July 2017 was an outstanding month for science fiction and fantasy, publishing enough worthy titles that the following list is just a short sample of the riches published last month. For those looking for “the feeling of romance and the sense of wonder I had known as a kid. I wanted the world to be what they had promised me it was going to be–instead of the tawdry, lousy, fouled-up mess it is.” these adventures are but the first course in July’s feast for the imagination.

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Alpha Fleet (Rebel Fleet #3) – B. V. Larson

The Imperials have devised a cunning new method of destroying Rebel worlds.

Captain Leo Blake is largely responsible for both our survival and our current predicament. He and his crew are infamous among the stars. As a result, when ships of an unknown configuration begin flowing out of swirling rifts above Earth, Blake is called upon again to deal with the problem.

But the approaching fleet isn’t what it seems. They’re employing an entirely new way to exterminate Rebels. They will accept nothing less than conquering Earth—or better yet, destroying all life on our planet.

“Larson just keeps getting better. This Rebel Fleet series has a lot of similarities to his first effort, the Star Force series, but is more polished, and fun…  Larson has a lot of Laumer and Heinlein in him – there is an unself-conscious grandiosity which hearkens back to the golden age of Science Fiction.” – from an Amazon reader review

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Galactic Outlaws (Galaxy’s Edge #2)  – Jason Anspach and Nick Cole

A long, long time from now, at the edge of the galaxy…

Seven years after the battle of Kublar: A young girl searches crime-ridden gutters for an infamous bounty hunter in a quest for revenge. A short jump away, a double-dealing legionnaire-turned-smuggler, in it for the money, navigates a deadly course of Republic lackeys and wanton space pirates.

It’s sleek starfighters, exotic aliens, loyal bots, blasters, scoundrels, heroes and powerful enemies in a thrilling adventure that will take you back to that magic place a from a long time ago…

“This is what Star Wars SHOULD have been! Kudos to Nick and Jason for creating a real. live, breathing Star Wars-like universe where the good guys are heroic for their own reasons, the bad guys frequently have legitimate gripes, and people and aliens act like you’d expect, instead of cardboard cut-outs. This is the thinking person’s space opera! “–from an Amazon reader review.

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The Lost Earth (The Lost Starship #7) – Vaughn Heppner

It finally happened. Commander Thrax Ti Ix created a hyper-spatial tube for the Swarm Imperium. Across thousands of light-years, a vast armada of warships is heading for Earth to burn the homeworld down to its bedrock as the Swarm begins its genocidal campaign against the human race.

No one—not the New Men, the Spacers, the Wahhabi Caliphate or Star Watch—has faced such staggering odds. Alone or united, it makes no difference.

Captain Maddox has a last-ditch plan. He’s returning to the null region of last voyage to grab the ancient Destroyers hidden there. But an immortal entity of evil cunning haunts the vessels. If it escapes its prison…Maddox will have made things infinitely worse.

This time, mankind needs a miracle.

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The Longest Day (Ark Royal #10) – Christopher Nuttall

A Stand-Alone Novel Set In The Ark Royal Universe!

The first major alien offensive against Earth has been blunted, winning humanity time to deploy new weapons and prepare new tactics as Earth’s space navies prepare to take the offensive. But the enigmatic aliens have plans of their own – a full-scale attack on Earth that will either win the war in a single stroke or lose it.

The stakes have never been so high. The fate of humanity itself is in the balance. And, as battle rages across the solar system, as humanity finds its back pushed firmly against the war, millions of people – military and civilian – struggle for survival, knowing that victory will come with a very high price …

… And defeat will be the end of everything humanity holds dear.

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Mechs vs. Dinosaurs (Argonauts #8)- Isaac Hooke

An alien entity has stolen a time weapon.

Rade and the Argonauts must retrieve the weapon and travel back sixty-five million years to ancient Earth to stop the entity from intervening in humankind’s evolution.

The stakes are high. If the team fails, they will return to find a galaxy populated not by humans, but by the descendants of the dinosaurs.

The mission won’t be easy. Ancient Earth is ruled by giant meat-eaters who are just as happy to dine on the Argonauts as on the natives. The team does have one small advantage: their Hoplite battle suits, war machines packed with enough firepower to smash a small army. But how effective are the suits against building-sized predators?

As the raging hordes of carnivores close in, the stage is set for the ultimate battle: Mechs vs. Dinosaurs.

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Out of the Soylent Planet (Starship Grifters #0) – Robert Kroese

Interstellar con man Rex Nihilo has a price tag on his head. Railroaded into smuggling a shipment of contraband corn to a planet short on food, Rex finds himself on the run from an insidious corporation named Ubiqorp, which reaps obscene profits by keeping planets dependent on shipments of synthetic rations. When Rex and his long-suffering robot companion Sasha are sentenced to work as slave labor on a massive Ubiqorp plantation, they learn the terrible secret behind the corporation’s products. To escape, Rex and Sasha team up with a mis-programmed combat drone and an intelligent mutant plant to lead a rebellion against their merciless corporate overlords.

Out of the Soylent Planet is a novel-length prequel to Starship Grifters, the book NYT bestselling author Hugh Howey called “one of my favorite space romps of all time.”

This edition of Out of the Soylent Planet also contains the story “The Chicolini Incident”.

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Powered (Mech Wars #1) – Scott Bartlett

Humanity is tired of losing. Enter the mech.

After the mysterious discovery of an alien mech inside a comet, Darkstream Security has finally completed its own design. They assign Chief Gabriel Roach with the task of whittling down hundreds of bright young recruits to form a team of elite mech pilots, which he will command.

Their mission: protect human colonies from the almighty Quatro.

A single Quatro can take down an entire squad of traditional soldiers. Bigger than a draft horse, more muscular than a grizzly, with jaws that splinter bone. And zero fear. They almost defeated humanity before, and now they’re back – in numbers we didn’t know they had.

But Roach is the perfect one for the job. Almost too perfect. The Quatro took from him the only woman he ever loved, and now, he’s determined to make one thing clear:

It’s them or him.

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Winged Hussars (Revelations Cycle #3) – Mark Wandrey

For more than a century, Winged Hussars has been the richest of Earth’s mercenary companies, as well as the only one to specialize in space warfare. Led by Alexis Cromwell, they have carved out a reputation in the galaxy for being dependable, unflappable, and lethally efficient. Until people began shooting at them everywhere they went.

Rick Culper left Earth in the hopes of finding a job as a merc. A natural at fighting in the armed suits known as CASPers, he finally caught on with one of the premier Four Horsemen companies, but it’s with the Winged Hussars, and the company’s prospects are beginning to look bleak.

Traps have been laid throughout a number of systems, and Commander Alexis Cromwell and her flagship, Pegasus, will be hard-pressed to make it back to their secret base. Even with Rick’s help, the situation is much worse than anyone in the Hussars could have imagined. The Four Horsemen are being hunted, and the Hussar’s future is dark. But there’s one thing Alexis’ enemies didn’t count on—Alexis Cromwell is nobody’s prey.