Hard science fiction

Book SynopsisIsaac Asimov's Robot series from the iconic collection I, Robot to four classic novels contains some of the most influential works in the history of science fiction. Establishing and testing the Three Laws of Robotics, they continue to shape the understanding and design of artificial intelligence to this day.Could a robot ever show true creativity? Is it wise to trust self-driving cars? Will robotic body parts transform human beings into machines? Will organic technology allow robots to become human?The Complete Robot combines the stories in I, Robot and The Rest of the Robots with many more found only in this collection including one of Asimov's masterpieces, the Hugo and Nebula award-winning novella The Bicentennial Man'.Featuring Dr. Susan Calvin, Donovan and Powell, and the detective Elijah Baley, hero of the Robot novels, this is the ultimate collection of short stories from a genius of the genre.Trade Review‘Isaac Asimov was one of the great explainers of the age…It will never be known how many practicing scientists today, in how many countries, owe their initial inspiration to a book, article, or short story by Isaac Asimov’Carl Sagan ‘Asimov displayed one of the most dynamic imaginations in science fiction’Daily Telegraph ‘Asimov’s career was one of the most formidable in science fiction’The Times

Read more less

Book SynopsisIsaac Asimov's Robot series from the iconic collection I, Robot to four classic novels contains some of the most influential works in the history of science fiction. Establishing and testing the Three Laws of Robotics, they continue to shape the understanding and design of artificial intelligence to this day.Two centuries have passed since Elijah Baley's actions on Aurora sent settlers from Earth to new worlds all over the galaxy.The Spacer planet of Solaria has been abandoned by humans, though countless robots remain. When settlers arrive to salvage them, something unthinkable happens the robots attack.Accompanied by Gladia Delmarre and the robots Daneel and Giskard, a descendant of Elijah Baley sets out for Solaria to investigate, a quest that will lead them to a vast, catastrophic conspiracy and a revolution in the Three Laws of Robotics.Trade Review‘Isaac Asimov was one of the great explainers of the age…It will never be known how many practicing scientists today, in how many countries, owe their initial inspiration to a book, article, or short story by Isaac Asimov’Carl Sagan ‘Asimov displayed one of the most dynamic imaginations in science fiction’Daily Telegraph ‘Asimov’s career was one of the most formidable in science fiction’The Times

Read more less

Book SynopsisSigns of life have been found on Titan, Saturn's largest moon.A group of visionaries led by NASA's Paula Benacerraf plan a daring one-way mission that will cost them everything. Taking nearly a decade, the billion-mile voyage includes a slingshot' transit of Venus, a catastrophic solar storm, and a constant struggle to keep the ship and crew functioning.But it is on the icy surface of Titan itself that the true adventure begins. In the orange methane slush the astronauts will discover the secrets of life's origins and reach for a human destiny beyond their wildest dreams.Trade Review‘The most important living science-fiction writer in the country’THE TIMES ‘The best SF writer in Britain’SFX Praise for The NASA Trilogy: ‘VOYAGE is, quite simply, a brilliant book . . . skilfully constructed and enthrallingly told’SFX ‘Baxter handles a complex and gripping plot with his customary aplomb… The ending will blow your mind. Buy TITAN, read it – and then go out and buy everything else that Baxter has ever written’NEW SCIENTIST ‘A plausible tale of America’s last gasp at interplanetary exploration… Stephen Baxter proves what a cosmic thinker he is’WASHINGTON POST

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe first novel in Kim Stanley Robinson's massively successful and lavishly praised Mars trilogy. The ultimate in future history' Daily MailMars the barren, forbidding planet that epitomises mankind's dreams of space conquest.From the first pioneers who looked back at Earth and saw a small blue star, to the first colonists hand-picked scientists with the skills necessary to create life from cold desert Red Mars is the story of a new genesis.It is also the story of how Man must struggle against his own self-destructive mechanisms to achieve his dreams: before he even sets foot on the red planet, factions are forming, tensions are rising and violence is brewing for civilization can be very uncivilized.Trade Review‘One of the finest working novelists in any genre’GUARDIAN 'If I had to choose one writer whose work will set the standard for science fiction in the future, it would be Kim Stanley Robinson’NEW YORK TIMES Praise for The Mars Trilogy: ‘One of the finest works of American SF’TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT ‘The ultimate in future history’DAILY MAIL ‘Absorbing, impressive, fascinating… Utterly plausible’FINANCIAL TIMES ‘A staggering book. The best novel on the colonization of Mars that has ever been written’Arthur C. Clarke ‘Red Mars may simply be the best novel ever written about Mars’INTERZONE

