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Shannach The Last
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Book Synopsis Shannach: The Last by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book Shannach: The Last written by Leigh Brackett and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2020-11-17 with total page 38 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Even in this grip of alien horror a man could not throw away his lifetime goal . . . and not stand idly by as endless rows of alabaster, shapes seated in their chars of stone, thought-rules this gargoyle planet from the dead blackness of deep Mercurian caverns. Leigh Brackett was the undisputed Queen of Space Opera and the first women to be nominated for the coveted Hugo Award. She wrote short stories, novels, and scripts for Hollywood. She wrote the first draft of the Empire Strikes Back shortly before her death in 1978.
Book Synopsis Shannach - the Last by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book Shannach - the Last written by Leigh Brackett and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 572 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis Terror Out of Space by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book Terror Out of Space written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-06-10 with total page 26 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It was driving men to madness... they had managed to capture it, but for how long?ExcerptLundy was flying the aero-space convertible by himself. He'd been doing it for a long time. So long that the bottom half of him was dead to the toes and the top half even deader, except for two separate aches like ulcerated teeth; one in his back, one in his head.Thick pearly-grey Venusian sky went past the speeding flier in streamers of torn cloud. The rockets throbbed and pounded. Instruments jerked erratically under the swirl of magnetic currents that makes the Venusian atmosphere such a swell place for pilots to go nuts in.Jackie Smith was still out cold in the copilot's seat. From in back, beyond the closed door to the tiny inner cabin, Lundy could hear Farrell screaming and fighting.He'd been screaming a long time. Ever since the shot of avertin Lundy had given him after he was taken had begun to wear thin. Fighting the straps and screaming, a hoarse jarring sound with no sense in it.Screaming to be free, because of It.Somewhere inside of Lundy, inside the rumpled, sweat-soaked black uniform of the Tri-World Police, Special Branch, and the five-foot-six of thick springy muscle under it, there was a knot. It was a large knot, and it was very, very cold in spite of the sweltering heat in the cabin, and it had a nasty habit of yanking itself tight every few minutes, causing Lundy to jerk and sweat as though he'd been spiked.Lundy didn't like that cold tight knot in his belly. It meant he was afraid. He'd been afraid before, plenty of times, and he wasn't ashamed of it. But right now he needed all the brains and guts he had to get It back to Special headquarters at Vhia, and he didn't want to have to fight himself, too.Fear can screw things for you. It can make you weak when you need to be strong, if you're going to go on living. You, and the two other guys depending on you.Lundy hoped he could keep from getting too much afraid, and too tired-because It was sitting back there in its little strongbox in the safe, waiting for somebody to crack.Farrell was cracked wide open, of course, but he was tied down. Jackie Smith had begun to show signs before he passed out, so that Lundy had kept one hand over the anesthetic needle gun bolstered on the side of his chair. And Lundy thought, the hell of it is, you don't know when It starts to work on you. There's no set pattern, or if there is we don't know it. Maybe right now the readings I see on those dials aren't there at all . . . .Down below the torn grey clouds he could see occasional small patches of ocean. The black, still, tideless water of Venus, that covers so many secrets of the planet's past.It didn't help Lundy any. It could be right or wrong, depending on what part of the ocean it was-and there was no way to tell. He hoped nothing would happen to the motors. A guy could get awfully wet, out in the middle of that still black water.Farrell went on screaming. His throat seemed to be lined with impervium. Screaming and fighting the straps, because It was locked up and calling for help.
