A major work of twentieth-century American literature...Wolfe creates a truly alien social order that the reader comes to experience from within...once into it, there is no stopping. ---The New York Times on The Book of the New Sun

Gene Wolfe has been called the finest writer the science fiction world has yet produced by the Washington Post.

THE BOOK OF THE NEW SUN is unanimously acclaimed as Wolfe's most remarkable work, hailed as a masterpiece of science fantasy comparable in importance to the major works of Tolkien and Lewis by Publishers Weekly and one of the most ambitious works of speculative fiction in the twentieth century by the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction.

The Shadow of the Torturer is the first volume in this four-volume epic, the tale of young Severian, an apprentice to the Guild of Torturers on the world called Urth, exiled for committing the ultimate sin of his profession- showing mercy toward his victim.

The Claw of the Conciliator continues the saga of Severian, banished from his home, as he undertakes a mythic quest to discover the awesome power of an ancient relic and learn the truth about his hidden destiny.

A masterpiece...the best science fiction I've read in years! --Ursula K. Le Guin

This new Tor Essentials edition of Shadow & Claw contains a new introduction by historian and novelist Ada Palmer, author of the award-winning Too Like the Lightning.

A major work of twentieth-century American literature...Wolfe creates a truly alien social order that the reader comes to experience from within...once into it, there is no stopping. ---The New York Times on The Book of the New Sun

This new Tor Essentials edition of Sword & Citadel contains a new introduction by historian and novelist Ada Palmer, author of the award-winning Too Like the Lightning.

Gene Wolfe has been called the finest writer the science fiction world has yet produced by the Washington Post.

THE BOOK OF THE NEW SUN is unanimously acclaimed as Wolfe's most remarkable work, hailed as a masterpiece of science fantasy comparable in importance to the major works of Tolkien and Lewis by Publishers Weekly and one of the most ambitious works of speculative fiction in the twentieth century by the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction.

The Sword of the Lictor is the third volume in Wolfe's remarkable epic, chronicling the odyssey of the wandering pilgrim called Severian, driven by a powerful and unfathomable destiny, as he carries out a dark mission far from his home.

The Citadel of the Autarch brings The Book of the New Sun to its harrowing conclusion, as Severian clashes in a final reckoning with the dread Autarch, fulfilling an ancient prophecy that will alter forever the realm known as Urth.

Wonderfully vivid and inventive... the most extraordinary hero in the history of the heroic epic. --The Washington Post

A Hugo and Nebula Award nominee, The Urth of the New Sun is the long awaited sequel to science fiction Grand Master Gene Wolfe's four-volume classic, The Book of the New Sun.

We return to the world of Severian, now the Autarch of Urth, as he leaves the planet on one of the huge spaceships of the alien Hierodules to travel across time and space to face his greatest test, to become the legendary New Sun or die.

The strange, rich, original spaceship scenes give way to travels in time, wherein Severian revisits times and places which fill in parts of the background of the four-volume work, that will thrill and intrigue particularly all readers of the earlier books. But The Urth of the New Sun is an independent structure all of a piece, an integral masterpiece to shelve beside the classics, one itself.

Gene Wolfe is the smartest, subtlest, most dangerous writer alive today, in genre or out of it. This book is] important and wonderful. --Neil Gaiman on The Knight

A novel in two volumes, The Wizard Knight is in the rare company of works of fantasy like The Once and Future King, or The Wizard of Earthsea, that drink directly from the wellspring of myth. Now it appears in a single-volume edition for the first time.

A young man in his teens is transported from our world to a magical realm consisting of seven levels of reality. Transformed by magic into a grown man of heroic proportions, he takes the name Sir Able of the High Heart and sets out on a quest to find the sword that has been promised to him, the blade that will help him fulfill his ambition to become a true hero--a true knight.

Inside, however, Sir Able remains a boy, and he must grow in every sense to survive what lies ahead...

Wolfe] should enjoy the same rapt attention we afford to Thomas Pynchon, Toni Morrison, and Cormac McCarthy. --The Washington Post on The Knight

Wolfe's version of Faerie is both allusive and elusive, beautiful and fatally glamorous. --Tad Williams on The Knight

With a new introduction by Yves Meynard, acclaimed author of The Book of Knights.

Tor Essentials presents new editions of science fiction and fantasy titles of proven merit and lasting value, each volume introduced by an appropriate literary figure.

Far from Earth, two sister planets, Saint Anne and Saint Croix, circle each other in an eternal dance. It is said a race of shapeshifters once lived here, only to perish when men came. But one man believes they can still be found, somewhere in back of the beyond.

In The Fifth Head of Cerberus, Gene Wolfe skillfully interweaves three bizarre tales to create a mesmerizing pattern: the harrowing account of the son of a mad genius who discovers his hideous heritage; a young man's mythic dreamquest for his darker half; and the bizarre chronicle of a scientist's nightmarish imprisonment. Like an intricate, braided knot, the pattern at last unfolds to reveal astonishing truths about this strange and savage alien landscape.

