Showing results by author "Nancy Kress" in All Categories

In Rip-Off!, 13 of today’s best and most honored writers of speculative fiction face a challenge even they would be hard-pressed to conceive: Pick your favorite opening line from a classic piece of fiction (or even non-fiction) - then use it as the first sentence of an entirely original short story.

An unabridged audio collection spotlighting the “best of the best” science fiction stories published in 2017 by current and emerging masters of the genre, edited by Allan Kaster, as narrated by top voice talents.

Famine. Death. War. Pestilence. These are the harbingers of the biblical apocalypse, of the end of the world. In science fiction the end is triggered by less figurative means: nuclear holocaust, biological warfare/pandemic, ecological disaster, or cosmological cataclysm.

After neurosurgeon Caro Soames-Watkins’ career has gone down in flames, she receives a strange job offer from Nobel Prize-winning scientist Sam Watkins, a great uncle she barely knows, and desperation overcomes any suspicions. Watkins’ mysterious medical facility conducts research into the nature of consciousness, reality, and life after death. Two obstacles stand in his way: an intel leak and his failing body may not last long enough for the tech to be ready. As danger mounts, Caro finds more than she bargained for: murder, love, and a deep disturbing look into the nature of reality.

In a world where the slightest edge can mean the difference between success and failure, Leisha Camden is beautiful, extraordinarily intelligent, and one of a growing number of human beings who have been genetically modified to never require sleep. Once considered interesting anomalies, now Leisha and the other "Sleepless" are outcasts, victims of blind hatred, political repression, and shocking mob violence meant to drive them from human society and, ultimately, from Earth itself.

A deadly cloud of spores has already infected and killed the inhabitants of two worlds. Now the plague is heading for Earth, threatening humans and aliens alike. Can either species be trusted to find the cure? Geneticist Marianne Jenner is immersed in the desperate race to save humanity, yet her family is tearing itself apart. Siblings Elizabeth and Ryan are strident isolationists who agree only that an alien conspiracy is in play. Marianne's youngest, Noah, is a loner addicted to a drug that constantly changes his identity.

Ten years after the aliens left Earth, humanity has succeeded in building a ship, Friendship, in which to follow them home to Kindred. Aboard are a crew of scientists, diplomats, and a squad of Rangers to protect them. But when the Friendship arrives, they find nothing they expected: no interplanetary culture, no industrial base, and no cure for the spore disease. A timeslip in the apparently instantaneous travel between worlds has occurred, and far more than 10 years have passed.

In this final installment of Nancy Kress's award-winning Beggars trilogy, it is now 200 years in the future. Regular human beings hate and fear the Sleepless and the SuperSleepless, genetically-modified humans who are immune to disease and hunger and who do not need to sleep. When the Sleepless plot to take over the world and leave regular humans powerless, civilization and the very meaning of the word "human" hang in the balance.

In a future America strangely altered by genetic modifications, millions of ordinary people are supported by the efforts of handsome and intellectually-superior gene-modified humans. These, in turn, are running scared in the face of the near-superhuman powers of the Sleepless, radically altered humans who have their own agenda for humanity. The Sleepless have withdrawn from the rest of the race to an island retreat, from which they periodically release dazzling scientific advances.

Despite economic and territorial tensions, no one wants the city-states of the Eight Worlds to repeat the Terran Collapse by going to war. But when war accidentally happens, everyone seeks ways to exploit it for gain. The Landry and Peregoy ruling dynasties see opportunities to grab territory, increase profits, and settle old scores. Exploited underclasses use war to fuel rebellion. Ambitious heirs can finally topple their elders’ regimes - or try to.

The diplomatic mission from Earth to World ended in disaster, as the Earth scientists discovered that the Worlders were not the scientifically advanced culture they believed. Though they brought a limited quantity of the vaccine against the deadly spore cloud, there was no way to make enough to vaccinate more than a few dozen. The Earth scientists, and surviving diplomats, fled back to Earth. But once home, after the 28-year gap caused by the spaceship transit, they find an Earth changed almost beyond recognition.

Starships come in many shapes and sizes. Their crews and passengers are an eclectic lot. They venture into the deep voids of space on their assigned missions. Sometimes they succeed and sometimes they do not. This collection tells the stories of the crews and passengers aboard six of these starships.

This is an unabridged audio collection of the "best of the best" science fiction stories published in 2013 by current and emerging masters of the genre, edited by Allan Kaster, as narrated by top voice talents. In "Zero for Conduct," by Greg Egan, an Afghani teenager, living in a near-future Iran with her exiled grandfather, makes a game-changing superconductor discovery. A young girl struggles to survive on a planet, with a stringent class structure, where Doors are used to go off-world in "Exile, Interrupted," by C. W. Johnson.

This audio collection presents the best-of-the-best short science fiction novels published in 2013 by current and emerging masters of this vibrant form. In Earth I, by Stephen Baxter, a search among the stars to ferret out the origins of mankind amidst the Xaian normalisation digs up many surprises. In Success, by Michael Blumlein, a brilliant but erratic biologist studying epigenetics struggles to hang onto his grip on everyday life as he writes his ground-breaking tome.

It’s 2336, and the future needs heroes! They must reach back in time to find them. What if they come for you? In 2336 there is no war, no pollution, no disease, no crime—but utopia has a price.

This collection of unabridged, unforgettable tales, written by some of science fiction's most esteemed authors, pays homage to one of the genre's most cherished story types. Whether time travel stories leap forward in time or slip into the past, they remain popular with fans.

This coming of age tale follows Leisha Camden. She is the first person genetically altered before birth so that she does not need to sleep. Her rich industrialist father pays for the procedure so that his daughter will have a competitive edge over others. It's soon discovered that Leisha's mother is also carrying a "normal" child. As Leisha grows older she finds others who've had the non-sleep genetic alteration.

This unabridged audio collection spotlights the “best of the best” hard science-fiction stories published in 2017 by current and emerging masters of the genre.

The aliens appeared one day, built a base on the moon, and put an ad on the Internet: “We are an alien race you may call the Atoners. Ten thousand years ago we wronged humanity profoundly. We cannot undo what has been done, but we wish humanity to understand it. Therefore we request 21 volunteers to visit seven planets to witness for us. We will convey each volunteer there and back in complete safety. Volunteers must speak English. Send requests for electronic applications to witness@atoners.com.”

This collection of unabridged readings chronicles the lives of people striving to survive as aliens rule Earth. In James Van Pelt's "How Music Begins", a junior-high school band director struggles to keep the band members' spirits up after they've been shanghaied, by unknown and unseen aliens, and confined to a dormitory and practice auditorium.