Stephen Baxter

The young Julius Caesar is serving on board a war galley, gaining a fearsome reputation. Then his ship is captured, and he is ransomed and then abandoned on the north African coast. After gathering a force of men powerful enough not only to gain vengeance on his captors but also to suppress an uprising in Greece, he returns to Rome a hero. But then Julius finds he must fight again. For a new crisis is threatening the city. In the unexpected form of a rebellious gladiator named Sparticus ...

It's the job of a science fiction writer to visualize extrapolations of the future. But there are those who go far beyond, venturing into realms of breathtaking science. That kind of cutting edge talent is as rare as a supernova--and, in its own way, just as powerful. Arthur C. Clarke had it. So did William Gibson. Now, with Evolution, Stephen Baxter delivers what is sure to be one of the most talked-about books of the year--and shows once again why he belongs among the select company of science fiction writers who matter.Stretching from the distant past into the remote future, from primordial Earth to the stars, Evolution is a soaring symphony of struggle, extinction, and survival, a dazzling epic that combines a dozen scientific disciplines and a cast of unforgettable characters to convey the grand drama of evolution in all its awesome majesty and rigorous beauty.Sixty-five million years ago, when dinosaurs ruled the Earth, lived a small mammal, a proto-primate of the species Purgatorius. From this humble beginning, Baxter traces the human lineage forward through time. The adventure that unfolds is a gripping odyssey governed by chance and competition, a perilous journey to an uncertain destination along a route beset by sudden and catastrophic upheavals. It is a route that ends, for most species, in stagnation or extinction. Why should humanity escape this fate?A generation from today, a group of concerned scientists--distant descendants of that primitive Purgatorius--gathers on a remote island to discuss this very question. The ceaseless expansion of human civilization has triggered an urgent environmental crisis that must be solved now if the Earth is to survive as a place hospitable to human life. But just when a peaceful solution seems within reach, two acts of shocking violence set in motion a cataclysmic chain of events that will expose the limitations of human intellect and adaptability in the face of the blind and implacable processes of Darwin's dangerous idea. From the Hardcover edition.

Robie is an experienced traveler. She’s taken the flight from Honolulu to the Midway Atoll, a group of Pacific islands where her parents live, many times. When she has to get to Midway in a hurry after a visit with her aunt in Hawaii, she gets on the next cargo flight at the last minute. She knows the pilot, but on this flight, there’s a new co-pilot named Max. All systems are go until a storm hits during the flight. The only passenger, Robie doesn’t panic until the engine suddenly cuts out and Max shouts at her to put on a life jacket. They are over miles of Pacific Ocean. She sees Max struggle with a raft. And then . . . she’s in the water. Fighting for her life. Max pulls her onto the raft, and that’s when the real terror begins. They have no water. Their only food is a bag of Skittles. There are sharks. There is an island. But there’s no sign of help on the way.

It Eats Planets. And It's Here. It starts when Venus explodes into a brilliant cloud of dust and debris, showering Earth with radiation and bizarre particles that wipe out all the crops and half the life in the oceans, and fry the ozone layer. Days later, a few specks of moon rock kicked up from the last Apollo mission fall upon a lava crag in Scotland. That's all it takes...Suddenly, the ground itself begins melting into pools of dust that grow larger every day. For what has demolished Venus, and now threatens Earth itself, is part machine, part life-form: a nano-virus, dubbed Moonseed, that attacks planets. Four scientists are all that stand between Moonseed and Earth's extinction, four brilliant minds that must race to cut off the virus and save what's left of Earth--a pulse-stopping battle for discovery that will lead them from the Earth's inner core to a daredevil Moon voyage that could save, or damn, us all.

"A sequel to the H.G. Wells classic THE WAR OF THE WORLDS, brilliantly realized by award-winning SF author and Wells expert Stephen Baxter It has been 14 years since the Martians invaded England. The world has moved on, always watching the skies but content that we know how to defeat the Martian menace. Machinery looted from the abandoned capsules and war-machines has led to technological leaps forward. The Martians are vulnerable to earth germs. The Army is prepared. So when the signs of launches on Mars are seen, there seems little reason to worry. Unless you listen to one man, Walter Jenkins, the narrator of Wells' book. He is sure that the Martians have learned, adapted, understood their defeat. He is right. Thrust into the chaos of a new invasion, a journalist - sister-in-law to Walter Jenkins - must survive, escape and report on the war. The Massacre of Mankind has begun"--

In Cuba nuclear tensions are at breaking point. The end of the whole world could be just days away. At the heart of it all is Laura Mann. She's on the run, hunted by strange forces fighting over the future of humanity. Laura is the H-Bomb Girl. And Laura is about to discover that her own life is at stake - in ways she could never have imagined.

