Search Worlds Without End

6 years of stories from the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author.

Here are fifteen stories-never before collected-that tread upon familiar Haldeman territory, as well as explore the outer reaches of his phenomenal imagination.

Table of Contents:

• Meet Joe Haldeman - essay by Connie Willis
• Introduction: The Secret of Writing - essay
• A Separate War - (1999) - novelette
• Diminished Chord - (2005) - shortstory
• Giza - (2003) - shortstory
• Foreclosure - (2005) - shortstory
• Four Short Novels - (2001) - shortstory
• For White Hill - (1995) - novella
• Finding My Shadow - (2003) - shortstory
• Civil Disobedience - (2005) - shortstory
• Memento Mori - (2004) - shortstory
• Faces - (2004) - shortstory
• Heartwired - (2005) - shortstory
• Brochure - (2000) - shortstory
• Out of Phase - (1969) - shortstory
• Power Complex - (1972) - novelette
• Notes on the Stories - essay
• Fantasy for Six Electrodes and One Adrenaline Drip - shortstory

Otto McGavin is peaceful and idealistic by nature, an Anglo-Buddhist, who seeks employment with the Confederacion because he believes in it and its mission to protect the rights of humans and nonhumans. The only problem is that the Confederacion needs him as a Prime Operator for its secret service, the TBII, and the TBII wants Otto as a spy, a thief and an assassin.

It's not, of course, a problem for the Confederacion, which simply uses immersion therapy and hypnosis for Otto's training, and then sends him out in deep cover on a variety of dangerous missions on a number of bizarre worlds. But for Otto, it's a different matter: what he has to witness and what he is forced to do take a terrible toll on him...

This short story originally appeared in Cosmos: The Science of Everything, December 2005-January 2006. It can also be found in the anthologies Year's Best SF 11 (2006), edited by David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramers, and The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Third Annual Collection (2006), edited by Gardner Dozois. The story is included in the collection The Best of Joe Haldeman (2013).

Read the full story for free at the Baen website.

Also published as The Long Habit of Living.

Late in the 21st century, the rich have the option of rejuvenating their bodies once every decade, as long as they can come up with the price--everything they own, minimum 1 million. This has made the Stileman Foundation, which provides the medical makeover, the richest and most powerful corporation in the world, and has also created an elite expert in making and sheltering fortunes. One of these "immortals," Dallas Barr, has been invited to join a super-elite group calling itself the "Steering Committee," but finds instead that he has been set up for murder. Fleeing with his lover, Maria Marconi, an immortal who has decided to forgo further rejuvenation and therefore will die in a few years, Dallas sets himself on the trail of his would-be assassins, and of the secret someone wishes to keep him from discovering.

Two aliens have wandered Earth for centuries. The Changeling has survived by adapting the forms of many different organisms. The Chameleon destroys anything or anyone that threatens it.

Now, a sunken relic that holds the key to their origins calls to them to take them home--but the Chameleon has decided there's only room for one.

This stunning collection showcases 11 of Haldeman's best stories. They range through time and space from planets beyond our wildest dreams to a nightmare future Earth all too close to home.

Lindsay and the Red City Blues: A story of revenge - with a heart-stopping twist in the tail.

Blood Brothers: A 'Thieves World' story.

You Can Never Go Back: A self-contained story from the original version of 'The Forever War', never before published in book form.

And ten more sharp and startling visions of tomorrow.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction (1985) - essay
• Seasons - (1985) - novella
• A !Tangled Web - (1981) - novelette
• Manifest Destiny - (1983) - shortstory
• Blood Sisters - (1979) - novelette
• Blood Brothers - (1979) - novelette
• You Can Never Go Back - (1975) - novella
• More Than the Sum of His Parts - (1985) - shortstory
• Seven and the Stars - (1981) - shortstory
• Lindsay and the Red City Blues - (1980) - shortstory
• No Future in It - (1979) - shortstory
• The Pilot - (1979) - shortstory
• The Big Bang Theory Explained - (1985) - poem
• The Gift - (1985) - poem
• Saul's Death - (1983) - poem

This short story originally Elemental: The Tsunami Relief Anthology: Stories of Science Fiction and Fantasy (2006), edited by Alethea Kontis and Steven Savile. It can also be found in the anthology Year's Best SF 12 (2012), edited by David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer.

This noveltte originally appeared in Playboy, March 1993. It can also be found in the anthology The Year's Best Science Fiction: Eleventh Annual Collection (1994), edited by Gardner Dozois. The story is included in the collection None So Blind (1996).

