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World War II veteran Edward Bond’s recuperation from a disastrous fighter plane crash takes a distinct turn for the weird when he encounters a giant wolf, a red witch, and the undeniable power of the need-fire, a portal to a world of magic and swordplay at once terribly new and hauntingly familiar. In the Dark World, Bond opposes the machinations of the dread lord Ganelon and his terrible retinue of werewolves, wizards, and witches, but all is not as it seems in this shadowy mirror of the real world, and Bond discovers that a part of him feels more at home here than he ever has on Earth.

The opening of The Fugitive Worlds finds Toller Maraquine II – grandson of the hero of The Ragged Astronauts and The Wooden Spaceships – bemoaning the fact that life on the twin planets of Land and Overland has become dull and uneventful compared to the stirring times in which his illustrious forebear lived. Then, while on a balloon flight between the worlds, he makes an astonishing discovery – a rapidly growing crystal disc, many miles across, is creating a barrier between Land and Overland. Precipitated for personal reasons into investigating the enigmatic disc, Toller – armed with only his sword and boundless courage – becomes a pivotal figure in events which will decide the future of entire planets and their civilizations.

Thorinn went down. He had little choice, since his own father had hurled him into a well.

Yet the world was shifting in those days, and Thorinn was to go deeper than his father had ever dreamed; destined to discover strange worlds within worlds, to meet beasts undreamed of, and to discover that which few of us are permitted to know:

His Own True Name.

Rafe Harald, a cosmonaut, attempts to combat the mysterious power that has put most of the human race into an involuntary sleep . . .

There had to be a reason why that isolated human colony had been able to survive mankind’s implacable enemies. But nobody had been able to get to the quaintly named Dunroamin to find out.

If they had a secret defence, it could be the answer to a hundred planets’ prayers. And Feliz Gebrod realized as he came in for a crash landing that he’d know the secret sooner than he’d expected.

Except that what he encountered was a life-and-death riddle that had nothing to do with stellar defence. It was this: how can two mutually irreconcilable Utopias occupy the same space at the same time?

Over twelve generations the descendents of a space crash on a world completely covered in water had managed to adapt to their marine culture. Living in villages built on giant clumps of sea plants, they survived on the flora and fauna of the sea. But they have always been at the mercy of the kragen – gigantic squid-like monsters that prey on their fish flocks, and on them. The biggest of these is King Kragen, with whom the colonists can communicate, who has to be appeased. But one man has had enough of a life of slavery and sacrifice. But how can he convince his fellow men that King Kragen must be killed? And how can that be achieved in a world without weapons?

The Cradle was the starting point of the strange alien race that had colonised the galaxy while Man was still a cell floating in a warm primeval sea, From here must have surged the expanding tide of life that had built the enigmatic ruins, the constructions of rare and priceless materials. Beings who had left their mark for the new and curious race of Man to stare at, and to wonder at the mystery of the Cradle-the golden hoard of undreamed wealth for the first men to discover it.

To Rex Tendris and his two friends came the coordinates that could lead them to the legendary treasure. They set out on a voyage to find it-but it was a voyage into hell!

Atomic war! Men had started the war, overriding the desires of their women and plunging the world into an orgy of destruction. Finally, when the vast armies of men had finally been shattered, women took over as rulers.

Under successive Matriarchs, the world was slowly recovering, diverting the vast war potential to peaceful purposes. To keep the world free of war, the Matriarch employed official assassins under the chief of Security Police. It was felt that the death of one person was an acceptable price to preserve the lives of many. But when the Matriarch ordered the assassination of Don Burgarde, an apparently harmless young man, her personal secretary, Lyra, decided to intervene.

The seeds of rebellion had been sown…

From Turkish dominated Europe, across the high seas to the land of opportunity – the Aztec Empire. Dan Beauchamp is a young Englishman whose heart longs for fortune and adventure. But industrial Mexico is a long way from primitive Britain, and Dan has a lot to learn. From the city of London – better known as New Istanbul – to the untamed wilderness of North America here is a high adventure not to be missed.

