Experience Star Wars: A New Hope from a whole new point of view. On May 25, 1977, the world was introduced to Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, C-3PO, R2-D2, Chewbacca, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Darth Vader, and a galaxy full of possibilities. In honor of the 40h anniversary, more than 40 contributors lend their vision to this retelling of Star Wars. Each of the 40 short stories reimagines a moment from the original film, but through the eyes of a supporting character.

Firstborns rule society. Secondborns are the property of the government. Thirdborns are not tolerated. Long live the Fates Republic. On Transition Day, the second child in every family is taken by the government and forced into servitude. Roselle St. Sismode's eighteenth birthday arrives with harsh realizations: she's to become a soldier for the Fate of Swords military arm of the Republic during the bloodiest rebellion in history, and her elite firstborn mother is happy to see her go.

She's a prisoner with a secret gift. He's a soldier with a monster locked inside. Now they will decide if humanity is worth the fight.

Though the ragtag group of misfits known as the Black Star Renegades won a decisive battle by destroying Ga Halle’s War Hammer, the war is far from over. In response to losing the crown jewel of its fleet, the Praxis empire has vengefully reinforced its tyranny across the galaxy - but its rule won't be had so easily. Led by hotshot pilot Kira Sen, a growing rebel force stands in the way of Praxis’ might. Not only do they possess the will to fight for galactic freedom, they also possess the ultimate ace in the hole: the mythical Rokura, the most powerful weapon ever known.

When Jyn Erso was five years old, her mother was murdered and her father taken from her to serve the Empire. But despite the loss of her parents, she is not completely alone - Saw Gerrera, a man willing to go to any extremes necessary in order to resist Imperial tyranny, takes her in as his own and gives her not only a home but all the abilities and resources she needs to become a rebel herself.

Penn Mitchell vanishes from the NYU campus and shows up three months later on his mother's doorstep with a book screaming to get out of his head. When the FBI discovers the novel discloses top-secret information, they bring Penn in for questioning. The interrogation goes sideways and Penn escapes into a subterranean world he thought was a figment of his imagination, a world where the US government is hiding, and at war with, an ancient race that has existed since the dawn of time.

She will become one of the world's greatest heroes: Wonder Woman. But first she is Diana, princess of the Amazons. And her fight is just beginning. Diana longs to prove herself to her legendary warrior sisters. But when the opportunity finally comes, she throws away her chance at glory and breaks Amazon law - risking exile - to save a mere mortal. Even worse, Alia Keralis is no ordinary girl and with this single brave act, Diana may have doomed the world.

A chain of subglacial volcanoes erupt in Iceland. The melting ice floods the countryside. Poisonous gas descends on Scotland. A tsunami devastates the Norwegian coastline. An ash cloud rises into the atmosphere, blotting out the sun across Europe, ushering in a new Ice Age. Dozens of nuclear power plants, flooded by ocean water, experience meltdowns. Millions perish. Many more are displaced. All on the first day.

They say when the demons come, you either fight or you die.The Black Dogs know this all too well. For three hundred years, the warrior priests have sacrificed their lives to keep the island nation of Abios safe from the flesh-eating Nostros, while the rest of the world fell under the demons' savagery. However, an armada now stands poised to invade mankind's last bastion.

Kylie Rhoads is a junker. She makes her living traveling the stars, salvaging abandoned ships left over from pirate attacks on the edge of the Gedri system. Some of the hulls are legal for the taking, most aren't. When a salvage job goes bad, Kylie finds herself on the wrong end of a gun. The hand holding that gun? The SA Space Force, just the people Kylie wants to avoid. To avoid prison, Kylie makes a deal to go deep into the Gedri System and rescue a simple girl. But out on the fringe, nothing is as it seems.

Frey and Rafi are inseparable.... two edges of the same knife. But Frey's very existence is a secret. Frey is Rafi’s twin sister - and her body double. Their powerful father has many enemies, and the world has grown dangerous as the old order falls apart. So while Rafi was raised to be the perfect daughter, Frey has been taught to kill. Her only purpose is to protect her sister, to sacrifice herself for Rafi if she must.

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.

The New Arilion Knights contains books 1-3 of the series. Emma’s problems go far beyond carb-counting mean girls. With nonhuman-like pointed ears and a stuttering problem brought on by anxiety, she’s one of the few who know Earth’s about to be blindsided with annihilation. What if the only way to save her home is to secretly join the academy of intergalactic warriors? And the only way to save her dad is to betray him? It’s up to this wallflower to stop bullying from going extraterrestrial.

Two centuries after mankind drove itself to the brink of extinction, a new civilization rises from the ashes of what was once Great Britain. But when deadly strife breaks out among their ranks, the teenage son of one prominent family finds himself fleeing in the dead of night, only to wind up shipwrecked on the forbidden continent of America. Armed with only his wit and the most unexpected of allies, the teenager struggles to survive in a wasteland filled with unspeakable horrors.

Liora Day, half-human, half-mess with her and you'll die Damaclan, had been thrown onto a rough path at a very early age. But when she is broken out of a cage by Devren, the young captain of the SS Kratos, she is shown that perhaps humanity does have a heart. The Kratos is set on a mission to rescue fallen surveyors from the Revolutionaries, and Liora is given the choice to follow her Damaclan instincts, or trust Devren's dark eyes and captivating smile that promise an adventure unlike any she has ever experienced.