Book Synopsis The Stellar Legion by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book The Stellar Legion written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-11-05 with total page 13 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: MacIan was a man with a secret, and it had followed him to Venus and the Legion, escape was impossible...ExcerptSilence was on the barracks like a lid clamped over tight-coiled springs. Men in rumpled uniforms-outlanders of the Stellar Legion, space-rats, the scrapings of the Solar System-sweated in the sullen heat of the Venusian swamplands before the rains. Sweated and listened.The metal door clanged open to admit Lehn, the young Venusian Commandant, and every man jerked tautly to his feet. Ian MacIan, the white-haired, space-burned Earthman, alone and hungrily poised for action; Thekla, the swart Martian low-canaler, grinning like a weasel beside Bhak, the hulking strangler from Titan. Every quick nervous glance was riveted on Lehn.The young officer stood silent in the open door, tugging at his fair mustache; to MacIan, watching, he was a trim, clean incongruity in this brutal wilderness of savagery and iron men. Behind him, the eternal mists writhed in a thin curtain over the swamp, stretching for miles beyond the soggy earthworks; through it came the sound every ear had listened to for days, a low, monotonous piping that seemed to ring from the ends of the earth. The Nahali, the six-foot, scarlet-eyed swamp-dwellers, whose touch was weapon enough, praying to their gods for rain. When it came, the hot, torrential downpour of southern Venus, the Nahali would burst in a scaly tide over the fort.Only a moat of charged water and four electro-cannons stood between the Legion and the horde. If those things failed, it meant two hundred lives burned out, the circle of protective forts broken, the fertile uplands plundered and laid waste. MacIan looked at Lehn's clean, university-bred young face, and wondered cynically if he was strong enough to do his job.Lehn spoke, so abruptly that the men started. "I'm calling for volunteers. A reconnaissance in Nahali territory; you know well enough what that means. Three men. Well?"Ian MacIan stepped forward, followed instantly by the Martian Thekla. Bhak the Titan hesitated, his queerly bright, blank eyes darting from Thekla to Lehn, and back to MacIan. Then he stepped up, his hairy face twisted in a sly grin.Lehn eyed them, his mouth hard with distaste under his fair mustache. Then he nodded, and said; "Report in an hour, light equipment." Turning to go, he added almost as an afterthought, "Report to my quarters, MacIan. Immediately."MacIan's bony Celtic face tightened and his blue eyes narrowed with wary distrust. But he followed Lehn, his gaunt, powerful body as ramrod-straight as the Venusian's own, and no eye that watched him go held any friendship.
Download or read book Outpost on Io written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-06-01 with total page 17 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pendleton's quiet voice was grave. "Mars is old and tired and torn with famine. Venus is young, but her courage is undisciplined. Her barbarians aren't suited to mechanized warfare. And Earth . . . ." He sighed. "Perhaps if we hadn't fought so much among ourselves . . . ."Excerpt MacVickers stopped at the brink of the dark round shaft.It was cold, and he was stark naked except for the silver collar welded around his neck. But it was more than cold that made him shiver and clamp his long bony jaw.He didn't know what the shaft was for, or where it led. But he had a sudden feeling that once he went down he was down for good.The small, round metal platform rocked uneasily under his feet. Beyond the railing, as far as MacVickers could see to the short curve of Io's horizon, there was mud. Thin, slimy blue-green mud.The shaft went down under the mud. MacVickers looked at it. He licked dry lips, and his grey-green eyes, narrow and hot in his gaunt dark face, flashed a desperate look at the small flyer from which he had just been taken.It bobbed on the heaving mud, mocking him. The eight-foot Europan guard standing between it and MacVickers made a slow weaving motion with his tentacles.MacVickers studied the Europan with the hating eyes of a wolf in a trap. His smooth black body had a dull sheen of red under the Jupiter-light. There was no back nor front to him, no face. Only the four long rubbery legs, the roundish body, and the tentacles in a waving crown above.MacVickers bared white, uneven teeth. His big bony fists clenched. He took one step toward the Europan.A tentacle flicked out, daintily, and touched the silver collar at the Earthman's throat. Raw electric current, generated in the Europan's body, struck into him, a shuddering, blinding agony surging down his spine.He stumbled backward, and his foot went off into emptiness. He twisted blindly, catching the opposite side of the shaft, and hung there, groping with his foot for the ladder rungs, cursing in a harsh, toneless voice.The tentacle struck out again, with swift, exquisite skill. Three times like a red-hot lash across his face, and twice, harder, across his hands. Then it touched the collar again.MacVickers retched and let go. He fell jarringly down the ladder, managed to break his fall onto the metal floor below, and crouched there, sick and furious and afraid.The hatch cover clanged down over him like the falling hammer of doom.
