Keith Brooke

2110. Earth is suffering major resource shortages, and the impact of climate change is peaking,with much of the planet’s equatorial regions turned to lifeless desert and populations displaced.Colonies have been established on Mars and the Moon, but these cannot hope to sustain any morethan a scant population of hundreds of citizens. Attention has turned to the need to discover an extra-solar colony world. European scientists, using discoveries made at CERN, have identified the means of creating awormhole in the space-time continuum, which would allow interstellar travel. However, to do sothey must first physically transport one end of the wormhole to where they want it to be, so settingup a wormhole will always rely on physical travel first of all. A ship is sent to Mu Arae, earth-like planet discovered 10 years before. It is a journey that willtake 80 years, the crew, who will eventually set up the wormhole on the planet, kept in suspendedanimation. But only a few years into the trip, catastrophe strikes and the ship blows up en route, killing allaboard. 2190, eighty years after the starship set out. Gordon Kemp is a detective working in the cold case department in London. Usually he works oncases closed ten, twenty-five years earlier. Now, however, he has been assigned a murderinvestigation closed, unsolved, over eighty years ago. What he unearths will change history andthreatens everything we know about what the powers that be have planned for Earth. The tragedythat befell the ship 80 years before is not what it seems and the past and the present are radicallydifferent to what everyone on Earth believes. We made the journey. Why has it been kept a secret?

Trace: a country where magic is dying out. A country at war with itself. A country where the prophecies of the Book of the World have started to come true. Bligh: a young foreigner, drawn irresistibly to the war in Trace. A man who has rejected religion, yet appears to be possessed by one of the six Lords Elemental. Bligh thinks he's going mad, but if he is then it's a madness shared by others... Gritty and passionate, Lord of Stone is the first fantasy novel from the acclaimed author of The Accord and Genetopia. 'Satisfying prose ... well realised and visualised characters ... powerful and vivid portrayal of the conditions of war.' -Eric Brown 'Keith Brooke's prose achieves a rare honesty and clarity, his characters always real people, his situations intriguing and often moving.' -Jeff VanderMeer

...AND THE LORD COMMANDED HER TO UNPLUG.For Katya Tatin, a passionate believer in and employee of the Holy Corporation of GenGen, the opportunity to join the mission to the recently rediscovered colony of Expatria is much more than a chance to spread the gospel. For her, it represents a break with the past on Earth, with the Consumer Wars and the subversives who seek to undermine the standing of the Holy Corporation itself. It offers a chance to reconfirm her faith.On Expatria itself, and on the ancient arkships that orbit the planet, the news of the impending arrival of a mission from Earth further complicates an already murderously complex web of religious and political intrigue. For some, it looks like salvation from a backward-looking, superstition-ridden society; for others, it looks suspiciously like an invasion."For Katya, a devout apparatchik of the Holy Corporation of GenGen, her voyage to newly colonised Expatria is a chance to confirm a faith that has been undermined by her rebellious brother. That subversion, though, has only just begun in a story that brilliantly shows a world in which religious belief is used to secular advantage--where creeds are implanted along with genes."(The Times)"I have to admit to being truly astonished that this book, which is a direct sequel to Expatria, is neither simply the second half of one long story nor is it a lazy reworking of the first in a slightly different form. What we have here is a first-class novel of character that just happens to be set on the same world and use some of the same characters as the first novel. Keith Brooke has achieved something quite rare, in that the characters who we first met and saw grow and change in the first novel we now encounter and, knowing where they are coming from, can watch and enjoy and see them grow and change anew when their society changes due to new and different pressures. The first novel was of pressures from within, this one is of pressure from without, and both explore the effects superbly."(Nexus)

MURDER? THAT WAS ONLY THE BEGINNING...The descendants of Expatria's first colonists from Earth have rejected technology. When Mathias Hanrahan, heir to the primacy of Newest Delhi, wants to reintroduce the old ways he is framed for his father's murder and forced to flee.Recruited by a research team which is trying to relearn the ancient technologies, he goes to work for them, and against a background of impending war, Mathias discovers that strange messages are coming from space."Book of the Month ... The mix of semi-pastoral life and scientific research is convincingly handled ... The underlying conflict between religion and science is finely wrought ... an absorbing piece of fiction. Highly recommended." (Gamesmaster International)"Books like this are proving that the British can write SF as good as any American... This is a marvellous book that, despite the sequel ... is a complete novel in itself. Treat yourself: buy both, and read them over and over." (Nexus)"Brooke lies somewhere between Peter Dickinson and Barrington J Bayley in his novels: he tells one story, concentrating on one set of characters, while great events go on around them that are almost peripheral to their lives, but he does it with intense concentration and understanding ... Brooke is an author well worth reading ... I hope some publisher over here makes him available to American audiences." (Locus)"...brought beautifully to life ... I enjoyed this book a great deal and will definitely buy the sequel." (Critical Wave)