Joe Haldeman's For White Hill confronts humanity with hostile aliens who remorselessly grind down every defense against them. A lone artist struggles to find a place in this distant, wondrous future, where humanity seems doomed.

This novella originally appeared in the anthology Far Futures (1995), edited by Gregory Benford. It can also be found in the anthologies The Year's Best Science Fiction: Thirteenth Annual Collection (1996), edited by Gardner Dozois, Year's Best SF (1996), edited by David G. Hartwell, Worldmakers: SF Adventures in Terraforming (2001), edited by Gardner Dozois, and The Hard SF Renaissance (2002), edited by David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Kramer. The story is included in the collections A Separate War and Other Stories (2006) and The Best of Joe Haldeman (2013).

Hugo Award nominated story. It first appeared in French translation in 2001 before being published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, October-November 2003. It was reprinted in Lightspeed, July 2012. The story can be found in the anthology Year's Best SF 9 (2009), edited by David G. Hartwella and Kathryn Cramer. It is included in the collections A Separate War and Other Stories (2006) and The Best of Joe Haldeman (2013).

Read the full story for free at Lightspeed.

A volume of visions of future wars, fought with weapons out of nightmare, by today's top writers of military science fiction, as well as some writers who are not usually associated with military SF, such as best-selling writer Gregory Benford, and award-winning author Kristine Katherine Rusch. Also present are Michael Z. Williamson, author of the strong selling novels Freehold and The Weapon, award-winning author of Bolo Strike, William H. Keith, and more. Through the centuries, weapons have changed radically, but the soldier has remained much the same. But in the future, soldiers, too, may undergo radical changes.

As editor Joe Haldeman puts it, "Weapons are an extension of the soldier, and also an extension of the culture or species that produced the soldier. And they are sometimes more dangerous to the soldier than the enemy...."

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - (2007) - essay by Joe Haldeman
• Craters - (2007) - shortstory by Kristine Kathryn Rusch
• David in the Lion's Den - (2007) - shortstory by Geoffrey A. Landis
• Rocket Boy - (2007) - novelette by Paul J. McAuley
• Jade Angel - (2007) - novelette by Dena Bain Taylor
• Broken Bits - (2007) - novelette by Mark L. Van Name
• The First Cup of Coffee War - (2007) - novelette by James H. Cobb
• The Soldier Within - (2007) - shortstory by Michael A. Burstein
• Spec-Ops - (2007) - shortstory by L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
• The Weapon - (2007) - novelette by William H. Keith, Jr.
• The Looking Glass War - (2007) - novelette by Brendan DuBois
• The Humans Call it Duty - (2007) - shortstory by Michael Z. Williamson
• Casualty - (2007) - novelette by Brian Stableford

Nebula and World Fantasy Award winning short story. It originally appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, October-November 1992. It can be found in the anthologies The Year's Best Science Fiction: Tenth Annual Collection (1993), edited by Gardner Dozois, The Best from Fantasy & Science Fiction: A 45th Anniversary Anthology (1994), edited by Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Edward L. Ferman, and Nebula Awards 29 (1995), edited by Pamela Sargent. It is also included in the collections None So Blind (1996), War Stories (2005) and The Best of Joe Haldeman (2013).

Read the full story for free at Nightmare.

In 1879, Rosa Tolliver, a college-educated blueblood, marries a wealthy man who turns out to be a brute. She flees her Philadelphia mansion with her 14-year-old son, Daniel, and the two of them make their way to Dodge City, Kans. Rosa retrospectively describes the trip in incredible detail: the modes of transportation they took; the people they met; the books she read. With each carefully placed detail, Rosa weaves the tapestry of her life, and among the threads, she hints at a destiny: something extraordinary happens to her, and each book she reads, each decision she makes, in retrospect has something to do with this destiny. Her stay in Dodge City lasts only four years, and she and Daniel flee again when a Pinkerton detective tracks them down. Another well-documented trip-this time to the Alaska gold fields-follows. Toward the end, an Indian shaman, Raven, shows her alien wonders and a vision of a future Earth in which humanity's destiny is intertwined with her own.

This short story originally appeared in Nature, March 24, 2005. It can also be found in the anthology Science Fiction: The Best of the Year, 2006 Edition, edited by Rich Horton. The story is included in the collection A Separate War and Other Stories (2006).

