Penguin Classics: Sci-Fi & Fantasy

Fifty new books at £1 each, celebrating the pioneering spirit of the Penguin Modern Classics series, from inspiring essays to groundbreaking fiction and poetry. Time is a catastrophe, perpetual and irreversible. Science and fiction interweave delightfully in these playful Cosmicomic short stories.

A charming, mind-bending, and anarchic book of imagined civilizations. 'Most cosmic civilizations long for things, in the depths of their souls, they would never openly admit to...' Trurl and Klapaucius are 'constructors'—they travel around the universe creating machines of astonishing inventiveness and power, visiting a bewildering variety of violent, peculiar, and morose civilizations. The Cyberiad is oddly reminiscent of Gulliver's...

We by Yevgeny Zamyatin is a seminal work of dystopian fiction that has sparked imaginations and influenced numerous twentieth-century authors. Set in the distant future, the novel unfolds in OneState, a monolithic glass city where life is governed by logic and reason. Every aspect of existence is regulated by the omnipotent Benefactor, who ensures that citizens live without personal freedom,...

When Bill Masen awakes blindfolded in hospital and carefully removes his bandages, he realises he is one of the few who can see; almost everyone else has been blinded by a meteor shower. Now, with civilisation in chaos, the triffids—huge, venomous plants able to 'walk', feeding on human flesh—can have their day. This stark vision of a desolate world infested...

A stunning clothbound edition of Wells' science-fiction classic. Part of Penguin's beautiful hardback Clothbound Classics series, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith, these delectable and collectible editions are bound in high-quality, colourful, tactile cloth with foil stamped into the design. From the planet of war they came to conquer the Earth... The night after a shooting star is seen streaking...

A new selection of E. M. Forster's exquisite short stories, now in the beautifully designed Penguin English Library Series. We created the Machine, to do our will, but we cannot make it do our will now. It has robbed us of the sense of space and of the sense of touch, it has blurred every human relation and narrowed down...

Twenty new titles in the much-loved and hugely successful Penguin English Library series. 'To that flash of semi-vision can be traced a full half of the horror which has ever since haunted us' An expedition to Antarctica goes horribly wrong as a group of explorers stumbles upon some mysterious ancient ruins, with devastating consequences. At the Mountains of Madness ranks...

"In a decade marked, much like our own, by simple fears, John Wyndham refused to make simple metaphors". -M John Harrison. A world paralyzed by genetic mutation- Wyndham takes the reader into the anguished heart of a community where the chances of breeding true are less than fifty percent and where deviations are rooted out and destroyed as abominations.

Imagine the world if the Allies had lost the Second World War... Philip K Dick trips the switches of our minds with his vision of the world as it might have been: the African continent virtually wiped out, the Mediterranean drained to make farmland, the United States divided between the Japanese and the Nazis. In the neutral zone that divides...

Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne is a pioneering science fiction classic that tells the story of the distinguished but eccentric Professor Lidenbrock. He discovers a scrap of parchment in an old manuscript, revealing a cipher written in runes. This cipher tells of an entrance to another world—a world hidden beneath our own. In Jules Verne's...

A brilliant science-fiction satire from one of the best writers of the twentieth century. Dr Felix Hoenikker—a father of the atomic bomb—has another creation. Far more dangerous than that which levelled Hiroshima is ice-nine, a chemical that could freeze the world's oceans solid. The search for Hoenikker leads first to his three children, each in possession of the chemical, and...

'A stunningly inventive fantasy about cosmic travel' - The New York Times 'There were two kinds of landscape characteristic of the inner planets of the Sun- the purposeful and the desolate.' The planet Quinta is pocked with ugly mounds and covered by a spiderweb-like network draped from spindly poles. It is a kingdom of phantoms and of a beauty afflicted...

Fifty new books at £1 each, celebrating the pioneering spirit of the Penguin Modern Classics series, from inspiring essays to groundbreaking fiction and poetry. The Three Electroknights poses the question, "What use to a being that lives beneath a sun are jewels of gas and silver stars of ice?" From a giant of twentieth-century science fiction, these four miniature space...

