It was not like looking for a needle in a hay-stack. It was like feeling for a needle in a hay barn wearing gloves and a blindfold - that’s what Steven told me. He was talking about the search for extra terrestrial life, an impossible pursuit until two aliens, yes two, landed in Paris.

During a routine survey mission on an uncolonized planet, Kira finds an alien relic. At first she's delighted, but elation turns to terror when the ancient dust around her begins to move. As war erupts among the stars, Kira is launched into a galaxy-spanning odyssey of discovery and transformation. First contact isn't at all what she imagined, and events push her to the very limits of what it means to be human. While Kira faces her own horrors, Earth and its colonies stand upon the brink of annihilation. Now, Kira might be humanity's greatest and final hope....

The mission is simple. Escort an emissary to an intergalactic peace summit. Try not to get in the way. Lt. Magnus and his 79th Recon Team have certainly handled worse, after all. But when an explosion rocks the tower and sends everyone into a panic, Magnus and his asset find themselves cut off from the rest of the team. Worse still, a dying alien chieftain gives them a priceless drive of intel, marking them for death. The mission has officially changed. With enemies on all sides, Magnus must do everything in his power to protect the emissary and escape the tower.

Living and slaving in Fill City One, you get used to the smell. We call it the Everpresent Stink. But every once in a while, on a spring day with a breeze, it clears away enough to remind us that there is something more out there. Most Fillers' wildest dreams would be just to get past the walls and live in the mainland. But my dream? It’s a little bigger. I’m going to Mars.

On December 21st, 2012, the world was supposed to end. When the apocalyptic date came and went, the world concluded the Mayan prophecy was a myth. But it was not. The Earth was saved by extraordinary intervention from planet Akara — home to an awakened civilization far more evolved than our own.

When the biggest colony ship in human history was sent to settle a paradise world, an accident hurtled it deep into uncharted space. A thousand light years from Earth, with no way home and no way to call for help, the colonists’ only hope for survival was the one barely habitable planet in range, a nightmare world they named Croatoan. Landing on the only five mountain peaks tall enough to rise above the lethal acid clouds, the settlers carved a civilization from the rock.

The year is 1961. The Cold War is in full swing and the space race is on. Russia aims to send humanity to space. But what if space comes to humanity instead? Yuri Gagarin’s epic flight into space is disrupted when an alien Mothership jumps into orbit, causing a cosmic car crash that defies all odds. Everything changes. The US and USSR must quickly put aside their differences. In exchange for the Earth’s help in the rebuilding of their Mothership, the mysterious aliens, the Vulbathi, offer promises of technology beyond humanity's wildest dreams.

When half of mankind revolts and demands more opportunity, those at the top decide on a compromise: They will build the first colony ships and allow the rest to discover new worlds and start over. Twelve ships are built. The first is called the Orion. Many are eager to go, but only 100,000 are chosen for each vessel. Far from Earth, a new life awaits, and it promises the prosperity they've always wanted. But still, resistance stirs.

What should have been a relaxing hunting trip for Sergeant AJ Cole, his kid brother Remmy, and two Marines from his unit turns into an all-out brawl with enemies from another planet. An invasion is being planned in the secluded woods of West Virginia. Ravagers from a distant world have set up a gateway, allowing them to move their forces through space. Earth is their next conquest. When push comes to shove, Earth's Marines are shoving back and taking the fight to the enemy.

Seven years after first contact, Providence Five launches. It is an enormous and deadly warship, built to protect humanity from its greatest ever threat. On board is a crew of just four - tasked with monitoring the ship and reporting the war's progress to a mesmerized global audience by way of social media. But while pursuing the enemy across space, Gilly, Talia, Anders, and Jackson confront the unthinkable: Their communications are cut, their ship decreasingly trustworthy and effective. To survive, they must win a fight that is suddenly and terrifyingly real.

With a cataclysmic climate crisis on the horizon, Colonel William Graves, head of the US Disaster Mitigation Corps, has been ordered on a bold and highly classified mission. Graves must help billionaire tech entrepreneur Anthony Taulke develop the Lazarus Protocol, a secret plan to geoengineer the Earth's atmosphere, and prevent disaster. Taulke's vision is to create a Manhattan Project for repairing the earth's air, and he quietly recruits four other family-owned conglomerates to take part in the project.

