Adventure Space Opera

The gods are dead, but they are not gone. Their bodies litter the cosmos, magical fuel for vast interstellar empires, giving birth to mages, and more importantly, to magitech.

John Perry did two things on his 75th birthday. First he visited his wife's grave. Then he joined the army. The good news is that humanity finally made it into interstellar space. The bad news is that planets fit to live on are scarce—and alien races willing to fight us for them are common. So: we fight. To defend Earth, and to stake our own claim to planetary real estate. Far from Earth, the war has been going on for decades: brutal, bloody, unyielding. Earth itself is a backwater.

“Thy legend was born in the shadow of the beast. Marked with their sign. All dust in the wind. Thy strength was forged in the shadow of the beast. Strength within. Echoes without. Loathe greatest of all when beasts’ shadows are gone. No longer in shadow, the shadow in thee. Breaker of stars, devourer of gods. Haunted triumphs none would crave.”—Prophecy of Aion Origin

The prison ship Perdition, a floating city where the Conglomerate's most dangerous criminals are confined for life, orbits endlessly around a barren asteroid. Life inside is even more bleak. Hailed as the Dread Queen, inmate Dresdemona "Dred" Devos controls one of Perdition's six territories, bordered on both sides by would-be kings eager to challenge her claim. Keeping them at bay requires constant vigilance, as well as a steady influx of new recruits to replace the fallen.

On the grim death world of Fenris, the Space Wolves Chapter selects its aspirants from the best and brightest of the young tribesmen. Ragnar of the Thunderfist tribe finds his life changed forever when he is chosen. After being revived from a savage death on the battlefield, Ragnar is recruited into the fearsome Space Wolves Chapter. He is then thrown into a galactic war against the dark forces of Chaos. However, the implanting of the Canis Helix unleashes his primal instincts and Ragnar must fight to control the beast within him.

The Theocracy has been dead for 20 years, and the Polity rules on Masada - but it is an order that the rebels of the Tidy Squad cannot accept, and the iconic Jeremiah Tombs is top of their hitlist. Tombs, meanwhile, has escaped his sanatorium. His insanity must be cured, because the near-mythical hooder, called "the Technician", that attacked him all those years ago, did something to his mind even the AIs fail to understand. Tombs might possess information about the suicide of an entire alien race.

The Principal Investigator of the Chaalt people has covertly enlisted the aid of Nathan Myers and the crew of the Legacy. They desperately need help gaining access to their secret Prule research station. The facility has gone dark, and the automated defenses activated. Even the Chaalt's own advanced warships were not able to breach the shield dome and disable the cutting edge weaponry that protects the base. Nathan and his crew are in a race against time, because they believe a Prule Hivemind they once captured, now controls the facility.

"Oops, We Saved Humanity!" - A Briliant Sci-Fi Comedy of Adorable Chaos, Technological Mishaps, and Unexpected Heroism. An Absolute Must Read! Dr. Felix Bumblesnap never intended to trigger a global revolution—he just wanted to solve world hunger and have clean socks. But his latest invention, the Quantum Replicator™, has an unfortunate typo problem, and now the planet is overrun by intelligent robotic kittens capable of viral social-media campaigns, philosophical debates, and coordinated mischief. Soon, humanity finds itself caught between adorable technological overlords, politically ...

At long last, an extraterrestrial civilization reached out and made the First Contact. However, no one on Earth took their communique for the genuine article. In a similar vein, very few people appreciated just how little time our new suzerains had promised to keep our planet safe. Regardless, the end of their message showed humankind how to access a mysterious game. The objective of this game is unclear. No one can say where its servers are located, and its inner workings are beyond comprehension.

The Republic's AI controls a clone on one planet. The League controls a bot on another . . . Jade Thrall is the League’s Tetrarch but she holds a secret even she does not realize. She is a highly advanced droid, formerly known as Miriam. Few military assets are available to Jade in her effort to wrest back League planets lost during the war. But one potent tool remains in her arsenal: assassins . . . Join this rip-roaring, action-packed space opera adventure! Featuring space marines, rotten villains, fist fights, gun battles and sharp political intrigue, Digital Death kicks off a brand ...

