Search Worlds Without End

Hugo Award nominated novella. It originally appeared in the anthology Universe 4 (1974), edited by Terry Carr. The story can also be found in the collections Lost Moons (1982), Wild Thyme, Green Magic (2009) and Golden Girl and Other Stories (2012).

A collection of Vance's early stories, including Phalid's Fate (1945), Chateau d'If (1949), Crusade to Maxus (1950), Shape-Up (1952), The Gift of Gab (1954), The Augmented Agent (1956), Milton Hack from Zodiac (1957), Nopalgarth (1964) and The Narrow Land (1966).

Far in the future, the craftsmen of the distant planet Halma create goods which are the wonder of the galaxy. But they know little of this. Their society is harshly regimented, its religion austere and unforgiving, and primitive -- to maintain standards, even the most basic use of automation is punishable by death.

When Amiante, a wood-carver, is executed for processing old documents with a camera, his son Ghyl rebels, and decides to bring down the system. To do so, he must first interpret the story of Emphyrio, an ancient hero of Halman legend.

Contents:

• Foreword (Fantasms and Magics) - (1978) - essay
• The Miracle-Workers - (1958) - novella
• When the Five Moons Rise - (1954) - shortstory
• Noise - (1952) - shortstory
• The New Prime - (1951) - novelette
• Guyal of Sfere - [Dying Earth] - (1950) - novella
• The Men Return - (1957) - shortstory

Note that this is a republication of an earlier collection (Eight Fantasms and Magics (1968)) but with two stories removed (Telek and Cil).

Table of Contents:

• Dodkin's Job - (1959) - novelette
• Ullward's Retreat - (1958) - novelette
• Sail 25 - (1962) - novella
• The Gift of Gab - (1955) - novella

Featuring three tales of the galactic effectuator who first appeared in "The Dogtown Tourist Agency", a tale suggesting that its author is a well-travelled man, intimately acquainted with the shortcomings of those who may seek to serve your needs in foreign lands.

Originally appeared in Space Stories, December 1952. An abriged version appeared in Ace Double D-295 (1958).

Roy Barch is taken slave by the Klau, along with the golden Lekthwan, Komeitk Lelianr. On the industrialized world Magarak, the Klau hunt Barch and others for recreation. Barch refuses to fall prey--and fights a grim battle to return to Earth.

A collection of Vance's early stories, including Golden Girl (1945), Masquerade on Dicantropus (1950), Abercrombie Station (1951), Cholwell's Chickens (1951), The Mitr (1951), The World Between (1952), When the Five Moons Rise (1953), Meet Miss Universe (1954), and The Insufferable Redheaded Daughter of Commander Tynnott, O.T.E. (1972).

Table of Contents:

• Foreword - (1979) - essay by Poul Anderson
• Introduction - (1979) - essay by John Shirley
• Green Magic - (1963) - short story
• The Miracle-Workers - (1958) - novella
• The Moon Moth - (1961) - novelette
• The Mitr - (1953) - short story
• The Men Return - (1957) - short story
• The Narrow Land - (1967) - novelette
• The Pilgrims - (1966) - novelette
• The Secret - (1966) - short story
• Liane the Wayfarer - (1950) - short story

A collection of Vance's early short stories, including:

• Planet of the Black Dust (1945)
• Four Hundred Blackbirds (1948)
• Dead Ahead (1949)
• The Enchanted Princess (1949)
• The Potters of Firsk (1949)
• The Visitors (1950)
• The Uninhibited Robot (1950)
• Dover Spargill's Ghastly Floater (1951)
• Three-Legged Joe (1951)
• Sabotage on Sulfur Planet (1952)
• Sjambak (1952)
• Parapsyche (1957)
• Sail 25 (1961)

A society matron underwrites the interstellar tour of an Earth opera company, performing Beethoven, Mozart and Rossini for bewildered human and alien audiences on a kaleidoscopic range of planets. But intrigue and secret agendas complicate what was already a doubtful enterprise, and the matron's feckless nephew finds that the simple country girl he plans to marry is far more mysterious than she seems.

This is Jack Vance at his funniest, rolling out a rollicking picaresque tale where the belly laughs play a perfect duet with the grandmaster's sly observations on the absurdities of life, love and librettos.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - essay by Steven Owen Godersky
• Shape-Up - (1953) - short story
• The Man from Zodiac - (1967) - novella
• Golden Girl - (1951) - short story
• The Planet Machine - (1951) - short fiction
• Crusade to Maxus - (1951) - novella
• Three-Legged Joe - (1953) - short story
• Sjambak - (1953) - novelette
• The Augmented Agent - (1961) - novelette

Table of Contents:

• Preface to the Collection - essay by Jack Vance
• Capturing Vance - (1976) - essay by Barry N. Malzberg
• Sail 25 - (1962) - novella
• Ullward's Retreat - (1958) - novelette
• The Last Castle - (1966) - novella
• Abercrombie Station - (1952) - novella
• The Moon Moth - (1961) - novelette
• Rumfuddle - (1973) - novella

King Kragen has ruled a sea-covered world since human colonists arrived twelve generations before. A monstrous water creature with gluttonous appetites, King Kragen demands a payoff in return for protection- and to appease him has become a way of life. To anger King Kragen means certain death, but Sklar Hast is fed up with slavery and sacrifice. In a world without weapons, the fight won't be easy--particularly when the unwilling treat Sklar Hast as the enemy!

The galaxy is full of wealthy planets and haughty aliens who guard the technology of interstellar travel. Earth must pay a price for use of the space drive, and this rubs Paddy Blackthorn the wrong way- so he sets out to steal the secret. The powerful Shauls capture and dump him on a barren planet- yet here he acquires five golden bands containing the very data he is after. The information is coded- and while Paddy solves the puzzle he must evade a galactic manhunt!

original publication: Startling Stories, 1950

first book publication, as The Space Pirate, Toby Press 1953

currently available as The Rapparee (Vance's preferred title)

The Panarch of Pao is dead and Beran Panasper, his young son and heir, must flee the planet to live and avenge his father's death. It is at the secret fortress on the planet Breakness that Beran discovers the dreaded truth behind the assassination of his father-and much more. The people of Pao are a docile lot, content to live in harmony with the rest of the cosmos, but the scientists at Breakness seek to alter the psychology of the Paonese for their own purpose-and Beran holds the key to their audacious plan. Beran will return to Pao, transforming his home world beyond his teacher's wildest dreams. But though he has been fashioned into a man of Breakness, Beran's heart is of Pao. And he brings to his world the seeds of change that will save Pao...or destroy it.