Missions to alien planets have resulted in interactions with strange beings in the past, but never on this level. When Marine Corporal Goshawk becomes part of the search team tasked with locating some missing SEALs, he expected action and plenty of it. After all, they had to send in Marines to rescue SEALs. What he didn’t expect was that the mission would completely transform him, body and spirit. As new threats from strange beings continually challenge the team and their mission rapidly spirals out of control, odd allies emerge in unexpected places.

Max Tyco is a truck driver on the road more days than he's home. Events are about to transpire that will lead this everyday Joe on an adventure of a lifetime. Things like traveling through space, starships, alien monsters, and blasters have all been daydreams...until now. The Rowki is a fraternity of intergalactic guardians tasked with keeping the balance between the light and the darkness. A call for help from the oldest galaxy in the universe and the central planet in that galaxy will uncover an ancient secret that could mean the end of the universe as we know it.

Madison Wayward, niece to the most notorious captain among the outlaw Stardrifters, has a plan. She’ll stop at nothing to give humanity a flicker of hope in its darkest hour. If she would consider pausing, her plans might not blow up in her face quite so much. Kirehe Mahono, a skilled warrior with an uncommon gift, has a dragon. She’ll stop at nothing to protect her people from the enemy machines infesting her planet. If she had something better than a knife to bring to a laser fight, she might have better luck. Taken prisoner, both will have to harness their strengths to survive.

Complete Space Opera Series boxed set. A young explorer finds an alien space pod in the frozen tundra, which leads to an interplanetary chase and space battle. Plenty of action, epic original worldbuilding, and enjoyable moments with colorful characters. This series has all the right elements for a terrific alien contact space opera. And the ending is both surprising and satisfying!

When half of mankind revolts and demands more opportunity, those at the top decide on a compromise: They will build the first colony ships and allow the rest to discover new worlds and start over. Twelve ships are built. The first is called the Orion. Many are eager to go, but only 100,000 are chosen for each vessel. Far from Earth, a new life awaits, and it promises the prosperity they've always wanted. But still, resistance stirs.

Donovan is a world of remarkable wealth that comes at a high price. When Supervisor Kalico Aguila's ship arrives, she discovers a failing colony, its government overthrown, the few remaining colonists gone wild. Donovan could make her career - or kill her. Planetside, Talina Perez is one of three rulers of the Port Authority colony - the only law in the one remaining town. With the Corporate ship demanding answers about the things she's done, Perez could lose everything, including her life. For Dan Wirth, Donovan is a last chance. A psychopath with a death sentence looming over his head, he will make a desperate play for power. No matter who he has to corrupt, murder, or destroy. Captain Max Taggart is the Corporation's enforcer. But is it too late to seize control of Donovan?

The Covenant mission is the most ambitious endeavor in the history of Weyland-Yutani. A ship bound for Origae-6, carrying 2,000 colonists beyond the limits of known space, this is a make-or-break investment for the corporation - and for the future of all mankind. Yet there are those who would die to stop the mission. As the colony ship hovers in Earth orbit, several violent events reveal a deadly conspiracy to sabotage the launch.

Cities all around the world reported strange alien vessels descending. Some saw them as the heralds of a new age; others fired everything they had at them. All were taken as the beams lashed down and drew them into the sky. Dean was left behind, seemingly the last man on Earth. A trail of clues left by his dead wife guides Dean on a perilous journey across America and beyond to learn the truth behind the mysterious ships and save humanity from its doom.

Under the benevolent leadership of the League of Peoples, there is no war, little crime, and life is sacred...unless you're an Explorer. The ugly, the flawed, the misfit, the deformed, they are the unwanted, flung to the farthest corners of the galaxy to investigate hostile planets and strange, vicious creatures. Out there, there are a thousand different - and terrible - ways to die.

