In Other Worlds...: What We've Read So Far
Previous Book Club Reads....
All Systems Red by ISBN: 9780765397539Publication Date: 2017-05-02
Hugo Award Winner for Best Novella (2018), Nebula Award Winner for Best Novella (2017), Locus Award Winner for Best Novella (2018), Philip K. Dick Award finalist (2018), Prometheus Award Nominee for Best Novel (2019) ALA Alex Award (2018), Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Best Science Fiction (2017)
In a corporate-dominated spacefaring future, planetary missions must be approved and supplied by the Company. Exploratory teams are accompanied by Company-supplied security androids, for their own safety.
But in a society where contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder, safety isn’t a primary concern.
On a distant planet, a team of scientists are conducting surface tests, shadowed by their Company-supplied ‘droid -- a self-aware SecUnit that has hacked its own governor module, and refers to itself (though never out loud) as “Murderbot.” Scornful of humans, all it really wants is to binge-watch video serials and be left alone long enough to figure out who it is.
But when a neighboring mission goes dark, it's up to the scientists and their Murderbot to get to the truth.
We Sold Our Souls by ISBN: 9781683690122Publication Date: 2018-09-18
Locus Award Nominee for Best Horror Novel (2019), Shirley Jackson Award Nominee for Best Novel (2018), Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Best Horror (2018)
In this hard-rocking, spine-tingling, supernatural thriller, the washed-up guitarist of a '90s heavy metal band embarks on an epic road-trip across America and deep into the web of a sinister conspiracy.
Every morning, Kris Pulaski wakes up in hell. In the 1990s, she was lead guitarist of Dürt Würk, a heavy-metal band on the brink of breakout success until lead singer Terry Hunt embarked on a solo career and rocketed to stardom as Koffin, leaving his fellow bandmates to rot in obscurity in rural Pennsylvania.
Two decades later, Kris works as the night manager of a Best Western; she's tired, broke, and unhappy. Then one day everything changes--a shocking act of violence turns her life upside down, and she begins to suspect that Terry sold out more than just the band's musical careers.
Kris hits the road, hoping to reunite Dürt Würk and confront the man who ruined her life. It's a journey that will take her from the Pennsylvania rust belt to a Satanic rehab center and finally to a Las Vegas music festival that's darker than any Mordor Tolkien could imagine.
A furious power ballad about never giving up, even in the face of overwhelming odds, We Sold Our Souls is an epic journey into the heart of a conspiracy-crazed, pill-popping, paranoid country that seems to have lost its very soul... where only a girl with a guitar can save us all.
Ball Lightning by ISBN: 9780765394088Publication Date: 2018-08-14
Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Best Science Fiction (2018)
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Three-Body Problem, Cixin Liu's Ball Lightning is the story of what happens when the beauty of scientific inquiry runs up against the drive to harness new discoveries with no consideration of their possible consequences.....
When Chen’s parents are incinerated before his eyes by a blast of ball lightning, he devotes his life to cracking the secret of mysterious natural phenomenon. His search takes him to stormy mountaintops, an experimental military weapons lab, and an old Soviet science station. The more he learns, the more he comes to realize that ball lightning is just the tip of an entirely new frontier in particle physics. Although Chen’s quest provides a purpose for his lonely life, it also pits him against soldiers and scientists with motives of their own: a beautiful army major with an obsession with dangerous weaponry, and a physicist who has no place for ethical considerations in his single-minded pursuit of knowledge.
"Wildly imaginative."--Barack Obama on The Three-Body Problem trilogy
The Belles by ISBN: 9781484728499Publication Date: 2018-02-06
Hugo Award Nominee for Best Young Adult Book (Lodestar Award) (2019), Locus Award Nominee for Best Young Adult Book (2019), Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Young Adult Fantasy & Science Fiction (2018)
Welcome to the dark decadence of Dhonielle Clayton's sharp tale of beauty, obsession and magic. . .
I am a Belle. I control Beauty.
Camellia Beauregard is a Belle. In the opulent world of Orléans, the Belles are revered, for Beauty is a commodity coveted above all else and only the Belles can provide it. The people of Orléans are born grey and damned, and only with the help of a Belle's powers can they transform and be made beautiful.
But it's not enough for Camellia to be just a Belle. She wants to be the favorite—the one chosen by the Queen to live in the royal palace, tend to the royal family and their court, and be recognized as the most talented Belle in the land.
Once Camellia and her Belle sisters arrive at court, it becomes clear that being the favorite is not everything she always dreamed it would be. Behind the gilded palace walls live dark secrets, and Camellia soon learns that very essence of her existence is a lie. Her powers may be far greater—and far darker—than she ever imagined.
When the Queen asks Camellia to help the ailing princess by using Belle powers in unintended ways, Camellia faces an impossible decision. With the future of Orléans and its people at stake, Camellia must decide: should she protect herself, her sisters, and the way of the Belles, or should she risk her own life, save the princess, and change her world forever?
Dhonielle Clayton creates a rich, detailed, decadent world of excess and privilege, where beauty is not only skin-deep, but a complete mirage. Weaving deeper questions about the commodification of women's bodies, gender equality, racial identity, and vanity with high-stakes action and incredible imagery, The Belles is the must-read epic of the season.
Children of Blood and Bone by ISBN: 9781250170972Publication Date: 2018-03-06
Hugo Award Winner for Best Young Adult Book (Lodestar Award) (2019), Nebula Award Winner for Outstanding Young Adult Science Fiction or Fantasy book (Andre Norton Award) (2019), Goodreads Choice Award Winner for Debut Author and Nominee for Young Adult Fantasy & Science Fiction (2018), Audie Award for Audiobook of the Year (2019), Locus Award Nominee for Best First Novel, Kitschie Nominee for Golden Tentacle Award (Debut Novel) (2019),Kirkus Prize Finalist for Young Readers' Literature (2018), YALSA William C. Morris YA Debut Award Nominee (ALA) (2019), Nommo (Ilube) Award Nominee for Best Novel (African Speculative Fiction Society) (2019), Tonight Show Summer Read (2018), New York Times Notable Children's Books (2018), TIME Top 10 Best YA and Children's Books (2018), NPR's Book Concierge Great Reads List (2018), Buzzfeed's 24 Best YA Books (2018), School Library Journal Best Books (2018) Publishers Weekly Best YA Books (2018)
Tomi Adeyemi conjures a stunning world of dark magic and danger in her West African-inspired fantasy debut Children of Blood and Bone.
They killed my mother.
They took our magic.
They tried to bury us.
Now we rise.
Zélie Adebola remembers when the soil of Orïsha hummed with magic, and different clans ruled. Burners ignited flames, Tiders beckoned waves, and Zélie's Reaper mother summoned forth souls.
But everything changed the night magic disappeared. Under the orders of a ruthless king, maji were killed, leaving Zélie without a mother and her people without hope.
Now Zélie has one chance to bring magic back to her people and strike against the monarchy. With the help of a rogue princess, Zélie must learn how to harness her powers while she outwits and outruns the crown prince, who is hell-bent on eradicating magic for good.
Danger lurks in Orïsha, where snow leoponaires prowl and vengeful spirits wait in the waters. Yet the greatest danger may be Zélie herself as she struggles to come to terms with the strength of her magic—and her growing feelings for an enemy.
Book One in the brand-new "Legacy of Orïsha" series.
Dread Nation by ISBN: 9780062570604Publication Date: 2018-04-03
Hugo Award Nominee for Best Young Adult Book (Lodestar Award) (2019), Nebula Award Nominee for Outstanding Young Adult Science Fiction or Fantasy book (Andre Norton Award) (2019), Bram Stoker Award Nominee for Best Young Adult Novel (2019), Locus Award Nominee for Best Young Adult Book (2019), Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Young Adult Fantasy & Science Fiction (2018)
At once provocative, terrifying, and darkly subversive, Dread Nation is Justina Ireland's stunning vision of an America both foreign and familiar—a country on the brink, at the explosive crossroads where race, humanity, and survival meet.
Jane McKeene was born two days before the dead began to walk the battlefields of Gettysburg and Chancellorsville—derailing the War Between the States and changing America forever.
In this new nation, safety for all depends on the work of a few, and laws like the Native and Negro Education Act require certain children attend combat schools to learn to put down the dead. But there are also opportunities—Jane is studying to become an Attendant, trained in both weaponry and etiquette to protect the well-to-do. It's a chance at a better life for Negro girls like Jane. After all, not even being the daughter of a wealthy white Southern woman could save her from society’s expectations.
But it’s not a life Jane wants. Almost finished with her education at Miss Preston's School of Combat in Baltimore, Jane is set on returning to her Kentucky home and doesn’t pay much mind to the politics of the eastern cities, with their talk of returning America to the glory of its days before the dead rose.
But when families around Baltimore County begin to go missing, Jane is caught in the middle of a conspiracy and sent far from home. She finds herself in a desperate fight for her life against some powerful enemies, a fight that will require all her resourcefulness, wit and strength of character to survive.
The restless dead, it would seem, are the least of her problems.
A powerful, compelling tale of a young girl's journey through a hostile world, Jane McKeene is an unforgettable protagonist, and Dread Nation is an unforgettable book.
Have Space Suit -- Will Travel by ISBN: 9781416505495Publication Date: 1958-09-01
Science Fiction Hall of Fame Posthumous Inductee (1998), SFWA Grand Master Award (1975), Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel (1959), British SF Association Award for Best Novel of 1958 nominee (2008),#58 on Locus Online's Best All-Time SF Novels before 1990 (1998), British Science Fiction Association Award Nominee for Best Novel of 1958 (2007)
A journey of 167,000 lights years begins with—a bar of soap?
Fasten your zero gravity restraints for Robert Heinlein’s novel of intergalactic adventure, a story that carries teenager Clifford “Kip” Russell from his job as soda jerk to winner of an authentic (stripped-down) spacesuit in a soap contest to alien abductee! Along the way Kip is joined by a pint-sized genius named PeeWee and an empathetic alien creature known as “the Mother Thing.” The story of how this strange trio battles alien gangsters only to end up on trial in an intergalactic court trillions of miles from Earth features all the wicked humor, brilliant detail, and G-force drama that made Robert Heinlein one of the world’s favorite science fiction writers.
First published in 1958 as one of Heinlein’s “boy’s books”, Have Spacesuit, Will Travel soon found an adult audience as well, and has become one of the most beloved of all his novels.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by ISBN: 9781400052929Publication Date: 1979-10-12
Science Fiction Hall of Fame Inductee (2017), Ditmar Award Winner, Best International Fiction (1980), #6 on Locus Online's Top SF Novels of the 20th Century (2012), Nominated as one of America's best-loved novels by PBS's The Great American Read
How shall we begin? This is the story of a book called The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy--not an Earth book, never published on Earth and, until the terrible catastrophe occurred, never seen or even heard of by any Earthman. Nevertheless, a wholly remarkable book.
Or...
This is the story of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a number-one best seller in England, a weekly radio series with millions of fanatic listeners, and now a television and cinematic spectacle on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.
Or...
This is the story of Arthur Dent, who, seconds before the Earth is demolished to make way for a galactic freeway, Arthur Dent is plucked off the planet by his friend Ford Prefect, a researcher for the revised edition of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and who, for the last fifteen years, has been posing as an out-of-work actor.
Together this dynamic pair begin a journey through space aided by quotes from The Hitchhiker's Guide ("A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have") and a galaxy-full of fellow travelers: Zaphod Beeblebrox—the two-headed, three-armed ex-hippie and totally out-to-lunch president of the galaxy; Trillian, Zaphod's girlfriend (formally Tricia McMillan), whom Arthur tried to pick up at a cocktail party once upon a time zone; Marvin, a paranoid, brilliant, and chronically depressed robot; and Veet Voojagig, a former graduate student who is obsessed with the disappearance of all the ballpoint pens he bought over the years, to find the answers to these burning questions: Why are we born? Why do we die? And why do we spend so much time in between wearing digital watches?
Read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. But remember . . . don't panic, and always know where your towel is.
The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by ISBN: 9780062444134Publication Date: 2016-07-29
Prix Julia Verlanger Winner (2017), Arthur C. Clarke Award Nominee (2016), British Fantasy Awards Best Newcomer Nominee (2016), Kitschies Nominee for Golden Tentacle (Debut) (2014) Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction Longlist Nominee (2016), Tiptree Award Longlist Nominee (2015), Library Journal's Best SFF of 2016, Tor.com's Best Books of 2015 (Reader's Choice)
When Rosemary Harper joins the crew of the Wayfarer, she isn't expecting much. The Wayfarer, a patched-up ship that's seen better days, offers her everything she could possibly want: a small, quiet spot to call home for a while, adventure in far-off corners of the galaxy, and distance from her troubled past.
But Rosemary gets more than she bargained for with the Wayfarer. The crew is a mishmash of species and personalities, from Sissix, the friendly reptilian pilot, to Kizzy and Jenks, the constantly sparring engineers who keep the ship running, to Ohan, the enigmatic and reclusive Navigator. Life on board is chaotic, but more or less peaceful -- exactly what Rosemary wants.
That is, until the crew is offered the job of a lifetime: the chance to build a hyperspace tunnel to a distant planet. They'll earn enough money to live comfortably for years...if they survive the long trip through war-torn interstellar space without endangering any of the fragile alliances that keep the galaxy peaceful.
But Rosemary isn't the only person on board with secrets to hide, and the crew will soon discover that space may be vast, but spaceships are very small indeed. To survive, Rosemary’s got to learn how to rely on this assortment of oddballs— an experience that teaches her about love, trust, and family, and how the journey can be a lot more important than the destination.
Station Eleven by ISBN: 9780385353304Publication Date: 2014-09-09
Arthur C. Clarke Award winner for Best Novel (2015); Toronto Book Award winner (2015); NAIBA Book of the Year Award winner for Fiction (2015); August Derleth Award nominee for Best Horror (2015); John W. Campbell Award finalist for Best New Writer (2015); National Book Award finalist for Fiction (2014); PEN/Faulkner Award finalist for Fiction (2015); Sunburst Award (Canadian Literature of the Fantastic) nominee for Best Adult Novel (2015); Andrew Carnegie Medal longlist nominee for Excellence in Fiction (2015); Baileys Women's Prize longlist nominee for Fiction (2015); Goodreads Choice Award nominee for Fiction (2014)
An audacious, darkly glittering novel about art, memory, fame, and ambition, set in the eerie days of civilization's collapse, Station Eleven tells the spellbinding story of a Hollywood star, his would-be savior, and a nomadic group of actors roaming the scattered outposts of the Great Lakes region, risking everything for art and humanity.
One snowy night a famous Hollywood actor slumps over onstage during a production of King Lear. Fellow actors watch in horror as a member of the audience-- a paparazzo-turned-EMT-- leaps to his aid and performs CPR, to no avail. Within hours, a terrible flu begins to spread, and the world as we know it starts to dissolve.
Fifteen years later, a small theater troupe known as the Traveling Symphony roams the wasteland of an altered world, performing Shakespeare and music for scattered communities of survivors. Written on their caravan is a line from Star Trek: "Because survival is insufficient." Many towns welcome them, but then they encounter one whose charismatic leader does not want them to leave....
Spanning decades, moving back and forth in time, and vividly depicting life before and after the pandemic, this suspenseful, elegiac, and spellbinding novel charts the strange twists of fate that connect five people: the actor, the man who tried to save him, the actor's first wife, his oldest friend, and a young actress with the Traveling Symphony, caught in the crosshairs of a dangerous self-proclaimed prophet.
