Fiction Space Adventure

When the UN invaded the Freehold of Grainne, the intent was simple: Force a noncompliant star nation back into the collective. What the politicians hadn't accounted for was that the Freehold had spent 200 years as the haven for every independent, rebellious, self-reliant adventurer in human space. Its military are scattered remnants, its bases smoking ruins, its cities occupied. But Grainne and its space habitats have resources beyond measure.

Galaxy on Fire: Publisher's Pack 2 contains books three and four of the Galaxy on Fire series. Firestorm, book three: If you can't be dead, make sure someone pays for that fact dearly. When he was a human, Jon Ryan always looked forward to a better future. We all do. But his tomorrows turned out poorly. Ripped from his original time, he's being tested severely two billion years down the time stream. He only wants to protect the shape-shifting teens he rescued from genocide. The Adamant and his evil twin aren't going to make that easy.

In the war for control of the galaxy between the armies of the dark side and the Republic, former Jedi Master turned ruthless Sith Lord Count Dooku has grown ever more brutal in his tactics. Despite the powers of the Jedi and the military prowess of their clone army, the sheer number of fatalities is taking a terrible toll. And when Dooku orders the massacre of a flotilla of helpless refugees, the Jedi Council feels it has no choice but to take drastic action: targeting the man responsible for so many war atrocities, Count Dooku himself.

Think there's an unbridgeable gulf between human and alien thought? Not so! There's a common tongue, all right - and Nicholas Van Rijn speaks it fluently: trade. For behind the buffoonish blarney and bawdy bonhomie of the Falstaffian Van Rijn is a man who gets things done. A born wheeler-dealer who usually leaves both sides better off in the bargain. (While pocketing a hefty cut of the profits himself, of course!)

When an experimental shuttlecraft fails, Captain Christopher Pike suspects a mechanical malfunction—only to discover the very principles on which Starfleet bases its technology have simply stopped functioning. He and his crewmates are forced to abandon ship in a dangerous maneuver that scatters their party across the strangest new world they’ve ever encountered.

When aliens trundled a gate to other worlds into the solar system, the world reacted with awe, hope and fear. But the first aliens to come through, the Glatun, were peaceful traders and the world breathed a sigh of relief.

Following his successful mission to recover the missing warship, ESS Crimson, Captain John Duggan finds himself unredeemed in the eyes of his superiors. His duties resume, and this time, he's given something easy - escort a cargo ship to a distant planet and bring it home safely. But war is never so predictable, and a straightforward mission becomes something much more important. The outcome may well determine the future of humanity. Someone has terrible plans for the ESS Crimson, and Duggan is about to find himself party to endless destruction.

Randall Munroe's past won't stay dead. Born Tyler Callas, the pampered heir of a Corporate Council scion, he fled that life and adapted the new identity of Randall Munroe so he could join the Commonwealth Space Fleet Marine Corps' elite Force Recon unit in the war against the alien Tahni Imperium. But when he returned from the war, his old life found him. His mother, Corporate Council Executive Patrice Damiani, tracked him down and tried to return him to her web of control, even if she had to have his personality altered by drugs and psychological brainwashing to do it.

The Sentinels narrowly escaped the collapsing edge of the Divide. They have mustered a few other surviving Sentinels, but with no engines they have no way to leave the edge of the universe before they starve. Adequin Rake has gathered a team to find the materials they'll need to get everyone out. To do that they're going to need new allies and evade a ruthless enemy. Some of them will not survive.

Aliens and humans alike play positions based on physiology, creating receivers that jump 25 feet into the air, linemen that bench-press 1,200 pounds, and linebackers that literally want to eat you. Organized crime runs every franchise, games are fixed, and rival players are assassinated. Follow the story of Quentin Barnes, a 19-year-old quarterback prodigy that has been raised all his life to hate, and kill, those aliens. Quentin must deal with his racism and learn to lead, or he'll wind up just another stat in the column marked "killed on the field."

