Showing results by author "Jay Allan" in All Categories

Smuggler and mercenary Arkarin Blackhawk and the crew of the ship Wolf's Claw are freelance adventurers who live on the fringe of human society in the Far Stars. A veteran fighter as deadly with a blade as he is with a gun, Blackhawk is a man haunted by a dark past. Even his cynicism cannot banish the guilt and pain that threaten his sanity.

War. The word spreads throughout the Confederation...the long-expected Union invasion has come. The enemy is strong, their fleets larger and more powerful than intelligence reports had predicted. They have broken through the forward defenses, sent the Confederation's proud fleets into an ignominious retreat.

The Hegemony has launched the invasion Tyler Barron and his Confederation comrades have feared, and all the Rim is ablaze with the fires of war and destruction. The Hegemony has brought its vast fleets, its advanced technology, and its endless legions of grim cyborg warriors to impose its system of rigid genetic hierarchy over all humanity on the Rim. The Confederation fleet is outnumbered and outmatched, but they will fight nevertheless, struggling and dying to hold back the onslaught any way they can.

The war is over, but the struggle continues. Tyler Barron and his spacers have set out into the unknown, deep into the Badlands, seeking to discover the empire’s old tech and the secrets of its tortured history before Gaston Villieneuve and the resurgent Union can beat them to it. The White Fleet is a vast force, powerful, and crewed by the toughest veterans from the war. Barron and his people know the future of the Confederation, even its survival, depends on recovering the scientific secrets of the empire before the enemy can do the same.

Successfully completing their mission to rescue Marshal Augustin Lucerne's daughter, Astra, the crew of the Wolf's Claw are enjoying some well-deserved rest - all, that is, except Blackhawk. The space gun for hire cannot escape Lucerne's relentless pleas for help against growing imperial control in the Far Stars. While Blackhawk deeply respects his friend, he fears that the power Lucerne offers will lead him back to his old dark ways.

The Confederation and its allies have won their first victory, retaking their capital from the forces of the Hegemony. But the enemy is not beaten, far from it, and they are back, with an unstoppable weapon, a vast superbattleship, a deadly hybrid of imperial and Hegemony technology, called the Colossus. The great ship is enormously powerful, nearly unstoppable, and in its armored depths it hides a secret, another Hegemony weapon, one that will change the dynamic of the entire war.

On the worlds of the Iron Belt, the heavily industrialized sector near the Confederation's Core, massive shipyards operate around the clock, producing the great vessels that can end the war. The Union knows it cannot win the economic struggle with its wealthier, more productive enemy, and Sector Nine, its feared spy agency, is not idle. Their focus is not on the front lines, the ravaged border between the two nations, but far off, beyond the Rim, in the strange, militaristic realm known as the Alliance.

Night is falling. The unstoppable Hegemony invasion has reached the very heart of the Confederation. Battle after desperate battle has been fought, and each time, the Confeds have been pushed back, columns of battered and blasted ship retreating from system to system. Now, they prepare to grimly defend the capital world of Megara, the very center of the Confederation. Tyler Barron prepares for what could be his final battle, a final desperate defense, one last chance to stem the tide of Hegemony conquest and subjugation.

The warrior culture of the Alliance has fragmented, and comrade fights comrade, brother kills brother. The Red Alliance forces, backed by the Union and its propaganda machine, have the advantage in numbers and position, and they are pushing forward, driving relentlessly toward the final attack. The Gray Alliance forces are weaker, trapped in the great Sentinel-2 fortress where they've established their headquarters. Their enemies have the larger fleets and armies and control of the homeworld...but the Grays have Tyler Barron and Dauntless.

Hugh McDaniel lives in Queens, New York. He's a genius, and he has been struggling to pick one area to focus his life’s work on. His brother and best friend, Travis, is a marine officer. They get along very well, despite their differences. When aliens suddenly invade and destroy their entire culture, they are forced to struggle together in the ruins. At first they just tried to survive; to collect food, medicine, weapons, and to find other survivors. But now, they've set their sights higher: on resistance and reclaiming their planet from invaders.