Sometimes terrifying, sometimes tender, Station Eleven tells a story about the relationships that sustain us, the ephemeral nature of fame, and the beauty of the world as we know it.
Good Omens by ISBN: 9780060853969Publication Date: 1990-05-01
World Fantasy Award nominee for Best Novel (1991); Locus Award nominee for Best Fantasy Novel (2nd place, 1991); HOMer Award nominee for Best Fantasy Novel; BBC's The Big Read "Top 100" book (2003)
"DON'T THINK OF IT AS DYING, said Death. JUST THINK OF IT AS LEAVING EARLY TO AVOID THE RUSH."
According to The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch (the world's only completely accurate book of prophecies, recorded in 1655, just before she exploded), the world will end on a Saturday.
Next Saturday, in fact.
So the armies of Good and Evil are amassing, the Four Bikers of the Apocalypse are revving up their mighty hogs and hitting the road, and the world's last two remaining witch-finders are getting ready to fight the good fight, armed with awkwardly antiquated instructions and stick pins. Atlantis is rising, frogs are falling, tempers are flaring....
Right. Everything appears to be going according to Divine Plan.
Except that a somewhat fussy angel and a fast-living demon -- both of whom have lived amongst Earth's mortals since The Beginning and have grown rather fond of the lifestyle -- are not particularly looking forward to the coming Rapture. If Crowley and Aziraphale are going to stop it from happening, they've got to find and kill the Antichrist (which is a shame, as he's a really nice kid). There's just one glitch: someone seems to have misplaced him....
Put New York Times bestselling authors Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett together... and all Hell breaks loose. The Apocalypse has never been funnier.
More Previous Book Club Reads...
Parable of the Sower by ISBN: 9780941423991Publication Date: 1993-10-01
Nebula Award nominee for Best Novel (1995); Locus Award nominee for Best SF Novel (2nd place, 1995)
From one of science fiction's grand dames, a dystopian classic of terror and hope about an African-American teenage girl trying to survive in an all-too-real future.
God is change. This is the central truth of the Earthseed movement.
When unattended environmental and economic crises lead to social breakdown, not even gated communities are safe. In a night of fire and death, 18-year-old Lauren Olamina, an empath and the daughter of a minister, loses her family and home and is forced to venture out into the unprotected American landscape.
But what begins as a flight for survival soon leads to something much more: a startling vision of human destiny... and the birth of a new faith, with Lauren as its unlikely prophet.
Lauren's diary entries tell the story of her life amid a violent 21st-century hell of walled neighborhoods and drug-crazed pyromaniacs, and reveal her evolving Earthseed philosophy. Against a backdrop of horror emerges a message of hope: if we are willing to embrace divine change, we will survive to fulfill our destiny among the stars.
Chilling and thought-provoking for adult and young adult readers alike, "...there isn't a page in this vivid and frightening story that fails to grip the reader" (San Jose Mercury News).
Red Rising by ISBN: 9780345539786Publication Date: 2014-01-28
Goodreads Choice Award for Debut Author (2014); John W. Campbell Award Finalist for Best New Writer (2016)
“I live for the dream that my children will be born free,” she says. “That they will be what they like. That they will own the land their father gave them.”
“I live for you,” I say sadly.
Eo kisses my cheek. “Then you must live for more.”
16-year-old Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he works all day, believing that he and his people are making the surface of Mars livable for future generations. Yet he toils willingly, trusting that his blood and sweat will one day result in a better world for his children.
But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed. Soon he discovers that humanity reached the surface generations ago. Vast cities and lush wilds spread across the planet. Darrow—and Reds like him—are nothing more than slaves to a decadent ruling class.
Inspired by a longing for justice and driven by the memory of lost love, Darrow sacrifices everything to infiltrate the legendary Institute, a proving ground for the dominant Gold caste, where the next generation of humanity’s overlords struggle for power. Surgically altered to resemble a Gold, he is forced to compete for his life and the very future of civilization against the best, the brightest, and the most ruthless of Society’s ruling class.
Darrow will stop at nothing to bring down his enemies . . . even if it means he has to become one of them to do so.
"Brown's debut novel... is reminiscent of both Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games and William Goldman's The Lord of the Flies but has a dark and twisted power of its own that will captivate readers and leave them wanting more."—Library Journal 9/15/2013
“[A] spectacular adventure . . . one heart-pounding ride . . . Pierce Brown’s dizzyingly good debut novel evokes The Hunger Games, Lord of the Flies, and Ender’s Game. . . . [Red Rising] has everything it needs to become meteoric.”—Entertainment Weekly
Infomocracy by ISBN: 9780765385154Publication Date: 2016-06-07
Locus Award Finalist for Best First Novel (2017); John W. Campbell Award Finalist for Best new Writer (2017); Washington Post's "Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of 2016" list
"There's an election coming up, and campaign operatives such as Ken are traveling the globe to drum up support for their party. Government isn't local in the near future. The world is divided into centenals of 100,000 people, and parties vie for their votes, hoping to win the Supermajority. Many of the parties are wholly owned corporate entities, but some, like Ken's idealistic Policy1st party, campaign on issues. Ken crosses paths with Mishima, an agent working for Information (this future realm's version of the Internet that also watches over the elections), and Domaine, a man aiming to bring down the election process. As the vote gets closer, it's clear that many will do anything in their power to get the outcome they desire." - Library Journal 5/15/2016
Infomocracy is Malka Older's debut novel.
"Kinetic and gripping." -NPR
“A fast-paced, post-cyberpunk political thriller... If you always wanted to put The West Wing in a particle accelerator with Snow Crash to see what would happen, read this book.” —Max Gladstone, author of Last First Snow
"Smart, ambitious, bursting with provocative extrapolations, Infomocracy is the big-data-big-ideas-techno-analytical-microdemoglobal-post-everything political thriller we've been waiting for." —Ken Liu, author of The Grace of Kings
Fahrenheit 451 by ISBN: 9781613832493Publication Date: Oct 1953
Hugo Award for Best Novel (1954), Prometheus Hall of Fame Award (1984), Geffen Award for Best Translated SF Book (2002), California Book Award for Fiction (Silver) (1953)
Ray Bradbury's internationally acclaimed novel stands as a classic of world literature set in a bleak and terrifying post-literate future. Today its message has grown more relevant than ever before.
"Fahrenheit 451- The temperature at which book paper catches fire and burns."
Guy Montag was a fireman whose job it was to start fires. His purpose was to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they were hidden. And he enjoyed his job. He had been a fireman for ten years, and he had never questioned the pleasure of the midnight runs or the joy of watching pages consumed by flames.
Guy never questioned anything... until he met a seventeen-year-old girl who told him of a past when people were not afraid. Then he met a professor who told him of a future in which people could think. Where they could see the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television. He began to question his job, his purpose, his comfortable life... everything he had ever known. And Guy Montag suddenly realized what he had to do...
Bradbury’s powerful and poetic prose combines with uncanny insight into the potential of technology to create a novel which, decades on from first publication, still has the power to dazzle and shock.
The City and the City by ISBN: 9780345497512Publication Date: 2009-05-09Hugo Award for Best Novel (2010); World Fantasy Award for Best Novel (2010); Arthur C. Clarke Award for Best Novel (2010); British SF Assoc. Award for Best Novel (2010); Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel (2010); SF Site Readers Poll winner for best SF/Fantasy book (2010); Kitschie Red Tentacle Award for Best Novel (2010); Nebula Award nominee for Best Novel (2010); John W. Campbell Memorial Award nominee for Best Novel (2010)
When a murdered woman is found in the city of Beszel, somewhere at the edge of Europe, it looks to be a routine case for Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime Squad. To investigate, Borlú must travel from the decaying Beszel to its equal, rival, and intimate neighbor, the vibrant city of Ul Qoma.
But this is a border crossing like no other, a journey as psychic as it is physical, a seeing of the unseen. With Ul Qoman detective Qussim Dhatt, Borlú is enmeshed in a sordid underworld of nationalists intent on destroying their neighboring city, and unificationists who dream of dissolving the two into one. As the detectives uncover the dead woman’s secrets, they begin to suspect a truth that could cost them more than their lives. What stands against them are murderous powers in Beszel and in Ul Qoma: and, most terrifying of all, that which lies between these two cities.
New York Times-bestselling author Mieville delivers an existential thriller set in a city that is unlike any other, real or imagined--a murder mystery taken to dazzling metaphysical and artistic heights.
Altered Carbon by ISBN: 9780345457691Publication Date: 2003-02-28
Philip K. Dick Award winner (2004), Best SFF Novels of the Decade, Tor.com (2011)
For Kovacs, the shell that blew a hole in his chest was only the beginning....
In the twenty-fifth century, humankind has spread throughout the galaxy, monitored by the watchful eye of the U.N. While divisions in race, religion, and class still exist, advances in technology have redefined life itself. Now, assuming one can afford the expensive procedure, a person’s consciousness can be stored in a cortical stack at the base of the brain and easily downloaded into a new body (or "sleeve"), making death nothing more than a minor blip on a screen.
Onetime U.N. envoy Takeshi Kovacs has been killed before, but his last death was particularly painful. Dispatched one hundred eighty light-years from home, re-sleeved into a body in Bay City (formerly San Francisco, now with a rusted, dilapidated Golden Gate Bridge), Kovacs is thrown into the dark heart of a shady, far-reaching conspiracy that is vicious even by the standards of a society that treats "existence" as something that can be bought and sold.
"A tour-de-force of genre-bending, a brilliantly realized exercise in science fiction" - NY Times Book Review
The Caves of Steel by ISBN: 9780553293401Publication Date: June 1954
SF Hall of Fame posthumous inductee (1997), SFWA Grand Master award (1987), Forry Award, lifetime achievement (1990), Skylark Award (1967), Retro Hugo Awards best novel nomination (2004), Your Picks: Top 100 Science-Fiction, Fantasy Books, NPR (2011), Top 50 Science Fiction & Fantasy Books, Science Fiction Book Club (2003), Best All-Time SF Novels, Locus Magazine (1987)
A millennium into the future, two advancements have altered the course of human history: the colonization of the galaxy, and the creation of the positronic brain. Isaac Asimov's Robot novels chronicle the unlikely partnership between a New York City detective and a humanoid robot who must learn to work together.
Like most people left behind on an over-populated Earth, New York City police detective Elijah Baley had little love for either the arrogant Spacers or their robotic companions. But when a prominent Spacer is murdered under mysterious circumstances, Baley is ordered to the Outer Worlds to help track down the killer.
The relationship between Life and his Spacer superiors, who distrusted all Earthmen, was strained from the start. Then he learned that they had assigned him a partner: R. Daneel Olivaw. Worst of all was that the "R" stood for robot--and his positronic partner was made in the image and likeness of the murder victim!
All Our Wrong Todays by ISBN: 9781101985137Publication Date: 2017-02-07You know the future that people in the 1950s imagined we'd have? Well, it happened. In Tom Barren's 2016, humanity thrives in a techno-utopian paradise of flying cars, moving sidewalks, and moon bases, where avocados never go bad and punk rock never existed . . . because it wasn't necessary.
Except Tom just can't seem to find his place in this dazzling, idealistic world, and that's before his life gets turned upside down. Utterly blindsided by an accident of fate, Tom makes a rash decision that drastically changes not only his own life but the very fabric of the universe itself. In a time-travel mishap, Tom finds himself stranded in our 2016, what we think of as the real world. For Tom, our normal reality seems like a dystopian wasteland.
But when he discovers wonderfully unexpected versions of his family, his career, and—maybe, just maybe—his soul mate, Tom has a decision to make. Does he fix the flow of history, bringing his utopian universe back into existence, or does he try to forge a new life in our messy, unpredictable reality? Tom’s search for the answer takes him across countries, continents, and timelines in a quest to figure out, finally, who he really is and what his future—our future—is supposed to be.
Filled with humor and heart and packed with insight, intelligence, and mind-bending invention, Elan Mastai's acclaimed debut novel is a story of friendship and family, of unexpected journeys and alternate paths, and of love in its multitude of forms.
Dark Matter by ISBN: 9781101904220Publication Date: 2016-07-26"Are you happy with your life?"
Those are the last words Jason Dessen hears before the masked abductor knocks him unconscious.
Before he awakens to find himself strapped to a gurney, surrounded by strangers in hazmat suits.
Before a man Jason's never met smiles down at him and says, "Welcome back, my friend."
In this world he's woken up to, Jason's life is not the one he knows. His wife is not his wife. His son was never born. And Jason is not an ordinary college physics professor, but a celebrated genius who has achieved something remarkable. Something impossible.
Is it this world or the other that's the dream? And even if the home he remembers is real, how can Jason possibly make it back to the family he loves? The answers lie in a journey more wondrous and horrifying than anything he could've imagined--one that will force him to confront the darkest parts of himself even as he battles a terrifying, seemingly unbeatable foe.
From the author of the bestselling Wayward Pines trilogy, Dark Matter is a brilliantly plotted tale that is at once sweeping and intimate, mind-bendingly strange and profoundly human--a relentlessly surprising science-fiction thriller about choices, paths not taken, and how far we'll go to claim the lives we dream of.
Barrayar by ISBN: 9780671720834Publication Date: 1991-09-01Forry Award for lifetime achievement (2013); NESFA Skylark Award (2011); Romantic Times Career Achievement Award for Sci Fi/Fantasy (2009); Hugo Award for Best Series (The Vorkosigan Saga) (2017); NPR "Your Picks" Top 100 Science Fiction and Fantasy series (The Vorkosigan Saga) (2011); Hugo Award for Best Novel (1992); Locus Award for Best SF Novel (1992); HOMer Award for Best SF Novel (1992); Nebula Award nominee for Best Novel (1992); Seiun Award nominee for Best Translation of a Foreign Novel (2001); cited in Science Fiction: The 101 Best novels 1985-2010 (Broderick & Di Filippo); Essential SF (Cowie & Chester); Anatomy of Wonder, 5th ed. (Barron), The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction, 2nd ed. (Pringle) and A Basic Science Fiction Library (Gunn)
A precursor to Bujold's famed Miles Vorkosigan series, Barrayar chronicles his parents' marriage and the tumultuous beginning of Miles' story, amidst a new era for the hidebound, warlike planet of his birth.
From opposing sides of an intergalactic war, Captain Cordelia Naismith and Admiral Lord Aral Vorkosigan have married and now live in aristocratic splendor on his country estate on Barrayar. Cordelia Naismith, now Lady Vorkosigan, is ready to settle down to a quiet life on her adopted planet. But bloody civil war is looming, and Cordelia little dreams of the part she and her unborn son will play in it.
