Narrator: Stefan Rudnicki

Fire in the East (Warrior of Rome Book 1)

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Fire in the East (Warrior of Rome Book 1)
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A.D. 255. The Roman imperium is stretched to the breaking point, its authority and might challenged throughout the territories and along every border. One man is sent to marshal the defenses of a lonely city and to shore up the crumbling walls of a once indomitable symbol of Roman power, a man whose very name means war: a man called Ballista.

So unfolds an epic drama – a story of empire, heroes, treachery, courage, and most of all, of brutal, bloody warfare.

The spectacular flair for explosive action and depth of literary and geographic knowledge, as well as the psychological complexity of the characters, makes Fire in the East the most authoritative historical adventure novel this year.

The Shockwave Rider

The Shockwave Rider
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In a world drowning in data, a fugitive tries to outrun the forces that want to reprogram him, in this smart, edgy novel by a Hugo Award–winning author.

Constantly shifting his identity among a population choking on information, innovation, and novelty, Nickie Haflinger is a most dangerous outlaw, yet he doesn’t even appear to exist. As global society falls apart in all directions, with corporate power run amok and personal freedom surrendered to computers and bureaucrats, Haflinger is caught and about to be re-programmed. Now he has to try to escape once again, defy the government—and turn the tide of organizational destruction, in this visionary science fiction novel by the author of The Sheep Look Up and Stand on Zanzibar.

“Brunner writes about the future as if he and the reader were already living in it.” —The New York Times Book Review

“When John Brunner first told me of his intention to write the book, I was fascinated—but I wondered whether he, or anyone, could bring it off. Bring it off he has, with cool brilliance. A hero with transient personalities, animals with souls, think tanks and survival communities fuse to form a future so plausibly alive it as twitched at me ever since.” —Alvin Toffler, author of Future Shock

“One of the most important science fiction authors. Brunner held a mirror up to reflect our foibles because he wanted to save us from ourselves.” —SF Site

Eon (The Way Book 1)

Eon (The Way Book 1)
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From the New York Times–bestselling author of War Dogs: A novel that “may be the best constructed hard SF epic yet” (The Washington Post).

In a supernova flash, the asteroid arrived and entered Earth’s orbit. Three hundred kilometers in length, it is not solid rock but a series of hollowed-out chambers housing ancient, abandoned cities of human origin, a civilization named Thistledown. The people who lived there survived a nuclear holocaust that nearly rendered humanity extinct—more than a thousand years from now.

To prevent this future from coming to pass, theoretical mathematician Patricia Vasquez must explore Thistledown and decipher its secret history. But what she discovers is an even greater mystery, a tunnel that exists beyond the physical dimensions of the asteroid. Called the Way, it leads to the home of humanity’s descendants, and to a conflict greater than the impending war between Earth’s superpowers over the fate of the asteroid, in “the grandest work yet” by Nebula Award–winning author Greg Bear (Locus).

The Humanoids by Jack Williamson

The Humanoids by Jack Williamson
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The story takes place thousands of years in the future when humankind has spread out and settled much of the galaxy. A powerful new technology called rhodomagnetics has emerged. On a distant planet called Wing IV, the new science resulted in weapons that wiped out most of the population. The inventor, wracked with guilt, then used rhodomagnetics to build the “humanoids”, perfect sleek black androids, all identical and all controlled by a central transmitter on Wing IV..He imbued them with a Prime Directive: “To Serve and Obey, And Guard Men From Harm”. But the robots were too powerful and their prime directive robbed human life of meaning wherever they went. They are rapidly spreading throughout the galaxy, and they appear to be irresistible..

 

Clay Forester is a scientist working in a weapons laboratory on a distant planet, when a vast army of robotic “humanoids” land and, as they have done on countless other worlds, take control of every aspect of human society. The official line is to “guard men from harm”, but in fact the humanoids deny any meaningful freedom to their human victims. Forester tries to fight back, with the help of a vagabond band of “psychophysical” adepts with amazing transphysical powers. Forester’s long fight against the strictures and despotic “protections” offered by the humanoids makes a fascinating tale, which Damon Knight called “without a doubt, one of the most important science-fantasy books of its decade.”
Author’s self-revealing Afterword, “Me And My Humanoids”, also included.

“Without a doubt, one of the most important science-fantasy books of its decade.”
– Damon Knight

“On looking back over his long and influential career, I have no hesitation in placing Jack Williamson on a level with the two other American giants, Isaac Asimov and Robert Heinlein.”
– Arthur C. Clarke

For Love of Mother Not (Adventures of Pip & Flinx Book 1)

For Love of Mother Not (Adventures of Pip & Flinx Book 1)
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From bestselling author Alan Dean Foster, an exciting early Pip and Flinx novel that shows the origins of a certain boy with special powers—and the mini-dragon that becomes his devoted sidekick. . . .

