Space First Contact

In the aftermath of the Guild War, the trail of Kr’et’Socae has gone cold. Young Peacemakers Jyrall and Larth continue their search with the intent to bring the disgraced Enforcer to justice. With new intelligence in hand, they make a move on a known associate and the game’s afoot once more.

With the Merc Guild opening up contracts again, it’s Zuul eat Zuul to get one, as there are far more companies looking for work than there are contracts to be had. So when Taylor Van Zant gets an inside line on a 30-million-credit contract for Swamp Eagle Security, he races to Karma to throw his hat in the ring. Unfortunately, Taylor arrives to find that the other North Florida mercenary company - the River Hawk Defense Group - is also bidding, and Taylor is forced to watch as they steal the contract out from under the Eagles.

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.

Scorpia Kaiser has always stood in Corvus's shadow until the day her older brother abandons their family to participate in a profitless war. However, becoming the heir to her mother's smuggling operation is not an easy transition for the always rebellious, usually reckless, and occasionally drunk pilot of the Fortuna, an aging cargo ship and the only home Scorpia has ever known. But when a deal turns deadly and Corvus returns from the war, Scorpia's plans to take over the family business are interrupted, and the Kaiser siblings are forced to make a choice....

It’s been ten years since the Lunar Free State established itself on Earth’s moon. Since then, other Earth nations have pushed into space, but - thanks to the advantages provided by its gravity-driven spacecraft - the LFS has continued to prosper. When the research ship LFS Stephen Hawking encounters an alien probe near Saturn, though, the craft leads Hawking on a chase before vanishing into hyperspace. Now the Lunar Free State must face two facts: The humans of Earth are not the only intelligent life in the universe, and travel to other star systems is possible.

Zilfaquir is having a bad day. Shin-Sho Corporation dispatched his emergency engineering team (EET) to the remote ice planet, Xiao 2, to investigate a communications blackout. The Xiao 2 facility, composed of three subsurface ocean stations, awaits his team below hundreds of meters of ice and kilometers underwater. Upon arrival, he discovers the Xiao 2 facility has experienced an epidemic, leaving most of the station’s personnel either dead or dying. Or transforming. Worse, the stations are in danger of imploding due to sabotage.

Mankind has spread to the stars, only to become locked in warfare with an insidious alien race. All that stands against the alien menace are the soldiers of the Simulant Operation Programme, an elite military team remotely operating avatars in the most dangerous theatres of war. Captain Conrad Harris has died hundreds of times - running suicide missions in simulant bodies. Known as Lazarus, he is a man addicted to death. So when a secret research station deep in alien territory suddenly goes dark, there is no other man who could possibly lead a rescue mission.

When the terraforming crews introduced the alien Quill to worlds where they did not belong, they saw them only as a mindless form of fungal life. But the Quill multiplied and mutated until they were no longer harmless. In the ensuing chaos, many stations failed. For the survivors, their only hope rests in finding a way to wipe out the Quill....

Peacemakers. The Galactic Union’s most capable enforcers and resolute negotiators, their name alone elicits fear and awe among the Union’s citizenry. When necessary, the Peacemaker Guild deputizes citizens to carry out special missions of great difficulty and danger. The only person ever to land a Combat Assault System, Personal (CASPer) from high-altitude free fall without a parachute, Tara Mason’s career as a mercenary showed promise, but it crumbled under poor choices and even worse leadership

Julie E. Czerneda's acclaimed Web Shifters series continues with the story of Esen - the last survivor of a unique alien race. Able to take on the form of any creature she observes, Esen has long since broken the cardinal rule of her species: noninterference.

Over 100 identical generations, Mia’s family has shaped earth history to push humanity to the stars, making brutal, wrenching choices and sacrificing countless lives. After nudging the human race through the dawn of rocket technology, Mia finds herself about to help launch the first people into space. She can't take them to the stars, not quite yet, but she's getting them ever closer. But a terrible adversary is upon her, threatening the future of two species.

War is on the horizon. Daniel Hunt has no desire to lead the first coalition of corporations the galaxy has ever known. This is exactly why he's perfect for the job. In the face of humankind's greatest threat, old enemies will find redemption and new allies will answer the call. If this wasn't enough, more mysteries are unraveled as Daniel finally finds answers to the fate of the woman he loves.

Daniel Hunt has been many things in his life, but a commander in a full out military conflict has never been one of them. The Voy is a deadly opponent, and if humanity is going to have a chance, every faction must come together. Galactic Praetorians, Corporate Mercenaries, and the woman known as Madam Eternal will have to play all of their cards in order to survive.

A chance encounter with a strange creature puts Nathan on the trail of a lost civilization that predates everything else in the galaxy. For thousands of years, many have abandoned the deadly search, but there are powerful forces that will do anything to possess the promised technological marvels that will change everything. Determined to uncover the truth, Nathan joins the hunt, but when the race for the ultimate prize turns deadly, it will test the loyalty of his crew.

Brave and beautiful Aleytys has been gifted with mental abilities far beyond those of ordinary humans - thanks to her genetic heritage as a homo superior Vyrhh as well as the alien technology she wears called the Diadem, which, once donned, can never be removed. Her long, strange journey across the galaxy in search of her past now takes an unexpected turn as she accepts a position with Hunters Inc., and begins training as an interstellar mercenary.

The McCormacks are finally going to start an Earth Colony and the Paraxeans are finally getting a home. Catie is going to the Academy and Marc is going to Artemis. What will it take for both of them to survive their new challenges? Will Catie’s cover hold? Will Marc be able to get the colony moving to self-sufficiency? Will the aliens who are heading to Artemis give him the time he needs. What will happen on Earth as people start leaving.

CDF Lieutenant Harry Wilson has one simple task: Watch an ambassador’s dog while the diplomat is conducting sensitive negotiations with an alien race. But you know dogs - always getting into something. And when this dog gets into something that could launch an alien civil war, Wilson has to find a way to solve the conflict, fast, or be the one in the Colonial Union’s doghouse. "The Dog King" is a tale from John Scalzi's The Human Division, a series of self-contained but interrelated short stories set in the Old Man's War universe.

The Colonial Defense Forces usually protect humanity from alien attack, but now the stability of the Colonial Union has been threatened, and Lieutenant Heather Lee and her squad are called to squash a rebellion on a colony world. It seems simple enough - but there's a second act to the rebellion that finds Lee captive, alone, and armed with only her brains to survive.

The Conclave is a confederation of 400 alien races - many of whom would like to see the Colonial Union - and the humans inside of it - blasted to extinction. To avoid a conflict that neither side can afford, Conclave leader General Tarsem Gau appoints Hafte Sorvalh to resolve an emerging diplomatic crisis with the humans, before the only acceptable solution is war. "The Back Channel" is a tale from John Scalzi's The Human Division, a series of self-contained but interrelated short stories set in the Old Man's War universe.

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.