Book Synopsis The Dragon-Queen of Venus by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book The Dragon-Queen of Venus written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-11-01 with total page 12 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Attempting to make Venus safe for colonists turns out to be a very dangerous job for Tex and his partner Breska.excerptTex stirred uneasily where he lay on the parapet, staring into the heavy, Venusian fog. The greasy moisture ran down the fort wall, lay rank on his lips. With a sigh for the hot, dry air of Texas, and a curse for the adventure-thirst that made him leave it, he shifted his short, steel-hard body and wrinkled his sandy-red brows in the never-ending effort to see.A stifled cough turned his head. He whispered, "Hi, Breska."The Martian grinned and lay down beside him. His skin was wind-burned like Tex's, his black eyes nested in wrinkles caused by squinting against sun and blowing dust.For a second they were silent, feeling the desert like a bond between them. Then Breska, mastering his cough, grunted: "They're an hour late now. What's the matter with 'em?"Tex was worried, too. The regular dawn attack of the swamp-dwellers was long overdue."Reckon they're thinking up some new tricks," he said. "I sure wish our relief would get here. I could use a vacation."Breska's teeth showed a cynical flash of white."If they don't come soon, it won't matter. At that, starving is pleasanter than beetle-bombs, or green snakes. Hey, Tex. Here comes the Skipper."Captain John Smith-Smith was a common name in the Volunteer Legion-crawled along the catwalk. There were new lines of strain on the officer's gaunt face, and Tex's uneasiness grew.He knew that supplies were running low. Repairs were urgently needed. Wasn't the relief goin' to come at all?But Captain Smith's pleasant English voice was as calm as though he were discussing cricket-scores in a comfortable London club."Any sign of the beggars, Tex?""No, sir. But I got a feeling. . . .""H'm. Yes. We all have. Well, keep a sharp. . . ."
Download or read book A World Is Born written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-06-10 with total page 22 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first ripples of blue fire touched Dio's men. Bolts of it fastened on gun-butts, and knuckles. Men screamed and fell. Jill cried out as he tore silver ornaments from her dress...ExcerptMel Gray flung down his hoe with a sudden tigerish fierceness and stood erect. Tom Ward, working beside him, glanced at Gray's Indianesque profile, the youth of it hardened by war and the hells of the Eros prison blocks.A quick flash of satisfaction crossed Ward's dark eyes. Then he grinned and said mockingly."Hell of a place to spend the rest of your life, ain't it?"Mel Gray stared with slitted blue eyes down the valley. The huge sun of Mercury seared his naked body. Sweat channeled the dust on his skin. His throat ached with thirst. And the bitter landscape mocked him more than Wade's dark face."The rest of my life," he repeated softly. "The rest of my life!"He was twenty-eight.Wade spat in the damp black earth. "You ought to be glad--helping the unfortunate, building a haven for the derelict....""Shut up!" Fury rose in Gray, hotter than the boiling springs that ran from the Sunside to water the valleys. He hated Mercury. He hated John Moulton and his daughter Jill, who had conceived this plan of building a new world for the destitute and desperate veterans of the Second Interplanetary War."I've had enough 'unselfish service'," he whispered. "I'm serving myself from now on."