"...a cyber-anti-war story. Or anti-cyber-war. Cyber-dove? Whatever. Lucius Shepard and Joe Haldeman bounced off Heinlein and Gibson." (Russell Letson, Locus) Jed Brindle is an alien. At least, that's what they call him on Earth. He's really a colony-bred soldier - augmented with cyborg implants - with the Extraterran Peacekeeping Force, fighting for control of what used to be the United States. When he and his squad are sent behind enemy lines on a kidnap operation, it isn't long before things start to go wrong. Marooned in the desert with two wounded comrades and his quarry, Jed's mission becomes not just a struggle for survival but also a journey to rediscover the quiet, reliable farm boy he was before he became a machine for killing. "...should be required reading for anyone who still subscribes to the popular, dangerous fantasy of the nobility of war." (Lisa Tuttle, Time Out) "This is a very fine debut novel ... Recommended both for the vision of the future and the excellent characterisation." (Paul Brazier, Nexus) "It has been several years since a first novel has grabbed me the way Keith Brooke's Keepers of the Peace did. It's a well-crafted, very personal look at the way war changes (and doesn't change) a kid from the sticks ... It is smooth, clean and elegant; a very straightforward book whose writing recalls the 1950s Heinlein, telling the tale without getting in the way." (Tom Whitmore, Locus) "Brooke balances action with introspection, the lyrical with a gritty documentary 'realism' in stark contrast to the usual shoot-'em-up adventure. Anyone who has thrilled to the exploits of lunar rebels or others among sf's doughty warriors should read Keepers of the Peace - as an antidote. It's a gripping story of challenge and skin-of-the-teeth survival, but it's also much more: an anti-war testament with a direct power that requires no preaching." (Faren Miller, Locus)

With his health failing, the great mage Donn has chosen to pass on his Talents to a new generation: an old era is drawing to a close, a new era about to begin. But with change comes instability. War looms and a rogue church leader threatens to set loose the wild powers of the First City. Donn's children must oppose this man but, also, they must contend with Donn himself: the old mage has not finished with his children yet. On the run from the religious repression of the mainland, Leeth Hamera joins a group of outcasts on the Serpent's Back, a continually changing island continent in the middle of a lava sea. Leeth has never lived up to the expectations of his wealthy merchant family and his only magical skill is the lowly Talent of bonding with animals. But, as he learns, the greatest Talents can sometimes be the slowest to emerge. The leader of the outcasts is Chi, son of Donn and the greatest healer of his generation. Chi is in exile for breaking the Embodied Church's edict against intervening in the natural order: many years ago Chi used his skills to revive his son from the dead. That son, Lachlan Pas, is now a church leader tortured by the guilty knowledge of what his father had to do to return him to life. When he learns Chi is still alive, he orders his execution, determined that his secret should never be exposed. Until now, Chi has been content to live in exile but now he knows that his son's insane and cruel rule must be stopped. Chi summons his half-siblings from throughout the inhabited lands of the Rift valley. The need for action is confirmed when one of them reveals that Lachlan and his mage, Oriole, are rebuilding the ancient city of Samhab - an act which will release the powers of the earth with unforeseeable consequences. Welcome to the magical island city of Zigan , endlessly adrift in the southern lava sea; the searing soda plains home of the Morani warriors; the impenetrable Zochi jungle, full of illusion and hidden hazard; the charmed fortress-like City of the Divine Wall; and Samhab, the fantastic First City of the True, built at the geographical centre of the Rift, where the magical powers of the earth rise up to be set free by the earth-charmers and mages. The novel's cast of shape-changers, earth-charmers, healers and illusionists must battle to save civilization from the evil rule of Lachlan Pas and his followers. For whoever controls the power of Samhab controls the future of the world. "Keith Brooke's prose achieves a rare honesty and clarity, his characters always real people, his situations intriguing and often moving." World Fantasy Award-winner Jeff VanderMeer "A progressive and skilful writer." Peter F Hamilton, author of the Night's Dawn trilogy "In the recognized front ranks of SF writers." Locus

"The stories in this collection are among the best science fiction. These are stories imbued with a rich intelligence and a deep sense of humanity. These are mature stories, tales of love and loss, of pleasure and pain. Cherish them." -- from the foreword by Stephen Baxter Parallax View showcases the previously unpublished novella 'In Transit', set in a future war-torn universe in which human expansion has come up against the implacable Kryte. Xeno-psychologist Abbott finds himself the guardian of a deadly Kryte on a mission to study it on his return to Earth. When they crash-land on the fortress planet of St Jerome, the Kryte prisoner turns the tables and takes Abbott into terrible custody. What follows is a terrifying journey across a hellish landscape towards a finale that might change the destiny of the Kryte and humanity, forever... Plus six other stories that examine the interface between human and alien - a parallax view from two of Britain's top science fiction writers, both shortlisted for the 2012 Philip K Dick Award. "Individually, Keith Brooke and Eric Brown purvey SF of the highest order: their stories have epic scope and a huge heart. The fusion of their talents is a sublime alchemy, a seamless pageant of humanity and wonder, eloquently expressed." --James Lovegrove "A stunning cluster of sf parables ... Brooke and Brown possess the world-building ability of Frank Herbert, the same capacity for extrapolation and black humour that marked Philip K Dick's work and a social conscience to rival that of Orwell's ...to view this book is to view science fiction at its very best." --Paul Kane, Terror Tales

Strange Divisions and Alien Territories explores the sub-genres of science fiction from the perspectives of a range of top SF authors. Combining a critical viewpoint with the exploration of the challenges and opportunities facing authors working in the field, contributors include Michael Swanwick, Catherine Asaro and Paul di Filippo.