Redshirts is John Scalzi's Hugo Award-winning novel of the starship ensigns who were expendable...until they started comparing notes.
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. Ensign Andrew Dahl has just been assigned to the Universal Union Capital Ship Intrepid, flagship of the Universal Union since the year 2456. It's a prestige posting, with the chance to serve on Away Missions alongside the starship's famous senior officers. Life couldn't be better...until Andrew begins to realize that (1) every Away Mission involves a lethal confrontation with alien forces, (2) the ship's senior officers always survive these confrontations, and (3) sadly, at least one low-ranking crew member is invariably killed. Unsurprisingly, the savvier crew members belowdecks avoid Away Missions at all costs. Then Andrew stumbles on information that transforms his and his colleagues' understanding of what the starship Intrepid really is...and offers them a crazy, high-risk chance to save their own lives. With a new introduction by Mary Robinette Kowal, author of the Hugo-winning The Calculating Stars.Huxley's final word about the human condition and the possibility of the good society. . . . Island is a welcome and in many ways unique addition to the select company of books--from Plato to now--that have presented, in imaginary terms, a coherent view of what society is not but might be. -- New York Times Book Review
The final novel from Aldous Huxley, Island is a provocative counterpoint to his worldwide classic Brave New World, in which a flourishing, ideal society located on a remote Pacific island attracts the envy of the outside world.
In the novel Huxley considered his most important, he transports us to the remote Pacific island of Pala, where an ideal society has flourished for 120 years. Inevitably, this island of bliss attracts the envy and enmity of the surrounding world. A conspiracy is underway to take over Pala, and events are set in motion when an agent of the conspirators, a newspaperman named Faranby, is shipwrecked there. What Faranby doesn't expect is how his time with the people of Pala will revolutionize all his values and--to his amazement--give him hope.
Pratchett cheerfully takes readers on an exuberant tale of mystery and invention. Along the way, he skewers everything from monarchy to fascism, as well as communism and capitalism, oil wealth and ethnic identities, Russian plays, immigration, condoms, and evangelical Christianity--in short, everything worth talking about. --Publishers Weekly
Elephants, werewolves, and ruby tights (oh my!) collide in this clever Discworld tale rich in mystery, myth, intrigue, and a dollop of diplomacy from the legendary New York Times bestselling author Terry Pratchett.
Everyone knows that the world is flat, and supported on the backs of four elephants. But weren't there supposed to be five? Indeed there were. So where is the fifth elephant?
Commander Sam Vimes of the Ankh-Morpork constabulary is the man to find out. A copper through and through, he's been invited to attend a royal function as a diplomat, ambassador to the mysterious, fat-rich country of Uberwald--complete with ruby tights.
Of course where cops go, crime follows. An attempted assassination and a theft soon lead to a desperate chase from the low halls of Discworld royalty to the legendary fat mines of Uberwald, where lard is found in underground seams along with tusks and teeth and other precious ivory artifacts. It's up to the dauntless Vimes to solve the puzzle of the missing pachyderm. After all, that's what he does.
Only there are monsters on his trail--bright, fast, toothy werewolves. And they're catching up.
The Discworld novels can be read in any order but The Fifth Elephant is the 5th book in the City Watch collection.
The City Watch series in order:
New York Times Bestseller
Hypnotic and darkly funny. . . . Belongs to a particular strain of American gothic that encompasses The Twilight Zone, Stephen King and Twin Peaks, with a bit of Tremors thrown in. --The Guardian
A splendid, weird, moving novel.-- NPR.org
From the creators of the wildly popular Welcome to Night Vale podcast comes an imaginative mystery of appearances and disappearances that is also a poignant look at the ways in which we all struggle to find ourselves. . . no matter where we live.
Located in a nameless desert somewhere in the great American Southwest, Night Vale is a small town where ghosts, angels, aliens, and government conspiracies are all commonplace parts of everyday life. It is here that the lives of two women, with two mysteries, will converge.
Nineteen-year-old Night Vale pawn shop owner Jackie Fierro is given a paper marked KING CITY by a mysterious man in a tan jacket holding a deer skin suitcase. Everything about him and his paper unsettles her, especially the fact that she can't seem to get the paper to leave her hand, and that no one who meets this man can remember anything about him. Jackie is determined to uncover the mystery of King City and the man in the tan jacket before she herself unravels.
Night Vale PTA treasurer Diane Crayton's son, Josh, is moody and also a shape shifter. And lately Diane's started to see her son's father everywhere she goes, looking the same as the day he left years earlier, when they were both teenagers. Josh, looking different every time Diane sees him, shows a stronger and stronger interest in his estranged father, leading to a disaster Diane can see coming, even as she is helpless to prevent it.
Diane's search to reconnect with her son and Jackie's search for her former routine life collide as they find themselves coming back to two words: KING CITY. It is King City that holds the key to both of their mysteries, and their futures...if they can ever find it.
Being undead sucks. Literally.
