Space Opera Science Fiction

Sera leads a simple life. A little smuggling, some drinking contests, and captaining her star freighter, Sabrina. But when she picks up a mysterious shipping container on Coburn Station, things begin to go wrong. She finds herself at odds with The Mark, a dangerous pirate organization that wants the cargo on her ship. Inside the container she not only finds a woman, but a secret thought lost millennia ago.

Deep within Syndicate World space, the Alliance fleet continues its dangerous journey home under the command of Captain John “Black Jack” Geary—revived after a century spent in suspended animation. Geary’s victories over the enemy have earned him both the respect—and the envy—of his fellow officers…

Hugo Award winner Harry Turtledove is the master of alternate history. In American Front he envisions World War I as it may have been if fought on American soil. The United States and Germany clash with the Confederacy, France, and Britain as the machines of modern warfare litter the landscape with carnage. Meanwhile, oppressed southern blacks head toward a fateful confrontation.

The 200 years' (and counting) peace was a time of tranquility that hasn't been seen since...well, ever. Mankind in the Galactic Age had finally conquered war, so what was left for the military to do but drink and barbecue? That's the kind of military that Sergeant R. Wilson Rogers lived in before he left the fleet to become a smuggler. But it turns out that smuggling is hard. Like getting-arrested-for-dealing-with-pirates-and-forced-back-into-service kind of hard.

The year is 3326. Nigel Sheldon, one of the founders of the Commonwealth, receives a visit from the Raiel - self-appointed guardians of the Void, the enigmatic construct at the core of the galaxy that threatens the existence of all that lives. The Raiel convince Nigel to participate in a desperate scheme to infiltrate the Void. Once inside, Nigel discovers that humans are not the only life-forms to have been sucked into the Void. The humans trapped there are afflicted by an alien species of biological mimics.

For decades, the spacefaring species of known space have battled over the largest artifact - and grandest prize - in the galaxy: the all-but-limitless resources and technology of the Ringworld. Now, without warning, the Ringworld has vanished, leaving behind three rival war fleets. If the fallen civilization of the Ringworld can no longer be despoiled of its secrets, the puppeteers will be forced to surrender theirs - everyone knows that they are cowards. But the crises converging upon the trillion puppeteers of the Fleet of Worlds go far beyond even the onrushing armadas.

High above Earth orbits the starship Basilica. On board the huge vessel is a sleeping woman. Of those who made the journey, Shedemei alone has survived the hundreds of years since the Children of Wetchik returned to Earth.

GSW - a.k.a. a gunshot wound - back to front. That’s what landed me in Sophie’s operating room after a black op went to hell. After I bled out, she “volunteered” me for Project Angel, a top-secret program determined to revive KIAs with alien tech. I became their first success. Fast-forward to Armageddon: Demons are everywhere. Bodies even more so. After some intense fighting, we’ve reached the hospital where she worked. The place looks grim, but I’m not about to stop searching for the angel who saved my life.

The starship Freedom was once a mighty warship. Today, she's a tourist attraction. The space wars ended long ago. The Freedom is now a flying museum; the tourists love it. The Changing of the Guard, the starfighter aerobatics, the starboard cannon salute...it's the best show in the galaxy. James King commands the starship Freedom. He hates his job. He was a real soldier once, back when the Freedom was a real warship. He never imagined himself running a tourist trap. Right after Christmas, he plans to retire. Then, on Christmas day, the aliens attack.

Skulking around in the ruins on a planet swarming with treasure hunters, slavers, and bounty hunters isn't good for one's health. But Ankari Markovich needs a few archaeological samples for her latest business venture, a venture that might prove lucrative enough to move her family off the impoverished planet where she grew up. Unfortunately, she has no sooner collected her samples than she's captured by a band of brawny mercenaries.

Autistic scientist Yasira Shien has developed a radical new energy drive that could change the future of humanity. But when she activates it, reality warps, destroying the space station and everyone aboard. The AI gods who rule the galaxy declare her work heretical, and Yasira is abducted by their agents. Instead of simply executing her, they offer mercy - if she'll help them hunt down a bigger target: her own mysterious, vanished mentor. With her homeworld's fate in the balance, Yasira must choose who to trust: the gods and their ruthless post-human angels, or a rebel scientist....

