[Free eBook] Walkaway by Cory Doctorow [Post-Scarcity Science Fiction]

Walkaway by Canadian author Cory Doctorow, a recipient of the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer and a noted advocate for fairer copyright law reform, is a standalone post-scarcity science fiction novel, free for a limited time courtesy of publisher Macmillan’s Tor Books.

This is their featured free eBook of the Month Club offer for April, and is being made free to help promote his latest release, the novella collection Radicalized.

The story is set in the near-future and explores the potential future of humanity in a post-scarcity world, taking place over the decades as disaffected people begin opting out of a dystopian surveillance state dominated by mega-rich elite and plagued by pollution and climate change, walking away to create a more utopian society with the help of increasingly advanced technology which takes care of their basic needs by gradually improving at transforming waste and litter into useful material, even as the ruling elite try to thwart the people leaving their control and exploit their inventions.

Offered through April 19th at just before midnight Eastern Time, available DRM-free to Canada & US only directly from the publisher.

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[Free eBook] Hades Rising by Aden Polydoros [YA Sci-Fi Suspense Thriller]

Hades Rising by Aden Polydoros is a prequel novella in the Assassin Fall series of YA dystopian science fiction mystery/suspense thrillers with f/m romantic elements, free for a limited time courtesy of publisher Macmillan’s Entangled: Teen imprint.

This is apparently being made free to promote the upcoming 2nd novel, Project Prometheus, due in August. The series is centred around the premise that vulnerable teens in foster care are being kidnapped and brainwashed to be used as assassins by a mysterious organization which they must gradually uncover the truth about even as they try to shut it down.

This prequel tells the backstory of one such teen assassin who initially embraces his training, as he comes into conflict with the goals of the program when another assassin he’s fallen for tries to escape.

Offered worldwide, available at multiple retailers.

[Free eBook REPEAT] Rush by Eve Silver [Award-Winning YA Science Fiction]

Rush by Canadian author Eve Silver is the 1st novel in her The Game series of YA dystopian science fiction thrillers with f/m romantic elements, free again for a limited time courtesy of publisher HarperCollins’s Katherine Tegen Books imprint.

This is B&N’s Featured Free Fridays book for the weekend, and was the 2015 winner of the Ontario Library Association’s Forest of Reading White Pine Award and was also shortlisted for the Monica Hughes Award in Science Fiction and Fantasy.

The series is set in a dystopia where human teens are selected from our world to repeatedly play deadly games against mysterious aliens for an unknown purpose, only able to return to our world if they survive, but still being pulled back into the game again and again. This story focuses on a teen who’s new to the game and trying to figure it all out as she fights to survive not only the mission, but also the potential betrayal of her team.

Offered in Canada & the US, available at multiple retailers.

[Free Audiobooks] The Just Men of Cordova by Edgar Wallace & Everland by Wendy Spinale [Classic Mystery & YA Steampunk]

AudioFile’s SYNC Summer of Listening 2018 promotion for young adults offers 2 free audiobooks per week—1 classic or non-fiction, 1 modern—as free MP3 downloads, usually available worldwide (some titles are subject to geo-restrictions, and you can see the planned release schedule here).

This week’s two selected titles, which have a theme of quests for unofficial justice in the absence of law, available until 7am Eastern Time on June 14th, are as follows:

• The Just Men of Cordova by the late Edgar Wallace, the 3rd novel in the The Four Just Men series of vintage mystery/detective thrillers starring a group of gentlemen vigilantes dedicated to pursuing wrongdoers the law cannot touch, with this story originally published in 1917 and dealing with aristocratic gambling, horse-racing, and blackmail; read by Bill Homewood, from Naxos Audiobooks, available worldwide
• Everland by Wendy Spinale, the 1st novel in the Everland series of young adult steampunk science fiction novels which remix Peter Pan in a dystopian postwar London riddled by disease, where the surviving children are hunted by Captain Hook of the German Army experimenting upon a cure, with this installment starring a girl in search of her kidnapped sister, who meets the mysterious Peter and his Lost Boys on the quest to save her; read by Fiona Hardingham & Steve West, from Scholastic Audio, available US & Canada only

Offered as DRM-free MP3s through 7am Eastern Time on June 14th, available in selected countries worldwide (requires installing Overdrive Media console software on your PC, Mac, Android, or iDevice, and you need to finish downloading before the time limit).

[Free Audiobooks] Love and First Sight by Josh Sundquist & Extraordinary Means by Robyn Schneider [YA SFnal Dystopia & Contemporary with Romance]

AudioFile’s SYNC Summer of Listening 2018 promotion for young adults offers 2 free audiobooks per week—1 classic or non-fiction, 1 modern—as free MP3 downloads, usually available worldwide (some titles are subject to geo-restrictions, and you can see the planned release schedule here).

This week’s two selected titles, which have a theme of living with and overcoming the challenges of illness and disability, available until 7am Eastern Time on June 7th, are as follows:

• Love and First Sight by Josh Sundquist, a young adult contemporary drama novel with f/m romantic elements starring a blind teen attending a mainstream high school for the first time, then later undergoing experimental surgery to acquire sight and adapting to that as well as discovering that his sighted friends have been less than honest about what the world (and his new girlfriend) looks like; read by Pat Young, from Hachette Audio, available worldwide
• Extraordinary Means by Robyn Schneider, an sfnal dystopian fiction novel with strong f/m romantic elements set in near future where an epidemic of virulent tuberculosis has led to people diagnosed with it being confined to sanatoriums, starring a new inmate gradually adapting to the facility, as he gets to know the odd rules of the place with the help of another teen; read by Khristine Hvam & James Fouhey, from HarperAudio, available most countries worldwide (including Canada, but excluding UK and the rest of the British Commonwealth)

Offered as DRM-free MP3s through 7am Eastern Time on June 7th, available in selected countries worldwide (requires installing Overdrive Media console software on your PC, Mac, Android, or iDevice, and you need to finish downloading before the time limit).