Read more less

Book SynopsisA techno-fiction novel on the uneasy desire for anti-rationalist ideas on the internet.Taking off along the grotesque evolutionary curve of the internet, this novel by Mochu brings together Japanese otaku subcultures, Hindu mythology, darknet highways, ultraviolent cyberpunk forums, and renegade university departments to forge a transnational narrative that trips through the incompatible fantasies of rationality and civilization, with wormholes through ancient tales, recent cinema, plain-wrong art histories, and pirated philosophical reflections. The novel opens with a case of abduction in India. The operations of a far-right publishing house are interrupted by extraterrestrial influences with political intent. The attack on a science-fiction writer at a beach in Goa seems connected to a bot-propelled puzzle revolving around the defacement of Medieval temple relics elsewhere. A detective specialized in interstellar sociology finds clues that point to a transgalactic anarchist group with ties to online Posadist forums, while Eurasian political theory circulates as noise-objects in Goa’s beachside clubs. Meanwhile, occultist explorers in the sci-fi writer’s story find that the legendary homeland for Hinduism in the Arctic has become infested by “Gradients of Hegelian Unhappiness” by way of an invasive subzero entity buried in deep snow. The detective’s investigations eventually turn metaphysical, settling on impossible solutions spanning the far reaches of outer space.Reactionary behavior on the internet, having spawned numerous retroactive origin stories for itself, takes on a tentacular presence across diverse political spectrums, time periods, and cultural contexts, giving the impression of a vast and tangled entity with distributed intelligence. Fatally fused by a common hatred for the legacies of the Enlightenment, popular manifestations go by terms like “alt-right” and “neo-reaction,” powered by nerdy forums and blog posts across the web. Stationing conspiracy theory itself as the central form of thinking, acting, and concept-making in the twenty-first century, Bezoar Delinqxenz is a mixtape simulation of these entanglements at the borderlands of fiction, insanity, and political emancipation.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe third timeless, amazing and amusing volume of Isaac Asimov''s robot stories. Asimov''s Three Laws of Robotics have since been programmed into real computers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and used as the outline for a legal robotic charter in Korea.ROBOT TONY is the first robot designed to perform domestic duties by the US Robots and Mechanical Men Corporation. Is it Tony's fault that the lady of the house where he's field tested falls in love with him?ROBOT AL was intended for shipment to a mining outfit on the moon. Instead, he's loose in the mountains of Virginiabuilding from scraps of junk his very own, very dangerous disintegrator.ROBOT LENNY answers workaday questions in babytalk. So why is Dr Susan Calvin, the world's top robopsychologist, fascinated by this messed up specimen of an industrial robot?Trade Review‘Isaac Asimov was one of the great explainers of the age…It will never be known how many practicing scientists today, in how many countries, owe their initial inspiration to a book, article, or short story by Isaac Asimov’Carl Sagan ‘Asimov displayed one of the most dynamic imaginations in science fiction’Daily Telegraph ‘Asimov’s career was one of the most formidable in science fiction’The Times

Read more less

Book SynopsisAdrian Tchaikovsky was born in Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire before heading off to Reading to study psychology and zoology. For reasons unclear even to himself he subsequently ended up in law and has worked as a legal executive in both Reading and Leeds, where he now lives. Married, he is a keen live role-player and occasional amateur actor, has trained in stage-fighting, and keeps no exotic or dangerous pets of any kind, possibly excepting his son.He is the author of the critically acclaimed Shadows of the Apt series, Echoes of the Fall series, and Children of Time, the winner of the 30th Anniversary Arthur C. Clarke Award for Best Science Fiction Novel.Trade ReviewBrilliant science fiction and far out world building. -- James McAvoyChildren of Time is a joy from start to finish. Entertaining, smart, surprising and unexpectedly human. -- Patrick NessA refreshingly new take on post-dystopia civilizations, with the smartest evolutionary worldbuilding you'll ever read. -- Peter F. HamiltonThis is superior stuff, tackling big themes - gods, messiahs, artificial intelligence, alienness - with brio * Financial Times *I cannot recommend it enough. It's a helluva first contact story, and that's only like its 5th most interesting feature! -- Ezra Klein, New York Times columnist

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn epic masterwork of science fiction, Neverness is a stand-alone novel from one of the most important talents in the genre.Trade Review‘Zindell makes you think’New Scientist ‘Philip K. Dick would have been proud to conjure up such philiosophies’Manchester Evening News ‘A thick, lush, vivid, panoramic view of evolved humans in an evolving universe far in the future’Twilight Zone ‘Excellent hard science fiction… a brilliant novel’Orson Scott Card, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction

Read more less

Book SynopsisClassic sense-of-wonder sf from the author of THE ENGINES OF GOD.Trade Review‘The heir to Asimov’MICHAEL SWANWICK

Read more less

Trade Review“Implications of [Soulminder’s premise] mount up in interlocking stories, which make for an intriguing thought experiment. . . . Those who enjoy deep philosophical questions will appreciate being left with much to ponder.” —Publishers Weekly “Zahn is clearly an expert in his craft. Vividly described and immaculately well thought-out, the theoretical scenarios he presents make Soulminder a fascinating read.” —CBS Local’s Man Cave Daily blog