A mind-expanding space opera from one of Germany's most acclaimed science-fiction writers. In the dusty wastes of a far-flung planet, strange artisans toil. Like their fathers before them, they tie intricate knots out of the hair of their wives and daughters, slowly forming carpets. Delicate and unique, each carpet requires an entire lifetime of work—and all will be sold to...

Philip K. Dick's cult novel—now in an official tie-in edition to accompany the new TV series. Imagine the world if the Allies had lost the Second World War... Philip K. Dick trips the switches of our minds with his vision of the world as it might have been—the African continent virtually wiped out, the Mediterranean drained to make farmland, the...

New to Penguin Classics, this is the funny and deeply moving story of the apocalypse - as seen from one small village in England. Self-important and more or less friendless, retired teacher Edgar Hopkins lives for the thrill of winning poultry prizes. But his narrow world is shattered when he discovers that the moon is about to come crashing to...

First paperback publication of Italo Calvino's phenomenally funny account of the universe as a cosmic joke. The Complete Cosmicomics enchants with stories about the evolution of the universe, presenting characters fashioned from mathematical formulae and cellular structures. These characters disport themselves among galaxies, experience the solidification of planets, move from aquatic to terrestrial existence, play games with hydrogen atoms, and...

A satirical and philosophical set of space adventure stories from one of the best-loved science fiction writers of the twentieth century. The Star Diaries, Stanislaw Lem's set of short stories written over a period of twenty years, all feature the adventures of space traveller Ijon Tichy. These tales recount him spinning in time-warps, spying on robots, encountering bizarre civilisations and...

When Bill Masen wakes up blindfolded in hospital, there is a bitter irony in his situation. Carefully removing his bandages, he realises that he is the only person who can see — everyone else, doctors and patients alike, have been blinded by a meteor shower. A stunning new clothbound edition of one of the most famous science-fiction novels of the...

Russell Hoban's masterpiece, a post-apocalyptic vision of humanity stripped back to its essentials. O what we ben! And what we come to... Wandering a desolate post-apocalyptic landscape, speaking a broken-down English lost after the end of civilisation, Riddley Walker sets out to find out what brought humanity here. This is his story.

A wildly imaginative short story collection from one of the greatest female science fiction writers ever. Daring, energetic, and struck through with linguistic inventiveness, Warm Worlds and Otherwise is one of the most influential short story collections in all of science fiction, and one of the principal achievements of James Tiptree Jr - the pen name of Alice Bradley Sheldon....

When a Victorian scientist propels himself into the year 802,701 AD, he is initially delighted to find that suffering has been replaced by beauty, contentment, and peace. Entranced at first by the Eloi, an elfin species descended from man, he soon realises that this beautiful people are simply remnants of a once-great culture now weak and childishly afraid of the...

The dazzling debut collection from one of the greatest female science fiction writers ever. James Tiptree Jr, the pen name of Alice Bradley Sheldon, is widely considered to be one of the most influential American genre writers ever, and a pioneer of feminist science fiction. Ten Thousand Light-Years From Home, her brilliant debut collection, displays all her trademark humour, intensity...

The first English-language publication of one of the greatest Polish science fiction novels of all time. Is BER-66 a human or a machine? As he navigates the corridors and locked rooms of a strange bunker, he must solve the mysteries of murderous doppelgängers, a slow-motion city on the verge of destruction, and ultimately, the all-powerful Mechanism itself... Considered to be...

The adventures of one of Lem's most endearing characters, Pirx—a 'space truck driver' and everyman in Outer Space. Mission: Vertical launch at half booster power. Ascent to ellipsis B68. Correction to stable oriental path, with orbital period of four hours and twenty-six minutes. Proceed to rendezvous with shuttlecraft vehicles of the JO-2 type. There await further instructions. Tales of Pirx...

