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Today Only: Sci-Fi Classics eBook Sale

May the 4th be with you! It’s Star Wars day, and we’re celebrating with some of our favorite science fiction titles. Check out tales of empires in the stars, alien conflict, and more with this ebook sale—available today only for just $2.99 each.

The Collapsing Empire  by John Sclazi

Place holder  of - 59Our universe is ruled by physics. Faster than light travel is impossible—until the discovery of The Flow, an extradimensional field available at certain points in space-time, which can take us to other planets around other stars.

Riding The Flow, humanity spreads to innumerable other worlds. Earth is forgotten. A new empire arises, the Interdependency, based on the doctrine that no one human outpost can survive without the others. It’s a hedge against interstellar war—and, for the empire’s rulers, a system of control.

Buy The Collapsing Empire: B&N Nook | eBooks.com | Google Play | iBooks | Kindle | Kobo

The Dark Between the Stars by Kevin J. Anderson

Poster Placeholder of - 79Twenty years after the elemental conflict that nearly tore apart the cosmos in The Saga of Seven Suns, a new threat emerges from the darkness. The human race must set aside its own inner conflicts to rebuild their alliance with the Ildiran Empire for the survival of the galaxy.

In Kevin J. Anderson’s The Dark Between the Stars, galactic empires clash, elemental beings devastate whole planetary systems, and factions of humanity are pitted against each other. Heroes rise and enemies make their last stands in the climax of an epic tale seven years in the making.

Buy The Dark Between the Stars: B&N Nook | eBooks.com | Google Play | iBooks | Kindle | Kobo

Dune: The Butlerian Jihad by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson

Placeholder of  -26Throughout the Dune novels, Frank Herbert frequently referred to the long-ago war in which humans wrested their freedom from “thinking machines.” In Dune: The Butlerian Jihad, Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson bring to life the story of that war, a tale previously seen only in tantalizing hints and clues. Finally, we see how Serena Butler’s passionate grief ignites the war that will liberate humans from their machine masters. We learn the circumstances of the betrayal that made mortal enemies of House Atreides and House Harkonnen; and we experience the Battle of Corrin that created a galactic empire that lasted until the reign of Emperor Shaddam IV.

Buy Dune: The Butlerian Jihad: B&N Nook | eBooks.com | Google Play | iBooks | Kindle | Kobo

Earth Unaware by Orson Scott Card and Aaron Johnston

Image Place holder  of - 44A hundred years before Ender’s Game, humans thought they were alone in the galaxy. Humanity was slowly making their way out from Earth to the planets and asteroids of the Solar System, exploring and mining and founding colonies.

The mining ship El Cavador is far out from Earth, in the deeps of the Kuiper Belt, beyond Pluto. Other mining ships, and the families that live on them, are few and far between this far out. So when El Cavador‘s telescopes pick up a fast-moving object coming in-system, it’s hard to know what to make of it. It’s massive and moving at a significant fraction of the speed of light.

Buy Earth Unaware: B&N Nook | eBooks.com | Google Play | iBooks | Kindle | Kobo

A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge

Image Placeholder of - 5Thousands of years in the future, humanity is no longer alone in a universe where a mind’s potential is determined by its location in space, from superintelligent entities in the Transcend, to the limited minds of the Unthinking Depths, where only simple creatures, and technology, can function. Nobody knows what strange force partitioned space into these “regions of thought,” but when the warring Straumli realm use an ancient Transcendent artifact as a weapon, they unwittingly unleash an awesome power that destroys thousands of worlds and enslaves all natural and artificial intelligence.

Buy A Fire Upon the Deep: B&N Nook | eBooks.com | Google Play | iBooks | Kindle | Kobo

Haze by L.E. Modesitt, Jr.

What lies beneath the millions of orbiting nanotech satellites that shroud the world called Haze? Major Keir Roget’s mission is to make planetfall in secret, find out, and report back to his superiors in the Federation, the Chinese-dominated government that rules Earth and the colonized planets.

For all his effectiveness as a security agent, Roget is troubled by memories of an earlier mission. When he was assigned to covert duty in the Noram backcountry town of St. George, he not only discovered that the long-standing Saint culture was neither as backward nor as harmless as his superiors believed, but he barely emerged with his life and sanity whole.

Buy Haze: B&N Nook | eBooks.com | Google Play | iBooks | Kindle | Kobo

Hellhole by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson

Only the most desperate colonists dare to make a new home on Hellhole. Reeling from a recent asteroid impact, tortured with horrific storms, tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, and churning volcanic eruptions, the planet is a dumping ground for undesirables, misfits, and charlatans…but also a haven for dreamers and independent pioneers.

