Space Science Fiction

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.

Removed from the concerns of the galaxy at large and regarding the Warmaster's unfolding Heresy with cold detachment, he has dedicated his hollow existence to the preservation of all the knowledge once held in the great libraries of Tizca, should mankind ever seek such enlightenment again. But his sons can see the change in their primarch - he is a broken soul whose mind and memories are slipping away into the tumult of the warp.

For years, the Zodarks plotted their revenge against the Republic. Spies infiltrated their colonies and eventually found their seat of power—Earth, located in a previously unknown system. A plan was hatched, a force made ready. The Zodarks would unveil a superweapon that was sure to tip the balance of power back in their favor. Then the Zodarks learned of Murphy's Law—and their plans were never the same.

When mysterious aircraft wreak havoc across Earth’s skies, it is revealed that there are clusters of other planets where humankind resides, distant worlds where the people wield the power of the stars themselves. It is an energy force that can bring about miracles or, as the alien fleet’s ruthless leader displays, unleash horrors beyond imagination. After experiencing a loss during the onslaught, Colton Samson, an ordinary college student, vows to protect his loved ones at any cost. But to learn the power to do so, he must enlist into the Army of the Universal Throne.

The Queen's fist never fades. Beware the shadows, for they might be Masks. Beneath the reign of the Galatian Queens lies a secret army, veiled in mystery and dread. These assassins, known as the Black Masks, serve a singular, unyielding purpose: to hunt down and annihilate Galatian hybrids—as well as the mothers who bring them into existence. Their ruthlessness is matched only by their anonymity.

Ex-Army paratrooper Griffin “Fin” Brooks thought he left danger behind when his battlefield injuries forced him to pursue a new career in marine biology. But one fateful night off the coast of South Africa, a ship nearly crashes into him and his loyal golden retriever, Jacques. Not just any ship. A starship. Though its alien pilot is dead, the rare extraterrestrial animal inside is not. Fin learns the creature is being smuggled across the galaxy when a pair of interstellar visitors respond to the crash. But those same investigators accuse Fin and his dog of crimes he didn’t even know existed.

L'ultime mission de Patrick « Wic » Finnegan avant son départ en retraite l'envoie dans la froideur des Hautes terres sous-glaciaires d'Ellsworth. Quand il voit ce que l'équipe a découvert, il n'en croit pas ses yeux. Il est loin d'imaginer la violence qui va en découler : un portail s'ouvre et libère un ouragan de fureur qui se déchaîne sur l'humanité. De l'Antarctique aux rues de Manhattan, Wic et son équipe vont tester leurs limites en se battant pour repousser la menace qui pèse sur la Terre.

In a distant future, Alexander scrapes by in a rundown repair shop while secretly searching for answers to his fragmented past. He has skills he can't explain and only foggy glimpses of who he used to be. His solitary quest takes an unexpected turn when he crosses paths with a sharp-witted girl who awakens echoes of his lost humanity. Together, they navigate a galaxy full of stagnant technology, shifting loyalties, and corporate secrets, but Alexander's awakening has not gone unnoticed.

Late in the 26th century, the human race has advanced enough to accidentally trigger the Inhibitors---alien-killing machines designed to detect intelligent life and destroy it. The only hope for humanity lies in the recovery of a secret cache of doomsday weapons---and a renegade named Clavain who is determined to find them. But other factions want the weapons for their own purposes---and the weapons themselves have another agenda altogether.

New York Times best-selling author Eric Flint has received glowing critical praise for his Ring of Fire alternate history series. In this first installment, a West Virginia town is transported from the year 2000 to 1631 Germany at the height of the Thirty Years’ War. Thrust into conflict, the town residents must also contend with moral issues such as who should be considered a citizen.

From the master of alternate history comes an epic of the second Civil War. It was an epoch of glory and success, of disaster and despair. 1881: A generation after the South won the Civil War, America writhed once more in the bloody throes of battle. Furious over the annexation of key Mexican territory, the United States declared total war against the Confederate States of America in 1881.