The Spoked Offensive is underway! The Atrekna assault planet after planet, each planet conquered providing the jump-off point for an assault of five additional systems as the Atrekna have no need of supply lines when they can use their mastery of time and space to replicate supplies over and over again. The Terran Confederacy of Aligned Systems is sent reeling back, in desperate need of refit and reinforcements. World after world has turned into a desperate holding action when what the Confederacy needs is breathing room. Operational tempo has collapsed and things looks bleak. In the ...

The Cygnus-Orion Galactic Arm Spur is being devoured by warfare. The vile Atrekna have launched a second spoked offensive despite the fact the first one was blunted. However, this time the Confederacy is ready to defend the tens of thousands of stellar systems threatened. Operation Iron Piglet and Atomite Djinn pit the Confederacy against the Atrekna in a no holds barred slug-fest. The Confederacy knows that the Atrekna have to be stopped completely and then rooted out. There is no choice but to throw everything at defending the worlds the Atrekna attack. And even liberate the ones that ...

Fleet of Worlds takes a closer look at Human-Puppeteer (Citizen) relations and the events leading up to Niven's first Ringworld novel. Kirsten Quinn-Kovacks is among the best and brightest of her people. She gratefully serves the gentle race that rescued her ancestors from a dying starship, gave them a world, and nurtures them still. If only the Citizens knew where Kirsten's people came from.

Ruthless bankers are breathing down their necks, vengeful warlords are promising to pursue them across the galaxy, and now a mysterious new client wants Rade and his Argonauts to escort her to a frontier planet. Problem is, the new client won't reveal her cargo. It's probably something illegal. Well, Rade needs the money, so a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do. They arrive to find the frontier colony strangely deserted. When the shit hits the fan and the Argonauts face a possible alien infestation, it's time to pull out the big guns.

Major Rodger Y. Murphy should have died when his helicopter crashed off the coast of Mogadishu in November, 1993. Instead, he woke up in August, 2125, in a binary star system 152 light years from home. Without any memory of the otherworldly abductors who spirited them away in cold sleep, Murphy and 100 other “Lost Soldiers” have been retrieved and awakened by officers of the Consolidated Terran Republic. Promising to return to the 55 Tauri B system after completing a distant mission, they leave the twentieth century castaways with a daunting objective.

City slickers should never underestimate a farmer . . . With Reynard Gliph out of the capital, Casper Slodovich remains behind, running the entire Southside Projects as his own personal fiefdom. He is known far and wide as Overlord. Casper enjoys revenue from gambling, prostitution and other gray areas. He also retains a tidy stash from a recent bank robbery. But he’s looking for more. A lot more. What Casper does not count on is the city’s guardian, Night Shadow. And she’s not alone. The world’s richest farmer backs her, along with an ever-expanding AI and many other assets . . . ...

The Battle of Serenity Valley was the turning point that led the Independents to their defeat at the hands of the Alliance. Yet the Browncoats had held the valley for weeks against all odds, before being ordered to lay down their arms. Command stated they refused to send in airpower because the ground war was "too hot". But the soldiers who were there insist that was not true.... While picking up a new cargo on Persephone, Captain Malcolm Reynolds is kidnapped by a bunch of embittered veteran Browncoats who suspect him of sabotaging the Independents during the war.

After daring escapes and narrow victories, Thomas finds himself not only as the commander of Excalibur, but a symbol of hope to a fledgling resistance movement determined to challenge Morgana’s tyrannical rule. There’s a high price to freedom. Hidden among the stars, Thomas and his crew must transform from fugitives into fighters, striking where the enemy least expects while gathering strength for the battles to come.

In this thrilling second book of the Earthborn trilogy, Lucas and Asha have survived the decimation of Earth at the hands of the invading Xalans and seek safe haven with their enemy's true foes, the Sorans. They find a lush planet inhabited by a civilization far more advanced than their own, waging a seemingly endless war against a constantly evolving enemy. The Sorans call the pair of them the "Earthborn", and they're welcomed as heroes, almost as gods.