Hugo and Nebula Award nominated novella.

For 700 years the Meks served without complaint; they were indispensable, for no gentleman would demean himself with toil. But now they turn against the strongholds of civilization--Castle Halcyon, then Sea Island, Morninglight, and Maraval--one by one the proud castles of Earth fall; last standing is Castle Hagedorn.

Winner Nebula Award 1966, Hugo award 1967.

The story originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, April 1966. The story can also be found in the Nebula Award Stories Two (1967), edited by Brian W. Aldiss and Harry Harrison, The Hugo Winners, Volume 2: (1963-70) (1971), edited by Isaac Asimov, and The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume III (1982), edited by George W. Proctor and Arthur C. Clarke. It is half of Tor Double #15: The Last Castle/Nightwings (1989, with Robert Silverberg) and is included in The Best of Jack Vance (1976) and The Jack Vance Treasury (2007).

Humankind has dominated the world Pangborn for sixteen-hundred years. Jinxmen use powerful telepathy as a weapon—but when the indigenous First Folk fight to win Pangborn back, their weapons may be superior.

A collection of Vance's early stories, including The New Prime (1950), The Men Return (1955), Green Magic (1956), Ullward's Retreat (1957), Dodkin's Job (1958), The Moon Moth (1960), Alfred's Ark (1964), Sulwen's Planet (1966), and Rumfuddle (1972).

A collection of Vance's early short stories, including The World Thinker (1944), I'll Build Your Dream Castle (1946), The God and the Temple Robber (1946), Men of the Ten Books (1949), Seven Exits from Bocz (1949), Telek (1951), The Secret (1951), Noise (1952), D.P. (1951), The Absent Minded Professor (1953), The Devil on Salvation Bluff (1954), The Phantom Milkman (1955), Where Hesperus Falls (1955), A Practical Man's Guide (1956), and The House Lords (1956).

Jack Vance has long been one of the most influential, admired and imitated writers in science fiction and fantasy literature, the award-winning author of such widely acclaimed works as The Dying Earth, the Lyonesse trilogy, the adventures of Cugel the Clever, the Demon Princes series, and many other masterful tales set among the stars, in exotic fantasy realms or on our own Earth.

For much of his career, Vance has also been one of the field's most private writers, an author who preferred to let his work speak for him. Now, at last, to coincide with the release of the tribute anthology Songs of the Dying Earth, Jack gives us this intimate and fascinating glimpse into his rich and eventful life, and a valuable insight into how he went about practicing his craft.

For fans of the Grand Master's work, these memoirs are something to be treasured.

In the far-future city of Clarges, you can live forever – if you can make the grade. In Clarges, everyone competes for the ultimate prize: immortality. Gavin Waylock had that prize – the live-forever rank of Amaranth, but lost it when he was accused of murder. Now, after seven years in hiding he begins again the struggle to reach the top. But a strong-willed woman,The Jacynth Martin, is determined to see him fail – and failure means death.

The Spatterlight Press e-book is available under the alternate title Clarges.

When Jack Vance decided to become a writer, a "million words a year" man as he put it so pragmatically at the time, he also gave fantastic literature one of its most cherished and distinctive voices. Though primarily a novelist throughout his long and distinguished career, this Hugo, Nebula, Edgar and World Fantasy Award-winning Grand Master also produced many short and mid-length works.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction by Terry Dowling and Jonathan Strahan
• Assault on a City
• Rumfuddle
• The Augmented Agent
• Green Magic
• Ullward's Retreat
• Coup de Grace
• Chateau d'If
• The Potters of Firsk
• The World-Thinker
• Seven Exits from Bocz
• Wild Thyme and Violets

Big Planet

Charley Lysidder, the Bajarnum of Beaujolais was ruthlessly expanding his empire on the Big Planet. The objectives of the mission from Earth was to stop him and ensure that the whole world didn't fall under the domination of the tyrant.

But when sabotage forced the spacecraft carrying the mission crashlanded, the priority changed. The survivors faced an epic 40,000 mile trek to safety, across the vast and unknown surface of the planet, harassed by monsters, the native people and the agents of the Bajarnum, and riven by their own deadly disputes.

Slaves of the Klau

Roy Barch is taken slave by the Klau, along with the golden Lekthwan, Komeitk Lelianr. On the industrialized world Magarak, the Klau hunt Barch and others for recreation. Barch refuses to fall prey--and fights a grim battle to return to Earth.

Table of Contents:

• Monsters in Orbit - novel
• The World Between - (1953) - novelette
• The Moon Moth - (1961) - novelette
• Brain of the Galaxy - (1951) - novelette (variant of The New Prime)
• The Devil on Salvation Bluff - (1955) - shortstory
• The Men Return - (1957) - shortstory

Son of the Tree

The Tree ruled the horizons, shouldered aside the clouds, and wore thunder and lightning like a wreath of tinsels- it had come to be worshipped by the first marveling settlers on Kyril". Joe Smith arrives from Earth and soon is caught up in a political plot between opposing worlds. Ultimately he discovers the true, horrific nature of The Tree of Life...

The Houses of Iszm

The people of Iszm live in homes which are alive. Their dwellings are elaborate, hollow trees, wherein the very walls, floors- even furniture and plumbing- are all part of a living plant. For decades, inhabitants of other worlds, including Earth, have been trying to steal a female house seed, but every attempt has failed. This is the story of a most ingenious plot to carry off a prize worth billions: one seed from the Houses of Iszm.

Table of Contents:

• The Brains of Earth - novella
• The Kokod Warriors - (1952) - novelette
• The Unspeakable McInch - (1948) - shortstory
• The Howling Bounders - (1949) - shortstory
• The King of Thieves - (1949) - shortstory
• The Spa of the Stars - (1950) - shortstory
• Coup de Grace - (1958) - shortstory

The Dragon Masters

Men have been at war for centuries with the reptilian race called "Basics." As conquerors always have, the winners of each bloody encounter have made slaves of the losers--but in this far-future war, each side has improved upon its slaves with genetic engineering.