What no one knows is this: the planet Hellhole, though damaged and volatile, hides an amazing secret. Deep beneath its surface lies the remnants of an obliterated alien civilization and the buried memories of its unrecorded past that, when unearthed, could tear the galaxy apart.

Buy Hellhole: B&N Nook | eBooks.com | Google Play | iBooks | Kindle | Kobo

Jupiter by Ben Bova

Grant Archer only wanted to study astrophysics. But the forces of the “New Morality,” the coalition of censorious do-gooders who run 21st-century America, have other plans for him.

To his distress, Grant is torn from his young bride and sent to a research station in orbit around Jupiter, to spy on the scientists who work there. Their work may lead to the discovery of higher life forms in the Jovian system-with implications the New Morality doesn’t like at all.

Buy Jupiter: B&N Nook | eBooks.com | Google Play | iBooks | Kindle | Kobo

Off Armageddon Reef by David Weber

Humanity pushed its way to the stars – and encountered the Gbaba, a ruthless alien race that nearly wiped us out.

Earth and her colonies are now smoldering ruins, and the few survivors have fled to distant, Earth-like Safehold, to try to rebuild. But the Gbaba can detect the emissions of an industrial civilization, so the human rulers of Safehold have taken extraordinary measures: with mind control and hidden high technology, they’ve built a religion in which every Safeholdian believes, a religion designed to keep Safehold society medieval forever.

Buy Off Armageddon Reef: B&N Nook | eBooks.com | Google Play | iBooks | Kindle | Kobo

*This offer ends May 4th.

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24 Audiobooks to Match Your Travel Time

Fourth of July weekend is almost here and that has us thinking about SUMMER VACATION! We’ve planned our trip and packed our bags. The car is gassed up and ready to go. But here’s the hardest part: what audiobook are we going to listen to on the drive?

If we’re having this problem, we’re assuming you are too. So we decided to put together a list of recommended audiobooks of varying lengths. Whether it’s a short train ride or a long flight with transfers, here are 24 audiobooks that will help make the journey memorable!

(more…)

Space Opera eBooks Now on Sale

Space Opera ebook sale

We are celebrating space operas this month with a special ebook promotion! Seven titles are now available for just $3.99 each. This sale ends May 8th.

(more…)

Kevin J. Anderson at Dallas Comic Con

Kevin J. Anderson

Kevin J. Anderson, co-author of Mentats of Dune, will be at this year’s Dallas Comic Con this weekend, May 16-18. He will be signing autographs (for free) at a large table in the Exhibit Hall, Booth 1049.

Check out his schedule of panels:

Saturday, May 17th

  • 3:00 PM Panel: Q&A with International Bestselling Author, Kevin J. Anderson, Room 222

Sunday, May 18th

  • 12:00 PM Panel: Building My First Lightsaber: From Fanboy to Bestselling Author, with Kevin J. Anderson, Room 151A

In addition to Dallas Comic Con, Kevin will also be stopping at conventions across the country. Here’s where he’ll be in the upcoming months:

  • Tuesday-Friday, August 29-September 1
    Dragoncon
    Atlanta, GA

Kevin J. Anderson at FanX

Kevin J. Anderson

Kevin J. Anderson, co-author of Mentats of Dune, will be at this year’s FanX!

Check out his schedule of panels:

Friday, April 17

  • 11:00 AM Panel: The Writers of Star Wars, Room 250A
    Featured: Kevin J. Anderson, David Wolverton, Michael A. Stackpole, and Bryan Young
  • 7:00 PM Panel: Steampunk for the Ages, Room 151A
    Featured: Kevin J. Anderson, James Wymore, Dan Willis, Scott Taylor, and Jennifer McGrew

Saturday, April 18th

  • 1:00 PM Panel: Building My First Lightsaber: From Fanboy to Bestselling Author, Room 151A
    Featured: Kevin J. Anderson

In addition to FanX, Kevin will also be stopping at conventions across the country. Here’s where he’ll be in the upcoming months:

  • Tuesday-Friday, August 29-September 1
    Dragoncon
    Atlanta, GA

Kevin J. Anderson and Brian Herbert at ECCC

Kevin J. Anderson

Kevin J. Anderson and Brian Herbert, the authors of Mentats of Dune, will be at this year’s Emerald City Comic-con! Check out their schedule of panels and signings:

Friday, March 21st

  • 12 – 1 PM Signing: BOOM! Booth (Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson will be signing Mentats of Dune)
  • 3 – 3:50 PM ECCC Writer’s Block presents Kevin J. Anderson, Room: 3AB

Saturday, March 22nd

  • 12:30 – 2 PM Guest Signing Area (Kevin J. Anderson will be signing)
  • 6 – 6:50 PM Panel: Weaving a World Through Short Fiction, Block (309-310)
    Award-winning authors Kevin J. Anderson (Jedi Academy), David Farland (The Mummy Chronicles), and Cat Rambo (A Seed Upon the Wind) talk about writing a world-building anthology for aboriginal fantasy TV series: Animism.

