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Best Science-Fiction and Fantasy Books

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Best Science-Fiction and Fantasy Books includes Last Unicorn (1976), World War Z (2007), Cryptonomicon (2000), Stardust (2007), Contact (1997), Childhood's End (1953).

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Last Unicorn

by: Peter S Beagle
Last Unicorn
The Last Unicorn is one of the true classics of fantasy, ranking with Tolkien's The Hobbit, Le Guin's Earthsea Trilogy, and Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. Beagle writes a shimmering prose-poetry, the voice of fairy tales and childhood: The unicorn lived in a lilac wood, and she lived all alone. She was very old, though she did not know it, and she was no longer the careless color of sea foam but rather the color of snow falling on a moonlit night. But her eyes were still clear and unwearied, and she still moved like a shadow on the sea. The unicorn discovers that she is the last unicorn in the world, and sets off to find the others. She meets Schmendrick the Magician--whose magic seldom works, and never as he intended--when he rescues her from Mommy Fortuna's Midnight Carnival, where only some of the mythical beasts displayed are illusions. They are joined by Molly Grue, who believes in legends despite her experiences with a Robin Hood wannabe and his unmerry men. Ahead wait King Haggard and his Red Bull, who banished unicorns from the land. This is a book no fantasy reader should miss; Beagle argues brilliantly the need for magic in our lives and the folly of forgetting to dream.

World War Z

by: Max Brooks
release date: Jan 01, 2007
World War Z
“The end was near.” –Voices from the Zombie War

The Zombie War came unthinkably close to eradicating humanity. Max Brooks, driven by the urgency of preserving the acid-etched first-hand experiences of the survivors from those apocalyptic years, traveled across the United States of America and throughout the world, from decimated cities that once teemed with upwards of thirty million souls to the most remote and inhospitable areas of the planet. He recorded the testimony of men, women, and sometimes children who came face-to-face with the living, or at least the undead, hell of that dreadful time. World War Z is the result. Never before have we had access to a document that so powerfully conveys the depth of fear and horror, and also the ineradicable spirit of resistance, that gripped human society through the plague years.
Ranging from the now infamous village of New Dachang in the United Federation of China, where the epidemiological trail began with the twelve-year-old Patient Zero, to the unnamed northern forests where untold numbers sought a terrible and temporary refuge in the cold, to the United States of Southern Africa, where the Redeker Plan provided hope for humanity at an unspeakable price, to the west-of-the-Rockies redoubt where the North American tide finally started to turn, this invaluable chronicle reflects the full scope and duration of the Zombie War.

Most of all, the audiobook captures with haunting immediacy the human dimension of this epochal event. Facing the often raw and vivid nature of these personal accounts requires a degree of courage on the part of the listener, but the effort is invaluable because, as Mr. Brooks says in his introduction, “By excluding the human factor, aren't we risking the kind of personal detachment from history that may, heaven forbid, lead us one day to repeat it? And in the end, isn't the human factor the only true difference between us and the enemy we now refer to as 'the living dead'?”

Note: Some of the numerical and factual material contained in this edition was previously published under the auspices of the United Nations Postwar Commission.

Cryptonomicon

by: Neal Stephenson
release date: Jan 01, 2000
Cryptonomicon

With this extraordinary first volume in what promises to be an epoch-making masterpiece, Neal Stephenson hacks into the secret histories of nations and the private obsessions of men, decrypting with dazzling virtuosity the forces that shaped this century.

In 1942, Lawrence Pritchard Waterhouse—mathematical genius and young Captain in the U.S. Navy—is assigned to detachment 2702. It is an outfit so secret that only a handful of people know it exists, and some of those people have names like Churchill and Roosevelt. The mission of Waterhouse and Detachment 2702—commanded by Marine Raider Bobby Shaftoe-is to keep the Nazis ignorant of the fact that Allied Intelligence has cracked the enemy's fabled Enigma code. It is a game, a cryptographic chess match between Waterhouse and his German counterpart, translated into action by the gung-ho Shaftoe and his forces.

