Search Worlds Without End

At first, only a few things are known about the celestial object that astronomers dub Rama. It is huge, weighing more than ten trillion tons. And it is hurtling through the solar system at inconceivable speed. Then a space probe confirms the unthinkable: Rama is no natural object. It is, incredible, an interstellar spacecraft. Space explorers and planet-bound scientists alike prepare for mankind's first encounter with alien intelligence. It will kindle their wildest dreams... and fan their darkest fears. For no one knows who the Ramans are or why they have come. And now the moment of rendezvous awaits -- just behind a Raman airlock door.

Elder Race

Adrian Tchaikovsky

Lynesse is the lowly Fourth Daughter of the queen, and always getting in the way.

But a demon is terrorizing the land, and now she's an adult (albeit barely) with responsibilities (she tells herself). Although she still gets in the way, she understands that the only way to save her people is to invoke the pact between her family and the Elder sorcerer who has inhabited the local tower for as long as her people have lived here (though none in living memory has approached it).

But Elder Nyr isn't a sorcerer, and he is forbidden to help, and his knowledge of science tells him the threat cannot possibly be a demon...

Becoming Alien

Becoming Alien: Book 1

Rebecca Ore

Living on a chicken farm in backwater America, forced to help his older brother run an illegal drug operation, Tom was going nowhere fast. Then an extraterrestial ship crashed on his farm, and he managed to save one alien from the wreck - Mica, a cadet of the multi-species Federation.

Communicating largely through pictures, the two form an odd friendship and Tom decides to become a Federation cadet -- a test case to see if humans could ever be considered for membership. As the lone human among the alien race, Tom's survival was not assured. And if he fell prey to fear and prejudice, Earth would be condemned to eternal quarantine.

2001: A Space Odyssey

Space Odyssey: Book 1

Men, Martians and Machines

On the moon, an enigma is uncovered. So great are the implications of the discovery that, for the first time, men are sent out deep into the solar system. But before they can reach their destination, things begin to go wrong. Horribly wrong.

The Martian Chronicles

Ray Bradbury

Leaving behind a world on the brink of destruction, man came to the Red planet and found the Martians waiting, dreamlike. Seeking the promise of a new beginning, man brought with him his oldest fears and his deepest desires. Man conquered Mars?and in that instant, Mars conquered him. The strange new world with its ancient, dying race and vast, red-gold deserts cast a spell on him, settled into his dreams, and changed him forever. Here are the captivating chronicles of man and Mars?the modern classic by the peerless Ray Bradbury.

Eric Frank Russell

Contents:

Gateway

The Heechee Saga: Book 1

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

Gateway opened on all the wealth of the Universe... and on reaches of unimaginable horror. When prospector Bob Broadhead went out to Gateway on the Heechee spacecraft, he decided he would know which was the right mission to make him his fortune. Three missions later, now famous and permanently rich, Robinette Broadhead has to face what happened to him and what he is... in a journey into himself as perilous and even more horrifying than the nightmare trip through the interstellar void that he drove himself to take!

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Book 2

Douglas Adams

Facing annihilation at the hands of the warlike Vogons is a curious time to have a craving for tea. It could only happen to the cosmically displaced Arthur Dent and his curious comrades in arms as they hurtle across space powered by pure improbability--and desperately in search of a place to eat.

Among Arthur's motley shipmates are Ford Prefect, a longtime friend and expert contributor to the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; Zaphod Beeblebrox, the three-armed, two-headed ex-president of the galaxy; Tricia McMillan, a fellow Earth refugee who's gone native (her name is Trillian now); and Marvin, the moody android who suffers nothing and no one very gladly. Their destination? The ultimate hot spot for an evening of apocalyptic entertainment and fine dining, where the food (literally) speaks for itself.

Will they make it? The answer: hard to say. But bear in mind that the Hitchhiker's Guide deleted the term "Future Perfect" from its pages, since it was discovered not to be!

Dragon's Egg

Dragon's Egg: Book 1

Robert L. Forward

In a moving story of sacrifice and triumph, human scientists establish a relationship with intelligent lifeforms--the cheela--living on Dragon's Egg, a neutron star where one Earth hour is equivalent to hundreds of their years. The cheela culturally evolve from savagery to the discovery of science, and for a brief time, men are their diligent teachers . . .

Solaris

Stanislaw Lem

Who's testing whom? When Kris Kelvin arrives at the planet Solaris to study the ocean that covers its surface, he is forced to confront a painful, hitherto unconscious memory embodied in the living physical likeness of a long-dead lover. Others examining the planet, Kelvin learns, are plagued with their own repressed and newly corporeal memories. Scientists speculate that the Solaris ocean may be a massive brain that creates these incarnate memories, its purpose in doing so unknown.

The first of Lem's novels to be published in America and now considered a classic, SOLARIS raises a question: Can we truly understand the universe around us without first understanding what lies within?

Lem himself, who read English fluently, repeatedly voiced his disappointment about the Kilmartin-Cox translation of the French translation, and it has generally been considered second-rate. In 2011, the first direct Polish-to-English translation by Bill Johnston was released as an audiobook narrated by Alessandro Juliani, and then as an e-book.

Mindbridge

Joe Haldeman

In the space of a few years, Joe Haldeman has come to be recognized as one of the best writers of science fiction of our time. Mindbridge, a novel at once traditional in ist plot and a daring new departure in its structure, is certain to add to this reputation.

Jacque LeFavre live in the formidable world of the future. A pioneer in interstellar colonization, he is the co-discoverer of a creature that acts as a psychic link... allowing one person to sense directly the thoughts and emotions of another. But he learns the terrible price fo this power when his partner suddenly dies.