Sunday, March 23rd

  • 10 – 11 AM Signing: BOOM! Booth (Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson will be signing Mentats of Dune)
  • 11 – 11:50 AM Panel with Kevin J. Anderson: World Building for Fun and Profit, Block (309-310)
  • 4 – 5 PM  Signing: BOOM! Booth (Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson will be signing Mentats of Dune)

In addition to ECCC, Kevin J. Anderson will also be stopping at conventions across the country. Here’s where he’ll be in the upcoming months:

  • Thursday-Saturday, April 17-19
    FanX
    Salt Lake City, UT
  • Tuesday-Friday, August 29-September 1
    Dragoncon
    Atlanta, GA

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Commuting Between Universes

Hellhole Awakening by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson

Hellhole Awakening by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson

Written by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson

An author, especially a science fiction and fantasy author, has to have a big imagination—big enough, in fact, to hold an entire universe. Sometimes more than one universe.

We have spent many years developing and expanding Frank Herbert’s extensive Dune universe, telling its story from ten thousand years before the original novel to more than five thousand years after. Right now, we are completing Mentats of Dune, the second in a trilogy set in the formative years of the Dune universe, revealing the origins of the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood, the Mentats, the Spacing Guild and the Navigators, and the Suk Doctors.

But the Dune universe isn’t the only place we work. After eleven novels based on Frank Herbert’s creation, we developed our own original science fiction universe, a big galactic empire with a colonization initiative, a corrupt government, and a planet so damaged and difficult that only the hardiest of colonists dare to settle there. We called it, appropriately, Hellhole.

While it’s the same type of big, epic story with politics and multiple characters, Hellhole’s universe is different from Dune’s, and when we commute from one to the other, we have to keep the specific details straight. We have to remember what a “communicator” is called in each universe, what weapons are used, what exotic materials, the names of peripheral planets, as well as the mindsets, the cultures, the societies.

Even as we’re finishing the edit of Mentats of Dune, we are about to go on a promotional tour for Hellhole Awakening, and during one of our joint book-signing stops, the two of us will brainstorm the third book in the Hellhole Trilogy.

Just bouncing from the Dune to the Hellhole universe is only one part of the commute. While collaborating, we alternate manuscripts; while one of us works on an edit, the other one tackles an original project. It’s like a constant relay race among universes.

Kevin is currently finishing the first book in his new space opera, The Saga of Shadows, which spans numerous star systems, alien races, and superpowerful enemies; for something completely different, he has also done five humorous horror capers featuring Dan Shamble, Zombie P.I. Brian, meanwhile, is digging closer to home, dealing with ecological shifts and the politics of a green “utopia” for The Little Green Book of Chairman Rahma, and he’s just released a new ecological disaster story, Stormworld, with Bruce Taylor.

Some might say all this takes multiple personalities, or at least a lot of energy and imagination. We are both voracious readers, so we are continually exposed to other science fiction ideas, as well as history, sociology, philosophy, and science. We use all those ingredients to create and build upon our imaginary universes. But it requires great care not to get things mixed up as we move from the desert planet of Arrakis to the volcanically active ruin of Hellhole, from a world of zombie detectives to a universe where aliens are at war, or from any of these to a green utopia.

Still, for us, it’s all in a day’s work, and we commute to our jobs, from one universe to another to another….

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From the Tor/Forge March newsletter. Sign up to receive our newsletter via email.

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More from the March Tor/Forge newsletter:

Not at New York Comic-Con Sweepstakes

Not at New York Comic-Con Sweepstakes

Tor Books is heading to New York Comic-Con!

Place holder  of - 48We hope to see many of you there. Stop by Booth #920 to say hi or to participate in one of our many events and signings.

But for those of you who couldn’t make it out to New York, we wanted to offer you the chance to grab some of the same amazing swag and books that we’re promoting at #NYCC. To enter for the chance to win one of these five prize bundles, leave a comment on this post telling us one fabulous thing that you’ll be doing this week while you are #NotAtComicCon.

