The titans of military science fiction rise to duel with mecha and starships in this week’s new release roundup.

---

Absolution (Blood Runners #1) – George S. Mahaffey Jr. and Justin Sloan  

In a futuristic New Chicago where justice is meted out via a barbaric system called Absolution, you can either level up or check out.

Nobody knows this better than Marisol, a super-powered tracker whose job involves hunting down “Runners,” people who’ve been paid bounties to become suspects in crimes committed by the wealthy.

On the verge of becoming the city’s premier Hunter, she stumbles upon a young Runner who holds the key to a conspiracy that could topple New Chicago’s dictator–and threatens everything she’s ever believed in.

“It’s a little bit Hunger Games with a touch of Running Man and just a sprinkle of Ready Player One.”–Amazon Reader Review

---

Armor World (Undying Mercenaries #11) – B. V. Larson

In a twist of fate that rocks the Galactic Empire, James McGill finds himself negotiating the future of a thousand inhabited worlds.

An artificial object made of compressed stardust is barreling toward Earth. Is it an invasion ship? A doomsday weapon? Perhaps it’s the final response of Squanto, the Warlord of Rigel who McGill has repeatedly humiliated. Or could it be from the Mogwa, sent to avenge McGill’s assassination of Earth’s Imperial Governor?

No one knows the truth of its origins, but the object is huge and unstoppable. Whoever hurled this rock at us isn’t answering our calls. Every weapon bounces off, and the people of Earth begin to go mad as they realize their destruction is only hours away.

---

The Colossus (Blood on the Stars #12) – Jay Allan

The Hegemony strikes again…

The Confederation and its allies have won their first victory, retaken their capital from he forces of the Hegemony. But the enemy is not beaten, far from it, and they are back, with an unstoppable weapon, a vast superbattleship, a deadly hybrid of imperial and Hegemony technology, called the Colossus.

The great ship is enormously powerful, nearly unstoppable, and in its armored depths it hides a secret, another Hegemony weapon, one that will change the dynamic of the entire war. One that will challenge Admiral Barron, and his officers and spacers, to the greatest test they have ever faced.

The battle for the Rim has reached its climactic stage, but even as the Hegemony moves forward to claim victory, an old enemy, a terror from the distant past, is about to return…and change everything.

---

Dropship (Forsaken Mercenary #1) – Jonathan Yanez

If they can’t control him.

They’ll try and kill him.

Daniel Hunt is the deadliest mercenary in the galaxy if he can just remember. Five years before he woke up with nothing more than his name. Now his present is on a violent collision with his past and the future of the galaxy.

The Earth is dead. Humanity has taken to the moon and Mars to have a chance. On what’s left of Earth primal gangs war for dominance.

A rebel force will discover a weapon of unimaginable strength, the wealthy in the galaxy will do anything to possess. As Daniel unravels the origin of his past he’ll realize he’s not the same weapon he once was. But does redemption exist for someone like him?

---

Dust of the Deep (Wings of Earth #2) Eric Michael Craig

Some runs pay better than others … Especially when there are pirates involved.

After almost losing his Shipmaster’s licenses, Captain Ethan Walker takes on three new crewmembers and the first job that will get him back into space. He realizes en route that the supplies and personnel they’re carrying make the ship a prime target for pirates. It’s too late. He has no option but to complete the run regardless of the danger.

Things get worse for the Olympus Dawn when they make a one hundred light-year detour to pick up an archaeologist who knows their actual destination, only to find that someone has kidnapped her.

While they’re waiting for instructions from the archaeologist who hired them, Walker learns that Captain Kendrick Jetaar will stop at nothing to capture their cargo. Captain Walker must escape the ruthless pirate lord before he and his crew become casualties in a war he didn’t know existed.

Fortunately, the load pays exceptionally well, if only he can survive to collect.

---

Earth Aflame (Earthrise #11) – Daniel Arenson

The Singularity has come. The machines have risen.

Our robots, once loyal servants, now slaughter us. Our cars, planes, and starships have become machines of death. Cyborgs roam the land, deforming humans, growing their twisted army.

Is a heartless, mechanized hell our future?

A faint hope shines. Heroes still fight. Famous names. Einav. Marco. Addy. Lailani. The heroes of the Alien Wars. Names etched in our history, in our hearts. Four friends. Four humans . . . against an army of metal.

A shadow has fallen. Humanity must shine brighter than ever before.

---

Gott Mit Uns (Terran Strike Marines #5) – Richard Fox and Scott Moon

Terran Strike Marines fight for victory. No matter the odds. No matter the cost.

The final battle against the Kesaht begins.

Lieutenant Hoffman and the exhausted Marines of Valdar’s Hammer are called upon to make a desperate assault against the enemy’s home world. But the foe is prepared, and their planet is a death trap.

While the Strike Marines fight for their lives, the fabled ship Breitenfeld remains captured by the Ibarra Nation, and the Ember War hero Valdar languishes in a cell. The ship and her captain are held on a strange world of the Ibarra’s design, and only the Hammers can free them.

Hoffman and his Strike Marines have fought from the icy wastes of Koen, to the jungles of Eridu, and even deep into the heart of a shattered moon, but their final mission will demand a price in blood.

---

The Lost Supernova (Lost Starship #10) – Vaughn Heppner

Androids used to mingle among us, pretending to be human. Then an alien puppet-master altered their programming. Unknown to us, androids began leaving human society, burning their clothes and peeling off their skin to reveal the chrome-colored bodies underneath.

They gathered in a system were a star had exploded, blowing away the atmosphere of a Jupiter-like planet. The supernova had hurled heavy metals against the remaining core. The androids are mining supermetals that can turn ordinary ship weapons and shields into invincible armaments.

The altered programming includes human genocide, which will start with a murderous attack on Earth.

Luckily, Captain Maddox finds the enemy system. But during a space battle, something happens to hurl Victory thousands of light-years away into the Scutum-Centaurus Spiral Arm. The crippled starship will take years to reach home again. Long before that, Earth will be a radioactive ruin.

Now begins a desperate journey in hostile space that will stretch everyone as Maddox strains to reach the Lord High Admiral in time with knowledge about the coming android attack.

---

With Your Shield (Four Horsemen Tales #10) – Chris Kennedy and Alex Rath

Come back with your shield…or on it!

Staff Sergeant Markus ‘Spartan’ Nicolos is one of the Intelligence Department’s best. A hacker who can beat any code, he’s in charge of communications intercepts for the Golden Horde’s Computer Operations section. When people can’t break a code, they bring in Spartan.

It wasn’t always this way, though. Spartan used to be a frontline CASPer pilot—someone who could be counted on to get the job done and bring the squad home safely…until he lost his entire squad in an ambush. He also lost his edge in the attack, and he swore he would never pilot a CASPer in combat again.

Everything changed, though, when he came up with an idea for a new type of scout CASPer—one that would prevent what happened to him from ever happening again. He’s been given a mech to convert and a team to help him bring his idea to reality. And he’s been given a chance to test it out on a Golden Horde deployment.

But in the time immediately before the events of the Omega War, forces are already moving behind the scenes, and nothing is as it seems…and they’re bringing along Spartan’s combat mech—which he said he’d never pilot in combat again—just in case.