Fast-forward to the present, where Waterhouse's crypto-hacker grandson, Randy, is attempting to create a "data haven" in Southeast Asia—a place where encrypted data can be stored and exchanged free of repression and scrutiny. As governments and multinationals attack the endeavor, Randy joins forces with Shaftoe's tough-as-nails granddaughter, Amy, to secretly salvage a sunken Nazi submarine that holds the key to keeping the dream of a data haven afloat. But soon their scheme brings to light a massive conspiracy with its roots in Detachment 2702 linked to an unbreakable Nazi code called Arethusa. And it will represent the path to unimaginable riches and a future of personal and digital liberty...or to universal totalitarianism reborn.

A breathtaking tour de force, and Neal Stephenson's most accomplished and affecting work to date, Cryptonomicon is profound and prophetic, hypnotic and hyper-driven, as it leaps forward and back between World War II and the World Wide Web, hinting all the while at a dark day-after-tomorrow. It is a work of great art, thought and creative daring; the product of a truly iconoclastic imagination working with white-hot intensity.

Stardust

by: Neil Gaiman
release date: Jan 01, 2007
Stardust

Catch a fallen star . . .

Tristran thorn promised to bring back a fallen star. So he sets out on a journey to fulfill the request of his beloved, the hauntingly beautiful Victoria Forester—and stumbles into the enchanted realm that lies beyond the wall of his English country town. Rich with adventure and magic, Stardust is one of master storyteller Neil Gaiman's most beloved tales, and the inspiration for the hit movie.

Contact

by: Carl Sagan
release date: Jan 01, 1997
Contact
In December, 1999, a multinational team journeys out to the stars, to the most awesome encounter in human history. Who -- or what -- is out there?
In Cosmos, Carl Sagan explained the universe. In Contact, he predicts its future -- and our own.

Childhood's End

by: Arthur C Clarke
Childhood's End
When the silent spacecraft arrived and took the light from the world, no one knew what to expect. But, although the Overlords kept themselves hidden from man, they had come to unite a warring world and to offer an end to poverty and crime. When they finally showed themselves it was a shock, but one that humankind could now cope with, and an era of peace, prosperity and endless leisure began. But the children of this utopia dream strange dreams of distant suns and alien planets, and begin to evolve into something incomprehensible to their parents, and soon they will be ready to join the Overmind...and, in a grand and thrilling metaphysical climax, leave the Earth behind.

Neverwhere

by: Neil Gaiman
release date: Jan 01, 1996
Neverwhere
Richard Mayhew is an unassuming young businessman living in London, with a dull job and a pretty but demanding fiancée. Then one night he stumbles across a girl bleeding on the sidewalk. He stops to help her--and the life he knows vanishes like smoke.

Several hours later, the girl is gone, too. And by the following morning Richard Mayhew has been erased from his world. His bank cards no longer work, taxi drivers won't stop for him, his landlord rents out his apartment to strangers. He has become invisible, and inexplicably consigned to a London of shadows and darkness—to a city full of monsters and saints, murderers and angels, knights in armor and pale girls in black velvet. It's a netherworld that exists entirely in a labyrinth of sewer canals and abandoned subway stations. He has fallen through the cracks of reality and has landed somewhere different, somewhere that is Neverwhere.

Once And Future King

by: Terence Hanbury White
Once And Future King
T.H. White's masterful retelling of the saga of King Arthur is a fantasy classic as legendary as Excalibur and Camelot, and a poignant story of adventure, romance, and magic that has enchanted readers for generations.

Silmarillion

by: J.R.R. Tolkien
Silmarillion
The Silmarillion tells of the Elder Days, of the First Age of Tolkien's World, when Morgoth, the first Dark Lord, dwelt in Middle Earth, and the High Elves made war upon them for the recovery of the Silmarils, the jewels containing the pure light of Valinor.  It is to this ancient drama that the characters in The Lord of the Rings so often look back to.

Sit at the feet of the most beloved storyteller of the 20th century and hear how the world came to be.  The Silmarillion is told here in a brilliantly faceted audio production, with all the glory of the First Age itself.  Dazzlingly performed by Martin Shaw, it sparkles with the magic of the dawn of time--when Elves and Men roamed a world set spinning through space by the haunting music of supernatural choirs.  Slip through the shadows and you, too, may catch the whisper of harp-song on the winds of the high air above the mists of the world.

This exclusive audio boxed set of Tolkien's elegant masterpiece is one that will delight fans young and old.  It is an extraordinary keepsake to be treasured and listened to again and again.

