New Releases (7)

The Icarus Twin

The Icarus Twin

Gregory Roarke and his partner Selene are on the hunt for portals created by a long-vanished alien race—portals that can teleport a person thousands of light-years in the blink of an eye. But the alien Patth are also searching for such portals, and they have resources and ruthlessness far beyond anything Roarke and Selene can match.

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Light of the Veil

Light of the Veil

Once a poor dock rat on a backwater planet, Jayce Artan finds himself thrust into an ongoing war between Good and Evil. He must journey into another realm to lay claim to a stone of immense power. Along the way, he himself must take up the mantle of a Paragon. But the forces of darkness are arrayed against him.

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Protected Species

Protected Species

Caine Riordan and his self-styled “Crewe” must do more than merely survive on the planet Bactradgaria. The wildly ferocious x’qao pose a threat that must be dealt with. To do that, humans must claw higher up the food chain . . . or else tumble off into extinction.

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Threading the Needle

Threading the Needle

Talia Merrit came to Gōruden to leave behind her past. But she soon finds herself thrust into the start of another conflict. With the fate of a planet and her own peace of mind hanging in the balance, Talia must decide whether or not to once again take up the mantle of Death’s Handmaiden.

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Haunted by the Past

Haunted by the Past

When a man goes missing in an old country manor house turned hotel, the world’s foremost supernatural detective and his partner are called in to solve a case that threatens to bring a dark past into the light of the present—with terrifying results.

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Summer's End

Summer's End

Fresh out of college, Ship Engineer 3rd-Class Dave Walker is forced to take a berth on an old tramp freighter plying the routes that the corporations ignore and visiting the kinds of places that the folks on Earth pretend don’t exist. Between the assassins, the criminals, and the pirates, Dave discovers that there are a lot of things out there that he still needs to learn.

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Worlds Long Lost

Worlds Long Lost

We were not alone. The farther we push into the universe, the more obvious it becomes. The signs are everywhere: canals and pyramids on Mars, roads on the moons of Jupiter, ruined cities on worlds about the nearer stars. The galaxy once teemed with life, or so it seems. Which begs the question: What happened to it all?

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Electronic Advance Reader Copies

Beggar's Sky - eARC

Beggar's Sky - eARC

Igbal Renz is one of the Four Horsemen—trillionaires who have successfully privatized the space industry in Earth’s solar system. Now, Renz has constructed a starship capable of making the twenty-year journey to Alpha Centauri. So why is he stopping at barely one-tenth that distance, with a cargo of a hundred frozen scientists and diplomats?

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An Angel Called Peterbilt - eARC

An Angel Called Peterbilt - eARC

Michael and Melanie Anderle are hauling a tanker full of oil with their Peterbilt eighteen-wheeler when they’re struck by a temporal irregularity that sends them, the truck, and their daughter back in time a thousand years.

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Beyond Enemies - eARC

Beyond Enemies - eARC

Talinn Reaze and Bee serve as “Breezy,” part of the United Colonial Force’s elite Artificial Intelligence Troops. Exceeding expectations to become one of the premier heavy tanks, they lead assaults on several fronts of the long war against the Interstellar Defense Corps. But, when they’re thrown to a backwater base without cause, boredom becomes their main enemy—until the world falls out from under their treads . . .

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Down These Mean Streets - eARC

Down These Mean Streets - eARC

New science fiction and fantasy stories with a hardboiled noir twist—focusing on the mean streets of the city. Stories by Larry Correia, Laurell K. Hamilton, Steve Diamond, Mike Massa, and more.

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Among the Gray Lords - eARC

Among the Gray Lords - eARC

An encounter with an old friend becomes tragically fatal, and Indrajit and Fix set out on a high-stakes quest across the ancient city of Kish to bring their friend back to life. Can the heroes save their friend? Can Indrajit and Fix survive? Will Kish itself fall?