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe Martian meets 127 Hours in this “powerfully humane” (Owen King, New York Times bestselling author) and scientifically accurate thriller about a scuba diver who’s been swallowed by an eighty-foot, sixty-ton sperm whale and has only one hour to escape before his oxygen runs out.Jay Gardiner has given himself a fool’s errand—to find the remains of his deceased father in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Monastery Beach. He knows it’s a long shot, but Jay feels it’s the only way for him to lift the weight of guilt he has carried since his dad’s death by suicide the previous year. The dive begins well enough, but the sudden appearance of a giant squid puts Jay in very real jeopardy, made infinitely worse by the arrival of a sperm whale looking to feed. Suddenly, Jay is caught in the squid’s tentacles and drawn into the whale’s mouth where he is pulled into the first of its four stomachs. He quickly realizes he has only one hour before his oxygen tanks run out—one hour to defeat his demons and escape the belly of a whale. Suspenseful and cinematic, Whalefall is an “astoundingly great” (Gillian Flynn, New York Times bestselling author) thriller about a young man who has given up on life…only to find a reason to live in the most dangerous and unlikely of places.Trade Review"Whalefall is a rare thing: a page-turning, hold-your-breath, man-vs-nature thrill ride, but also a gripping exploration of the unnavigable relationship between parent and child. It's an anguished cry from the depths of that struggle. Bravo!" -- Christopher Golden, New York Times bestselling author of Road of Bones and All Hallows“A crazy, and crazily enjoyable, beat-the-clock adventure story about fathers, sons, guilt and the mysteries of the sea . . . [Kraus] brings the rigor of a scientist and the sensibility of a poet to his descriptions of the undersea world.”—New York Times “This gripping sci-fi thriller from bestseller Kraus takes readers quite literally into the belly of the beast […] Kraus provides solid nautical science alongside the stretchy coincidences that fuel Jay’s survival. Just on the brink of horror fiction, especially for the claustrophobic, Kraus’s deep-sea thrill ride will have readers on the edges of their seats.”—Publishers Weekly "A moving character study disguised as a riveting, cinematic survival thriller...The pacing is relentless, the awe astounding, and the tension palpably constricting, even as Kraus takes time to provide necessary details both scientific and visceral."—Booklist, starred review "This hard sci-fi thriller is full of cinematic and wild suspense and would be great for fans of Andy Weir."—Library Journal, starred review “Picture Jack London, but with a more nuanced handling of broken, damaged men.”—Chicago Tribune “One of the most intense — and moving — stories that will grace the bookstores in 2023…what Daniel Kraus has created here is something that can’t be quantified.”—Cemetery Dance “An absolute triumph, a masterpiece of suspense, emotion, and flat-out terror…It’s one of this year’s can’t-miss books, and a journey you won’t soon forget.”—Paste Magazine “Kraus turns the literal guts of this novel into a haunted house, a torture chamber, a church and a uterus for belated rebirth. There is nothing else quite like Whalefall.” —New Scientist“A brutal, unsparing, wildly uplifting book. The sheer buoyancy had me breathless by the end.” -- Clay McLeod Chapman, author of Ghost Eaters and Wendell & Wild“Astoundingly great. Whalefall is, quite simply, a beautiful novel—a must-read story of the sea, the nature of awe, and the briny relationships between fathers and sons.” -- Gillian Flynn, #1 New York Times bestselling author“Brave, bold, epic, propulsive. Whalefall is a deeply moving thriller that holds a planet’s worth of hope in the pit of its stomach.” -- Joshua Ferris, National Book Award finalist“The primordial nightmare at the core of Whalefall is fantastically gripping. A character study developed in the most intense crucible imaginable, Kraus’s latest novel is smart, surreal, and powerfully humane.” -- Owen King, New York Times bestselling author"A masterpiece. I haven't felt so alive reading a book in a long, long time." -- Alissa Nutting, author of Made for Love and creator of the HBO Max series“One of our oldest stories, one of our greatest fears, and one of our most capable writers. Stranger things than being swallowed by a whale have probably happened, but they've rarely been told so well.” -- Stephen Graham Jones, New York Times bestselling author“Whalefall is a mind-blowing, take-your-breath-away adventure, but it’s also a tender and moving story of the relationship between a father and son. Daniel Kraus is a writer I greatly admire. He can do anything, and does.” -- Dan Chaon, National Book Award finalist and New York TImes bestselling author of Sleepwalk“Unexpectedly emotional and wildly entertaining, Whalefall is the tense revamp of Jonah’s tale you didn’t know you needed." -- Gabino Iglesias, award-winning author of The Devil Takes You Home

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less