The Left Hand of Darkness

by: Ursula K. Le Guin
release date: Jan 01, 1987
The Left Hand of Darkness
When The Left Hand of Darkness first appeared in 1969, the original jacket copy read, "Once in a long while a whole new world is created for us. Such worlds are Middle Earth, Dune—and such a world is Winter."  Twenty-five years and a Hugo and Nebula Award later, these words remain true. In Winter, or Gethen, Ursula K. Le Guin has created a fully realized planet and people. But Gethen society is more than merely a fascinating creation. The concept of a society existing totally without sexual prejudices is even more relevant today than it was in 1969. This special 25th anniversary edition of The Left Hand of Darkness contains not only the complete, unaltered text of the landmark original but also a thought-provoking new afterword and four new appendixes by Ms. Le Guin.

When the human ambassador Genly Ai is sent to Gethen, the planet known as Winter by those outsiders who have experienced its arctic climate, he thinks that his mission will be a standard one of making peace between warring factions. Instead the ambassador finds himself wildly unprepared. For Gethen is inhabited by a society with a rich, ancient culture full of strange beauty and deadly intrigue—a society of people who are both male and female in one, and neither. This lack of fixed gender, and the resulting lack of gender-based discrimination, is the very cornerstone of Gethen life. But Genly is all too human. Unless he can overcome his ingrained prejudices about the significance of "male" and "female," he may destroy both his mission and himself.

Ringworld

by: Larry Niven
release date: Sep 12, 1985
Ringworld
A new place is being built, a world of huge dimensions, encompassing millions of miles, stronger than any planet before it. There is gravity, and with high walls and its proximity to the sun, a livable new planet that is three million times the area of the Earth can be formed. We can start again!

Mistborn

by: Brandon Sanderson
release date: Nov 03, 2009
Mistborn

The New York Times bestselling series from Brandon Sanderson.

This boxed set contains:
Mistborn
The Well of Ascension
The Hero of Ages

Mists of Avalon

by: Marion Zimmer Bradley
release date: May 01, 1995
Mists of Avalon
The legends of King Arthur come to life in the extraordinary stories of the women in his life--including his half-sister Morgaine, a high-priestess of the religion of the Mother Goddess, and his beautiful wife Gwynhefar, torn between her duty and her love for Lancelot. Book available.

The Belgariad V.2

by: David Eddings
release date: Aug 27, 2002
The Belgariad V.2
Millions of readers have discovered the magic of David Eddings' New York Times bestselling series The Belgariad. Now the first three books in this monumental epic appear in a single volume. Here, long-time fans can rediscover the wonder—and the uninitiated can embark upon a thrilling new journey of fantasy and adventure.

It all begins with the theft of the Orb that for so long protected the West from an evil god. As long as the Orb was at Riva, the prophecy went, its people would be safe from this corrupting power. Garion, a simple farm boy, is familiar with the legend of the Orb, but skeptical in matters of magic. Until, through a twist of fate, he learns not only that the story of the Orb is true, but that he must set out on a quest of unparalleled magic and danger to help recover it. For Garion is a child of destiny, and fate itself is leading him far from his home, sweeping him irrevocably toward a distant tower—and a cataclysmic confrontation with a master of the darkest magic.

War of the Worlds

by: H.G. Wells
release date: Jan 01, 2009
War of the Worlds
H.G. Wells classic science fiction novel relates the tale of aliens suddenly invading England and attacking it residents. The War of the Worlds is one of the earliest examples of a story depicting a struggle between human beings and an alien race. One of H.G. Wells most well known works it stands as one of the finest science fiction thrillers ever written.

Flowers for Algernon

by: Daniel Keyes
release date: Apr 01, 1995
Flowers for Algernon
Oscar-winning film Charly starring Cliff Robertson and Claire Bloom-a mentally challenged man receives an operation that turns him into a genius...and introduces him to heartache.

Time Machine

by: H. G. Wells
Time Machine
One of the most thrilling science-fiction adventures of all time, now with an introduction by Melvin Burgess

The Time Traveller has ridden his machine hundreds of years into the future. Buildings, cities, and civilizations rise and fall before his eyes. He is welcomed to 802701 by the frail and simple Eloi.
The future seems safe--until the Time Traveller encounters the shadowy, carnivorous Morlocks, inhabitants of the Underworld. The Morlocks terrorize the Eloi, hunt the Time Traveller, and capture the Time Machine.
Can the Time Traveller escape the future with his Time Machine...and his life?