Devi Morris isn't your average mercenary. She has plans. Big ones. And a ton of ambition. It's a combination that's going to get her killed one day - but not just yet. That is, until she gets a job on a tiny trade ship with a nasty reputation for surprises. The Glorious Fool isn't misnamed; it likes to get into trouble, so much so that one year of security work under its captain is equal to five years everywhere else. With odds like that, Devi knows she's found the perfect way to get the jump on the next part of her plan.

When Lyric Walker was 14 years old, her life was turned upside down when she witnessed a world-changing event - the arrival of the Triton, a five-nation race of warrior merpeople who walked out of the sea and camped on the beaches of modern-day Coney Island. Suddenly her neighborhood was home to a new minority group numbering in the tens of thousands. But the Triton's arrival also revealed a shocking family secret: Her own mother was a mermaid.

It's 1948, and World War II has just ended. Berlin is in pieces, torn apart by bullets, bombs, and bloodshed. But a particular scientist has survived - one with vital knowledge of an ancient weapon. When Endgame spies learn of the news, Boone, a Cahokian, and Ariadne, a Minoan, are each sent undercover to find the scientist amid the snowy rubble. But when their paths intertwine, the last thing they expect is to let their guards down and work together.

David was caught in the middle of the city when the zombie outbreak started. His wife and daughters were at home, stranded on the roof as zombies waited below. He would have to fight through hordes of undead, merciless other survivors, and a series of death defying stunts to get home. However, even if he makes it there, how can he be sure they're safe? Deadlocked puts you into David's head as he struggles to get home. Then a final confrontation occurs that could guarantee his family's survival, but at what cost?

When out-of-shape IT technician Roen wakes up and starts hearing voices in his head, he naturally assumes he’s losing it. He isn’t. As of last night, he has a passenger in his brain - an ancient alien life-form called Tao, whose race crash-landed on Earth before the first fish crawled out of the oceans. Over the millennia his people have trained human heroes to be great leaders, to advance our species at a rate far beyond what it would have achieved on its own. Split into two opposing factions - the peace-loving, but under-represented Prophus, and the savage, powerful Genjix - the aliens have been in a state of civil war for centuries.

Welcome to New Vegas, a city once covered in bling, now blanketed in ice. Like much of the destroyed planet, the place knows only one temperature: freezing. But some things never change. The diamond in the ice desert is still a 24-hour hedonistic playground, and nothing keeps the crowds away from the casino floors, never mind the rumors about sinister sorcery in its shadows. At the heart of this city is Natasha Kestal, a young blackjack dealer looking for a way out. Like many, she's heard of a mythical land simply called "the Blue".

Sometimes to save a recruit, he’s got to break them. A pragmatic, battle-tested Knight recalls the savage fallout of the Chaos War. Sergeant Claymore leads his recruits through a brutal boot camp training and to an unexpected, bloody battle. They will admire him. They will fear him. And when it’s all over, they will remember him for the rest of their lives.

Can humanity Survive what it never saw coming? On October 15 at 2:15 a.ms Earth vanished. A scattered few woke alone in a world with no rules, other than survival at any cost. A journalist wanders the wretched reality of an empty New York, searching for his wife and son. A serial killer must hunt in a land where prey is now an endangered species. A mother shields her young daughter from danger through every terror-filled breath.

Archaeologists Pippa Quinn and Charlie Jackson find advanced technology in undisturbed 16th-century graves. A portent, the discovery precedes thousands of giant sinkholes opening up across the globe as extreme weather threatens the population. Charlie suspects the two are related.

The Vagrant is his name. He has no other. Years have passed since humanity's destruction emerged from the Breach. Friendless and alone he walks across a desolate, war-torn landscape. A s each day passes the world tumbles further into depravity, bent and twisted by the new order, corrupted by the Usurper, the enemy, and his infernal horde. His purpose is to reach the Shining City, last bastion of the human race, and deliver the only weapon that may make a difference in the ongoing war.

Seventeen-year-old Ryn Whittaker is a Citadel: an elite, enhanced soldier specially chosen to guard a Rift, a mysterious and dangerous portal to alternate Earths scientists cannot control or close. Trained from the age of 14, Ryn can run faster, jump farther, and fight better than a Navy SEAL - which is good when you’re not sure if a laser-wielding Neanderthal or an axe-wielding Viking is trying to make it through the Rift and into your world. But the teenager’s military conditioning and education have not prepared her for the boy who crosses through.

The war between Almacia and the Empire of Kolakolvia is in its hundredth year. Casualties grow on both sides as the conflict leaves no corner of the world untouched. Illarion Glaskov’s quiet life on the fringes of the empire is thrown into chaos when an impossible tragedy strikes his village. When he is conscripted into the Tsarist military, he is sent to serve in The Wall - an elite regiment that pilots suits of armor made from the husks of dead golems.

Rhoma Grace is a 16-year-old student from House Cancer with an unusual way of reading the stars. While her classmates use measurements to make accurate astrological predictions, she looks up at the night sky and makes up stories.

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.

In the blink of an eye, everyone disappears. Gone. Except for the young. There are teens, but not one single adult. Just as suddenly, there are no phones, no Internet, no television. No way to get help. And no way to figure out what's happened. Hunger threatens. Bullies rule. A sinister creature lurks. Animals are mutating. And the teens themselves are changing, developing new talents - unimaginable, dangerous, deadly powers - that grow stronger by the day. It's a terrifying new world.