I hope you can help me find this book. It's actually a series and the basic premise is that a mysterious impenetrable force field suddenly springs up over the Earth. It causes time to dilate slower inside the shield so that thousands of years pass outside of the shield but inside things remain the same.   There was a Mars colony so they continue going through time with all the progress inherent with its passage. It seems there was some type of environmental problem on Earth that they needed assistance with and one day the shield suddenly drops.  That's all I can recall about it at this time. Anyone familiar with this series (I think it was a trilogy) or the author?
123324
I'm trying to recall the name of a book I read, probably published after 1990, where alien AI infects satellites and a barrier is established, isolating earth from space that maybe slows down time inside of it, relative to the passage of time outside.  Mars or the moon is also colonized in an attempt to flee the now real possibility that the sun will become a red giant and wipe out humanity in the not-too-distant future (as perceived on earth), but the colony gets one of the time barriers as well.  I think the name of the novel was short, "The _______" (one word).  The story focused more on the human cost and followed one particular family, one member of which was somehow also partially infected by the alien AI, but I don't remember as much about them.
31954
There's a book that I read several years ago that I'd like to find.  However, I cannot remember enough about it to find it myself.  Neither the title nor author remain in my mind, nor any keyword or phrase that's unique enough for the Grand Google to nail for me.  Hence my desperate plea here.  In the book, there is an interstellar civilization composed of several power blocks.  The entire civilization did not fill the galaxy, but it did span several stellar systems.  Maybe 10s or 100s.  I seem to remember that one of the civilizations was a decentralized group referred to as the Brotherhood and they seemed to have been keen on preserving old learning and political ideals.  A derelict alien spacecraft from outside all of this had been discovered and at least two of the power blocks sent ships to recover it.  I don't recall if they knew at the time about the power the alien ship had, but they must have had some clue since there was some urgency in capturing this ship.  One of the ships sent to capture the Alien craft was commanded by somebody who was rather shaken up, to say the least.  He had had some big trauma in his past (like... the last ship he captained was annihilated with all hands.) so he was kinda bummed out about things and wasn't really putting his heart into getting this done.  He was assisted by the ship's AI who had a lot of soul-to-soul chats with the captain, and at one point almost relieved him of command because he was just not getting the job done.  I think the ship's name was Boaz.  These were the "good guys".  There was at least one other ship sent from the "bad guys."  The alien craft had some remarkable powers.  The interior volume was apparently infinite and the operators could see and manipulate anything in the universe.  There might have been some example given where all the rats somewhere were found and disposed of.  Whoever had control was tempted by the ole absolute power corrupts absolutely problem, but nobody but nobody could stop them because of their power.  They could eat and multiply within the ship and become real bad-asses.  But alas... (or hurray, depending upon which side you're one) everything fails eventually, and whoever controlled the ship would eventually succumb to some horrible end.  Whereupon the ship became derelict again until some other lucky race found it and repeated the cycle.  The ship had an AI that was real interested in taking the power for itself, but there was some mechanical, spring-loaded, mechanism outside of its control that needed to be worked in order to execute power.  The AI apparently never figured out how to "work the spring" and this made him crazy angry.  The ending is equally foggy for me.  I'm pretty sure the good guys got the ship.  They agonized over what to do with it.  Apparently it was indestructable and nobody wanted to taste the temptation of all that power.  In the end they dumped it on the surface of a neutron star.  There it sat forever more, probably with the crazy AI really pissed off about being there.  If you've read this book, you'll recognize it immediately from these clues.  I'm looking forward to finding out the name of this book.  Thanks!
