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There was nothing on the island big enough to kill a man, yet each new day brought with it another bloody death, another mysterious disappearance.

The first hint of something wrong at the outpost was the plane. It crazily circled the little island, its cargo-bay doors open, its radio dead. It seemed to hang in the air for a moment and then it dived downward, levelled and dipped again. It made a belly landing on the runway with its wheels still retracted.

There was a singular, dead silence and then a shot rang out.

The crew of two and the seven passengers had vanished, the cargo was strewn about and the fuel tanks had been emptied. And the pilot, after landing, had blown his brains out…

Nicholas Van Rijn: Interstellar Merchant Prince one moment, barbarian chattel the next. Marooned half a world and an ocean away from the sole human outpost on a planet whose very water is poisonous to humans; captured by winged barbarians in the midst of a brutal war of extermination, somehow ‘Old Nick’ must scheme, conspire, wrangle and battle his way to survival.

From The SF Gateway, the most comprehensive digital library of classic SFF titles ever assembled, comes an ideal sample introduction to one of the giants of 20th century science fiction: Frank Herbert. Although best known for his award-winning Dune, Herbert’s other work is equally ambitious and accomplished. This omnibus contains three novels spanning some 20 years of Herbert’s career: The Dragon in the Sea, The Santaroga Barrier and The Dosadi Experiment.


THE DRAGON IN THE SEA
In the endless war between East and West, oil has become the ultimate prize. Nuclear-powered subtugs brave enemy waters to tap into hidden oil reserves. Psychologist John Ramsay has gone undercover aboard a Hell Diver subtug where, hunted relentlessly by the enemy, the crew find themselves isolated in a claustrophobic undersea prison, struggling for survival against the elements . . . and themselves.

THE SANTAROGA BARRIER
Santaroga seemed to be nothing more than a prosperous farm community. But there was something . . . different . . . about Santaroga. Maybe Santaroga was the last outpost of American individualism. Maybe they were just a bunch of religious kooks . . . Or maybe there was something extraordinary at work in Santaroga. Something far more disturbing than anyone could imagine.

THE DOSADI EXPERIMENT
Generations of a tormented human-alien people, caged on a toxic planet, conditioned by constant hunger and war – this is the Dosadi Experiment, and it has succeeded too well. For the Dosadi have bred for Vengeance as well as cunning, and they have learned how to pass through the shimmering God Wall to exact their dreadful revenge on the Universe that created them . . .

The humanoids, an ultra-mechanical race created by man, have pursued the last remnants of mankind to a remote galactic outpost. One man, a member of the planet’s ruling class, comes across a secret force that could be the only hope of defeating the machines.

Flinx and his amazing minidrag Pip are always finding themselves in the middle of danger and galactic intrigue. So Flinx is not too surprised when they happen upon a young woman unconscious upon a river bank, deep in the jungles of Alaspin. Nor is he particularly shocked to discover that she is a brilliant scientist, abducted from a remote outpost on inhospitable Longtunnel by a group of fanatic assassins.

Flinx can see no harm in returning Clarity – for that is her name – to her base before continuing on his way, although he is getting tired of having to sort out other people’s problems. He does have his own life to get on with.

However he is quite unprepared for the disturbing effect the beautiful Clarity has on him. And as he worries about this quite novel problem, the assassins are still at work. Stopping research at Longtunnel is their number one aim and they aim to kill anyone who gets in the way.

It is 700 years after the age of destruction and London is just a forest. Britain is no longer an independent state but a primitive outpost of the Euro-African Federation. All is not well at the settlement near Avebury. The native Britons do not like the new Britons who have ‘come home’ from Euro-Africa, dancing a bizarre, twenty-two-man cricket dance and singing an obscure song called ‘Landa Fope’.

After one of these immigrants takes a shot at the High Commissioner, Ali Pretorius, chaos breaks out, and it is left to a beautiful young woman, Thea, to restore peace and order . . .

Far out on the frozen outer limits of the thranx/humanx Commonwealth, on the permafrosted plant of Tran-ky-ky, lay the chilly trading outpost of Brass Monkey.

Inward bound on the interstellar transport Antares, Ethan Frome Fortune, space travelling salesman with a neat line in perfumes, jewelled knick-knacks and up market gadgetry, ran into grizzled, galactic hell raiser Skua September for the first time.