A Canticle for Leibowitz

by: Walter M. Miller Jr.
A Canticle for Leibowitz
In the depths of the Utah desert, long after the Flame Deluge has scoured the earth clean, a monk of the Order of Saint Leibowitz has made a miraculous discovery: holy relics from the life of the great saint himself, including the blessed blueprint, the sacred shopping list, and the hallowed shrine of the Fallout Shelter.

In a terrifying age of darkness and decay, these artifacts could be the keys to mankind's salvation. But as the mystery at the core of this groundbreaking novel unfolds, it is the search itself—for meaning, for truth, for love—that offers hope for humanity's rebirth from the ashes.

The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

by: Robert Heinlein
release date: Aug 01, 2010
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
Luna is an open penal colony and the regime is a harsh one. Not surprisingly, revolution against the hated authority is planned. But the key figures in the revolt are an unlikely crew: Manuel Garcia O'Kelly, an engaging jack of all trades, the beautiful Wyoming Knott - and Mike, a lonely computer who likes to make up jokes...

Dragonflight

by: Anne McCaffrey
release date: Nov 01, 1994
Dragonflight
HOW CAN ONE GIRL SAVE AN ENTIRE WORLD?

To the nobles who live in Benden Weyr, Lessa is nothing but a ragged kitchen girl. For most of her life she has survived by serving those who betrayed her father and took over his lands. Now the time has come for Lessa to shed her disguise—and take back her stolen birthright.

But everything changes when she meets a queen dragon. The bond they share will be deep and last forever. It will protect them when, for the first time in centuries, Lessa's world is threatened by Thread, an evil substance that falls like rain and destroys everything it touches. Dragons and their Riders once protected the planet from Thread, but there are very few of them left these days. Now brave Lessa must risk her life, and the life of her beloved dragon, to save her beautiful world. . . .

Starship Troopers

by: Robert Heinlein
release date: Jan 01, 1986
Starship Troopers
In one of Heinlein's most controversial best-sellers, a recruit in a future world is sent through the toughest boot camp in the Universe to join the Terran Mobile Infantry in battle against mankind's most alarming enemy.

Juan Rico signed up with the Federal Reserve on a lark, but despite the hardships and rigorous training, he finds himself determined to make it as a cap trooper. In boot camp he learns how to become a soldier, but it is in war that he will learn why.

Many consider this Hugo Award-winning book to be Heinlein's best. Forget the battle scenes and the high-tech weapons; this is Heinlein in his element, talking people and politics.

A Clockwork Orange

by: Anthony Burgess
release date: Jan 01, 1986
A Clockwork Orange
A brilliant reading from the novel by one of the wittiest commentators and literary figures of this century. "Antony Burgess reads chapters of his novel A Clockwork Orange" with hair-raising drive and energy. Although it is a fantasy set in an Orwellian future, this is anything but a bedtime story."-- "New York Times"

Doll's House

by: Neil Gaiman
release date: Jan 01, 1999
Doll's House
Featuring the popular characters from the award-winning Sandman series by Neil Caiman, THE SANDMAN: ENDLESS NIGHTS reveals the legend of the Endless, a family of magical and mythical beings who exist and interact in the real world. Born at the beginning of time, Destiny, Death, Dream, Desire, Despair, Delirium, and Destruction are seven brothers and sisters who each lord over their respective realms. In this highly imaginative book that boasts a diverse styles of breathtaking art, these seven peculiar and powerful siblings each reveal more about their true being as they star in their own tales of curiosity and wonder. THE SANDMAN: ENDLESS NIGHTS was the first comic graphic novel to be listed on the NY Times Best-seller list. SUGGESTED FOR MATURE READERS.

The Sandman

by: Neil Gaiman
release date: Jan 01, 2001
The Sandman
Written by Neil Gaiman; Art by Yoshitaka Amano Featuring striking painted artwork, this love story, set in ancient Japan, tells the story of a humble young monk and a magical, shape-changing fox who find themselves romantically drawn together. As their love blooms, the fox learns of a devilish plot by a group of demons to steal the monk's life. With the aid of Morpheus, the King of All Night's Dreamings, the fox must use all of her cunning and creative thinking to foil this evil scheme and save the man that she loves. This book also boasts an eight page section highlighting Yoshitaka Amano's amazing painted art.