Read the full story for free at Nature (*.pdf).

Hugo Award nominated novella. It originally appeared in Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, June 1972. The story can also be found in the anthologies Best SF: 1972, edtidt by Brian W. Aldiss and Harry Harrison, The Best Science Fiction of the Year #2 (1973), edited by Terry Carr, Analog 9 (1973), edited by Ben Bova, and The Best Military Science Fiction of the 20th Century (2001), edited by Martin H. Greenberg and Harry Turtledove. It is included in the collection The Best of Joe Haldeman. The story was incororated in the novel The Forever War (1975).

Contains:

• A Time to Live
• Tricentennial
• To Howard Hughes: A Modest Proposal
• Anniversary Project
• The Mazel Tov Revolution
• A Mind of His Own
• 26 Days, On Earth
• Armaja Das
• The Private War of Private Jacob
• Counterpoint
• All the Universe in a Mason Jar
• Summer's Lease
• Juryrigged

This short story originally appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, October 1983, and was reprinted in Clarkesworld Magazine, #86 November 2013. It can also be found in the anthology The Year's Best Science Fiction: First Annual Collection (1984), edited by Gardner Dozois. The story is included in the collections Dealing in Futures (1985) and The Best of Joe Haldeman (2013).

Read the full story for free at Clarkesworld.

In the space of a few years, Joe Haldeman has come to be recognized as one of the best writers of science fiction of our time. Mindbridge, a novel at once traditional in ist plot and a daring new departure in its structure, is certain to add to this reputation.

Jacque LeFavre live in the formidable world of the future. A pioneer in interstellar colonization, he is the co-discoverer of a creature that acts as a psychic link... allowing one person to sense directly the thoughts and emotions of another. But he learns the terrible price fo this power when his partner suddenly dies.

Older, disillusioned, he is one of a team that confronts the L'vrai, a race of angelic beauty but with a callous disregard for life. They are expanding through the universe and view humankind as a removable obstacle. LeFavre's assignment: establsih a telepathic link with a L'vrai leader and find an alternative to the interstellar war that threatens the extinction of one of the two races.

Nebula Award nominated short story. It originally appeared in Playboy, May 1985. The story can also be found in the anthologies The Year's Best Science Fiction: Third Annual Collection (1986), edited by Gardner Dozoiz, Nebula Awards 21 (1986), edited by George Zebrowski and Lightspeed: Year One (2011), edited by John Joseph Adams. It is included in the collections Dealing in Futures (1985) and The Best of Joe Haldeman (2012).

Read the full story for free at Lightspeed.

Hugo and Locus Award winning and Nebula Award nominated short story. It was originally published in Asimov's Science Fiction, November 1994. It can be found in the anthologies The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twelth Annual Collection (1995), edited by Gardner Dozois, The Best of the Best: 20 Years of the Year's Best Science Fiction (2005), edited by Gardner Dozois and Nebula Awards 30 (1996), edited by Pamela Sargent. The story is included in the collections None So Blind (1996) and The Best of Joe Haldeman (2013).

Read the full story for free at the author's website.

An award-winning visionary and true master of worlds and wonders, the man whom author David Brin calls "one of the nest prophetic writers of our times" once again demonstrates the breathtaking scope and startling power of his imagination--transporting the reader across space and time, into the heart of darkness and the soul of madness.

From the spinetingling account of an intergalactic poacher's rite of passage, to an erotic and ultimately uplifting modern fable of inner scars and otherworldly transformation, here are fifteen remarkable tales and "story poems"--featuring four HUGO and NEBULA Award-winners, including the classic novella THE HEMINGWAY HOAX. These are stories that sing with a unique and haunting voice--stories of war's monsters, of brutal art and lost stars... and a brief, miraculous moment called childhood, when a young girl can actually fly.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction: What You Don't Know Can't Hurt You - essay
• Feedback - (1993) - novelette
• Passages - (1990) - novelette
• Job Security - (1992) - shortstory
• The Hemingway Hoax - (1990) - novella
• Images - (1991) - shortstory
• Beachhead - (1991) - shortstory
• The Monster - (1986) - shortstory
• If I Had the Wings of an Angel - (1991) - shortstory
• The Cure - (1994) - shortstory
• Graves - (1992) - shortstory
• None So Blind - (1994) - shortstory
• The Homecoming - (1990) - poem
• Fire, Ice - (1994) - poem
• Time Lapse - (1989) - poem
• DX - (1987) - poem

Passengers aboard the starship "Aspera" on a thousand-year journey to Beta Hydrii, spend their time visiting 20th-century Earth within the virtual reality chamber. When people inside the chamber start to die, engineer Jacob Brewer must face a sentient machine obsessed with humanity.

