Happy Publication Day 11th August 2016!
Arise! Arise! Spines shall be shaken, covers shall be splintered! A word day . . . a red day . . . A PAPERBACK DAY!
Although we’re not publishing that particular classic today, we are publishing two SF Masterworks, a hard science fiction masterpiece, an incredibly imaginative fantasy as well as something we’ve only ever published once before: a flip book!
Xeelee: Endurance by Stephen Baxter continues the epic Xeelee Sequence that began way back in 1991 with Raft. Chronicling humanity’s history over million years and their ongoing conflict with enigmatic Xeelee, this sequence is a landmark of science fiction and future history.
Return to the eon-spanning and universe-crossing conflict between humanity and the unknowable alien Xeelee in the selection of uncollected and unpublished stories, newly edited and placed in chronological reading order.
From tales charting the earliest days of our adventure to the stars to stories of Old Earth, four billion years in the future, this is the story of humanity.
And as the human race rises and falls, ebbs and flows, one thing is always needed — the ability to endure.
‘Ideas come thick and fast, and an exhilarating sense of wonder is guaranteed’ Independent
‘With every passing year, the oft-made remark that Baxter is Arthur C. Clarke’s heir seems more and more apt’ SFX
Xeelee: Endurance is out now in paperback.
ALSO OUT TODAY IN EBOOK: Get the entire Xeelee Sequence (all 10 books) in one mega ebook collection!
Down Station by Simon Morden is stunning fantasy that takes a group of Londoners into a world called Down where all of history meets and your imagination bleeds into reality.
INSTEAD OF FIRE, THERE WAS WATER.
A wave slapped through the open doorway and a gust of wind blew into the smoke-filled corridor, dragging a spiral of soot outwards and away.
MARY. One slip away from prison, fighting to build herself a future from nothing.
DALIP. The gentle son of a warrior tradition. A young man who must fight for independence from his family.
STANISLAV. A fierce and capable man carrying the wounds of a brutal war.
They left London in flames for a place where everything was different. A place that can uncover your secrets.
A place haunted by a man called Crows . . .
‘Once again Simon Morden takes the fantasy genre and moulds it wonderfully’ SUN
‘There are horrors that surprise as well as moments of wonder’ SCI-FI NOW
Down Station is out now in paperback.
Empires: The First Battle by Gavin Deas is two for the price of one! Two alien races. One target. Earth is in trouble.
This ground-breaking collaboration between two Gollancz authors tells of the invasion of Earth by two different alien races – at the same time. Two men become aware of the threat, and must work to sabotage the invasion plans and see off the aliens.
Each book follows one hero, uncovering the threat to humanity and the world from their point of view. Each book can be read on its own, and will give the reader a complete, kinetic, fast-paced military SF story. But read both books and the reader gets something else – another view of (some of) the same events and crossover points, culminating in a bloody battle at Canary Wharf.
The two books can be read in any order, but together they tell the story of humanity caught in the crossfire between two deadly alien races, who have made Earth their battleground . . .
‘A neat idea, neatly executed . . . co-authors Gavin Smith and Stephen Deas pile on the exotic technology and visceral action, offering military SF grounded in blue-collar soldiering’ Financial Times
‘Fast-paced and blackly humorous . . . the cross-overs add to the fun’ SFX
Empires: The First Battle is out now in paperback.
Swastika Night by Murray Constantine is remarkable for its prescience, progressiveness and insight and rightly considered a companion book to 1984. Published in 1937 under a pseudonym for SF writer Katharine Burdekin Swastika Night is a seminal work of science fiction. Now republished as an SF Masterwork with an introduction by Michael Dirda.
Seven hundred years after Nazism achieved power, Hitler is worshipped as a god. The fascist Germans and Japanese struggle to maintain their populations. An Englishman named Alfred is on a German pilgrimage. According to official history, Hitler is a tall, blond god who personally won the war. Alfred is astounded when shown a photograph of Hitler before a crowd. He is shocked that Hitler was a small man with dark hair and a paunch. And Alfred’s discovery may mean his death . . .
‘While 1984 is perhaps more elegantly written, these books can be considered equals; and in some ways Swastika Night is in even more remarkable artistic and intellectual achievement’ GUARDIAN
Swastika Night is out now in paperback.
Monday Starts on Saturday by Arkady & Boris Strugatsky is another classic, mind-bending novel from the Russian brothers whose work includes Hard to be a God, Definitely Maybe, The Snail on the Slope, and Roadside Picnic. This welcome addition to the SF Masterworks series has an introduction by Adam Roberts.
When young programmer Alexander Ivanovich Privalov picks up two hitchhikers while driving in Karelia, he is drawn into the mysterious world of the National Institute for the Technology of Witchcraft and Thaumaturgy, where research into magic is serious business.
And where science, sorcery and socialism meet, can chaos be far behind?
Monday Starts on Saturday is out now in paperback.