I’m looking for a book I last read in the late 1970s to early 1980s. The main character was a young male humanoid whose skeleton had been enhanced with titanium to increase its lightness and strength. I think this character ended up leading some sort of battle against a rival faction or planet.
40852
I remember that the main character is trying to find the group that destroyed his home planet while he was on a mission. His planet was very difficult to live on and the people became expert in martial arts and were the best soldiers in the galaxy. They were mercenaries and often helped against tyrants. There was a very memorable section in at least one book about an initiation task that the main character had to do in that he had to survive in their wilderness for days. He was at some point surrounded in a old building by thousands of poisonous worm/snake creatures that he managed to survive until rescued by the leaders.
86873
Looking for a book I read in the 90's (not sure if it was published in the 90's or not).  The story as far as I can remember goes like this. Human-looking aliens evolve on a very hostile planet. They encounter some big bad threat and they cast about for help. They encounter a rich industrialist on Earth and they send a woman to recruit him. She teaches the guy to use magic and how to transform his body. They build a ship and travel to her planet but just before they arrive, she vanishes and he crash lands on this hostile planet.  He goes through many trials and tribulations in order to get to her and eventually he has enough and uses the ability she teaches him on how to transform his body. He transforms himself into a half-man, half-dragon-like creature which allows him to travel to the other side of the planet to get to the girl. On the way he manages to neurally link into a large flying creature that flies very fast, only to discover that it is intelligent and they soon become friends. When he gets to the girl she doesn't recognise him so he gets mad and starts attacking only to realise that it's all been a test set up by these people to allow him to reach higher levels of magic.   There were supposed to be sequels but I never got around to reading them.  I remember the cover art depicted a large dragon like creature with a torso of a man and a woman standing in front of it looking back at him.  Any idea what this book may be?
92754
This was the first science fiction novel I completed reading on my own some 36 years ago. Unfortunately the details are very sketchy indeed, but here's what I think I remember:   It was a hard back library book The book was 100 pages long (perhaps exactly or just over) I read it some time pre-1980, possibly in 1979 but it may not have been new then It would've been classified as a "Children's Book" back then, but would be YA or Middle Grade now The POV character was a young boy of about 10-12 years of age It was set on the Moon The boy is rescued by some space gypsies He is befriended by a young space gypsy girl with dark hair When he is returned to his family, his parents are very prejudiced against the gypsies. A scene fragment of transferring from a lunar rover to the entrance tunnel to a lunar base A scene fragment of the boy looking at a computer screen and seeing someone who reminds him of the girl   Like so many here, this is a long term unscratchable itch that I'd love to soothe. Many thanks in advance for any clues or pointers.
100995
I'm trying to find a story for my father, from the 70s or earlier  Earth is at war with aliens (possibly Martians) and was unable to effectively fight back as the aliens had planetary (or at least city-protecting) force fields through which no bombardment was possible.  Earth eventually wins through invention of a device that allows them to teleport weapons (nukes?) under the force fields.  originally believed to be one of Harry Harrison's 'One step from earth' shorts, but this is not the case.  Thanks in advance for any help here!
116375
I remember reading this as a kid and it starts out with:   a boy in his home village where the other kids are mean to him during sports and they heat up their home with floating logs or something.   The kid is being hunted by some reaper character and that reaper finds him at a place called "The Edge" or something similar.   He buys a glove covered in an expensive dust that purifies things and is really rare.  In one book they had to climb down the edge for some reason.  There was another part where people only communicated telepathically and when sneaking into somewhere he only thought of light.  One of the main things is the floating ships and how he is really good at flying them and he assembles a team for a mission or something.  There is like float powder and stuff.  I read this close to 10 years ago.
