Science Fiction Off the Beaten Path
Discover hidden gems in science fiction with our curated list of off-the-beaten-path books. Explore unique, lesser-known titles that redefine the genre.
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Native Tongue
by Suzette Haden Elgin
A brilliant cult classic of literary science fiction--back in print.
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Brother to Dragons, Companion to Owls
by Jane Lindskold
The Magic That Doesn't Go Away Cutbacks have forced Sarah out of the asylum in which she was raised--and into a strange new place where the Head Wolf rules the beautiful and the doomed. But Sarah can never truly assimilate, for she possesses wild talents. Walls tell her their secrets. Safes tell her their combinations. And a favorite toy dragon whispers dire warnings about those who would exploit her for their own malevolent purposes. There's no place Sarah can hide, from her pursuers or from her past...
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Stories of Your Life and Others
by Ted Chiang
One of the best short story collections of the last ten years, back in print in a new edition.
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Venus of Dreams
by Pamela Sargent
Iris Angharads, a determined, independent woman, sets herself one massive goal: to make the poison-filled atmosphere of Venus hospitable to humans. She works day and night to realize her dream, with only one person sharing her passion, Liang Chen. It seems impossible to make Venus, with its intolerable air and waterless environment, into a paradise, but Iris succeeds. And in doing so, she also creates a powerful dynasty, beginning with her first born, Benzi Liangharad.
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The Annunciate
by Severna Park
In a dark new age, technologically advanced humans have crossed vast stretches of space-yet have remained brutally, imperfectly human. In the star system ThreeSys, three members of the elite human "Meshed" caste have used their great gifts for evil purposes -- enslaving the lower orders in the addictive dreams of a powerful narcotic. Now hunted by those seeking bloody retribution, Corey, Annmarie, and Eve-along with Eve's lower caste lover, Naverdi -- must flee to Paradise, the first world in ThreeSys to know the curse of human habitation. But something is waiting for them on the now abandoned planet -- a sinister being that can turn their own powers against them, an entity that has broken down all barriers between virtual and real; a creature that has chosen Naverdi to bear its offspring into the world.
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The Children Star
by Joan Slonczewski
A brilliant new SF adventure from the John W. Campbell award winner which marks her return to the universe of A Door Into The Ocean & Daughter of Elysium.
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Hand of Prophecy
by Severna Park
A galaxy whirls in conflict as tyrant slavers prepare to reclaim the frontier planets wrested from them generations ago. Living on one of the forfeited worlds they covet most is Frenna, bred for bondage and given a virus that guarantees two decades of youth for servitude, followed by an agonizing death. But then she learns an amazing secret: the end is not inevitable. There is an escape. An antidote. A cure. Yet Frenna's escape is into an exotic, bloodswept world, a fierce arena where muscled slaves wage brutal battles for their masters' amusement. Frenna has become a medic: her job is to administer a mercifully quick end to the mortally wounded. But she still carries the secret of freedom. And as warships arrive in conquest, this last hope must survive in a murderous domain of monstrous holograms and irresistible deadly potions. In the final frenzy, sisters and lovers, killers and saviors, all will be swept together in a maelstrom of annihilation, survival and redemption.
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Grass
by Sheri S. Tepper
What could be more commonplace than grass, or a world covered over all its surface with a wind-whipped ocean of grass? But the planet Grass conceals horrifying secrets within its endless pastures. And as an incurable plague attacks all inhabited planets but this one, the prairie-like Grass begins to reveal these secrets -- and nothing will ever be the same again . . .
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Hurricane Moon
by Alexis Glynn Latner
Astronaut-physician, Catharin Gault, and scientist Joseph Devreze leave Earth to find a new world suitable to begin a new civilization; however, the ship's artificial programming locks onto two Earth-sized planets, one with abundant plant life and animals, and the other an oceanic world covered with hurricanes.
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Edenborn
by Nick Sagan
The six survivors of a microbial apocalypse that has wiped out the human race find themselves divided by two different views of how a new society should be established, in a tale told from the viewpoints of a child from each side of the conflict. Reprint.
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Tropic of Creation
by Kay L. Kenyon
In the bloody war that ended between Th Congress Worlds and the alien ahtra, Captain Eli Dammond had distinguished himself as an officer who could no wrong--until his last catastrophic battle. Now, with his shining reputation tarnished, the commander finds himself assigned to a grimy kettle of a ship making basic transport missions. Routine work -until he arrives on Null: a barren, scorned world at the mercy of two suns. Here, a marooned human outpost has survived for three years until their rescue by Eli's ship. But on this austere planet, the human newcomers are about to learn a harsh lesson: that nothing is quite as it seems. For soon a new season will call forth a hidden ecology both exquisite and deadly. And Null will test the survivors in a fight no soldier was ever trained for, and few can predict - while a young the survivors in a fight no soldier was trained for, and few predict - while a young woman of privilege may well prove to be their finest warrior. Yet for Eli Dammond, the worst struggle will unfold below the surface. There he will discover a threat to all the settle human worlds, even as he matches wits an adversary both familiar and alien. The odds are against human survival on null's surface or indeed, in the galaxy-- unless Eli succeeds in bringing home the hard-won secret that neither human nor ahtra can hear. From the Paperback edition.