Older, disillusioned, he is one of a team that confronts the L'vrai, a race of angelic beauty but with a callous disregard for life. They are expanding through the universe and view humankind as a removable obstacle. LeFavre's assignment: establsih a telepathic link with a L'vrai leader and find an alternative to the interstellar war that threatens the extinction of one of the two races.

The Mote in God's Eye

The Moties: Book 1

Larry Niven
Jerry Pournelle

In the year 3016, the Second Empire of Man spans hundreds of star systems, thanks to the faster-than-light Alderson Drive. No other intelligent beings have ever been encountered, not until a light sail probe enters a human system carrying a dead alien. The probe is traced to the Mote, an isolated star in a thick dust cloud, and an expedition is dispatched.

In the Mote the humans find an ancient civilization--at least one million years old--that has always been bottled up in their cloistered solar system for lack of a star drive. The Moties are welcoming and kind, yet rather evasive about certain aspects of their society. It seems the Moties have a dark problem, one they've been unable to solve in over a million years.

Schild's Ladder

Greg Egan

The Age of Death ended countless millennia ago. No longer burdened by limited lifespans, the immortal humans who populate inhabited space now have the luxury to travel vast distances effortlessly and to tinker with the intricate mechanics of spacetime. But one such experiment in quantum physics has had a catastrophic and unanticipated result, creating an enormous, rapidly expanding vacuum -- a region of new physics -- with the frightening potential to devour countless inhabited solar systems.

Tchicaya abandoned his homeworld four thousand years ago to travel the universe, freely choosing, as have others of his bent, to endure the hardships of distance and loneliness for the sake of knowledge and experience. Aboard the Rindler, a starship trawling the border of the allconsuming novo-vacuum, he feels his endless life has new purpose. For the Rindler is the center for the scientific study the phenomenon -- a common ground for Preservationists and Yielders alike, those working to halt and destroy the encroaching worlds-eater ... and those determinedto investigate its marvels while allowing its growth to continue unchecked. Tchicaya has allied himself firmly with the latter camp.

The passing decades -- and inevitable expansion of the void -- widen the great rift between the two factions, intensifying what was once simply ideological differences into something more angry, explosive, and dangerous. And the arrival of Tchicaya's fiery first love, Mariama, and her immediate embracing of the Preservationist cause, intensifies an inner turmoil he has been struggling with since his distant childhood.

But everything onboard the Rindler -- and, ultimately, in the inhabited universe itself-is on the cusp of further cataclysmic change, as the Yielders' explorations threaten to transform discord into violent action and potential xenocide. For new evidence suggests that something unthinkable is developing at an astounding rate deep within the mysterious, 600-light-years-wide void -- something neither Tchicaya and his compatriots nor Mariama and hers could ever have imagined possible: life.

Fiasco

Stanislaw Lem

The planet Quinta is pocked by ugly mounds and covered by a spiderweb-like network. It is a kingdom of phantoms and of a beauty afflicted by madness. In stark contrast, the crew of the spaceship Hermes represents a knowledge-seeking Earth. As they approach Quinta, a dark poetry takes over and leads them into a nightmare of misunderstanding.

The Entropy Effect

Star Trek: The Original Series: Book 2

Vonda N. McIntyre

The universe has less than a century left... unless Spock can change history.

The Enterprise is summoned to transport a dangerous criminal from starbase prison to a rehabilitation center: brilliant physicist, Dr. Georges Mordreaux, accused of promising to send people back in time - then killing them instead. But when Mordreaux escapes, bursts onto the bridge and kills Captain Kirk, Spock must journey back in time to avert disaster - before it occurs.

Now there's more at stake than just Kirk's life. Mordreaux's experiments have thrown the entire universe into a deadly time warp. Spock is fighting time... and the universe is closing in on itself with the relentless squeeze of the Entropy Effect.

Pushing Ice

Alastair Reynolds

Some centuries from now, the exploration and exploitation of the Solar System is in full swing. On the cold edge of the system, Bella Lind, captain of the huge commercial spacecraft Rockhopper IV, helps fuel this new gold rush by attaching mass-driver motors to organic-rich water-ice comets to move them back to the inner worlds. Her crew are tough, blue-collar miners, engineers and demolition experts. Around Saturn, something inexplicable happens: one of the moons leaves its orbit and accelerates out of the Solar System. The icy mantle peels away to reveal that it was never a moon in the first place, just a parked spacecraft, millions of years old, that has now decided to move on. Rockhopper IV, trapped in the pull, is hurled across time and space into the deep, distant future, arriving in a vast, alien-constructed chamber. And the crew are not alone, for each chamber contains an alien culture dragged into this cosmic menagerie at the end of time. The crew of the Rockhopper IV know a lot about blowing up comets, but not much about first contact with ultra-advanced aliens.

They have two things to worry about: can they (and their new alien allies) negotiate their way through each harrying contact? And can they assimilate the avalanche of knowledge about their own future - including all the glittering, dangerous technologies that are now theirs for the taking - without destroying themselves in the process?

Jupiter

The Grand Tour: Book 8

Ben Bova

Grant Archer only wanted to study astrophysics. But the forces of the "New Morality," the coalition of censorious do-gooders who run 21st-century America, have other plans for him.

To his distress, Grant is torn from his young bride and sent to a research station in orbit around Jupiter, to spy on the scientists who work there. Their work may lead to the discovery of higher life forms in the Jovian system-with implications the New Morality doesn't like at all.

