After waking up on the floor of a strange house with two dead bodies on the floor nearby, Joe Philby first sees "himself" floating away in a silver bubble, then finds a thick envelope addressed to him – in his own handwriting - with a mysterious set of top-secret plans and a strange computer chip. Meanwhile, his girlfriend-now-ex-girlfriend Sara Powell has invented an age-reversing gene therapy. With the top-secret plans, computer chip, Sara's therapy and a little bit of ambition, Joe real...

The last cryptic message from the colonies on Zarmina reported that they had been overrun by hostile alien invaders and warned Earth to stay away. Fearing the aliens might attack Earth next, the USFS Patton instead leads a fleet of warships to Zarmina to take the fight to them. After an initial battle leaves the fleet in disarray, Major Alexander Frazier leads a team on a reconnaissance mission to the planet. As Frazier peels away layers of lies and betrayal, new threats arise both within ...

We got off to a rocky start colonizing Zarmina, but three years later we were at peace and starting to feel at home. Then strange stuff started happening. We'd see alien creatures and they'd seem to vanish as quickly as they appeared. Then Zarmina, the world of perpetual light, was suddenly plunged into utter darkness for the first time in history. No sooner did the light reappear than a little girl vanished, soon to be followed by an entire group of miners. Then an entire settlement was w...

Zarmina … a tidally-locked world discovered in 2010 and thought to lie within the circumstellar habitability zone of Gliese 581, a red dwarf star in the Libra constellation. A real world. Perhaps man's best hope for a new home. But what might life be like on such a world? Could man even survive there?For decades no one knew. The discovery of the Branson-Musk star drive in 2068, though, finally gave scientists a chance to find out. As Earth continues to spiral into conflict and bloo...

For 20 years, Matt and Emma Powell built a perfect life together, only to see their family and their perfect world suddenly ripped apart by bad luck and bad decisions. Then they meet Mr. Philby, the proprietor of "Re-Life," who shows them a roomful of high-tech equipment and offers to use it to send them to an alternate universe -- one where they can re-live their lives and fix all their problems here. It's totally safe and they can come back if they want -- and the only cost is that they ...

This work is a science fiction short story (7,777 words). It also appears in Mindscapes: Ten Science Fiction and Speculative Fiction Short Stories (C) 2014 by Victor D. López.In the year 2020, astronomers discover a previously unknown asteroid that will strike Earth in exactly 666 days. Because of its massive size, it is impossible to deflect or destroy it with the available technology, and it is clear that the impending impact will be an extinction event. While most governments do...

A collection of short science fiction, each touching on a different world-ending scenario. The characters are diverse and the stories vary wildly, but each asks the question: What will it mean for the world to end, and at what point are those endings just new beginnings?Stories presented in this collection:DogThe DoorHigginsPongBlood SeaStarshipRoverReboot

This is a collection of short stories. All are fiction. Enjoy them as they are. Try not to think to deeply about what thoughts they may conjure up. Just enjoy!

A huge rock hurdles through space on a collision course with Earth. It's enormous, as big as the one that wiped out the dinosaurs. You've got a little more than a day to get to safety. Where will you go? Who will you help—and who will help you? Can you survive the greatest disaster that the human race has ever known?

Winner! 2019 Nebraska Book Award Retired astronaut Clayton Anderson takes readers on an A to Z flight through the alphabet from astronaut and blastoff to spacewalk and Zulu Time. Topics cover the history of NASA, science, and practical aspects of being an astronaut using fun poems for each letter paired with longer expository text in the sidebars. Perfect for science buffs, budding astronauts, and astronomy lovers of all ages.

Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs return to New York City to investigate a triple murder and confront a killer terrorizing couples at their happiest--and most vulnerable in this explosive New York Times bestseller.In the early hours of a quiet, weekend morning in Manhattan's Diamond District, a brutal triple murder shocks the city. Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs quickly take the case. Curiously, the killer has left behind a half-million dollars' worth of gems...

A soldier experiences the toll of interstellar war against a deadly alien foe in this Hugo and Nebula Award–winning science fiction masterpiece.In this novel, a landmark of science fiction that began as an MFA thesis for the Iowa Writers' Workshop and went on to become an award-winning classic—inspiring a play, a graphic novel, and most recently an in-development film—man has taken to the stars, and soldiers fighting the wars of the future return to Earth forever a...