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Weird World War: China - eARC

Weird World War: China - eARC

Glimpses of the war that might be between two superpowers—with some supernatural twists. Stories by Larry Correia, David Drake, Brian Trent, Martin L. Shoemaker, Kevin Ikenberry, Brad R. Torgersen, T.C. McCarthy, and more.

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Announcements

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

Announcements

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

This is a scrolling content area for announcements about press releases, price changes, etc (Baen will provide and update these announcements)

December Contest

Light of the Veil Giveaway

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Baen Free Radio Hour

Howard Andrew Jones and Monalisa Foster discuss the career and legacy of the Grand Dame of Space Opera, Leigh Brackett; and Tinker by Wen Spencer, Part 29

For the audio-only podcast click here

For the video podcast click here

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Study Guides

A new teacher guide is available for 1637: The Peacock Throne

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Baen's Bar

Talk about Baen books with other Barflies!

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Young Adult

This is a list of books published by Baen deemed to be appropriate for young adults.

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This Month’s Bundle

Only 24 days left to buy W202401 January 2024 Monthly Baen Bundle!

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Talia Merritt, protagonist of Monalisa Foster’s Threading the Needle, is a badass woman by any standard. As such, she joins a long line of Baen female characters who kick butt and take names. To welcome Talia (and her creator Monalisa Foster) to the Baen family, we’re offering discounts on Baen back catalog titles featuring strong women.


Details here

Monalisa Foster's writing career really began when she taught herself English by reading and translating Heinlein juveniles at the public library. She's self-published works in her Ravages of Honor space opera series. Her short stories have been published in Fantastic Hope, The Founder Effect, World Breakers, Robosoldiers, and The Ross 248 Project.

Monalisa graduated with dreams of becoming an astrophysicist. Instead she ended up in engineering and medicine.

“Relics” is set in the world of her Baen Books debut novel Threading the Needle.


Relics

Monalisa Foster

AIs don’t go rogue. Everybody knows it. Especially SAIs. Which never really made sense to me. They’re supposed to be people just like you and me, and people—flesh and blood humans such as yours truly—are sapient and we go rogue all the time.

But you never know.

Digital citizens were one of the first truly sapient AIs. Who knows what happens after a couple of centuries of rattling around, especially when you’ve been designed and built as an anachronism to begin with. Maybe they can’t handle change. If there’s one thing that the last three centuries have proven it’s that some people just can’t handle the world as it is, so why wouldn’t “digital citizens” lose it and go rogue?

To be honest, I was surprised to find out that these digital fossils were still around, although with the rise of Nostalgism, maybe I shouldn’t have been. The Commonwealth tolerated the movement because it helped move the, shall we say less-than-desirable, off-world. That much I knew.

A leggy brunette with doe eyes, ruby-red lips, and an hourglass figure—some things remain classics even in this screwed-up century—led me into a wood-paneled office and “He’ll be right with you Mr. Elliott,” rolled off her tongue with a distinctive twentieth-century lilt.

Given that this was a museum, her accent and the throwback design of the office shouldn’t have surprised me, although I’d figured the front—a replica of the historical Grumman Theatre—had been strictly for show and expected the back to be, well, a little bit more twenty-fourth century.

The desk was wood, the chair leather, and what had to be a mid-twentieth century television set complete with antennae was tucked neatly into a corner. No computers, no tablets, no holographic interfaces of any kind, at least not that I could see. Two couches fronted the desk, facing each other across a low table—also wood. A couple of books, huge ones, held it down, their covers sporting images from a cinematic golden age almost five centuries gone.

I picked up the top volume only to find that while indeed it was made of paper, the pages were blank.

“You’ll find us in compliance with the law.”

Setting the book back down, I turned toward the commanding voice. Like the human who’d shown me in, the SAI in the doorway wore twentieth-century attire—in his case, a suit and tie. It looked a bit odd on his tall and broad but clearly synthetic frame.