Four Ways to Forgiveness by ISBN: 9780060760298Publication Date: 1995-09-01Science Fiction Hall of Fame (Living Inductee) (2001); SFWA Grand Master Award (2003); World Fantasy Award life achievement (1995); National Book Award Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters (2014); Eaton Award for lifetime achievement in science fiction (2013); Gandalf Award Grand Master of Fantasy (1979); Forry Award for lifetime achievement (1988); Pilgrim Award for lifetime contribution to SF and fantasy scholarship (1989); Locus Award for Best Collection (1996); Locus Award for Best Novella ("Forgiveness Day") (1995); Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire for Best Translated Short Story or Collection (2007); Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for Best Short Fiction ("Forgiveness Day") (1995); Asimov's Reader Poll for Best Novella ("Forgiveness Day" and "A Woman's Liberation" (1995, 1996); Hugo Award nominee for Best Novella ("Forgiveness Day" and "A Man of the People") (1995, 1996); Nebula Award nominee for Best Novella ("Forgiveness Day" and "A Woman's Liberation" (1995, 1997); Prometheus Award nominee for Best Novel (1996); James Tiptree Jr Memorial Award short list ("Forgiveness Day") (1995); Locus Award nominee for Best novella ("A Man of the People" and "A Woman's Liberation;" "Old Music and the Slave Women") (1996; 2000); cited in A Basic Science Fiction Library (Gunn), 100 Must-Read Science Fiction Novels (Andrews & Rennison), and Anatomy of Wonder, 5th ed. (Barron)
At the far end of our universe lies a league of planets known collectively as the Ekumen of Worlds, founded by the Hainish people. On the twin planets of Werel and Yeowe, where all humankind is divided into "assets" and "owners," tradition and liberation are at war, and freedom takes many forms. Here is a society as complex and troubled as any on our world, peopled with unforgettable characters struggling to become fully human. For the elderly teacher Yoss and disgraced revolutionary Abberkam, for half-Terran "space brat" Solly and the haughty soldier Teyeo, for the Hainish exile Havzhiva, and for the slave woman Rakam, freedom and duty both begin in the heart, and success as well as failure has its costs.
In this stunning collection of four intimately interconnected novellas, Ursula K. Le Guin returns to the great themes that have made her one of America's most honored and respected authors.
Bonus Novella: "Old Music and the Slave Women" from The Birthday of the World and Other Stories by ISBN: 9780060509064Publication Date: 2003-03-04Le Guin's recently-published Hainish Novels & Stories includes the above collection as FIVE Ways to Forgiveness, adding the later-written "Old Music and the Slave Women" from the collection The Birthday of the World as the fifth "Way."
In this tale set some time after the original stories, Le Guin returns once more to the twin system of Werel and Yeowe with a story of beauty and cruelty, of peace and war, of captivity and the essence of what it means to be free. We encounter the familiar figure of Esdardon "Old Music" Aya (from "Forgiveness Day") as a wayward member of the Ekumenical embassy, three years after Werel has been torn apart by a civil war known as the Liberation-- or the Uprising, depending on which side of the war one stood. The assets have freed themselves. But as Old Music soon learns, for some, the war is not yet over.
The Handmaid's Tale by ISBN: 9780385490818Publication Date: 1985-10-01Science Fiction Hall of Fame (Creator) (2017); Franz Kafka International Literary Prize (2017); Peace Prize of the German Book Trade (2017); Nelly Sachs Prize (2010); Prince of Asturias Award for Literature (2008); Companion of the Order of Canada (1981); Arthur C. Clarke Award for Best Novel (1987); Governor General's Literary Awards for Fiction (1985); Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction (1986); Nebula Award Nominee for Best Novel (1986); Man Booker Prize Nominee (Shortlist) (1986); Prometheus Award Nominee for best novel (1987); James Tiptree Jr Memorial Award Short List for Retrospective Tiptree (1996); Commonwealth Writers' Prize Nominee for Best Book in Caribbean and Canada (1987)
Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, because in an age of declining births, Offred and the other Handmaids are valued only if their ovaries are viable.
Offred can remember the years before, when she lived and made love with her husband, Luke; when she played with and protected her daughter; when she had a job, money of her own, and access to knowledge. But all of that is gone now...
Set in the near future, Atwood's award-winning work describes life in what was once the United States and is now called the Republic of Gilead, a monotheocracy that has reacted to social unrest and a sharply declining birthrate by reverting to, and going beyond, the repressive intolerance of the original Puritans. The regime takes the Book of Genesis absolutely at its word, with bizarre consequences for the women and men in its population.
Funny, unexpected, horrifying, and altogether convincing, The Handmaid's Tale is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and literary tour de force.
The Devourers by ISBN: 9781101967515Publication Date: 2016-07-12Lambda Literary Award winner; Named one of the Best Books of the Year by the Washington Post
For readers of Neil Gaiman, Margaret Atwood, China Mieville, and David Mitchell comes a striking debut novel by a storyteller of keen insight and captivating imagination. On a cool evening in Kolkata, India, beneath a full moon, as the whirling rhythms of traveling musicians fill the night, college professor Alok encounters a mysterious stranger with a bizarre confession and an extraordinary story. Tantalized by the man's unfinished tale, Alok will do anything to hear its completion. So Alok agrees, at the stranger's behest, to transcribe a collection of battered notebooks, weathered parchments, and once-living skins.
From these documents spills the chronicle of a race of people at once more than human yet kin to beasts, ruled by instincts and desires blood-deep and ages-old. The tale features a rough wanderer in seventeenth-century Mughal India who finds himself irrevocably drawn to a defiant woman--and destined to be torn asunder by two clashing worlds. With every passing chapter of beauty and brutality, Alok's interest in the stranger grows and evolves into something darker and more urgent.
Shifting dreamlike between present and past with intoxicating language, visceral action, compelling characters, and stark emotion, The Devourers offers a reading experience quite unlike any other novel.
"A chilling, gorgeous saga that spans several centuries and many lands . . . The all-too-human characters--including the nonhuman ones--and the dreamlike, recursive plot serve to entrance the reader. . . . There's no escaping The Devourers. Readers will savor every bite." --N. K. Jemisin, The New York Times Book Review
"Das's narrative is lush, imaginative, and hypnotic, bringing to life scenes of savagery and moments of wonder. . . . Das's debut is an ambitious, unsettling trip into our own capacity for violence." --Kirkus Reviews
"[An] extraordinary piece of meta-fiction: stories within stories . . . trans-genre, transgender and transgressive . . . Who gets what he or she wants and, above all, who has the moral right to their desires, is the heart of this remarkable, multi-layered novel." --Maclean's
Bird Box by ISBN: 9780062259653Publication Date: 2014-05-13Written with the narrative tension of The Road and the exquisite terror of classic Stephen King, Bird Box is a propulsive, edge-of-your-seat horror thriller, set in an apocalyptic near-future world-- a masterpiece of suspense from the brilliantly imaginative Josh Malerman.
Something is out there . . . Something terrifying that must not be seen. One glimpse and a person is driven to deadly violence. No one knows what it is or where it came from. Five years after it began, a handful of scattered survivors remain, including Malorie and her two young children. Living in an abandoned house near the river, she has dreamed of fleeing to a place where they might be safe. Now, that the boy and girl are four, it is time to go. But the journey ahead will be terrifying: twenty miles downriver in a rowboat, blindfolded-- with nothing to rely on but her wits and the children's trained ears. One wrong choice and they will die. And something is following them. But is it man, animal, or monster?
Engulfed in darkness, surrounded by sounds both familiar and frightening, Malorie embarks on a harrowing odyssey-- a trip that takes her into an unseen world and back into the past, to the companions who once saved her. Under the guidance of the stalwart Tom, a motely group of strangers banded together against the unseen terror, creating order from the chaos. But when supplies ran low, they were forced to venture outside and confront the ultimate question: in a world gone mad, who can really be trusted?
Interweaving past and present, Josh Malerman's breathtaking debut is a horrific and gripping snapshot of a world unraveled that will have you racing to the final page.
The Girl with All the Gifts by ISBN: 9780356502731Publication Date: 2014-01-01NOT EVERY GIFT IS A BLESSING
Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant Parks keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don't like her. She jokes that she won't bite. But they don't laugh. Melanie is a very special girl. Emotionally charged and gripping from beginning to end, The Girl with All the Gifts is the most powerful and affecting thriller you will read this year.
"Scary, tense and fast-paced . . . but with a heart-warming tenderness" --MARIE CLAIRE
The Man in the High Castle by ISBN: 9780544916081Publication Date: 1962-10-1Hugo Award for Best Novel (1963); Science Fiction Hall of Fame Posthumous inductee (2005)
San Francisco, 1962. The Second World War has been over for seventeen years: people have now had a chance to adjust to the new order. But it's not been easy. The Mediterranean has been drained to make farmland, the population of Africa has virtually been wiped out, and America has been divided between the Nazis and the Japanese. Slavery is legal once again. The few Jews who still survive hide under assumed names.
In the neutral buffer zone that divides the two superpowers lives the man in the high castle, the author of an underground bestseller, a work of fiction that offers an alternative theory of world history in which the Axis powers didn't win the war. The novel is a rallying cry for all those who dream of overthrowing the occupiers. But could it be more than that?
Subtle, complex, and beautifully characterized, The Man in the High Castle remains the finest alternative-world novel ever written, and a work of profundity and significance. What the New York Times called "the single most resonant and carefully imagined book of Dick's career," this harrowing, Hugo Award-winning novel is the work that established Philip K. Dick as an innovator in science fiction while breaking the barrier between science fiction and the serious novel of ideas.
Dick offers a haunting vision of history as a nightmare from which it may just be possible to awake.
1984 by ISBN: 9780451524935Publication Date: 1949-06-08Prometheus Hall of Fame Award (1984); Locus Award Nominee for All-Time Best Science Fiction Novel (1987); Science Fiction Hall of Fame nominee for Creator inductee (2017)
"The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command."
Winston Smith is a low-rung member of the Party, the ruling government of Oceania. He is but a small brick in the pyramid that is the Party, at the head of which stands Big Brother. Big Brother the infallible. Big Brother the all-powerful.
Winston toes the Party line, rewriting history to satisfy the demands of the Ministry of Truth. With each lie he writes, Winston grows to hate the Party that seeks power for its own sake, and the Thought Police who persecute those who dare to commit thoughtcrimes such as individuality or free thinking.
In the company of Julia, Winston finds respite. Originality of thought awakens, love bloosoms and hope is rekindled. But Big Brother is always watching...
Written in 1948, 1984 was George Orwell's chilling prophecy about the future. And while the year 1984 has come and gone, his dystopian vision of a government that will do anything to control the narrative is timelier than ever. 1984 is still the great modern classic of "negative utopia"-- a startlingly original and haunting novel that creates an imaginary world that is completely convincing, from the first sentence to the last four words.
No one can deny the novel's hold on the imaginations of whole generations, or the power of its admonitions-- a power that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time.
Territory by ISBN: 9780312857356Publication Date: 2007-07-10World Fantasy Award Nominee for Best Novel (2008); 4th place, Locus Poll for Best Fantasy Novel (2008)
Wyatt Earp. Doc Holliday. Ike Clanton.
You think you know the story. You don't.
Just as legends and fragments of history from ancient Britain became the Arthurian tales we know— the story of Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, the Clantons and others, told and retold in innumerable stories and dramatizations, has became a great American myth. In Emma Bull's Territory, some of the mystery of that brooding, puzzling tale is accounted to the hitherto unrealized presence of magic. It is a story of power, of compulsion, and of consequences.
Tombstone, Arizona in 1881 is the site of one of the richest mineral strikes in American history, where veins of silver run like ley lines under the earth, a network of power that belongs to anyone who knows how to claim and defend it.
Above the ground, power is also about allegiances. A magician can drain his friends' strength to strengthen himself, and can place them between him and danger. The one with the most friends stands to win the territory.
Jesse Fox left his Eastern college education to travel West, where he's made some decidedly odd friends, like the physician Chow Lung, who insists that Jesse has a talent for magic. In Tombstone, Jesse meets the tubercular Doc Holliday, whose inner magic is as suppressed as his own, but whose power is enough to attract the sorcerous attention of Wyatt Earp.
Mildred Benjamin is a young widow making her living as a newspaper typesetter, and--unbeknownst to the other ladies of Tombstone--selling tales of Western derring-do to the magazines back East. Like Jesse, Mildred has episodes of seeing things that can't possibly be there.
When a failed stage holdup results in two dead, Tombstone explodes with speculation about who attempted the robbery. The truth could destroy Earp's plans for wealth and glory, and he'll do anything to bury it. Meanwhile, outlaw leader John Ringo wants the same turf as Earp. Each courts Jesse as an ally, and tries to isolate him by endangering his friends, as they struggle for magical dominance of the territory.
Events are building toward the shootout of which you may have heard. But you haven't heard the whole, secret story until you've read Emma Bull's unique take on an American legend, in which absolutely nothing is as it seems...
If Roger Zelazny had written a western, or if Susanna Clarke had reimagined the myths and legends of the American West, the results might have been something like Territory. But only something like. Because nobody writes like Emma Bull.
Silver on the Road by ISBN: 9781481429689Publication Date: 2015-10-06Endeavour Award finalist (2016)
Hailed by RT Book Reviews as “fresh and original…stark and lovely,” a heroic fantasy by an award-winning author about a young woman who is trained in the art of the sinister hand of magic. A Locus Magazine Bestseller.
A heroic fantasy by an award-winning author about a young woman who is trained in the art of the sinister hand of magic, but at what price?
Isobel, upon her sixteenth birthday, makes the choice to work for the Boss, called the Devil by some, in his territory west of the Mississippi. But this is not the devil you know. This is a being who deals fairly with immense— but not unlimited— power, who offers opportunities to people who want to make a deal, and they always get what they deserve. But his land is a wild west that needs a human touch, and that’s where Izzy comes in.
Inadvertently trained by him to see the clues in and manipulations of human desire, Izzy is raised to be his left hand and travel circuit through the territory helping those in need.
As we all know, where there is magic, there is chaos…and death.
Wake of Vultures by ISBN: 9780316264310Publication Date: 2015-10-27"Wake of Vultures doesn't just fly — it soars." -- Chuck Wending
"Wake of Vultures will kick your a** up one page and down the other." -- io9
A rich, dark fantasy of destiny, death, and the supernatural world hiding beneath the surface.
Nettie Lonesome lives in a land of hard people and hard ground dusted with sand. She's a half-breed who dresses like a boy, raised by folks who don't call her a slave but use her like one. She dreams of a greater life, but knows of nothing else. That is, until the day a stranger attacks her. When nothing, not even a sickle to the eye can stop him, Nettie stabs him through the heart with a chunk of wood, and he turns into black sand.
And just like that, Nettie can see.
But her newfound sight is a blessing and a curse. Even if she doesn't understand what's under her own skin, she can sense what everyone else is hiding -- at least physically. The world is full of evil, and now she knows the source of all the sand in the desert.
Nettie's got friends now, a good horse, and a better gun. But if she can't kill the thing haunting her nightmares and stealing children across the prairie, she'll lose it all -- and never find out what happened to her real family.
Haunted by the spirits, Nettie has no choice but to set out on a quest that might lead to her true kin... if the monsters along the way don't kill her first.
Wake of Vultures is the first novel of the Shadow series featuring the fearless Nettie Lonesome.
(The author's elevator pitch: "It’s Lonesome Dove meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer with a biracial, genderqueer heroine.")
The Windup Girl by ISBN: 9781597801577Publication Date: 2009-09-01Hugo Award for Best Novel (2010), Nebula Award for Best Novel (2009), Locus Award for Best First Novel (2010), Kurd-Laßwitz-Preis for Best Foreign Novel (2012), British Science Fiction Association Award Nominee for Novel (2010)
Seiun Award for Best Foreign Novel (2012), John W. Campbell Memorial Award (2010), Compton Crook Award (2010), Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire for Roman étranger (2013), Prix Bob Morane for roman traduit (2013), Cena Akademie SFFH for Kniha roku (Book of the Year) (2011), Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Science Fiction (2009), Prix Une autre Terre (2013)
Anderson Lake is a company man, AgriGen's Calorie Man in Thailand. Under cover as a factory manager, Anderson combs Bangkok's street markets in search of foodstuffs thought to be extinct, hoping to reap the bounty of history's lost calories. There, he encounters Emiko...
