Category: scifi 1970-1990

Sundiver (uplift saga) by David Brin

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Sundiver Kindle (uplift saga) by David Brin
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In all the universe, no species reached for the stars without “uplift” guidance, except possibly humankind. Did some cryptic patron race begin the job long ago, then abandon us? Or did we leap all by ourselves? That question burns, yet a greater mystery looms ahead, in the furnace of a star. Under the caverns of Mercury, Expedition Sundiver prepares for the most momentous voyage in our history – into the boiling inferno of the sun, seeking our destiny in the cosmic order of life.
David Brin’s Uplift novels are among the most thrilling and extraordinary science fiction ever written, comprising one of the most beloved sagas of all time. This freshly revised re-issue includes a substantial author’s introduction about the personal and scientific journeys leading to his now-classic first novel.

Star Commandos (Star Commandos Book 1)

Star Commandos
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Published: 1986
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Armed for Justice. Trained to Kill. They Were the Planet’s Only Hope. . . .

The Amonites: Innocent colonists eager to escape their impoverished homeworld and begin a new life on the unspoiled planet Vishnu. Colonists’ zeal and spacers’ greed have led them to a planet unexplored and untested. No one knows what malevolent life it may harbor. If trouble strikes, the Amonites will be alone, with no allies in sight.

Enter Commando—Colonel Islaen Connor: Beautiful. Intelligent. Deadly. She cut her teeth on a galactic war and has pledged to clean up the human filth left in its wake. Under deep cover and with death close on her heels, she digs for evidence to put away those who led the Amonites to this world. With the help of one trusted comrade, once a deadly enemy, she just may live long enough to succeed.

IF THEY LOSE—A WORLD DIES

“Excellent SF adventure!”—Andre Norton

Neverness by David Zindell

Neverness
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Published: 2015-12-17
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The price of greater life is death . . . . In an age of exploding stars and other cataclysmic galactic events in which Homo sapiens has long since split into different kinds, Mallory Ringess becomes a pilot of the Order of Mystic Mathematicians and Other Seekers of the Ineffable Flame. His quest to find the Elder Eddas - nothing less than the secret of life embroidered in humanity's oldest DNA - will lead him…

In an age of exploding stars and other cataclysmic galactic events in which Homo sapiens has long since split into different kinds, Mallory Ringess becomes a pilot of the Order of Mystic Mathematicians and Other Seekers of the Ineffable Flame. His quest to find the Elder Eddas – nothing less than the secret of life embroidered in humanity’s oldest DNA – will lead him from Neverness’s streets of colored ice into the deadly manifold: the “space beneath space” whose topology writhes and twists with hideous complexity like a nest of psychedelic snakes.

In his lightship named The Immanent Carnation, Mallory journeys far across the Milky Way and enters the Solid State Entity: a nebula-sized brain composed of moonlike biocomputers analogous to neurons. There he is tested. In the journeys and war that follow, he begins to grasp the infinite possibilities of evolution and what he will need to sacrifice in order save humankind from destruction and change the course of the universe.

Neverness is the internationally bestselling novel that introduces the epic Neverness Cycle. If you enjoy big-idea science fiction that explores the possibilities of consciousness, intelligence, technology, and evolution – all wrapped up in a page-turning, great adventure – you’ll love this book.

Sten: Sten chronicle Series, Book 1

Sten: Sten chronicle Series, Book 1
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Published: 1982
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The first book in an action-packed new science-fiction adventure series.

Vulcan is a factory planet, centuries old, company run, ugly as sin, and unfeeling as death. Vulcan breeds just two types of native: complacent or tough. Sten is tough.

When his family is killed in a mysterious accident, Sten rebels, harassing the Company from the metal world’s endless maze-like warrens. He could end up just another burnt-out Delinquent. But people like Sten never give up.

The Jagged Orbit by John Brunner

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Nebula Award Finalist:Mankind has been reduced to slavery by technology and surveillance, in this near-future novel from the author of Stand on Zanzibar.

In The Jagged Orbit, Brunner, writing at the peak of form that allowed him to create Stand on Zanzibar, takes a long, hard, disturbing, and hilarious look at the near and not-so-distant future. Catastrophic changes due to rampant drug abuse, uncontrolled violence, high-level government corruption, inhumane treatment of the too-readily defined “insane,” and the accompanying collapse of the social order are wreaking havoc on the world we recognize and turning it into a reality we must fear and hope to avoid. Brunner tells a spine-chilling tale of where the world could possibly go that is all too believable and real for our comfort.