This short story originally appeared in Gateways (2010) edited by Elizabeth Anne Hull. It can also be found in the anthologies Year's Best SF 16 (2011), edited by David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Kramer, and The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Eighth Annual Collection (2011), edited by Gardner Dozois. It is included in the collection The Best of Joe Haldeman (2013).

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - (1977) - essay by Joe Haldeman
• Basilisk - (1972) - shortstory by Harlan Ellison
• The Dueling Machine - (1963) - novella by Ben Bova and Myron R. Lewis
• A Man to My Wounding - (1959) - shortstory by Poul Anderson
• Commando Raid - (1970) - shortstory by Harry Harrison
• Curtains - (1974) - shortstory by George Alec Effinger
• Mercenary - (1962) - novella by Mack Reynolds
• Rule Golden - (1954) - novella by Damon Knight
• The State of Ultimate Peace - (1974) - shortstory by William Nabors
• By the Numbers - (1973) - essay by Isaac Asimov
• To Howard Hughes: A Modest Proposal - (1974) - shortstory by Joe Haldeman

Joe Haldeman "has quietly become one of the most important science fiction writers of our time" (Rocky Mountain News). Now he delivers a provocative novel of a man who stumbles upon the discovery of a lifetime-or many lifetimes.

Grad-school dropout Matt Fuller is toiling as a lowly research assistant at MIT when, while measuring subtle quantum forces that relate to time changes in gravity and electromagnetic force, his calibrator turns into a time machine. With a dead-end job and a girlfriend who has left him for another man, Matt has nothing to lose taking a time machine trip himself-or so he thinks.

Joe Haldeman has been one of the world's most universally admired and beloved science fiction writers for more than four decades. He has earned the respect of both lifelong science fiction fans and mainstream literary writers, both for the originality of his concepts and for the unsurpassed clarity of his prose, and his characters are among the most memorable in all of science fiction.

This first career retrospective of Haldeman's finest work ranges from early tales such as 'Hero'--which instantly earned his reputation and provided the basis for his classic novel The Forever War--to mid-career masterpieces like 'Seasons' and 'The Hemingway Hoax,' his major tribute to a favorite literary godfather, to very recent stories such as 'Sleeping Dogs' and 'Complete Sentence.' Haldeman has provided original story introductions for this new landmark collection.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - (2013)
• Introduction to "Hero"
• Hero - (1972)
• Introduction to "Anniversary Project"
• Anniversary Project - (1975)
• Introduction to "Tricentennial"
• Tricentennial - (1976)
• Introduction to "Blood Sisters"
• Blood Sisters - (1979)
• Introduction to "Lindsay and the Red City Blues"
• Lindsay and the Red City Blues - (1980)
• Introduction to "Manifest Destiny"
• Manifest Destiny - (1983)
• Introduction to "More Than the Sum of His Parts"
• More Than the Sum of His Parts - (1985)
• Introduction to "Seasons"
• Seasons - (1985)
• Introduction to "The Monster"
• The Monster - (1986)
• Introduction to "The Hemingway Hoax"
• The Hemingway Hoax - (1990)
• Introduction to "Graves"
• Graves - (1992)
• Introduction to "None So Blind"
• None So Blind - (1994)
• Introduction to "For White Hill"
• For White Hill - (1995)
• Introduction to "Civil Disobedience"
• Civil Disobedience - (2005)
• Introduction to "Four Short Novels"
• Four Short Novels - (2003)
• Introduction to "Angel of Light"
• Angel of Light - (2005)
• Introduction to "The Mars Girl"
• The Mars Girl - (2006)
• Introduction to "Sleeping Dogs"
• Sleeping Dogs - (2010)
• Introduction to "Complete Sentence"
• Complete Sentence - (2011)

From the depths of space comes a startling message: "We're Coming."

On the brink of war and hysteria, Earth must prepare for the arrival. But the question still remains as to who-or what-will actually arrive...

The hoax proposed to John Baird by a two-bit con man in a seedy Key West bar was shady but potentially profitable. With little left to lose, the struggling, middle-aged Hemingway scholar agreed to forge a manuscript and pass it off as Papa's lost masterpiece. But Baird never realized his actions would shatter the history of his own Earth... and others.