Emiko is the Windup Girl, a strange and beautiful creature. One of the New People, Emiko is not human; instead, she is an engineered being, creche-grown and programmed to satisfy the decadent whims of a Kyoto businessman, but now abandoned to the streets of Bangkok. Regarded as soulless beings by some, devils by others, New People are slaves, soldiers, and toys of the rich in a chilling near future in which calorie companies rule the world, the oil age has passed, and the side effects of bio-engineered plagues run rampant across the globe.
What Happens when calories become currency? What happens when bio-terrorism becomes a tool for corporate profits, when said bio-terrorism's genetic drift forces mankind to the cusp of post-human evolution? Award-winning author Paolo Bacigalupi delivers one of the most highly acclaimed science fiction novels of the twenty-first century.
Glasshouse by ISBN: 9780441014033Publication Date: 2006-06-27Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel (2007), Locus Award Nominee for Best Science Fiction Novel (2007), Kurd-Laßwitz-Preis for Foreign Novel (2009), John W. Campbell Memorial Award Nominee for Best Science Fiction Novel (2007), Prometheus Award for Best Novel (2007)
When Robin wakes up in a clinic with most of his memories missing, it doesn’t take him long to discover that someone is trying to kill him. It’s the twenty-seventh century, when interstellar travel is by teleport gate and conflicts are fought by network worms that censor refugees’ personalities and target historians. The civil war is over and Robin has been demobilized, but someone wants him out of the picture because of something his earlier self knew.
On the run from a ruthless pursuer and searching for a place to hide, he volunteers to participate in a unique experimental polity, the Glasshouse, constructed to simulate a pre-accelerated culture. Participants are assigned anonymized identities: It looks like the ideal hiding place for a posthuman on the run. But in this escape-proof environment, Robin will undergo an even more radical change, placing him at the mercy of the experimenters— and at the mercy of his own unbalanced psyche....
Neuromancer by ISBN: 9780441569595Publication Date: 1986-08-15Hugo Award for Best Novel (1985), Nebula Award for Best Novel (1984), British Science Fiction Association Award Nominee for Best Novel (1984), Philip K. Dick Award (1984), John W. Campbell Memorial Award Nominee for Best Science Fiction Novel (1985)
The Matrix is a world within the world, a global consensus- hallucination, the representation of every byte of data in cyberspace....
Case had been the sharpest data-thief in the business, until vengeful former employers crippled his nervous system. But now a new and very mysterious employer recruits him for a last-chance run. The target: an unthinkably powerful artificial intelligence orbiting Earth in service of the sinister Tessier-Ashpool business clan. With a dead man riding shotgun and Molly, mirror-eyed street-samurai, to watch his back, Case embarks on an adventure that ups the ante on an entire genre of fiction.
Hotwired to the leading edges of art and technology, Neuromancer ranks with 1984 and Brave New World as one of the century's most potent visions of the future.
Lovecraft Country by ISBN: 9780062292063Publication Date: 2016-02-16The critically acclaimed cult novelist makes visceral the terrors of life in Jim Crow America and its lingering effects in this brilliant and wondrous work of the imagination that melds historical fiction, pulp noir, and Lovecraftian horror and fantasy.
Chicago, 1954. When his father Montrose goes missing, 22-year-old Army veteran Atticus Turner embarks on a road trip to New England to find him, accompanied by his Uncle George-- publisher of The Safe Negro Travel Guide-- and his childhood friend Letitia. On their journey to the manor of Mr. Braithwhite-- heir to the estate that owned one of Atticus's ancestors-- they encounter both mundane terrors of white America and malevolent spirits that seem straight out of the weird tales George devours.
At the manor, Atticus discovers his father in chains, held prisoner by a secret cabal named the Order of the Ancient Dawn-- led by Samuel Braithwhite and his son Caleb-- which has gathered to orchestrate a ritual that shockingly centers on Atticus. And his one hope of salvation may be the seed of his-- and the whole Turner clan's-- destruction.
A chimerical blend of magic, power, hope, and freedom that stretches across time, touching diverse members of two black families, Lovecraft Country is a devastating kaleidoscopic portrait of racism-- the terrifying specter that continues to haunt us today.
All the Birds in the Sky by ISBN: 9780765379948Publication Date: 2016-01-26
From the editor-in-chief of io9.com, a stunning novel about the end of the world--and the beginning of our future.
Childhood friends Patricia Delfine and Laurence Armstead didn't expect to see each other again, after parting ways under mysterious circumstances during middle school. After all, the development of magical powers and the invention of a two-second time machine could hardly fail to alarm one's peers and families.
But now they're both adults, living in the hipster mecca San Francisco, and the planet is falling apart around them. Laurence is an engineering genius who's working with a group that aims to avert catastrophic breakdown through technological intervention. Patricia is a graduate of Eltisley Maze, the hidden academy for the world's magically gifted, and works with a small band of other magicians to secretly repair the world's every-growing ailments.
Little do they realize that something bigger than either of them, something begun years ago in their youth, is determined to bring them together-- to either save the world, or plunge it into a new dark ages.
A deeply magical, darkly funny examination of life, love, and the apocalypse.
The Library at Mount Char by ISBN: 9780553418606Publication Date: 2015-06-16Neil Gaiman meets Joe Hill in this astonishingly original, terrifying, and darkly funny contemporary fantasy.
A missing God.
A library with the secrets to the universe.
A woman too busy to notice her heart slipping away.
Carolyn's not so different from the other people around her. She likes guacamole and cigarettes and steak. She knows how to use a phone. Clothes are a bit tricky, but everyone says nice things about her outfit with the Christmas sweater over the gold bicycle shorts.
After all, she was a normal American herself once.
That was a long time ago, of course. Before her parents died. Before she and the others were taken in by the man they called Father.
Father could do strange things. He could call light from darkness. Sometimes he raised the dead. And when he was disobeyed, the consequences were terrible.
In the years since then, Carolyn hasn't had a chance to get out much. Instead, she and her adopted siblings have been raised according to Father's ancient Pelapi customs. They've studied the books in his Library and learned some of the secrets behind his equally ancient his power.
Sometimes, they've wondered if their cruel tutor might secretly be God.
Now, Father is missing. And if God truly is dead, the only thing that matters is who will inherit his library—and with it, power over all of creation.
As Carolyn gathers the tools she needs for the battle to come, fierce competitors for this prize align against her, all of them with powers that far exceed her own.
But Carolyn has accounted for this.
And Carolyn has a plan.
Carolyn can win. She's sure of it. What she doesn't realize is that her victory may come at an unacceptable price—because in becoming a God, she's forgotten a great deal about being human.
Populated by an unforgettable cast of characters and propelled by a plot that will shock you again and again, The Library at Mount Char is at once horrifying and hilarious, mind-blowingly alien and heartbreakingly human, sweepingly visionary and nail-bitingly thrilling—and signals the arrival of a major new voice in fantasy.
Roadside Picnic (Пикник на обочине) by ISBN: 9781613743416Publication Date: 1972John W. Campbell Memorial Award Nominee for Best Science Fiction Novel (1978), Graoully d'Or for Roman étranger (1981), Science Fiction and Fantasy Translation Award Nominee for Long Form (2013)
Red Schuhart is a stalker, one of those young rebels who are compelled, in spite of extreme danger, to venture illegally into the Zone to collect the mysterious artifacts that the alien visitors left scattered around. His life is dominated by the place and the thriving black market in the alien products.
But when he and his friend Kirill go into the Zone together to pick up a "full empty." something goes wrong. And the news he gets from his girlfriend upon his return makes it inevitable that he'll keep going back to the Zone, again and again, until he finds the answer to all his problems.
First published in 1972, Roadside Picnic is still widely regarded as one of the greatest science fiction novels, despite the fact that it has been out of print in the United States for almost thirty years. This authoritative new translation corrects many errors and omissions and has been supplemented with a foreword by Ursula K. Le Guin and a new afterword by Boris Strugatsky explaining the strange history of the novel's publication in Russia.
The Stars My Destination by ISBN: 9780679767800Publication Date: 1957Prometheus Hall of Fame Award (1988); Science Fiction Hall of Fame, posthumous inductee (2001)
In this pulse-quickening novel, Alfred Bester imagines a future in which people "jaunte" a thousand miles with a single thought, where the rich barricade themselves in labyrinths and protect themselves with radioactive hit men-- and where an inarticulate outcast is the most valuable and dangerous man alive.
Gulliver "Gully" Foyle was a Mechanic's Mate 3rd class aboard the merchant spaceship Nomad, a crewman with no education, no skills, and no ambition. But he did want to live. The only survivor of a vicious attack upon of his vessel, Foyle does live for 170 days in the airless purgatory of deep space, drifting halfway between Mars and Jupiter on a derelict wreck, surviving in an airtight locker the size of a giant's coffin.
When the spaceship Vorga ignores his distress flares and sails by, leaving him marooned and dying, Gully Foyle finally discovers something to live for: revenge. Foyle pushes himself beyond his limits to win free of the crippled ship, only to fall prey to a cult on the Sargasso Asteroid and become hideously scarred. Finally escaping to Terra, Foyle remakes himself body and mind, taking on a new identity and infiltrating the highest levels of society in order to track down the captain and crew of the ship that left him to die.
But as he works out his murderous grudge, Gully Foyle also uncovers a secret that could change the course of history....
A classic which in large part inspired both the science fiction New Wave of the 1960s and the cyberpunk movement of the 1980s, originally serialized in Galaxy magazine in 1956-1957 and released in book form in 1957 as Tiger! Tiger! in the U.K, The Stars My Destination has an unrivalled claim to be the most influential sf book of all time.
The Invisible Man by ISBN: 9780451528520Publication Date: 1897Science Fiction Hall of Fame, posthumous inductee (1997)
When a stranger arrives in the small English town of Iping, the owners of the Coach and Horses bless their good fortune at having a customer in the off-season-- even if he appears to be a bit odd. With his head covered in bandages, his hands constantly gloved, and his eyes hidden behind dark glasses even indoors, the inn’s mistress assumes their reclusive new guest has some kind of terrible disfigurement.
The truth, however, is far more chilling. Griffin, a former medical student turned scientist, developed a a serum capable of rendering bodies invisible and impulsively tried it on himself. Now nearing the end of his resources, Griffin has taken refuge in this country inn as he struggles to find an antidote that will reverse the process. But even as he desperately searches for a cure, the horror of his fate is bending his brilliant mind towards criminal madness....
Depicting one man's transformation and descent into brutality, The Invisible Man is a riveting exploration of science's power to corrupt.
Foreigner by ISBN: 9780886776374Publication Date: 1994-02-013rd place, Locus Awards for Best SF Novel (1995)
The first book in C.J.Cherryh's eponymous series, Foreigner begins an epic tale of the survivors of a lost spacecraft who crash-land on a planet inhabited by a hostile, sentient alien race.
From its beginnings as a human-alien story of first contact, the Foreigner series has become a true science fiction odyssey, following a civilization from the age of steam through early space flight to confrontations with other alien species in distant sectors of space. It is the masterwork of a truly remarkable author.
The Necessary Beggar by ISBN: 9780765310972Publication Date: 2005-10-01Mythopoeic Fantasy Award nominee for Adult Literature (2007); ALA Alex Award (2006)
Praised as "a deeply felt, deeply moving tale . . . chilling and finely tuned" ( Publishers Weekly ), Susan Palwick's first novel Flying in Place won widespread acclaim for its haunting exploration of a troubled childhood. Now, after a decade, Palwick returns with the powerful tale of a family cast out of an idyllic realm, learning to live in our own troubled world - an exciting and insightful examination of humanity in the spirit of Ursula Le Guin's The Disposessed and Robert Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land. Lemabantunk, the Glorious City, is a place of peace and plenty. But it is also a land of swift and severe justice. Young Darroti has been accused of the murder of a highborn woman who had chosen the life of a Mendicant, a holy beggar whose blessing brings forgiveness. Now his entire family must share his shame, and his punishment - exile to an unknown world. Grieving for the life they have left behind, Darroti and his family find themselves in a hostile land - an all-too-familiar American future, a country under attack in a world torn by hatred and war. There, each tries to cope in their own way.Some will surrender to despair. Some will strive to preserve the old ways. Some will be lured by the new world's temptations. And some, sustained by extraordinary love, will find a way to heal the family's grief and give them hope.
Eifelheim by ISBN: 9780765300966Publication Date: 2006-10-17Hugo nominee for Best Novel (2007); 11th place, Locus Awards for Best SF Novel (2007); Prix Julia Verlanger (2009); SF ga Yomitai for Best Translated SF of the Year in Japan (2010)
In 1349, one small town in Germany disappeared and has never been resettled. Tom, a contemporary historian, and his theoretical physicist girlfriend Sharon, become interested. Tom indeed becomes obsessed. By all logic, the town should have survived, but it didn't and that violates everything Tom knows about history. What's was special about Eifelheim that it utterly disappeared more than 600 years ago? Father Deitrich is the village priest of Oberhochwald, the village that will soon gain the name of Teufelheim, in later years corrupted to Eifelheim, in the year 1348, when the Black Death is gathering strength across Europe but is still not nearby. Deitrich is an educated man, knows science and philosophy, and to his astonishment becomes the first contact between humanity and an alien race from a distant star when their interstellar ship crashes in the nearby forest. It is a time of wonders, in the shadow of the plague. Tom and Sharon, and Father Deitrich, have a strange and intertwined destiny of tragedy and triumph in this brilliant SF novel by the winner of the Robert A. Heinlein Award.
The Gospel of Loki by ISBN: 9781481449465Publication Date: 2015-05-05Mythopoeic Award Nominee for Adult Literature, 2015
A surprise from the author of Chocolat; New York Times bestselling author Joanne M. Harris, “this pacy adult fantasy is narrated by Loki, the Norse god of fire and mischief” (Vogue). This novel is a brilliant first-person narrative of the rise and fall of the Norse gods—retold from the point of view of the world’s ultimate trickster, Loki. A #1 bestseller in the UK, The Gospel of Loki tells the story of Loki’s recruitment from the underworld of Chaos, his many exploits on behalf of his one-eyed master, Odin, through to his eventual betrayal of the gods and the fall of Asgard itself. Using her lifelong passion for the Norse myths, New York Times bestseller Joanne M. Harris has created a vibrant and powerful fantasy novel that the Sunday Sun recommends “to her long-standing audience with wit, style and obvious enjoyment;” The Sunday Times claims it “lively and fun;” and The Metro adds that “Harris has enormous fun with her antihero...this mythical bad boy should beguile fans of Neil Gaiman.”
Horns by ISBN: 9780061147951Publication Date: 2010-02-16Bram Stoker Nominee for Best Novel (2011), Locus Awards Nominee for Best Fantasy Novel (2011)
Joe Hill has been hailed as "a major player in 21st-century fantastic fiction" (Washington Post); "a new master in the field of suspense" (James Rollins); "one of the most confident and assured new voices in horror and dark fantasy to emerge in recent years (Publishers Weekly); a writer who "builds character invitingly and plants an otherworldly surprise around every corner" (New York Times). This gifted and brilliantly imaginative author catapulted to bestsellerdom with the chilling Heart-Shaped Box and cemented his reputation with the prizewinning volume of short fiction 20th Century Ghosts. At last, the New York Times bestselling author returns with a relentless supernatural thriller that runs like Hell on wheels....