The year is 2381. The place is Urban Monad 116 of the constellation Chippitts. The population of this one-thousand storey super-structure is 800,000+ and always growing. After two centuries of ruthless, selective breeding, the essence of life is to be blessworthy and to multiply; to afford one’s neighbours any type of sexual fulfilment and, above all, to avoid the evil of frustration.

But, within this seemingly blissful vertical world there are individuals who feel such perverse desires as a longing for privacy, a wish to descend from the heights, to walk on earth and bask in the sunshine. These rebel throwbacks to an earlier Earth are dangerous, disruptive elements. And they must be destroyed – if they do not destroy themselves first . . .

Something is rotten in tomorrow’s computer world¿

The time is in the not-too-distant future. Physical work is done by robot devices. Men and women are endowed at birth with a sum of credit called Inalienable Basic. Everyone operates with a Universal Credit Card – which is also identification, police record, medical record, and many other things. Every detail of life in the United States of the Americas is stored in the International Data Center, located in Denver.

Paul Kosloff, a language teacher who lectures over National Tri-Vision is rescued from a mysterious assault by a secret agent of the authorities who insists that only he, Kosloff, can prevent the International Data Center from being destroyed – and every living being’s data wiped out.

Kosloff goes forth – into a maelstrom of plot and counter-plot, murder, treason – and worse¿

MILK RUN.

That’s what they told Ronny Bronston this job would be. “Just like a vacation,” his boss had said. All he and the giant Dorn Horsten would have to do is visit the planet Einstein and see if there was any reason not to admit them to United Planets.

The planet was a paradise, where the people had bred themselves for intelligence and beauty, where everyone was completely free. Free, sometimes, to get into more trouble than they could handle.

Only Ronny could get them out of that trouble; and that’s how he wound up on Dawnworld, in a gladiator’s arena!

Jonathan Herovit is a science fiction writer in a state of deep personal and professional crisis. Whilst struggling to deal with his wife’s post-partum depression, his own alcoholism and a long-overdue novel that he has no motivation to write, the pseudonym under which he writes begins talking to him…

Out of nowhere came the grim, cold, black-clad men, to kidnap three Earth people and carry them to a weird and terrible world where a man could be a giant at will.

‘Suddenly out of the darkness, out of the night, there swooped something with a swish like an aeroplane. The whole group of us were covered for an instant by a canopy of leathery wings, and I had a momentary vision of a long, snake-like neck, a fierce, red, greedy eye, and a great snapping beak, filled, to my amazement, with little, gleaming teeth.’

Desperate for adventure, journalist Ed Malone joins a scientific expedition to the South American jungle led by the larger than life figure of Professor Challenger. But you should be careful what you wish for. After climbing to the summit of a mysterious plateau in the Amazon rainforest the explorers find themselves trapped in a world lost in time, inhabited by carnivorous dinosaurs, giant fish-lizards and murderous ape-men.

Arthur Conan Doyle’s thrilling tale of adventure and crypto-zoology became a template for an industry of creature features that came in its wake.

‘TWAS BORING IN ARTESIA

…or so thought Sir Lafayette O’Leary, ex-craftsman from Earth, and now seemingly ex-interdimensional swashbuckler extraordinaire as well. His battles were all won, his dragons all slain and life was just the same boring round of riches, royal hunts and regatas. Boring, boring, boring; until he walked past the azalia…

Suddenly Artesia was gone, and O’Leary was trapped in Melange, a world of giants and pirates, karate-chopping hags and electronic flying carpets, a world where goons and harlots are the spitting images (literally!) of his own aristocratic Artesian associates. And because they think he’s his double, lots of his new friends want O’Leary dead.

Unless he can get through the interdimensional gate and find the continuum path back home, O’Leary’s life will never be boring again. Just short.

An American diplomat, trapped in a world he never made…

At first Brion Bayard was relieved to discover that his kidnappers were very apologetic and very British. Then he learned that they were not from Earth…

Pel Brown has troubles in his basement. But it’s not water leaking in – it’s magic. Sword-carrying barbarians are spilling through, demanding that Pel help them defeat Shadow, a dark force taking over their world.

Meanwhile, on the other side of town, a spaceship has crashed in Amy Jewell’s backyard, and the aliens want Amy’s help against the Shadow seeking to conquer their world. When Pel and Amy go through the basement portal into the world of magic, the Shadow attacks and traps them inside.