Hugo and Nebula Award winning novella. It originally appeared in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, April 1990. The story can also be found in the anthologies The Year's Best Science Fiction: Eighth Annual Collection (1991), edited by Gardner Dozois, Nebula Awards 26 (1992), edited by James Morrow, The New Hugo Winners, Volume III: (1989-91) (1994), edited by Connie Willis and Best of the Best Volume 2: 20 Years of the Year's Best Short Science Fiction Novels (2007). It is included in the collections None So Blind (1996) and The Best of Joe Haldeman. It was published as a slightly expanded novel The Hemingway Hoax shortly after the magazine publicatiion.

Carl Bok is a citizen of Springworld, the heavy-gravity planet with monstrous and dangerous flora and fauna. Carl is well over two metres tall and weighs-in at 180 kilograms.

Now Carl has won a scholarship to Starschool. He'll spend a year on this touring school, visiting sixteen of the colonised planets. This will be the experience of a lifetime.

It's tough enough for Carl as the poor scholarship student among the rich kids. His problems get worse when they arrive at Earth. Carl finds himself in urgent need of big money and, since he's a pretty tough guy, becomes a paid fighter. He has to fight dangerous and deadly human and animal opponents. His fellow students, B'oosa, Miko, Alegria and Francisco "Pancho" Bolivar, get caught up in his exploits.

And then there are the aliens.

In the waning years of the Cold War Nicholas Foley, a Soviet sleeper agent and a survivor of the World War II siege of Leningrad, is a scientist and technological genius quietly working in American academia. He develops an ultrasonic gadget with which he can indetectably control the minds of others. His wife knows his secrets, but loves him too much to turn him over to Federal authorities. When both the Americans and the Soviets find out what Foley has invented, his wife is kidnapped, and he is forced to flee the CIA and the KGB. He must save his wife, elude capture in a massive manhunt and, at a summit meeting between the President of the United States and the Soviet premier, make a daring masterstroke for peace in our time, and for all time.

Hugo and Locus Award winning and Nebula Award nominated short story. It originally appeared in Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, July 1976. The story can also be found n the anthologies Nebula Winners Twelve (1978), The edited by Gordon R. Dickson, The Best of Analog (1978), edited by Ben Bova, The Endless Frontier (1979), edited by Jerry Pournelle, The Road to Science Fiction 3: From Heinlein to Here (1979), edited by James Gunn, and The Hugo Winners, Volume 4: (1976-79) (1985) edited by Isaac Asimov. It is included in the collections Infinite Dreams (1978) and The Best of Joe Haldeman (2013).

An engaging tour through the work and life of one of America's great science fiction writers

Nebula and Hugo Award-winning author Joe Haldeman burst onto the literary scene with the hugely popular novel The Forever War, but his career also took off on the strength of his short fiction. This brilliant collection brings together examples of his science fiction as well as his writing on Vietnam--and reveals the inexorable connections between the two.

The works included in Vietnam and Other Alien Worlds are united by its title essay, in which Haldeman explains how his past informs his envisioned futures. One of these futures is a grouping of four stories from the Confederación universe, which includes his novels All My Sins Remembered and There Is No Darkness. An anthropological expedition goes awry as a research team's subjects become murderous, and trade negotiations fall apart, comically lost in translation. The collection closes with one of Haldeman's most affective works about Vietnam--the moving narrative poem "DX."

Vietnam and Other Alien Worlds proves to be an anthology as versatile and multifaceted as the author who wrote it.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - essay
• Passages - (1990) - novelette
• A !Tangled Web - (1981) - novelette
• Seasons - (1985) - novella
• The Mazel Tov Revolution - (1974) - shortstory
• Vietnam and Other Alien Worlds - (1992) - essay
• Not Being There - essay
• Confessions of a Space Junkie - (1992) - essay
• War Stories - essay
• Photographs and Memories - essay
• Saul's Death - (1983) - poem
• Homecoming - (1990) - poem
• Time Lapse - (1989) - poem
• DX - (1987) - poem

An omnibus of Joe Haldeman's war stories, this will be an important book that gives massive insight into Vietnam from the perspective of one of the finest science fiction writers in the field.