Ignatius Perrish spent the night drunk and doing terrible things. He woke up the next morning with a thunderous hangover, a raging headache... and a pair of horns growing from his temples.
At first, Ig thought the horns were a hallucination, the product of a mind damaged by rage and grief. He had spent the last year in a lonely, private purgatory, following the death of his beloved, Merrin Williams, who was raped and murdered under inexplicable circumstances. A mental breakdown would have been the most natural thing in the world. But there was nothing natural about the horns, which were all too real.
Once, the righteous Ig had enjoyed the life of the blessed: born into privilege, the second son of a renowned musician and younger brother of a rising late-night TV star, he had security, wealth, and a place in his community. Ig had it all, and more-- he had Merrin and a love founded on shared daydreams, mutual daring, and unlikely midsummer magic. But Merrin's death damned all that.
The only suspect in the crime, Ig was never charged or tried. And he was never cleared. In the court of public opinion in Gideon, New Hampshire, Ig is and always will be guilty because his rich and connected parents pulled strings to make the investigation go away. Nothing Ig can do, nothing he can say, matters. Everyone, it seems, including God, has abandoned him. Everyone, that is, but the devil inside....
Now Ig is possessed of a terrible new power to go with his terrible new look-- a macabre talent he intends to use to find the monster who killed Merrin and destroyed his life. Being good and praying for the best got him nowhere. It's time for a little revenge.... It's time the devil had his due.
Redemption in Indigo by ISBN: 9781931520669Publication Date: 2010-08-01World Fantasy Award Nominee for Best Novel (2011), Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature (2011), Frank Collymore Award (2008), William L. Crawford (2011), OCM Bocas Prize Nominee for Caribbean Literature (2011), Carl Brandon Parallax Award (2010), Golden Tentacle Kitschie Award (Debut) (2012)
Karen Lord's debut novel, which won the prestigious Frank Collymore Literary Prize in Barbados, is an intricately woven tale of adventure, magic, and the power of the human spirit.
Paama's husband is a fool and a glutton. Bad enough that he followed her to her parents' home in the village of Makende, now he's disgraced himself by murdering livestock and stealing corn. When Paama leaves him for good, she attracts the attention of the undying ones--the djombi--who present her with a gift: the Chaos Stick, which allows her to manipulate the subtle forces of the world. Unfortunately, a wrathful djombi with indigo skin believes this power should be his and his alone.
Bursting with humor and rich in fantastic detail, Redemption in Indigo is a clever, contemporary fairy tale that introduces readers to a dynamic new voice in Caribbean literature. Lord's world of spider tricksters and indigo immortals, inspired in part by a Senegalese folk tale, will feel instantly familiar--but Paama's adventures are fresh, surprising, and utterly original. "Fantasy as a genre does not have boundaries," writes Lord. "It has roots. You may call it fantasy. I call it life."
Karen Lord was born in Barbados in 1968. She holds a science degree from the University of Toronto and a PhD in the sociology of religion from the University of Wales.
"The impish love child of Tutuola and Marquez. Utterly delightful."--Nalo Hopkinson
The Speed of Dark by ISBN: 9780345447555Publication Date: 2003-01-01Winner of the 2003 Nebula Award for Best Novel (2003); nominee for 2003 Arthur C. Clarke Award.
In the near future, disease will be a condition of the past. Most genetic defects will be removed at birth; the remaining during infancy. Unfortunately, there will be a generation left behind. For members of that missed generation, small advances will be made. Through various programs, they will be taught to get along in the world despite their differences. They will be made active and contributing members of society. But they will never be normal.
Lou Arrendale is a member of that lost generation, born at the wrong time to reap the awards of medical science. Part of a small group of high-functioning autistic adults, he has a steady job with a pharmaceutical company, a car, friends, and a passion for fencing. Aside from his annual visits to his counselor, he lives a low-key, independent life. He has learned to shake hands and make eye contact. He has taught himself to use "please" and "thank you" and other conventions of conversation because he knows it makes others comfortable. He does his best to be as normal as possible and not to draw attention to himself.
But then his quiet life comes under attack. It starts with an experimental treatment that will reverse the effects of autism in adults. With this treatment Lou would think and act and be just like everyone else. But if he was suddenly free of autism, would he still be himself? Would he still love the same classical music-- with its complications and resolutions? Would he still see the same colors and patterns in the world-- shades and hues that others cannot see? Most importantly, would he still love Marjory, a woman who may never be able to reciprocate his feelings? Would it be easier for her to return the love of a "normal"?
There are intense pressures coming from the world around him-- including an angry supervisor who wants to cut costs by sacrificing the supports necessary to employ autistic workers. Perhaps even more disturbing are the barrage of questions within himself. For Lou must decide if he should submit to a surgery that might completely change the way he views the world . . . and the very essence of who he is.
Thoughtful, provocative, poignant, unforgettable, The Speed of Dark is a gripping exploration into the mind of an autistic person as he struggles with profound questions of humanity and matters of the heart.
Praise for The Speed of Dark:
“Splendid and graceful . . . A lot of novels promise to change the way a reader sees the world; The Speed of Dark actually does.” —The Washington Post Book World
“[A] beautiful and moving story . . . [Elizabeth] Moon is the mother of an autistic teenager and her love is apparent in the story of Lou. He makes a deep and lasting impact on the reader while showing a different way of looking at the world.” —The Denver Post
“Every once in a while, you come across a book that is both an important literary achievement and a completely and utterly absorbing reading experience— a book with provocative ideas and an equally compelling story. Such a book is The Speed of Dark.” —Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel
“A remarkable journey [that] takes us into the mind of an autistic with a terrible choice: become normal or remain an alien on his own planet.” —Mary Doria Russell, author of The Sparrow
“A powerful portrait . . . an engaging journey into the dark edges that define the self.” —The Seattle Times
The Drowning Girl by ISBN: 9780451464163Publication Date: 2012-03-06Winner of the 2013 Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel and 2013 James Tiptree Jr Memorial Award; runner-up for 2013 Locus Award for Best Fantasy; nominee for the 2013 Nebula, 2013 World Fantasy, 2013 August Derleth, 2013 Shirley Jackson, and 2013 Adult Lit Mythopoeic Awards.
India Morgan Phelps-- Imp to her friends-- is schizophrenic. She can no longer trust her own mind, because she is convinced that her memories have somehow betrayed her, forcing her to question her very identity.
Struggling with her perceptions of reality, Imp must uncover the truth about an encounter with a vicious siren, or a helpless wolf that came to her as a feral girl, or neither of these things but something far, far stranger . . .
Praise for The Drowning Girl:
'With The Drowning Girl, Caitlin R. Kiernan moves firmly into the new vanguard, still being formed, of our best and most artful authors of the gothic and fantastic-- those capable of writing fiction of deep moral and artistic seriousness.' --Peter Straub
'Incisive, beautiful, and as perfectly crafted as a puzzle box, The Downing Girl took my breath away.' --Holly Black
'This is a masterpiece. It deserves to be read in and out of genre for a long, long time.' --Elizabeth Bear
'A beautifully written, startlingly original novel.' --Elizabeth Hand
Half a King by ISBN: 9780804178327Publication Date: 2014-07-15Winner of the 2015 Locus Award for Best YA book; named a Best Book of the Year by Time and the Washington Post.
First in the Shattered Sea series.
"I swore an oath to avenge the death of my father. I may be half a man, but I swore a whole oath."
Prince Yarvi has vowed to regain a throne he never wanted. But first he must survive cruelty, chains, and the bitter waters of the Shattered Sea. And he must do it all with only one good hand.
The deceived will become the deceiver.
Born a weakling in the eyes of his father, Yarvi is alone in a world where a strong arm and a cold heart rule. He cannot grip a shield or swing an axe, so he must sharpen his mind to a deadly edge.
The betrayed will become the betrayer.
Gathering a strange fellowship of the outcast and the lost, he finds they can do more to help him become the man he needs to be than any court of nobles could.
Will the usurped become the usurper?
But even with loyal friends at his side, Yarvi finds that his path may end as it began--in twists, and traps, and tragedy.
Praise for Half a King:
"Tremendously entertaining . . . lightning-fast and filled with a wonderful collection of rogues, villains and two-faced bastards . . . From the first chapter [Joe Abercrombie] wastes no time as the reader is swept up in a gripping tale of betrayal and revenge." --SciFi Now
"Half a King is my favorite book by Joe Abercrombie so far, and that's saying something." --Patrick Rothfuss
"As in all Abercrombie's books, friends turn out to be enemies, enemies turn out to be friends; the line between good and evil is murky indeed; and nothing goes quite as we expect. With eye-popping plot twists and rollicking good action, Half a King is definitely a full adventure." --Rick Riordan
“Enthralling! An up-all-night read.” —Robin Hobb
"Polished and sharp, perhaps his most technically proficient novel yet . . . I dare you to read the first chapter and try not to turn the next page." --Brent Weeks
"Half a King can be summed up in a single word: masterpiece. It's a coming-of-age story. It's a Viking saga. It's a revenge tale and family drama and the return of the prodigal son. But most of all, it's this: a short time alongside people as weak and blundering as we are and, in the midst of it all, as heroic. Far too short a time, as it turns out. What a wonderful book." --Myke Cole
"Half a King is full of all the adventure I've come to expect from Abercrombie and a tenderness I never knew he had." --Sam Sykes
"A fast-paced tale of betrayal and revenge that grabbed me from page 1 and refused to let go." --George R. R. Martin
Tigerman by ISBN: 9780385352413Publication Date: 2014-07-29A Kirkus Reviews and NPR Best Book of the Year; an ALA Notable Book.
Sergeant Lester Ferris is a good man in need of a rest. After a long career of being shot at, he's about to be retired. The mildly larcenous, backwater island of Mancreu is the ideal place to serve out his time, a former British colony in legal limbo, belching toxic clouds of waste and facing imminent destruction by an international community concerned for their own safety. The perfect place for Lester is also the perfect location for a multinational array of shady businesses. Hence the Black Fleet of illicit ships lurking in the bay: spy stations, arms dealers, offshore hospitals, money-laundering operations, drug factories and torture centers. None of which should be a problem, since Lester's brief is to sit tight and turn a blind eye.
Meanwhile, he befriends a brilliant, Internet-addled street kid with a comic-book fixation who will need a new home when the island dies. When Mancreu's fragile society erupts in violence, Lester must be more than just an observer: he has no choice but to rediscover the man of action he once was, and find out what kind of hero the island--and the boy--will need.
From the award-winning author of Angelmaker and The Gone-Away World, Tigerman is a novel at once deeply heartfelt and headlong thrilling-- about parenthood, friendship and secret identities, about heroes of both the super and the everyday kind.
After the Golden Age by ISBN: 9780765325556Publication Date: 2011-04-12
It's not easy being a superhero's daughter....
Carrie Vaughn has captured legions of fans with her wildly popular Kitty Norville novels. Now she uses her extraordinary wit and imagination to tell a sensational new story about superhuman heroes-- and the people who have to live with them.
Most people dream of having superheroes for parents, but not Celia West. The only daughter of Captain Olympus and Spark, the world's greatest champions, she has no powers of her own, and the most exciting thing she's ever done is win a silver medal in a high school swim meet. Meanwhile, she's the favorite hostage of every crime boss and supervillain in Commerce City. She doesn't have a code name, but if she did, it would probably be Bait Girl, the Captive Wonder.
Rejecting her famous family and its legacy, Celia has worked hard to create a life for herself beyond the shadow of their capes, becoming a skilled forensic accountant. But when her parents' archenemy, the Destructor, faces justice in the "Trial of the Century," Celia finds herself sucked back into the more-than-mortal world of Captain Olympus-- and forced to confront a secret that she hoped would stay buried forever.
Vicious by ISBN: 9780765335340Publication Date: 2013-09-24
A masterful tale of ambition, jealousy, desire, and superpowers.
Victor and Eli started out as college roommates--brilliant, arrogant, lonely boys who recognized the same sharpness and ambition in each other. In their senior year, a shared research interest in adrenaline, near-death experiences, and seemingly supernatural events reveals an intriguing possibility: that under the right conditions, someone could develop extraordinary abilities. But when their thesis moves from the academic to the experimental, things go horribly wrong.
Ten years later, Victor breaks out of prison, determined to catch up to his old friend (now foe), aided by a young girl whose reserved nature obscures a stunning ability. Meanwhile, Eli is on a mission to eradicate every other super-powered person that he can find-- aside from his sidekick, an enigmatic woman with an unbreakable will. Armed with terrible power on both sides, driven by the memory of betrayal and loss, the archnemeses have set a course for revenge--but who will be left alive at the end?
In Vicious, V. E. Schwab brings to life a gritty comic-book-style world in vivid prose: a world where gaining superpowers doesn't automatically lead to heroism, and a time when allegiances are called into question.
"A dynamic and original twist on what it means to be a hero and a villain. A killer from page one; highly recommended!" --Jonathan Maberry, New York Times bestselling author
Ancillary Justice by ISBN: 9780316246620Publication Date: 2013-10-01Hugo Award for Best Novel (2014), Nebula Award for Best Novel (2013), Locus Award for Best First Novel (2014), Arthur C. Clarke Award for Best Novel (2014), British Science Fiction Association Award for Best Novel (2013), Philip K. Dick Award Nominee (2013), John W. Campbell Memorial Award Nominee (2014), James Tiptree Jr. Award Nominee (2013), The Kitschies for Golden Tentacle (Debut) (2013)
On a remote, icy planet, the soldier known as Breq is drawing closer to completing her quest.
Once, she was the Justice of Toren - a colossal starship with an artificial intelligence linking thousands of soldiers in the service of the Radch, the empire that conquered the galaxy. Now, an act of treachery has ripped it all away, leaving her with one fragile human body, unanswered questions, and a burning desire for vengeance.
Book 1 of the Imerial Radch trilogy.
Annihilation by ISBN: 9780374104092Publication Date: 2014-02-04Nebula Award for Best Novel nomination (2015); Shirley Jackson Award for Best Novel nomination (2015); John W. Campbell Memorial Award finalist (2015); Locus Award for Best SF Novel nomination (2015)
Area X has been cut off from the rest of the continent for decades. Nature has reclaimed the last vestiges of human civilization. The first expedition returned with reports of a pristine, Edenic landscape; the second expedition ended in mass suicide; the third expedition in a hail of gunfire as its members turned on one another. The members of the eleventh expedition returned as shadows of their former selves, and within weeks, all had died of cancer. In Annihilation, the first volume of Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach trilogy, we join the twelfth expedition.
The group is made up of four women: an anthropologist; a surveyor; a psychologist, the de facto leader; and our narrator, a biologist. Their mission is to map the terrain, record all observations of their surroundings and of one another, and, above all, avoid being contaminated by Area X itself.
They arrive expecting the unexpected, and Area X delivers-- they discover a massive topographic anomaly and life forms that surpass understanding-- but it's the surprises that came across the border with them and the secrets the expedition members are keeping from one another that change everything.
The Martian by ISBN: 9780804139021Publication Date: 2014-02-11GoodReads Choice Awards 2014 SF winner; 2015 Alex Award winner, movie directed by Ridley Scott forthcoming (Nov. 25, 2015)
Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars.
Now, he's sure he'll be the first person to die there.
After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he's alive--and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive. Chances are, though, he won't have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old "human error" are much more likely to kill him first.
But Mark isn't ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills--and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit--he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him?
Kindred by ISBN: 9780807083109Publication Date: 2009-02-01
Dana, a modern black woman, is celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday with her new husband when she is snatched abruptly from her home in California and transported to the antebellum South.