[Free eBook] Qualify by Vera Nazarian [YA Science Fiction]

Qualify by Vera Nazarian, a Nebula Award-nominated author and publisher of the Norilana Books small press imprint, is the 1st novel in the The Atlantis Grail trilogy of dystopian YA science fiction adventure, free for a limited time courtesy of the author herself via StoryBundle.

This is offered to promote StoryBundle’s The Sci-Fi SFWA Space Bundle, curated by members of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. (Humble Bundle also has an otherwise unrelated, but excellent and highly recommended ebook bundle, The Super Nebula Author Showcase 2018 presented by the SFWA containing backlist and newly-collected works reprinted by Open Road Media, Small Beer Press, Tachyon Publications, and more, featuring major authors and award-winners including Ursula K. Le Guin, Harlan Ellison, Jane Yolen, Octavia E. Butler, Tim Powers, Fritz Leiber, and many others for just $20 for 40 titles (fewer if you buy from outside the US, since some are unfortunately geo-restricted due to competing publisher rights).)

The series takes place in the near future of the 2040s, with an asteroid expected to hit Earth soon and the descendants of ancient Atlantis returned from space to help evacuate a small proportion of humanity, with a catch. This installment sets up the premise of the storyline, which is a Hunger Games-like sports competition for teens to qualify to escape the doomed planet and incidentally grant their other wishes before they leave, which one girl is hoping to win in order to cure her mother’s cancer, but for the fact that she’s an unathletic klutz.

Offered through May 31st at midnight Eastern Time, available DRM-free worldwide directly from StoryBundle.

[Free eBook] The Futureworld Omnibus by Christopher Hodder-Williams [1970s Science Fiction Technothrillers]

The Futureworld Omnibus by the late British author Christopher Hodder-Williams is an omnibus of three vintage science fiction technothriller novels, free for a limited time courtesy of publisher Endeavour Press’ Venture imprint.

This collected edition contains the standalone novels The Thinktank That Leaked, The Chromosome Game, and Coward’s Paradise, two of which were 70s-era early precursors to the modern style of blockbuster technothriller, originally published in 1974, 1979, and 1984 by United Writers Publications & Mithras Publishing.

The separate stories mainly involve then-contemporary characters uncovering disturbing and humanity-altering experiments, from persons undergoing treatment at institutes finding out what’s really being done to their fellow patients, to scientists discovering their colleagues’ less-than-ethical manipulation of human thought and emotional patterns. One novel is set on a future dystopian Earth where a team must locate the remains of a long-ago genetic engineering experiment that may revitalize the human race.

Offered worldwide, available at Amazon.

[Free eBook] Blossom by Raya Jones [Science Fiction Technothriller]

Blossom by Welsh author Raya Jones, a Reader in Social Studies at the University of Cardiff who is also currently doing scholarly research into studying social robotics in the context of psychology, according to her bio-blurb, is the 2nd novel in the Rinzler series of science fiction mystery/crime technothrillers, free for a limited time courtesy of publisher Endeavour Press’ Venture Press imprint.

The series is set in a post-apocalyptic dystopian future dominated by technology, where humanity sometimes comes into conflict with artificial intelligence in the form of androids, starring a freelance PI investigating crimes and conspiracies.

This story follows a journalist who becomes cut off from her technologically advanced world, where one’s identity and access to resources are controlled by a digital fingerprint, when hers becomes corrupted, leading to a virtual “death” which may be a symptom of deeper trouble within the Artificial Intelligence network suspected by the PI.

Offered worldwide, available at Amazon.

[Free eBook] In the Valley, Where Belladonna Grows by Tim Lebbon [Psychological Horror Fantasy]

In the Valley, Where Belladonna Grows by Welsh author Tim Lebbon, a recipient of multiple British Fantasy Awards, is his standalone horror-ish novella with sfnal elements, free for a limited time courtesy of publisher Endeavour Press’ Venture imprint.

This was originally published in 2005 by Cemetary Dance, as part of the Fourbodings anthology edited by Peter Crowther, and this edition contains a bonus short story, The Rain God.

The story is a Twilight Zone-esque blend of psychological horror and dystopian sci-fantasy, exploring an isolated woman’s chilling mental vision of the dangers outside which threaten to encroach upon her idyllic rural existence.

Offered worldwide, available at Amazon.

[Free eBook] Thaw by Stephen Bowkett [Young Adult Sci-Fantasy Adventure]

Thaw by Welsh author Stephen Bowkett is the 3rd novel in his The Wintering trilogy of YA science fiction with fantasy adventure elements, free for a limited time courtesy of publisher Endeavour Press’ Venture imprint.

This was originally published in 2002 by Orion Children’s Books’s Dolphin imprint. The trilogy is set in a future world frozen over by an ice age, where the remaining humans live in a protected enclave which is watched over by an all-encompassing AI whose guardianship has dominated them for millenia.

This story brings the escaped human hero home after life-changing adventures in the frozen outside world bonding with intelligent mutant wolves and discovering astonishing powers, completing the obligatory coming of age tale by coming full circle to confront the stifling AI and presumably liberate his original people.

Offered worldwide, available at Amazon.