Includes the stories "War Year," "1968," "Time Piece," "The Private War of Private Jacob," "To Howard Hughes: A Modest Proposal," "The Monster," "Graves," "A Separate War," and "Giza." Plus the long narrative poems "Saul's Death" and "DX" as well as three essays by Haldeman about his experiences in Vietnam and about writing "The Forever War," "1968," "War Year," and short fiction.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction: You Have To Start Somewhere - essay
• War Year - non-genre - (1972) - novel
• Introduction: Fragments - essay
• Time Piece - (1970) - shortstory
• The Private War of Private Jacob - (1974) - shortstory
• To Howard Hughes: A Modest Proposal - (1974) - shortstory
• The Monster - (1986) - shortstory
• Graves - (1992) - shortstory
• A Separate War - (1999) - novelette
• Giza - (2003) - shortstory
• Saul's Death - (1983) - poem
• DX - (1987) - poem
• Introduction: A Tangled Web - essay
• 1968 - (1994) - novel

Wounded in combat and honorably discharged nine years ago, Jack Daley still suffers nightmares from when he served his country as a sniper, racking up sixteen confirmed kills. Now a struggling author, Jack accepts an offer to write a near-future novel about a serial killer, based on a Hollywood script outline. It's an opportunity to build his writing career, and a future with his girlfriend, Kit Majors.

But Jack's other talent is also in demand. A package arrives on his doorstep containing a sniper rifle, complete with silencer and ammunition--and the first installment of a $100,000 payment to kill a "bad man." The twisted offer is genuine. The people behind it are dangerous. They prove that they have Jack under surveillance. He can't run. He can't hide. And if he doesn't take the job, Kit will be in the crosshairs instead.

On a routine mission, Captain Kirk and the crew of the starship Enterprise detect a rogue planet (dubbed Anomaly) orbited by a miniature black hole. This seems to contravene all scientific laws. Assuming that the system is artificial, Captain Kirk leads a landing party to the planet's surface, where they become trapped. The crew find themselves at the center of a galactic conflict, in which an alien race is threatening to invade Federation space. Dr. McCoy, Mr. Spock, and Captain Kirk must participate in a series of trials that will determine not just their survival, but that of the Federation.

Chatalia... a fantastic artificial world, inhabited by furry winged creatures with awesome powers. Here Kirk, Spock and their Enterprise mates, trapped, face terrifying death. And if by some miracle they escape, they will confront the roving killers of the Klingon Empire!

As Captain Kirk and members of his landing party are held prisoner aboard the alien planetoid, the Enterprise - ensnared in a trap - loses power and begins to descend on a collision course with the planetoid.

Captain James T. Kirk and the crew of the Enterprise face a foe of incredible power and intelligence - a nightmare image from humanity's past.

Captain's log, stardate 7505.6. This is being recorded by Science Officer Spock, temporarily in command.

The Enterprise is currently in orbit around an alien "starship" (actually an artificial planetoid approximately 217.352 kilometers in diameter) of unknown origin, aboard which Captain Kirk and a landing party of four are stranded. They are currently detained in a prison cell, awaiting interrogation.

Far more immediate is the condition of the Enterprise. The ship has been 'snared' by wires apparently composed of the same material as the alien craft (a substance harder than any known to Federation science) -- wires which are draining off our power reserves at an alarming rate. We appear to have the choice of remaining on board the Enterprise (and crashing to the surface of the planetoid once our power is gone), or joining the Captain inside the alien spacecraft. A fascinating dilemma.

This novelette originally appeared in the anthology Warriors (2010), edited by Gardner Dozois and George R. R. Martin. It was reprinted in Clarkesworld, Issue 130, July 2017.

Read the full story for free at Clarkeswordl.

Private William Mandella is a hero in spite of himself -- a reluctant conscript drafted into an elite military unit, and propelled through space and time to fight in a distant thousand-year conflict. He never wanted to go to war, but the leaders on Earth have drawn a line in the interstellar sand -- despite the fact that their fierce alien enemy is unknowable, unconquerable, and very far away. So Mandella will perform his duties without rancor and even rise up through the military's ranks... if he survives. But the true test of his mettle will come when he returns to Earth. Because of the time dilation caused by space travel the loyal soldier is aging months, while his home planet is aging centuries -- and the difference will prove the saying: you never can go home....

In the year 2043, the Ngumi War rages. Limited nuclear strikes have been used on Atlanta and two enemy cities, but the war goes on, fought by 'soldierboys' -- indestructible war machines operated by remote control by soldiers hundreds of miles away.