Book Synopsis The Beast-Jewel of Mars by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book The Beast-Jewel of Mars written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-06-10 with total page 29 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The wise men of Caer Dhu were not so wise. They found the secret of Shanga, and they escaped their wars and their troubles by fleeing backward along the path of evolution.Excerpt Burk Winters remained in the passenger section while the Starflight made her landing at Kahora Port. He did not think that he could bear to see another man, not even one he liked as much as he did Johnny Niles, handle the controls of the ship that had been his for so long.He did not wish even to say goodbye to Johnny, but there was no avoiding it. The young officer was waiting for him as he came down the ramp, and the deep concern he felt was not hidden in the least by his casually hearty grin.Johnny held out his hand. "So long, Burk. You've earned this leave. Have fun with it."Burk Winters looked out over the vast tarmac that spread for miles across the ochre desert. An orderly, roaring confusion of trucks and flatcars and men and ships-ore ships, freighters, tramps, sleek liners like the Starflight, bearing the colors of three planets and a dozen colonies, but still arrogantly and predominantly Terran.Johnny followed his gaze and said softly, "It always gives you a thrill, doesn't it?"Winters did not answer. Miles away, safe from the thundering rocket blasts, the glassite dome of Kahora, Trade City for Mars, rose jewel-like out of the red sand. The little sun stared wearily down and the ancient hills considered it, and the old, old wandering wind passed over it, and it seemed as though the planet bore Kahora and its spaceport with patience, as though it were a small local infection that would soon be gone.He had forgotten Johnny Niles. He had forgotten everything but his own dark thoughts. The young officer studied him with covert pity, and he did not know it.Burk Winters was a big man, and a tough man, tempered by years of deep-space flying. The same glare of naked light that had burned his skin so dark had bleached his hair until it was almost white, and just in the last few months his gray eyes seemed to have caught and held a spark of that pitiless radiance. The easy good nature was gone out of them, and the lines that laughter had shaped around his mouth had deepened now into bitter scars.
Book Synopsis The Jewel of Bas by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book The Jewel of Bas written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-11-05 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A quest to the Mountain of Life to save what remained by humanity from the machines that were bent on destroying them.excerptMouse stirred the stew in the small iron pot. There wasn't much of it. She sniffed and said: "You could have stolen a bigger joint. We'll go hungry before the next town.""Uh huh," Ciaran grunted lazily.Anger began to curl in Mouse's eyes."I suppose it's all right with you if we run out of food," she said sullenly.Ciaran leaned back comfortably against a moss-grown boulder and watched her with lazy gray eyes. He liked watching Mouse. She was a head shorter than he, which made her very short indeed, and as thin as a young girl. Her hair was black and wild, as though only wind ever combed it. Her eyes were black, too, and very bright. There was a small red thief's brand between them. She wore a ragged crimson tunic, and her bare arms and legs were as brown as his own.Ciaran grinned. His lip was scarred, and there was a tooth missing behind it. He said, "It's just as well. I don't want you getting fat and lazy."Mouse, who was sensitive about her thinness, said something pungent and threw the wooden plate at him. Ciaran drew his shaggy head aside enough to let it by and then relaxed, stroking the harp on his bare brown knees. It began to purr softly.Ciaran felt good. The heat of the sunballs that floated always, lazy in a reddish sky, made him pleasantly sleepy. And after the clamor and crush of the market squares in the border towns, the huge high silence of the place was wonderful.He and Mouse were camped on a tongue of land that licked out from the Phrygian hills down into the coastal plains of Atlantea. A short cut, but only gypsies like themselves ever took it. To Ciaran's left, far below, the sea spread sullen and burning, cloaked in a reddish fog.To his right, also far below, were the Forbidden Plains. Flat, desolate, and barren, reaching away and away to the up-curving rim of the world, where Ciaran's sharp eyes could just make out a glint of gold; a mammoth peak reaching for the sky.Mouse said suddenly, "Is that it, Kiri? Ben Beatha, the Mountain of Life?"
Book Synopsis The Citadel of Lost Ships by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book The Citadel of Lost Ships written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-06-10 with total page 28 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis Partners in Wonder by : Eric Leif Davin
Download or read book Partners in Wonder written by Eric Leif Davin and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2006 with total page 452 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Partners in Wonder' explores our knowledge of women and science fiction between 1936 and 1965. It describes the distinctly different form of science fiction that females produced, one that was both more utopian and more empathetic than that of their male counterparts.