And so at last there came to be two neighboring worlds: Aerlith, where men have raised a race of fearsome dragons to be their servants, and nearby Coralyne, where the descendants of those very dragons are served by strong, savage mutants who once were human. Inevitably, those two worlds would meet in one final contest...

The Last Castle

For 700 years the Meks served without complaint; they were indispensable, for no gentleman would demean himself with toil. But now they turn against the strongholds of civilization--Castle Halcyon, then Sea Island, Morninglight, and Maraval--one by one the proud castles of Earth fall; last standing is Castle Hagedorn.

The Five Gold Bands

The galaxy is full of wealthy planets and haughty aliens who guard the technology of interstellar travel. Earth must pay a price for use of the space drive, and this rubs Paddy Blackthorn the wrong way- so he sets out to steal the secret. The powerful Shauls capture and dump him on a barren planet- yet here he acquires five golden bands containing the very data he is after. The information is coded- and while Paddy solves the puzzle he must evade a galactic manhunt!

The Dragon Masters

The race of man is growing old, but it's not yet ready to die - not while there are dragons still to kill!

The cross-bred dragon armies of the Men of Aerlith are the most appalling horrors ever to threaten the sanity of our future:

Termagents ~ three hundred reptilian giants with six legs apiece, the most fecund breeders of them all

Jugglers ~ eighteen of them, growling amongst themselves, waiting for an opportunity to snap off a leg from any unwary groom

Murderers (striding and long-horned) ~ eighty-five of each, with scaly tails and eyes like crystals

Fiends ~ fifty-two powerful monsters, their tails tipped with spike steel balls

Blue Horrors, Basics, Spider Dragons.

The Last Castle

For 700 years the Meks served without complaint; they were indispensable, for no gentleman would demean himself with toil. But now they turn against the strongholds of civilization--Castle Halcyon, then Sea Island, Morninglight, and Maraval--one by one the proud castles of Earth fall; last standing is Castle Hagedorn.

World of the Sleeper

Take your choice of any world or time - but at your perril.

Fifteen-year-old Dick Murdoch leaves Venus to meet his father Paul on the Moon. On the voyage there, the captain stops to examine the wreckage of a sister spaceship. No one knows what attacked the ship—some say it's the Basilisk. Dick's adventures aboard spaceship and on the Moon start to pay off as he finds more and more clues.

Written for younger readers as part of the Winston Science Fiction series of "juveniles."

First of the three fabulous Alastor Cluster novels from Jack Vance, one of the finest authors ever to devote his career to science fiction, certainly one of the wittiest, most inventive, erudite and poetic. An absolutely wonderful novel.

The Alastor Cluster, thirty thousand inhabited worlds ruled by the mysterious Connatic.

Trullion, world 2262 of the Alastor Cluster, was a world of fens, mists, idyllic islands scattered in an aquatic setting of surpassing beauty with its shaggy trees like bursts of great chrysanthemums, its natural growth of fruits and all the richness the clear oceans provided for the easy taking.

The Trill were a lackadaisical, easy-living race-except for the planetwide game of hassade when a ferocious instinct for gambling drove them to risk all-home, friends, family, even life itself-on the teams that contested the water-checkerboard gaming fields.

With the prize the virginal body of a sheirl-maiden, a body any Trill is willing to die for...

His Past Was Gone-and There Were 3, 000 Worlds to Search for It!

From his fabulous palace on Nemenes, the Connatic ruled the sprawling Alastor Clustor. And kept track of the doings of each of his trillion or more subjects.

But there was one man he knew nothing about-for the past life of the wonderer called Pardero was a complete mystery. Pardero set himself two goals. Find out who he was.....and find his enemy, the person who had stolen his memory.

Psychologists deduced that his home world must be the mysterious Marune-a planet lit by four shifting suns.

Pardero made his way there-and was hailed as the Kaiark Efaim, ruler of the shadowed realm. Uncovering his last identity had been comparatively simple. Finding his sworn enemy would be more difficult - there were so many people to choose from!

This is the second book in the author's three books set in the Alastor Cluster , a whirl of 30,000 stars of which 3,000 are inhabited by five trillion humans.

The Alastor Cluster, thirty thousand inhabited worlds ruled by the mysterious Connatic.

Wyst, the planet numbered 1716 in the cluster, appears a utopia, but there is something decidedly strange going on that forces the Connatic to send in an investigator.

The objective of the mission from Earth: to stop the ruthless Barjarnum of Beaujolais from expanding his empire on the Big Planet...and prevent the world from falling under this tyrant's domination. Then sabotage forces the craft to crash land, and the survivors face an epic 40,000-mile trek across the dangerous landscape. A SF landmark.

From Handbook of the Inhabited Worlds: "Big Planet lies beyond the frontier of terrestrial law, and has been settled by groups impatient with restraint: non-conformists, anarchists, fugitives, religious dissidents, misanthropes, deviants, freaks. Big Planet represents for us that tantalizing vision of the land beyond the frontier where bravery, resource and daring are more important than the mastery of urban abstractions. Who can deem this good or bad? Who can define justice, or correctness or truth? Big Planet is in essence a problem to which there exists no solution". Shipmasters who run the magnificent showboats along the rivers of Big Planet know that each port has unique character and sensitivities. Apollon Zamp and Garth Ashgale are adept at dodging danger; two of the wiliest rascals in the business, they are deadly rivals to boot. When Zamp sets out to compete at the Grand Festival at Mornune, he knows Ashgale is never far behind!

Vance Integral Edition/Spatterlight Press title: The Magnificent Showboats of the Lower Vissel River, Lune XXIII South, Big Planet.

For centuries the breathtakingly beautiful planet Cadwal has been held in trust by a centuries-old Charter of Conservancy, created by the now-defunct Naturalist Society on Old Earth.

Over time, restrictions on population expansion written into the Charter have become irksome to some who live on Cadwal--those who would take the unexploited wealth of Cadwal for themselves, also those forced to leave the planet to keep population in check.

Glawen Clattuc grows to manhood within the insular community of Araminta Station, the primary settlement on the planet, and becomes attuned to conflicts among the parties wishing to break free of the Charter. He joins the Constabulary, and ties mysterious events and circumstances together. To uphold the Conservancy, much depends upon locating the original Charter document, which has been lost for many years; Glawen is chosen to search for the Charter, on backwater Earth and worlds beyond.

