Space Exploration Fiction

What comes after boarding school for an evil lord? The military academy, of course! Liam's subordinates arrange the perfect overpowered patrol fleet for his post-academy training period, but the Guide is hungry for revenge against the young evil lord and takes this as an opportunity to strike! Will the Guide succeed? And will Liam ever notice that the Guide isn't actually trying to help?

After their showstopping defeat of the crystal life-forms, Hiro and the gang head to the imperial capital for Hiro's award ceremony. No shortage of trouble awaits them in the heart of the empire, from Elma's overly affectionate brother crashing the party, to a reunion with Chris, to the emperor liking Hiro a little too much. Just when the crew thinks they've seen it all, they learn that the imperial princess...is the spitting image of Mimi?!

Van and his crew suspect there's more to the Equal Grasp than just a band of thieves, and they begin their campaign at Bopul Station, a lonely outpost where corruption rules and Peacemakers are feared. To continue the fight and the case, the crew and friends need more than just contacts. They need money. To that end, Van begins exploring an old mystery about his grandfather, which leads to the shocking discovery—the Earth is being stripped of its history, one object at a time, but that's not the main purpose of the criminals.

A year has passed since the Hell Divers defeated the machines at Kilimanjaro. The freed captives have settled into their new home at the Vanguard Islands, joining survivors from around the world. But extreme weather and failed crops have raised the specter of famine. Ships must push deeper into dangerous red zones, only to come back with less loot - and fewer soldiers.

Calamity, the digital plague, is spreading, and where it strikes is both ruthless and random. Fearful of the Earth being ravaged, Van and the crew go on high alert to keep his homeworld free of galactic influence. That vision is shattered when Tony Burgess captures an alien ship... in Wisconsin. The ship isn't just a stray workboat. It's the opening ploy of a group that sees humanity as a business opportunity too big to pass up. Advancing in rank, Van is torn between two duties—to his crew and to his home.

Sucked through a wormhole, Charlie's spaceship crash landed on a distant world, yet somehow he survived. But survival was about to get a lot harder as he found himself not just stranded on a new planet, but in another galaxy entirely. One ruled not by the laws of technology, but by magic. A realm of space pirates, deadly assassins, alien gladiators, and even dragons. For the spaceman from Earth, it was enough to make his head spin.

What could be more commonplace than grass or a world covered over all its surface with a wind-whipped ocean of grass? But the planet Grass conceals horrifying secrets within its endless pastures. And as an incurable plague attacks all inhabited planets but this one, the prairie-like Grass begins to reveal these secrets - and nothing will ever be the same again.

A collection of the year’s best science fiction and fantasy short fiction selected by New York Times bestselling author of the Silo series Hugh Howey and series editor John Joseph Adams. “These are dangerous stories. The kind that warp reality and threaten to change the world” warns guest...

Captain Brian Royce brings Hadad to his home planet, which shows obvious signs of battle. Did any of his family survive? Where are all the children; did the Zodarks take them? Admiral Miles Hunt finds himself appointed to a new position beyond his current skill set. He now has to become more than just a ship captain and fleet commander: he must become the Viceroy of the Milky Way Galaxy.

Mercenary life is hard. No home. No family. Always looking over your shoulder, likely for the rest of your life. When you find a crew that you can trust, you do anything for them. Jason Burke has a crew like that. He would kill for them...and he would die for them. Right now, they need his help, and it will take all of his cunning and skill to bring them home safely. He is alone, without his powerful ship, the Phoenix, and the criminal cartels he’s going up against are some of the most ruthless in the galaxy. For Captain Burke it’s all or nothing: bring his friends home safe...or die trying.

Dying planets, dangerous conspiracies, and secret romance abound in the second installment of the Devoured Worlds trilogy by award-winning author Megan E. O'Keefe. Naira and Tarquin have escaped vicious counter-revolutionaries, misprinted monsters, and the pull of a dying planet. Now, bound...

When your luck just plain sucks in not one galaxy, but two, most people would throw in the towel. But not Charlie. In fact, it almost seemed like he was a glutton for that sort of misery.

Van is a veteran now, and the lessons are getting tougher. But so is he. When a ghost ship arrives in port, filled with the victims of a crime beyond imagination, Van and his crew will be drawn into a chase that goes beyond any star system the Peacemakers know.

When Van gains rank as a Peacemaker, he becomes a bigger target for the criminals scattered among the stars. And he wouldn’t have it any other way. On a distant world under an alien sun, hunters and their companions—the Rovan—bond in a ritual as old as their civilization. But one of the hunters is missing, and Van, along with his growing crew, knows where to look. Climbing up into the rarified air of the super-rich, Van uncovers a new enemy: The Fade. And they are as cruel as the stars are many.

Van and his crew have killed an empire. The problem is the empire doesn’t know it’s dead. Moving among the stars, the Peacemakers are faced with their greatest challenge—removing an evil so vast, it has a presence in every known star system. To that end, they’ll need to move quickly. To do so, they must be mobile, and that means big changes in their tactics. . . and their crew. With the help of a shadowy figure known as the Body Thief, Van will continue his policy of justice and freedom for all citizens, even if they began life on a computer chip.

After taking a Peacemaker job to find missing fuel, Perry finds something far more sinister than simple theft - a voice, crying out in a forge of heat and flame, and the discovery reveals a series of acts so vicious that nothing short of revenge will suffice. Following leads across the stars, Van, Perry, and Torina discover the wealthy elite are doing more than just taking fuel.

Some people are convinced they can do anything; Evan Orgell is one of them. So when his company president sends him off-world to investigate a breakdown in communications from a small research station on a newly discovered planet, he's all in. The planet's resources could mean massive profits for the company-and a successful mission could mean massive advancement for Evan. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Nova is a lonely planet. It has been on its way to the Andromeda galaxy for ages. And yet, it is inhabited by people who have never known anything other than the caves beneath the surface that protect them from the vacuum and cosmic radiation. A surprising encounter changes everything. The planet gets visitors who seem to have their own agenda, and are so alien that communication seems futile. But they, too, have unexpected existential problems.

When swordswoman Konoha joins Serena's edge-world investigation, Hiro's gobsmacked by her combat chops. Supposedly, Konoha's here to investigate a metal spider with psionic abilities—and check up on Kugi!

A crescent moon set against a jeweled field of stars gracefully slid into view. The thin arc of its crater-filled landscape drew Jack’s mind in. His eyes followed the long, inky shadows cast by jagged crater walls as they cut sharply into the pockmarked ashen terrain. Deeper within the jet-black lunar night-side were the lonely peaks of a smattering of mountain tops, catching a few last rays of sunlight. All Jack felt was a desire to escape; to be down there exploring...perhaps uncovering some new detail in the history of Earth’s nearest neighbor.