With a new introduction by O. Henry Award winning author Brian Evenson

Litany of the Long Sun contains the full texts of Nightside the Long Sun and Lake of the Long Sun, that together make up the first half of The Book of the Long Sun. This great work is set on a huge generation starship in the same future as the classic Book of the New Sun (also available in two volumes from Orb).

Hailed as one of the literary giants of SF by the Denver Post, Gene Wolfe has repeatedly won the field's highest honors, including the Nebula, the Hugo, and the World Fantasy awards.

Peace is Gene Wolfe's first full-length novel, a work that shows the genius that later flourished in such acclaimed works as The Fifth Head of Cerberus and The Book of The New Sun.

Originally published in 1975, Peace is a spellbinding, brilliant tour de force of the imagination. The melancholy memoir of Alden Dennis Weer, an embittered old man living out his last days in a small midwestern town, the novel reveals a miraculous dimension as the narrative unfolds. For Weer's imagination has the power to obliterate time and reshape reality, transcending even death itself. Powerfully moving and uncompromisingly honest, Peace ranks alongside the finest literary works of our time.

A major work of twentieth-century American literature...Wolfe creates a truly alien social order that the reader comes to experience from within...once into it, there is no stopping. ---The New York Times on The Book of the New Sun

This new Tor Essentials edition of Sword & Citadel contains a new introduction by historian and novelist Ada Palmer, author of the award-winning Too Like the Lightning.

Gene Wolfe has been called the finest writer the science fiction world has yet produced by the Washington Post.

THE BOOK OF THE NEW SUN is unanimously acclaimed as Wolfe's most remarkable work, hailed as a masterpiece of science fantasy comparable in importance to the major works of Tolkien and Lewis by Publishers Weekly and one of the most ambitious works of speculative fiction in the twentieth century by the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction.

The Sword of the Lictor is the third volume in Wolfe's remarkable epic, chronicling the odyssey of the wandering pilgrim called Severian, driven by a powerful and unfathomable destiny, as he carries out a dark mission far from his home.

The Citadel of the Autarch brings The Book of the New Sun to its harrowing conclusion, as Severian clashes in a final reckoning with the dread Autarch, fulfilling an ancient prophecy that will alter forever the realm known as Urth.

Wonderfully vivid and inventive... the most extraordinary hero in the history of the heroic epic. --The Washington Post

A distinguished compilation of two classic fantasy novels, Soldier of the Mist and Soldier of Aret , in one volume

This omnibus of two acclaimed novels is the story of Latro, a Roman mercenary who while fighting in Greece received a head injury that deprived him of his short-term memory but gave him in return the ability to see and converse with the supernatural creatures and the gods and goddesses, who invisibly inhabit the ancient landscape. Latro forgets everything when he sleeps. Writing down his experiences every day and reading his journal anew each morning gives him a poignantly tenuous hold on himself, but his story's hold on readers is powerful indeed, and many consider these Wolfe's best books.

An all new collection from an American literary icon

The circus comes to town... and a man gets to go to the stars.

A young girl on a vacation at the sea meets the man of her dreams. Who just happens to be dead. And an immortal pirate.

A swordfighter pens his memoirs... and finds his pen is in fact mightier than the sword.

Welcome to Gene Wolfe's playground, a place where genres blend and a genius's imagination straps you in for the ride of your life.

The Wolfe at the Door is a brand new collection from one of America's premier literary giants, showcasing some material never been seen before. Short stories, yes, but also poems, essays, and ephemera that gives us a window into the mind of a literary powerhouse whose world view changed generations of readers in their perception of the universe.

Gene Wolfe's Return to the Whorl is the third volume, after On Blue's Waters and In Green's Jungles, of his ambitious SF trilogy The Book of the Short Sun . . . It is again narrated by Horn, who has embarked on a quest in search of the heroic leader Patera Silk. Horn has traveled from his home on the planet Blue, reached the mysterious planet Green, and visited the great starship, the Whorl and even, somehow, the distant planet Urth. But Horn's identity has become ambiguous, a complex question embedded in the story, whose telling is itself complex, shifting from place to place, present to past. Perhaps Horn and Silk are now one being. Return to the Whorl brings Wolfe's major new fiction, The Book of the Short Sun, to a strange and seductive climax.

The Best of Gene Wolfe is the definitive collection of the best of Gene Wolfe's short fiction.

One of the greatest writers in genre (and literary fiction) of the 20th century, Gene Wolfe was a national treasure who produced the finest and most significant body of short fiction in the SF and fantasy field over the last fifty years. The Best of Gene Wolfe is an amazing retrospective collection of his short fiction, selected by Wolfe himself.

Too many award winners and Best Of stories to list here; just as a sample we have The Island of Dr. Death and Other Stories, The Fifth Head of Cerberus, Petting Zoo, The Tree Is My Hat, Seven American Nights, and A Cabin on the Coast.

Incredible tales from a writer who challenged and amazed. Who revolutionized the genre.

And whose stories will stand the test of time.