“For each generation, there is a writer meant to bend the rules of what we know. Hugo Award winner (Best Novel, Stand on Zanzibar) and British science fiction master John Brunner remains one of the most influential and respected authors of all time, and now many of his classic works are being reintroduced. For readers familiar with his vision, it is a chance to reexamine his thoughtful worlds and words. For new readers, Brunner’s work proves itself the very definition of timeless.

Total Eclipse Kindle Edition by John Brunner

Total Eclipse
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Published: 1975-09-16
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Nineteen light years from Earth, on Sigma Draconis, an international space team stumbles upon the first evidence of another highly advanced civilization in the universe.

Tragically, however, the Draconians are extinct and have been for a hundred thousand years. What mysterious disaster destroyed man’s nearest neighbour in the colossal emptiness of space? And will the same fate befall Earth?

The answers, as Earth degenerates into squabbles, paranoia and self-destruction, are vital. But how to begin the almost insuperable task of cracking the enigma of a long-buried and utterly alien culture?

The Dragon Never Sleeps

The Dragon Never Sleeps
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Glen Cook (The Black Company, The Dread Empire) delivers a masterpiece of galaxy spanning space opera! For four thousand years, the Guardships ruled Canon Space with an iron fist. Immortal ships with an immortal crew roaming the galaxy, dealing swiftly and harshly with any mercantile houses or alien races that threatened the status quo.

But now the House Tregesser believes they have an edge; a force from outside Canon Space offers them the resources to throw off Guardship rule. Their initial gambits precipitate an avalanche of unexpected outcomes, the most unpredicted of which is the emergence of Kez Maefele, one of the few remaining generals of the Ku Warrior race — the only race to ever seriously threaten Guardship hegemony.

Kez Maefele and a motley group of mysterious aliens, biological constructs, and scheming aristocrats find themselves at the center of the conflict. Maefele must choose which side he will support; the Guardships, who defeated and destroyed his race, or the unknown forces from outside Canon Space that promise more death and destruction. S

 

Armor by John Steakly

Armor
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Published: 1984-12-04
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A best-selling novel of military science fiction follows the battle of a one-man, atomic-powered, armored fighting machine on the alien planet of Banshee, home to a horde of berserk enemies of humanity.  The military sci-fi classic of courage on a dangerous alien planet

The planet is called Banshee. The air is unbreathable, the water is poisonous. It is home to the most implacable enemies that humanity, in all its interstellar expansion, has ever encountered.

Body armor has been devised for the commando forces that are to be dropped on Banshee—the culmination of ten thousand years of the armorers’ craft. A trooper in this armor is a one-man, atomic powered battle fortress. But he will have to fight a nearly endless horde of berserk, hard-shelled monsters—the fighting arm of a species which uses biological technology to design perfect, mindless war minions.

Felix is a scout in A-team Two. Highly competent, he is the sole survivor of mission after mission. Yet he is a man consumed by fear and hatred. And he is protected, not only by his custom-fitted body armor, but by an odd being which seems to live within him, a cold killing machine he calls “The Engine.”

This is Felix’s story—a story of the horror, the courage, and the aftermath of combat, and the story, too, of how strength of spirit can be the greatest armor of all.

Shadow & Claw: The First Half of The Book of the New Sun

Shadow & Claw
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“The Book of the New Sun is unanimously acclaimed as Gene Wolfe’s most remarkable work, hailed as “a masterpiece of science fantasy comparable in importance to the major works of Tolkien and Lewis” by Publishers Weekly. Shadow & Claw brings together the first two books of the tetralogy in one volume:

The Shadow of the Torturer is the tale of young Severian, an apprentice in the Guild of Torturers on the world called Urth, exiled for committing the ultimate sin of his profession — showing mercy toward his victim.

Ursula K. Le Guin said, “Magic stuff … a masterpiece … the best science fiction I’ve read in years!” The Claw of the Conciliator continues the saga of Severian, banished from his home, as he undertakes a mythic quest to discover the awesome power of an ancient relic, and learn the truth about his hidden destiny.