Kidnapped, knocked unconscious and crash landed – all quite accidentally – they were about to find out that life on the sub- zero wasteland was full of incident. Bored they would not be. Dead they might well be – particularly if Sagyanak, Chief of the nomadic Horde, could lay hands on them.

The great adventure has just begun and early retirement was not an option.

Just when it looked as if Ethan Fortune might be able to breathe a warm sigh of relief at getting away from the icy world of Tran-ky-ky, he was ordered to stay right where he was.

It seemed the scientists at the outpost of Brass Monkey had spotted something odd – an isolated and ominous atmosphere hot spot far to the south.

Only Ethan, along with the huge, hell-raising Skua September, had the local knowledge and the persuasiveness to get the Tran to mount an expedition. Only the giant icerigger Slanderscree could cope with the conditions.

Knowing you’re wanted may warm the cockles of the human heart but Ethan knew at once that the rest of him was going to be exposed to freezing cold, considerable danger and a whole lot more of the adventures that kept coming his way…

Pip and Flinx: Book Two.

Repler was a humanx-controlled planet, a minor outpost of the flourishing Commonwealth. It housed two of the most terrible threats ever to have faced the material universe.

First was the Vom. A vast mass of liquid blackness, it had waited half a million years to be discovered. The wait was over.

Second there was Bloodyhype, a killer drug with no known antidote. It caused instant addiction, followed by excruciatingly slow death.

Flinx was a sanitation engineer, strictly on the sidelines. But his role in the affairs of the planet soon took on a more ominous aspect.

Formula for revenge:
Take one high-spirited little boy.
Kill his family before his eyes.
Allow him to escape.
Give him time to grow up.
You’re in trouble.

They had slaughtered Earth’s colonists with impunity. Now they were going pay.

A hundred years in our future, the first expedition from Earth reaches Alpha Centauri only to discover a vast human empire, long-established and sternly ruled by the aristocratic High-born. In a stroke Earth becomes merely another primitive outpost, its people dubbed “wolflings” by the rulers of the Throne World. Painstakingly chosen and meticulously trained, Jim Keil was sent merely to observe conditions on the Throne World.

The High-born would consider him no more than a diversion until Keil cast away his orders from Earth and proved a Wolfling indeed.

The 22nd century, 150 years after the Dust War destroyed America’s Mid-West, and much else besides. California is a last outpost for survival and reclamation during a long epidemic of all-purpose despair.

The extraordinary cult of ‘Tumbonde,’ a former taxi driver its prophet and leader, predicts the imminent arrival on earth of ‘Gods’ from the stars. The movement grows daily.

Tom O’Bedlam, an apparent madman, prey since childhood to visions which seem to confirm ‘Tumbonde,’ goes even further. He can, he will, help others to make the Crossing. If the world doesn’t go too man too soon. If well-meaning ‘rationalists’ don’t lock him away . . .

Santaroga seemed to be nothing more than a prosperous farm community. But there was something . . . different . . . about Santaroga.

Santaroga had no juvenile delinquency, or any crime at all. Outsiders found no house for sale or rent in this valley, and no one ever moved out. No one bought cigarettes in Santaroga. No cheese, wine, beer or produce from outside the valley could be sold there. The list went on and on and grew stranger and stranger.

Maybe Santaroga was the last outpost of American individualism. Maybe they were just a bunch of religious kooks. . . .

Or maybe there was something extraordinary at work in Santaroga. Something far more disturbing than anyone could imagine.

A stunning work from the acclaimed author of Dune, the series which inspired the 2021 Denis Villeneuve epic film adaptation, Dune, starring Oscar Isaac, Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya and Josh Brolin.

Earthmen and Aleriona have met in space and neither side can afford to let the other get too strong. The Aleriona have captured the human outpost, New Europe, and claim that all the inhabitants were killed. The World Federation on Earth seems committed to peace at any price, but there are those, and ex-navy Captain Gunnar Heim is one of them, who know that appeasement will only lead to further Alerion encroachment, and he passionately believes that there must be a showdown now, before it is too late.

Heim and his crew of volunteers take off from Earth in the Star Fox and start to fit out for their hit-and-run battle.