The saga of Harald Harrede. Poul Anderson's mighty historical epic of the last and greatest Viking King - Harald Harrede - the real-life CONAN. Drunk with battle, Harald hardly saw the men he killed. There seemed to be wings beating over him as his blade rose and fell, smashing down whatever stood before it. A Housecarle chopped at him, but he caught the ax on his sword and drove it back and sank edge into bone. Sending down three men who stood side by side, Harald came up to the English shield-wall chanting the Krakamaal, the death-song of Ragnar.

Four disparate human explorers, marooned in deep space by a terrifying failure of technology, must work together to achieve the impossible and escape a floating prison in this classic of hard science fiction In the twenty-third century, when humankind has spread itself throughout the cosmos, with many intergalactic colonies teetering on the brink of open revolt against the hated ruling Protectorate, a team of four is transported by a miraculous technology onto the deep-space vessel Southern Cross. Hailing from vastly different backgrounds, philosophies, and worlds, Ryerson, Nakamura, Sverdlov, and Maclaren have been entrusted to explore a long-dead star located light-years beyond where humanity has previously traveled. But venturing too close to the target proves disastrous when the black sun's magnetic field permanently obliterates their only means of returning home. Suddenly, four strangers, two hailing from a privileged Earth and two from oppressed...

What if we were all designed to be smarter than we actually are? That is the premise of master science fiction novelist Poul Anderson's 1954 debut work, Brain Wave. Unbeknown to its inhabitants, the solar system has for millions of years been caught in a force field that has had the effect of supressing intelligence. When in the course of normal galactic movement the solar system breaks free of the force field that has held it in its sway for so long, gone are the inhibiting effects and a remarkable change begins to sweep across the earth.In fact, the entire world is turned upside-down and Anderson's novel is devoted to detailing the sometimes surprising, sometimes chilling aftereffects of this watershed event. In one of the novel's opening scenes, Archie Brock, a mentally disabled man, finds himself suddenly awash in new kinds of thought as he ponders the night sky. In another scene, a young boy on a summer break works out the basic fundamental foundations of calculus before...

Second book The saga of Harald Harrede. Poul Anderson's mighty historical epic of the last and greatest Viking King - Harald Harrede - the real-life CONAN.

Product DescriptionHis father had been slain in a heinous ambush; his grandfather, in an act of brotherly murder. His blood was of the Skjoldungs . . . and even the most unremarkable of seers knew his life would be as sweeping as it was savage. From the roiling midnight years before his birth, to the unshakable love and twisted fates that brought him to the throne of his ravaged Icelandic kingdom, Hrolf Kraki's magnificent saga is the story of an age of runes and ravishments, of blades and omens . . . and of a man who ruled and was ruled by an inescapable destiny.

A collection of three Flandry tales: • The Game of Glory : Captain Flandry follows a dying man's clue to the watery provincial world of Nyanza, where a rebellion against the Empire may be brewing. • A Message in Secret : Flandry ventures to the remote colonial world of Altai, whose human inhabitants haven't been in contact with the Terran Empire for centuries, and discovers that they are cutting a Faustian deal with the Merseians. • The Plague of Masters : Flandry, of his own volition, decides to investigate the remote and isolated world of Unan Besar, to see exactly why it is they have had no contact with the Empire in over 300 years First published in 1965.

Bribed to explore a supposedly barren moon, Lt. Flandry finds it swarming with a hideous race of killers, controlled by a deranged computer brain!

Like two giants the old enemies faced each other across the reaches of the galaxy — the Terran Empire and the Ythrian Domain. Terra was a Leviathan, encroaching ever further among the stars, promising peace and prosperity — but at the price of freedom. Ythri was smaller, but an empire in its own right, peopled by birdlike beings with a civilization and intellect that easily matched Terra’s own. Nominated for Nebula Award in 1973, Hugo and Locus awards in 1974.

From Robert Silverberg’s, “Earthmen and Strangers” anthology, 1966: Earthly life has developed many methods of reproducing itself. The amoeba is content to split in half; the hydra produces a bud that develops into a new hydra; the small crustacean known as daphnia lays eggs that do not need to be fertilized in order to bring forth young daphnias. Most animals, though, rely on two sexes, female and male, one to produce eggs and the other to fertilize them. The variations within this scheme are great—take, for example, the case of the oyster, which is male at one time of the year and female at another. Given such biological variations, it was inevitable that science-fiction writers would begin to speculate about the unearthly aspects reproduction might take among alien beings. Poul Anderson, a lanky chap of Viking descent who lives in California, is better qualified to make scientific speculations than most of his colleagues. He took a degree in physics at the University of Minnesota before turning to science fiction, and keeps abreast of the latest technical developments in a way that gives his stories the solid ring of authenticity. In this example, he provides a convincing blend of science and imagination that yields insight into a wholly alien race. But because recent scientific research has given us a view of conditions on Mercury different from the one that was accepted in 1957, when this story was written, Anderson has added his own introduction to the story in the interest of maintaining accuracy.

Book one of the King of Ys series: Blending fantasy, history, and adventure, the epic story of Ys begins as the Roman Gratillonius finds himself thrust into the highest seat of power In the waning days of the Roman Empire, Magnus Maximus sends his prefect Gratillonius to western Gaul and the faraway land of Ys, a place shrouded in legend and ruled by a cruel and tyrannical king. When the sovereign challenges Gratillonius to a duel, the envoy from Rome emerges victorious and claims the throne as the new king of Ys, inheriting a land whose religion, culture, and history are entirely foreign. He also gains the former king's nine wives, the Gallicenae, a powerful group of women to whom he must appear equally devoted despite his growing feelings for one in particular. As he adjusts to his new role as ruler of Ys, Gratillonius must fight to keep his strange new country on its feet while the rest of the Roman Empire begins to crumble around him. Roma...