Silēna Edgāra ir franču valodas skolotāja un rakstniece, kas sarakstījusi jauniešiem vairākus zinātniskās fantastikas romānus. Viņa vada vecākiem, bibliotekāriem un skolotājiem paredzētu tīmekļa vietni, kurā apkopota informācija par bērnu un jauniešu literatūru.

Romāns "14-14" ir abu rakstnieku pirmais kopdarbs, kas saņēmis daudzas nozīmīgas balvas, tostarp Prix Gulli, jauno lasītāju balvu Prix des Incorruptibles, Puatjē Akadēmijas balvu par labāko laikmetīgo romānu u.c.

http://virja.lv/product_info.php/cPath/25/products_id/8700/osCsid/imd1i6muca00drmbkcaopde583

Ursula Le Gvina. Spārnotie kaķi

Ursula K. Le Guin. Catwings

Ar Ursulu Le Gvinu nav nepieciešams iepazīstināt lasītājus. Viņa ir pasaules literatūras klasiķe. Taču viņas garstāsti un stāsti bērniem, kas pasaulē ir ne mazāk populāri kā "Viduszemes burvis", pie mums vēl nav izdoti. Šī grāmata ir pirmā stāstu sērijā par spārnotajiem kaķiem.

http://www.labirint.ru/books/452756/

Kims Stenlijs Robinsons. Zaļais Marss (triloģijas 2. grāmata)

Kim Stanley Robinson. Green Mars (Mars Trilogy)

Jēga nav tur, lai radītu otro Zemi, vajag kaut ko marsiešiem...

Ir pagājuši piecdesmit gadi, kopš laika, kad pirmie kolonisti izsēdās uz Marsa. Sarkanā planēta pakāpeniski zaudē savu pirmatnējo izskatu, pirmie, zaļie asni jau rāpjas pa klinšu aukstajām nogāzēm. Taču vēl dzīvi ir tie, kas vēlas saglabāt dzimtās planētas tuksnesīgo skaistumu un negrib ļaut, lai to sāktu pārvaldīt Zemes iebraucēji. Tā ir pirmā bērnu paaudze, kas dzimusi uz Marsa un viņi ir gatavi parādīt, uz ko ir spējīgi.

http://www.labirint.ru/books/559161/

Čets Van Duzers. Jūras briesmoņi uz Viduslaiku un Renesanses laikmeta kartēm

Chet Van Duzer. Sea Monsters on Medieval and Renaissance Maps

Dīvainu jūras dzīļu iemītnieku attēli ir viens no visatpazīstamākiem elementiem uz Viduslaiku un Renesanses laikmeta ģeogrāfiskajām kartēm. Apbrīnojami, ka nekad agrāk šādi attēli nav bijuši par sīkas un nopietnas izpētes objektiem. Pētījumu priekšmets ne tikai ir svarīgs kartogrāfijas vēsturē, tēlotājmākslā un animalistikā, bet arī atver durvis uz nezināmā ģeogrāfiju, palīdz izsekot, kā mainās eiropiešu priekšstati par Pasaules okeānu. Vēl vairāk, jūras briesmoņi, kas attēloti uz senajām kartēm, var kalpot mums par atslēgu, lai saprastu kartogrāfu, kuri šeit ir pielikuši roku, darba avotus, sakarus un metodes.

Šīs lieliski ilustrētās monogrāfijas autors analizē vissvarīgākos jūras briesmoņu attēlojuma piemērus uz Eiropas kartēm, sākot ar desmito gadsimtu, kad uz pasaules grafiskajām kartēm pirmo reizi parādās dīvainu jūras radību attēli, un beidzas ar sešpadsmito gadsimtu.

http://www.labirint.ru/books/560519/

Ellen Klages. Passing Strange

San Francisco in 1940 is a haven for the unconventional. Tourists flock to the cities within the city: the Magic City of the World’s Fair on an island created of artifice and illusion; the forbidden city of Chinatown, a separate, alien world of exotic food and nightclubs that offer “authentic” experiences, straight from the pages of the pulps; and the twilight world of forbidden love, where outcasts from conventional society can meet.

Six women find their lives as tangled with each other’s as they are with the city they call home. They discover love and danger on the borders where magic, science, and art intersect.

Inspired by the pulps, film noir, and screwball comedy, Passing Strange is a story as unusual and complex as San Francisco itself from World Fantasy Award winning author Ellen Klages.

https://www.amazon.com/Passing-Strange-Ellen-Klages/dp/0765389525

Neil Clarke (Editor). Galactic Empires

Neil Clarke, publisher of the award-winning Clarkesworld magazine, presents a collection of thought-provoking and galaxy-spanning array of galactic short science fiction.

From E. E. "Doc" Smith’s Lensman, to George Lucas’ Star Wars, the politics and process of Empire have been a major subject of science fiction’s galaxy-spanning fictions. The idiom of the Galactic Empire allows science fiction writers to ask (and answer) questions that are shorn of contemporary political ideologies and allegiances. This simple narrative slight of hand allows readers and writers to see questions and answers from new and different perspectives.