Rufus, the white son of a plantation owner, is drowning, and Dana has been summoned across the years to save him. After this first summons, Dana is drawn back, again and again, to the plantation to protect Rufus and ensure that he will grow to manhood and father the daughter who will become Dana's ancestor.
Yet each time Dana's sojourns become longer and more dangerous, until it is uncertain whether or not her life will end, long before it has even begun.
Alif the Unseen by ISBN: 9780802120205Publication Date: 2012-06-19
In an unnamed Middle Eastern security state, a young Arab-Indian hacker shields his clients--dissidents, outlaws, Islamists, and other watched groups--from surveillance and tries to stay out of trouble. He goes by Alif--the first letter of the Arabic alphabet, and a convenient handle to hide behind.
The aristocratic woman Alif loves has jilted him for a prince chosen by her parents, and his computer has just been breached by the State's electronic security force, putting his clients and his own neck on the line. Then it turns out his love's new fiancé is the head of State security, and his henchmen come after Alif, driving him underground.
When Alif discovers The Thousand and One Days, the secret book of the jinn, which both he and the Hand suspect may unleash a new level of information technology, the stakes are raised and Alif must struggle for life or death, aided by forces seen and unseen.
With shades of Neal Stephenson, Neil Gaiman, Philip Pullman, and The Thousand and One Nights, Alif the Unseen is a tour de force debut--a sophisticated melting pot of ideas, philosophy, religion, technology and spirituality smuggled inside an irresistible page-turner.
Hogfather by ISBN: 9780061050466Publication Date: 1998-11-01
Better watch out ... It's that time of year again. Hogswatchnight. 'Tis the season to be jolly, to hang mistletoe and holly, and other stuff ending in -olly.
'Tis the season when the Hogfather himself dons his red suit and climbs in his sleigh pulled by -- of course -- eight hogs and brings gifts to all the boys and girls of Discworld.
But this year, there's a problem. A stranger has taken the place of the Hogfather. Well, not exactly a stranger. He's actually pretty well known. He carries a scythe along with his bag of toys, and he's going to SLEIGH everyone he sees tonight.
Ho. Ho. Ho.
Somebody has to rescue the real Hogfather before this morbid impostor tracks soot on the world's carpets. It's up to Ankh-Morpork's intellectual elite, the assembled wizards of Unseen University -- with the help of a monster-bashing nanny, the world's worst inventor, plus a bona-fide, honest-to-god god (the oh god of hangovers, to be precise) -- to come up with a plan to save the universe.
And they'd better hurry. The bogus Hogfather is asking the wrong questions. Like: How come rich kids get all the nice toys? How come the poor kids are left with the cheap stuff?
"Thats life," he is told.
Which cuts no ice with Death.
Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency by ISBN: 9780671746728Publication Date: 1987-05-15Author of the cult classic Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy "trilogy." Honored annually on Towel Day (May 25th).
(Honestly, how many authors have their own holiday?)
"A thumping good detective-ghost-horror-whodunnit-time travel-romantic-musical-comedy-epic!"
There is a long tradition of Great Detectives, and Dirk Gently does not belong to it. But his search for a missing cat uncovers a ghost, a time traveler, AND the devastating secret of humankind!
Detective Gently's bill for saving the human race from extinction: NO CHARGE.
Creatures of Light and Darkness by ISBN: 9780061936456Publication Date: 2010-04-13Science Fiction Hall of Fame inductee
Two gods, two houses, one quest, and the eternal war between life and death.
To save his kingdom, Anubis, Lord of the Dead, sends forth his servant on a mission of vengeance. At the same time, from The House of Life, Osiris sends forth his son, Horus, on the same mission to destroy utterly and forever The Prince Who Was a Thousand. But neither of these superhuman warriors is prepared for the strange and harrowing world of mortal life, and The Thing That Cries in the Night may well destroy not only their worlds, but all mankind.
As Zelazny did with the Hindu pantheon in the legendary, groundbreaking classic Lord of Light, the master storyteller here breathes new life into the Egyptian gods with another dazzling tale of mythology and imagination.
Previously Previous Book Club Reads...
The Lathe of Heaven by ISBN: 9781416556961Publication Date: 1971-11-01Living Inductee, Science Fiction Hall of Fame; SFWA Grand Master; World Fantasy Award Life Achievement.
1972 Hugo and Nebula nominee, best novel; 1972 Locus Award winner, best novel.
A classic science fiction novel by one of the greatest writers of the genre, set in a future world where one man's dreams control the fate of humanity.
In a future world racked by violence and environmental catastrophes, George Orr wakes up one day to discover that his dreams have the ability to alter reality. He seeks help from Dr. William Haber, a psychiatrist who immediately grasps the power George wields. Soon George must preserve reality itself as Dr. Haber becomes adept at manipulating George's dreams for his own purposes.
The Lathe of Heaven is an eerily prescient novel from award-winning author Ursula K. Le Guin that masterfully addresses the dangers of power and humanity's self-destructiveness, questioning the nature of reality itself. It is a classic of the science fiction genre.
Mortal Engines by ISBN: 9780060082079Publication Date: 2003-11-01It was a dark, blustery afternoon in spring, and the city of London was chasing a small mining town across the dried-out bed of the old North Sea...
The great traction city London is on the move again. It has been lying low, skulking in the hills to avoid the bigger, faster, hungrier cities loose in the Great Hunting Ground. But now, as its great mountain of metal lumbers along in hot pursuit of its quarry, the sinister plans it has harbored for years can finally start to unfold behind its soaring walls...
Thaddeus Valentine, London's Head Historian and most famous archaeologist, and his daughter, Katherine, are down in The Gut when the young assassin with the black scarf strikes. Only the quick intervention of Tom, a lowly third-class apprentice, prevents Valentine from being stabbed in the heart.
Madly racing after the fleeing girl, Tom suddenly glimpses her hideous face: scarred from forehead to jaw, nose a smashed stump, a single eye glaring back at him. "Look at what your Valentine did to me!" she screams. "Ask him! Ask him what he did to Hester Shaw!" And with that she jumps down the waste chute to her death.
Minutes later, Tom finds himself tumbling down the same chute and stranded in the Out-Country, a sea of mud scored by the huge caterpillar tracks of cities like the one now steaming off over the horizon.
In a stunning literary debut, Philip Reeve has created an unforgettable adventure story set in a dark and utterly original world fueled by Municipal Darwinism -- and betrayal.
The Monstrumologist by ISBN: 9781416984481Publication Date: 2009-09-222010 Printz Honor Award winner
"These are the secrets I have kept. This is the trust I never betrayed. But he is dead now and has been for nearly ninety years, the one who gave me his trust, the one for whom I kept these secrets. The one who saved me . . . and the one who cursed me."
So starts the diary of Will Henry, orphan and assistant to a doctor with a most unusual specialty: monster hunting.
In the short time he has lived with the doctor, Will has grown accustomed to his late night callers and dangerous business. But when one visitor comes with the body of a young girl and the monster that was feeding on her, Will's world is about to change forever. The doctor has discovered a baby Anthropophagi--a headless monster that feeds through the mouthfuls of teeth in its chest--and it signals a growing number of Anthropophagi. Now, Will and the doctor must face the horror threatening to overtake and consume our world before it is too late.
The Monstrumologist is the first stunning gothic adventure in a series that combines the spirit of H. P. Lovecraft with the storytelling ability of Rick Riordan.
Three Parts Dead by ISBN: 9780765333117Publication Date: 2013-07-23Nominated for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer.
A god has died, and it's up to Tara, first-year associate in the international necromantic firm of Kelethres, Albrecht, and Ao, to bring Him back to life before His city falls apart. Her client is Kos, recently deceased fire god of the city of Alt Coulumb. Without Him, the metropolis's steam generators will shut down, its trains will cease running, and its four million citizens will riot.
Tara's job: resurrect Kos before chaos sets in.
Her only help: Abelard, a chain-smoking priest of the dead god, who's having an understandable crisis of faith.
When Tara and Abelard discover that Kos was murdered, they have to make a case in Alt Coulumb's courts-- and their quest for the truth endangers their partnership, their lives, and Alt Coulumb's slim hope of survival.
Set in a phenomenally-built world in which justice is a collective force bestowed on a few, craftsmen fly on lightning bolts, and gargoyles can rule cities, Max Gladstone's THREE PARTS DEAD introduces readers to an ethical landscape in which the line between right and wrong blurs.
Redshirts by ISBN: 9780765334794Publication Date: 2013-01-15Winner of the Hugo and Locus (SF) Awards.
Ensign Andrew Dahl has just been assigned to the Universal Union Capital Ship "Intrepid," flagship of the Universal Union since the year 2456. It's a prestige posting, with the chance to serve on "Away Missions" alongside the starship's famous senior officers. Life couldn't be better...until Andrew begins to realize that:
1) every Away Mission involves a lethal confrontation with alien forces,
2) the ship's senior officers always survive these confrontations, and
3) sadly, at least one low-ranking crew member is invariably killed.
Unsurprisingly, the savvier crew members belowdecks avoid Away Missions at all costs. Then Andrew stumbles on information that transforms his and his colleagues' understanding of what the starship "Intrepid" really is...and offers them a crazy, high-risk chance to save their own lives.
Pandemonium by ISBN: 9780345501165Publication Date: 2008-08-26Nominated for World Fantasy, Shirley Jackson, and Mythopoeic Awards; Winner of the William L. Crawford IAFA Fantasy Award for best first fantasy book.
It is a world like our own in every respect... save one. In the 1950s, random acts of possession begin to occur. Ordinary men, women, and children are the targets of entities that seem to spring from the depths of the collective unconscious, pop-cultural avatars some call demons. There's the Truth, implacable avenger of falsehood. The Captain, brave and self-sacrificing soldier. The Little Angel, whose kiss brings death, whether desired or not. And a string of others, ranging from the bizarre to the benign to the horrific.
As a boy, Del Pierce is possessed by the Hellion, an entity whose mischief-making can be deadly. With the help of Del's family and a caring psychiatrist, the demon is exorcised... or is it? Years later, following a car accident, the Hellion is back, trapped inside Del's head and clamoring to get out. Del's quest for help leads him to Valis, an entity possessing the science fiction writer formerly known as Philip K. Dick; to Mother Mariette, a nun who inspires decidedly unchaste feelings; and to the Human League, a secret society devoted to the extermination of demons. All believe that Del holds the key to the plague of possession-- and its solution. But for Del, the cure may be worse than the disease.
Labyrinths by ISBN: 9780811216999Publication Date: 2007-05-17Jorge Luis Borges was honored with the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement in 1979, for these and other works.
Take a new look at Labyrinths, the classic by Latin America's finest writer of the twentieth century-- a true literary sensation-- with cyber-author William Gibson. The groundbreaking trans-genre work of Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986) has been insinuating itself into the structure, stance, and very breath of world literature for well over half a century. Multi-layered, self-referential, elusive, and allusive writing is now frequently labeled Borgesian. Umberto Eco's international bestseller, The Name of the Rose, is, on one level, an elaborate improvisation on Borges' fiction "The Library," which American readers first encountered in the original 1962 New Directions publication of Labyrinths.
This new edition of Labyrinths, the classic representative selection of Borges' writing edited by Donald A. Yates and James E. Irby (in translations by themselves and others), includes the text of the original edition (as augmented in 1964) as well as Irby's biographical and critical essay, a poignant tribute by Andre Maurois, and a chronology of the author's life. Borges enthusiast William Gibson has contributed a new introduction bringing Borges' influence and importance into the twenty-first century.
Doomsday Book by ISBN: 9780553562736Publication Date: 1993-08-01Winner of the 1993 Hugo, Nebula, and Locus Awards for best novel.
For Kivrin, preparing an on-site study of one of the deadliest eras in humanity's history was as simple as receiving inoculations against the diseases of the fourteenth century and inventing an alibi for a woman traveling alone. For her instructors in the twenty-first century, it meant painstaking calculations and careful monitoring of the rendezvous location where Kivrin would be received.
But a crisis strangely linking past and future strands Kivrin in a bygone age as her fellows try desperately to rescue her. In a time of superstition and fear, Kivrin -- barely of age herself -- finds she has become an unlikely angel of hope during one of history's darkest hours.
Five years in the writing by one of science fiction's most honored authors, Doomsday Book is a storytelling triumph. Connie Willis draws upon her understanding of the universalities of human nature to explore the ageless issues of evil, suffering and the indomitable will of the human spirit.
After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall by ISBN: 9781616960650Publication Date: 2012-04-012012 Nebula Award Winner - 2012 Locus Award Winner - 2013 Hugo Nominee - 2013 Sturgeon Award Nominee
The year is 2035. After ecological disasters nearly destroyed the Earth, 26 survivors-- the last of humanity-- are trapped by an alien race in a sterile enclosure known as the Shell. Fifteen-year-old Pete is one of the Six-- children who were born deformed or sterile and raised in the Shell. As, one by one, the survivors grow sick and die, Pete and the Six struggle to put aside their anger at the alien Tesslies in order to find the means to rebuild the earth together. Their only hope lies within brief time-portals into the recent past, where they bring back children to replenish their disappearing gene pool.
Meanwhile, in 2013, brilliant mathematician Julie Kahn works with the FBI to solve a series of inexplicable kidnappings. Suddenly her predictive algorithms begin to reveal more than just criminal activity. As she begins to realize her role in the impending catastrophe, simultaneously affecting the Earth and the Shell, Julie closes in on the truth. She and Pete are converging in time upon the future of humanity-- a future which might never unfold. Weaving three consecutive time lines to unravel both the mystery of the Earth's destruction and the key to its salvation, this taut adventure offers a topical message with a satisfying twist.
A Monster Calls by ISBN: 9780763655594Publication Date: 2011-09-15An unflinching, darkly funny, and deeply moving story of a boy, his seriously ill mother, and an unexpected monstrous visitor. At seven minutes past midnight, thirteen-year-old Conor wakes to find a monster outside his bedroom window. But it isn't the monster Conor's been expecting-- he's been expecting the one from his nightmare, the nightmare he's had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments. The monster in his backyard is different. It's ancient. And wild. And it wants something from Conor. Something terrible and dangerous. It wants the truth. From the final idea of award-winning author Siobhan Dowd-- whose premature death from cancer prevented her from writing it herself-- Patrick Ness has spun a haunting and darkly funny novel of mischief, loss, and monsters both real and imagined.
Among Others by ISBN: 9780765321534Publication Date: 2011-01-18Winner of the 2011 Nebula Award for Best Novel Winner of the 2012 Hugo Award for Best Novel Startling, unusual, and yet irresistably readable, Among Others is at once the compelling story of a young woman struggling to escape a troubled childhood, a brilliant diary of first encounters with the great novels of modern fantasy and SF, and a spellbinding tale of escape from ancient enchantment. Raised by a half-mad mother who dabbled in magic, Morwenna Phelps found refuge in two worlds. As a child growing up in Wales, she played among the spirits who made their homes in industrial ruins. But her mind found freedom and promise in the science fiction novels that were her closest companions. Then her mother tried to bend the spirits to dark ends, and Mori was forced to confront her in a magical battle that left her crippled--and her twin sister dead. Fleeing to her father whom she barely knew, Mori was sent to boarding school in England–a place all but devoid of true magic. There, outcast and alone, she tempted fate by doing magic herself, in an attempt to find a circle of like-minded friends. But her magic also drew the attention of her mother, bringing about a reckoning that could no longer be put off. Combining elements of autobiography with flights of imagination in the manner of novels like Jonathan Lethem's The Fortress of Solitude, this is potentially a breakout book for an author whose genius has already been hailed by peers like Kelly Link, Sarah Weinman, and Ursula K. Le Guin. One of School Library Journal's Best Adult Books 4 Teens titles of 2011. One of io9's best Science Fiction & Fantasy books of the year 2011
Ghostlight by ISBN: 0312858817Publication Date: 1995-08-01In this contemporary fantasy, parapsychologist Truth Jourdemayne researches the life of her father, the leader of an occult group, & visits a 19th-century estate, Shadow's Gate, where she makes discoveries about her family, the death of her mother during an occult ritual nearly 30 years ago, & ghosts of the past, while trying to elude evil spirits of the present.