An industrial hell. The foulest and most decrepit slum on Parsephon. A nest of human misery, where hope is word long forgotten, and the dead are carted away every day. It is the worst pit in the Confederation’s great industrial machine known as the Iron Belt. Among the millions born into misery, poverty, and despair under the dark and smoky haze that covers the planet, Andromeda Lafarge is unique. One lost soul among billions, she is tough, relentless, determined to get out, to escape, to blaze her own trail, and to make a name for herself across the stars.

Earth Two. A new home for the survivors of the fleet, the men and women who battled against seemingly insurmountable odds to survive the assault of the First Imperium and to destroy the homicidal Regent, the artificial intelligence committed to their destruction. They have prospered in the years since their arrival, adapting the technology of the First Imperium to build a new and prosperous republic. But as the fear of the First Imperium recedes, cracks have begun to appear, conflicts looming that threaten to destroy all they have worked to achieve.

The combined forces of humanity have beaten back the First Imperium invasion. For the first time, the enemy has been defeated in battle. The cost was high in blood and suffering, but the Line held. The heart of human-occupied space has been saved from annihilation. For now. There is little time for the victorious warriors to savor their triumph or mourn their dead. The First Imperium has been driven back, but it has not been defeated. No one expects the fruits of victory to be more than a brief respite.

The planet Haven slides closer to revolution against its parent nation, Federal America. Everett Wells, the fair-minded planetary governor, tried to create a peaceful resolution, but his failure has caused the government to send Asha Stanton, a ruthless federal operative, to quell the insurgency. Wells quickly realizes that Stanton has the true power...and two battalions of government security troops under her control.

The Far Stars stands on the edge of a precipice. The forces of Governor Vos have surged forth, conquering worlds and imposing the emperor's brutal rule over millions. Only one thing stands in the way of total victory: Marshal Augustin Lucerne and his newly created Confederation. Vos has a simple plan: assassinate the marshal and manipulate his generals to fight over his legacy, destroying each other in the process.

A grim, haunted expanse of space, vast light years filled with dead, empty worlds. A dark place, the graveyard of an empire…and a frontier where vast riches can be had by those with the courage - and the luck - to survive. Andi Lafarge and the crew of Pegasus are among the elite of the strange brotherhood that ventures forth, seeking the remnants of humanity’s lost past. She and her people will face the deadliest challenges, fight constant battles, and plunge forth into the darkest corners of the lost region of space.

The war with the First Imperium is over, and Grand Fleet is limping home from the frontier. Erik Cain, Augustus Garret, and the rest of the high command are grimly satisfied that humanity has been saved from the First Imperium menace. There is no joy, however…no elation at the “victory.” The losses this time were too heavy…too personal…to bear. They did what had to be done to drive back the enemy and save the human worlds from certain destruction. Now they were left to find a way to live with the gut wrenching decisions that victory had required.

The Third Frontier War is raging, and all across human-occupied space worlds are burning. Massive fleets struggle for dominance and kilometer-long war ships exchange thermonuclear barrages. Battered in the early years of the war, the Western Alliance is resurgent. The brilliant Admiral Augustus Garret leads the Alliance fleet from victory to victory, taking the war to the very heart of the enemy empires.

Directed by the maniacal Regent, the enemy pressed forward with one goal - the destruction of mankind. The Superpowers of Earth, enemies for over a century, have banded together to face the threat from outside, and their combined forces have fought delaying actions to buy time. But now the Rim has fallen, and the heart of human space lies before the invaders. On three worlds, mankind will make its stand, and all the power Earth and its colonies can muster has been gathered there.

Are you a high potential? Your managers and HR department are constantly wondering that about you - and assessing whether or not you have what it takes to advance. Here's how to get them to answer yes. Being seen as a high potential leader is essential to getting promoted and reaching an organization's upper echelons, but most companies keep their top talent list a closely guarded secret. And the assessment process they use to decide who is and isn't a future leader is an even greater mystery.