The stories in this book do just that. What social, political, and economic issues do the organizing structure of “empire” address? Often the size, shape, and fates of empires are determined not only by individuals, but by geography, natural forces, and technology. As the speed of travel and rates of effective communication increase, so too does the size and reach of an Imperial bureaucracy. Sic itur ad astra—“Thus one journeys to the stars.”

At the beginning of the twentieth century, writers such as Kipling and Twain were at the forefront of these kinds of narrative observations, but as the century drew to a close, it was writers like Iain M. Banks who helped make science fiction relevant. That tradition continues today, with award-winning writers like Ann Leckie, whose 2013 debut novel Ancillary Justice hinges upon questions of imperialism and empire.

Here then is a diverse collection of stories that asks the questions that science fiction asks best. Empire: How? Why? And to what effect?

Table of Contents:

- “Winning Peace” by Paul J. McAuley

- “Night’s Slow Poison” by Ann Leckie

- “All the Painted Stars” by Gwendolyn Clare

- “Firstborn” by Brandon Sanderson

- “Riding the Crocodile” by Greg Egan

- “The Lost Princess Man” by John Barnes

- “The Waiting Stars” by Aliette de Bodard

- “Alien Archeology” by Neal Asher

- “The Muse of Empires Lost” by Paul Berger

- “Ghostweight” by Yoon Ha Lee

- “A Cold Heart” by Tobias S. Buckell

- “The Colonel Returns to the Stars” by Robert Silverberg

- “The Impossibles” by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

- “Utriusque Cosmi” by Robert Charles Wilson

- “Section Seven” by John G. Hemry

- “The Invisible Empire of Ascending Light” by Ken Scholes

- “The Man with the Golden Balloon” by Robert Reed

- “Looking Through Lace” by Ruth Nestvold

- “A Letter from the Emperor” by Steve Rasnic Tem

- “The Wayfarer’s Advice” by Melinda M. Snodgrass

- “Seven Years from Home” by Naomi Novik

- “Verthandi’s Ring” by Ian McDonald

Skyhorse Publishing, under our Night Shade and Talos imprints, is proud to publish a broad range of titles for readers interested in science fiction (space opera, time travel, hard SF, alien invasion, near-future dystopia), fantasy (grimdark, sword and sorcery, contemporary urban fantasy, steampunk, alternative history), and horror (zombies, vampires, and the occult and supernatural), and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller, a national bestseller, or a Hugo or Nebula award-winner, we are committed to publishing quality books from a diverse group of authors.

https://www.amazon.com/Galactic-Empires-Neil-Clarke/dp/1597808849/

Charles Stross. Empire Games

Charles Stross builds a new series with Empire Games, expanding on the world he created in the Family Trade series, a new generation of paratime travellers walk between parallel universes.

The year is 2020. It's seventeen years since the Revolution overthrew the last king of the New British Empire, and the newly-reconstituted North American Commonwealth is developing rapidly, on course to defeat the French and bring democracy to a troubled world. But Miriam Burgeson, commissioner in charge of the shadowy Ministry of Intertemporal Research and Intelligence―the paratime espionage agency tasked with catalyzing the Commonwealth's great leap forward―has a problem. For years, she's warned everyone: "The Americans are coming." Now their drones arrive in the middle of a succession crisis.

In another timeline, the U.S. has recruited Miriam's own estranged daughter to spy across timelines in order to bring down any remaining world-walkers who might threaten national security.

Two nuclear superpowers are set on a collision course. Two increasingly desperate paratime espionage agencies try to find a solution to the first contact problem that doesn't result in a nuclear holocaust. And two women―a mother and her long-lost daughter―are about to find themselves on opposite sides of the confrontation.

https://www.amazon.com/Empire-Games-Charles-Stross/dp/0765337568/

Carrie Vaughn. Martians Abroad: A novel

Well-known for her bestselling series Kitty Norville, Carrie Vaughn moves to science fiction with Martians Abroad, a novel with great crossover appeal. Polly Newton has one single-minded dream, to be a starship pilot and travel the galaxy. Her mother, the Director of the Mars Colony, derails Polly's plans when she sends Polly and her genius twin brother, Charles, to Galileo Academy on Earth.

Homesick and cut off from her plans for her future, Polly cannot seem to fit into life on Earth. Strange, unexplained, dangerous coincidences centered on their high-profile classmates begin piling up. Charles may be right―there's more going on than would appear, and the stakes are high. With the help of Charles, Polly is determined to find the truth, no matter the cost.

https://www.amazon.com/Martians-Abroad-novel-Carrie-Vaughn/dp/0765382202/

Steven Brust, Skyler White. The Skill of Our Hands: A Novel (The Incrementalists)

"Secret societies, immortality, murder mysteries and Las Vegas all in one book? Shut up and take my money." ―John Scalzi on The Incrementalists

The Incrementalists are a secret society of two hundred people―an unbroken lineage reaching back forty thousand years. They cheat death, share lives and memories, and communicate with one another across nations and time. They have an epic history, an almost magical memory, and a very modest mission: to make the world better, a little bit at a time.