Diverted from a life of servitude to SSI’s elite assassin school, Tori graduates just before Epsilon falls . . . Now she has to find a way off world before the Republican Marines sweep up all SSI personnel on the planet. Somehow, she and her fellow graduates must adapt to the changes wrought by the Republicans while staying alive. Where they once held the line of authority and kept order for the Tetrarchy, now they are hunted down and killed following speedy trials. On the way to Diego, she meets a pair of young AOJ agents, with deadly results . . . Don’t miss the second book in this ...

Follow a motley crew on an exciting journey through space - and one adventurous young explorer who discovers the meaning of family in the far reaches of the universe - in this lighthearted debut space opera from a rising sci-fi star.

Keeping up-to-date with the most buzzworthy and cutting-edge science fiction requires sifting through countless magazines, e-zines, websites, blogs, original anthologies, single-author collections, and more - a task accomplishable by only the most determined and voracious readers. For everyone else, Night Shade Books is proud to introduce the latest volume of The Best Science Fiction of the Year, collecting the finest that the genre has to offer, from the biggest names in the field to the most exciting new writers.

An entire sector in turmoil...neighbors who appear unconcerned...a favor asked of an old friend...sacrifices made for the good of humanity.... Before they can challenge the Dusahn and prevent them from expanding their empire further, the Karuzari must first gather much-needed resources. But doing so could be more difficult than anticipated.

The fall from grace is a long one, and Slick Mick Triton has finally hit the bottom. After the disastrous events of the Spectre Protocol, he's been professionally and personally demolished. His name is mud, his accounts are frozen, and his legendary ship, the Snatch & Grab, is a painful memory. Now a ghost haunting the grimiest corners of the galaxy, he's forced to take the most demeaning job of his career: a janitorial contract to tag a derelict junk-hauler in the Tenebris Sector, the graveyard of the galaxy, all for a handful of credits that won't even cover a week's worth of synth-...

Solstice, the secret organization running the Galactic Union, has made an enemy of The Last Horizon. Soon, they will regret it. Varic and Omega have a plan to infiltrate and destroy Solstice’s leaders, removing another threat to the galaxy. Compared to the apocalyptic monsters the crew has faced in the past, this opponent should be simple.

One human princess. Five Dangerous Aliens. A fate she never saw coming. They took me from my palace and called me queen. A kraken prince who wraps his tentacles around my throat like a vow. Two antlered warriors who share everything—including me. A cyborg with hands that make me forget what I’m fighting for. And the assassin hunting us all… who might be the only one who truly sees me. They’ll kill for me. Obsess over me. Ruin me. And the scariest part? I think I want them to. Celestial Sins is a why-choose alien space opera romance packed with court intrigue, ruthless warriors, and ...

The war raged across the galaxy. Billions had died, billions more were doomed. Moons, planets, the very stars themselves, faced destruction, cold-blooded, brutal, and worse, random. The Idirans fought for their Faith; the Culture for its moral right to exist. Principles were at stake. There could be no surrender. Within the cosmic conflict, an individual crusade. Deep within a fabled labyrinth on a barren world, a Planet of the Dead proscribed to mortals, lay a fugitive Mind. Both the Culture and the Idirans sought it....

Generations ago, nine ships headed into the unknown to explore a distant star called LQ Pyx. Eons later, the convoy has returned to LQ Pyx to begin work on the Web, the alien megastructure that covers the star. Is it a Dyson Sphere, designed to power a civilization as everyone believes - or something far more sinister? Meanwhile, Planet United's littlest convoy, long thought to be lost, reemerges in a different sector of deep space. What they discover holds the answers to unlocking the Web's greater purpose.

Rory Thorne is a princess with 13 fairy blessings, the most important of which is to see through flattery and platitudes. As the eldest daughter, she always imagined she'd inherit her father's throne and govern the interplanetary Thorne Consortium. Then, her father is assassinated, her mother gives birth to a son, and Rory is betrothed to the prince of a distant world. When Rory arrives in her new home, she uncovers a treacherous plot to unseat her newly betrothed and usurp his throne.