63542
This was a 'young-adult' SF novel I read in the late 1970's, about the same time I was reading Voorloper by Andre Norton, Madeleine L'engle's Wrinkle In Time books and the Dragonfall 5 young adult novels. so I am not sure if it is actually one of the Dragonfall 5 stories, but I can't confirm it is or isn't by reading available synposes online.   As I recall, the story went something like this...    * SOME SPOILERS BELOW *  A young person and sibling - I think female protag and younger brother, but not sure - is scheduled to visit their aunt and uncle on another planet but to make the voyage in a timely fashion, must utilize this new consciousness transference technology to transmit their consciousness across the cosmos to a host replica body at the destination. After arriving at the destination the protagonist is impressed by their new body and is aware of the only way to tell they are in a replicant body is a small seam, scar or patch on their back, I think near the top of their spine, just below the collar of whatever clothing they wore.  The mystery begins when the protagonist realizes their hosts also sport the same scar when they should legitimately be in their real bodies.  The plot thickens when the protag or sibling finds a room of people in stasis when their replicant counterparts are roaming the same planet, and is subsequently caught in the act.  Sadly, I do not remember anything else, including the reasoning behind the deception.  I was quite young when I read this novel, so I probably got some of the details mixed up, but would love to know the name and author of the novel if anyone remembers.
115131
I'm looking for a book (or series of books) which I read as a kid (around 1995). I don't know a lot about the storyline anymore but I remember that there were two distinct alien races in the book with whom humans interacted. One of the races was lizard-like and had as a trait that they had sort of a bladder that filled up when they were upset. When it was full they would go to some sort of temple and release it. They then went completely berserk and fought each other. Sometimes, when they didn't make it to a temple in time, this could happen in the outside world. I think the other race focussed on bio-organic and space ship development and I think they were shaped like small pyramid, but I'm not entirely sure about the last part. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
89272
I'm looking for the name of a science-fiction novel/series, which I read sometime between 2001-2005. The only things I can definitely remember:   There are "pleasure bots" (there's a name for them in the book, but I forget), actually very life-like, that are stored in some sort of case when not in use. (Sort of like the ivory dittos from "Kiln People", but these are more-or-less autonomous, if a bit empty-headed.) No one is really sure where these androids came from, but at some point in the book (or later in the series) it is revealed that they were created by a woman scientist-type (who might have been the protagonist in an earlier book in the series) for the purpose of population control, and to reduce violence against women. I think the woman scientist is near-immortal, or can time-travel; unless I'm getting different works mixed up, this pleasure-bot scheme is one of several interventions she performs across centuries, if not millenia.
113202
I'd like to ask you to help me identify a sci-fi/fantasy book that I read probably sometime in the 90s though I don't know when it was written. Here are the plot points that I remember:   the story starts with a human on contemporary Earth being turned to stone (or probably something much more exotic) by some sort of experiment gone wrong, he is turned back to his original form millions of years later by a lightning or some similar phenomenon, the local population considers him a god or a prophet since his "stone form" was a center of a cult before he was awaken, the population is not human but consists of creatures evolved from various contemporary animals, one of the most important locations is a huge tree which is so ridiculously big that it contains multiple settlements.
84281
This was a trilogy about a future earth where double clones were made to fight wars and they nearly destroyed the earth. They were good fighters because they were mentally linked. All were supposedly destroyed but a few were found by this reporter type.  I believe the USA version were called Jeeks.  In the second book a space ship containing a bunch of them returned.  In the final book one clone of a command 3 person clone fought them (the other 2 in the triad were killed and somehow this one did not go insane).  I have looked for this book for 30 years.
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?
22220
I read this book at least ten years ago.  Any help identifying it would be appreciated.  Characters are teleported to an artificial world where each take over the mind of a different species.  I remember a moving sentient plant, a faun-like character, and a wasp-like character.  The planet is subdivided into different zones designed for each species.  One of the characters had long sharp fingernails with poison in them.  Thanks for any help, steve
42002
I'm trying to track down an old sci-fi book I read when I was a teenager.  The book was at the Cottage Grove, OR Public Library around 1982-1985.  The plot followed a brother and sister who were scientists or spies, or both.  The brother once used a series of pills to change his weight, height and appearance.  Towards the end of the book, the brother takes a space ship that his sister invented, removes a governor so that he can travel faster than the speed of light and goes back in time several hours.  This is really vague, but thanks for any leads you can share.