Hailed as “one of the most inventive writers that science fiction has ever produced" (SF Site), Stephen Baxter builds on the massive success of Proxima with a career-defining novel of big ideas.... On the planet of Per Ardua, alien artifacts were discovered—hatches that allowed humans to step across light-years of space as if they were stepping into another room. But this newfound freedom has consequences.... As humanity discovers the real nature of the universe, a terrifying truth comes to light. We all have countless pasts converging in this present—and our future is terrifyingly finite. There are minds in the universe that are billions of years old and now we are vulnerable to their plans for us.... It’s time to fight back and take control.

Half a million years in the future, on a dead, war-ravaged world at the centre of the Galaxy, there is a mile-high statue of Michael Poole. Poole, born on Earth in the fourth millennium, was one of mankind's most influential heroes. He was not a warrior, not an emperor. He was an engineer, a builder of wormhole transit systems. But Poole's work would ultimately lead to a vast and destructive conflict, a million-year war between humanity and the enigmatic, powerful aliens known as the Xeelee.

Sequel to Stone Spring (

"As William the Conqueror's men attempt to stamp out the flames of rebellion to bring an end to the Murdrum, the furtive slaughter, of the guerilla campaign against the occupying forces a prophecy is spoken by a bedraggled woman in a shattered village. A prophecy that speaks of terrifying engines of war, engines of God's vengeance that will be unleashed in a war between civilizations." "As the flame of the crusades burns back and forth across Outremer, as the Mediterranean becomes a crucible for a seemingly endless war between Islam and Christianity, as even in Spain where Moor and Christian had lived side by side the years bring savage sieges, people die and families are torn apart to keep the prophecy alive." "Will the engines finally win the war for Christianity or Islam? Or will all be swept away by the rumored might of the Mongols that have already swept through Asia? Or does the future lie not to the East, but to the West, across the great sea?" "And while the scholars debate the true nature of the prophecy, and Kings and Emirs, all the time the engineers are working to build the engines of God." "Where have the plans for these terrifying weapons of war come from? What does the Weaver of Time's Tapestry intend?"--BOOK JACKET.

A Sherlockiana primer / Christopher Roden -- [The doctor's case / Stephen King]-- The horror of the many faces / Tim Lebbon -- The case of the bloodless sock / Anne Perry -- The adventure of the other detective / Bradley H. Sinor -- A scandal in Montreal / Edward D. Hoch -- The adventure of the field theorems / Vonda N. McIntyre -- The adventure of the death-fetch / Darrell Schweitzer -- The shocking affair of the Dutch Steamship Friesland / Mary Robinette Kowal -- The adventure of the mummy's curse / H. Paul Jeffers -- The things that shall come upon them / Barbara Roden -- Murder to music / Anthony Burgess -- The adventure of the inertial adjustor / Stephen Baxter -- Mrs. Hudson's case / Laurie R. King -- The singular habits of wasps / Geoffrey A. Landis -- The affair of the 46th birthday / Amy Myers -- The Specter of Tullyfane Abbey / Peter Tremayne -- The vale of the white horse / Sharyn McCrumb -- The adventure of the Dorset Street lodger / Michael Moorcock -- The adventure of the lost world / Dominic Green -- The adventure of the antiquarian's niece / Barbara Hambly -- Dynamics of a hanging / Tony Pi -- Merridew of abominable memory / Chris Roberson -- Commonplaces / Naomi Novik -- The adventure of the Pirates of Devil's Cape / Rob Rogers -- The adventure of the Green Skull / Mark Valentine -- The human mystery / Tanith Lee -- A study in emerald / Neil Gaiman -- You see but you do not observe / Robert J. Sawyer.

The story of how we colonise a new world, and the discovery of an ancient secret that will change our understanding of our place in the Universe for ever. Sequel is Ultima.

"The Weaver of Time's Tapestry has finally succeeded in twisting the threads of history into a new shape; the Luftwaffe have pushed the RAF to the brink, and the invasion barges have reached the beaches of Sussex and Kent. Britain wakes up to the nightmare of the Wermacht unleashed in Southern England." "As the desperate battle to hold up the invasion rages it is left to a few individuals caught up in the panic and chaos to piece together what has really happened - is this the culmination of a plan that has taken centuries to play out, a plot from the future to change the past forever?" "Stephen Baxter's historical thriller series crashes into the 20th century with a terrifying vision of mechanised war and political atrocity unleashed on English soil. This is the climax of one of the most thoughtful and involving series of novels that have brought history alive like no other."--BOOK JACKET.

A new edition of Ronald Johnson's masterpiece, edited by Peter O'Leary. As Guy Davenport comments, "ARK is a metaphysical poem that could only have been written in our time, of which it displays a new vision. It is a late harvest of seeds sown by Blake, L. Frank Baum, the Bible, and Zukofsky, all in a new architecture, a wholly new voice, and even a new chemistry of words and images. It is for those who can see visions, and for those who know how to look well and be taught that they can see them.