FREE/BARGAIN — Science Fiction & Fantasy

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Quoth

The KU exclusive "contract" "mysteriously" doesn't apply to large publishers.

Yeah. It's slimy and wouldn't work if they weren't a near monopoly.

On the other hand, they got where they are in part due to failed collusion and incompetence from their competitors.

And it has been undeniably good for indie authors and those authors who got their rights reverted.

[Critteranne]

It's Read an Ebook Week at Smashwords, and there are a *lot* of SF and fantasy stories on sale. It's overwhelming. So I'm looking for suggestions from other readers. The bargains range from free to as much as 75% off. There are also deals on boxed sets.

Does anyone have recommendations from the Science Fiction or Fantasy category on Smashwords? I might be partial to space operas and to some military SF. In fantasy, I like it all, even the romantic ones. I also like swords & sorcery (and sometimes grimdark), but they don't have specific categories for those.

SF:
https://www.smashwords.com/shelves/promos/1213/any/any

Fantasy:
https://www.smashwords.com/shelves/promos/1206/any/any

[Critteranne]

I found one!

TTA Press is having a sale for Read an Ebook Week Bargains at Smashwords.

You can get issues of Interzone for 50% off (until March 9) -- $2.47 per issue, $4.87 for double issues.

This is the list sorted by newest:
https://www.smashwords.com/books/byseries/3071/newest

[cromag]

Originally Posted by Critteranne

It's Read an Ebook Week at Smashwords, and there are a *lot* of SF and fantasy stories on sale. It's overwhelming. So I'm looking for suggestions from other readers. The bargains range from free to as much as 75% off. There are also deals on boxed sets.

Does anyone have recommendations from the Science Fiction or Fantasy category on Smashwords? I might be partial to space operas and to some military SF. In fantasy, I like it all, even the romantic ones. I also like swords & sorcery (and sometimes grimdark), but they don't have specific categories for those.

SF:
https://www.smashwords.com/shelves/promos/1213/any/any

Fantasy:
https://www.smashwords.com/shelves/promos/1206/any/any

Mars: A Traveler's Guide, by Ruth Nestvold

Published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in January 2008, and nominated for the Nebula Award in 2009. I read it and enjoyed it a few years ago. It's "FREE" until the 9th.

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/45103

[salty-horse]

From the Horror thread:

Originally Posted by Critteranne

TTA Press is having a sale for Read an Ebook Week Bargains at Smashwords.

You can get issues of Black Static Magazine for 50% off (until March 9). Issues of Interzone are also half-priced.

https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/ttapress

Spin by Nina Allan is great. Excellent eerie vibes.
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/315557

In ancient Greece Arachne challenged the gods with her weaving skill so they turned her into a spider. Nina Allan's 'Spin' weaves Greek mythology, science fiction and alternate history into Layla Vargas' journey across an alternate modern Greece. Layla is a surrogate for Arachne so fate and destiny, powers of prophecy and possibly those gods are implicit in her story and those of people she meets.

[SomeSteve]

Three by Finney, an omnibus with three novels by Jack Finney (The Woodrow Wilson Dime, The Night People, and Marion's Wall) is $1.99 at Amazon US and Kobo US.

https://www.amazon.com/Three-Finney-.../dp/B00AK9IVPW

https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/three-by-finney

[Cactus Chef]

Some Andre Norton collections appear to be on sale today.

Witch World: High Hallack Cycle is $5.99, and includes The Jargoon Pard, Zarsthor's Bane, The Crystal Gryphon, Gryphon in Glory, and Horn Crown.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GQLD8TX

Along with that, The Magic Sequence Volume Two is also on sale $3.99, and includes Dragon Magic, Lavender-Green Magic, and Red Hart Magic.

I have not read any of Mrs. Norton's books, but I feel like I should. Maybe I will start with one of the free ones available from Kobo:
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/star-soldiers
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/time-traders

[salty-horse]

Activation Degradation by Marina J. Lostetter is $3 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
Getting a lot of comparisons to Murderbot, including in the blurb, but some say it's different enough.

A futuristic, standalone novel exploring sentience and artificial intelligence through the lenses of conflicted robot hero Unit Four.