The Cadwal Chronicles was written by Vance in his maturity--an accomplished master sure of his game- using a light touch and broad palette of characters.

At the remote end of Mircea's Wisp, far out on the galaxy's Perseid Arm, is the Purple Rose System--containing the three stars Lorca, Sing and Syrene. Around Syrene swings the spectacular planet Cadwal, which the now defunct Naturalist Society of Earth long ago chartered to forever protect from exploitation. Cadwal is administered from Araminta Station--where young Glawen Clattuc wonders what the future may hold for him in the hierarchic, constrained society of Cadwal. His budding relationship with the lovely Sessily Veder ends with her mysterious disappearance- casting Glawen into a strange adventure, and the unraveling of a potent conspiracy.

Araminta Station is part 1 of 3 of The Cadwal Chronicles.
Cadwal is a planet of extraordinary beauty. To protect it, the "Naturalist Society" has set up a Charter which allows only limited settlement on the planet in order to enforce the laws of the Conservancy. These laws forbid extensive human habitations, mining and other exploitation activities. Only six "Agents" and their staff are allowed to reside permanently on the planet: their main function is to prevent other humans from establishing residence, although tourists are allowed in specially designed lodges, overlooking sites of natural beauty and interest.

The planet Cadwal has an ecosystem unique in the human-explored galaxy. A thousand years past it was set aside as a natural preserve, protected by law and covenant against colonization and exploitation. But there is a conspiracy to open the planet and its rich resources to commerce. Glawen Clattuc must find who is behind the sabotage, and bring them to justice- but discovers that his own family is involved! Ancient crimes will be discovered, along with the key to the crisis which threatens Cadwal.

Ecce and Old Earth is part 2 of 3 of The Cadwal Chronicles.
Cadwal is a planet of extraordinary beauty. To protect it, the "Naturalist Society" has set up a Charter which allows only limited settlement on the planet in order to enforce the laws of the Conservancy. These laws forbid extensive human habitations, mining and other exploitation activities. Only six "Agents" and their staff are allowed to reside permanently on the planet: their main function is to prevent other humans from establishing residence, although tourists are allowed in specially designed lodges, overlooking sites of natural beauty and interest.

The Conservancy of Cadwal has a new Charter- thanks to the courage of Glawen Clattuc and his beloved Wayness Tamm. But this has not brought peace to the people of Cadwal- instead, it has polarized them. Led by exiles, anti-Conservancy forces continue work to open Cadwal to commercial exploitation, while a new extremist faction seeks to restore Cadwal to entirely natural condition. In the middle are the governors of the planet, and their police force. Newly-promoted Commander Glawen Clattuc is charged with apprehending the conspirators wherever they might flee, but he also has a personal agenda. After twenty years, he will solve the mystery of his mother's death.

Throy is part 3 of 3 of The Cadwal Chronicles.
Cadwal is a planet of extraordinary beauty. To protect it, the "Naturalist Society" has set up a Charter which allows only limited settlement on the planet in order to enforce the laws of the Conservancy. These laws forbid extensive human habitations, mining and other exploitation activities. Only six "Agents" and their staff are allowed to reside permanently on the planet: their main function is to prevent other humans from establishing residence, although tourists are allowed in specially designed lodges, overlooking sites of natural beauty and interest.

Star Kings are a race of non-humans who characteristically disguise themselves as humans -- but humans with a difference. Power alone is their goal -- a goal that is sought no matter the price in ordinary "human" life. Kerth Gerson was NOT a Star King, but he was looking for one -- a very specail Star King, a Star King who had murdered his parents many years before. All Gerson knew was that the Star King's name was Attel Malagate. Throughout endless galaxies of space, Gerson hunted down his Star King and finally found him....

Jack Vance excels at writing a series of shorter works that together comprise a grand, interstellar adventure. Such is the The Demon Princes, a series of five tales that chronicle Kirth Gersen's quest for vengeance against the five demon princes. The princes led the Mount Pleasant Massacre, a raid that destroyed Gersen's family and his world. But now Kirth is on their trail, and no matter how many galaxies there are to search, he will find them one by one and exact his revenge. This first volume collects three of the five Demon Prince stories, while the second volume will carry the remaining two.

In the midpoint novel of the "Demon Princes" series, Kirth Gersen sets his sights upon the mysterious Viole Falushe. Vance describes this murderous creature as a "sybarite." "Sadistic pervert" would probably be a more apropos phrase. After several false leads, Gersen backtracks the villain to his point of origin - Earth, of all places! Then the trail moves outward again, to the starworlds and a place back of beyond where there is actually a physical Palace of Love.

Kirth Gersen carries in his pocket a slip of paper with a list of five names written upon it--the names of five Demon Princes. The Demon Princes are a race of beings who disguise themselves as humans and delight in power and destruction. however, to Kirth they are merely murderers who killed his family and destroyed his home planet--and who deserves to die for those misdeeds. Three have already fallen in Kirth's hands, but there are two more names on his list, two more Princes who will live only long enough to regret their evil ways.

Lens Larque was just as unique as the other Demon Princes--uniquely appalling. He was personally ugly, startling vicious, and arrogant above all others. Larque's own mission was a villainy of the highest order, and his personal obsession with success kept him hidden well from attackers--almost well enough. Howard Alan Treesong poisoned his friends, tortured his colleagues, and wrote his own horrific holy book, The Book of Dreams. But, clever as he may be, a galaxy-wide guessing game will be his undoing--and Kirth Gersen's sworn vengeance will be complete.

The minstrel Gastel Etzwane lives in Shant- a country of cantons, each independently dictating its own law and customs. The enforcement of law is simple, quick, and inevitable: death by decapitation, from an explosive torc clamped around each citizen's neck by authority of a single man- the Anome. For millennia Anomes have ruled Shant, dealing death as they see fit- and none dares defy them, until Gastel Etzwane risks his head to expose the Anome's identity- and end the tyranny of these faceless men forever.

The Anome is part 1 of 3 of Durdane.

The land of Shant on the planet Durdane is ruled by a purposely anonymous dictator called the Anome or Faceless Man. He maintains control by virtue of the torc, a ring of explosive placed around the neck of every adult in Shant.

