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Matthew Wade had been a coord, one of the mysterious chosen ones, who through the powers unknown to the rest of mankind, ruled over the known galaxy. But Wade fled the overwhelming responsibility of his exalted caste and went into hiding on the symb-socket circuit.

The symb-socketeers were the migrant workers of the galaxy. Traveling from planet to planet, they worked for play and played for a living. Matthew Wade adopted the freewheeling, ever-changing life hoping to evade the bailiffs of Altimus, the home planet of the cords, knowing that they would never rest until they had tracked down the renegade.

And then Wade took service on the plant of Ashramdrego, and was faced with the most important decision of his life – would he let an entire planet be destroyed rather than reveal his true identity?

The team from Earth had the task of raising backward planets to the home world’s high level. The situation on Rigel was this:

“The most advanced culture on Rigel’s first planet is to be compared to the Italian cities during Europe’s feudalistic yeas. The most advanced of the second planet is comparable to the Aztecs at the time of the Spanish conquest.”

“These planets are in your control to the extent that no small group has ever dominated millions before. No Caesar ever exerted the power that will be in your collective hands. For half a century, you will be as gods and goddesses!”

But the Rigelians were themselves descended from the lost colonists of old Earth and they could learn their lessons as fast as they could be taught.

In fact, they could even teach their teachers a thing or two. And therein lay the peril the professors from space never dreamed of.

Colonising a new planet requires much more than just settling on a newly discovered island of Old Earth. New planets were different in thousands of ways, different from Earth and from each other. Any of those differences could mean death and disaster to a human settlement.

When a ship filled with refugees from a cosmic catastrophe crash-landed on such an unmapped world, their outlook was precarious. Their ship was lost, salvage had been minor, and everything came to depend on one bright young man accidentally among them.

He was a trainee planet-builder. It would have been his job to foresee all the problems necessary to set up a safe home for humanity. But the problem was that he was a mere student – and he had been studying the wrong planet.




(First published 1974)

When a team of scientists starts to investigate the flora and fauna of the distant planet of Xica, it soon becomes apparent that this is a unique opportunity to study alien life forms. The planet offers a rich and varied eco-system and each of the scientists recognises what this could mean for their individual reputations.
And then, their dreams come true – they establish first contact with a humanoid civilization.
But this is a planet where nature breaks all the rules, where logic falls apart, and where nothing is as it seems. And their dreams turn into a nightmare.

In the Room of the Seven Doors, Carson Napier faced the choice of his life. Six doors led to terrible deaths – the seventh was the door of life. But for him, this door too would lead only to the new dangers of a planet whose beasts were more frightful than those of his native Earth.


But Carson sought the rescue of the planet’s fairest princess, and even though he stepped from one danger to meet another, he was determined to make good an Earthman’s pledge.

Conn, the son of a melon planter on the planet Poictesme, returns home after five years on Earth, studying.

And spying.

The planet had been used as a military staging point during the last interstellar war between the Federation and the System States Alliance, and somewhere among the leftover war debris on the planet is rumored to be the supercomputer that won the war.

Many believe that this supercomputer can provide the answers to lift Poictesme out of economic stagnation and make it a prosperous place again. Conn has been gathering information just for this purpose – the search is on…

Time drifted onto the ruin of the Galactic Federation. The centuries rolled over the wars of the first part of the new millennium, laying their patina of forgetfulness over the adventures of the survivors of the expedition to the Forever Planet. Only in the memory banks of lost and ruined computers was there a record of the withering piece of time, hung in its weird universe, poised in a matrix of forever, which had waited eons to release its makers from their imprisonment on a planet which was their plaything, workshop, laboratory and engine.

No one returned to the planet of the Timepivot.

Not of his own volition.

When Morgan Chane and his comrades of John Dilullo’s interstellar mercenaries invaded the Close World of Arkuu in search of a lost Terran expedition, they found a planet of strange menace. Incredibly powerful monsters prowled though Arkuu’s dense jungles, and the ghosts of the planet’s past haunted its ancient deserted cities. The Arkuuns themselves fought grimly to drive the Terrans away. But at last Chane discovered the Free-Faring, the terrible alien secret of Arkuu..and suddenly he knew why no Terran had left the Closed Worlds alive.

The Riddle of Enigma

Years of exacting study were coming to an end. All five student scientists, each the best its species had to offer, were one step away from their final degrees. One examination remained: the students were to determine why the tiny planet of Enigma, a planet with so little mass that it should never have had an atmosphere, in fact it did.

Everything seemed to be running smoothly until the only Human member of the team, Molly was accidentally blown into one of the deep fissures that pocked the planet’s surface.

She found herself trapped in a series of tunnels and caves that only led her deeper into the riddle that was at the heart of Enigma. But as her concerned companions followed her, they found Enigma’s most puzzling anomaly. For in the dark passages they discovered life – life which couldn’t possibly exist.

This sequel to “Araminta Station”, features the character of Glawen Clattuc, who helped save the unique planet Cadwal. The charter that granted Cadwal conservation has disappeared – and Glawen and Wayness Tamm are sent across a variety of planets to try and retrieve it.

Masters of Everon, announces the brass plate on the door of the original Everon colonists’ corporate headquarters. But somehow Everon resisted all their efforts; it was as if the planet itself fought against human efforts to establish a foothold. Some settlers want to return the favour, wrecking Everon’s ecology in revenge, but Jef Roboni loves the great cat-like maolots of Everon, and the planet itself; he believes that settlers and planet can coexist.

