Literary Science Fiction

This fierce and beautiful story charts the histories of two women: Rae, young, unmarried, and far from home, awaits the birth of her first child. Lila, a fortune-teller with no interest in the future, lost her own daughter more than a quarter of a century earlier in New York. When these two women meet in Southern California, it's earthquake weather - the time when unexpected things happen.

Like Kafka's The Castle, Invitation to a Beheading embodies a vision of a bizarre and irrational world. In an unnamed dream country, the young man Cincinnatus C. is condemned to death by beheading for "gnostical turpitude", an imaginary crime that defies definition.

The Clone Wars have exploded across the galaxy as Republic forces and Separatists struggle to gain the upper hand. But while the Jedi generals work tirelessly to defeat Count Dooku and his rebels, Supreme Chancellor Palpatine is hatching his own dark plans. The Separatists have launched a sneak...

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.

This is the era of Luke Skywalker’s legacy: the Jedi Master has unified the order into a cohesive group of powerful Jedi Knights. But as the new era begins, planetary interests threaten to disrupt this time of relative peace, and Luke is plagued with visions of an approaching darkness. Evil is...

Forty years after the Battle of Yavin a dangerous new era in the Star Wars epic begins–the revelations are shocking, the stakes desperate, and the enemy everywhere. As civil war threatens the unity of the Galactic Alliance, Han and Leia Solo have enraged their families and the Jedi by joining...

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the author of Star Wars: Lost Stars comes a thrilling novel set in the years before the events of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. “Unmissable . . . Bloodline’s tense politics, vivid new characters, and perfectly characterized Leia make it feel as central to...

In the wake of the king's death, war has come to Vordan. The deputies-general have precarious control of the city, but it is led by a zealot who sees traitors in every shadow. Executions have become a grim public spectacle. The new queen, Raesinia Orboan, finds herself nearly powerless as the government tightens its grip and assassins threaten her life. But she did not help free the country from one sort of tyranny to see it fall into another. Placing her trust with steadfast soldier, Marcus D'Ivoire, she sets out to turn the tide of history.

For centuries, the extremely powerful and ruthless vampire witches of the European Council have wandered the Earth, controlling governments, fostering war, creating political conflict, and often leaving absolute destruction in their wake. One of the strongest of them is set to create some havoc in the city of New Orleans, and it's definitely personal.

One treat a day! A 23-volume series of 365 treats: stories, facts, questions and answers, and science experiments for young listeners.

The brave pilots of Rogue Squadron face the impossible as the sinister Ysanne Isard wreaks havoc on a fragile Coruscant. The Rebels have taken the Imperial headquarters world of Coruscant, but their problems are far from over. A killer virus called Krytos is spreading among the population and...

This is the second official tie-in novel to the hugely successful God of War series of video games, set in the rich and thrilling world of Greek mythology. In this sequel, Kratos, the game's protagonist, is a great warrior who seeks revenge on the gods of Olympus after repeated betrayals. On his journey to Olympus, Kratos must battle great monsters of legend - and fight his own inner demons.

In 1878, two young stage magicians clash in the dark during the course of a fraudulent séance. From this moment on, their lives become webs of deceit and revelation as they vie to outwit and expose each other. In the course of pursuing each other's ruin, they will deploy all the deception their magician's craft can command. Their rivalry will take them to the peaks of their careers, but with terrible consequences.

Although Raistlin and Caramon urge him not to go, Sturm Brightblade attends an annual Solamnic ceremony that is interrupted by...a stranger, taunting challenge. Clues from the past. Death. Once he accepts a mysterious gauntlet, young Sturm must make a dangerous journey with some curious friends, rescue a fair if querulous maid, defeat a traitor knight, and learn the secret fate of his long-lost father. He must also learn the meaning of honor.

In the third installment of the Girl Genius novels, Agatha H. and the Voice of the Castle begins as Agatha Heterodyne returns to her ancestral home, the warped little town of Mechanicsburg. There she must claim her inheritance by convincing the artificial intelligence that animates her family's castle that she is, in fact, the new Heterodyne. But this apparently simple task is made complicated in several ways: An imposter claiming to be the legitimate heir appears.

Ord Cestus, a planet mostly barren and inhospitable to life, was first colonized as a prison world—until a handful of hardy pioneers discovered its rich ore deposits and managed to build up a successful droid-manufacturing industry. But when the Clone Wars erupted, bringing severe rationing of...

Chief of State Natasi Daala has been overthrown, and the Jedi Order has taken control of the Galactic Alliance. But while the new governors dismantle Daala’s draconian regime, forces still loyal to the deposed official are mobilizing a counterstrike. And even the Jedi’s new authority may not...

First published in the US in 1988 and in the UK in 1990, The Wine-Dark Sea contains eight unsettling stories that explore protagonists' fears and desires, at once illogical and terrifying, and culminate in a disturbing and enigmatic ending. Aickman's "strange stories" (his preferred term for them) are a subtle exploration of psychological displacement and paranoia; his characters ordinary people that are gradually drawn into the darker recesses of their own minds. For fans of the horror genre, Robert Aickman is a must read.

This remarkable novel begins in 1850s Louisiana, where Gilda escapes slavery and learns about freedom while working in a brothel. After being initiated into eternal life as one who "shares the blood" by two women there, Gilda spends the next 200 years searching for a place to call home. An instant lesbian classic when it was first published in 1991, The Gilda Stories has endured as an auspiciously prescient book in its explorations of blackness, radical ecology, re-definitions of family, and yes, the erotic potential of the vampire story.

The Underdark: Beneath the surface of Faern lies a whole different world. A world of drow, deep gnomes, and other denizens of the dark. A world of cities like Menzoberranzan and Skullport, of warriors and rogues like Drizzt Do'Urden and Liriel Baenre and numerous others. Leave the security of the surface world and seek out the darkness that lies below. Welcome to the Realms of the Underdark.