Now Phil, the Incrementalist whose personality has stayed stable through more incarnations than anyone else’s, has been shot dead. They’ll bring him back―but first they need to know what happened. Their investigation will lead down unexpected paths in Arizona, and bring them up against corruption, racism, and brutality in high and low places alike.

But the key may lay in one of Phil’s previous lives, in “Bleeding Kansas” in the late 1850s―and the fate of the passionate abolitionist we remember as John Brown.

Steven Brust and Skyler White's The Skill of Our Hands is the thrilling and thought-provoking follow-up to their critically acclaimed The Incrementalists.

https://www.amazon.com/Skill-Our-Hands-Novel-Incrementalists/dp/0765382881/

Seanan McGuire. Dusk or Dark or Dawn or Day

When her sister Patty died, Jenna blamed herself. When Jenna died, she blamed herself for that, too. Unfortunately Jenna died too soon. Living or dead, every soul is promised a certain amount of time, and when Jenna passed she found a heavy debt of time in her record. Unwilling to simply steal that time from the living, Jenna earns every day she leeches with volunteer work at a suicide prevention hotline.

But something has come for the ghosts of New York, something beyond reason, beyond death, beyond hope; something that can bind ghosts to mirrors and make them do its bidding. Only Jenna stands in its way.

Dusk or Dark or Dawn or Day is a new standalone urban fantasy novella from New York Times bestselling author Seanan McGuire.

https://www.amazon.com/Dusk-Dark-Dawn-Seanan-McGuire/dp/0765391422/

Neil Gaiman. Norse Mythology

Introducing an instant classic―master storyteller Neil Gaiman presents a dazzling version of the great Norse myths.

Neil Gaiman has long been inspired by ancient mythology in creating the fantastical realms of his fiction. Now he turns his attention back to the source, presenting a bravura rendition of the great northern tales.

In Norse Mythology, Gaiman stays true to the myths in envisioning the major Norse pantheon: Odin, the highest of the high, wise, daring, and cunning; Thor, Odin’s son, incredibly strong yet not the wisest of gods; and Loki―son of a giant―blood brother to Odin and a trickster and unsurpassable manipulator.

Gaiman fashions these primeval stories into a novelistic arc that begins with the genesis of the legendary nine worlds and delves into the exploits of deities, dwarfs, and giants. Once, when Thor’s hammer is stolen, Thor must disguise himself as a woman―difficult with his beard and huge appetite―to steal it back. More poignant is the tale in which the blood of Kvasir―the most sagacious of gods―is turned into a mead that infuses drinkers with poetry. The work culminates in Ragnarok, the twilight of the gods and rebirth of a new time and people.

Through Gaiman’s deft and witty prose emerge these gods with their fiercely competitive natures, their susceptibility to being duped and to duping others, and their tendency to let passion ignite their actions, making these long-ago myths breathe pungent life again.

https://www.amazon.com/Norse-Mythology-Neil-Gaiman/dp/039360909X/

Laura Anne Gilman. The Cold Eye (The Devil's West)

In the anticipated sequel to Silver on the Road, Isobel is riding circuit through the Territory as the Devil's Left Hand. But when she responds to a natural disaster, she learns the limits of her power and the growing danger of something mysterious that is threatening not just her life, but the whole Territory.

Isobel is the left hand of the old man of the Territory, the Boss—better known as the Devil. Along with her mentor, Gabriel, she is traveling circuit through Flood to represent the power of the Devil and uphold the agreement he made with the people to protect them. Here in the Territory, magic exists—sometimes wild and perilous.

But there is a growing danger in the bones of the land that is killing livestock, threatening souls, and weakening the power of magic. In the next installment of the Devil’s West series, Isobel and Gabriel are in over their heads as they find what’s happening and try to stop the people behind it before it unravels the Territory.

https://www.amazon.com/Cold-Eye-Devils-West/dp/148142971X/

Gail Carriger. Romancing the Inventor: A Supernatural Society Novella

A steampunk lesbian romance featuring a maid bent on seducing abrilliant cross-dressing scientist who's too brokenhearted to notice. Or is she?

Imogene Hale is a lowly parlourmaid with asoul-crushing secret. Seeking solace, she takes work at a local hive,only to fall desperately in love with the amazing lady inventor thevampires are keeping in the potting shed. Genevieve Lefoux is heartsick, lonely, and French. With culture, class, and the lady herself setagainst the match, can Imogene and her duster overcome all odds and winGenevieve's heart, or will the vampires suck both of them dry?

This is a stand-alone LBGTQ sweet romance set in Gail Carriger'sParasolverse, full of class prejudice, elusive equations, and paranormal creatures taking tea.

Delicate Sensibilities? This story contains women pleasing women and ladies who know what they want and pursue it, sometimes in exquisite detail

Supernatural Society novellas can be read in any order. Look for surpriseappearances from popular characters and the occasional strategicapplication of cognac.

https://www.amazon.com/Romancing-Inventor-Supernatural-Society-Novella/dp/1944751076/