Flinx was just a freckle-faced, redheaded kid with green eyes and a strangely compelling stare when Mather Mastiff first saw him an the auctioneer’s block. One hundred credits and he was hers.

For years the old woman was his only family. She loved him, fed him, taught him everything she knew—even let him keep the deadly flying dragon he called Pip. But when Mother Mastiff mysteriously disappears, Flinx tails her kidnappers on a dangerous journey. Across the forests and swamps of the winged world called Moth, their only weapons are Pip’s venom . . . and Flinx’s unusual talent.

Dorsai! (Childe Cycle Book 1)

Dorsai! (Childe Cycle Book 1)
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Donal Graeme set out to re-shape the galaxy, but first he must tear it apart. Donal Graeme, Dorsai of the Dorsai, was the final link in a long genetic train, the ultimate soldier, whose breadth of vision made him a master of space war and strategy – and something even greater. He was the focus of centuries of evolution, the culmination of planned development, and through him a new force made itself felt. Dorsai were renowned throughout the galaxy as the finest soldiers ever born, trained from birth to fight and win, no matter what the odds. With Donal at their head they embarked upon the final, impossible venture: they set out to unify the splintered worlds of Mankind.

 

audiobook here

Hardwired

Hardwired
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There is also a little known novelette published 3 years after in the same universe available here

Hardwired, the acknowledged inspiration for the games Cyberpunk Red and Cyberpunk 2077, is now available in a deluxe edition for its thirtieth anniversary, with new content by the author.

Earth lies prostrate beneath the lash of the Orbital powers, and Earth’s Balkanized nations have no choice but to let the Orbitals plunder their remaining wealth. Below the zone of Orbital control, buttonheads, panzerjocks, dirtgirls, and hustlers scramble for their ticket out of the gravity well.

But now, if the criminal underworld and the guerrilla underground can join forces, there is a chance to shift the balance of power— in a war fought on the ground by hardwired commandos, in the air by high-flying deltajocks, and by genius hackers in the neural interface.

Cobra Alliance: Cobra War Book I

Cobra Alliance: Cobra War Book I
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The colony worlds Adirondack and Silvern fell to the Troft forces almost without a struggle. Outnumbered and on the defensive, Earth made a desperate decision. It would attack the aliens not from space, but on the ground—with forces the Trofts did not even suspect. Thus were created the Cobras, a guerilla force whose weapons were surgically implanted, invisible to the unsuspecting eye, yet undeniably deadly. And the Moreau family were the most famous of the Cobra warriors.
Long after victory over the Troft was achieved, the Cobras made common cause with their former adversaries against a new enemy. Their reward was three planets that would be a home for the Cobras, whose deadly powers made them too dangerous to feel at home on Earth.
Now, years had passed and not everyone on the Cobra worlds thought that the Cobras were worth the high cost of providing their training and maintaining their existing built-in weaponry, let alone supporting research to improve the Cobra weapons, and possibly even put an end to the negative effects of that built-in weaponry, which caused Cobras to die much too young. Many who had never known interplanetary war were convinced that the Cobras were not needed at all.
That was a grave miscalculation, because a new menace was approaching, one that even the formidable Cobra warriors might not be able to defeat . . .

Deadman’s Road

Deadman's Road
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Audio only

Deadwood meets Cthulhu in this wild and profane Western romp featuring zombies, werewolves, evil spirits, and one pissed-off gunslinging preacher.

The Wild West has never seen the likes of the Reverend Jebidiah Mercer, a hard man wielding a burning Bible in the battle between God and the devil, in an endless struggle he’s not sure he cares who wins. With its five stories laced with fast-paced action, nonstop humor, and spine-tingling horror,

Deadman’s Road is your ride to hell, in which a vengeful shaman curses a town by conjuring a seemingly unstoppable army of the undead; an ill-advised shortcut leads to a bees’ nest of terror; a man stands condemned, not for murdering his wife but for raising the Lovecraftian horror that killed her; a woman is attacked by werewolves and left for dead in a ghost town; and a mining camp faces off with a horde of cannibalistic fiends.

Empire of Man (March Upcountry combo volumes Book 1)

Empire of Man
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New York Times best-selling series - Omnibus - March Upcountry and March to the Sea, Books 1 and 2 in the Empire of Man Series. Roger Ramius MacClintock was young, handsome, athletic, an excellent dresser, and third in line for the Throne of Man. It probably wasn't too surprising that someone in his position should react by becoming spoiled, self-centered, and petulant. After all, what else did he have to do with his life? Then…

collect 4 book in 2 volume

first here

second here

4 books version available with audio here