When today’s top science-fiction and fantasy authors look for inspiration, they turn to the classics. We continue reading those same books (year after year) because they stand the test of time. For a limited time, you can download these beloved science fiction and fantasy books for free!
She
On the occasion of his twenty-fifth birthday, Leo Vincey opens the locked iron box that is his birthright and finds an ancient potsherd. Following clues engraved on the relic, Vincey and the man who raised him, Cambridge professor Horace Holly, embark on a remarkable adventure that will take them from Victorian England to an uncharted region in East Africa. Surviving shipwreck, disease, and hostile natives, they discover a lost civilization no European has ever encountered—or lived to describe. They have entered the realm of the cruel and beautiful Ayesha, known to those who worship her as “She-who-must-be-obeyed.” For two thousand years, the white queen has been waiting—for what, Vincey and Holly are about to find out.
One of the bestselling novels of all time, She has held readers in its thrall for more than a century. Alongside Haggard’s other classic, King Solomon’s Mines, it established the conventions of the lost world fantasy genre, and has inspired some of our greatest thinkers and writers, from Sigmund Freud to J. R. R. Tolkien to Margaret Atwood.
The Sleeper Awakes
Firebrand activist Graham falls into a drug-induced sleep in 1897 London—and is stunned to wake in the year 2100 to a world he does not know. But the world knows him.
When word spreads that the “Sleeper” has awakened, it rocks the foundations of what the planet has become: a dystopian existence of unending toil ruled by the all-powerful White Council. And the more Graham learns about his new era, the more he discovers that, while times and technology may change, the failures and flaws of humanity do not.
With this stark examination of a society that may yet be, author H. G. Wells crafted a timeless story of an everyman thrust into a struggle for power over both men and men’s souls, and of the cyclical nature of those who seek to break the chains of oppression, only to become the oppressors. A jarring allegory for our modern world, The Sleeper Awakes joins Wells’s many masterpieces, including The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and The War of the Worlds.
Youth
Tagging along while his astronomer father visits an industrialist at his vast estate, young Slim is lucky enough to make fast friends with the industrialist’s son, Red, who has recently caught some very strange animals on the property.
The animals seem intelligent enough, and Red recruits Slim to help him train the odd creatures to do circus tricks. But the boys are about to discover their playthings aren’t exactly animals—and they’ve allowed themselves to be caught for a reason …
Youth is a riveting tale from the author of countless classics, including I, Robot and the Foundation Trilogy, which won the Hugo Award for Best All-Time Series.
The Chessmen of Mars
The daughter of Earthman John Carter and Martian Princess Dejah Thoris, Tara, Princess of Helium, was raised to be strong and independent. When Prince Gahan of Gathol seeks her hand in marriage, Tara is unimpressed by his dandyish ways. But while out flying in a storm, she finds herself stranded in an unfamiliar region of Barsoom, and she is captured by the Kaldanes, a strange species of aliens with gigantic heads and tiny, crablike legs.
While imprisoned, Tara wins the heart of a Kaldane called Ghek and hopes he will let her go free. But she is instead rescued by a dashing and mysterious warrior—none other than Prince Gahan in disguise. But when Tara, Prince Gahan, and Ghek are all captured in the city of Manator, new dangers confront them: Tara will be made the prize of a brutal game of Martian Chess, in which living pieces must fight to the death . . .