The pixelated membrane that covered the android skeleton mimicked human skin to an uncanny degree, one that immediately gave me chills. The face too did a remarkable job of emulating skin and coloring, placed as it was over a bone structure that must have been true to the original human—strong but not overpowering jaw, slightly curved nose, steely blue eyes. I’d seen images of SAIs of course, but never met one. It was the eyes that gave them away. They weren’t orbs inside sockets and didn’t move as such.

“I’m not a cop anymore,” I said a bit defensively, I don’t know why.

“But you are still required to report violations, are you not?”

A smirk found its way onto my face before I could stop it. “I don’t make it a practice to inform on my clients. Tarnished I might be, but not that much.”

He gave me a skeptical look and extended his hand. “Call me Chuck. I insist.”

What a throw-back custom.

Awkwardly, I shook his hand. Room-temperature like a corpse. While it emulated skin right down to the veins and calluses on his hand, there was no accompanying texture. Images of hairs were overlaid over images of veins. The calluses were as smooth as you’d expect a pixelated surface to be. Ironic, no? He was an image on a screen, just as he must have been when his original had been alive.

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Jim Beall (BS-Math, MBA, PE) has been a nuclear engineer for over forty years, a war gamer for over fifty, and an avid reader of science fiction for even longer. His experience in nuclear engineering and power systems began as a naval officer. Experience after the USN includes design, construction, inspection, enforcement, and assessment with a nuclear utility, an architect engineering firm, and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (USNRC).

The term “Artificial Intelligence” (AI) was coined by mathematician and computer scientist John McCarthy at a 1956 Dartmouth conference now deemed to be the birthplace of AI as a field of science, but the idea goes back nearly three millennia!

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Finalists exemplify the best of near-future, forward-thinking science fiction. Annual contest marks 16 years of highlighting bright futures and rising talent.

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Baen Books has signed a contract with author Christopher Ruocchio to publish the final two books in his internationally award-winning Sun Eater series, as well as for a first look deal for Ruocchio’s next series.

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We’re happy to announce an easier way to deliver our Ebooks directly from Baen.com to your favorite Ereader. You can now email EPUB files directly to your device from our site—no download necessary!

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Baen to publish new science fiction novels from authors Monalisa Foster and Marisa Wolf

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Lucille Robbins, Eric Flint’s widow and heir, in conjunction with Baen Books would like to announce the forthcoming titles from Eric Flint.

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Baen to publish sword and sorcery series The Chronicles of Hanuvar, with first book in August 2023

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Baen Books formally announced this year’s finalists for the Baen Fantasy Adventure Award earlier this month.

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It is with a heavy heart that we share the news that Eric Flint has passed away. We were proud to publish Eric’s first novel, Mother of Demons, in 1997, and to continue publishing his many worlds, including the best-selling Ring of Fire series that started with 1632.

There are several of Eric’s works already delivered and on the schedule. Eric was a tireless collaborator, and readers can also expect more of his works to be released with Eric’s designated collaborators in the future.

We will be celebrating Eric and his works on the Baen Free Radio Hour this week and the following week and encourage all to tune in.

—Toni Weisskopf
Publisher, Baen Books

Lakewood, Colorado author Wil McCarthy has been named the winner of the 2022 Prometheus Award for Best Novel, for his novel Rich Man’s Sky.

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To all of those who expressed interest and support for Baen's Bar in recent weeks, we are happy to announce it is back on-line, though with some changes. Baen is handing the Bar over to its users, and will henceforth be run by SFF Forums, LLC, and may be found at https://www.baensbar.net. Returning users will be able to use the Bar as usual, but new members will have to make a purchase at baen.com before they can log in. (Note: New users will not have to buy a book; there is a Bar tipjar option so they may contribute to the maintenance of the forum).

—Toni Weisskopf for SFF Forums

Innovative Independent Publisher to Bring Author Readings, Q&As, and Convention-Style Programming to Facebook LIVE

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Over 170 titles from Baen Books to be published as audiobooks over the next three years

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