La colonie, dernier vestige de l'humanité échoué sur la planète Eden, tente de se reconstruire après sa guerre civile, mais les dégâts matériels sont conséquents. Par ailleurs, un conflit avec les tribus primitives voisines semble de plus en plus inévitable. Alors que militaires et politiciens opposent deux visions, l’une pacifiste et l’autre belliqueuse, les scientifiques, devenus archéologues sur cette exoplanète, se concentrent eux sur le passé d’Eden, qui leur réserve encore de nombreuses surprises.

A Fire Upon the Deep is the big, breakout book that fulfills the promise of Vinge's career to date: a gripping tale of galactic war told on a cosmic scale. Thousands of years hence, many races inhabit a universe where a mind's potential is determined by its location in space, from superintelligent entities in the Transcend, to the limited minds of the Unthinking Depths, where only simple creatures and technology can function.

Ethos is real. The crew of Excursion Two made it safely to the colony planet, but where are the colonists? Jane’s ancestor has recovered from nearly three centuries in a damaged cryochamber, but Linus Vanderbilt is holding onto secrets. He warns them never to use the Link, then disappears with his trusted robot assistant, Atticus.

For thousands of years, the planet of Belusha has served the galactic Sollan Empire as its most notorious prison planet. It is here the very worst men in the Empire are locked away: murderers, traitors, deserters—each condemned to toil on the oil rigs and scrapyards of the planet in bitter cold, preyed upon both by the men of the Martian Guard set to watch over them, and by the Outborn reavers whose fathers escaped the work camps to scratch a living from the icy wilderness. It is a hard world. A desperate world. And it is here that Lorian Aristedes finds himself: alone; friendless; betrayed.

The Amazon rainforest holds a world-changing secret—a ship lost to time from another world. College student Will Kaufman unearthed the biggest archaeological discovery in human history… he just needs to find a way back to Earth to tell people about it. Four thousand years ago, a Federation bounty hunter Void ship crashed on a remote and primitive planet. There it remained until Will found it and accidentally reactivated it, launching him light-years away.

Major Jacob Berger’s career takes the next step when he becomes captain of the Revenge, a reverse-engineered Xeno starship. When the starship is attacked in hyperspace, Jacob is given a gift from beings from another realm. Jacob finds himself stranded on an alien planet with only one task: find the Revenge’s missing crew members. To do that, he’ll need to survive a world filled with hostile aliens. Luckily he’s the most powerful human the universe has ever seen.

Rejected scientist Alexander Hawke is down to his last chance. Brilliant but sheltered, every banker in New York has refused to finance his ideas. Enter the Russian—charming, dangerous, and offering an Antarctic expedition that promises answers to all of his questions. Now, Alexander stands at the edge of a bottomless chasm. With a helpful shove from his foreign benefactor, he plunges into adventure. Landing in darkness, Alexander finds a portal to destiny—weirder than New York, colder than Russia, and filled with the ruins of an empire that once spanned the galaxy.

Now available in print for the first time with author's notes on each story, this short fiction addition to the Hugo Award-winning Expanse series includes a brand-new novella set after the events of Leviathan Falls. On Mars, a scientist experiments with a new engine that will one day become the...

Als Perry Rhodan bei einem scheinbaren Routinebesuch den Mars besichtigt, geschieht das Ungeheuerliche: Mitsamt seinem besten Freund Reginald Bull und einer wild zusammengewürfelten Gruppe von Menschen wird der Terraner entführt – in eine Zukunft, die rund eine Milliarde Jahre von seiner eigenen Zeit entfernt ist. Dort ist nichts mehr so, wie sie es kennen. Menschen sind unbekannt, die Erde ist nicht einmal mehr eine Legende. Und der Mars, auf dem sie in einer Milliarde Jahre herauskommen, entpuppt sich als ein Planet, dem eine unglaubliche Zukunft winkt.