Space Science

It's the mid-21st century. The oceans are rising, the world's population is growing, terrorist organizations are running rampant, and it has become readily apparent that humanity's destructive nature is at the heart of the matter. When all faith in humanity seems lost, a startling proposal is announced: Solomon Chavez, the mysterious son of the world's first trillionaire, announces that he, backed by a consortium of governments and wealthy donors, will build an interstellar starship.

In the gripping Never Panic Early, Fred Haise, Lunar Module Pilot for Apollo 13, offers a detailed firsthand account of when disaster struck three days into his mission to the moon. An oxygen tank exploded, a crewmate uttered the now iconic words, “Houston, we’ve had a problem here,” and the world anxiously watched as one of history’s most incredible rescue missions unfolded. Haise brings listeners into the heart of his experience on the challenging mission—considered NASA’s finest hour—and reflects on his life and career as an Apollo astronaut.

The rescue of a noble girl gets Hiro and his crew in more trouble than they bargained for. The heat is on, and their enemies are closing in, so Hiro decides to...take a vacation? There's no better place to lie low than a high-class resort in a tropical paradise!

The Merry Band of Pirates are in desperate trouble after the end of their last mission, and the real danger to humanity is just getting started. Hostile aliens have discovered there is something odd going on with wormholes in the galaxy, and their investigations could lead to finding a shortcut to Earth....

John Perry did two things on his 75th birthday. First he visited his wife's grave. Then he joined the army. The good news is that humanity finally made it into interstellar space. The bad news is that planets fit to live on are scarce—and alien races willing to fight us for them are common. So: we fight. To defend Earth, and to stake our own claim to planetary real estate. Far from Earth, the war has been going on for decades: brutal, bloody, unyielding. Earth itself is a backwater.

Running. Putting distance between himself and the relentless Night Brigade has been Nomad’s strategy for years. Staying one or two steps ahead of his pursuers by skipping through the Cosmere from one world to the next. But now, his powers too depleted to escape, Nomad finds himself trapped on Canticle, a planet that will kill anyone who doesn’t keep moving. Fleeing the fires of a sunrise that melts the very stones, he is instantly caught up in the struggle between a heartless tyrant and the brave rebels who defy him.

Bob thought he was doing fine on his own. Then the love of his life fell out of the sky. Can he get her back in the air with auto parts and a cutting torch? If he does, will she ever come back? Nikki took a job before she saw the equipment. Can she keep her passengers alive on a strange planet? Are the natives friendly?

Once again, reluctant hero Commissar Cain is catapulted into glory in the fourth instalment of this tremendously popular series. Escaping from a disastrous space battle, the commissar and his malodorous sidekick Jurgen crash-land behind enemy lines. Even the sly Cain can't avoid a straight fight this time, as the only way out is to round up what few troops they can find and fight their way back to safety. Unfortunately, hundreds of thousands of barbaric alien orks stand in their way.

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.

Hadrian Marlowe is trapped. For nearly a century, he has been a guest of the Emperor, forced into the role of advisor, a prisoner of his own legend. But the war is changing. Mankind is losing. The Cielcin are spilling into human space from the fringes, picking their targets with cunning precision. The Great Prince Syriani Dorayaica is uniting their clans, forging them into an army and threat the likes of which mankind has never seen.

Our universe is ruled by physics, and faster-than-light travel is not possible - until the discovery of The Flow, an extradimensional field we can access at certain points in space-time that transports us to other worlds, around other stars. Humanity flows away from Earth, into space, and in time forgets our home world and creates a new empire, the Interdependency, whose ethos requires that no one human outpost can survive without the others. It's a hedge against interstellar war - and a system of control for the rulers of the empire.

For almost a hundred years, Hadrian Marlowe has served the empire in its war against the Cielcin, a vicious alien race bent on humanity's destruction. Rumors of a new king among the Cielcin have reached the imperial throne. This one is not like the others. It does not raid borderworld territories, preferring precise, strategic attacks on the humans' empire.

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.

The war for the fate of mankind blazes on. Though the outer defences have fallen, the walls of the Palace itself remain inviolate as Rogal Dorn, the Praetorian of Terra himself, uses every known stratagem and ploy to keep Horus' vast armies at bay. In Perturabo, the Traitor siegebreaker, Dorn faces an adversary worthy of his skill. A terrible, grinding attrition ensues. The crucial battle for the Lion's Gate spaceport is at the heart of this conflict. With it in their possession, the Traitors can land their most devastating weapons on Terran soil. Dorn knows it must not fall.

In AD 2600, the human race is finally beginning to realize its full potential. Hundreds of colonized planets scattered across the galaxy host a multitude of prosperous and wildly diverse cultures. Genetic engineering has pushed evolution far beyond nature's boundaries, defeating disease and producing extraordinary spaceborn creatures. Huge fleets of sentient trader starships thrive on the wealth created by the industrialization of entire star systems, and throughout inhabited space the Confederation Navy keeps the peace.

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.

After a series of victories, the Imperial forces are on the back foot once more. The power of Chaos is rising, the Traitors gain ground, and all hope seems lost. Can Terra endure?

Master Sergeant Gant Maker was a highly decorated and well-respected marine - until his last mission left him as the sole survivor of an encounter with a vicious race called the Vacra. Served up as a scapegoat and drummed out of the military, he has since lived a life of seclusion with only an adopted alien as a companion. Now the Vacra have returned.

A towering genius who'd already solved the problem of death by making memory recording possible, Cassia leads a team of scientists and problem solvers to a station floating in the harsh winds of Saturn. Their mission: to grow interstellar ships using nanobots in the planet's material-rich environment. She called them "monsters" to help sell the project to a skeptical public. Little did she know how prophetic that name would become.

As the Warmaster's campaign of galactic domination continues, his generals seek out fresh battlefields to conquer. After leaving the Crone World of Iydris behind, Perturabo strikes for Tallarn. A bitter, vengeful primarch, the lord of the Iron Warriors unleashes a deadly bombardment against the world, killing millions but entrenching the survivors. A brutal, all-consuming armoured conflict ensues, the greatest of the war and one that grinds down all combatants over more than a year of relentless battles.