Where the Anomes once ruled stands young Gastel Etzwane, facing a mortal threat to his homeland. Hoards of red Roguskhoi, armed by an unknown enemy, have swarmed out of the southern bogs to slaughter men, despoil women, and spread waves of terror. Through the peace imposed by the tyranny of the Anomes, men of Shant have lost the art of weaponry and war. Now Gastel must revive those skills to forge Shant's citizens into an army - an army of the free.

The Brave Free Men is part 2 of 3 of Durdane.

The land of Shant on the planet Durdane is ruled by a purposely anonymous dictator called the Anome or Faceless Man. He maintains control by virtue of the torc, a ring of explosive placed around the neck of every adult in Shant.

Gastel Etzwane and his army of Brave Free Men have driven the Roguskhoi from Durdane, only to discover that Durdane is but one tiny front- a testing ground- for an implacable enemy intent on subjugating all the worlds of man. Gastel and his people are in no position to resist, but must find a way to escape a slave army, forced to fight a war that is not their own, and defeat the Asutra!

The Asutra is part 3 of 3 of Durdane.

The land of Shant on the planet Durdane is ruled by a purposely anonymous dictator called the Anome or Faceless Man. He maintains control by virtue of the torc, a ring of explosive placed around the neck of every adult in Shan't.

One of Jack Vances enduring classics is his 1964 novel, The Dying Earth, and its sequelsa fascinating tale set on a far-future Earth, under a giant red sun that is soon to go out forever. This volume comprises all four books in the series, The Dying Earth, The Eyes of the Overworld, Cugels Saga and Rialto the Magnificent.

WFA nominated novelette. It originally appeared in the anthology Flashing Swords! #4: Barbarians and Black Magicians (1977), edited by Lin Carter. The story can also be found in the anthologies The Year's Finest Fantasy (1978), edited by Terry Carr, and Masterpieces of Fantasy and Wonder (1989), edited by David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer. It is included in the collection The Jack Vance Treasury (2007). A limmited edition chapbook also appeared in 1979.

The stories included in The Dying Earth introduce dozens of seekers of wisdom and beauty, lovely lost women, wizards of every shade of eccentricity with their runic amulets and spells. We meet the melancholy deodands, who feed on human flesh and the twk-men, who ride dragonflies and trade information for salt. There are monsters and demons. Each being is morally ambiguous: The evil are charming, the good are dangerous. All are at home in Vance's lyrically described fantastic landscapes like Embelyon where, "The sky [was] a mesh of vast ripples and cross-ripples and these refracted a thousand shafts of colored light, rays which in mid-air wove wondrous laces, rainbow nets, in all the jewel hues...." The dying Earth itself is otherworldly: "A dark blue sky, an ancient sun.... Nothing of Earth was raw or harsh-the ground, the trees, the rock ledge protruding from the meadow; all these had been worked upon, smoothed, aged, mellowed. The light from the sun, though dim, was rich and invested every object of the land ... with a sense of lore and ancient recollection." Welcome.

alternate title: Mazirian the Magician

The Eyes of the Overworld is the first of Vance's picaresque novels about the scoundrel Cugel. Here he is sent by a magician he has wronged to a distant unknown country to retrieve magical lenses that reveal the Overworld. Conniving to steal the lenses, he escapes and, goaded by a homesick monster magically attached to his liver, starts to find his way home to Almery. The journey takes him across trackless mountains, wastelands, and seas. Through cunning and dumb luck, the relentless Cugel survives one catastrophe after another, fighting off bandits, ghosts, and ghouls-stealing, lying, and cheating without insight or remorse leaving only wreckage behind.

Betrayed and betraying, he joins a cult group on a pilgrimage, crosses the Silver Desert as his comrades die one by one and, escaping the Rat People, obtains a spell that returns him home. There, thanks to incompetence and arrogance he misspeaks the words of a purloined spell and transports himself back to the same dismal place he began his journey.

Alternate title: Cugel the Clever

The roguish Cugel the Clever is stranded on a shore on the other side of the world by the Laughing Magic and must fight, bluff, and connive his way back to Almery to take vengeance on the wizard.

Alternate title: Cugel: The Skybreak Spatterlight

Jack Vance is one of the most remarkable talents to ever grace the world of science fiction. His unique, stylish voice has been beloved by generations of readers. One of his enduring classics is hisThe Dying Earth series, fascinating, baroque tales set on a far-future Earth, under a giant red sun that is soon to go out forever.

Rhialto the Marvellous contains three linked novellas about the adventures of the wizard Rhialto across the decadent landscape of the Dying Earth, under its swollen red sun.

Far across the galaxy on the planet Maske, young Jubal Droad leaves home to make his fortune. Droad attaches himself to the powerful court of Nai the Hever, and is made an interplanetary economic spy. Jubal courts Mieltrude - the cold-blooded, beautiful daughter of the house - and becomes the rival and enemy of the brutal Ramus Ymph. In disguise, Jubal leaves the planet and proves Ramus' connection to a sinister interplanetary cartel that covets a foothold on Maske; Jubal pursues Ramus, and finds him among the Waels - a strange people who worship intelligent trees. The trees will determine the outcome of their final confrontation...

Found as a child with no memory of his past, adopted by a scholarly couple who raised him as their own, Jaro never quiet fit into the rigidly defined Society of Thanet.

When his foster parents are killed in a mysterious bombing, Jaro Fath sets out to discover the truth of his origins--a quest that will take him across light-years and into the depths of the past.

The races of Koryphon keep an uneasy peace- the swift, nomadic Wind-runners, the fierce Uldras, and the aristocratic Outkers. For over two hundred years the Outkers have occupied the Alouan lands, living in baronial splendor where Uldra chieftains once ruled. When the self-proclaimed "Gray Prince" leads Uldras in an onslaught to expunge the Outkers from ancestral lands, he faces a challenge from the Outkers, and from history itself!

AKA: The Gray Prince, AKA: The Grey Prince

The race of man is growing old, but it's not yet ready to die - not while there are dragons still to kill!

The cross-bred dragon armies of the Men of Aerlith are the most appalling horrors ever to threaten the sanity of our future:

Termagents ~ three hundred reptilian giants with six legs apiece, the most fecund breeders of them all

Jugglers ~ eighteen of them, growling amongst themselves, waiting for an opportunity to snap off a leg from any unwary groom

Murderers (striding and long-horned) ~ eighty-five of each, with scaly tails and eyes like crystals

Fiends ~ fifty-two powerful monsters, their tails tipped with spike steel balls

Blue Horrors, Basics, Spider Dragons...

