Recommendations based on "Something Happened Here, But We're Not Quite Sure What It Was A Tor.Com Original"

The mystery of a missing translator sets three lives on a collision course that will have a ripple effect across the stars in this powerful novel from a Hugo, Nebula, and Arthur C. Clarke award-winning author."There are few who write science fiction like Ann Leckie can. There are few who ever could." —John ScalziQven was created to be a Presger translator. The pride of their Clade, they always had a clear path before them: learn human ways, and eventually, make a match and serve as an intermediary between the dangerous alien Presger and the human worlds. The realization that they might want something else isn't "optimal behavior". It's the type of behavior that results in elimination.But Qven rebels. And in doing so, their path collides with those of two others. Enae, a reluctant diplomat whose dead grandmaman has left hir an impossible task as an inheritance: hunting down a fugitive who has been missing for over 200 years. And Reet, an adopted mechanic who is increasingly desperate to learn about his genetic roots—or anything that might explain why he operates so differently from those around him.As a Conclave of the various species approaches—and the long-standing treaty between the humans and the Presger is on the line—the decisions of all three will have ripple effects across the stars.Masterfully merging space adventure and mystery, and a poignant exploration about relationships and belonging, Translation State is a triumphant new standalone story set in the celebrated Imperial Radch universe."Leckie’s humane, emotionally intelligent, and deeply perceptive writing makes this tautly plotted adventure feel fundamentally true while also offering longtime fans a much anticipated glimpse into the Radch’s most mysterious species. Readers will be thrilled." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)"Another of Leckie’s beautiful mergings of the political, philosophical, and personal." —Kirkus (starred review)

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Anathem, Reamde, and Cryptonomicon comes an exciting and thought-provoking science fiction epic—a grand story of annihilation and survival spanning five thousand years.What would happen if the world were ending?A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.But the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers threaten the intrepid pioneers, until only a handful of survivors remain . . .Five thousand years later, their progeny—seven distinct races now three billion strong—embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown . . . to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth.A writer of dazzling genius and imaginative vision, Neal Stephenson combines science, philosophy, technology, psychology, and literature in a magnificent work of speculative fiction that offers a portrait of a future that is both extraordinary and eerily recognizable. As he did in Anathem, Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and Reamde, Stephenson explores some of our biggest ideas and perplexing challenges in a breathtaking saga that is daring, engrossing, and altogether brilliant.

Whenever there's a need to fix, repair, or salvage, Starfleet calls in the crack S.C.E. team on the U.S.S. da Vinci. Under the command of Captain David Gold and Commander Sonya Gomez, the S.C.E. solves the unsolvable, from finding a Starfleet vessel lost inside a holographic ship to doping out new technology captured during the Dominion War.However, the da Vinci's mission to Galvan VI will prove to be the S.C.E.'s greatest challenge to date, as they must salvage the U.S.S. Orion from the turbulent atmosphere of a gas giant. As if that wasn't enough, the Orion is carrying the prototype of the deadly Wildfire device -- a protomatter warhead that can ignite gas giants into stars -- and the planet seems to be home to a strange alien life-form that may have been responsible for the Orion 's destruction!Wildfirecontains the complete eBook editions of S.C.E. adventures #20-24:Enigma Ship, War Stories Book 1, War Stories Book 2, Wildfire Book 1,andWildfire Book 2.

Andrew Keane, formerly a Northern colonel in the American Civil War, was now leading a mixed force of humans snatched from assorted periods in history on a desperate flight from an enemy more horrific than any nightmare. The alien Merki hordes, to whom all the humans brought to this distant world were cattle to be harvested at will, were mobilizing to destroy the humans in a payment for the assassinaton of their revered warlord. And, his own military lines overextended, Andrew saw no alternative except to retreat, burning the land behind him as he went.

Kris Longknife encounters some peaceful aliens who have come to warn humanity of an unidentifiable force that is roaming the galaxy, obliterating everything in its path-a path now leading directly toward the human worlds.