Childhood's End by ISBN: 0345444051Publication Date: 2001-07-03The Overlords appeared suddenly over every city--intellectually, technologically, and militarily superior to humankind. Benevolent, they made few demands: unify earth, eliminate poverty, and end war. With little rebellion, humankind agreed, and a golden age began. But at what cost? With the advent of peace, man ceases to strive for creative greatness, and a malaise settles over the human race. To those who resist, it becomes evident that the Overlords have an agenda of their own. As civilization approaches the crossroads, will the Overlords spell the end for humankind . . . or the beginning?
World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by ISBN: 9780307346612Publication Date: 2007-10-16NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE The Zombie War came unthinkably close to eradicating humanity. Max Brooks, driven by the urgency of preserving the acid-etched first-hand experiences of the survivors from those apocalyptic years, traveled across the United States of America and throughout the world, from decimated cities that once teemed with upwards of thirty million souls to the most remote and inhospitable areas of the planet. He recorded the testimony of men, women, and sometimes children who came face-to-face with the living, or at least the undead, hell of that dreadful time. "World War Z" is the result. Never before have we had access to a document that so powerfully conveys the depth of fear and horror, and also the ineradicable spirit of resistance, that gripped human society through the plague years. Ranging from the now infamous village of New Dachang in the United Federation of China, where the epidemiological trail began with the twelve-year-old Patient Zero, to the unnamed northern forests where untold numbers sought a terrible and temporary refuge in the cold, to the United States of Southern Africa, where the Redeker Plan provided hope for humanity at an unspeakable price, to the west-of-the-Rockies redoubt where the North American tide finally started to turn, this invaluable chronicle reflects the full scope and duration of the Zombie War. Most of all, the book captures with haunting immediacy the human dimension of this epochal event. Facing the often raw and vivid nature of these personal accounts requires a degree of courage on the part of the reader, but the effort is invaluable because, as Mr. Brooks says in his introduction, "By excluding the human factor, aren't we risking the kind of personal detachment from history that may, heaven forbid, lead us one day to repeat it? And in the end, isn't the human factor the only true difference between us and the enemy we now refer to as 'the living dead'?" Note: Some of the numerical and factual material contained in this edition was previously published under the auspices of the United Nations Postwar Commission. Eyewitness reports from the first truly global war "I found 'Patient Zero' behind the locked door of an abandoned apartment across town. . . . His wrists and feet were bound with plastic packing twine. Although he'd rubbed off the skin around his bonds, there was no blood. There was also no blood on his other wounds. . . . He was writhing like an animal; a gag muffled his growls. At first the villagers tried to hold me back. They warned me not to touch him, that he was 'cursed.' I shrugged them off and reached for my mask and gloves. The boy's skin was . . . cold and gray . . . I could find neither his heartbeat nor his pulse." --Dr. Kwang Jingshu, Greater Chongqing, United Federation of China "'Shock and Awe'? Perfect name. . . . But what if the enemy can't be shocked and awed? Not just won't, but biologically can't That's what happened that day outside New York City, that's the failure that almost lost us the whole damn war. The fact that we couldn't shock and awe Zack boomeranged right back in our faces and actually allowed Zack to shock and awe us They're not afraid No matter what we do, no matter how many we kill, they will never, ever be afraid " --Todd Wainio, former U.S. Army infantryman and veteran of the Battle of Yonkers "Two hundred million zombies. Who can even visualize that type of number, let alone combat it? . . . For the first time in history, we faced an enemy that was actively waging total war. They had no limits of endurance. They would never negotiate, never surrender. They would fight until the very end because, unlike us, every single one of them, every second of every day, was devoted to consuming all life on Earth." --General Travis D'Ambrosia, Supreme Allied Commander, Europe
Deathless by ISBN: 9780765326300Publication Date: 2011-03-29Koschei the Deathless is to Russian folklore what devils or wicked witches are to European culture: a menacing, evil figure; the villain of countless stories which have been passed on through story and text for generations. But Koschei has never before been seen through the eyes of Catherynne Valente, whose modernized and transformed take on the legend brings the action to modern times, spanning many of the great developments of Russian history in the twentieth century. Deathless, however, is no dry, historical tome: it lights up like fire as the young Marya Morevna transforms from a clever child of the revolution, to Koschei’s beautiful bride, to his eventual undoing. Along the way there are Stalinist house elves, magical quests, secrecy and bureaucracy, and games of lust and power. All told, Deathless is a collision of magical history and actual history, of revolution and mythology, of love and death, which will bring Russian myth back to life in a stunning new incarnation.
Shades of Grey by ISBN: 9780670019632Publication Date: 2009-12-29An astonishing, hotly anticipated new novel from the great literary fantasist and creator of Thursday Next, Jasper Fforde. As long as anyone can remember, society has been ruled by a Colortocracy. From the underground feedpipes that keep the municipal park green to the healing hues viewed to cure illness to a social hierarchy based upon one's limited color perception, society is dominated by color. In this world, you are what you can see. Young Eddie Russett has no ambition to be anything other than a loyal drone of the Collective. With his better-than-average red perception, he could well marry Constance Oxblood and inherit the string works; he may even have enough red perception to make prefect. For Eddie, life looks colorful. Life looks good. But everything changes when he moves with his father, a respected swatchman, to East Carmine. There, he falls in love with a Grey named Jane who opens his eyes to the painful truth behind his seemingly perfect, rigidly controlled society. Curiosity--a dangerous trait to display in a society that demands total conformity--gets the better of Eddie, who beings to wonder: Why are there not enough spoons to go around? Why is everything--and everyone--barcoded? What happened to all the people who never returned from High Saffron? And why, when you begin to question the world around you, do black-and-white certainties reduce themselves to shades of grey? Part satire, part romance, part revolutionary thriller, this is the new world from the creative and comic genius of Jasper Fforde.
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter by ISBN: 0446563072Publication Date: 2011-04-19Indiana, 1818. Moonlight falls through the dense woods that surround a one-room cabin, where a nine-year-old Abraham Lincoln kneels at his suffering mother's bedside. She's been stricken with something the old-timers call "Milk Sickness." "My baby boy..." she whispers before dying. Only later will the grieving Abe learn that his mother's fatal affliction was actually the work of a vampire. When the truth becomes known to young Lincoln, he writes in his journal, "henceforth my life shall be one of rigorous study and devotion. I shall become a master of mind and body. And this mastery shall have but one purpose..." Gifted with his legendary height, strength, and skill with an ax, Abe sets out on a path of vengeance that will lead him all the way to the White House. While Abraham Lincoln is widely lauded for saving a Union and freeing millions of slaves, his valiant fight against the forces of the undead has remained in the shadows for hundreds of years. That is, until Seth Grahame-Smith stumbled upon The Secret Journal of Abraham Lincoln, and became the first living person to lay eyes on it in more than 140 years. Using the journal as his guide and writing in the grand biographical style of Doris Kearns Goodwin and David McCullough, Seth has reconstructed the true life story of our greatest president for the first time-all while revealing the hidden history behind the Civil War and uncovering the role vampires played in the birth, growth, and near-death of our nation.
Cat's Cradle by ISBN: 038533348XPublication Date: 1998-09-08Cat's Cradle is Kurt Vonnegut's satirical commentary on modern man and his madness. An apocalyptic tale of this planet's ultimate fate, it features a midget as the protagonist, a complete, original theology created by a calypso singer, and a vision of the future that is at once blackly fatalistic and hilariously funny. A book that left an indelible mark on an entire generation of readers, Cat's Cradle is one of the twentieth century's most important works-- and Vonnegut at his very best.
The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories by ISBN: 0141182342Publication Date: 1999-10-01Frequently imitated and widely influential, H. P. Lovecraft reinvented the horror genre for the twentieth century. Discarding witches and ghosts, he envisaged mankind as an outpost of dwindling sanity in a chaotic and malevolent universe. S. T. Joshi makes his selection from the early tales of nightmares and madness to the overpowering cosmic terror of 'The Call of Cthulhu'. This is the first paperback edition to include the definitive corrected texts of these classics of American fantasy fiction.
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by ISBN: 0060234814Publication Date: 2007-08-14A beautiful hardcover edition of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, book two in C. S. Lewis's classic fantasy series, The Chronicles of Narnia. The full-color jacket features art by three time Caldecott Medal-winning illustrator David Wiesner, and interior black-and-white illustrations by Pauline Baynes, the original illustrator of Narnia. Four adventurous siblings--Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie--step through a wardrobe door and into the land of Narnia, a land frozen in eternal winter and enslaved by the power of the White Witch. But when almost all hope is lost, the return of the Great Lion, Aslan, signals a great change . . . and a great sacrifice. Journey into the land beyond the wardrobe The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is the second book in C. S. Lewis's classic fantasy series, which has been captivating readers of all ages for over sixty years. This is a stand-alone novel, but if you would like journey back to Narnia, read The Horse and His Boy, the third book in The Chronicles of Narnia. Supports the Common Core State Standards.
A Discovery of Witches by ISBN: 9780670022410Publication Date: 2011-02-08A richly inventive novel about a centuries-old vampire, a spellbound witch, and the mysterious manuscript that draws them together. Deep in the stacks of Oxford's Bodleian Library, young scholar, Diana Bishop, unwittingly calls up a bewitched alchemical manuscript in the course of her research. Descended from an old and distinguished line of witches, Diana wants nothing to do with sorcery; so after a furtive glance and a few notes, she banishes the book to the stacks. But her discovery sets a fantastical underworld stirring, and a horde of daemons, witches, and vampires soon descends upon the library. Diana has stumbled upon a coveted treasure lost for centuries-and she is the only creature who can break its spell. Debut novelist Deborah Harkness has crafted a mesmerizing and addictive read, equal parts history and magic, romance and suspense. Diana is a bold heroine who meets her equal in vampire geneticist Matthew Clairmont, and gradually warms up to him as their alliance deepens into an intimacy that violates age-old taboos. This smart, sophisticated story harks back to the novels of Anne Rice, but it is as contemporary and sensual as the Twilight series-with an extra serving of historical realism.
I Am Legend by ISBN: 031286504XPublication Date: 1997-09-15Robert Neville is the last living man on Earth... but he is not alone. Every other man, woman, and child on Earth has become a vampire, and they are all hungry for Neville's blood.By day, he is the hunter, stalking the sleeping undead through the abandoned ruins of civilization. By night, he barricades himself in his home and prays for dawn.How long can one man survive in a world of vampires?
Contact by ISBN: 0780778979Publication Date: 1997-07-01The future is here...in an adventure of cosmic dimension.In December, 1999, a multinational team journeys out to the stars, to the most awesome encounter in human history. Who -- or what -- is out there? In "Cosmos," Carl Sagan explained the universe. In "Contact," he predicts its future -- and our own.
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by ISBN: 0679751521Publication Date: 1999-06-28Shots rang out in Savannah's grandest mansion in the misty,early morning hours of May 2, 1981. Was it murder or self-defense? For nearly a decade, the shooting and its aftermath reverberated throughout this hauntingly beautiful city of moss-hung oaks and shaded squares.
John Berendt's sharply observed, suspenseful, and witty narrative reads like a thoroughly engrossing novel, and yet it is a work of nonfiction. Berendt skillfully interweaves a hugely entertaining first-person account of life in this isolated remnant of the Old South with the unpredictable twists and turns of a landmark murder case.
It is a spellbinding story peopled by a gallery of remarkable characters: the well-bred society ladies of the Married Woman's Card Club; the turbulent young redneck gigolo; the hapless recluse who owns a bottle of poison so powerful it could kill every man, woman, and child in Savannah; the aging and profane Southern belle who is the "soul of pampered self-absorption"; the uproariously funny black drag queen; the acerbic and arrogant antiques dealer; the sweet-talking, piano-playing con artist; young blacks dancing the minuet at the black debutante ball; and Minerva, the voodoo priestess who works her magic in the graveyard at midnight. These and other Savannahians act as a Greek chorus, with Berendt revealing the alliances, hostilities, and intrigues that thrive in a town where everyone knows everyone else.
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil: A Savannah Story is a sublime and seductive reading experience. Brilliantly conceived and masterfully written, this enormously engaging portrait of a most beguiling Southern city is certain to become a modern classic.
Physics of the Impossible by ISBN: 9780385520690Publication Date: 2008-03-11A fascinating exploration of the science of the impossible,from death rays and force fields to invisibility cloaks, revealing to what extent such technologies might be achievable decades or millennia into the future. One hundred years ago, scientists would have said that lasers, televisions, and the atomic bomb were beyond the realm of physical possibility. In Physics of the Impossible, the renowned physicist Michio Kaku explores to what extent the technologies and devices of science fiction that are deemed equally impossible today might well become commonplace in the future. From teleportation to telekinesis, Kaku uses the world of science fiction to explore the fundamentals-- and the limits-- of the laws of physics as we know them today. He ranks the impossible technologies by categories-- Class I, II, and III, depending on when they might be achieved, within the next century, millennium, or perhaps never.
An extraordinary scientific adventure, Physics of the Impossible takes readers on an unforgettable, mesmerizing journey into the world of science that both enlightens and entertains.
Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife by ISBN: 0393059626Publication Date: 2005-09-17The best-selling author ofStiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadaversnow trains her considerable wit and curiosity on the human soul. What happens when we die? Does the light just go out and that's that—the million-year nap? Or will some part of my personality, my me-ness persist? What will that feel like? What will I do all day? Is there a place to plug in my lap-top?" In an attempt to find out, Mary Roach brings her tireless curiosity to bear on an array of contemporary and historical soul-searchers: scientists, schemers, engineers, mediums, all trying to prove (or disprove) that life goes on after we die. She begins the journey in rural India with a reincarnation researcher and ends up in a University of Virginia operating room where cardiologists have installed equipment near the ceiling to study out-of-body near-death experiences. Along the way, she enrolls in an English medium school, gets electromagnetically haunted at a university in Ontario, and visits a Duke University professor with a plan to weigh the consciousness of a leech. Her historical wanderings unearth soul-seeking philosophers who rummaged through cadavers and calves' heads, a North Carolina lawsuit that established legal precedence for ghosts, and the last surviving sample of "ectoplasm" in a Cambridge University archive.
The Night Circus by ISBN: 0385534639Publication Date: 2011-09-13The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called Cirque des Rêves and it is only open at night. But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway - a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love - a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands. True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus performers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead. Written in rich, seductive prose, this spell-casting novel is a feast for the senses and the heart.
Perfume by ISBN: 0375725849Publication Date: 2001-02-13An acclaimed bestseller and international sensation, Patrick Suskind's classic novel provokes a terrifying examination of what happens when one man's indulgence in his greatest passion—his sense of smell—leads to murder.
