Showing results for "jack" in Hard Science Fiction

Are the extraterrestrial Flickers what they seem to be? They're outwardly friendly, sometimes more than that. But troubling questions have emerged: What of the destroyed village on the Flicker world Alpha Orionis 8? Is there an acceptable explanation for the adult humans living on Flicker worlds, who were taken up by flying saucers as infants? And the biggest questions of all: What drew the Flickers to the solar system in the first place, and are the communities on Mars the first wave of a Flicker invasion? These are just some of the questions troubling Mac and Chuck, and there's more.

Jack Four - one of 20 human clones - has been created to be sold. His purchasers are the alien prador, and they only want him for their experimentation program. But there is something different about Jack. No clone should possess the knowledge that’s been loaded into his mind. And no normal citizen of humanity’s Polity worlds would have this information. The prador’s king has been mutated by the Spatterjay virus into a creature even more monstrous than the prador themselves.

In a world half of light, half of darkness, where science and magic strive for dominance, there dwells a magical being who is friendly with neither side. Jack, of the realm of shadows, is a thief who is unjustly punished. So he embarks on a vendetta.

Philip Mercer, a preeminent geologist with a taste for international intrigue and danger, rides an elevator 2,000 into the Earth at the Leister Deep Mine in Minnesota. Mercer is there to visit his old friend and mentor, who is leading a research team to the deepest section of the mine for a groundbreaking study on climate change. But as Mercer approaches, he is stunned to hear gunfire in the massive underground chambers. By the time he finds his way to them, Abe Jacobs and the entire research team have been brutally attacked - and Mercer is left seeking not only answers but revenge.

The mysterious species called Flickers are thought to have a base in the outer solar system. A task force is sent to find out. Living in the Kuiper Zone, the Flicker want nothing more than to be left alone. But the solar system belongs to humans. Can the two coexist? Or will history repeat and contact lead to war, as has so often happened in humanity's past?

Interstellar antiquities dealer Alex Benedict receives a cryptic message asking for help from celebrated writer Vicki Greene - who has been mind-wiped. She has no memory of her past life, or of her plea for assistance. But she has transferred an enormous sum of money to Alex, also without explanation. The answers to this mystery lie on the most remote of human worlds, where Alex will uncover a secret connected to a decades-old political upheaval - a secret that somebody desperately wants hidden.

Building a spaceship that uses Nicola Tesla's revolutionary space drive is only the beginning. From a new industrial revolution to the brink of global war, restless humanity presses onward, eventually to the first contact with an alien species.

Priscilla “Hutch” Hutchins discovers an interstellar message from a highly advanced race that could be her last chance for a mission before the program is shut down for good. Hutch has been the academy’s best pilot for decades. She’s had numerous first contact encounters and even became a minor celebrity. But world politics have shifted from exploration to a growing fear that the program will run into an extraterrestrial race more advanced than humanity and war.

When a young physicist unveils an efficient star drive capable of reaching the core of the galaxy, veteran star pilot Priscilla "Hutch" Hutchins finds herself back in the deepest reaches of space, and on the verge of discovering the origins of the deadly Omega clouds that continue to haunt her.

Centuries after a war with the Mutes, the first aliens to be encountered by humankind, a startling new discovery in the far reaches of the Orion Nebula appears. On a planet with conditions favorable to life, explorer vessel The Columbia comes across a small town seemingly inhabited by an intelligent species not yet discovered. But when a highly publicized follow-up mission is sent to make contact mere months later, the entire town has vanished, leaving no trace—or such is presumed to be the case until Alex Benedict and his archaeological crew show up to investigate.

A civilization-destroying omega cloud has switched direction, heading straight for a previously unexplored planetary system--and its alien society. And suddenly, a handful of brave humans must try to save an entire world--without revealing their existence.

I was staring into deep space the night she crashed back into my life. A missing person. A mysterious masked man. Murder. It was all in a night's work for private investigator Jack Gemini. But when his ex-wife turns up at his door and a bomber targets his lover's bar, Jack finds himself unravelling a case that will overturn everything he thought was true.

An experimental training program produces a psychokinetic, a man who can move objects by mental power alone. He has other abilities as well. But is he too powerful? What if the Special Talents decide to go their own way?

World War III is about to break out. As if that wasn’t dangerous enough, the enigmatic extraterrestrials called the Flickers have returned with a warning: do not venture beyond the moon. Faced with the ultimate threat, can humanity put aside their differences and unite to face the common danger?

An ancient group intends to decimate the human population and convert the remainder to slaves. Their only internal disagreement was the method. Jaeger Kunstler was their monster, but would he remain loyal, or turn rebel agent? Deepak Advani created Aura and dedicated his life to her keeping. But Aura was doomed by a fatwa.

It is summer, in the probably distant future, and Artie Lindstrom - the wizard behind a remotely-triggered jar lid opener that became the weapon that defeated the Martian invasion, a water desalinization machine that inadvertently produced gin, and a death ray gun that obliterated Venus during the Three-Day War - has sketched out plans for an anti-gravity machine not much bigger than a mini-fridge.

Professor Alice Sutton, a self-taught physicist, grew up in the Appalachian Mountains of southern Ohio. While still in her teens, she stunned the scientific world with her discovery of a fifth force of nature, with profound implications for cosmology. She became a full professor at MIT in her early 20s. But, her hillbilly ways and beliefs stayed with her, guiding her through mind-bending adventures in scientific discovery. This hard science fiction novel pulls no punches in describing the physics behind Dr. Alice’s work.

FNH Audio presents 10 short stories from the classic era of science fiction....

Shannon dreams of being a cinema verite type of reporter, but she needs an edge. With the help of a trust fund and a ham radio guru, she gets the help she needs, but at what price? Maxwell Burnham, known as Max Burner, is a rogue government operative, a monster who hunts "squawkers." He's also a runaway diabetic who uses his excess glucose to power his killer beam. Phi is an "Elmer," in the old tradition of ham radio. Can he help Shannon save more than 100,000 squawkers from a horrible death?