What Grant's would-be controllers don't know is that his loyalty to science may be greater than his desire for a quiet life. But that loyalty will be tested in a mission as dangerous as any ever undertaken-a mission to the middle reaches of Jupiter's endless atmosphere, a place where hydrogen flows as a liquid, and cyclones larger than planets rage for centuries at a time.

What lurks there is more than anyone has counted on...and stranger than anyone could possibly have imagined.

Deepsix

The Academy: Book 2

Beyond the Blue Event Horizon

A spellbinding epic adventure of discovery, catastrophe, and survival from one of the most masterful storytellers in speculative fiction.

In the year 2204, tragedy and terror forced a scientific team to prematurely evacuate Maleiva III. Twenty-one years later, the opportunity for scientists to study this galactic rarity -- a life-supporting planet -- is about to vanish forever, as a rogue gas giant has invaded the planetary system on a deadly collision course with the world they are now calling Deepsix.

A superluminal pilot for the Academy of Science and Technology, Priscilla "Hutch" Hutchins is the only even remotely qualified professional within lightyears of Deepsix. With less than three weeks left before the disaster, she and a small scientific team -- including Randall Nightingale, a survivor of the original expedition who was made the scapegoat for its failure -- must descend to the surface, and glean whatever they can about the doomed planet's lifeforms and lost civilizations.

There is more to this strange and complex world, however, than anyone could have imagined: hidden predators stone cities under the ice remnants of a warlike, primitive society, yet with inexplicable hints of an impossible technology buried in the rubble ... and in orbit around the soon to be demolished planet. The deeper Hutch and her team delve, the more puzzles are revealed within puzzles, and startling discoveries lead only to greater and more perplexing questions.

But then the unthinkable occurs. An earthquake destroys the explorers' only means of escape. As scientists and sightseers who have come to witness the spectacular end of Deepsix watch helplessly from miles above, Hutch and her people must survive somehow on a hostile planet going rapidly mad. And with the clock ticking relentlessly toward an unavoidable apocalypse, they must find some way, any way, to get off before Deepsix plunges like a pebble into the limitless depths of the rampaging gas giant.

From the acclaimed author of Infinity Beach comes the ultimate survival adventure -- a riveting, relentlessly suspenseful, awesomely possible tale with a firm foundation in hard science which showcases the best and the worst aspects of complex human nature. It is yet another stunning achievement by Jack McDevitt, proving without a doubt that he is indeed the true heir to Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke.

The Heechee Saga: Book 2

In Book Two of the Heechee Saga, Robinette Broadhead is on his way to making a fortune by bankrolling an expedition to the Food Factory--a Heechee spaceship that can graze the cometary cloud and transfor the basic elements of the universe into untold quantities of food. But even as he gambles on the breakthrough technology, he is wracked with the guilt of losing his wife, poised forever at the "event horizon" of a black hole where Robin had abaondoned her. As more and more information comes back from the expedition, Robin grows ever hopeful that he can rescue his beloved Gelle-Klara Moynlin. After three and a years, the factory is discovered to work, and a human is found aboard. Robin's suffering may be just about over....

Vacuum Diagrams

The Xeelee Sequence: Book 5

Stephen Baxter

While the human race struggles against alien oppressors, an even greater epic battle rages between the deadly dark-matter photino birds and their implacable enemy, the Xeelee...

Tides of Light

The Galactic Center Series: Book 4

Gregory Benford

The sequel to "Great Sky River", this book continues the author's chronicle of life at the galaxy's centre, many centuries in the future. A band of humans flee aboard a regenerated starship to another planet where the mechs are in retreat but an even greater threat of alien cyborgs exists.

A Meeting With Medusa

Nebula winning and Hugo nominated novella.

In leading an expedition through the many-layered Jovian atmosphere in the hydrogen balloon craft Kon-Tiki, Captain Howard Falcon discovers a world where bioluminescent air plankton produce brilliant atmospheric sea-fire, predatory manta-ray creatures dominate the skies, and enormous jellyfish-like beings grow to be over a mile across.

This story was originally published in the December 1971 issue of Playboy and has been reprinted many times. It is incuded in the collections The Wind from the Sun (1972), The Sentinel (1983) and The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke (2000). It is half of the Tor Double A Meeting with Medusa / Green Mars (1988). It can be found in numerous anthologies. Among them Nebula Award Stories Eight (1973), edited by Isaac Asimov, Best SF: 1971 (1972) edited by Harry Harrison and Brian W. Aldiss, The Best Science Fiction of the Year (1972) edited by Terry Carr, The Arbor House Treasury of Science Fiction Masterpieces (1983), edited by Robert Silverberg and Martin H. Greenberg and The SFWA Grand Masters, Volume 2 (2000), edited by Frederik Pohl.

2010: Odyssey Two

Space Odyssey: Book 2

Nine years after the disastrous Discovery mission to Jupiter in 2001, a joint U.S.-Soviet expedition sets out to rendezvous with the derelict spacecraft *to search the memory banks of the mutinous computer HAL 9000 for clues to what went wrong... and what became of Commander Dave Bowman.

Without warning, a Chinese expedition targets the same objective, turning the recovery mission into a frenzied race for the precious information Discovery may hold about the enigmatic monolith that orbits Jupiter.

Meanwhile, the being that was once Dave Bowman *the only human to unlock the mystery of the monolith *streaks toward Earth on a vital mission of its own...

Chindi

The Academy: Book 3

Something-or somebody-has left a series of satellites in orbit around various planets in the galaxy. Now a crew sets off to discover the origin of the satellites-and learn if mankind is no longer alone among the stars.