As the crippled starship Trumpet drifts in space, its drives sabotaged from within by a crewman tainted with an alien mutagen, a deadly game is being played out on a satellite near Earth in the headquarters of the UMC Police. In the wake of a suicide attack in the chambers of the Governing Council for Earth and Space, UMCP Director Warden Dios is preparing to expose the secret machinations of the Dragon, the corrupt head of the United Mining Companies. But Dios's own dangerous actions are about to come to light and may precipitate all-out war with the Amnion, leaving Dios - and all humanity - to pay a terrible price for what could be termed treason. Thought dead in space, Trumpet broadcasts to any ship in range the formula of the mutagen's antidote - a drug the UMC has suppressed for its own sinister purposes. A small band of battered survivors, these fugitives hold the key to Earth's future: Morn Hyland, a former UMCP cop whose obsession with the Amnion has grown so fierce she is becoming something even her son doesn't recognize; Angus Thermopyle, cyborg tool of the UMCP, released from his cybernetic enslavement and now testing the boundaries of his new freedom; Ciro Vasaczk, tormented by the damage done him by the Amnion mutagen - and by the damage he himself has done Trumpet while in thrall to the drug. Their escape from the Calm Horizons will prove to be only a temporary triumph if the alien combat craft survives its battle with the UMCP ship Punisher and returns to the Amnion with the antidote's formula - and the key to the destruction of all human life. Morn Hyland can see just one way out of their situation. As Min Donner and Punisher close in on the disabled Trumpet to arrestthe fugitives, Morn prepares for a desperate gamble. To commandeer the police craft by any means necessary...and take it back to Earth. As Dios in Earth's orbit and Morn in deep space each make dire, far-reaching decisions, the Amnion act with swift fury, and suddenly Earth stands threatened with fiery destruction.

Suspense fiction. The first two stories in the Gap quintet. In the far future, gap drives faster-than-light deep space travel, but sometimes this afflicts some with irreparable brain damage. A Zone Implant can turn such a person into a zombie, to protect his shipmates, but it's highly illegal. Ensign Morn Hyland works for the United Mining Company, which is in charge of law enforcement throughout known space. She lives aboard a police ship, together with most of her family; their job is to chase down pirates and other illegals who prey on the weak, or smuggle goods into forbidden space. Her life is nothing out of the ordinary - until she falls in with the pirate Captain Nick Succorso. All of a sudden, the young, strong, beautiful police officer appears to be falling in love - well, lust at least - with the murdering pirate, or so it appears to the folk at the space station's bar. But the real story was quite different.

"In the beginning, before Man and the insect Thranx became allies, in the days when the reptilian AAnn were just occasional raiders of the Thranx colony worlds, one young Thranx agricultural expert lived a life of quiet desperation. A dreamer in a world of sensible well adjusted socialised beings, Ryo buried himself in the work of reclaiming marshland until ... Until he met the Aliens. Grotesque two legged creatures, unpleasingly soft-skinned, gross in their appetites, alarming in their movements, all in all a pretty revolting species, yet his curiosity overcame his queasiness and he befriende3d them. And discovered they were called Man."--Publisher description

An exclusive two-in-one novel from the Science Fiction Book Club, set in Charles Stross’ Eschaton Universe: Singularity Sky and Iron Sunrise. Singularity Sky: Spaceship engineer Martin Springfield and U.N. diplomat Rachel Mansour hail from an Earth that has gone through the Singularity, an accelerated technological and social evolution far beyond anything we can imagine. The Singularity was triggered by the Eschaton, a super-powerful being descended from humanity that can travel in time and that essentially rules the universe. Springfield and Mansour meet on the home world of the New Republic, a repressive, backwater society that has outlawed virtually all advanced technology other than that necessary for interstellar warfare. When one of the New Republic's colonial worlds is besieged by the Festival, an enigmatic alien intelligence, the Republic counterattacks, using time travel in an attempt to put its warships in position to catch the Festival by surprise. Springfield and Mansour, working for different masters, have both been assigned the task of either diffusing the crisis or sabotaging the New Republic's warfleet, no matter what the cost. Iron Sunrise: In the 24th century, a McWorld ("bland, comfortable, tolerant... boring") called New Moscow apparently has been destroyed by trade rival New Dresden—but not before New Moscow launched its own Slower-Than-Light (STL) counterstrike: a massive ship accelerated to 80% the speed of light. The U.N., now central Earth government, knows New Dresden was set up. They need the STL's recall code, now known only to a handful of New Moscow's ambassadors—but someone has been systematically assassinating them. U.N. special operative Rachel Mansour and her husband, engineer Martin Springfield, must protect the last living ambassador and find out who's really responsible for the whole mess.

When the festive season arrives at Larklight, so does some unsettling news. A sinister-looking cloud is fast approaching the outskirts of the Known Universe. The closest planet, Georgium Sidus, has but two human inhabitants- the missionary Rev Cruet and his daughter Charity- most recent communication- 'Great danger - imperative that-'. And so, aboard a Naval Gunship, Art, Myrtle and family, bravely go where only one man and his daughter have gone before, to determine the nature of the menacing cloud and rescue the Cruets. But the evil which awaits them is far beyond their imagining, and it looks as though Mother may have finally Met Her Match. Lucky, then, that Jack Havoc is hot on their heels to help in the battle to save the Universe (again).