Space Opera Science Fiction

Major Jimjoy Earle Wright, secret agent of the Empire, is intelligent and highly trained. But he succeeds all too well in overthrowing a military dictatorship - and the result is a new government inimical to the Empire and disgrace for Jimjoy. After surviving two assassination attempts, Jimjoy realizes that it's his own imperial superiors who want him dead; that, in fact, his worst enemies could become his best friends. He fights his way to safety on the planet Accord, where the Ecolitan Institute wins his loyalty and changes his identity.

Kylie Rhoads is a junker. She makes her living traveling the stars, salvaging abandoned ships left over from pirate attacks on the edge of the Gedri system. Some of the hulls are legal for the taking, most aren't. When a salvage job goes bad, Kylie finds herself on the wrong end of a gun. The hand holding that gun? The SA Space Force, just the people Kylie wants to avoid. To avoid prison, Kylie makes a deal to go deep into the Gedri System and rescue a simple girl. But out on the fringe, nothing is as it seems.

The starship Freedom was once a mighty warship. Today, she's a tourist attraction. The space wars ended long ago. The Freedom is now a flying museum; the tourists love it. The Changing of the Guard, the starfighter aerobatics, the starboard cannon salute...it's the best show in the galaxy. James King commands the starship Freedom. He hates his job. He was a real soldier once, back when the Freedom was a real warship. He never imagined himself running a tourist trap. Right after Christmas, he plans to retire. Then, on Christmas day, the aliens attack.

The starship crew was stuck on a planet where the well-meaning schemes of ivory-tower social engineers had created a nightmare of battling gangs. So they pretended to be the "Royal Legions" from a distant star kingdom in hot pursuit of an unspeakably evil and nearly all-powerful villain who was hiding somewhere on the planet. Things went even better than they had hoped, and the planet was rapidly becoming civilized...and then the real Royal Flagship showed up.

My history is unknown. My present is violent. My future may be more dangerous still. I use my unique skillset in one of the Moon’s many watering holes. Here, miners can spend their hard-earned money to forget that they’re not among the wealthy elite in the paradise colony on Mars. When a known crime boss walks in, events will begin to unfold hinting at a dark past and an even murkier future.

The gods are dead, but they are not gone. Their bodies litter the cosmos, magical fuel for vast interstellar empires, giving birth to mages, and more importantly, to magitech.

Rix Banner thought his fighting days ended with World War II. Back home in Cranberry Cove, he just wants to fix cars, drink coffee, and put the past behind him. But when a broken-down starship crash-lands in a Wisconsin cornfield, Rix discovers the universe isn’t done with him yet. The Galactic Empire doesn’t care about Earth’s isolation. They want their ship back—and the fugitive who stole it. Rix isn’t a soldier anymore, but he’s the only one standing between his town and an alien war.

After saving the world many times, the Merry Band of Pirates have accepted the inevitable: Earth is doomed. All they can do is try to bring a few thousand people to safety, before vicious aliens arrive to destroy humanity's home world. No. There is one other thing they can do: hit the enemy so hard that the aliens will regret they ever heard of humans.

Decades after the last footprints were left on the Moon, the US was preparing to return to the Lunar surface in a new class of rockets, when the mission suddenly became much more urgent. It would have to be a rescue mission. Unbeknownst to the rest of the world China had sent its own Lunar expedition. A manned expedition. Until a distress call was received, no human outside of China even knew that the mission was manned - or that their ship had crash-landed and couldn't take off again.

The Laconian Empire has fallen, setting the 1,300 solar systems free from the rule of Winston Duarte. But the ancient enemy that killed the gate builders is awake, and the war against our universe has begun again.

The Traitor Host of Horus Lupercal tightens its iron grip on the Palace of Terra, and one by one the walls and bastions begin to crumple and collapse. Rogal Dorn, Praetorian of Terra, redoubles his efforts to keep the relentless enemy at bay, but his forces are vastly outnumbered and hopelessly outgunned. Dorn simply cannot defend everything. Any chance of survival now requires sacrifice, but what battles dare he lose so that others can be won? Is there one tactical stroke, one crucial combat, that could turn the tide forever and win the war outright?