Julian Class is one of these soldiers, and for him war is truly hell. The psychological strain of being jacked-in to his soldierboy -- and the genocidal results -- are becoming too much to bear. Now he and his companion, Dr Amelia Harding, have made a terrifying scientific discovery, which could literally take the universe back to square one. Except that for Julian, the discovery isn't so much terrifying as tempting....

William Mandela is a genetic throwback, one of the small group of humans who fought and survived the Forever War. They returned to find humanity has evolved into a group mind called Man. Surrounded by a society that is too autocratic and intrusive, living a dull existence which cannot compare to the certainties of combat and feeling increasingly alienated, the veterans plan an escape to the future by means of space travel and relativity. But when their ship starts to fail, their journey becomes a search for the Unknown, the elusive entity responsible.

Young Carmen Dula and her family are about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime - they're going to Mars.

Once on the Red Planet, however, Carmen realizes things are not so different from Earth. There are chores to do, lessons to learn, and oppressive authority figures to rebel against. And when she ventures out into the bleak Mars landscape alone one night, a simple accident leads her to the edge of death until she is saved by an angel—an angel with too many arms and legs, a head that looks like a potato gone bad, and a message for the newly arrived human inhabitants of Mars:

We were here first.

Carmen Dula and her husband have spent six years traveling to a distant solar system that is home to the enigmatic, powerful race known as "The Others," in the hopes of finding enough common purpose between their species to forge a delicate truce.

By the time Carmen and her party return, fifty years have been consumed by relativity-and the Earthlings have not been idle, building a massive flotilla of warships to defend Earth against The Others. But The Others have their own plans.

The mysterious alien Others have prohibited humans from space travel-destroying Earth's fleet of starships in a display of unimaginable power. Now Carmen Dula, the first human to encounter Martians and then the mysterious Others, and her colleagues struggle to find a way, using nineteenthcentury technology, to reclaim the future that has been stolen from them.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction (Nebula Award Stories 17) - essay by Joe Haldeman
• 1981 and Counting - (1982) - essay by Algis Budrys
• Venice Drowned - (1981) - novelette by Kim Stanley Robinson
• The Quiet - (1981) - shortstory by George Guthridge
• Going Under - (1981) - novelette by Jack Dann
• Johnny Mnemonic - (1981) - shortstory by William Gibson
• Films and Television--1981 - (1982) - essay by Baird Searles
• Zeke - (1981) - shortstory by Tim Sullivan
• The Saturn Game - (1981) - novella by Poul Anderson
• Disciples - (1981) - shortstory by Gardner Dozois
• The Quickening - (1981) - novelette by Michael Bishop
• The Pusher - (1981) - shortstory by John Varley
• The Claw of the Conciliator (Excerpt) - (1981) - shortfiction by Gene Wolfe
• Meeting Place - (1980) - poem by Ken Duffin
• On Science Fiction - (1980) - poem by Thomas M. Disch
• Appendices - essay by uncredited

Contents:

• 1 - Introduction (Body Armor: 2000) - essay by Joe Haldeman
• 5 - Contact! - (1974) - short story by David Drake
• 21 - The Warbots - (1968) - short story by Larry S. Todd
• 23 - General Motors Terrain Walker - interior artwork by Larry S. Todd
• 25 - McCauley Walker (Ambulant) - interior artwork by Larry S. Todd
• 28 - Burton Damnthing - interior artwork by Larry S. Todd
• 31 - Christopher Warbot - interior artwork by Larry S. Todd
• 33 - Cuiver (Greedy Nick) Warbot - interior artwork by Larry S. Todd
• 35 - Critter's Gateway Warbot - interior artwork by Larry S. Todd
• 38 - Quicksilver Warbot - interior artwork by Larry S. Todd
• 40 - 2nd Alakar - interior artwork by Larry S. Todd
• 45 - The Scapegoat - [Alliance-Union] - (1985) - novella by C. J. Cherryh
• 93 - The Last Crusade - (1955) - short story by George H. Smith
• 106 - Hired Man - (1970) - short story by Richard C. Meredith
• 122 - Early Model - (1956) - short story by Robert Sheckley
• 141 - In the Bone - (1966) - short story by Gordon R. Dickson
• 163 - The Chemically Pure Warriors - (1962) - novella by Allen Kim Lang
• 222 - Right to Life - (1985) - short story by Thomas A. Easton
• 234 - Or Battle's Sound - [Matter Transmitter] - (1968) - novelette by Harry Harrison (variant of No War, or Battle's Sound)
• 256 - Hero - [Mandella] - (1972) - novella by Joe Haldeman