Mission of Gravity

Mesklin: Book 1

Hal Clement

For a profit -- and adventure -- Barlennan would sail thousands of miles across uncharted waters, into regions where gravity itself played strange tricks. He would dare the perils of strange tribes and stranger creatures -- even dicker with those strange aliens from beyond the skies, though the concept of another world was unknown to the inhabitants of the disk-shaped planet of Mesklin.

But in spite of the incredible technology of the strangers and without regard for their enormous size, Barlennan had the notion of turning the deal to an unsuspected advantage for himself . . . all in all a considerable enterprise for a being very much resembling a fifteen-inch caterpillar!

Children of God

Sparrow Series: Book 2

Mary Doria Russell

Mary Doria Russell's debut novel, The Sparrow, took us on a journey to a distant planet and into the center of the human soul. A critically acclaimed bestseller, The Sparrow was chosen as one of Entertainment Weekly's Ten Best Books of the Year, a finalist for the Book-of-the-Month Club's First Fiction Prize and the winner of the James M. Tiptree Memorial Award. Now, in Children of God, Russell further establishes herself as one of the most innovative, entertaining and philosophically provocative novelists writing today.

The only member of the original mission to the planet Rakhat to return to Earth, Father Emilio Sandoz has barely begun to recover from his ordeal when the Society of Jesus calls upon him for help in preparing for another mission to Alpha Centauri. Despite his objections and fear, he cannot escape his past or the future.

Old friends, new discoveries and difficult questions await Emilio as he struggles for inner peace and understanding in a moral universe whose boundaries now extend beyond the solar system and whose future lies with children born in a faraway place.

Strikingly original, richly plotted, replete with memorable characters and filled with humanity and humor, Children of God is an unforgettable and uplifting novel that is a potent successor to The Sparrow and a startlingly imaginative adventure for newcomers to Mary Doria Russell's special literary magic.

Orbitsville

Orbitsville: Book 1

Bob Shaw

Fleeing Elizabeth Lindstrom's anger at the death of her son, Vance Garamond, a flickerwing commander, leaves the solar system far behind. Pursued by Earth's space fleet, Garamond finds a vast, alien-built spherical structure which might just change the destiny of the human race.

Memoirs of a Spacewoman

Naomi Mitchison

Never make a date with a martian - the end result might surprise you.

The strangest of all worlds. Worlds where gigantic centipedes and grotesque parasites abound. Worlds where Martians transmit their messages by touch. Worlds where the first spacewoman breaks down the barriers and produces the first truly inter=planetary child.

Omega

The Academy: Book 4

The First Men in the Moon

A civilization-destroying omega cloud has switched direction, heading straight for a previously unexplored planetary system -- and its alien society. And suddenly, a handful of brave humans must try to save an entire world -- without revealing their existence.

Probability Moon

The Probability Trilogy: Book 1

Nancy Kress

Humanity has expanded out into other solar systems using the remnants of an ancient technology of star gates. But now an alien race has also discovered the gates. In this situation, a new planet is discovered inhabited by a human-like race, and a team of scientists is sent to contact and study them. It isnt long before the killer aliens arrive and the whole powerkeg explodes.

H. G. Wells

H. G. Wells' 1901 science fiction novel, "The First Men in the Moon", is the story of an impoverished businessman, Mr. Bedford, who retreats to the countryside for some rest from the weary of modern life and to try his hand at authoring a play. While there he meets an eccentric scientist, Dr. Cavor, who is developing a new material, 'cavorite', which is designed to shield off gravity. When it is discovered that the material works and can be practically fashioned into a spaceship, the two undertake a mission to the moon. There they discover that the moon is inhabited by a sinister alien civilization, whom the call "the Selenites".

Fashioned as a criticism against imperialism, "The First Men in the Moon" draws upon a theme common to Wells' work, that of the impact of technology on society and the challenges that humans face in the modern world.

Jem: The Making of a Utopia

The discovery of another habitable world might spell salvation to the three bitterly competing power blocs of the resource-starved 21st century; but when their representatives arrive on Jem, with its multiple intelligent species, they discover instead the perfect situation into which to export their rivalries. Subtitled, with savage irony, 'The Making of a Utopia', Jem is one of Frederik Pohl's most powerful novels.

Starplex

Robert J. Sawyer

Twenty years after the discovery of artificial wormholes launches Earth space exploration to unforeseeable heights, Starplex Director Keith Lansing investigates a mysterious vessel that soon threatens the station with intergalactic war.

Discovery is superseding understanding. And when an unknown vessel — with no windows, no seams, and no visible means of propulsion — arrives through a new wormhole, an already battle-scarred Starplex could be the starting point of a new interstellar war . . .

Infinity Beach

We are alone. That is the verdict, after centuries of Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence missions and space exploration. The only living things in the Universe are found on the Nine Worlds settled from Earth, and the starships that knit them together. Or so it's believed, until Dr. Kimberly Brandywine sets out to find what happened to her clone-sister Emily, who, after the final, unsuccessful manned SETI expedition, disappeared along with the rest of her ship's crew.

Following a few ominous clues, Kim discovers the ship's log was faked. Something happened out there in the darkness between the stars, and she's prepared to go to any length to find answers. Even if it means giving up her career...stealing a starship...losing her lover. Kim is about to discover the truth about her sister -- and about more than she ever dared imagine.

Galileo's Dream

Kim Stanley Robinson

In a novel of stunning dimensions, the acclaimed author of the MARS trilogy brings us the story of the incredible life -- and death -- of Galileo, the First Scientist. Late Renaissance Italy still abounds in alchemy and Aristotle, yet it trembles on the brink of the modern world. Galileo's new telescope encapsulates all the contradictions of this emerging reality.