Admiral John "Black Jack" Geary earned his rank after being revived from cryogenic sleep to lead the Alliance to victory against the Syndicate Worlds. But his superiors question his loyalty to the regime. Now in command of the First Fleet, Geary is tasked with exploring the frontier beyond Syndic space, a mission he fears deliberately puts the fleet--and himself--in harm's way. An encounter with the alien enigmas confirms Geary's fears.

The revelations Mark Tudor unearthed on Tactus Ares were profound. The Piraxians fell victim to the aggressive, expansionist Eridani Federation. That same confederacy funded and facilitated the Lyrae. They made Stillness. And the Guild was complicit. How does one bring exposure to something the galaxy at large would rather forget? And how does an honorable man remove corruption when its gravity consumes all? A plan is hatched in secret.

The Last Horizon has already sown new legends across the galaxy, tales of monsters defeated and worlds saved. For better and for worse, their reputation is spreading. Their enemies have taken notice. On Karosha, the Perfected gather fleets crewed by inhumanly flawless soldiers. In the Galactic Union, the secretive organization known as Solstice pulls strings in the shadows. And in the depths of Dark Space, after years of silence, the ravenous D’Niss begin to stir.

The collapse of The Flow, the interstellar pathway between the planets of the Interdependency, has accelerated. Entire star systems - and billions of people - are becoming cut off from the rest of human civilization. This collapse was foretold through scientific prediction...and yet, even as the evidence is obvious and insurmountable, many still try to rationalize, delay and profit from, these final days of one of the greatest empires humanity has ever known.

The ancient menace has finally escaped from Lalonde, shattering the Confederation's peaceful existence. Those who succumbed to it have acquired godlike powers but now follow a far-from-divine gospel as they advance inexorably from world to world. On planets and asteroids, individuals battle for survival against the strange and brutal forces unleashed upon the universe.

Three decades have passed since Wraith Squadron carried out its last mission. Taking on the most dangerous and daring operations, the rogues and misfits of the elite X-Wing unit became legends of the Rebellion and the Second Galactic Civil War, before breaking up and going their separate ways. Now their singular skills are back in vital demand - for a tailor-made Wraith Squadron mission. A powerful general in the Galactic Alliance Army, once renowned for his valor, is suspected of participating in the infamous Lecersen Conspiracy, which nearly toppled the Alliance back into the merciless hands of the Empire.

Jordan McKell has a problem with authority. Unfortunately for him, the iron-fisted authority of the powerful Patthaaunutth controls virtually every aspect of galactic shipping. In order to survive, Jordan ekes out a living dabbling in interstellar smuggling for outlaw concerns that represent the last vestiges of free trade in the galaxy. So when Jordan and his partner, Ixil - an alien with two ferret-like "outhunters" linked to his neural system - are hired by a mysterious gentleman to fly a ship and its special cargo to Earth, they jump at the job.

After finding out that he has unusual powers, he is banished from the planet Karnak. Thrust into the tranquil world of Aurore, vacation paradise for the galaxy, Martin finds that the reality of this planet is much different from its serene veneer. The gods are wantonly cruel and indifferent to the chaos they cause: Are they really gods or just men and women with larger-than-life powers? Whatever the answer, Martin Martel must challenge their supremacy to defend his life, love, and the fate of the galaxy.

Chief of State Natasi Daala has been overthrown, and the Jedi Order has taken control of the Galactic Alliance. But while the new governors dismantle Daala’s draconian regime, forces still loyal to the deposed official are mobilizing a counterstrike. And even the Jedi’s new authority may not be enough to save Tahiri Veila, the former Jedi Knight and onetime Sith apprentice convicted of treason for the killing of Galactic Alliance officer Gilad Pellaeon. Meanwhile, Luke and Ben Skywalker are relentlessly pursuing Abeloth, the powerful dark-side entity bent on ruling the galaxy.

The Great Devourer is descending on the world of Tarsis Ultra, but to defeat the xenos horrors, Captain Uriel Ventris may have to embark upon a dangerous and unorthodox mission.