Space Opera First Contact

The final volume of the Uplift trilogy by Hugo and Nebula Award winner David Brin, Heaven’s Reach brings readers back to the planet Jijo one last time. The starship Streaker is still on the run with its dangerous cargo of ancient artifacts when the prophesied Time of Changes rocks the galaxy. As each race battles for control and chaos reigns, the truth about the Five Galaxies and The Progenitors finally comes to light.

After more than 20 years in special operations, USMC Gunnery Sergeant Wolf Mathison wasn’t looking forward to retirement when—implanted with an experimental artificial intelligence—he deployed on his last mission with a platoon of Marine Raiders being sent to the Jovian moon Europa. The USS Jefferson was destroyed en route, though, and only Mathison and three other marines survived. Trapped in stasis, they were hurled into the outer reaches of the solar system, where they wouldn’t be found for hundreds of years.

The McCormacks have their floating city growing in the South Pacific, and their space station well underway. As they continue their quest to unite Earth and bring her into the modern age of space travel and repair her environment before it’s too late, they have to fight with the major powers that aren’t too sure they want to change the status quo. Now they have discovered an incoming asteroid the size of Ceres. What will it take to unite Earth to deal with this threat to its very existence? And what other threats may be lurking there?

The year is 2650. Seventy-five years ago, an alien fleet attacked Earth. Without warning. Without mercy. We were not prepared. Hundreds of millions perished. Dozens of cities burned. We nearly lost everything. Then the aliens abruptly left. We rebuilt. We armed ourselves. We swore: never again. But the aliens never came back. Until now. With overwhelming force the aliens have returned, striking deep into our territory, sending Earth into a panic.

Nearly two centuries after a human colony is abandoned on an alien planet, the two races have reached a tenacious peace agreement. But when the human ship returns unexpectedly, both governments are thrown into chaos.

When the Equal Grasp and other unsavory aliens launch their plot to open humanity up to the stars—in the name of profit, of course—Van and his crew spring into action, fearing the fallout of a world gone mad. With each passing event in his career, Van continues to unravel locked memories, held by Perry, that explain a family history far more violent than he ever imagined.

Investigating the massacre of a telepathic minority, Captain James T. Kirk and the crew of the USS Enterprise confront a terrifying new threat: faceless, armored hunters whose extradimensional technology makes them seemingly unstoppable. Kirk must team with the powerful telepath Miranda Jones and the enigmatic Medusans to take on these merciless killers in an epic battle that will reveal the true faces of both enemy and ally!

After first contact, humanity learns that the galaxy is a place of ancient and far-reaching authorities. The Earth has not emerged as an autonomous peer into a community of sovereign worlds, but as an involuntary entrant into a galactic society whose demands are not light. John Riley, the physicist who inadvertently touched off first contact with his research into gravitation, now sees that the implications of his discoveries lead to more than technical frontiers. The galaxy, the nature of the Universe itself, is not what humanity has believed it to be.

Jack Morgan has been framed for theft. He's hiding on a distant planet with the virtual presence of his deceased Uncle Virge, a con man who has been his only family since Jack's parents died. Jack knows he must clear his name before the cops catch up with him. A firefight among ships in the skies above leaves a downed ship near Jack's hiding place, with a single unlikely survivor. It looks like a dragon, and it must join with a human host within six hours or die. The only available host is Jack. Draycos, Jack's new companion, is a K'da, a dragon-like species that lives symbiotically with the humanoid Shontine. The attackers, determined to exterminate Draycos's people, will find them if they don't flee; so the pair works together to escape the planet and begin a search for the truth behind Jack's frame-up and the identity of the attackers. With Jack's future hanging in the balance, as well as the future of billions of Draycos's people, the pair must track down the people who framed Jack, and prevent the destruction of the remaining K'da and Shontine. They'll also discover whether their union was mere coincidence, or a friendship written in the stars. Zahn keeps the story moving at breakneck speed.

The surviving Méridiens have returned to Confederation space, aided by their recently discovered cousins, the New Terrans. They expect a celebration after their 71-year absence. Instead, they're shocked to find the silver ships have destroyed half the Confederation. The Méridiens are fleeing in advance of the horde of alien ships. But Alex Racine and his crew didn't come this far to run away from humanity's enemy.

