First up is Larry’s new collaboration- Gun Runners
As always, click on the cover to get the Amazon link!
The blurb-
THRILLING SCIENCE FICTION ADVENTURE FROM BEST-SELLING AUTHORS LARRY CORREIA AND JOHN BROWN
The Heart of a Warrior
Once, Jackson Rook was a war hero. Raised from boyhood to pilot an exosuit mech, he’d fought gallantly for the rebellion against the Collectivists. But that was a long time ago, on a world very far away.
Now, Jackson Rook is a criminal, a smuggler on board the Multipurpose Supply Vehicle Tar Heel. His latest mission: steal a top-of-the-line mech called the Citadel and deliver it to the far-flung planet Swindle, a world so hostile even the air will kill you. The client: a man known only as the Warlord. Rook has been in the smuggling business long enough to know that it’s best to take the money and not ask questions. But Rook cannot stand by and watch as the Warlord runs roughshod over the citizens of Swindle, the way the Collectivists did on his homeworld. For all his mercenary ways, Rook is not a pirate. And deep within the smuggler, the heart of a warrior still beats.
Next up is Ben English’s first book in the new Templer family series- The Uvalde Raider
The blurb-
The time is the eve of the First Gulf War. The place is an abandoned World War II emergency landing strip for heavy bombers, nestled amid the near countless miles upon miles of wide openness in West Texas. Here another climatic battle will be fought, while the rest of the world focuses on what would become known as Operation Desert Storm. But in some ways, the stakes are even higher as men from other places and past conflicts gamble all that they are, and all they ever were, to prevent a catastrophic terrorist attack unthinkable before on an American city. The key to either side’s success or failure? One old Boeing B-17G Flying Fortress, an enduring symbol from another war and ensuing catastrophe of a different era. This relic of a not so distant past is named ‘The Uvalde Raider,’ and this is its story…
Ben does a great job with this one, and the flying scenes are accurate!
Last but not least, an anthology- Starflight: Tales From The Starport Lounge
The blurb-
Seventeen incredible authors. Seventeen amazing stories. One fantastic sci-fi universe, where the only limit is one’s imagination. Welcome to Starflight.
Based on the exploration-based Starflight video game series created by Greg Johnson and the Binary Systems team, the stories in Tales From the Starport Lounge flesh out and shine a light into the darkest corners of the known universe. Join the last vestiges of Humanity and their alien allies (the reptilian Thrynn, the insectoid Velox, and the plant-based Elowan) as they attempt to carve out their own territory in a sector of space filled with wondrous opportunity and deadly threats. Brave explorers seek out new worlds to colonize while merchants cruise from starport to starport, their holds laden with exotic goods.
Not all in this futuristic setting have noble intent. For every prospector and trader attempting to make a difference, a dozen pirates, smugglers, and mobsters engage in all manner of criminal enterprise. Gangs fill the underbellies of every major city and raid the trade routes between the stars, pushing the outnumbered and outgunned Interstel Police to their limit and forcing civilians to take matters into their own hands. It’s a rough and tumble universe, where one wrong move could spell doom for an expedition, or grant enough wealth to buy a planet.
Board your ship and set course for stars unknown! The universe awaits.
Stories include:
“Those Who Came Before” by Michael Gants
“Choices” by Christopher Woods
“Black Box Blues” by Philip K. Booker
“Rock of Truth” by Bart Kemper
“Obligations” by Marisa Wolf
“Hindsight” by R.J. Ladon
“Peacestone” by Brisco Woods
“Everyone Gets What They Have Coming” by D.J. Butler
“A New Beginning” by J.F. Posthumus
“Fire at Will” by Declan Finn
“Hiro of Arth” by David A. Tatum
“Rover Rescue” by Michael J. Allen
“Territory” by Nick Steverson
“Turn of Luck” by William Joseph Roberts
“Always on Duty” by Benjamin Tyler Smith
“To Cache a Killer” by Michael J. Ciaravella
“Through the Time Lens” by Robert Silverberg
Plus an introduction by Starflight creator, Greg Johnson
From a dream I had:
The Unicornians* were being attacked. The Testostrians* had exhausted the resources of their plant. A space traveler who happened to be on planet suggested that the Unicornians use an old technology in a novel way.
Far in the past the Unicornians had developed a way to save their species. They had been able to extract DNA from the last surviving members of the last generation not exposed to the deadly COV-IDEN. The space traveler, himself interested in history, made frequent trips to the antiquated dusty libraries strewn throughout the galaxy.
His suggestion was to send scientists to those libraries to extract DNA. Specifically from the pages of the books. But not any books. To be sought were those certain books which appealed to a certain class of people; those who were interested in military history. It was from those books the Unicornians would extract the DNA to be able to create a warrior class to battle against the the invading Testostrians.
*These are working names, they are derived from familiar words which should provide clues to the nature of the belligerents.
If anyone can take this seed and nourish it into book form, they are welcome to it.
Darn it. I muddled that.
The DNA from the fingers which turned the pages. War stories held by men with fire in their hearts.
Conversely, if you want bleeding heart snowflakes, it is the romance novels you’d want.
Oh no, don’t throw me into the book patch Old NFO!
Now my reading list is longer and that’s good.
*stunned expression*
I was just discussing Starflight the other day. God, that game was a -classic-.
Gonna have to pick that up, OldNFO. Then maybe pull out DosBox and give Starflight a spin again 🙂
O.K., I clicked on “The Uvalde Raider,” and it looked good, so I bought the Kindle edition. I hope that link gets you 5 cents or whatever they’re paying from Amazon these days.
R- That is an interesting concept! And it would be interesting to play that out…
John- Sorry (not)!
Toast- There are some GOOD stories in there!
UOS- It is good! And Ben’s books about the Big Bend area are fantastic for their detail and history of the region, they are NOT fiction!
I love the book cover! Both my missile wings had been B-17 Bomb Groups. One of them, the 351st, went over in ’43 with Clark Gable on board. My wife was the wing’s Public Affairs Officer, and found two photos of him in her files…with NO information on them. Made a movie over there, which I found out about some years later. On YouTube, see “Air Combat”.
Sam- Wow! Thanks.
Your welcome! I post from my basement, which is the best I can do, as thirty-one of my missile sites have been blown up/in. The one south of Tucson, now the Titan Missile Museum (titanmissilemuseum.org/) was the closest in, and Oscar-0 was the one something like 50′ below Whiteman AFB, MO. SHORTEST drive to the site, roughly 100-200′ from the briefing and dispatch. The farthest site was two hours away to the west-south-west.
https://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/facility/images/whiteafb.gif
This shows the site locations. One of them was near where Robert Heinlein grew up.
Nice.
Sam- Nothing but admiration for you for putting up with that. I would have gone nuts…
LSP- Thanks!