Space Science Fiction

In the galactic prison system, she’s listed as an ‘Organic Weapon of Mass Destruction’… too bad she’s your new cellmate. Grant didn’t sign up for interstellar incarceration. One minute he’s brawling with lizard freaks behind his pickup, next, he wakes up paralyzed in a space supermax. Tagged. Scanned. Sentenced without trial. All because he tried to stop his girlfriend from getting probed by a UFO.

The third book in the New York Times bestselling Expanse series, Abaddon's Gate opens the door to the ruins of an alien gate network—and the crew of the Rocinante may hold the key to unlocking its secrets. Now a Prime Original series. For generations, the solar system—Mars, the Moon, the...

Before Hr'ent Golramm became a legendary Enforcer for the Peacemaker Guild, he was a mere candidate. Granted, he was a particularly unusual candidate - only six Oogar had ever successfully graduated from the Peacemaker Academy on Ocono, and Hr'ent would be the seventh. Every candidate must pass a commissioning mission in order to graduate, though, and Hr'ent's is unsolvable. The Pushtal of Vorrhurna were once one of the Mercenary Guild's 37 races.

Years ago, Old Earth sent forth sisters and brothers into the vast dark of the prodigal colonies armed only with crucifixes and iron faith. Now, the sisters of the Order of Saint Rita are on an interstellar mission of mercy aboard Our Lady of Impossible Constellations, a living, breathing ship which seems determined to develop a will of its own. When the order receives a distress call from a newly-formed colony, the sisters discover that the bodies and souls in their care - and that of the galactic diaspora - are in danger.

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.

Given the fact that there are perhaps 400 billion stars in our galaxy alone and perhaps 400 billion galaxies in the universe, it stands to reason that somewhere out there, in the 14-billion-year-old cosmos, there is or once was a civilization at least as advanced as our own. The sheer enormity of the numbers almost demands that we accept the truth of this hypothesis. Why, then, have we encountered no evidence, no messages, no artifacts of these extraterrestrials?

Captain Chhun's Dark Ops squad is reunited with Wraith, and they are entrusted with the task of denying Goth Sullus the shipyards he so eagerly desires. But when the mission doesn't go as planned, Chhun and Wraith must find a way to stop the Black Fleet's advance—even if it costs them their lives. Meanwhile, an old friend from Nether Ops executes a covert operation that will turn the focus of the Last War of the Republic in a terrible new direction.

The science fiction genre has become increasingly influential in mainstream popular culture, evolving into one of the most engaging storytelling tools we use to think about technology and consider the shape of the future. Along the way, it has also become one of the major lenses we use to explore important philosophical questions. The origins of science fiction are most often thought to trace to Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, a story born from a night of spooky tale-telling by the fireside that explores scientific, moral, and ethical questions that were of great concern in the 19th century - and that continue to resonate today.

A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.

Sergeant Richard Stavos was a Technomancer, capable of creating stronger than normal mental links with nanites. But that alone wasn't enough to keep him alive. Not when the Ka Empire wages wars across the galaxy. Death was supposed to be his release...an end to the constant fighting that plagued his life. But gifted beings like Richard are assets, and almost a decade after his death, the Ka overlords bring him back from the grave as a "reward" for his good service.

With The Best Science Fiction of the Year: Volume 3, award-winning editor Neil Clarke provides a year-in-review and 27 of the best stories published by both new and established authors in 2017.

Captain Kyle Roberts has commanded the carrier Avalon through the most vicious battles of the war against the Terran Commonwealth - but with Avalon in for repair, his political enemies deny him a new ship. Unwilling to accept a desk, he takes command of a covert operation using a captured Commonwealth warship to strike at the very heart of their enemy, drawing away the reinforcements that could destroy the Alliance's recent gains.

Three years have passed for Ginsi, aka 'Uuba Fett.' During those three years, she has trained non-stop under Morgan's relentless direction, regaining some semblance of her former self. But word finally comes that Star Force and the Neofan have finished their prototype essence shield drainer, and they need to test it with her integrated...in battle.

The Great Ones arrived on Earth and conquered us with little bloodshed. They collected our strongest warriors and shipped them off to a world called Hadran—a one-of-a-kind artificial planet, a cosmic gladiatorial arena where the slave races engage in blood sports for the Great Ones' entertainment. But Earth has lost the last of its real champions and now risks losing its candidate status. If that happens, it will become less than a slave colony.

The Singularity. It is the era of the posthuman. Artificial intelligences have surpassed the limits of human intellect. Biotechnological beings have rendered people all but extinct. Molecular nanotechnology runs rampant, replicating and reprogramming at will. Contact with extraterrestrial life grows more imminent with each new day.

On the world of Verghast, a grinding war between two hive cities - one loyal to the Imperium, the other fallen to the worship of the Dark Gods - is bolstered by the forces of the Astra Militarum, spearheaded by the Colonel-Commissar Gaunt and the Tanith First and Only. But bitter rivalries and treachery threaten to derail the defence of Vervunhive, and it falls to Gaunt to take command of the Imperial forces and forge victory from an almost certain defeat.

Their foothold established, Reach and the soldiers sent to secure Amir have only begun to repair the destruction inflicted on them by hostile neighbors when a terrifying new threat emerges from the deep woods and dark jungles of Amir itself. Something so lethal and evasive, not even Brody can seem to take it down. New threats and old enemies arrive as more mysteries of this new home world are uncovered, and with them, clues to humanity’s own mysterious past.

Belisarius Cawl, Archmagos Dominus of the Adeptus Mechanicus, is the most brilliant mind alive. For 10,000 years he has furthered the cause of mankind, working under the aegis of the Emperor and Lord Commander Roboute Guilliman to prevent the inexorable march of the alien and the traitor. Many call him heretic, but all must recognise the magnitude of his achievements, for who else but he was entrusted to create a new generation of Space Marines?

In the year AD 3000, Earth is a dystopian wasteland, plundered of its natural resources by alien conquerors known as Psychlos. Fewer than 35,000 humans survive in a handful of communities scattered across the face of a post-apocalyptic Earth. From the ashes of humanity rises a young hero, Jonnie Goodboy Tyler. Setting off on an initial quest to discover a hidden evil, Jonnie unlocks the mystery of humanity’s demise and unearths a crucial weakness in their oppressors.

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.