It’s the middle of summer, the mercury is rising, and John Ringo’s Live Free or Die is back in trade paperback! So, this month we’re offering up scorching deals on John Ringo’s blazing backlist. Through the end of July, get John Ringo’s entire back catalog in a special discount bundle.

Brad Zeiger is nominally a chemist, an engineer, or a writer, depending on which dubious source you care to reference. He lives in northwestern Oregon, squandering his time in the local semiconductor industry. He has several self-published novels on Amazon, but offers the caveat that they are substantially different in style from this work. "The Insomniac," which won the 2023 Jim Baen Memorial Short Story Award Contest, represents his first professionally-published piece of fiction, and he is deeply grateful to Baen for that opportunity.

The Insomniac

Brad Zeiger

The neat rows of glittering coffins stretched in all three dimensions. Each occupant lay in blissful peace, enshrined in crystal and metal.

All but one.

Darius Bosco glared with bleary eyes at the lid of his pod, fighting a nascent claustrophobia. The computer offered reassuring noises, informing him that life support would have the cabin ready for habitation within an hour.

Bosco loudly informed the computer that life support should have kicked on before the wake-up routine. His only reply was the indifferent thrum of the spaceship.

Hell, but it was tight in that little space. He began to sweat, which didn’t do wonders for the ambiance. He craned his neck and made sense of the readout to the left of his head.

Two years and four months. His next duty cycle wasn’t for another two months. Something must have gone wrong. Terribly wrong, if the ship couldn’t even perform the wake-up routine in the correct sequence.

More sweat. Disaster scenarios ran through his mind. Meltdown. Cladding breach. Irradiation of the passengers. He pounded uselessly on the lid of the coffin. The ship wasn’t patching through any messages from headquarters, which could be good news or bad, depending on the reasoning.

Minimum requirements met at last, the lid slid open with a pneumatic hiss. The frigid air over his sweaty body immediately chilled him. Wreathed in the vapor from his breath, he moved quickly to the reactor control panel and began checking alarm readouts, gauges, and settings. He worked frantically at first, then forced himself to adopt a more methodical approach.

His brow furrowed as he came to the end of his review. One of the heat exchange fins was running a little hot, but only a little. Well within spec. Why was he awake then?

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!

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

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.

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!

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

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

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

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

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

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.