Preludes and Nocturnes

by: Neil Gaiman
release date: Jan 01, 1993
Preludes and Nocturnes
Written by Neil Gaiman; Art by Sam Kieth, Mike Dringenberg, and Malcolm Jones, III; Painted Cover by Dave McKean A wizard attempting to capture Death to bargain for eternal life traps her younger brother Dream instead. Fearful for his safety, the wizard kept him imprisoned in a glass bottle for decades. After his escape, Dream, also known as Morpheus, goes on a quest for his lost objects of power. On the way, Morpheus encounters Lucifer and demons from Hell, the Justice League, and John Constantine, the Hellblazer. This book also includes the story "The Sound of Her Wings" which introduces us to the pragmatic and perky goth girl, Death.

The Sandman

by: Neil Gaiman
release date: Jan 01, 1999
The Sandman
Written by Neil Gaiman; Art by P. Craig Russell, Bryan Talbot, Shawn McManus, Jill Thompson and others The critically acclaimed THE SANDMAN: FABLES AND REFLECTIONS continues the fantastical epic of Morpheus, the King of Dreams, as he observes and interacts with an odd assortment of historical and fictional characters throughout time. Featuring tales of kings, explorers, spies, and werewolves, this book of myth and imagination delves into the dark dreams of Augustus Caesar, Marco Polo, Cain and Abel, Norton I, and Orpheus to illustrate the effects that these subconscious musings have had on the course of history and mankind.

Cat's Cradle

by: Kurt Vonnegut
Cat's Cradle
The setting for this relatively short novel is the Caribbean Island of San Lorenzo, and it is here that we meet Felix Hoenikker, a physicist and one of the fathers of the atomic bomb.

He has just made another discovery -- "ice nine" -- a substance that can turn all the liquid in the world into a solid block of ice.

Supporting characters include a crazy religious prophet, a bicycle salesman from Indiana, a Caribbean beauty and her dictator father.

Martian Chronicles

by: Ray Bradbury
release date: Jan 01, 2010
Martian Chronicles
Leaving behind a world on the brink of destruction, man came to the Red planet and found the Martians waiting, dreamlike. Seeking the promise of a new beginning, man brought with him his oldest fears and his deepest desires. Man conquered Mars—and in that instant, Mars conquered him. The strange new world with its ancient, dying race and vast, red-gold deserts cast a spell on him, settled into his dreams, and changed him forever. Here are the captivating chronicles of man and Mars—the modern classic by the peerless Ray Bradbury.

Cobweb

by: Neal Stephenson
Cobweb
From the opening line of his breakthrough cyberpunk novel Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson plunges the reader into a not-too-distant future. It is a world where the Mafia controls pizza delivery, the United States exists as a patchwork of corporate-franchise city-states, and the Internet--incarnate as the Metaverse--looks something like last year's hype would lead you to believe it should. Enter Hiro Protagonist--hacker, samurai swordsman, and pizza-delivery driver. When his best friend fries his brain on a new designer drug called Snow Crash and his beautiful, brainy ex-girlfriend asks for his help, what's a guy with a name like that to do? He rushes to the rescue. A breakneck-paced 21st-century novel, Snow Crash interweaves everything from Sumerian myth to visions of a postmodern civilization on the brink of collapse. Faster than the speed of television and a whole lot more fun, Snow Crash is the portrayal of a future that is bizarre enough to be plausible.

The Stand

by: Stephen King
The Stand

When a man escapes from a biological testing facility, he sets in motion a deadly domino effect, spreading a mutated strain of the flu that will wipe out 99 percent of humanity within a few weeks. The survivors who remain are scared, bewildered, and in need of a leader. Two emerge--Mother Abagail, the benevolent 108-year-old woman who urges them to build a community in Boulder, Colorado; and Randall Flagg, the nefarious "Dark Man," who delights in chaos and violence.

(This edition includes all of the new and restored material first published in The Stand: The Complete And Uncut Edition.) 

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