Now Pel and Amy find themselves entangled in escapades that will make them into heroes … or corpses.

Because he was bored with life on a world that had become a museum, Paul Hilder answered a mysterious advertisement, and found himself plunged into a life that was different, dangerous and far from boring.

This is the story of an Earth that existed alongside the one that Paul Hilder knew, and with which he became so involved that the bitter struggle waged on one world threatened to encroach on the other.

And it is the story of Ruth, daughter of the powerful Controller Orstey, and her longing for a peace and happiness that did not exist in her own space and time – a peace she tried to find by passing through the cosmic junction of THE ECHOING WORLDS.

Humanity played with fire once too often. It was atomic fire and its ravages produced an almost complete annihilation, but there were survivors. The radiations had not been entirely malevolent in their influence. Genes and chromosomes danced like dervishes in the gamma bombardments, and settled back into fantastic new patterns. God-like beings strode proudly athwart the devastation. Half-human demons lurked in the shadowy ruins. The twilight of humanity faded into a new heroic epoch, behind which the forbidden secrets of the ancient atom gods bided their time…

Everything was ordinary. Men worked in factories and fields. Women were shopping. Children were at school. Then came the four-minute warning. Wires hummed madly between heads of governments. Just before the massive retaliation went into the air the world realised that no-one had despatched the first rocket.

The retaliation was checked with seconds to spare. Experts examined the ruined city. There was something else besides radiation. Deadly bacteria from an unknown source spread across the planet. More alien bombs followed the first. But there was no real pattern in the attacks, if they were genuine attacks.

At last the detectors found the alien ships. They were fighting among themselves and earth was the battle-area. Could the remnants of humanity interfere? What would be the result if they did?

Anzar was known as a crazy eccentric scientist. Nobody paid much attention to his weird pseudo -scientific experiments. When unexplained accidents started to happen around his derelict house it took a young I.P.F lieutenant named Cameron to find out what was going on… Then Cameron vanished.

The I.P.F sent another man after Cameron, he went too. That started the full scale attack; an attack that was repulsed before it started. Anzar was ready.

Maybe Anzar wasn’t crazy? Maybe Anzar was the outstanding scientific genius of the 22nd century? What strange power did his yellow mist possess? What became of the men who got caught in it? As Cameron blacked out he wondered whether there was flesh and blood behind the metal . . .

Above all, what mystery lay locked in the great steel cylinder?

Brant was a scientist, a space scientist. He had techniques and technologies at his fingertips that would have looked like magic to the old timers of the twentieth century.
There were new sciences that hadn’t been heard of a century before. Things like Teleportology and Psycholithography. The specialised departmental scientists were narrow field experts in spheres of work that a twentieth century man wouldn’t even have begun to comprehend.
Science had the answer to most things, but there was a new world out through the Hyperdrive Lanes, a world of mystery on the edge of the universe. It was inhabited by ebony skinned humanoids, with proud noble chieftains and weird La-akas or medicine men.
Brant and his crew scoffed at first. “Primitive magic and superstition” laughed the scientists. Then the La-akas did things that science couldn’t’ explain. Things like controlling nature.
Brant and his men began to investigate the age of the culture. It wasn’t primitive, it was old…. thousands of years older than Earth…. And it throbbed with terrible danger.

Krells never set out to be a hero. He was the first to admit he was a trader. “In it for the money; I leave thinking to the experts.” But the experts couldn’t solve the problem of Ralcor IX.

Professional fighters and scientific investigators vanished or were mysteriously destroyed. The robot might of an armoured Bellicose 35 was found shredded like tinsel. Krells still refused to think of himself as hero material – but he wouldn’t quit. Martia, his computer girl, and Galor, the despatch man, stayed with him. For some reason the power that had driven every other terrestrial humanoid off Ralcor IX couldn’t dislodge the traders. Krells groped desperately for a reason. Finding one meant the return of his own people and that meant money. Something he couldn’t understand was shielding him from the Unknown Menace. Suppose he accidentally stopped doing whatever it was that protected him…?

Most people would have become neurotic and quit – not Krells. He didn’t seem to have enough intelligence or imagination to know when to worry.