Wolfe is our Melville.--Ursula K. Le Guin

Gene Wolfe's In Green's Jungles is the second volume, after On Blue's Waters, of his ambitious SF trilogy, The Book of the Short Sun.

It is again narrated by Horn, who has embarked on a quest from his home on the planet Blue in search of the heroic leader Patera Silk. Now Horn's identity has become ambiguous, a complex question embedded in the story, whose telling is itself complex, shifting from place to place, present to past. Horn recalls visiting the Whorl, the enormous spacecraft in orbit that brought the settlers from Urth, and going thence to the planet Green, home of the blood-drinking alien inhumi. There, he led a band of mercenary soldiers, answered to the name of Rajan, and later became the ruler of a city state. He has also encountered the mysterious aliens, the Neighbors, who once inhabited both Blue and Green. He remembers a visit to Nessus, on Urth. At some point, he died. His personality now seemingly inhabits a different body, so that even his sons do not recognize him. And people mistake him for Silk, to whom he now bears a remarkable resemblance.

In Green's Jungles is Wolfe's major new fiction, The Book of the Short Sun, building toward a strange and seductive climax.

Wolfe's narrative glows, rich and seductive as ever.--Kirkus Reviews

On Blue's Waters is the start of a major new work by Gene Wolfe, the first of three volumes that comprise The Book of the Short Sun, which takes place in the years after Wolfe's four-volume Book of the Long Sun.

Horn, the narrator of the earlier work, now tells his own story. Though life is hard on the newly settled planet of Blue, Horn and his family have made a decent life for themselves. But Horn is the only one who can locate the great leader Silk, and convince him to return to Blue and lead them all to prosperity. So Horn sets sail in a small boat, on a long and difficult quest across the planet Blue in search of the now legendary Patera Silk. The story continues in In Green's Jungles and Return to the Whorl.

By any standard, Wolfe's beautifully composed, meditative, thrilling, and tricky-beyond-belief 'science fantasy' is a work of the highest art.--The Washington Post Book World

A superb collection of science fiction and fantasy stories, The Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories and Other Stories is a book that transcends all genre definitions. The stories within are mined with depth charges, explosions of meaning and illumination that will keep you thinking and feeling long after you have finished reading.

A Borrowed Man: a new science fiction novel from Gene Wolfe, the celebrated author of the Book of the New Sun series.

It is perhaps a hundred years in the future, our civilization is gone, and another is in place in North America, but it retains many familiar things and structures. Although the population is now small, there is advanced technology, there are robots, and there are clones.

E. A. Smithe is a borrowed person. He is a clone who lives on a third-tier shelf in a public library, and his personality is an uploaded recording of a deceased mystery writer. Smithe is a piece of property, not a legal human.

A wealthy patron, Colette Coldbrook, takes him from the library because he is the surviving personality of the author of Murder on Mars. A physical copy of that book was in the possession of her murdered father, and it contains an important secret, the key to immense family wealth. It is lost, and Colette is afraid of the police. She borrows Smithe to help her find the book and to find out what the secret is. And then the plot gets complicated.

In a contemporary town in the American Midwest where he has no connections, an educated man recently released from prison is staying in a motel. He writes letters to his brother and to others, including a friend still in jail. When he meets a real estate agent who tells him he is the heir to a huge old house, long empty, he moves in, though he is too broke to even buy furniture, and is immediately confronted by supernatural and fantastic creatures and events.

His life is utterly transformed and we read on, because we must know more. We revise our opinions of him, and of others, with each letter. We learn things about magic, and another world, and about the sorcerer Mr. Black, who originally inhabited the house. And then perhaps we read it again.

The third book in the Latro series from science fiction and fantasy master Gene Wolfe, Soldier of Sidon

Latro forgets everything when he sleeps. Writing down his experiences every day and reading his journal anew each morning gives him a poignantly tenuous hold on himself, but his story's hold on readers is powerful indeed. The two previous novels, combined in Latro in the Mist (Soldier of the Mist and Soldier of Arete) are generally considered classics of contemporary fantasy.

Latro now finds himself in Egypt, a land of singing girls, of spiteful and conniving deities. Without his memory, he is unsure of everything, except for his desire to be free of the curse that causes him to forget.

The Washington Post has called Gene Wolfe the finest writer the science fiction world has yet produced.

This volume, Castle of Days, joins together two of his rarest and most sought after works--Gene Wolfe's Book of Days and The Castle of the Otter--and add thirty-nine short essays collected here for the first time, to fashion a rich and engrossing architecture of wonder.

Gene Wolfe follows his acclaimed all-fantasy short story collection, Innocents Aboard, with a volume devoted primarily to his science fiction. The twenty-five stories here amply demonstrate his range, excellence, and mastery of the form. A few tantalizing samples:
Viewpoint takes on the unreality of so-called reality TV and imagines such a show done truly for real, with real guns. Empires of Foliage and Flower is in the classic Book of the New Sun series. Golden City Far. is about dreams, high school, and finding love, which Wolfe says is about as good a recipe for a story as I've ever found. You're sure to agree.