Living and slaving in Fill City One, you get used to the smell. We call it the Everpresent Stink. But every once in a while, on a spring day with a breeze, it clears away enough to remind us that there is something more out there. Most Fillers' wildest dreams would be just to get past the walls and live in the mainland. But my dream? It’s a little bigger. I’m going to Mars.

Captain Tess Bailey is in deep trouble. She and her crew are on the run, pursued by a tyrant who'll take them dead or alive. Tess's best hope is a tall, dark, and much-too-appealing stranger, Shade Ganavan, who says he can help her. But his motivations are far from clear. With the dreaded Dark Watch closing in, what Tess and Shade don't know about each other might get them killed, unless they can set aside their differences and learn to trust each other before it's too late.

My history is unknown. My present is violent. My future may be more dangerous still. I use my unique skillset in one of the Moon’s many watering holes. Here, miners can spend their hard-earned money to forget that they’re not among the wealthy elite in the paradise colony on Mars. When a known crime boss walks in, events will begin to unfold hinting at a dark past and an even murkier future.

A wicked snowstorm had blown in from the north and the roads were a mess. Recently split from his one-time girlfriend, there was now nothing holding Cameron Decker here in the little backwater mountain town of Larksburg Stand. Time to get back to college, back to Stanford. Seeing a guy knee-deep in slush at the side of the road, he pulled to the curb and waved him over. The guy smacked his head getting in - knocked his watch cap askew. Only then did Cameron notice - noticed that the individual couldn't possibly be human. Cameron decided to help his stranded passenger - a decision he'd soon come to regret. Along with his rust-bucket of a pickup truck, he was soon heading deep into space aboard an interstellar spacecraft. After the vessel crash-landed onto an alien world, he would now have to contend with a murderous droid and a slew of strange alien life forms.

Jodi Taylor reads the long-awaited prequel in her Chronicles of St Mary’s series, as Dr Bairstow struggles to set up St Mary’s as we know it in a world still scarred by the ravages of civil war. Ever wondered how it all began? It’s two years since the final victory at the Battersea Barricades. The fighting might be finished, but for Dr Bairstow, just now setting up St Mary's, the struggle is only beginning. How will he assemble his team? From where will his funding come?

Earth’s first colony ship finally reaches the target world. The excitement of planetfall is indescribable, but quickly transforms into sick disappointment when they find the atmosphere is a roiling mass of hydrochloric acid, carbon dioxide, and other deadly poisons. They fly onward, seeking better planets. They find them, but none are ideal. The search goes on for a century, then longer still. As they move farther from Earth, aliens discover the intruding ship, and they begin to investigate humanity. They find our species unacceptable.

Forced to hyperjump during a brutal ambush, Sara Lorelle, navigator of the Venture, the last human colony ship, discovers a terrible truth: They've jumped to somewhere that shouldn't exist. Trapped inside a pocket universe known only as Hollow Space, where technology inexplicably fails, Sara and her crew have to face the lethal politics of their only destination, Haven - a decrepit station, home to deadly aliens and rival factions that soon sees the Venture crew up to their necks in danger.

When the biggest colony ship in human history was sent to settle a paradise world, an accident hurtled it deep into uncharted space. A thousand light years from Earth, with no way home and no way to call for help, the colonists’ only hope for survival was the one barely habitable planet in range, a nightmare world they named Croatoan. Landing on the only five mountain peaks tall enough to rise above the lethal acid clouds, the settlers carved a civilization from the rock.

Alec works in the Detroit Overseer-factories, building a mysterious alien device. When three strangers appear, he's provided an opportunity to escape after years of servitude. Cole, a Freeborn loner, encounters Lina after her village is destroyed by the alien Occupation. Together, they make the arduous journey to a fabled safe-zone, trying to stay one step ahead of the enemy drones on their trail. Dex is a Hunter, working for the Occupation to track down escaped factory slaves, or Roamers, at all costs. But his latest hunt uncovers a massive secret.

Tina never worries about being 'ordinary' - she doesn't have to, since she's known practically forever that she's not just Tina Mains, average teenager and beloved daughter. She's also the keeper of an interplanetary rescue beacon, and one day soon, it's going to activate, and then her dreams of saving all the worlds and adventuring among the stars will finally be possible.