Humanity has reached an uneasy truce with the Empire—but unless the allies bring the fight to the enemy, extinction is all but assured. In preparation for the inevitable next war, Commander Stephen Michaels is at the helm of the Archangel Squadron, and his orders are simple: go rogue. Disguised as mercenaries, Commander Michaels and the Archangels seek valuable intelligence on their imposing foe. Their mission takes them deep into uncharted territory, where they make inroads with the Empire, fiercely guarding their true identities and purpose.

With the human-Shiravan treaty on the line, Kitty Hawke must violently end a mutiny aboard one of her ships. Afterwards, she leaves Shiravi, bound for Earth after being away for two years. Marsha Kane replaces Kitty as the head of the human fleet in Shiravan space, but she has her own plans on how to end the war with the Garmon, formerly called the Korvil. Meanwhile, the humans and Shiravan take the fight to the Garmon, destroying their ships and decimating their worlds, and it seems as if the war is nearing its end.

The invasion begins! The survey starship Yellowjacket is no pushover, but when an alien force larger than any in living memory appears out of nowhere, she is overwhelmed and left for dead on a hostile world. It's a bad start to the day for Captain Brynn Jameson — and that's before he learns the architect of the invasion has a personal vendetta against him. Now, the resourceful crew must find a way to repair their crippled ship, gather allies, and get back in the fight — before there's no fight left to join. Note: The Stars Dark series is an homage to thrilling pulp sci-fi of yesteryear....

Colonial Union Ambassador Ode Abumwe and her team are used to life on the lower end of the diplomatic ladder. But when a high-profile diplomat goes missing, Abumwe and her team are last minute replacements on a mission critical to the Colonial Union’s future. As the team works to pull off their task, CDF Lieutenant Harry Wilson discovers there’s more to the story of the missing diplomats than anyone expected... a secret that could spell war for humanity.

Bladerunner and a grievously wounded Charlotte Omandi have escaped from Drac’ath, while also having assured Earth’s survival, by gaining its admission into the Galactic Confederation. Omandi and her crew regroup with their Phadex allies on the hidden refuge planet, Rulia. While there, a long awaited message is unlocked and delivered by Rulia’s lost founder, Talus. It sets off a string of unlikely events that brings Charlotte into a shadowy world of assassins. Meanwhile, Linnea Sorenson travels to the legendary planet Aluria, where strange magics are rumored to exist.

For generations, we colonized worlds, and the human race spread throughout the galaxy. One discovery could end it all. They called the ship Lady Vengence, and her Captain, Gavin Andal, was young, a bit arrogant, and the perfect fit for a bunch of misfits more interested in shore leave than work. Nobody was interested in being a hero. Sometimes there's no choice.

Fergus Ferguson, repo-man, has one job: find the spacecraft Venetia's Sword and steal it back from Arum Gilger, ex-nobleman turned power-hungry trade boss. Finding Gilger in the farthest corner of human-inhabited space, a gas-giant harvesting colony called Cernee, was easy. The hard part will be getting past a field of space mines, hacking into the Sword's compromised AI, and fighting a crew of hostile enemies to take control of the ship. But when a cable car explosion launches Cernee into a civil war, Fergus finds himself caught in the crosshairs.

A novella set in the hard-scrabble world of James S. A. Corey's NYT best-selling Expanse series, Strange Dogs follows a family of colonists on Laconia where a new generation of humanity struggles with the profound changes that come with making a home on an alien world. Like many before them, Cara and her family ventured through the gates as scientists and researchers, driven to carve out a new life and uncover the endless possibilities of the unexplored alien worlds now within reach.

Colton Beck has six months to live. He works for the Angor near Los Angeles, aware that any day could be his last. The Angor arrived 20 years ago, resolved to help mankind survive, but not everyone believes their motives are honorable. When the Angor offer humanity a colony world, Colton is determined to see another planet before his final breath. He’s been diagnosed with Xeno, a rare disorder that surfaced with the Angor’s arrival, but he won’t let this stop him.

My name's Noah Kilmartin. I'm from Ruddock, Ohio, and I'm absolutely, 100 percent unqualified to save the universe from the slavering demonic hordes of the super evil queen Lilith. Too bad nobody asked my opinion. All I've got to do is pass five lethal trials that'll prove I'm the universe's last chance at salvation. To do so, I'll have to lean hard on those three years of Okinawan jiu-jutsu classes I took in high school, learn to wield my new magic sword, and, oh yeah - select five women to flesh out my team.