49297
I'll apologize for this being a vague description up front. I read a book about 8 years ago about a girl who could grow her nails into essentially razorblades or long enough that they could be used as razors. She travels to a city and either becomes an assassin or a thief (pretty sure it was a thief). I vaguely remember the book opening with her being chased by a mob. At some point during her thief training she realizes that the layout of the city is the key to some important plot device. I think she was given some scroll or cryptic image and then during her training she realizes that the layout of the city correlates to it.  Although I did read this 8 years ago I'm pretty sure the book was at least 5-10 years older than that, maybe even more because it was my mom who gave it to me and she said had read it when she was younger. The dust cover was missing when I read it so I have no description for the cover. I do remember that the author was male. It was a fantasy setting and there may have been vampires involved at some point but that part of my recollection of the book is even fuzzier than what I've already described. I've tried googling for this book but obviously my description is fairly vague. I will gladly answer any follow up questions that I can to try and help figure this out because it has been bothering me for years.
19591
Probably in the late 1960s or early 1970s I read a book the general plotline of which was: a teenage boy builds his own spacecraft that operates by pulling and/or pushing gravity. He takes the home-built craft to Mars where he is stranded when one of the vacuum tubes in the device burns out.  I read the book probably 40 years ago so publication most likely 60s or earlier. A key component of the gravity gadget was a vacuum tube, so that almost certainly pens it in the 50s. Doubt if it was from foreign source, the writing was quite American biased.   I think he traveled alone, but that follow up question made me think his girlfriend might have gone with him.  It has been too many years for that detail to be remembered.   Light sci fi, nothing dark in the storyline. Situational jeopardy, no bad guys. I hate to spoiler the ending just in case someone wants to read it, but I can add if it would help.  OK. It was suggested I include the ending, so (SPOILER ALERT!!!)      After being stranded and surviving quite well, a team from earth arrives to look for him.  A member of the expedition was either his mother (I think) or his father.  What happened was, back home they figured out what he had done, but were unable to duplicate the technology.  And the space agency REALLY wanted that drive.  So the "rescue" mission was really just to try to recover the technology, as they had never expected to find him still alive. Surprise surprise...
58914
I'm trying to find the title of a book I read sometime between 85 and 95 in German. It could have been written much earlier, and it was most likely translated from English. I think it had a "book to the movie" sticker on the cover, but all googling for the movie or book failed so far.  What I remember:   brain transplants are safe and affordable enough to rent a body for a holiday. This is achieved with a robotic surgeon removing the brain and spinal cord from the old body and reattaching all nerves in the new body. an overweight guy leaves his dominating mother to take a holiday on a space cruise, renting a new body for the trip. I think through a bribe he manages to rent the body belonging to an assassin that was held in storage while the assassin was on an assignment. At some point a small alien is revealed to be living in one of the legs. the assassin returns from the assignment and gets the body of the overweight guy to follow him onto the cruise to get his body back. He later discovers that the body contained an implant producing a permanent feeling of guilt. overall villain is a human-alien hybrid that has a robotic container attached to his spine that contains four additional brains. He owns the cruise ship and I think he tries to crash / blow it up somewhere. Though details are getting fuzzy, there.
88862
I seek some help identifying a short book I read in my childbook. It was a science fiction book about a society where due to scarcity of resources, you were allowed a certain life span depending on your achievements and contributions to society. If you exceed the amount before doing something that causes you to get promoted to a higher life span, you will be taken in the night by some sort of police and vanish.   For extraordinary achievements the highest status you could achieve was immortality (I seem to dimly remember the usage of the word amaranth for those people).   The protagonist of the novel was someone who had once been granted immortaility but then had it stripped away from him again due to some misdeed or mistake. Now he tries to get that status again (maybe under a fake identity?), but one of the immortal people is suspicious of him so he murders her. She gets revived later, because that's part of the immortality package.    It ends with him being apprehended, but society decides to invest heavily into space again so that hopefully in the future there is space for everyone to be immortal. The book ends with the protagonists being sent of an explorer into space alone.