Space First Contact

Zack Lightman has never much cared for reality. He vastly prefers the countless science-fiction movies, books, and videogames he's spent his life consuming. And too often, he catches himself wishing that some fantastic, impossible, world-altering event could arrive to whisk him off on a grand spacefaring adventure.

Light is almost everywhere, but what is it, really? How does it work? What does it experience as it zips along at the universe's ultimate speed limit? Light features heavily in this, the 8th book in the Voided Man series. Alan Franklin, who was once known as Maestro, narrates the volume. In Book 8 we learn... Of Alan's early years in the City... Of what's been happening with Andromeda and others back on the Potato... More about what the society made up of quadrillions of humans in the distant future is like... What happened when Banner Dawson found Pioneer 10 past the orbit of Pluto... All ...

The Alliance has arrived. There is uncertainty about the arrival of a substantial alien presence on Earth and its impact on humanity, and its way of life. At the same time, there is fear the Coalition may return. That fear becomes a harsh reality of inter-galactic war when the Coalition returns, in strength. Earth is now on the frontlines of the War of Succession. Joe Hunt and his team now have internal and external threats to Earth. The only option is to travel to the Alliance to learn more about the war and what may be in store for Earth. MORE BOOKS BY DONALD B MCFARLANE The Earth Saga ...

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.

Anywhere is better than at home… unless it’s an alien planet! Running from her abusive boyfriend, Lila doesn’t care about the interdimensional storm raging outside, the dragons that have been sighted on Earth, or the fact that people have gone missing in the storms. She grabs her dog, runs outside… and gets struck by a lightning that transports her to a world with giant, purple alien barbarians! Should she have stayed at home after all? When the aliens start courting her, she gets even more concerned. Men are all violent brutes. Except maybe these brutish alien barbarians are ...

The chance of a lifetime… Noah, a shy IT guy from a small town on Earth gets the chance of a lifetime when he is selected to travel to the planet of Zata among the very first humans ever. He hopes to experience more of the famous Zatan technology, but what he does not expect is to be thrown into the middle of a mating celebration and to meet a Zatan man who claims to be the prince of his planet! …And who says that Noah belongs to him… A lifetime of waiting… Arex, the third prince of Zata, has all but given up hope on finding his true mate. But when their new acquaintances from ...

Changes are happened to Earth. They can't be stopped, and the results will be fatal. An ancient alien fleet is heading towards the Sol System, and with it, the fate of the known galaxy hangs in the balance. The stakes are higher than ever before for our heroes and all of humanity. All the challenges and battles that have been fought until now for Earth mean nothing. This is the battle that will determine the fate of not only humanity, but the galaxy.

Orphaned as a boy, raised in the Czech countryside by his doting grandparents, Jakub Procházka has risen from small-time scientist to become the country's first astronaut. When a dangerous solo mission to Venus offers him both the chance at heroism he's dreamt of, and a way to atone for his father's sins as a Communist informer, he ventures boldly into the vast unknown.

Aliens? Someone get her out of here! The strange storms that have been raging all over the world have only intensified in the past months. Some say the end of the world is coming, but Mikaela doesn’t believe in such nonsense. Although she’d like nothing more than to curl up in front of the TV when it rains, she has her small dog to take care of. Taking Tremor out for a walk, a lightning suddenly strikes her. She wakes up in a completely different world with hulky, purple alien barbarians. When one of them tries to grab poor Tremor, she fights back. Hell no, they’re not taking her dog!...

The Bobiverse is a different place in the aftermath of the Starfleet War, and the days of the Bobs gathering in one big happy moot are far behind. There’s anti-Bob sentiment on multiple planets, the Skippies playing with an AI time bomb, and multiple Bobs just wanting to get away from it all. But it all pales compared to what Icarus and Daedalus discover on their 26,000-year journey to the center of the galaxy.

