The full book is available to download in all 7 DRM-free formats
From New York Times best‑seller and science fiction and fantasy mistress of adventure Mercedes Lackey, Book #4 in the pulse‑pounding SECRET WORLD saga of modern‑day humans with superpowers. The metaheroes deal with the consequences of their superpowers, but the evil Thulian threat lies in wait.
Destroying the Thulian North American Headquarters has not made life easier for ECHO, or the world. The Thulians
continue their attacks, first in unpredictable incursions, then with another all‑out assault on ECHO, orchestrated
against ECHO headquarters across the world.
Dominic Verdigris has not given up on his effort to obtain The Seraphym for himself, in order to use her to avert his
own fate at the hands of the Thulians. Nor have the heroes of ECHO and the CCCP found life anything but harder.
Belladonna's duties have increased a thousand‑fold, and now she has responsibility for the lives of every metahuman in
ECHO on her conscience. Obviously using the intelligence gathered from the raid on the North American Thulian base
to find the main Headquarters is of paramount importance‑‑but once it is found, can she manage to convince the armies
of the world to follow ECHO into an all‑out attack?
Then Red Saviour risks everything on a risky gambit of her own: send her "wolves" of the CCCP to find the Thulian
Headquarters, despite the dangers, and despite the consequences of blowing everything on this hazardous gambit that
could very well end, not in victory, but with the world in flames.
BOOK ONE IN A BRAND NEW SERIES by Nebula and Hugo Award Winner Catherine Asaro set in the world of her Skolian Empire universe
Major Bhaajan, a former military officer with Imperial Space Command, is now a hard‑bitten P.I. with a load of baggage to deal with, and clients with woes sometimes personal, sometimes galaxy‑shattering, and sometimes both. Bhaajan must sift through the shadows of dark and dangerous Undercity—the enormous capital of a vast star empire—to find answers.
Listen to the author discuss the book here on the Baen Free Radio Hour.
Being an expert in information searches, image processing and enhancement, pattern matching, and data forensics
earned Jason Wood a lot of money – from private contracts and working with the police. And it was a nice,
comfortable job most of the time. But then an informant showed up dead on his doorstep, a photograph didn't show
someone who'd been in the viewfinder when the picture was taken, and Jason's world is suddenly turned upside‑down.
Against things that violate the very reality he thought he understood, Jason has only three weapons: his best friend
Sylvie, his talent for seeing patterns… and his ability to think beyond the pattern and see a solution that no one else imagined. Against the darkness of the unknown, the greatest weapon is the light of reason.
A vastly expanded and revised edition of Digital Knight, Ryk E. Spoor's first published novel, Paradigms Lost adds
two brand new adventures for Jason and includes many chapters of additional material within the originals.
Listen to the author discuss the book here on the Baen Free Radio Hour.
Two classic novels from a best‑selling master of SF.
Cradle of Saturn
Discoveries made by colonists on the moons of Saturn show that the Solar System has undergone repeated cataclysms and the last was only a few thousand years. This flies in the face of accepted scientific dogma, and is dismissed by Earth’s authorities—until the planet Jupiter suddenly emits a white‑hot Earth‑sized protoplanet that hurtles sunward on a collision course with Earth.
The Legend That Was Earth
The alien Hyadeans have showered high‑tech gifts on the population of Earth and are offering to make a paradise of the planet. But when wealthy socialite Roland Cade discovers the dark underbelly of the alien presence, and learns that his ex‑wife is one of the so‑called terrorists who are fighting against the alien takeover, he’s forced to choose sides. Soon, he’s caught up in a terrifying conflict that threatens the very existence of the Earth.
Star‑spanning galactic trader Jethri Gobelyn’s story continues in the seventeenth entry in the Liaden Universe® series by master storytellers Sharon Lee and Steve Miller.
In a universe full of interstellar intrigue and burgeoning commerce novice Terran trader Jethri Gobelyn, adopted by a Liaden clan after an ill‑directed bow of honor insulted the scion of a major Liaden house, is alive and whole to tell the tale. Convinced that the adoption has saved his life and made his future he settles into a comfortable and even elite routine, a Trader's Ring his goal.
Even as Jethri's initiation into the mysteries and joys of Liaden Festival bring him to manhood he's forced to face Necessity and the facts of life: his adoption has also invigorated a net of unfinished Balance far more complex and potentially deadly than a simple Terran blood feud. He must embrace his Terran birthright as well as his Liaden connections while leaving behind the safety of the great Liaden trade ship Elthoria to defend his honor and that of shipmates past and present. Forced to sit Second Board as a back‑up pilot on a Liaden Scout ship, Jethri's convinced he's already at wit's end—when several familiar faces threaten all that he knows of himself, and all that he wishes to do.
Listen to the authors discuss the book here on the Baen Free Radio Hour.
Two classic Robert A. Heinlein novels in one volume, with an all‑new introduction by Mark L. Van Name, author of the Jon and Lobo military SF series.
The Man Who Sold the Moon: D. D. Harriman is a billionaire with a dream: the dream of space for all mankind. The method? Anything that works. Maybe, in fact, Harriman goes too far. But he will give us the stars…
Orphans of the Sky: Hugh had been taught that, according to the ancient sacred writings, the Ship was on a voyage to faraway Centaurus. But he also understood that this must be allegory for a voyage to spiritual perfection. After all, the real world was only metal corridors and nothing else, right? And then Hugh begins to suspect the truth. . .
Two all‑time classics from seven‑time Hugo winner and Dean of Science Fiction, Robert A. Heinlein.
With human civilization annihilated by a biological zombie plague, a rag‑tag fleet of yachts and freighters known as Wolf Squadron scours the Atlantic, searching for survivors. Within every abandoned liner and carrier lurks a potential horde, safety can never be taken for granted, and death and turning into one of the enemy is only a moment away.
The Candle Flickers
Yet every ship and town holds the flickering hope of survivors. One and two from lifeboats, a dozen from a fishing village, a few hundred wrenched by fury and fire from a ship that once housed thousands...
Light a Flame
Now Wolf Squadron must take on another massive challenge: clear the assault carrier USS Iwo Jima of infected before the trapped Marines and sailors succumb to starvation. If Wolf Squadron can accomplish that task, an even tougher trial awaits: an apocalyptic battle to win a new dawn for humanity. The war for civilization begins as the boats of the Wolf Squadron become a beacon of hope on a Darkling Sea.
Download the Reader’s Group Discussion Guide here.
The Continent Makers and other tales of the Viagens
When men attained interstellar travel in the 21st century, the Third World War had reduced the United States to a second-class power and the USSR had ceased to be a power at all. World leadership had been taken over by fast-growing Brazil. Hence, most early spatial exploration was done by Brazilians, and the government-owned space-transport system, the Viagens Interplanetarias, was largely Brazilian in control and personnel.
L. Sprague de Camp draws on this background of the interplanetary frontiers with the master touch that has made him one of the best-known of science fiction writers. Like every frontier, the star-ways are overrun by wildcatters. Not even the rigid controls set up by the Viagens to protect the native cultures of the plants can stop the influx of adventurers, swindlers, crackpots, shady salesmen, tourists ripe for the confidence man. There are reptiles buying bathing suits, outlaws selling animal crackers as weapons in local wars, dude ranches on the other side of space. Anything goes for a quick Credit (buck, to you), anything from setting up numbers racket on medieval Krishna to taking the clothes off every many, woman and child in California. Sprague de Camp's Viagens stories are here brought together for the first time. you will enjoy every yarn in this happy collection.
