A.I. extermination fleets, shape shifting mecha, and desperate gambles feature in this week’s roundup of science fiction’s newest releases.

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A.I. Void Ship (The A.I. Series #6) – Vaughn Heppner

Through desperate tactics and by deliberately keeping a low profile, we survived the machine assaults longer than any human or cybership thought possible. But now our luck has deserted us. The main A.I. brain-core has just given human extinction top priority. The robots are massing an armada to exterminate us.

We’ve done what we could in expectation of this grim day, grabbing enemy factory planets to mass produce warships. And we found an ally, the Star Lords of Roke. But it’s just not enough, damn it.

We need more…like the alien void ship Hawkins once saw. Or maybe we can make a deal with the treacherous Cog Primus. One thing’s sure. We’d better do it soon or we’ll join thousands of other extinct species obliterated by the hateful death machines.

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Bringers of Hell (Tau Ceti Agenda #6) – Travis S. Taylor

HELL WILL BREAK LOOSE

Despite unprecedented victories on the part of humanity, the war with the alien Chiata Horde drags on. The Chiata may be temporarily hindered by the cunning tenacity of General Alexander Moore and the men and women who fight at his side, but they have no intention of beating a hasty retreat. In fact, intelligence suggests that the Chiata Invasion is at hand, and with numbers sure to overwhelm humankind. But hope has come from an unlikely source: the Thgreeth, long-dead inhabitants of a world ground under the heels of the Chiata millennia ago. In the crumbled ruins of their homeworld is a map—and it may lead to victory.

PHOENIX WILL RISE

Meanwhile, Alexander Moore’s daughter, Deanna Moore, now known by the callsign “Phoenix,” wages a personal war on the Chiata. Grievously wounded in the battle for Thgreeth and rebuilt with state-of-the-art cybernetics, she leads a group of mecha-suited Marines known as “The Bringers of Hell.” Once a tough-as-nails Marine, she has been reborn as an implacable scourge to the Chiata. And nothing will stand in the way of her mission: to take down the alien scourge.

HER ENEMIES WILL PAY

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The Grand Alliance (Blood on the Stars #11) – Jay Alan

Hell is Unleashed

The Hegemony controls Megara, the Confederation’s capital. War has raged for five years. Millions are dead, vast fleets of ships have been destroyed. But in the stronghold where Tyler Barron and his comrades have gathered their allies and the last of their strength, a plan is being devised.

Barron and his people have fought bravely, stubbornly, relentlessly, but the Hegemony has been too strong. Now, Barron is relying on the one source of strength that remains to him.

Defiance.

He will not surrender, he will not yield. And he will not remain meekly on the defensive, waiting for the enemy to bring forward reinforcements to launch the final assault.

That leaves only one option. Attack. Take back what the enemy has captured. Bring the war to the invader, and send them reeling back into the Badlands from whence they came.

The fight will be difficult, the odds steep. But Barron is ready to take the final gamble, and as one, the thousands of spacers he leads are behind him, shouting a single rallying cry.

Back to Megara!

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The Link (AI Empire #1) – Isaac Hooke

An impossible enemy. A fleet surrounded.

Jain and his fleet of elite AI warships hurry to Earth’s defense when an alien empire known as the Link stages an all-out attack. Though his fleet is equipped with the most powerful weapons tech ever developed, with enough firepower to raze an entire moon base, even Jain’s mighty vessels prove no match for the enemy.

When unexpected allies show up, the tide seems to turn in his favor. But will it be enough?

Perhaps. The aliens were expecting to find a race of organics barely out of the stone ages.

It must have come as quite a shock when they realized they faced a budding AI Empire.

Also available: The Alliance (AI Empire #2)

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A Pale Dawn (Four Horsemen: The Omega War #8) – Chris Kennedy  and Mark Wandrey

After a stunning victory at the Merc Guild shipyard of Golara, the leaders of the Four Horsemen mercenary units of Earth have decided it’s time to take back the colonies the Merc Guild has captured, and the Horsemen split up to liberate them.