The Green Pearl and Madouc in a single volume.

The Elder Isles, located in what is now the Bay of Biscay off the the coast of Old Gaul, are made up of ten contending kingdoms, all vying with each other for control. At the centre of much of the intrigue is Casmir, the ruthless and ambitious king of Lyonnesse. His beautiful but otherworldly daughter, Suldrun, is part of his plans. He intends to cement an alliance or two by marrying her well. But Suldrun is as determined as he and defies him. Casmir coldly confines her to the overgrown garden that she loves to frequent, and it is here that meets her love and her tragedy unfolds.

Political intrigue, magic, war, adventure and romance are interwoven in a rich and sweeping tale set in a brilliantly realized fabled land.

In Lyonesse II: The Green Pearl the magical lands of high enchantment - the Elder Isles, the land, long-vanished beneath the ocean, from which King Arthur's ancestors fled to Britain - come to brilliant life again. In this ancient land the realm of chivalry and the world of faerie exist side by side and it is a place of strange beauty, high adventure and eerie magic. Warring kings renew their conflicts, opposing magicians devise ever more strange and sinister stratagems and Madouc, ostensibly the daughter of the ill-fated Princess Suldrun but in reality a changeling, becomes embroiled in political rivalries, military adventures - and the quest for the Grail.

Set in the magical world of the Elder Isles, this novel describes the adventures of Madouc, ostensibly the daughter of the ill-fated Princess Suldrun, but really the daughter of a faerie. This is the third volume in the "Lyonesse" saga.

"Magnus Ridolph didn't look like an interstellar troubleshooter, at first. He was not tall and muscular, ... and his voice and manner seemed far too mild for an adventurer. Yet there was a chill hardness in his mild eyes that warned of the deceptiveness of his appearance..."

This is a collection of all stories featuring Magnus Ridolph, troubleshooter for hire. Invariably those with whom he associates try to either cheat him or take advantage of him, but Magnus Ridolph always comes up with the answer to their problem and, usually with an unexpected twist, manages to collect his full fee from the cheater.

Contains:

• The Kokod Warriors
• The Unspeakable McInch
• The Howling Bounders
• The King of Thieves
• The Spa of the Stars
• Coup de Grace
• The Sub-standard Sardines
• To B of not to C or to D

Omnibus edition: The Brains of Earth (novella) aka Nopalgarth

• The Houses of Iszm
• Son of the Tree

Original publication: Thrilling Wonder Stories, 1951. Also appeared in Ace Double F-265 and #77525.

The Tree ruled the horizons, shouldered aside the clouds, and wore thunder and lightning like a wreath of tinsels- it had come to be worshipped by the first marveling settlers on Kyril". Joe Smith arrives from Earth and soon is caught up in a political plot between opposing worlds. Ultimately he discovers the true, horrific nature of The Tree of Life...

Original publication: Startling Stories, 1954. It also appeared as half of Ace Double F-265 and #77525.

The people of Iszm live in homes which are alive. Their dwellings are elaborate, hollow trees, wherein the very walls, floors- even furniture and plumbing- are all part of a living plant. For decades, inhabitants of other worlds, including Earth, have been trying to steal a female house seed, but every attempt has failed. This is the story of a most ingenious plot to carry off a prize worth billions: one seed from the Houses of Iszm.

Myron Tany is an unhappy young economist until his flamboyant great-aunt lets him captain her space yacht on an interstellar hunt for a clinic rumored to restore youth. But when a disagreement with Dame Hester leaves Myron stranded on a distant planet, he signs on as supercargo aboard the tramp freighter Glicca. He travels the exotic worlds of the Gaean Reach, finding adventure or misadventure at every touchdown.

Jack Vance, grandmaster of lighthearted space opera, shapes a picaresque tale of adventure, romance, humor, and youth's eternal yearning to see the wonders that lie beyond the horizon.

Rejoin the adventures of Myron Tany, rebellious scion of a wealthy family, as he tours the Galaxy on a very questionable interstellar freighter, in a crew of actors, musicians, thieves and other ne'er-do-wells.

A legend has to start somewhere...

As so many writers have said, it's in the shorter and mid-length work that the storytelling craft is best learned. Hard-Luck Diggings brings together fourteen such pieces from the first twelve years of Grand Master Jack Vance's genre-defining career, from back when he first worked to pay the mortgage, buy the groceries, travel the world, eventually building his own private "dream castle" and starting a family.

Like any writer serious about staying in the game, we see him targeting the markets of the day, doing what was needed to meet the tastes of editors and their readerships while at the same time perfecting his own special way of doing things so that his name, his distinctive voice, stood a chance (in modern marketing parlance) of becoming a viable "brand."

Hard-Luck Diggings brings that fascinating process to life in fine style. As well as serving up vintage entertainment from one of the field's genuine masters, it provides an illuminating armchair tour of how the Jack Vance enterprise came to be, full of zest and life, the thrill of the upward climb and of so much more to be done. This is a book to be savoured with a twinkle in the eye, a knowing smile, but most of all, with a love of adventure and high romance firmly in place.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction
• Hard-Luck Diggings (1948)
• The Temple of Han (1951)
• The Masquerade on Dicantropus (1951)
• Abercrombie Station (1952)
• Three-Legged Joe (1953)
• DP! (1953)
• Shape-Up (1953)
• Sjambak (1953)
• The Absent-Minded Professor (1954)
• When the Five Moons Rise (1954)
• The Devil on Salvation Bluff (1955)
• Where Hesperus Falls (1956)
• The Phantom Milkman (1956)
• Dodkin's Job (1959)

Jack Vance, Magician

Like the professional wizards and sorcerers he so often writes about, Jack Vance has long been a master magician when it comes to storytelling, turning out marvelous tricks with words, using his wonderful knack for names, detail and dialog, his fine eye for rendering the vagaries of the human condition to deliver high adventure set on fascinating worlds and in fabulous realms that are second to none.

In a career spanning nearly sixty years, this peerless F&SF Grand Master has taken us from the Dying Earth to Lyonesse, from the Oikumene of the Demon Princes to the farthest corners of the Gaean Reach, Alastor Cluster and beyond, bringing alive on the page magical places we can only dream about.