23418
I am looking for some help remembering this book series I listened to on audiobook many years ago. It was a good story I just for the life of me can't remember the name, author or any of the character names lol I think this is a long shot as I don't remember many details but I really would like to read it again.  Some of the details I do remember: the story is set in a medieval time, not on this planet.  It's told from the viewpoint of a man, I believe he was a soldier. The main character meets him in a war torn world and allows him to travel with her.  The main character is a woman. She is a wanderer and carries a sword that only she can hold. If I remember correctly the magic is too powerful for anyone else to bear and it physically hurts them.  This sword allows her to pass through portals into other worlds. The portals are stationary and they need to travel to them.  There was also something special about her horse.... Ugh.  Each book is set on a different world.I only remember two of the worlds.  One is doomed world. It's land is sinking and towards the end there is a rush to get to the next portal. The book is set in a bog filled environment.  The other world I remember is more lush. Open plains and dense forest. The man is separated from the woman for some time. He stays with tribes-people, elves maybe? When it's time for them to go to the next world the man is torn between staying with his new friends and leaving.  So that's really all I remember. At the time I remember noting after I had read a few of the books that the author never really finished the series.  Any help would be appreciated :) throw me some guesses so I can do some research!
69653
I am looking for the title of a novel that I only caught part of on audio. It takes place within our current time frame and deals with the Moon getting struck and fragmented into (initially) 7 pieces by a high-speed asteroid that they called "The Agent".  Within a few weeks of this episode, scientists figure out the the Moon will continue to break down in a cascade reaction over the next couple of years until the planet gets bombarded by so much debris that it sterilizes Earth. The governments of the world frantically start to build a series of ships using swarming concepts to evacuate the planet as much as possible... and that's all I have heard so far.  Thanks for any info.
21468
I'm trying to identify a book (or possibly a series, as I seem to recall reading a sequel which still left the story unfinished).  I read the book or books in the early 90's and had picked them up from a jumble sale at school, so they were probably published in the 80's or possibly 70's. I guess you would class them as YA fiction, though that wasn't really such a thing back then...  As I recall the story began with a slave transport craft crash landing on an alien world, with only a handful of teenage and pre-teen humans surviving. They scraped together what they could, including a couple of functional 'sunguns' (basically, laser rifles) and began a low level guerilla rebellion against the alien race that were using humanity as slave labour on the planet.  I've googled 'sungun' repeatedly, thinking that this should be the best way of finding the story but the references that come up are all for other stories or conspiracy technologies.  Anyone got any vague recollections of a book or series like this?
63701
Shortly before his death, my father spoke to me about a series of novels that he had just finished reading which had a fascinating concept.  However I soon forgot the title(s) and author and I've been absolutely desperate to find out what they were.  The premise (as I understood) was that humanity had expanded out from the solar system into the local star systems before coming into contact with an incredibly aggressive species which was focused on wiping out the entire species.  Earth and her colonies were lost as remnants of the species fled.  Eventually it was decided by the military leadership to set up a colony in order to rebuild the human race.  However, in order for this colony to escape detection and to keep humanity from going back out into space and thus potentially running into this hostile alien race again, a series of satellites were set up around the planet chosen that would lock onto and destroy any form of technology (and usually the surrounding city) that went beyond pre-industrial standards.    One of the series protagonist is a long living android who possesses the consciousness of a human who was present at the original founding of the colony (and who seems shielded from detection) which observes as civilization is repeatedly regrown and torn down again and who attempts to try and reverse humanities self imposed lot in life.      From what I understood this was a series of novels, but I could be wrong. I've been trying to find this for years on my own with only a rough plot line as a guide and it's gotten me nowhere.
69670
I have been trying to find a book I read quite a few years ago. Well, there are 2, one being the sequel.  Now I'm sure my memory has been kind enough to mix parts of the 2 books, but I will do my best with the description.  The cover of the book had a hand print. As far as the story, a boy finds out he has some powers from some guy. I think he had a ring that allowed him to use his power. Later when training the boy, he has him learn to control his power by deflecting rocks or meteors or some rocky item. The boy ends up using too much force and shatters them, but eventually gets the hang of it. Another part close to the end, the boy has a vision, I think, of some other kid getting struck by lightning, so he figures out a way to save the kid, but gets struck by the lightning himself.  In the second book, I remember a part early on where a sign falls from a building toward some child, but the boy uses his power to save the kid; afterwards, no trace of the boy is found. A lady who witnessed it said something like it was her dead son (I'm guessing his mom from the previous book).   I'm having trouble remembering anything but that. I read them in '97 or '98, I believe. As far as the publication dates, I never checked.
