Buy Ebooks
Baen Community
About Baen
Sign up for a new account.
New Stuff: Stories, Updates, News, Nonfiction, Etc.
Perhaps nothing highlights the IDEAS of science fiction and fantasy as well as the short story. Baen Books has long kept the short story alive—and delivering the sense of awe and wonder great SF and fantasy is known for! Throughout October, get these hot anthologies for a cool price.
Charles E. Gannon is the author of Compton Crook Award-winning, Nebula-nominated Caine Riordan series. He is the coauthor of several novels in best-selling Ring of Fire series. He has written two novels in John Ringo’s best-selling Black Tide Rising series. “The Rot’s Last Laugh” is set in the world of his upcoming epic fantasy novel This Broken World. A former professor, Gannon lives near Annapolis, Maryland, with his wife and children.
Druadaen nodded encouragement at the sleepy young ur zhog woman who had just finished her thorough account of all the foodstuffs she had eaten while a prisoner in the Under. “Thank you. That is very helpful. Can you recall anything else, Zhuklu’a?”
She shook her head, groggy. “I can barely remember my own name. Our flight from the upper tunnels was very tiring.”
Umkhira, a Lightstrider like her but both older and more formidable, added, “The shaman who held Zhuklu’a did not allow much sleep. It is a common tactic that ensures an escaped captive lacks the endurance to get very far.”
Druadaen nodded, then smiled genuine thanks at the younger Lightstrider. “Rest, then. And do tell me if you remember anything else.”
Zhuklu’a waved acquiescence, reclined, and rolled over. Her breathing became heavy and slow within a few seconds.
Druadaen arched his back to stretch it. Her recounting of foodstuffs had been quite detailed and quite long. He yawned soundlessly, fighting to keep his own eyes open.
“Well,” rumbled an amused voice from over his shoulder, “you asked for it.”
Druadaen turned to nod at the speaker: Ahearn, the nominal leader of their small group. “That I did,” Druadaen answered, stifling another yawn.
“And was it worth it?”
Read MoreJim 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).
Nonfiction
Stars recycle and so must we if we are to travel between them.
Stars have practiced recycling from near the beginning
The ordinary matter of the early universe was mostly hydrogen with some helium. Population III stars formed out of that primordial mix (with trace amounts of lithium and beryllium) and fused more hydrogen into helium. Those stars had comparatively short lifespans ending in supernovas (or other stellar events such as becoming black holes) and spreading heavier elements into space where they—along with hydrogen—became part of Population II stars.
Read More
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
Press Release
Baen Books announces the top ten finalists for the 2021 Baen Fantasy Adventure Award for best original fantasy short story.
Read More
Press Release
Contest Jointly Sponsored by Baen Books and The National Space Society Honors Positive Fictional Takes on Space Exploration
Details here
To Whom It May Concern:
What is it we do at Baen Books? We publish books at the heart of science fiction and fantasy.
Science fiction has traditionally been a unique kind of intellectual pleasure, a process of glorious intercommunication and inspiration, with ideas flowing from scientist and engineer to writer and artist, to reader and viewer, back and forth, in a delightful mélange of shared thoughts, wild speculation, cautionary tales, reality checks, and the sheer fun of playing with boundaries and ideas. It is not for everyone. But those who enjoy it, take great pleasure in the dialogue.
When the modern form of SF began, with Hugo Gernsback and the other pulp magazines of the early 20th century, the publishers fostered that interaction through letter columns in the magazines and by encouraging science fiction readers to organize in clubs and meet in conventions. Baen Books continued that tradition with Baen’s Bar, a kind of virtual convention and on-line conversation that has been around in some form for over 20 years.
The moderators are volunteers. The readers, editors, and writers post and interact on the Bar at their own desire. Some conversations have been gone over so many times, they’ve been retired as simply too boring to contemplate again. Sometimes the rhetoric can get heated. We do not endorse the publication of unlawful speech. We have received no complaints about the content of the Bar from its users.
That said, it has come to our attention that allegations about the Bar have been made elsewhere. We take these allegations seriously, and consequently have put the Bar on hiatus while we investigate. But we will not commit censorship of lawful speech.
It is not Baen Books’ policy to police the opinions of its readers, its authors, its artists, its editors, or indeed anyone else. This applies to posts at the Bar, or on social media, on their own websites, or indeed anywhere else. On the Bar, the publisher does not select what is allowed to be posted, and does not hijack an individual’s messages for their own purposes. Similarly, the posts do not represent the publisher’s opinion, except in a deep belief that free speech is worthy in and of itself.
Most sincerely,
Toni Weisskopf
Publisher
Here’s a list of all the works published in 2020 which are eligible for awards.
Read More
Press Release
Join David Weber, Eric Flint and More in Livestream Showcasing New and Upcoming Books
Read More
Press Release
Baen Books announces the top ten finalists for the 2020 Baen Fantasy Adventure Award for best original fantasy short story.
Read More
Press Release
M.T. Reiten of Los Alamos, New Mexico, has won the grand prize in the 2020 Jim Baen Memorial Award competition for his short story “Bagala Devi Objective.”
Read More
Press Release
Innovative Independent Publisher to Bring Author Readings, Q&As, and Convention-Style Programming to Facebook LIVE
Read More
Press Release
A list of all novels, short stories, and nonfiction pieces published by Baen Books in 2019, which are thereby eligible for most major awards
Read More
Press Release
Over 170 titles from Baen Books to be published as audiobooks over the next three years
Read More
Press Release
Seventh Annual Contest for Best Original Fantasy Adventure Story To be Presented at NASFIC 2020 in Columbus, Ohio
Read More