In the slums of eighteenth-century France, the infant Jean-Baptiste Grenouille is born with one sublime gift-an absolute sense of smell. As a boy, he lives to decipher the odors of Paris, and apprentices himself to a prominent perfumer who teaches him the ancient art of mixing precious oils and herbs. But Grenouille's genius is such that he is not satisfied to stop there, and he becomes obsessed with capturing the smells of objects such as brass doorknobs and frest-cut wood. Then one day he catches a hint of a scent that will drive him on an ever-more-terrifying quest to create the "ultimate perfume"—the scent of a beautiful young virgin. Told with dazzling narrative brillance,Perfumeis a hauntingly powerful tale of murder and sensual depravity.
Translated from the German by John E. Woods.
The Children of Men by ISBN: 0307275434Publication Date: 2006-05-16Told with P. D. James's trademark suspense, insightful characterization, and riveting storytelling,The Children of Menis a story of a world with no children and no future. The human race has become infertile, and the last generation to be born is now adult. Civilization itself is crumbling as suicide and despair become commonplace. Oxford historian Theodore Faron, apathetic toward a future without a future, spends most of his time reminiscing. Then he is approached by Julian, a bright, attractive woman who wants him to help get her an audience with his cousin, the powerful Warden of England. She and her band of unlikely revolutionaries may just awaken his desire to live . . . and they may also hold the key to survival for the human race.
Interview with the Vampire by ISBN: 0345409647Publication Date: 1997-03-18International standard book number used for this book also used for earlier editions.
The Hobbit by ISBN: 0618968636Publication Date: 2007-09-21This deluxe hardcover edition of J.R.R. Tolkien's classic prelude to hisLord of the Ringstrilogy contains a short introduction by Christopher Tolkien, a reset text incorporating the most up-to-date corrections, and all of Tolkien’s own drawings and full-color illustrations, including the rare “Mirkwood” piece.
J.R.R. Tolkien's own description for the original edition: "If you care for journeys there and back, out of the comfortable Western world, over the edge of the Wild, and home again, and can take an interest in a humble hero (blessed with a little wisdom and a little courage and considerable good luck), here is a record of such a journey and such a traveler. The period is the ancient time between the age of Faerie and the dominion of men, when the famous forest of Mirkwood was still standing, and the mountains were full of danger. In following the path of this humble adventurer, you will learn by the way (as he did) -- if you do not already know all about these things -- much about trolls, goblins, dwarves, and elves, and get some glimpses into the history and politics of a neglected but important period. For Mr. Bilbo Baggins visited various notable persons; conversed with the dragon, Smaug the Magnificent; and was present, rather unwillingly, at the Battle of the Five Armies. This is all the more remarkable, since he was a hobbit. Hobbits have hitherto been passed over in history and legend, perhaps because they as a rule preferred comfort to excitement. But this account, based on his personal memoirs, of the one exciting year in the otherwise quiet life of Mr. Baggins will give you a fair idea of the estimable people now (it is said) becoming rather rare. They do not like noise."
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by ISBN: 0345404475Publication Date: 1996-05-28"The most consistently brilliant science fiction writer in the world."
--John Brunner
THE INSPIRATION FOR BLADERUNNER. . .
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? was published in 1968. Grim and foreboding, even today it is a masterpiece ahead of its time.
By 2021, the World War had killed millions, driving entire species into extinction and sending mankind off-planet. Those who remained coveted any living creature, and for people who couldn't afford one, companies built incredibly realistic simulacrae: horses, birds, cats, sheep. . . They even built humans.
Emigres to Mars received androids so sophisticated it was impossible to tell them from true men or women. Fearful of the havoc these artificial humans could wreak, the government banned them from Earth. But when androids didn't want to be identified, they just blended in.
Rick Deckard was an officially sanctioned bounty hunter whose job was to find rogue androids, and to retire them. But cornered, androids tended to fight back, with deadly results.
"[Dick] sees all the sparkling and terrifying possibilities. . . that other authors shy away from."
--Paul Williams, Rolling Stone
Boneshaker by ISBN: 9780765318411Publication Date: 2009-09-29In the early days of the Civil War, rumors of gold in the frozen Klondike brought hordes of newcomers to the Pacific Northwest. Anxious to compete, Russian prospectors commissioned inventor Leviticus Blue to create a great machine that could mine through Alaska's ice. Thus was Dr. Blue's Incredible Bone-Shaking Drill Engine born.
But on its first test run the Boneshaker went terribly awry, destroying several blocks of downtown Seattle and unearthing a subterranean vein of blight gas that turned anyone who breathed it into the living dead.
Now it is sixteen years later, and a wall has been built to enclose the devastated and toxic city. Just beyond it lives Blue's widow, Briar Wilkes. Life is hard with a ruined reputation and a teenaged boy to support, but she and Ezekiel are managing. Until Ezekiel undertakes a secret crusade to rewrite history.
His quest will take him under the wall and into a city teeming with ravenous undead, air pirates, criminal overlords, and heavily armed refugees. And only Briar can bring him out alive.
The Haunting of Hill House by ISBN: 0143039989Publication Date: 2006-11-28The classic supernatural thriller by an author who helped define the genre First published in 1959, Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill Househas been hailed as a perfect work of unnerving terror. It is the story of four seekers who arrive at a notoriously unfriendly pile called Hill House: Dr. Montague, an occult scholar looking for solid evidence of a "haunting"; Theodora, his lighthearted assistant; Eleanor, a friendless, fragile young woman well acquainted with poltergeists; and Luke, the future heir of Hill House. At first, their stay seems destined to be merely a spooky encounter with inexplicable phenomena. But Hill House is gathering its powers-and soon it will choose one of them to make its own.
The Ladies of Grace Adieu by ISBN: 9781596912519Publication Date: 2006-10-17Following the enormous success of 2004 bestseller and critics’ favoriteJonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, Susanna Clarke delivers a delicious collection of ten stories set in the same fairy-crossed world of 19th-century England. With Clarke’s characteristic historical detail and diction, these dark, enchanting tales unfold in a slightly distorted version of our own world, where people are bedeviled by mischievous interventions from the fairies. With appearances from beloved characters from her novel, including Jonathan Strange and Childermass, and an entirely new spin on certain historical figures, including Mary, Queen of Scots, this is a must-have for fans of Susanna Clarke and an enticing introduction to her work for new listeners.
Watchmen by ISBN: 0930289234Publication Date: 1995-04-01A New York Times Best Seller! This Hugo Award-winning graphic novel chronicles the fall from grace of a group of super-heroes plagued by all-too-human failings. Along the way, the concept of the super-hero is dissected as the heroes are stalked by an unknown assassin. One of the most influential graphic novels of all time and a perennial bestseller, WATCHMEN has been studied on college campuses across the nation and is considered a gateway title, leading readers to other graphic novels such as V FOR VENDETTA, BATMAN: THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS and THE SANDMAN series.
The Sandman, v. 1: Preludes and Nocturnes by ISBN: 1563890119Publication Date: 1993-12-07The Sandman is the most acclaimed and award-winning comics series of the 1990s for good reason: a smart and deeply brooding epic, elegantly penned by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by a rotating cast of comics' most sought-after artists, it is a rich blend of modern myth and dark fantasy in which contemporary fiction, historical drama, and legend are seamlessly interwoven. The saga of The Sandman encompasses a series of tales unique in graphic literature and is a story you will never forget. Preludes and Nocturnes introduces readers to a dark and enchanting world of dreams and nightmares-the home of The Sandman, Master of Dreams, and his kin, The Endless. This first collection of Neil Gaiman's multi-award-winning title introduces key themes and characters, combining myth, magic, and black humor. Preludes and Nocturnes is the first volume of eleven in The Sandman Library. These books can be read in order or as individual volumes.
The Nobody by ISBN: 9781401220808Publication Date: 2009-07-07The tiny, isolated fising village of Large Mouth never saw much excitement -- until the arrival of the stranger, that is. Wrapped from head to toe in bandages and wearing weird goggles, he quietly took up residence in the sleepy town's motel. Driven by curiousity, the townfolk quickly learn the tragic story of his past, and of the terrible accident that left him horribly disfigured. Eventually, the town embraces the stranger as one of their own -- but do his bandages hide more than just scars?
The Picture of Dorian Gray by ISBN: 1593080255Publication Date: 2003-05-01The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde, is part of the Barnes & Noble Classics series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of Barnes & Noble Classics: New introductions commissioned from today's top writers and scholars Biographies of the authors Chronologies of contemporary historical, biographical, and cultural events Footnotes and endnotes Selective discussions of imitations, parodies, poems, books, plays, paintings, operas, statuary, and films inspired by the work Comments by other famous authors Study questions to challenge the reader's viewpoints and expectations Bibliographies for further reading Indices & Glossaries, when appropriate All editions are beautifully designed and are printed to superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest. Barnes & Noble Classics pulls together a constellation of influences#151;biographical, historical, and literary#151;to enrich each reader's understanding of these enduring works. Oscar Wilde brings his enormous gifts for astute social observation and sparkling prose to The Picture of Dorian Gray, his dreamlike story of a young man who sells his soul for eternal youth and beauty. This dandy, who remains forever unchanged#151;petulant, hedonistic, vain, and amoral#151;while a painting of him ages and grows increasingly hideous with the years, has been horrifying, enchanting, obsessing, even corrupting readers for more than a hundred years. Taking the reader in and out of London drawing rooms, to the heights of aestheticism, and to the depths of decadence, The Picture of Dorian Gray is not only a melodrama about moral corruption. Laced with bon mots and vivid depictions of upper-class refinement, it is also a fascinating look at the milieu of Wilde’s fin-de-siècle world and a manifesto of the creed #147;Art for Art’s Sake.” The ever-quotable Wilde, who once delighted London with his scintillating plays, scandalized readers with this, his only novel. Upon publication, Dorian was condemned as dangerous, poisonous, stupid, vulgar, and immoral, and Wilde as a #147;driveling pedant.” The novel, in fact, was used against Wilde at his much-publicized trials for #147;gross indecency,” which led to his imprisonment and exile on the European continent. Even so, The Picture of Dorian Gray firmly established Wilde as one of the great voices of the Aesthetic movement, and endures as a classic that is as timeless as its hero. Camille Cauti, Ph.D., is an editor and literary critic who lives in New York City. She is a specialist in the Catholic conversion trend among members of the avant-garde in London in the 1890s.
Frankenstein by ISBN: 0486282112Publication Date: 1994-10-21Few creatures of horror have seized readers' imaginations and held them for so long as the anguished monster of Shelley'sFrankenstein. The story of Victor Frankenstein's monstrous creation and the havoc it caused has enthralled generations of readers and inspired countless writers of horror and suspense. Includes the author's own 1831 introduction.
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Call Number: Horror StevensonISBN: 0679734767Publication Date: 1991-05-07Robert Louis Stevenson’s thrilling tale of the mild-mannered Dr. Jekyll and his evil double, Mr. Hyde, is one of the most famous horror stories in English literature. It is also a profound and fascinating fable of the divided self that continues to seize readers’ imaginations. This story of a misguided genius who brings hisdoppelgängerto life brilliantly dramatizes inner conflict and the capacity for violence and evil in every soul. An instant sensation on its first publication in 1886, Stevenson’s spine-chilling novella has given rise to countless adaptations on stage and screen over the past century, but none can match the power and dark complexity of the original.
The Thief of Always by ISBN: 0060177241Publication Date: 1992-11-01An eerie tale about young Harvey and the seductive Mr. Hood's Holiday House, which may or may not be every child's dream. Awards: BL Editors' Choice.
Ender's Game by ISBN: 0312853238Publication Date: 1992-08-15Winner of the Hugo and Nebula Awards
In order to develop a secure defense against a hostile alien race's next attack, government agencies breed child geniuses and train them as soldiers. A brilliant young boy, Andrew "Ender" Wiggin lives with his kind but distant parents, his sadistic brother Peter, and the person he loves more than anyone else, his sister Valentine. Peter and Valentine were candidates for the soldier-training program but didn't make the cut--young Ender is the Wiggin drafted to the orbiting Battle School for rigorous military training.
Ender's skills make him a leader in school and respected in the Battle Room, where children play at mock battles in zero gravity. Yet growing up in an artificial community of young soldiers Ender suffers greatly from isolation, rivalry from his peers, pressure from the adult teachers, and an unsettling fear of the alien invaders. His psychological battles include loneliness, fear that he is becoming like the cruel brother he remembers, and fanning the flames of devotion to his beloved sister.
Is Ender the general Earth needs? But Ender is not the only result of the genetic experiments. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway for almost as long. Ender's two older siblings are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. Between the three of them lie the abilities to remake a world. If, that is, the world survives.
Dark Lord of Derkholm by Call Number: Young Adult Fiction WynneISBN: 0064473368Publication Date: 2001-04-10Mr. Chesney operates Pilgrim Parties, a tour group that takes paying participants into an outer realm where the inhabitants play frightening and foreboding roles. The time has come to end the staged madness . . . but can it really be stopped? Master storyteller Diana Wynne Jones serves up twists and turns, introduces Querida, Derk, Blade, and Shona and a remarkable cast of wizards, soldiers, kings, dragons, and griffins, and mixes in a lively dash of humor. With all the ingredients of high fantasy, this unforgettable novel will delight fans old and new.
Sphere by ISBN: 0345418972Publication Date: 1997-06-23"A page-turner...Chichton's writing is cinematic, with powerful visual images and nonstop action. This book should come with hot buttered popcorn." NEWSWEEK A group of American scientists are rushed to a huge vessel that has been discovered resting on the ocean floor in the middle of the South Pacific. What they find defines their imaginations and mocks their attempts at logical explanation. It is a spaceship of phenomenal dimensions, apparently, undamaged by its fall from the sky. And, most startling, it appears to be at least three hundred years old.... "The suspense is real." THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW From the Paperback edition.
'Salem's Lot by Call Number: Horror KingISBN: 067103975XPublication Date: 2000-10-01Published a year after his stunning debut novel, Carrie, 'Salem's Lot firmly cemented Stephen King's name in the literary lexicon of great American storytellers. His rich and finely crafted tale of a mundane New England town under siege by the forces of darkness is both a homage to Bram Stoker's classic Dracula and an allegory of our post-Vietnam society. Considered one of the most terrifying vampire novels ever written, it cunningly probes the shadows of the human heart -- and the insular evils of small-town America.
The Princess Bride by ISBN: 0345418263Publication Date: 2003-07-15In this 30th anniversary edition, Goldman frames the famous fairy tale with an "autobiographical" story; his father had abridged the book as he read it to his son. Now, Goldman is publishing an abridged version, interspersed with comments on the parts that had been cut out.
American Gods by ISBN: 0380973650All Shadow wants is to get out of prison and go home to his wife. Three days before his release, she dies in car accident. On his way to her funeral, he is waylaid by a strange man who calls himself Wednesday. What follows is an adventure unlike any other.
Perdido Street Station by ISBN: 0345443020The progenitor of the 'new weird', Mieville is always doing something unique. Perdido is the perfect blend of fantasy, science fiction and horror. Following along a half-dozen plotlines, the characters struggle with moral quandaries, corrupt politicians and the laws of nature.
"All the Troubles in the World" from The Best Science Fiction of Isaac Asmiov by ISBN: 0385197829Multivac, the gigantic computer that controls the entire world and can even predict the probabilities of potential crimes before they happen, suddenly announces that someone is plotting to destroy Multivac.