Dream Castles presents a generous serving of this celebrated magician's "performances," ten fascinating tales from his long and influential career, among them his two Miro Hetzel adventures, "The Dogtown Tourist Agency" and "Freitzke's Turn," the intriguing "The Narrow Land," a second outing for Jean Parlier in "Choldwell's Chickens," and the classic space opera of "Son of the Tree."

Dream Castles shows a true magician storyteller perfecting his craft, one moment as journeyman finding a voice all his own, the next as fully-fledged maestro intent on exploring worlds and delivering adventure and wonder in equal parts, the very stuff that dreams are made of.

Table of Contents:

• The Dogtown Tourist Agency
• Freitzke's Turn
• I'll Build Your Dream Castle
• Golden Girl
• Sulwen's Planet
• Cholwell's Chickens
• A Practical Man's Guide
• The Narrow Land
• The Enchanted Princess
• Son of the Tree

The Ultimate Grandeur

Fantasy and Science Fiction Grandmaster Jack Vance is very much a writer of the Space Age. His time "traveling" the magic highways of his imagination spans the period bracketed by the final years of World War 2 and the Cassini-Huygens probe reaching Saturn space in late 2004, the year he brought his magnificent career to a close.

In those first thrilling, dangerous, heady days, science did seem to promise all the answers, and it was in a "double" universe of the familiar workaday world and the utterly unlimited one of the imagination that the ever-practical yet romantic, diligently physics-savvy yet as often wildly improvisational Jack Vance worked.

Even as he wrote tales set in the far future of his acclaimed Dying Earth, even as he produced mysteries and suspense stories of a much less fanciful kind, Jack's determined quest to become a "million words a year" man saw him ranging a universe criss-crossed with busy interstellar highways: a network of flourishing trade and tourist routes leading to new frontiers, far-flung colonies, alien worlds, with ample room for exotic races, travelers, traders and scoundrels, even space pirates, ample opportunity for grand schemes of every kind.

Magic Highways gathers sixteen of those early space adventures from that exciting first decade, spanning the years 1946 to 1956. In these frequently inventive, often surprising space operas, Jack takes us to vivid destinations along the vast interstellar highways of a future where anything is possible.

Table of Contents

• Phalid's Fate
• Planet of the Black Dust
• Ultimate Quest
• Men of the Ten Books
• The Planet Machine
• Dover Spargill's Ghastly Floater
• Winner Lose All
• Sabotage on Sulfur Planet
• The House Lords
• Sanatoris Short-cut
• The Unspeakable McInch
• The Sub-Standard Sardines
• The Howling Bounders
• The King of Thieves
• The Spa of the Stars
• To B or Not to C or to D

Strange things happen...

Throughout his long and impressive career as a celebrated professional storyteller, Jack Vance showed a fascination not only with having characters solve mysteries in all sorts of dramatic and wondrous situations using their powers of observation, deduction and common sense, but also with the possibility of higher states of mind in play, other realms of existence, even spirit worlds.

Vance approached such things with a healthy, properly wary, scientific curiosity, even while embracing the liberties allowed any popular entertainer, and so made the exploration of such higher states part of his stock in trade.

Whether richly displayed in his Dying Earth stories with their wizardly spellcasting, eldritch beings and strange dimensions, or in his science fiction tales with the incredible mental powers afforded races like the Green Chasch, the Fwai-chi, the Meks of Etamin 9 besieging the final human strongholds in "The Last Castle," even given to divergent human peoples on Koryphon, Maske and countless other worlds, or to the likes of his most extraordinary Demon Prince, Howard Alan Treesong, Vance was forever drawn to what else might comprise human (and other) natures in all their myriad forms.

Minding the Stars: The Early Jack Vance Volume 4 reflects this beguiling blend of the practical and the otherworldly, combining tales that explore the workings of such mental powers with other stories selected from the earlier days of the Grandmaster's illustrious career.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction
• Nogpalgarth
• Telek
• Four Hundred Blackbirds
• Alfred's Ark
• Meet Miss Universe
• The World Between
• Milton Hack from Zodiac
• Parapsyche

Avenues into the Future...

"Truth to tell, we're tourists, out to see the wonders of the universe."

--Paddy Blackthorn, The Rapparee

Grand journeys among the stars--pursuits, quests, explorations and encounters. These were very much science fiction and fantasy Grandmaster Jack Vance's stock in trade, whether to have Kirth Gersen roam the Oikumene and Beyond tracking down his five Demon Princes or to strand Adam Reith on far-off Tschai. Or, as in this present volume, to take Earth-style opera to the non-human folk of distant Rlaru, to study the much coveted tree-pod dwellings on Iszm, to follow the clues in five gold bands to the knowledge that lets a handful of races control all space travel in the universe, or to endure servitude at the hands of ruthless alien overlords.

Just as Vance sought adventure and the joys of a fulfilled life by travelling the highways and byways of his own beloved Earth, so he had his heroes and heroines do the same on other worlds. The five early tales featured in Grand Crusades: The Early Jack Vance, Volume Five take us on a fascinating selection of such journeys, showing us how the future was in the earlier years of his writing career.

And inevitably, as with storytellers from Homer to Shakespeare, Dickens to Austen, Tolstoy to Twain, our Grandmaster also used his craft as something on which to hang personal preoccupations, fascinations and longings. For as with any good writer, the completions and pay-offs of these otherworldly travels often deliver more than just a satisfactory conclusion to the affairs on hand and a few hours' pleasant diversion for the reader. Vance also put us in touch with things beyond the page, delivering an awareness of a universe and a future for humanity filled with possibility, leaving us--as the best writers, artists and makers always do--with feelings of connection with something larger.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction
• The Rapparee
• Crusade to Maxus
• Gold and Iron
• The Houses of Iszm
• Space Opera

The Last Castle:

For 700 years the Meks served without complaint; they were indispensable, for no gentleman would demean himself with toil. But now they turn against the strongholds of civilization--Castle Halcyon, then Sea Island, Morninglight, and Maraval--one by one the proud castles of Earth fall; last standing is Castle Hagedorn.

Winner Nebula Award 1966, Hugo award 1967.

