First Contact Fiction

Idris has neither aged nor slept since they remade his mind in the war. And one of humanity’s heroes now scrapes by on a freelance salvage vessel, to avoid the attention of greater powers. Eighty years ago, Earth was destroyed by an alien enemy. Many escaped, but millions more died. So mankind created enhanced humans ­such as Idris - who could communicate mind-to-mind with our aggressors. Then these ‘Architects’ simply disappeared, and Idris and his kind became obsolete.

Frederik Pohl was on a streak when this Hugo Award-finalist novel was published in 1980. Now back in print after an absence of nearly a decade, this unique science fiction novel is as fresh and entertaining as ever. The story begins when the hero of Gateway finances an expedition to a distant alien spaceship that may end famine forever. On the ship, the explorers find a human boy, and evidence that reveals a powerful alien civilization is thriving on a transport ship headed right for Earth....

Lucky and crew think the worst is behind them when a ship finally arrives to whisk them away from a doomed diplomatic mission. It doesn't take long to learn how wrong they are. Before they know it, a seemingly vanquished foe returns more powerful, and with more resources, than ever.

The human race has turned to dust. August Morrison faces it after rising from the depths of a dark matter research facility in Arizona. His co-workers. His daughter. All of them: dust. Friends and colleagues around the world don’t answer their phones. The city of Phoenix burns. He is alone. As a world without mankind starts to crumble, August fights not just for survival, but for his very sanity. On the other side of the country, Poe McDowell watches her parents crumble into dust just moments after being shoved inside a coffin-like device that spares her from the same fate.

It has been six years since the end of the Covenant War...and yet on the planet Carrow, a world on the edge of the Joint Occupation Zone, a decisive new battle suddenly erupts. Human colonists and the alien Sangheili have already been living a tension-filled coexistence in this place, with Unified Earth Government envoy Melody Azikiwe attempting to broker a lasting peace between their two species.

Combat is literally her middle name. Chimeric Adaptive Enhanced Combat Operator - but now Caeco Jensen - works for the FBI, building a new life and trying to learn from a painful past. It’s hard to fit in when you are one of a kind, but maybe, just maybe, there’s a place for her in this world. That is, if threats from off planet don’t ruin it first. Forging and protecting a new future with a her unique skillset won’t be easy, maybe almost as hard as making new friends.

Former Marine Will Hawthorne has revealed himself to the alien world of Taitala as the Makalang, a legendary creature who is expected to reverse the world's decline into senescence and extinction. With his first wives already pregnant, tensions between the city's clans begin stretching to the breaking point as the demand for new children intensifies. But Will's attempts to mediate the dispute are upended by a campaign of bombings by the shadowy Black Sky group and suspicions that the mysterious nocturnal panikang are behind it.

Casmir has survived against impossible odds, and now he longs to return home. But an invasion force is blockading the Kingdom’s wormhole gate, and it would be suicidal to fly through it now. Worse, his family and friends are stuck on the other side, with hostile forces attacking their home world. The only way Casmir can help is to find out who’s behind the invasion...and convince him to stop. But Casmir isn’t known for his ability to strong-arm people, and this is one enemy who won’t be won over by his friendly demeanor.

Twenty years have passed since the interstellar scourge known as the Husnock were exterminated without warning by a being with godlike abilities. Left behind, intact but abandoned, their desolate worlds and derelict ships brim with destructive potential. Now a discovery by a Federation cultural research team has drawn the attention of several ruthless factions. From black market smugglers to alien military forces, it seems every belligerent power in the quadrant hopes to capture the Husnock's lethal technology.

Joining the fight for the Galaxy isn't required. It's a choice. The United Galactic Government is mired in a decade-long war for control of a key planet. Weakened by overextension and political intrigue, they could lose everything. When a child of privilege gives up everything to enlist and fight for what is right, he learns what it means to become part of a team. He encounters refugees, aliens he never expected to empathize with, and the loss of comrades. In the end he must develop the courage to stand up, not only to aliens and governments, but his own family.

First Contact has not been going well. The nations of Earth are rapidly militarizing against the arrival of the Superorganism, an alien civilization that promises to destroy humanity before it can develop into a real threat. The Superorganism has done it before–to their distant transient relatives–and they could easily do it again. But the alien Ampersand and his human interpreter Cora Sabino are done with trying to save humanity from both the Superorganism and itself; to them, this is a civilization that does not deserve to be saved.

Beks Bridgett’s mission in life is to try everything at least once. Some call her fearless. Others, reckless. While her bucket list includes things like skydiving and kissing random strangers, getting kidnapped by aliens and sold to an intergalactic fight club definitely isn’t. That is, until a fierce, intimidating, and hot alien warrior springs her from her caged prison.

Nyssa Dakros, a hunter in training and dignitary escort, is tired of dealing with males who are only interested in her because of her family’s high-ranking status. And no matter how much a male persists, she absolutely refuses to be claimed by one that isn’t her destined mate. An annoying situation made worse by her mother’s interference and constant insistence that she choose from a group of undesirable men. When a forced claiming attempt is thwarted by a gorgeous human male, Nyssa faces a greater dilemma—how to tell Dawson he is her mate and that they are meant to be together ...

Mira Braddock's own humanity was sacrificed in order for her to become the world's savior. A cybernetic soldier enhanced with a Tier 7 Nexus Implant, she's a Mist Warden capable of manipulating the nanites inside anything and any one, making her the most powerful and feared being in existence. Mira's crusade against Earth's enemies has brought mass destruction in her wake. Millions of aliens and humans have died at her hands. Each victory increases her godlike power, and she finds herself slipping away, struggling to relate to the needs of her allies....

Morgan Mars is doing everything he can to protect humanity from alien invasion. But even his new organization, The First Line of Defence, isn’t enough to save what’s already lost. Sectors are collapsing like dominoes as the aftermath of the 20th Cycle invasion leaves everyone trapped in the falling Sectors. No one knows what to do. No one, that is, except Nicholas Thistlebush. He has a plan to save Sector 6. The only question is, what will it cost him?

I was abducted by the alien puppy pound. Thrown into a cage and sold as a galactic pet. An alien captain has made me his beloved pet. Things have happened that I can’t live with. Things too terrible to mention here.

As the Federation starship Voyager continues to lead the Full Circle Fleet in its exploration of the Delta Quadrant, Admiral Kathryn Janeway remains concerned about the Krenim Imperium and its ability to rewrite time to suit its whims. At Captain Chakotay's suggestion, however, she orders the fleet to focus its attention on a unique planet in a binary system where a new element has been discovered.

Beth, forever fanning the flames of tension and dissension, has the Stryvers, the Progerians, and the entire human race on the brink of annihilation. It is up to Michael Talbot, BT, Drababan, and the United Earth Marine Corps to stave off this extinction event, along with General Ginson aboard the outgunned, outmanned, and nearly crippled USS Guardian. Is it too late, or can it all still be saved?

It is 2555, more than two years after the Master Chief went missing in action following a decisive conflict on Installation 00 - the massive, extragalactic Forerunner construct known as the Ark - as part of the final chapter in humanity's bloody 30-year struggle against the overwhelming forces of the Covenant.

N. K. Jemisin is one of the most powerful and acclaimed speculative fiction authors of our time. In the first collection of her evocative short fiction, Jemisin equally challenges and delights listeners with thought-provoking narratives of destruction, rebirth, and redemption.