Book Synopsis Enchantress of Venus by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book Enchantress of Venus written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-06-01 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few men have gone beyond that barrier, into the vast mystery of Inner Venus. Fewer still have come back.Excerpt The ship moved slowly across the Red Sea, through the shrouding veils of mist, her sail barely filled by the languid thrust of the wind. Her hull, of a thin light metal, floated without sound, the surface of the strange ocean parting before her prow in silent rippling streamers of flame.Night deepened toward the ship, a river of indigo flowing out of the west. The man known as Stark stood alone by the after rail and watched its coming. He was full of impatience and a gathering sense of danger, so that it seemed to him that even the hot wind smelled of it.The steersman lay drowsily over his sweep. He was a big man, with skin and hair the color of milk. He did not speak, but Stark felt that now and again the man's eyes turned toward him, pale and calculating under half-closed lids, with a secret avarice.The captain and the two other members of the little coasting vessel's crew were forward, at their evening meal. Once or twice Stark heard a burst of laughter, half-whispered and furtive. It was as though all four shared in some private joke, from which he was rigidly excluded.The heat was oppressive. Sweat gathered on Stark's dark face. His shirt stuck to his back. The air was heavy with moisture, tainted with the muddy fecundity of the land that brooded westward behind the eternal fog.There was something ominous about the sea itself. Even on its own world, the Red Sea is hardly more than legend. It lies behind the Mountains of White Cloud, the great barrier wall that hides away half a planet. Few men have gone beyond that barrier, into the vast mystery of Inner Venus. Fewer still have come back.Stark was one of that handful. Three times before he had crossed the mountains, and once he had stayed for nearly a year. But he had never quite grown used to the Red Sea.It was not water. It was gaseous, dense enough to float the buoyant hulls of the metal ships, and it burned perpetually with its deep inner fires. The mists that clouded it were stained with the bloody glow. Beneath the surface Stark could see the drifts of flame where the lazy currents ran, and the little coiling bursts of sparks that came upward and spread and melted into other bursts, so that the face of the sea was like a cosmos of crimson stars.It was very beautiful, glowing against the blue, luminous darkness of the night. Beautiful, and strange.There was a padding of bare feet, and the captain, Malthor, came up to Stark, his outlines dim and ghostly in the gloom."We will reach Shuruun," he said, "before the second glass is run."Stark nodded. "Good."The voyage had seemed endless, and the close confinement of the narrow deck had got badly on his nerves."You will like Shuruun," said the captain jovially. "Our wine, our food, our women-all superb. We don't have many visitors. We keep to ourselves, as you will see. But those who do come..."He laughed, and clapped Stark on the shoulder. "Ah, yes. You will be happy in Shuruun!"It seemed to Stark that he caught an echo of laughter from the unseen crew, as though they listened and found a hidden jest in Malthor's words.Stark said, "That's fine.""Perhaps," said Malthor, "you would like to lodge with me. I could make you a good price."He had made a good price for Stark's passage from up the coast. An exorbitantly good one.Stark said, "No.""You don't have to be afraid," said the Venusian, in a confidential tone. "The strangers who come to Shuruun all have the same reason. It's a good place to hide. We're out of everybody's reach."He paused, but Stark did not rise to his bait. Presently he chuckled and went on, "In fact, it's such a safe place that most of the strangers decide to stay on. Now, at my house, I could give you..."
Book Synopsis Child of the Sun by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book Child of the Sun written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-06-01 with total page 28 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Eric Falken couldn't run any more. At least he'd led the Hiltonists away from the pitiful starving holes where his people hid, on the outer planets and barren asteroids and dark derelict hulks floating far outside the traveled lanes.ExcerptEric Falken stood utterly still, staring down at his leashed and helpless hands on the controls of the spaceship Falcon.The red lights on his indicator panel showed Hiltonist ships in a three-dimensional half-moon, above, behind, and below him. Pincer jaws, closing fast.The animal instinct of escape prodded him, but he couldn't obey. He had fuel enough for one last burst of speed. But there was no way through that ring of ships. Tractor-beams, criss-crossing between them, would net the Falcon like a fish.There was no way out ahead, either. Mercury was there, harsh and bitter in the naked blaze of the sun. The ships of Gantry