Nightwings:

A fabulous tale of pilgrimage and hope, betrayal and transformation by one of science fiction's greatest writers. Only at night on the winds of darkness can she soar. And it was Avluela the Flier's ebony and scarlet wings that lead the Watcher to the seven hills of the ancient city from which, in a moment of weakness, the Watcher failed his vigil, leaving the skies and deep space unguarded. The invaders came and conquered. With Avluela lost in the turmoil of conquest, the Watcher set out alone for the Holy City home of the Rememberers, keepers of the past. This is where the secret of Earth's salvation lay hidden in antiquity. On his journey the Watcher hoped to recapture his youth and find the soaring, beautiful woman he loved. But Avluela held more for the Watcher - and Earth - than love. Her wonder stretched beyond flight, for she knew the riddle that would free all men.

A Short Sharp Shock:

A man tumbles through wild surf, half drowned, to collapse on a moonlit beach. When he regains consciousness, he has no memory of who he is or where he came from. he know only that the woman who washed ashore with him has disappeared sometime in the night, and that he has awakened in a surreal landscape of savage beauty -- a mysterious watery world encircled by a thin spine of land. Aided by strange tribesmen, he will journey to the cove of the spine kings, a brutal race that has enslaved the woman and several of the tribesmen. That is only the beginning of his quest, as he struggles to find her identity in this wondrous and cruel land -- and seeks out the woman whose hold on his imagination is both unfathomable and unshakable.

The Dragon Masters:

The race of man is growing old, but it's not yet ready to die - not while there are dragons still to kill!

The cross-bred dragon armies of the Men of Aerlith are the most appalling horrors ever to threaten the sanity of our future:

Termagents ~ three hundred reptilian giants with six legs apiece, the most fecund breeders of them all

Jugglers ~ eighteen of them, growling amongst themselves, waiting for an opportunity to snap off a leg from any unwary groom

Murderers (striding and long-horned) ~ eighty-five of each, with scaly tails and eyes like crystals

Fiends ~ fifty-two powerful monsters, their tails tipped with spike steel balls

Blue Horrors, Basics, Spider Dragons...

The four Planet of Adventure volumes chronicle Adam Reith's saga on the planet Tschai, under the amber glow of the star Carina 4269. Reith is a Terran first-in scout stranded on a planet which he learns is now occupied, after an ancient struggle which has come to a standstill, by three technically advanced cultures who now guardedly share the surface while the original inhabitants- the mysterious Pnume- dwell in subterranean depths. On Tschai, Reith discovers to his surprise (and disgust) Earth-derived humans whom the three off-world cultures imported long ago, who have undergone physical and perceptual modifications to closely mimic their masters. The enslaved humans retain however that most human of traits- ruthless self-interest.

In The Chasch, Reith encounters a handful of free humans ranging the face of Tschai, and begins his quest to secure a space-worthy craft with which to return to Earth. Resourcefulness is Reith's byword as his odyssey takes him among the domains of aliens, humans, and their various collateral societies.

In the final book of the omnibus, Vance introduces the Pnume, one of his most enigmatic and incomprehensible creations. Forced to live in the depths of Tschai by the long-ago surface struggle between the invading aliens, the Pnume have occupied themselves within an eternal obsession for collecting and preserving Tschai's historical oddities. Reith is horrified to discover that they seek to exhibit him in their Museum of Foreverness.

Jack Vance is at his best as he introduces the cultures and beings who make up the chaotic population of this ancient planet. Reith's path to return to Earth is thorny and fraught with constant threats. His epic tale is a masterpiece of story-telling.

alternate title (Spatterlight Press): The Chasch

When the Terran starship Explorator IV reached the planet Tschai, its crew didn't know what to expect.

Tschai was so far from Earth that the distress signal which had brought them here must have taken centuries to reach them.

Whatever cataclysm had threatened this planet was probably long past.

The starship Explorator IV is destroyed after entering orbit around the planet Tschai. Adam Reith's scout ship is en route to the surface when the attack occurs, and is damaged in the explosion; Reith crash-lands and is separated from his ship. He finds a world full of violence, where four non-human races rule: the Chasch, the Dirdir, the Wannek, and the Pnume. Humans are present, but dominated by the other races. In this volume Reith sets out to regain his scout ship, and makes his way to Dadiche, ruled by the Blue Chasch and their human servants. Along the way he finds loyal friends, and challenges social inequities with the same aplomb that he rescues fair maidens- like the lovely Ylin Ylan, Flower of Cath.

The Chasch is part 1 of 4 of Tschai. Tschai is a planet orbiting the star Carina 4269, 212 light-years from Earth. It is populated by three alien, mutually hostile species; the displaced, native Pnume; and various human races, some of whom live as slaves or clients of the aliens. Each of the four novels relates Reith's adventures with one of the species, and is named after that species.

Alternate title (Spatterlight Press edition): The Wannek

The second book of the Planet of Adventure series

Marooned on the strange planet Tschai, Adam Reith agreed to lead an expedition to return the princess Ylin Ylan, the flower of Cath, to her homeland halfway accross the globe. Reith is assured of assistance from her father if he delivers her back to Cath; but as events unfold, he is forced to make a dangerous choice. Inevitably he must risk everything against the enigmatic Wannek - and their devious human servants, the Wannekmen.

Monsters of land and sea lay before them, and beings both human and alien who might rob, kill or enslave them. Tschai was a large planet, an ancient planet, where four powerful alien races struggled for mastery while humans were treated as pawns...

Book 3 of Tschai, Planet of Adventure:

Getting back to Earth from the planet Tschai involved either stealing a spaceship or having one built to order - for Tschai was home to several intelligent star-born races, and so they had spaceyards. But Adam Reith's problem was not so simple. He'd already been lucky to escape the Chasch and the Wankh and a dozen different types of humans, and now his course led directly to the Grand Sivishe Spaceyards in the domains of the Dirdir.

Book 4 of Tschai, Planet of Adventure:

The mystery-shrouded aliens of Tschai held him captive in a labyrinth of terror.

The Pnume were an ancient race of the planet Tschai, living undergound in a vast network of caverns with their human slave-species, the Pnumekin.

The Pnume were the historians of Tschai, collecting its past with scholarly disinterest. Surface-dwellers never saw the Pnume, if the surface-dwellers were lucky.

Adam Reith was not so fortunate. The Pnume had heard rumors of a strangeman, claining to come from the planet Earth, and they needed him for Foreverness, the museum of Tschai life. Adam Reith was about to become an alien exhibit.