The galaxy is doomed. Monkeys may be clever and too stubborn to give up, but Skippy The Idiot Who Got Played knows the harsh truth: this is a fight he can’t win. The odds are not only stacked against him, he was designed not to win this fight. Maybe he can salvage some faint memory of the civilizations that inhabit the galaxy, but those beings are doomed. Doomed. Including the Merry Band of Pirates.

Millennia ago, the great empire of the Lazax brought the galaxy to heel, but now their ancient doctrine of strength and peace is failing. In the shadows, other factions begin to move against each other and their authoritarian masters. To rule themselves they must first tear down the crumbling regime they are forced to serve. When the Barony of Letnev, supplier of the Lazax's grand fleet, blockades a crucial wormhole to force the empire to listen to its demands, the spark of war is ignited and Zara Hail, an official for the Federation of Sol, is caught in the middle.

In Chris Wraight’s Homebound, Ilya Ravallion must choose between the decimated White Scars and living out what remains of her life in peace. An embattled Ahzek Ahriman must race against time to learn what he can of the warp before its gates close to him forever in Ex Libris by John French. Featuring tales from Dan Abnett, Aaron Dembski-Bowden, Guy Haley and many more, this anthology follows mighty Custodians, scheming sorcerers, and the lowly footsoldiers of the Imperial Army as all negotiate the devastating aftermath of Humanity's greatest reckoning.

The Cadian Gate is broken, and the Imperium is riven in two. The might of the Traitor Legions, kept shackled for millennia behind walls of iron and sorcery, has been unleashed on a darkening galaxy. Among those seeking vengeance on the Corpse Emperor’s faltering realm are the Death Guard, once proud crusaders of the Legiones Astartes, now debased creatures of terror and contagion.

The sand-blasted world of Arrakis has become green, watered, and fertile. Old Paul Atreides, who led the desert Fremen to political and religious domination of the galaxy, is gone. But for the children of Dune, the very blossoming of their land contains the seeds of its own destruction. The altered climate is destroying the giant sandworms, and this in turn is disastrous for the planet's economy.

It’s been 120 years since the 50 or so worldships containing the few million survivors of the human species set off after the planet Earth was destroyed by a meteor. On the Worldship Humility, Sam, a 30-year-old Airlock Operative, is bored. Living in space should be exciting and full of adventure, except it isn’t, and he fills his time hacking 3-D movie posters and holographic adverts outside the stores in the retail zone. Petty thief Yasmine Emile Dufont is also from the WS Humility, but she is not bored....

The Carryx—part empire, part hive—has waged wars of conquest for centuries, destroying or enslaving species across the galaxy in its conflict with an ancient and deathless enemy. When they descend on the isolated world of Anjiin, the human population is abased, slaughtered, and put in chains. The best and brightest are abducted, taken to the Carryx world-palace to join prisoners from a thousand other species. Dafyd Alkhor, assistant to a prestigious scientist, is captured along with his team.

The galaxy is burning. With the Cielcin united under one banner, the Sollan Empire stands alone after the betrayal of the Commonwealth. The Prophet-King of the Cielcin has sent its armies to burn the worlds of men, and worse, there are rumors … whispers that Hadrian Marlowe is dead, killed in the fighting. But it is not so. Hadrian survived with the help of the witch, Valka, and together they escaped the net of the enemy having learned a terrible truth: the gods that the Cielcin worship are real and will not rest until the universe is dark and cold.

When Earth's colonies go silent, Legion Varus drops onto Kepler-62 expecting a routine investigation. Instead, they find something far worse than death. The colonists aren't dead—they're changed. A new kind of enemy has arrived in Province 921, microscopic invaders that transform humans into perfectly coordinated killing machines. These "Demon" parasites don't just control minds; they improve them, creating an army that works with terrifying efficiency.