and Ava’s planet has plenty of it. The fifth to be born among the stars, Ava sets forth to make a name for herself despite this obscure claim to fame. Being raised by emotionless, loveless robots doesn’t exactly merit a natural flair for spontaneity or empathy, but Ava makes do. At the very least, she tries to. Her life is here on South Island, where the sea represents freedom and the air symbolizes a dangerous kind of thrill. But now, her existence is under threat. The autonomous supply ship fails to deliver. With only a few weeks’ worth of oxygen left, Ava and her beau must embark on a journey to retrieve more. However, what once was a straightforward quest slowly morphs into one rife with ambush. Something has affected the robots’ advanced processors, causing them to spiral into a fruitless quest for an artifact that may not even exist. And the more they wait, the more Ava’s in peril. Will Ava be able to save herself and her colony from asphyxiation? Will the robots prove too strong, too cunning to be overcome? Or will Ava succumb to her own resentful demons and allow her personal battles to take center stage? |
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Day 115 on an Alien World by Jeannette Bedard A barren world. A crashed colony ship. A saboteur at work. After a tarnished military record leaves her unable to find work on Earth, Margo is hunting for a fresh start. A colonizing mission heading to a new world creates the perfect opportunity—or at least that’s what she thinks. Strapped into a crashing colony ship, she realizes how wrong she is. On the ground of their destination planet, the straight forward colonizing mission becomes a scramble for survival. Her new world is harsh and unforgiving. Accidents keep happening. Too many to blame on bad luck alone. The trail of evidence leads Margo to a startling conclusion—one of her fellow colonists is a saboteur. Tomorrow is the colony’s first communications window with Earth and their only chance to send a message home. With the fate of the colony at stake, will Margo stop the saboteur before it’s too late? |
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Captain Wu, Starship Nameless #1 by Patrice Fitzgerald Captain Wu’s the name. Smuggling’s her game. To be fair, they only started shooting after she started insulting them. She was just about to hand off the package—Wu didn’t know what was inside, and she didn’t want to—when three tentacle-faced strangers attacked. Wu loves a good fight and lives for a good heist. The Captain and her crew make their living taking undercover assignments from questionable clients... and it pays. Or at least, it used to. But this time the merchandise is a little too hot to handle. So when the squid-shaped xenos show up and destroy the guys who are there to receive it, Wu is barely able to make it back to her ship alive. Soon the Nameless is racing around the galaxy with not only the powerful Commonwealth on its tail, but another dangerous creature bent on revenge. And then an unexpected visitor arrives, putting Wu and her crew in the position of taking care of some very precious cargo. Is it time for the Captain to give up criming and retire to a sedate life more suitable for a woman of her age? Not a chance. Captain Wu is the first volume in the Starship Nameless trilogy, to be followed by Smugglers Crew: Starship Nameless #2, April 2021 New Path: Starship Nameless #3, June 2021 |
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The Flight of the Kingfisher by Chloe Garner Smuggling is supposed to be the kind of job where you're in, you're out, and no one ever knew you were there. Simple. Boring, even. But that's only when you're doing it right. Unfortunately, Avery and the rest of the crew of the Kingfisher have hit a snag, one in the form of a strange woman living in a hallway ceiling at Installation 23, and from there on out, it seems like they're ever only one jump ahead of the next guy looking to kill them. Increasingly enmeshed in complex politics and missing their blissful ignorance, the crew of the Kingfisher are going to have to make some hard decisions about what role they really want to play in galactic events, and just how far from their mundane world of weapons smuggling they're willing to venture. Climb aboard. The flight of the Kingfisher is about to begin. |
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Quantum Space by Douglas Phillips Space turned out to be deeper than anyone imagined. High above the windswept plains of Kazakhstan, three astronauts on board a Russian Soyuz capsule begin their reentry. A strange shimmer in the atmosphere, a blinding flash of light, and the capsule vanishes in a blink as though it never existed. On the ground, evidence points to a catastrophic failure, but a communications facility halfway around the world picks up a transmission that could be one of the astronauts. Tragedy averted, or merely delayed? A classified government project on the cutting edge of particle physics holds the clues, and with lives on the line, there is little time to waste. Daniel Rice is a government science investigator. Marie Kendrick is a NASA operations analyst. Together, they must track down the cause of the most bizarre event in the history of human spaceflight. They draw on scientific strengths as they plunge into the strange world of quantum physics, with impacts not only to the missing astronauts, but to the entire human race. If you liked the authenticity of The Martian, the page-turning pace of Da Vinci Code, and the inspirational world view of Arthur C. Clarke, you'll love Quantum Space. A mind-bending journey from the ultra-small to the vast stage of the Milky Way. |
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Billions around the world celebrated Khaos when it was finally revealed, awestruck by the rogue planet entering our solar system. However, for a small group of individuals, it was apocalyptic. Dr. Peels had predicted the path of the celestial body, warning the governments of the world that a near miss was likely. Still, no government had listened, citing other predictive models as the most likely path. In secret, Dr. Peels built a cooperative effort between private industry, lobbied congress and passed laws, ensuring his veiled plans could unfold. Quickly, humanity began to crumble, coups ensued, and anarchy took hold. Dr. Peels was forced to launch his hand-picked crew early, but things quickly fell apart before the mission began. As the vulnerable crew raced towards Mars, the one thing which held them together wasn’t human, it was an android named Omega, tasked to learn all it can before it’s too late. It’s a race against time, gravity, and the laws of nature in this Khaotic story of salvation. |
