This acclaimed twenty-first–century Russian novel is “a Dantean descent” into the abandoned Soviet gulags, written “with a clear poetic sensibility” (The Wall Street Journal). In Sergei Lebedev’s debut novel, an unnamed young man travels to the vast wastelands of the Far North to uncover the truth about a mysterious neighbor who once saved his life, and whom he knows only as Grandfather II. What he finds among the forgotten mines and decrepit barracks of former gulags is a world relegated to oblivion, where it is easier to ignore both the victims and the executioners than to come to terms with a terrible past. This disturbing tale evokes the great and ruined beauty of a land where man and machine work in tandem with nature to destroy millions of lives during the Soviet century. Emerging from today’s Russia, where the ills of the past are being forcefully erased from public memory, this masterful novel is an epic literary act of bearing witness, attempting to rescue history from the brink of oblivion. A Wall Street Journal Top 10 Novel of the Year “Not since Alexander Solzhenitsyn has Russia had a writer as obsessed as Sergei Lebedev with that country’s history or the traces it has left on the collective consciousness . . . The best of Russia’s younger generation of writers.” ―The New York Review of Books
Two colonies set out from Earth. One would travel the solar system and return in fifty years. The other, by design, would never come back. The crew of the returning ship, however, finds that during its absence, it missed a rather crucial planetary event: the Apocalypse. Soon the last remaining humans--those in the second, wandering colony--are about to be thrust into a final battle for souls between the forces of good and evil. Evil is much better prepared for the fight, though. The futures of both mankind and the afterlife depend upon the actions of all the humans caught in the struggles. Even though the forces they are up against are no less powerful than deity, humans with enough willpower can sometimes do amazing things...
This Atom Bomb in Me traces what it felt like to grow up suffused with American nuclear culture in and around the atomic city of Oak Ridge, Tennessee. As a secret city during the Manhattan Project, Oak Ridge enriched the uranium that powered Little Boy, the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima. The city was a major nuclear production site throughout the Cold War, adding something to each and every bomb in the United States arsenal. Even today, Oak Ridge contains the world's largest supply of fissionable uranium. The granddaughter of an atomic courier, Lindsey A. Freeman turns a critical yet nostalgic eye to the place where her family was sent as part of a covert government plan. Theirs was a city devoted to nuclear science within a larger America obsessed with its nuclear prowess. Through memories, mysterious photographs, and uncanny childhood toys, she shows how Reagan-era politics and nuclear culture irradiated the late twentieth century. Alternately tender and alarming, her book takes a Geiger counter to recent history, reading the half-life of the atomic past as it resonates in our tense nuclear present.
First Lieutenant Shaara was dead this morning. Her captain is furious at her. She wasted company resources getting herself killed, and it’s coming out of her paycheck. Now, she’s sitting across from the first other human being she’s seen in six years. His name is Adnan. He claims to come from Earth—but that’s impossible. Earth died a long time ago. If Adnan’s telling the truth, he and the decaying ship the captain pulled him off are nearly a thousand years old. Wherever he’s from, he’s Shaara’s responsibility now. Which is the last thing she needs. But it’s either that, or the captain sells Adnan into slavery. Shaara knows what that would mean. Most humans do. And something inside her won’t let her abandon Adnan to it: revenant memories, stabbed awake by the look in his eyes. Facing those memories won’t be easy. It’d be far easier to ignore the feeling driving her forward. Far easier to let it all go to hell, and drift back to sleep. Until a shadowy new faction starts stoking the fires of war. They’re looking for Adnan; Earth’s last survivor holds the key to unleash a terrible, indiscriminate vengeance on the galaxy that wronged them. Who they are is a mystery—to everyone but Shaara. Hard as she’s tried to forget, she knows them all too well. Which means she’s the only one who can stop them. The question is: does she want to? Maybe the galaxy’s earned a little vengeance. The first book in the trilogy, Oblivion's Cloak, won First Place in the Space Opera category at the 2023 Cygnus Awards!
USA TODAY BESTSELLER A Master Chief story and original full-length novel set in the Halo universe—based on the New York Times bestselling video game series! October 2559. It has been a year since the renegade artificial intelligence Cortana issued a galaxy-wide ultimatum, subjecting many worlds to martial law under the indomitable grip of her Forerunner weapons. Outside her view, the members of Blue Team—John-117, the Master Chief; Fred-104; Kelly-087; and Linda-058—are assigned from the UNSC Infinity to make a covert insertion onto the ravaged planet Reach. Their former home and training ground—and the site of humanity’s most cataclysmic military defeat near the end of the Covenant War—Reach still hides myriad secrets after all these years. Blue Team’s mission is to penetrate the rubble-filled depths of CASTLE Base and recover top-secret assets locked away in Dr. Catherine Halsey’s abandoned laboratory—assets which may prove to be humanity’s last hope against Cortana. But Reach has been invaded by a powerful and ruthless alien faction, who have their own reasons for being there. Establishing themselves as a vicious occupying force on the devastated planet, this enemy will soon transform Blue Team’s simple retrieval operation into a full-blown crisis. And with the fate of the galaxy hanging in the balance, mission failure is not an option…
Magic that shouldn't exist. A secret war. The courage to save an empire. As one of the empire's most skilled soldiers, Brandt is no stranger to combat. After he and his fellow wolfblades fight a merciless warrior armed with unbelievable powers, Brandt is left shattered. Searching for answers, Brandt stumbles upon a secret war, fought by a very few, that threatens the land he calls home. Alena is a gifted student studying for university exams. She moonlights as a thief and spy, searching for a purpose beyond the walls of her small town. When she steals a powerful artifact she becomes the most wanted thief in the empire, sending her fleeing across the continent for safety. Their quest for answers uncovers lies buried for generations. Lies at the heart of their empire. As a mysterious and powerful enemy prepares their assault, Brandt and Alena must race to find the truth and save their home. Before the Gate Beyond Oblivion summons them both. The Oblivion's Gate Trilogy collects for the first time the complete epic fantasy series!
Shaara is running out of friends. The sacrifices she and Warden made two years ago bought the League time, not victory. The war against the Undying has left them exhausted, drained of everything but hope—and precious little of that. The simple fact is that the Undying are going to win. Warden knows it, Shaara knows it. The Undying sure as hell know it. Until, out of the black, the Eternal comes to Shaara with an offer she can’t refuse, however much she’d like to. The threat he warned her about two years ago is real, and now it’s come calling. It cares nothing for their little war. All life in the galaxy, Undying or not, will end if it spreads unchecked. Shaara and the Eternal have little choice but to work together to destroy it . . . At least, for now. But people on both sides aren’t happy with an alliance, however temporary. Some of them are willing to risk all that lives just for a shot at power—and revenge. If Shaara can’t find a way to defeat them, she and the few friends she has left will lose more than their lives. They’ll lose everything.