Space First Contact

The Méridiens are fleeing to their far colonies - and they have reason to run. Over the course of decades, they have lost hundreds of ships, billions of people, and seven Confederation colonies to an alien enemy: an advancing swarm of silver ships transported in the bowels of a gigantic, spherical vessel. Alex Racine, who once enjoyed the solitary life of an explorer-tug captain, is now an admiral and responsible for the lives of a quarter million Librans.

Contains books 5-8 of the sci-fi survival horror series Reality Bleed, written by best-selling authors J.Z. Foster and Justin M. Woodward.

Humanity is on the brink of annihilation. Only one man can turn the tide. For centuries, we explored the stars and settled new worlds. But a mysterious alien threat emerged, launching devastating attacks and seizing entire star systems. Every fifty years they come, silent and relentless, before disappearing again into the dark. And as they close in on humanity’s home worlds, one more defeat could mean total extinction.

As a sci-fi author with a hit TV show, I have a few ideas about what alien invaders are supposed to look like. In my stories, they’re technologically advanced monsters, with tentacles, and no faces. Turns out I was right about the technology. And about how angry they’d be. But the way they look is more terrifying than even I could have imagined. They look exactly like us. Because they are us.

It’s been eight years since an alien invasion drove a small surviving group of settlers to seek refuge in an underground shelter. Cut off from the rest of humanity, the ragtag band has maintained a narrowly functioning colony due to communal effort and salvage runs. Alex Archer has her own duties as a dog handler. While this off-world colony may be harsh, Ash, Alex’s black shepherd raised to sense threats, makes living in it a little nicer.

Earth has been allowed to colonize the planet Garth only because its previous occupants went berserk and wiped out virtually all life there. But now humans, chimps, and their alien allies on Garth are being held hostage in a conflict that could affect the fate of the entire Five Galaxies.

John Varley's monumental trilogy - Titan, Wizard, and Demon - has achieved cult status, hailed as a modern triumph of the imagination by critics and fans. It begins with humankind's exploration of a massive satellite orbiting Saturn. It culminates in a shocking discovery: the satellite is a giant alien being. Her name is Gaea. Her awesome interior is mind-boggling - because it is a mind. A mind that calls out to explorers...and transforms all who enter.

The Queller race has lived for millennia in isolation. However, a secret kept by the Queller senior elder and a few associates drives the elder to make contact with another race. Little do the Quellers know that they send a QASAP ship, an autonomous search ship, to engage the conclave. Not detecting an aggressive society, Julien chooses to accept the autonomous ship’s invitation, and a small fleet commanded by Commodore Tocknicka follows the QASAP’s star map to the Queller home world.

Astronaut Lee Rifkin's life is about to change. NASA has done the math. The space object named Cassandra 22007 is not behaving as expected. He will lead a team on a cutting-edge ship to get a closer look. But another group wants to get there first. Who is this shadow organization that seems to be one step ahead of them? Agent Jenna Haynes works to put together the pieces that will pull the veil off those who seem to have known about Cassandra's arrival since long before NASA spotted it. What is their goal?

Shortlisted for the Arthur C. Clarke Award 2020! "A terrifying tour de force." --James Rollins "Readers will be riveted." --Publishers Weekly (starred review) Sally Jansen was NASA's leading astronaut, until a mission to Mars ended in disaster. Haunted by her failure, she lives in quiet...

A meteor makes landfall in South Africa, carrying a strange substance that alters plants, soil—and humans. Yet something much more dangerous is on a collision course with Earth—something that will change the future forever. In a Hail Mary attempt to save the planet from certain doom, the government sends a ship and its crew directly into the path of the oncoming threat. The crew’s daring plan might be the only way to save humanity.

Human descendants of the Earth colony ship Destiny face an incursion into their area of space by a powerful race. The Imperium Empire, which is ruled by the Krackus, is one wormhole away from the humans, and a rim mining planet, Kilmer, would be the alien race’s first contact. Fear rules the company leader. The Krackus represent danger. They sail powerful battleships. Moreover, the Naiad Council reels from the news that an alien race abuts their space. For centuries, humans in the Axis Crossing region thought they were alone.

Six months have passed since the reappearance of the starship Phoenix - the same ship which brought humans to the world of alien atevi nearly 200 years ago, leaving a small and vulnerable colony to struggle for survival in a hostile environment. During these six months, the alien atevi have striven to reconfigure their fledgling space program in a breakneck bid to take their place in the heavens alongside humans. But the return of the Phoenix has added a third party to an already volatile situation....

Where life as we know it is impossible, the real adventure begins. Venus is a hostile planet, covered by active volcanoes, but NASA launches an expedition to search for life there anyway. Their specially developed airship cruises in the clouds of Venus to serve as a research platform for its four astronauts. When they discover dangerous activities on the glowing-hot surface, there can only be one explanation: A highly sophisticated life form must be at work.

Conclave warships fended off four enemy fleets intent on attacking the Malia system. No one believes the fighting is finished. As anticipated, a fifth fleet of more sophisticated warships arrives. The commanders are armed with information from the previously defeated races, making it more difficult for the conclave to defend Cercia, the inhabited planet. In an effort to diminish Messinant power over mercenary races, Vice Admiral Mila Pappas leads the first wave to gain a new ally, the Ondas. However, Mila’s arrival at the Kega military base ignites a mutiny headed by two commanding officers.

The planet of Azure is nearly idyllic: There is a high standard of living, industry is booming, and the two races — Human and Wrogul — get along well with each other most days. But underneath it all, there is tension between the races. Despite having no reason for it, the Humans don’t always trust the Wrogul, and there is a faction within the Wrogul community that doesn’t want its young growing up “Human.”

Persecuted refugees from six separate alien races have migrated to the idyllic planet Jijo. And despite their incredible diversity, the inhabitants live together in blissful harmony. However, settlement on Jijo is illegal - and it's only a matter of time before the residents of this forbidden paradise are discovered by the galactic powers-that-be.

It's been a year of upheaval since Bren Cameron's return from space - a year since he and the aiji-dowager, one of his most powerful atevi allies, returned home from their two-year interstellar mission to find the government overthrown and their world in chaos. Now, at last, things on the atevi world seem to be on the right track, and Bren hopes that life may soon become much more tranquil. But something is coming, quietly, stealthily - just the first ominous twinkle of a new star in the heavens....

The Veklocks require the Pyreans to explore the extent of the Colony's usurpation of domes. The Colony is composed of two insectoid species, the grays and the reds. They're aggressive three- and five-meter long insectoids with venomous pincers that live for the expansion of their race. The Pyreans already lost one member of their team on their first exploration and are hesitant to meet the Colony again, unless they're better prepared.

Nothing quite prepared telepath Larry Greenberg for mind-to-mind contact with an alien. In the interest of science, Larry tapped the mind of Kzanol - and that was his first mistake. Kzanol was a thrint from a distant galaxy. He had been trapped on Earth in a time-stasis field for two billion years. Now he was on the loose, and Larry knew everything he was thinking. Thrints lived to plunder and enslave lesser planets - and what the planet Kzanol had in mind was Earth!