94674
I'm looking for the name of a series of space opera novels I read some time ago, probably between 2003 and 2010.    It may have been published quite a few years before I read it, I don't think it was new at the time. I borrowed the novels from the local library, but I can't find them in its catalogue. I think the covers were fairly dark and plain, though there may have been some artwork on them. There was a totalitarian empire that controlled most planets, possibly ruled by a queen. There was no mention of Earth, the solar system or other real planets, the setting was completely fictional. There were people with psychic/psionic powers, referred to as something like "psi". These people were second-class citizens or slaves. Spaceships were used to travel between worlds. I'm not sure what kind of FTL technology they had, if any. Beyond the edge of the empire was some kind of "dark space", where there was no light. There were some horror themes: When travelling in dark space in one of the novels, a ships crew experienced strange thoughts and hallucinations. I remember finding this quite scary at the time.   Does anyone know which series this could be?  This isn't a duplicate of , since the two questions are about different parts of the same series (the first and second episodes).
38458
I read part of the series in 2005, a young man was the protagonist, he was traveling to different worlds. I think he was telepathic and the most identifying thing I can remember was he had a flying snake or asp as a pet which possibly was his protector? He was in danger for some reason. Also there was a romantic interest female. The books were very distinct from one another. The second or third book he visited a planet that was extremely bio-diverse, where he was on top of all this vegetation and he realized how many layers of vegetation he would have to get to before he got to the ground and it was vast. I never finished it and it's been driving me nuts.
99148
I'm trying to find a novel I read a long time ago and it's driving me nuts - all Google searches result in failure..it's been 10-15 years since I've read it I think, here's some details I remember:  The biggest plot twist is that the main character is being told that he's on an exact replica of earth, that was 'snapshotted' around ~1940 (I think?) Certain historic events after WWII happened differently in that world There's a sub plot about gravitational waves / using it to construct some sort of phone (I think?) At some point in the book, nanobots or something heal this guys' body / rejuvenate it completely, after he meets some folks that transport him out of the replica earth (I think)  I realize this is a very loose recollection of my memory, so some stuff might be off, apologies in advance! Any leads would be spectacular. Thanks!
115760
I was 12 years old in 1988 and, that year, I spent most of my savings on a large format hardcover book where the authors attempted to tell the story of mankind's expansion in the universe.  They did that by taking characters, settings, technologies and plot devices from famous novels or pulps and juxtapose it with more or less random cover art. The result was extremelly well put together and -- at least to my young mind -- very convincing.  Needless to say, this book has been a kind of gateway drug for me.  Unfortunately, I lost this book about 15 years ago. I have no idea who were the author(s) or the editor(s).  Here is what I remember:   the book was written in French but I kind of remember that it was translated from the American the book measured about 30 cm x 40 cm it had one of those removable jacket that I lost quickly so I have no idea what it looked like the actual covers were blue-gray and off-white and represented a two tone space scene with no title all the art was in full colour most of the art came from sci-fi books but there was also Conan-type fantasy when they needed to illustrate a planet returned to barbary or whatever   That's it.  Do you know this book?
53959
What I remember of this novel/series is that the main character creates solar laser satellites and mines asteroids to create more satellites to defend Earth from aliens. Later on, he uses the hollowed out asteroids as a base and eventually as an armored fortress to repulse the alien fleets. I last remember the main character attempting to hollow out more asteroids to defend and attack the aliens eventually.