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Trapped on a spaceship, hunted by an unknown and deadly creature, will he survive the night with no help in sight? Lieutenant Michael Collins’s week just went to hell. The suspicious actions of his captain escalates as he orders Michael to investigate a dead ship’s heart—the cephalopods that pilot the star drive system. The mission forces Michael from the safety of his ship and his lover, Commander Eizen Sartris, while straining the bond with his own ship’s heart, Padua. Attacked by Siwu pirates, Michael finds refuge on a damaged alien vessel, where he waits for Eizen to rescue him. But in the dark cold wreckage, he discovers a thriving garden tended by a strange young boy on behalf of his enigmatic “Mama.” Fear dominates Michael’s thoughts as he struggles not to succumb to the darkness and terror of abandonment. To survive he must rely on his wits and hold fast to his faith that Eizen will find him before the pirates—or before the mysterious entity on board decides to destroy him. |
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Bache Loftt wants nothing more than to follow in his father’s footsteps and be an engineering officer on one of the galaxy’s most powerful, state of the art starships. He has the grades, he has the aptitude – and his application for the naval academy is in. All he has to do is wait for the call up. Then he witnesses a double murder. Barely escaping with his life, can he evade the unlimited resources of a galactic syndicate hunting for him and uncover a conspiracy that involves the very institution he’s determined to join? The Aspirant: a tale of friendships, betrayals, unspeakable crimes – and greed. "Absolutely loved this book! Adventure; Mystery; Intrigue; Conspiracy; Crime; Murder; Assassination — and all of it done on an intergalactic level, this book is worth picking up and taking the time to enjoy" - Goodreads |
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The Scent of Metal by Sabrina Chase The expedition ship Kepler races to Pluto, intent on uncovering the secrets of the alien structure recently discovered under the ice. Computer scientist Lea Santorin can’t wait to figure out the alien technology. Instead, she wakes it up … and it continues its long-interrupted journey across the galaxy, taking Lea and Kepler with it.. And something strange also wakes in Lea. She hears voices no one else can, and sees things the mission command prefers hidden. Why bring so many soldiers along with the scientists? Who concealed the structure, and when? Who waits at the final destination...and will they survive the meeting? (May 2016) Updated cover art and added sample of book 2 in the series |
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In the Orbit of Sirens by T.A. Bruno THE LAST FRAGMENTS OF THE HUMAN RACE ARE FORCED TO ADAPT TO A DANGEROUS NEW WORLD OR FACE EXTINCTION. When starship mechanic, Denton Castus, is caught in the destructive path of a devastating war, he abandons his home and seeks refuge on a distant planet. However, this new safe haven has undiscovered threats of its own. Eliana Veston, a scout preparing the planet for the refugees, struggles with a deadly pandemic that is killing off colonists. The hunt for a cure unleashes a new threat to humanity—the Sirens—mysterious beings with incredible powers and a deep hatred for invaders. |
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I, Cunningham by Benoit Goudreault-Emond Gordon Cunningham, an ordinary citizen of 22nd century Earth, died in an unfortunate accident. Except he didn't die. Not really. Instead, he woke up stuck inside a robot. In the 29th century. Thirteen light-years from home. In a space station. Which is orbiting a planet that was meant to be a new home for the colonists. Unfortunately, everything went wrong. He was brought back to life by accident, but the station denizens need him. Their colony is failing. Most colonists have lost hope. The AI in charge can't do much, which is somewhat moot, since it's out of ideas. But Cunningham is a reluctant hero at best. He's disoriented by his new body. He doesn't know anything about his new environment. He doesn't trust the station's authorities. And yet, somehow, he must help them. Or, in less than a century, no one human will remain. Join him as he discovers his new home, his new body, and, perhaps, his new... mind? Content warning: the book presents only minimal violence and no sexual content. That said, the main character does use four letter swear words when life throws him a curve ball. Please bear with Mr. Cunningham; to say his day starts on the wrong foot is quite the understatement. |
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Earth. The mere name has had an almost talisman-like pull on the human race since we were driven from our homeworld over 6,000 years ago. Mankind’s ancestors ran from the genocidal threat engulfing them, fleeing like intergalactic refugees towards a new home that would allow us to flourish once again.And flourish we did. From a ragtag group of just over 12,000 survivors, humanity has grown to create a proper empire of nearly 900 billion spanning two galaxies. But we never forgot our home, so we waited and we planned. Now the time was finally right to return to Earth and take back what we once had no choice but to abandon.Although the military campaign, as well as the alien races between humanity and our birthplace, were the primary concern, they turned out to not be the only ones. You see, Earth itself, despite crawling with the vermin that nearly eradicated us, was far from free of surprises, both physical and historical. Unanticipated challenges waited for the people of the Terran Confederation, including notions that would shake the very foundations of what it meant to be human. Our legends had defined us, but could those legends withstand scrutiny? What if everything we’d come to believe about ourselves and our world had been carefully crafted to cocoon us for our own good?A story meant to be about our return to Earth expands to cover our journey both across and within the realms of known space, from long lost colony worlds where mankind has morphed into something else, to the edges of an intergalactic war between implacable enemies…enemies that now had the incentive to turn their attention towards humanity... |