Then one night a stranger presents a different kind of telescope for Galileo to peer through. Galileo is not sure if he is in a dream, an enchantment, a vision, or something else as yet undefined. The blasted wasteland he sees when he points the telescope at Jupiter, of harsh yellows and reds and blacks, looks just like hell as described by the Catholic church, and Galileo is a devout Catholic. But he's also a scientist, perhaps the very first in history. What he's looking at is the future, the world of Jovian humans three thousand years hence. He is looking at Jupiter from the vantage point of one of its moons whose inhabitants maintain that Galileo has to succeed in his own world for their history to come to pass.

Their ability to reach back into the past and call Galileo "into resonance" with the later time is an action that will have implications for both periods, and those in between, like our own. By day Galileo's life unfurls in early seventeenth century Italy, leading inexorably to his trial for heresy. By night Galileo struggles to be a kind of sage, or an arbiter in a conflict ...but understanding what that conflict might be is no easy matter, and resolving his double life is even harder. This sumptuous, gloriously thought-provoking and suspenseful novel recalls Robinson's magnificent Mars books as well as bringing to us Galileo as we have always wanted to know him, in full.

Heechee Rendezvous

The Heechee Saga: Book 3

Time Is the Simplest Thing

After millennia had passed, Mankind discovered the Heechee legacy (an alien culture that fled to the reative safety of a black hole) -- in particular an asteroid stocked with autonavigating spacecraft. Robinette Broadhead, who had led the expedition that unlocked the many secrets of Heechee technology, is now forced once more to make a perilous voyage into space -- where the Heechee are waiting. And this time the future of Man is at stake....

Clifford D. Simak

A telepath inadvertently acquires a powerful alien consciousness and must run for his life to escape corporate assassins and hate-filled mobs in this enthralling science fiction masterwork

Space travel has been abandoned in the twenty-second century. It is deemed too dangerous, expensive, and inconvenient--and now the all-powerful Fishhook company holds the monopoly on interstellar exploration for commercial gain. Their secret is the use of "parries," human beings with the remarkable telepathic ability to expand their minds throughout the universe. On what should have been a routine assignment, however, loyal Fishhook employee Shepherd Blaine is inadvertently implanted with a copy of an alien consciousness, becoming something more than human. Now he's a company pariah, forced to flee the safe confines of the Fishhook complex. But the world he escapes into is not a safe sanctuary; Its people have been taught to hate and fear his parapsychological gift--and there is nowhere on Earth, or elsewhere, for Shepherd Blaine to hide.

A Hugo Award nominee, Time Is the Simplest Thing showcases the enormous talents of one of the true greats of twentieth-century science fiction. This richly imagined tale of prejudice, corporate greed, oppression, and, ultimately, transcendence stands tall among Simak's most enduring works.

Out of the Silent Planet

The Cosmic Trilogy: Book 1

C. S. Lewis

The first book in C. S. Lewis's acclaimed Space Trilogy, which continues with Perelandra and That Hideous Strength, Out of the Silent Planet begins the adventures of the remarkable Dr. Ransom. Here, that estimable man is abducted by a megalomaniacal physicist and his accomplice and taken via spaceship to the red planet of Malacandra. The two men are in need of a human sacrifice, and Dr. Ransom would seem to fit the bill.

Once on the planet, however, Ransom eludes his captors, risking his life and his chances of returning to Earth, becoming a stranger in a land that is enchanting in its difference from Earth and instructive in its similarity.

First published in 1938, Out of the Silent Planet remains a mysterious and suspenseful tour de force.

Eden

Stanislaw Lem

A six-man crew crash-lands on Eden, fourth planet from another sun. The men find a strange world that grows ever stranger, and everywhere there are images of death. The crew's attempt to communicate with this civilization leads to violence and to a cruel truth-cruel precisely because it is so human.

Titan

NASA Trilogy: Book 2

Stephen Baxter

Paula Benacerraf is appointed to oversee the dismantling of the Shuttle fleet after another disaster. Instead, she listens to the scientist, Rosenberg, who wants to explore the life Cassini discovers on Titan. Humans are hurled to the edge of the Solar System. To the edge, also, of sanity.

Alien

Aliens Universe: Alien Quartet: Book 1

Alan Dean Foster

A crew of spaceship Nostromo is suddenly woken up from a cryogenic sleep because of mysterious signals coming from an unknown planet and received by a ship computer. The astronauts land on the planet surface and go to investigate an alien spaceship where one of them is attacked by an alien which fasten itself on his face. When the crew returns to their ship and abandon the planet, nobody forefeels that the real horror will begin very soon...

Across the Sea of Suns

The Galactic Center Series: Book 2

Gregory Benford

Lancer, a spaceship built to specifications found in the computers of an alien derelict, journeys to the star, Ra, from which the Earth has received mysterious radio transmissions in English.

Demon

The Gaean Trilogy: Book 3

John Varley

The satellite-sized alien Gaea has gone completely insane. She has transformed her love of old movies into monstrous realities. She is Marilyn Monroe. She is King Kong. And now she must be destroyed.

Four Hundred Billion Stars

Four Hundred Billion Stars: Book 1

Paul J. McAuley

Dorothy Yoshida, an astronomer and telepath, joins the archaelogical team exploring the mysterious ruins of a nearly dead planet that shows some signs of returning to life.

