Nancy Kress

From back cover: A Desperate Bid to Save Humanity Humankind has expanded out into interstellar space using star gates -- technological remnants left behind by an ancient, long-vanished race. But the technology comes with a price. Among the stars, humanity encountered the Fallers,a strange alien race bent on nothing short of genocide. It's all-out war, and humanity is losing. In this fragile situation, a new planet is discovered, inhabited by a pre-industrial race who experience "shared reality" -- they're literally compelled to share the same worldview. A team of human scientists is dispatched -- but what they don't know is that their mission of first contact is actually a covert military operation. For one of the planet's moons is really a huge mysterious artifact of the same origin as the star gates -- and it just may be the key to winning the war.

A group of scientists is sent to a distant planet to study an artifact that may hold the key to victory against the alien Fallers.

An anthology with two novellas, Beggars in Spain, on a society where genetics does away with sleep, and Dancing on Air, on the application of genetic engineering to ballet dancing. Other stories range from designer drugs, to a feminist take on Adam and Eve.

In teaching writers the fundamentals of creating characters that will keep their readers spellbound, Kress utilizes dozens of excerpts from well-known fiction, along with enlightening exercises. In this guide, award-winning author Nancy Kress explores the crucial relationship between characterization and plot, illustrating how vibrant, well-constructed characters act as the driving force behind an exceptional story.In teaching you the fundamentals of creating characters that will keep your readers spellbound, Kress utilizes:Dozens of excerpts from well-known fictionEnlightening exercises to help you build strong characters starting from the outside-inBeginning chapters that focus on the physical elements that comprise a character, providing techniques for using external qualities to reflect personalityBuilding skill upon skill, you blend these qualities with emotional and mental characterization, forming muti-dimensional characters that initiate exciting action, react to tense situations, and power the plot from beginning to end.

From back cover Tor paperback December 1997: Two hundred 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 need no sleep. When the Sleepless plot to take over the world and leave regular humans powerless, civiliaztion and the very meaning of the word "human" hang in the balance.

In a world where the slightest edge can mean the difference between success and failure, Leisha Camden is beautiful, extraordinarily intelligent ... and one of an ever-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.But Leisha Camden has chosen to remain behind in a world that envies and fears her "gift" -- a world marked for destruction in a devastating conspiracy of freedom ... and revenge.

From the back cover Tor paperback February 1996: Nancy Kress returns to the Nebula and Hugo Award-winning world of Beggars in Spain to tell a new tale in an America of the future, strangely altered by genetic modifications. Millions of ordinary people are supported by the efforts of the handsome and intellectually superior gene-modified, who are in turn running scared from the astonishing, nearly superhuman powers of the Sleepless. Wracked by the results of irresponsible genetic research and nanotechnology, overburdened by a population of jobless drones, the whole world is on the edge of collapse. Who will save it? And for whom?

Get your stories off to a roaring start. Keep them tight and crisp throughout. Conclude them with a wallop. Is the story or novel you've been carrying around in your head the same one you see on the page? Or does the dialogue suddenly sound flat and predictable? Do the events seem to ramble? Translating a flash of inspiration into a compelling story requires careful crafting. The words you choose, how you describe characters, and the way you orchestrate conflict all make the difference—the difference between a story that is slow to begin, flounders midway, or trails off at the end—and one that holds the interest of readers and editors to the final page. By demonstrating effective solutions for potential problems at each stage of your story, Nancy Kress will help you... hook the editor on the first three paragraphs make—and keep—your story's "implicit promise" build drama and credibility by controlling your prose Dozens of exercises help you strengthen your short story or novel. Plus, you'll sharpen skills and gain new insight into... the price a writer pays for flashbacks six ways characters should "reveal" themselves techniques for writing—and rewriting Let this working resource be your guide to successful stories—from beginning to end. About the Author Although she began by writing fantasy, Nancy Kress currently writes science fiction, most usually about genetic engineering. She teaches regularly at summer conferences such as Clarion, and during the year at the Bethesda Writing Center in Bethesda, Maryland. In addition, she is the "Fiction" columnist for Writer's Digest magazine. She has won two Nebulas and a Hugo, and lost over a dozen more of these awards. Her work has been translated into Swedish, French, Italian, German, Spanish, began by writing fantasy, among others.

Durch einen Eingriff im Gehirn ist es möglich geworden, Erinnerungen früherer Inkarnationen eines Menschen zugänglich zu machen. Nur - sie lassen sich weder steuern noch kontrollieren. Für jeden, der nach der Operation erwacht, beginnt eine gespenstische und abenteuerliche Reise in die Vergangenheit. (Klappentext)