Her life had gone from amazing to a total wreck. Her best friend had died in a plane accident and she had broken up with the man she had thought was ‘the one’. But she should have known things could always get worse. One night, while she was out buying food, two men approached her and before she knew it, they had rendered her unconscious. By the time she woke up, she was on board of an alien ship, into the unknown. Enslaved and sold out as livestock, she was then taken to a planet inhabited by dragons, real breathing fire dragons. What else could go wrong?

During a routine survey mission on an uncolonized planet, Kira finds an alien relic. At first she's delighted, but elation turns to terror when the ancient dust around her begins to move. As war erupts among the stars, Kira is launched into a galaxy-spanning odyssey of discovery and transformation. First contact isn't at all what she imagined, and events push her to the very limits of what it means to be human. While Kira faces her own horrors, Earth and its colonies stand upon the brink of annihilation. Now, Kira might be humanity's greatest and final hope....

Earth has been allowed to colonize the planet Garth only because its previous occupants went berserk and wiped out virtually all life there. But now humans, chimps, and their alien allies on Garth are being held hostage in a conflict that could affect the fate of the entire Five Galaxies.

Jazz pianist Gus Kitko expected to spend his final moments on Earth playing piano at the greatest goodbye party of all time, and maybe kissing rock star Ardent Violet, before the last of humanity is wiped out forever by the Vanguards—ultra-powerful robots from the dark heart of space, hell-bent on destroying humanity for reasons none can divine. But when the Vanguards arrive, the unthinkable happens—the mecha that should be killing Gus instead saves him. Suddenly, Gus's swan song becomes humanity's encore, as he is chosen to join a small group dedicated to saving humanity.

Winner of the Literary Titan Gold Book Award and the PenCraft Seasonal Book Award for Best Book Spring 2025 One daring mission could be her salvation—or her end. In a galaxy where stability is a luxury few can afford, young Sev dreams of a home she can call her own. Roaming the cosmos with her distant father, they drift from one perilous job to the next, barely scraping by in a universe full of danger and adventure. But when their last big job on a treacherous planet doesn't go as planned, their lives are forever altered. Join Sev on a thrilling journey through danger and discovery as she...

The McCormacks have their floating city growing in the South Pacific, and their space station well underway. As they continue their quest to unite Earth and bring her into the modern age of space travel and repair her environment before it’s too late, they have to fight with the major powers that aren’t too sure they want to change the status quo. Now they have discovered an incoming asteroid the size of Ceres. What will it take to unite Earth to deal with this threat to its very existence? And what other threats may be lurking there?

When Simon and Katherine Hawke stumble upon an alien shuttle that has landed on Earth, it will not only change the course of their lives but also the entire world. Taking the shuttle into orbit, they discover a much larger ship left adrift with no one on board. Commandeering it, they confirm that we're not alone in the universe and must prepare the human race for what is about to come.

In this present-day science fiction novel, Earth confronts an alien invasion. But not from a marauding army. It’s just one guy who got a bad tip. Jacob is a Prospector. He makes a living by discovering lost civilizations on long dead-worlds and selling off their cultural relics. And now he’s chasing a hot lead about a world where the population has only recently perished due to climate change. The artifacts would be worth a fortune. But when he reaches the planet called Earth, it isn’t dead at all. And the people there don’t appreciate him saying so. But they do like his spaceship. ...

Hadrian Marlowe is trapped. For nearly a century, he has been a guest of the Emperor, forced into the role of advisor, a prisoner of his own legend. But the war is changing. Mankind is losing. The Cielcin are spilling into human space from the fringes, picking their targets with cunning precision. The Great Prince Syriani Dorayaica is uniting their clans, forging them into an army and threat the likes of which mankind has never seen.

An extraordinary astronomical discovery, an international conspiracy and a rush to the truth. When she discovers an exoplanet with an unstable orbit around the nearby star Tau Sagittarii, Uma knows something is not right. Is this an opportunity or a threat to humanity? In her struggle to uncover the truth behind her discovery, Uma meets Abdo, a clever robotics specialist presenting her with an alternative and unsettling interpretation of what she has detected. Together, Uma and Abdo unmask a conspiracy entangling the scientific community and corporations. Their lives are at stake, while a ...