The Dark Light Years

Masters of Science Fiction: Book 20

Brian W. Aldiss

What would intelligent life-forms on another planet look like? Would they walk upright? Would they wear clothes? Or would they be hulking creatures on six legs that wallow in their own excrement?

Upon first contact with the Utod -- intelligent, pacifist beings who feel no pain -- mankind instantly views these aliens as animals because of their unhygienic customs. This leads to the slaughter, capture and dissection of the Utod. But when one explorer recognizes the intelligence behind their habits, he must reevaluate what it actually means to be "intelligent."

With a New Introduction from the Author!

Legacy

The Way Series: Book 3

Greg Bear

The Way is a tunnel through space and time. The entrance is through the hollow asteroid Thistledown and the space station Axis City that sits at the asteroid's center. From there the Flawships ride the center of the Way, traveling to other worlds and times.

Now the rulers of Axis City have discovered that a huge group of colonists has secretly entered one of the interdicted worlds along the Way. In some ways Lamarkia is very Earth-like--but its biology is extraordinary. A single genetic entity can take many forms, and span a continent. There are only a few of these "ecos" on Lamarkia, and the effect of human interaction on them is unknown.

Olmy Ap Sennon has been sent to secretly assess the extent of the damage. But he will find far more than an intriguing alien biology--for on their new world the secret colonists have returned to the old ways of human history: war, famine, and ecological disaster. On this mission, Olmy will learn about the basics: love, responsibility, and even failure...

Tor Double #9: The Ugly Little Boy / The [Widget], The [Wadget], and Boff

Tor Double: Book 9

Isaac Asimov
Theodore Sturgeon

The Ugly Little Boy:

A small Neanderthal boy is brought into the future for scientific experimentation. The nurse who takes care of him, starts to see him as something other than a experimental subject.

The [Widget], the [Wadget], and Boff:

Only Robin could really see the Aliens...

Rama II

Rama Series: Book 2

Gentry Lee
Arthur C. Clarke

Years ago, the enormous, enigmatic alien spacecraft called Rama sailed through our solar system as mind-boggling proof that life existed -- or had existed -- elsewhere in the universe. Now, at the dawn of the twenty-third century, another ship is discovered hurtling toward us. A crew of Earth's best and brightest minds is assembled to rendezvous with the massive vessel. They are armed with everything we know about Raman technology and culture. But nothing can prepare them for what they are about to encounter on board Rama II: cosmic secrets that are startling, sensational -- and perhaps even deadly.

In the Ocean of Night

The Galactic Center Series: Book 1

Gregory Benford

Set in a world of lunar colonies, cybernetic miracles, fanatic cults, deadly pollution and famine, the first story in the Galactic Center Series. This world of social decay is facing hardship, but not far beyond the shores of space comes a mystery, which one man, astronaut Nigel Walmsley is about to touch.

Perelandra

The Cosmic Trilogy: Book 2

C. S. Lewis

The second book in C. S. Lewis's acclaimed Space Trilogy, which also includes Out of the Silent Planet and That Hideous Strength, Perelandra continues the adventures of the extraordinary Dr. Ransom.

Pitted against the most destructive of human weaknesses, temptation, the great man must battle evil on a new planet -- Perelandra -- when it is invaded by a dark force.

Will Perelandra succumb to this malevolent being, who strives to create a new world order and who must destroy an old and beautiful civilization to do so? Or will it throw off the yoke of corruption and achieve a spiritual perfection as yet unknown to man?

The outcome of Dr. Ransom's mighty struggle alone will determine the fate of this peace-loving planet.

Juniper Time

Kate Wilhelm

Kate Wilhelm is at the top of her form in Juniper Time, her first science fiction novel since she won the Hugo Award for Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang.

Juniper Time is a panoramic and hauntingly beautiful novel of the survival of hunamkind and nature. Drought has devastated the western United States and the people migrate eastward to settle in squalid concentration camps called "Newtowns." One woman, Jean Brighton, flees in the opposite direction. A linguist who can decode secret messages and make sense of alien languages, Jean has found governmental pressure on her university work untenable, and she heads for the only place she knows she will be safe - her grandfather's new-deserted house in the Pacific Northwest.

Yet her survival does not come from her own devices alone, for she receives the help of Indians who have stayed to reclaim the land that was once theirs. Through them and the mysteries of their world, Jean masters the art of survival, not only in the desolate Northwest but also in the white man's world she must return to someday.

Rich in feeling and insight, Juniper Time ranks among Kate Wilhelm's most compelling novels.

2061: Odyssey Three

Space Odyssey: Book 3

Star Trek: The New Voyages

Fifty years after meeting the spirit of Dave Bowman aboard the abandoned Discovery and witnessing the fiery transformation of Jupiter into Earths second sun, 103-year-old Dr. Heywood Floyd boards the luxury spaceship Universe for the historic first landing on the surface of Halley's Comet.

At the same time, the Galaxy expedition sets out to probe the evolutionary upheaval on Jupiter's former moon Europa haunted by the fate of a doomed Chinese mission and by the ominous message from space: "All these worlds are yours *except Europa. Attempt no landings there. "

As the stranded Galaxy awaits rescue on the dangerous and forbidden surface of Europa and Universe races to her aid, the omniscient force that is Dave Bowman watches *and waits to reveal the extraordinary secrets of the monoliths, of the masters he now serves, and of mankind's ultimate role in the course of cosmic history . . .

The Stars are Ours!

Pax / Astra: Book 1

Andre Norton

The Stars are Ours! describes the first interstellar voyage, undertaken to escape the tyranny that rules the Earth.