Now time is running out – and even the hints that Jef has uncovered are not enough to prepare him for the incomprehensible strangeness and wonder of the true Masters of Everon.

Earl Dumarest, trans-galactic soldier of fortune, is still seeking his birthplace, the fabled planet Earth.

On the distant, decadent planet Dradea, he meets the mysterious, mutant woman Veruchia. She selected him from the gladiators’ arena to become her servant. . . and more.

Soon, Dumarest discovers that she too is engaged in a quest – and that the fate of her planet hangs in the balance. Fascinated, compelled, he agrees to help her.

But then he must face bizarre perils which make the gladiatorial arena seem a haven of safety. . .



(First published 1973)

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.

It was Thane who crossed the abyss of the ages and stood on the very brink of Eternity…who found the secret of the Time Treasure… who saw, and laughed and came back sane from that place beyond the Universe where no man had ever been before him, and where none should ever come again.

This was the ending. But the beginning was in the city of Zotheera on the planet Daikoon…

A restless outworlder was Thane of the Two Swords. A man of blood and steel, a man of strange powers strangely acquired. The warrior Thane possessed a secret vital to the greedy Princes of the Planets. And it was on the planet Daikoon that the princes tried to buy Thane’s services…

Muphormosy, a disease not unlike leprosy, has ravaged the first settlers on the planet Tezcatl. Generations later, their similarly emaciated descendants live in a compound where they are isolated from the planet’s normal inhabitants. The new kommissar of the compound, Lucian Yeardance, cares for his charges and alleviates their suffering with the narcotic heartsease. despite the open revulsion the normal inhabitants show for the maimed men and women, Luican determines to find out what the dread disease really is. Still, he is unprepared for the appalling discovery he makes: except for the open lesions and missing limbs and digits, not one of the muphormers shows a sign of any disease.

Terran Corps scattered their ships outward into the glittering galaxies. Solterra’s prime objective: orbital reconstruction of the far-flung planets. They had tightened up Solterra’s galaxy and had made mankind secure against alien threats – or so Terrans believed.

As Chief Commander, Stephen Strang aggressively explored the cosmos for the glory of his beloved Earth. He could boast that he had moved more planets into orbit around Sol than any other. Strang felt smugly safe against alien “sharks” – until he discovered the vast time-bomb that was planet Vesta’s core. . .

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!

In a galactic culture that extends from quasi-utopian worlds like New Alexandria to the vermin-infested slums of Old Earth, the Star-Pilots are the great heroes of the day, and Grainger has become a legend in his own time. Pharos is paradise – or so it appears. But the champions of commerce want to package and sell the planet, and the conservationists want to stop them. Grainger’s employer, Titus Charlot, is enlisted to negotiate a settlement, but the game is rigged. Charlot needs the Star-Pilot’s help, but there seems to be nothing he can do – until the planet’s ecosystem takes a hand, and “paradise” suddenly turns deadly!

When the starship Meteor crash-landed on a strange world orbiting a solitary sun in the vast darkness outside the galaxy, her crew of Earthmen had no idea of what to expect. The planet was Earthlike in gravity, air, animal and vegetable life – but what of the native races they glimpsed from a distance?

What kind of culture would evolve on a planet whose sky was dominated by the glow of an entire galaxy – and with no other stars save its own dim sun? What kind of gods would they worship?

The Earthmen had to find the astounding answers to these questions on a planet split by a world-wide war.

Earth was a planet of incompetents, but Simmons was the greatest loser of all. It seemed as if the powers of the Universe were concentrated on grinding his small soul into ultimate insignificance – until the aliens came. To them, Simmons was the most important human on the planet – for only through his mind could they overcome this world.

All the known planets had been conquered and colonized. Pluto was the last – as far as man could go into space. Beyond the frozen planet lay an immeasurable gulf of light years which no man could cross in a single lifetime. But one man kept trying to find the answer.

PLANET OF SAND: A world literally bald, completely covered by sand and devoid of life – or so the stranded spaceman thought until he saw the huge menacing girders whose origin and purpose he could not begin to fathom.

WHITE SPOT: A gold locket containing a picture of a girl, found in millennia-old ruins on a planet some hundreds of light-years from Earth, threatens the existence of the entire human race.

SECOND LANDING: A lost space team lands on a deserted planet, entirely unprepared for the strange world’s one citizen; a great white amoeboid monster, hiding in wait to wreak its fury on any intruders.

Earl Dumarest still seeks the mythical planet Earth . . . still roams alien and violent worlds. With him goes Mayenne, whose songs create joy and passion – or forgetfulness.

Together they are cast up on Tormyle, a planet from another galaxy; a planet unique throughout the Universe. For Tormyle is sentient – the most powerful intelligence in the Cosmos, constantly recreating itself.

Tormyle can be Paradise or Hell. Tormyle can manifest as a dragon or a knight on horseback, faceless behind the helmet. Tormyle understands nothing of humanity, of men and women, of emotion. And Tormyle will let no-one escape who cannot answer the unanswerable.




(First published 1973)

Twenty-four years have passed since Toller Maraquine led the population of Land to the sister planet of Overland. Somehow, those left behind have become immune to the deadly pterthacosis which caused the exodus, and their voracious ruler now lays claim to Overland.

Grudgingly put in charge of his planet’s defence, Toller designs a front-line force of spaceships and satellites made of wood, which will engage the enemy fleet in the cold vastness of space, before the invaders can set food upon Overland. As the war proceeds, a far more deadly, alien menace makes itself known, which will threaten the entire existence of Overland.