Hilton, President of the Federation of Worlds, inventor of the Psycho-Adjuster, and ruler of men's souls, were herding him down to a landing at the lonely Spaceguard outpost.A landing he couldn't dodge. And then . . . .For Paul Avery, a choice of death or Happiness. For himself and Sheila Moore, there was no choice. It was death.The red lights blurred before Falken's eyes. The throb of the plates under his feet faded into distance. He'd stood at the controls for four chronometer days, ever since the Hiltonists had chased him up from Los Angles, back on Earth.He knew it was because he was exhausted that he couldn't think, or stop the nightmare of the past days from tramping through his brain, hammering the incessant question at him. How?How had the Hiltonists traced him back from New York? Paul Avery, the Unregenerate recruit he went to get, had passed a rigid psycho-search-which, incidentally, revealed the finest brain ever to come to the Unregenerate cause. He couldn't be a spy. And he'd spoken to no one but Falken.Yet they were traced. Hiltonist Black Guards were busy now, destroying the last avenues of escape from Earth, avenues that he, Falken, had led them through.But how? He knew he hadn't given himself away. For thirty years he'd been spiriting Unregenerates away from Gantry Hilton's strongholds of Peace and Happiness. He was too old a hand for blunders.Yet, somehow, the Black Guards caught up with them at Los Angles, where the Falcon lay hidden. And, somehow, they got away, with a starving green-eyed girl named Kitty . . . ."Not Kitty," Falken muttered. "Kitty's Happy. Hilton took Kitty, thirty years ago. On our wedding day."A starving waif named Sheila Moore, who begged him for help, because he was Eric Falken and almost a god to the Unregenerates. They got away in the Falcon, but the Hiltonist ships followed.Driven, hopeless flight, desperate effort to shake pursuit before he was too close to the Sun. Time and again, using precious fuel and accelerations that tried even his tough body, Falken thought he had escaped.But they found him again. It was uncanny, the way they found him.Now he couldn't run any more. At least he'd led the Hiltonists away from the pitiful starving holes where his people hid, on the outer planets and barren asteroids and dark derelict hulks floating far outside the traveled lanes.And he'd kill himself before the Hiltonist psycho-search could pick his brain of information about the Unregenerates. Kill himself, if he could wake up.He began to laugh, a drunken, ragged chuckle. He couldn't stop laughing. He clung to the panel edge and laughed until the tears ran down his scarred, dark face.
Book Synopsis Black Amazon of Mars by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book Black Amazon of Mars written by Leigh Brackett and published by eStar Books. This book was released on 2011-06-01 with total page 60 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Grimly Eric John Stark slogged toward that ancient Martian city-with every step he cursed the talisman of Ban Cruach that flamed in his blood-stained belt Behind him screamed the hordes of Ciaran, hungering for that magic jewel-ahead lay the dread abode of the Ice Creatures-at his side stalked the whispering spectre of Ban Cruach, urging him on to a battle Stark knew he must lose!ExcerptThrough all the long cold hours of the Norland night the Martian had not moved nor spoken. At dusk of the day before Eric John Stark had brought him into the ruined tower and laid him down, wrapped in blankets, on the snow. He had built a fire of dead brush, and since then the two men had waited, alone in the vast wasteland that girdles the polar cap of Mars.Now, just before dawn, Camar the Martian spoke."Stark.""Yes?""I am dying.""Yes.""I will not reach Kushat.""No."Camar nodded. He was silent again.The wind howled down from the northern ice, and the broken walls rose up against it, brooding, gigantic, roofless now but so huge and sprawling that they seemed less like walls than cliffs of ebon stone. Stark would not have gone near them but for Camar. They were wrong, somehow, with a taint of forgotten evil still about them.The big Earthman glanced at Camar, and his face was sad. "A man likes to die in his own place," he said abruptly. "I am sorry.""The Lord of Silence is a great personage," Camar answered. "He does not mind the meeting place. No. It was not for that I came back into the Norlands."He was shaken by an agony that was not of the body. "And I shall not reach Kushat!"Stark spoke quietly, using the courtly High Martian almost as fluently as Camar."I have known that there was a burden heavier than death upon my brother's soul."He leaned over, placing one large hand on the Martian's shoulder. "My brother has given his life for mine. Therefore, I will take his burden upon myself, if I can."He did not want Camar's burden, whatever it might be. But the Martian had fought beside him through a long guerilla campaign among the harried tribes of the nearer moon. He was a good man of his hands, and in the end had taken the bullet that was meant for Stark, knowing quite well what he was doing. They were friends.