Space Opera

Catherynne M. Valente

A century ago, the Sentience Wars tore the galaxy apart and nearly ended the entire concept of intelligent space-faring life. In the aftermath, a curious tradition was invented -- something to cheer up everyone who was left and bring the shattered worlds together in the spirit of peace, unity, and understanding.

Once every cycle, the civilizations gather for Galactivision -- part gladiatorial contest, part beauty pageant, part concert extravaganza, and part continuation of the wars of the past. Instead of competing in orbital combat, the powerful species that survived face off in a competition of song, dance, or whatever can be physically performed in an intergalactic talent show. The stakes are high for this new game, and everyone is forced to compete.

This year, though, humankind has discovered the enormous universe. And while they expected to discover a grand drama of diplomacy, gunships, wormholes, and stoic councils of aliens, they have instead found glitter, lipstick and electric guitars. Mankind will not get to fight for its destiny -- they must sing.

A one-hit-wonder band of human musicians, dancers and roadies from London - Decibel Jones and the Absolute Zeroes -- have been chosen to represent Earth on the greatest stage in the galaxy. And the fate of their species lies in their ability to rock.

Nemesis

Isaac Asimov

In the twenty-third century pioneers have escaped the crowded earth for life in self-sustaining orbital colonies. One of the colonies, Rotor, has broken away from the solar system to create its own renegade utopia around an unknown red star two light-years from Earth: a star named Nemesis. Now a fifteen-year-old Rotorian girl has learned of the dire threat that nemesis poses to Earth's people--but she is prevented from warning them. Soon she will realize that Nemesis endangers Rotor as well. And so it will be up to her alone to save both Earth and Rotor as--drawn inexorably by Nemesis, the death star--they hurtle toward certain disaster.

Bantam Star Trek Original Novels: The New Voyages: Book 1

Sondra Marshak
Myrna Culbreath

Star Trek: The New Voyages was an anthology of novellas released by Bantam Books, edited by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath. It included a foreword by Gene Roddenberry and introductions to the stories by members of the original series cast.

Although published professionally under copyright, the stories contained in the anthology were all written by fans. The Acknowledgments also contained an address for manuscripts and feedback to be sent, with the intention of further volumes being produced.

Table of Contents:

Foreword (Star Trek: The New Voyages) - (1976) - essay by Gene Roddenberry
Introduction: The Once and Future Voyages - (1976) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Introduction to Ni Var - (1976) - essay by Leonard Nimoy
Ni Var - (1976) - shortfiction by Claire Gabriel
Introduction to Intersection Point - (1976) - essay by James Doohan
Intersection Point - (1976) - shortfiction by Juanita Coulson
Introduction to The Enchanted Pool - (1976) - essay by Nichelle Nichols
The Enchanted Pool - (1976) - shortfiction by Marcia Ericson
Introduction to Visit to a Weird Planet Revisited - (1976) - essay by Majel Barrett Roddenberry
Visit to a Weird Planet Revisited - (1976) - shortfiction by Ruth Berman
Introduction to The Face on the Barroom Floor - (1976) - essay by George Takei
The Face on the Barroom Floor - (1976) - shortfiction by Eleanor Arnason and Ruth Berman
Introduction to The Hunting - (1976) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
The Hunting - (1976) - shortfiction by Doris Beetem
Introduction to The Winged Dreamers - (1976) - essay by DeForest Kelley
The Winged Dreamers - (1976) - shortfiction by Jennifer Guttridge
Introduction to Mind-Sifter - (1976) - essay by William Shatner
Mind-Sifter - (1976) - shortfiction by Shirley S. Maiewski
Sonnet from the Vulcan: Omicron Ceti Three - (1976) - poem by Shirley Meech

The Deepest Rift

Ruthanna Emrys

In the deepest canyon in the inhabited worlds, giant mantas soar through the air and leave patterned structures behind. A team of sapiologists seek to prove that these delicate filaments are true language, not just bee's dance. But time has run out, and their reckoning is upon them. Will they prove that their research is valid, or will they be scattered to the corners of the galaxy?

Read the full story for free at Tor.com.

The Lovers

The Sturch: Book 1

Philip José Farmer

A linguist, studying languages on a previously unknown alien planet, begins to suspect that humans may have visited the planet at some time in the past.

Starfarers

Poul Anderson

When evidence of an advanced civilization is discovered by SETI astronomers, an expedition into the far reaches of the galaxy is planned and an eclectic team of scientists is chosen to make the trip. But because the origin of the alien signals is thousands of light-years away, the crew will age only a few years while millennia pass on Earth. And though they are ready to face the ramifications of such a voyage, none of the starfarers are prepared for what awaits them at the outer edge of the cosmos--or back at the planet they once called home.

The Time Traders

Time Traders: Book 1

Andre Norton

If it is possible to conquer space, then perhaps it is also possible to conquer time. At least that was the theory American scientists were exploring in an effort to explain the new sources of knowledge the Russians possessed. Perhaps Russian scientists had discovered how to transport themselves back in time in order to learn long-forgotten secrets of the past.

That was why young Ross Murdock, above average in intelligence but a belligerently independent nonconformist, found himself on a "hush-hush" government project at a secret base in the Arctic. The very qualities that made him a menace in civilized society were valuable traits in a man who must successfully act the part of a merchant trader of the Beaker people during the Bronze Age.

For once they were transferred by time machine to the remote Baltic region where the Russian post was located, Ross and his partner Ashe were swept into a fantastic action-filled adventure involving Russians, superstitious prehistoric men, and the aliens of a lost galactic civilization that demanded every ounce of courage the Americans possessed.