When Unit Four—a biological soft robot built and stored high above the Jovian atmosphere—is activated for the first time, it’s in crisis mode. Aliens are attacking the Helium-3 mine it was created to oversee, and now its sole purpose is to defend Earth’s largest energy resource from the invaders in ship-to-ship combat.

But something’s wrong. Unit Four doesn’t feel quite right.

There are files in its databanks it can’t account for, unusual chemical combinations roaring through its pipes, and the primers it possesses on the aliens are suspiciously sparse. The robot is under orders to seek and destroy. That’s all it knows.

According to its handler, that’s all it needs to know.

Determined to fulfill its directives, Unit Four launches its ship and goes on the attack, but it has no idea it’s about to get caught in a downward spiral of misinformation, reprograming, and interstellar conflict.

Most robots are simple tools. Unit Four is well on its way to becoming something more....

[Martinoptic]

Originally Posted by cromag

Mars: A Traveler's Guide, by Ruth Nestvold

Published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in January 2008, and nominated for the Nebula Award in 2009. I read it and enjoyed it a few years ago. It's "FREE" until the 9th.

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/45103

Thanks. Got it now.

[pdurrant]

Free: A Q&A session with Penric and Desdemona

I do heartily recommend the Penric and Desdemona Novellas by Lois McMaster Bujold

[salty-horse]

Posted in non-fiction.
Becoming Superman: My Journey From Poverty to Hollywood
by J. Michael Straczynski is $3 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

In this dazzling memoir, the acclaimed writer behind Babylon 5, Sense8, Clint Eastwood’s Changeling and Marvel’s Thor reveals how the power of creativity and imagination enabled him to overcome the horrors of his youth and a dysfunctional family haunted by madness, murder and a terrible secret.

Joe's early life nearly defies belief. Raised by damaged adults—a con-man grandfather and a manipulative grandmother, a violent, drunken father and a mother who was repeatedly institutionalized—Joe grew up in abject poverty, living in slums and projects when not on the road, crisscrossing the country in his father’s desperate attempts to escape the consequences of his past.

To survive his abusive environment Joe found refuge in his beloved comics and his dreams, immersing himself in imaginary worlds populated by superheroes whose amazing powers allowed them to overcome any adversity. The deeper he read, the more he came to realize that he, too, had a superpower: the ability to tell stories and make everything come out the way he wanted it. But even as he found success, he could not escape a dark and shocking secret that hung over his family’s past, a violent truth that he uncovered over the course of decades involving mass murder.

Straczynski’s personal history has always been shrouded in mystery. Becoming Superman lays bare the facts of his life: a story of creation and darkness, hope and success, a larger-than-life villain and a little boy who became the hero of his own life. It is also a compelling behind-the-scenes look at some of the most successful TV series and movies recognized around the world.

[Gardenman]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Free: A Q&A session with Penric and Desdemona

I do heartily recommend the Penric and Desdemona Novellas by Lois McMaster Bujold

So do I. All of her works are very good

[salty-horse]

Up the Walls of the World by James Tiptree Jr. is $2 on Amazon.com

Up the Walls of the World is the 1978 debut novel of Alice Sheldon, who had built her reputation with the acclaimed short stories she published under the name James Tiptree Jr. A singular representation of American science fiction in its prime, Tiptree’s first novel expanded on the themes she addressed in her short fiction. “From telepathy to cosmology, from densely conceived psychological narrative to the broadest of sense-of-wonder revelations, the novel is something of a tour de force” (The Science Fiction Encyclopedia).

Known as the Destroyer, a self-aware leviathan roams through space gobbling up star systems. In its path is the planet Tyree, populated by telepathic wind-dwelling aliens who are facing extinction. Meanwhile on Earth, people burdened with psi powers are part of a secret military experiment run by a drug-addicted doctor struggling with his own grief. These vulnerable humans soon become the target of the Tyrenni, whose only hope of survival is to take over their bodies and minds—an unspeakable crime in any other period of the aliens’ history . . .

[pdurrant]

Moderator Notice
A spam post and comments on the post have been deleted

[theducks]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Free: A Q&A session with Penric and Desdemona

I do heartily recommend the Penric and Desdemona Novellas by Lois McMaster Bujold

A really big SECOND!