While the Merc Guild still has humanity outnumbered, Alexis Cromwell, the leader of the Winged Hussars, has incorporated the ships captured in Golara into her fleet, and she hopes the Humans can achieve local superiority across four systems with her new battleships and her Egleesius cruisers. And…if the attacks go well, the next target might even be…Earth, itself?

But Peepo, the leader of the Merc Guild forces, didn’t get to her position by being stupid, and she continues not only to thwart the Humans, but also in her efforts to find the Hussars’ secret base in New Warsaw. If she can find it, she has a fleet ready to destroy it, and then the Humans will have nowhere left to run.

The forces are on a collision course, with all sights set on Earth. A pale dawn is rising, and there’s only one question that remains—who will be left standing when the clock reaches noon?

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Quantum Mortis #4: We Regret to Inform – Vox Day, Steve Rzasa, and Matvei Daniilovich

Chief Warrant Officer Graven Tower is a ruggedly handsome military policeman who hates aliens. Fortunately, as a member of His Grace’s Military Crimes Investigation Division – Xenocriminology and Alien Relations, he gets to arrest a lot of them. Sometimes he even gets to shoot them.

Chief Tower and Detector Derin Hildreth of the Trans Paradis Police Department are investigating the murder of the Crown Prince of Morchard, and when there is a second attempt on the life of his brother and successor, they rush to the scene. But their investigation is complicated by the discovery that the assassin is in the employ of a foreign embassy. Does Tower dare risking the wrath of an ambassador with diplomatic immunity? Do you even have to ask?

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Renegade Union (Renegade Star #9) – J.N. Chaney

After waking up on the floor of an unknown ship, and with no way of contacting his crew, Captain Jace Hughes is forced to fight his way through a myriad of soldiers. With no memory of the battle or how he arrived on the ship, he has no choice but to act.

By shooting his way out.

Along the way, Jace must rescue survivors, fill the missing gaps in his memory, and stop the enemy from accomplishing their goal–a mission that could lead to the destruction of Earth and all its people.

But with most of his crew missing and no sign of reinforcements, there’s little hope to be had. To make matters worse, there’s a hostage on the ship, and the enemy will stop at nothing to defend their new prize.

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A Shifting Alliance (Galaxy Ascendant #3) – Yakov Merkin

The Galactic Alliance, made up of friends old and new, as well as recently reconciled enemies, finds itself facing down the massive, monolithic, and oppressive Revittan Empire.

High Executor Darkclaw, who not long ago led the invasion of the Alliance, now fights to preserve, to restore peace. Grand Admiral Nayasar Khariah finds herself fighting alongside former foes in the face of a greater threat. An unlikely heroine, the former small-time criminal Ayil Lotyk, finds herself even further enmeshed in conflicts well above her pay grade, nevertheless is risking everything for a cause greater than herself—to her own surprise.

Even as the Alliance struggles with the Empire, there are those within its borders fighting against it. A lifetime Imperial loyalist, who now questions his place. A survivor, fighting to protect the weak and forge a better future. An observer, who sees something deeper and more sinister afoot, and cannot stand idly by.

The galaxy is aflame once again, and things will never be the same.

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Titanborn (Children of Titan #1) – Rhett C. Bruno

Offworlders are only worth the price on their heads.

After three decades as a Pervenio Corporation Collector, chasing wanted offworlders and extinguishing protests throughout the solar system, Malcolm Graves doesn’t bother asking questions. So long as the pay is right, he’s the man for the job. But his latest assignment doesn’t afford him that luxury.

A high-profile bombing on Earth has the men who sign Malcolm’s paychecks clamoring for answers. They force him to team up with a strange, augmented partner who’s more interested in statistics than instinct, and ship them both off to Titan to hunt down a suspected group of extremists: Titanborn rebels who will go to any length to free their home from the tyranny of Earth’s corporations.