Just ask C. Thomas Flood. Waking up after a fantastic night unlike anything he's ever experienced, he discovers that his girlfriend, Jody, is a vampire. And surprise Now he's one, too. For some couples, the whole biting-and-blood thing would have been a deal breaker. But Tommy and Jody are in love, and they vow to work through their issues.
But word has it that the vampire who initially nibbled on Jody wasn't supposed to be recruiting. Even worse, Tommy's erstwhile turkey-bowling pals are out to get him, at the urging of a blue-dyed Las Vegas call girl named (duh) Blue.
And that really sucks.
Curiosity didn't kill the cat. It mutated it into a vigilante crime fighter.
Dan's cats are acting weird. One has grown into a strength powerhouse, the other wants to communicate... verbally. And now other kitties have begun to go missing from his quiet suburban street. Could the man in the parka that haunts a nearby industrial estate have answers? Or perhaps it's something to do with the strange disappearing woman in the woods? Can our hero figure out the conspiracy before it turns into a catastrophe?
There's Something Wrong With The Cats is a laugh-out-loud science fiction mystery. If you like zeroes becoming heroes and twists that keep you guessing, you'll love this fun standalone novel.
TW: Some animal abuse
Join humanity's mad blast toward Mars in this rollicking near-future satire
You'd like to be the first man on Mars, the next Neil Armstrong, wouldn't you?
Astronaut Addy Johnson and his wife, Bria, beat the odds (and dodge a publicity scandal) to be on NASA's first crewed mission to Mars, along with another astronaut couple. The foursome are best friends and chart-topping bandmates in the runup to their mission, supporting each other as they grapple with personal conflicts and the rigors of training in Antarctica.
After the Boeing Deepthrust rocket launches the astronauts toward the stars, tensions run high when Addy, misjudging the impact of defying Mission Control--and the wishes of Bria and the other crew members--ponders a risky gambit to outrace their Chinese competition to the Red Planet. Facing a challenge that could end their deep space voyage, they experiment with the peculiar cargo someone smuggled onboard.
This big-hearted satire by first-time novelist Richmond Scott is a scintillating read for sci-fi fans. Addy and his crew share their adventure with a vibrant ensemble of characters including amorous robots and reality TV stars. Set in a not-too-distant future overrun by corporate sponsorships and a collective obsession with celebrity, Tripping Toward Mars takes you on a dazzling, high-spirited ride.
Lake Geneva, 1816. Nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley is inspired to write a story about a scientist who creates a new life-form. In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI and carrying out some experiments of his own in a vast underground network of tunnels. Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with his mom again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere. Across the Atlantic, in Phoenix, Arizona, a cryogenics facility houses dozens of bodies of men and women who are medically and legally dead... but waiting to return to life.
What will happen when homo sapiens is no longer the smartest being on the planet? In fiercely intelligent prose, Jeanette Winterson shows us how much closer we are to that future than we realize. Funny and furious, bold and clear-sighted, Frankissstein is a love story about life itself.
Sandman Slim must save himself--and the entire world--from the wrath of some enraged and vengeful ancient gods in this sixth high-octane adventure in the New York Times bestselling series.
Being a half-human, half-angel nephilim with a bad rep and a worse attitude--not to mention temporarily playing Lucifer--James Stark aka Sandman Slim has made a few enemies. None, though, are as fearsome as the vindictive Angra Om Ya--the old gods. But their imminent invasion is only one of Stark's problems right now. LA is descending into chaos, and a new evil--the Wildfire Ripper--is stalking the city.
No ordinary killer, The Ripper takes Stark deep into a conspiracy that stretches from Earth to Heaven and Hell. He's also the only person alive who may know how to keep the world from going extinct. The trouble is, he's also Stark's worst enemy . . . the only man in existence Stark would enjoy killing twice.
Heen Gru-Bares has been SERIES 5 for most of his adult life, traveling from planet to planet collecting data and filing reports for the CHAIRS who run the universe.
And then he lands on the planet Firdus for his next assignment and he meets
Borns and Lan Zing and Ziga Mey and Dill Tudd and something unsettling begins to stir within him, something unnerving and profoundly disruptive. Out of all the planets he's been to over the decades he's been doing this job, what is it about this one particular planet Firdus that so subversively affects him like it does?
And then Noon Yeah shows up and he learns that she's a SIGN 7,
sent to Firdus to do a GRAINING because of his failure to execute
the task at hand-it's more than he can bear as what he thought
was his life begins to unravel around him...
Will Heen make it through this devastating turbulence?
What will happen to Dill Tudd?
And is all of this a set up, one of the symptoms of a larger malaise that will
continue to spread through the entire universe unless someone does
something to stop it?
It's a galactic saga of struggle and survival.
It's an interplanetary tale of love, loss, and bread.
It's BOOK ONE of the WHERE'D YOU PARK YOUR SPACESHIP? Series.
Welcome to Firdus.