Contents:

• 1 - Introduction (Supertanks) - essay by Joe Haldeman
• 5 - The Horars of War - (1970) - short story by Gene Wolfe
• 23 - I Made You - (1954) - short story by Walter M. Miller, Jr.
• 35 - Encounter - (1979) - novelette by Stephen Leigh
• 55 - The Computer Cried Charge! - (1976) - short story by George R. R. Martin
• 69 - Hangman - [Hammer's Slammers] - (1979) - novella by David Drake
• 125 - Field Test - [Bolo] - (1976) - short story by Keith Laumer
• 149 - An Empty Gift - (1983) - short story by Steve Benson
• 161 - Tank - (1979) - short story by Francis E. Izzo
• 167 - The Tank and Its Wife - (1978) - short story by Arsen Darnay
• 177 - Damnation Alley - (1967) - novella by Roger Zelazny

Contents:

• 1 - Introduction (Space-Fighters) - essay by Joe Haldeman
• 6 - The Game of Rat and Dragon - [The Instrumentality of Mankind] - (1955) - short story by Cordwainer Smith
• 21 - The Immortal - (1965) - novelette by Gordon R. Dickson
• 58 - City of Yesterday - (1967) - short story by Terry Carr
• 67 - Industrial Accident - (1980) - novelette by G. Harry Stine [as by Lee Correy]
• 87 - Ender's Game - [Ender Wiggin] - (1977) - novelette by Orson Scott Card
• 125 - The Claw and the Clock - [Federation of Humanity] - (1971) - novelette by Christopher Anvil
• 148 - Time Piece - (1970) - short story by Joe Haldeman
• 157 - Medal of Honor - (1960) - novelette by Mack Reynolds
• 185 - Wings Out of Shadow - [Berserker (Fred Saberhagen)] - (1974) - novelette by Fred Saberhagen
• 204 - Gambler's War - (1980) - short story by Marcia Martin and Eric Vinicoff
• 221 - Safe to Sea - (1988) - short story by David Drake
• 236 - Empire Dreams - (1985) - novelette by Ian McDonald
• 259 - Stars, Won't You Hide Me? - (1966) - short story by Ben Bova
• 273 - Waiting in Crouched Halls - (1970) - short story by Edward Bryant [as by Ed Bryant]
• 285 - Early Bird - (1973) - short story by Theodore R. Cogswell and Theodore L. Thomas

At the end of the 21st century, many people believe the only real hope for humanity lies in the Worlds: 41 orbiting satellites housing half a million people. Though the creation of cheap fusion has undermined the Worlds as a source of solar energy, they still welcome many tourists and offer plenty of raw materials for export. For example, New New York is almost pure steel.

And, from that city comes Marianne O'Hara, a brilliant political-science student who has elected to spend a postgraduate year on Earth - where she unwittingly finds herself caught up in a group of fanatics looking to start another revolution in America. Even if it means the destruction of the planet.

The war that destroyed everything lasted a single day. After an initial nuclear strike, the Earth's population was further devastated by an insidious bioweapon targeting anyone above the age of puberty. Now most of what's left of human civilization gathers on New New York, one of the few orbiting Worlds that remain.

Monitoring the Earth below from the floating habitat, Marianne O'Hara searches for signs of life - and, in particular, for Jeff Hawking, her former lover, who survived the viral nightmare thanks to a biological anomaly that rendered him immune. But Jeff is not the sole surviving adult in this landscape of death, ruin, and feral children, and those who fled to safety underground are being seduced by a terrible new religion preaching blood and vengeance. The last war, it seems, is not over - and the last hope for preventing the final holocaust may be Marianne O'Hara.

The Earth is no more, an uninhabitable shell following the one-day war that obliterated the population. In the decades that followed, the surviving Worlds orbiting the dead planet have become the last refuge of humankind. With the discovery of a possibly habitable planet in a distant star system, ten thousand brave colonists are preparing to depart from New New York aboard the interstellar vessel Newhome. Among them is Marianne O'Hara, who will ultimately control the fate of what remains of the human race.

The momentous voyage is plagued from the start by ignorance and sabotage, and by the dark tenets of a nihilistic religion dedicated to ultimate destruction. But despite the many trials and tragedies, the spacefarers - and particularly Marianne and her loved ones - will be forced to endure. There is no turning back once the journey begins... for soon there will be nowhere left to return to.