Book Synopsis Lorelei of the Red Mist by : Leigh Brackett
Download or read book Lorelei of the Red Mist written by Leigh Brackett and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 471 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lorelei of the Red Mist: Planetary Romances is the companion volume to Martian Quest: The Early Brackett, a volume that collected the First twenty published stories by the ?undisputed Queen of ?Space Opera.? ?With the stories in this volume, Brackett takes the foundation of the Fictional universe established in her early work, and populates these worlds with colorful characters and locales teeming with adventure and intrigue. Here, hard-bitten and cynical rogues risk (and sometimes lose) all to battle stellar horrors, escape from decadent tyrannies, and yes, rescue the girl.During the timeframe when these stories were written, Brackett First broke into writing screenplays for Hollywood. With only modest success for Republic Pictures, it was on the strength of her First mystery novel that she was offered to co-author the screenplay for Warner Bros.? The Big Sleep with William Faulkner by director Howard Hawks.Appropriately, Lorelei of the Red Mist: Planetary Romances features an introduction by a protege of Leigh Brackett, a one-time collaborator (on this volume?s title story) and 2004 recipient of the National Medal of Arts, Ray Bradbury.
Book Synopsis Science Fact and Science Fiction by : Brian Stableford
Download or read book Science Fact and Science Fiction written by Brian Stableford and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2006-09-06 with total page 758 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Science fiction is a literary genre based on scientific speculation. Works of science fiction use the ideas and the vocabulary of all sciences to create valid narratives that explore the future effects of science on events and human beings. Science Fact and Science Fiction examines in one volume how science has propelled science-fiction and, to a lesser extent, how science fiction has influenced the sciences. Although coverage will discuss the science behind the fiction from the Classical Age to the present, focus is naturally on the 19th century to the present, when the Industrial Revolution and spectacular progress in science and technology triggered an influx of science-fiction works speculating on the future. As scientific developments alter expectations for the future, the literature absorbs, uses, and adapts such contextual visions. The goal of the Encyclopedia is not to present a catalog of sciences and their application in literary fiction, but rather to study the ongoing flow and counterflow of influences, including how fictional representations of science affect how we view its practice and disciplines. Although the main focus is on literature, other forms of science fiction, including film and video games, are explored and, because science is an international matter, works from non-English speaking countries are discussed as needed.
Book Synopsis Intergalactic Stories: 60+ SF Classics in One Edition (Illustrated) by : Clifford D. Simak
Download or read book Intergalactic Stories: 60+ SF Classics in One Edition (Illustrated) written by Clifford D. Simak and published by Good Press. This book was released on 2023-12-14 with total page 1762 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Intergalactic Stories: 60+ SF Classics in One Edition, illustrated and compiled from the pens of some of the most celebrated authors in science fiction, traverses the broad spectrum of humanity's outermost fantasies and fears. The collection showcases an array of literary styles, from the pioneering explorations of space operas to the intricate web of speculative science fiction, providing a panoramic view of the genre's evolution over several decades. Noteworthy for both its diversity and significance, the anthology presents an opportunity to engage with seminal works that have shaped the contours of modern science fiction, capturing the imagination with tales of interstellar adventure, dystopian futures, and the boundless curiosity of the human spirit. The contributing authors and editors, including Clifford D. Simak, Poul Anderson, Frederik Pohl, Damon Knight, and others, bring a rich tapestry of backgrounds to the collection. Their collective work aligns with various historical, cultural, and literary movements, from the golden age of science fiction to the more nuanced, philosophical undertones of the genre's later years. Through their diverse narratives, these authors contribute to a holistic exploration of what it means to venture beyond the known, blending tales of alien encounters, time travel, and cosmic wars with profound questions about humanity's place in the universe. For aficionados of science fiction and newcomers alike, Intergalactic Stories: 60+ SF Classics in One Edition offers an unparalleled journey through the myriad landscapes of speculative fiction. The anthology serves not only as an educational tool, enlightening readers on the genre's historical development and thematic richness but also as an invitation to witness the dialogue between some of its most influential voices. This collection promises a captivating exploration of the endless possibilities that science fiction represents, making it an essential addition to any literary library.