Here’s a look at the prize:

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And here’s a list of what’s included in each prize bundle:

  • Wheel of Time backpack
  • Halo patch
  • Article 5 by Kristen Simmons
  • The Battle of Blood and Ink written by Jared Axelrod and illustrated by Steve Walker
  • The Clockwork Sky Volume One by Madeleine Rosca
  • Dead Space: Martyr by Brian Evenson
  • Earthseed by Pamela Sargent
  • Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card
  • The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan
  • The Eye of the World: Graphic Novel: Volume 2 Based on the novel by Robert Jordan, written by Chuck Dixon, illustrated by Andie Tong
  • For the Win by Cory Doctorow
  • Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson
  • The Gift of Fire/On the Head of a Pin by Walter Mosley
  • Green by Jay Lake
  • Halo: Cryptum by Greg Bear
  • Halo: Glasslands by Karen Traviss
  • Hellhole by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson
  • Inside Straight edited by George R.R. Martin
  • Johnny Hiro: Half Asian, All Hero written and illustrated by Fred Chao
  • Off Armageddon Reef by David Weber
  • Old Man’s War by John Scalzi
  • The Omen Machine by Terry Goodkind
  • Only Superhuman by Christopher L. Bennett
  • Personal Demons by Lisa Desrochers
  • Three Parts Dead by Max Gladstone
  • The Way of the Kings by Brandon Sanderson

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. You must be 18 or older and a legal resident of the 50 United States or D.C. to enter. Promotion begins October 11, 2012 at 10:00 a.m. ET. and ends October 15, 2012, 12:00 p.m. ET. Void in Puerto Rico and wherever prohibited by law. Please see full details and official rules go here. Sponsor: Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

Hellhole Prize Pack Sweepstakes

Sign up for the Tor/Forge Newsletter for a chance to win a Hellhole prize pack:

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Prize pack includes a hardcover of Hellhole by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson, a Hellhole cap, an audiobook of Hellhole (not pictured), and an iPod nano with the audiobook of Sandworms of Dune already loaded.

About our newsletter: every issue of Tor’s monthly email newsletter features original writing by, and interviews with, Tor authors and editors about upcoming new titles from all Tor and Forge imprints. In addition, we occasionally send out “special edition” newsletters to highlight particularly exciting new projects, programs, or events.

If you’re already a newsletter subscriber, you can enter too. We do not automatically enter subscribers into giveaways. We promise we won’t send you duplicate copies of the newsletter if you sign up more than once.

Sign up for your chance to win today!

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. You must be 18 or older and a legal resident of the 50 United States or D.C. to enter. Promotion begins March 14, 2011 at 12 a.m. ET. and ends April 17, 2011, 11:59 p.m. ET. Void in Puerto Rico and wherever prohibited by law. For Official Rules and to enter, go to www.tor-forge.com/tor/promo/hellholeprizepack. Sponsor: Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

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Hellhole: There’s No Place Like Home

Poster Placeholder of - 45By Kevin J. Anderson

Hellhole: the place to go when there’s nowhere else to go.

Who says the galaxy has to be a pleasant place to settle down?  I grew up reading space opera stories set on strange alien planets filled with lush flora and exotic creatures, steamy dinosaur-filled jungles on Venus, bleak but poignant lost civilizations on Mars.

Of all the planets in habitable zones around stars, a great many may fit in the broad category of “fit for human life,” but that doesn’t mean they’re comfortable for human life.  In the classic Dune, Frank Herbert was one of the first authors to show sufficiently motivated people using their ingenuity to live reasonably normal lives in a truly inhospitable place.

After writing eleven books in Frank Herbert’s Dune universe, Brian Herbert and I had stretched our collaborative muscles and practiced building complicated epics.  We felt it was time to craft a large science fiction story of our own making.  Hellhole.  But it didn’t have to be a pleasant place.

I’ve traveled extensively in the desert southwest, hiked and explored in the red rock canyonlands of Utah, in now-abandoned potash and uranium mining towns, in Death Valley, in Arizona and New Mexico.  Because of the arid climate, much of the history remains intact, petrified dreams and rusted detritus.  People came out to these places, staked their claims, fought the elements, and tried to make lives for themselves.  I remember vividly one hike out to a crusty dry lake bed in Death Valley, the ruins of a large borax mining operation where hundreds of Chinese immigrants had slaved under 120°F heat, choking on air filled with alkaline dust, boiling chemicals out of the ground to make cakes for soap…and they did it willingly because these conditions were better than what they had left at home.

How much worse might it be on a planet that had been hammered by an extinction-event asteroid impact centuries earlier?  In a broad galactic empire, filled with malcontents, misfits, exiles, criminals, and people on the run, there would be volunteers to settle even in a place like this…Hellhole.

Our novel is their story, but it’s more than just a pioneer tale, also filled with galactic politics, treachery, and buried secrets.  And human fortitude to make a home…wherever it might be.

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From the Tor/Forge March newsletter. Sign up to receive our newsletter via email.

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