Close to Critical

Mesklin: Book 2

Hal Clement

The Tenebrans are intelligent, but primitive by human standards. Yet scientists from Earth have found ways to train and educate some of the Tenebrans. This training becomes crucial when two beings—a young girl from Earth and the son of an alien diplomat—are marooned in a bathyscape that is headed toward the surface of the planet, where neither can hope to survive.

Star Trek: The New Voyages 2

Bantam Star Trek Original Novels: The New Voyages: Book 2

Sondra Marshak
Myrna Culbreath

The men and women of the Starship Enterprise return in this dazzling volume of ten electrifying adventures set in deep space. Featuring the unforgettable characters created by Gene Roddenberry, each one of these extraordinary tales captures the beauty and courage of the fearless quest into uncharted realms - where others venture only in their boldest dreams.

Based on the blockbuster films and the legendary television show, these ten original Star Trek stories boldly go where no one has gone before.

Table of Contents:

Editors' Preface: The Once and Future Voyages 2 - The Camelot Connection - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Introduction (Star Trek: The New Voyages 2) - (1978) - essay by Jesco von Puttkamer
Editors' Introduction to "Surprise!" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Surprise! - (1978) - novelette by Nichelle Nichols and Myrna Culbreath and Sondra Marshak
Editors' Introduction to "Snake Pit!" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Snake Pit! - (1978) - shortstory by Connie Faddis
Editors' Introduction to "The Patient Parasites" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
The Patient Parasites - (1978) - novelette by Russell Bates
Editors' Introduction to "In the Maze" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
In the Maze - (1978) - novelette by Jennifer Guttridge
Editors' Introduction to "Cave-in" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Cave-in - (1978) - poem by Jane Peyton
Editors' Introduction to "Marginal Existence" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Marginal Existence - (1978) - shortstory by Connie Faddis
Editors' Introduction to "The Procrustean Petard" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
The Procrustean Petard - (1978) - novelette by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Editors' Introduction to "The Sleeping God" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
The Sleeping God - (1978) - novelette by Jesco von Puttkamer
Editors' Introduction to "Elegy for Charlie" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Elegy for Charlie - (1978) - poem by Antonia Vallario
Editors' Introduction to "Soliloquy" - (1978) - essay by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath
Postscript: "Gentlepersons" - The Vulcan Connection - (1978) - essay by Marguerite B. Thompson
Soliloquy - (1978) - poem by Marguerite B. Thompson
Epilogue (Star Trek: The New Voyages 2) - (1978) - essay by Nichelle Nichols

Fluency

Confluence: Book 1

Jennifer Foehner Wells

NASA discovered the alien ship lurking in the asteroid belt in the 1960s. They kept the Target under intense surveillance for decades, letting the public believe they were exploring the solar system, while they worked feverishly to refine the technology needed to reach it.

The ship itself remained silent, drifting.

Dr. Jane Holloway is content documenting nearly-extinct languages and had never contemplated becoming an astronaut. But when NASA recruits her to join a team of military scientists for an expedition to the Target, it's an adventure she can't refuse.

The ship isn't vacant, as they presumed.

A disembodied voice rumbles inside Jane's head, "You are home."

Jane fights the growing doubts of her colleagues as she attempts to decipher what the alien wants from her. As the derelict ship devolves into chaos and the crew gets cut off from their escape route, Jane must decide if she can trust the alien's help to survive.

The Wanderers

Meg Howrey

In an age of space exploration, we search to find ourselves.

In four years, aerospace giant Prime Space will put the first humans on Mars. Helen Kane, Yoshihiro Tanaka, and Sergei Kuznetsov must prove they're the crew for the historic voyage by spending seventeen months in the most realistic simulation ever created. Constantly observed by Prime Space's team of "Obbers," Helen, Yoshi, and Sergei must appear ever in control. But as their surreal pantomime progresses, each soon realizes that the complications of inner space are no less fraught than those of outer space. The borders between what is real and unreal begin to blur, and each astronaut is forced to confront demons past and present, even as they struggle to navigate their increasingly claustrophobic quarters--and each other.

Astonishingly imaginative, tenderly comedic, and unerringly wise, The Wanderers explores the differences between those who go and those who stay, telling a story about the desire behind all exploration: the longing for discovery and the great search to understand the human heart.

Shakespeare's Planet

Clifford D. Simak

After a thousand years in space, the earth vessel lands on a remote planet capable of supporting human life. Inside the explorer ship an almost inaudible hum fills the silence; computer lights blink softly, signaling the awakening of the cryogenically preserved crew.

But only one crew member awakens from his artificial sleep. A systems malfunction has killed the others. Carter Horton is alone.

Horton learns almost immediately that the planet is inhabited by a bizarre creature who calls himself Carnivore. And the creature addresses him in English, the language he had learned from an earlier traveler who called himself Shakespeare. Now, Shakespeare is dead, and Horton soon learns that he and Carnivore, too, face certain peril unless they can get away from this strange planet.

Leaving is no simple affair. Carnivore, and before him, Shakespeare, had come to the planet via an inner-space tunnel, one of many such tunnels that exist throughout the galaxy. But this tunnel has broken down and works only one way--the wrong way--and there is no exit. And Horton's explorer ship is a thousand years obsolete--incapable of returning them to civilization.

The creature called Carnivore and the earthman, Horton, are marooned on a planet of mysterious ruins bespeaking a catastrophic end to a once-grand civilization. The portentous signs they begin to encounter intimate some dire, ominous happening will soon befall them--unless they can repair the inner-space tunnel and leave Shakespeare's Planet.

The Gateway Trip

The Heechee Saga: Book 5