55105
I'm trying to find a series of stories (a trilogy, I think) with a slew of distinctive features. I can't remember when the books were written (I read them about a year and a half ago), but I can remember several points about the story:  1: It begins in a peaceful city controlled by a matriarchy.  2: Young men and women are tutored in the ways of the world by 'Aunts' and 'Uncles' (who have no actual familial connection).  3: The whole world is actually a colony whose inhabitants are being prevented from developing scientifically by a highly complex mind controlling satellite.  4: The satellite starts to break down, allowing some (including one particularly successful warlord) to fight it's control and develop destructive technologies.  5: The satellite loads itself up with some people (the protagonists) and heads back to Earth for repair.  6: Earth has changed and is now home to two sentient species, one avian ('angels', I seem to recall) and the other subterranean (and fond of sculpture).   7: These two species are in conflict, but are also intricately linked with each other's breeding behaviour.  8: The humans, returned from the colony by the mind controlling satellite, create peace between the two civilisations.  There are so many disparate elements here that I'm beginning to wonder if I just made the whole thing up in a fever dream. Anybody got any ideas?
49338
I'm looking for a science fiction novel that I would've read from a library in the early 2010s. I'm fuzzy on the plot, but it was in a setting with space travel, and I believe the view shifted around to follow the separate characters.  I do recall two distinguishing characteristics in particular:  Some people use a brain upload/backup to restore themselves to a new body after an accidental death, maybe retrieving the recorder if possible to include memories immediately before death. However, this may not be an accessible service for everyone due to cost/coverage, and I think a large corporation handled it. People might've kept identical clones on hand or opted for a brand new body, but I think it meant very little fear of death. At least one character, maybe an investigator/reporter/mercenary, died in an explosion (?) and was restored midway through the book.  Some others chose the (less common) option of linking several bodies together to form a group consciousness, where a single unified mind inhabited all of the bodies at once. They could purchase more bodies to connect, and gained similar immortality since any body dying would not affect the whole.  I remember that at one point, a character entered a store and was irritated when the employees carried on a conversation as she moved to the right aisle, only to realize they were a group mind and thought she'd noticed. She entered into a relationship with them later and, at the end of the book, ended up buying more bodies to become a group herself.  I've googled around for this book for a while and looked through Wikipedia's  and , but I didn't recognize the plot anywhere. Hope a detail stands out to someone out there, I'll try to answer any more questions!
14276
I read a series of books around 2005. I think it might have been a trilogy.  Basic story line is in a post apocalyptic world. The main character is a pilot for the Federation or something similar to that. He crash lands, is nursed back to health by the natives, comes to like and respect them, and does not want to fight against them.  Also in the later book I think it also involves another race who are very Japanese-ish. They drink sake and the "clan" names are things like Fu-Jitsu and Mitsu-Bishi.
50445
I am searching for the title of a book I read a long time ago, from the style I would say that it was "golden age" sci-fi. The Earth is attacked by a race of aliens who have set up camp on the moon and are bombarding Earth with poison gas shells. Ordinarily this would not be a problem as Earth is protected by a superweapon called AKKA, that can easily see off any threat. However due to fear of it falling into the wrong hands it is stored dismantled, and the aliens have cleverly kidnapped the scientist(s) who can can reassemble it. Our heroes, who are out on space patrol beyond Pluto survive the initial attack and travel to the aliens homeworld and rescue at least one scientist and return him to Earth. There, using just bits of random junk, he constructs an AKKA device and points it at the moon, which simply vanishes along with all the aliens on it. The meaning of AKKA is never revealed in the book, as far as I can remember.   I also remember that before setting off, the heroes take a bit of time out to tune up their 6-cylinder space engine for maximum performance, that was some good thinking.
20198
A few years ago I read an excellent sf book about nanobots that went out of control. In the book they were used for weather control, when they went amok the scientists threw in yet another bunch of nanites and so on, until Earth became uninhabitable, teeming with nanites, I remember the weather also became cold. The planet still could be visited but when they lost cloaking the nanites would attack.   Also, some humans in the book merged with nanites, they could behave benevolently but I forgot the plot too. I only remember fragments of this book, I would like to read it again in English. (loaned a long time ago from a library here in Sweden but they closed the library).   I only know that it was written by an Anglo-American contemporary SF writer, probably 30-55 y.o.