An omnibus of all four of the greatest science-fiction novels of H. G. Wells. In the space of less than four years, H. G. Wells (1866-1946) published four of the most influential, original, and hair-raising works of science-fiction. In a life of tireless experiment, travelling, and intellectual engagement, Wells was both a leading public figure and one of the great...

Existential science fiction with a family secret at its heart Fourth Galaxy, 4 November 2052 — in the blackness of space, a figure in blue overalls tumbles over and over as it drifts towards the planet Badr-al-Budur. No space suit, no helmet, no oxygen. He can't be alive, can he? But he is. First Navigator Fremder Gorn is the only...

A troubled insomniac in 1890s England falls suddenly into a sleep-like trance, from which he does not awake for over two hundred years. During his centuries of slumber, however, investments are made that make him the richest and most powerful man on Earth. But when he comes out of his trance, he is horrified to discover that the money accumulated...

When penniless businessman Mr. Bedford retreats to the Kent coast to write a play, he meets by chance the brilliant Dr. Cavor, an absent-minded scientist on the brink of developing a material that blocks gravity. Cavor soon succeeds in his experiments, only to tell a stunned Bedford the invention makes possible one of the oldest dreams of humanity: a journey...

A surreal work of science fiction from one of Japan's most brilliant novelists. In anticipation of a coming nuclear apocalypse, Mole has converted a huge underground quarry into an ark. While searching for his crew, he falls for the tricks of a wily insect dealer and his friends. In the surreal drama that ensues, the ark is invaded by first...

A darkly funny satire from the most acclaimed and popular Russian science-fiction writers. Astrophysicist Dmitri Malianov is on the precipice of a major discovery - a Nobel Prize-worthy breakthrough. Yet, home alone in his Leningrad apartment, his work is beginning to be stymied. Strange and improbable distractions are mounting around him - and he is not alone. Across the city,...

The definitive collection of stories from one of the most influential science fiction writers ever, and a pioneer of Black speculative fiction. Samuel R. Delany is widely considered to be one of the greatest science fiction writers of the twentieth century, and a pioneer of Black and Queer genre fiction. Driftglass, the definitive collection of Delany's science fiction stories, displays...

A classic of intergalactic, metaphysical science fiction and one of Philip Pullman's favourite books. After journeying across the stars, a man from Earth finds himself lost among the scarlet deserts, black cliffs, and semi-sentient oceans of Tormance, a world lit by the star Arcturus. Pulled northward by the sound of drums, and undergoing strange physical transformations, the Earthman's adventures with...

The night after a shooting star is seen streaking through the sky from Mars, a cylinder is discovered on Horsell Common in London. At first, naive locals approach the cylinder armed just with a white flag, only to be quickly killed by an all-destroying heat-ray, as terrifying tentacled invaders emerge. Soon the whole of human civilisation is under threat, as...

The Day of the Triffids introduces readers to the triffids, a monstrous species of stinging plant; they walk, they talk, they dominate the world. The narrator of this novel wakes up in hospital to find that, by missing the end of the world, he has survived to witness a new world. But the new world that awaits him is both...

A Jorge Luis Borges for the Space Age — The New York Times "On one side of the ducats was stamped the radiant profile of Archithorius, on the other - an image of his six hundred arms." Mortal Engines is a selection of the best of Stanislaw Lem's extraordinary miniature space epics, chosen by his heroic translator Michael Kandel, who...

A Victorian scientist propels himself into the future. Entranced at first by the Eloi, an elfin species descended from man, he soon realises that this beautiful people are simply remnants of a once-great culture—now weak and childishly afraid of the dark. They have reason to be afraid: in tunnels beneath their paradise lurks another race—the sinister Morlocks. When the scientist's...

Science fiction meets magical realism in this witty and wildly imaginative work from one of Argentina's best-loved writers. Part pulp adventure, part otherworldly meditation, this is the story of Trafalgar Medrano: intergalactic trader and lover of bitter coffee and black cigarettes. In the bars and cafes of Rosario, Argentina, he recounts tall tales of his space escapades — involving, among...

A romance in many dimensions that has fascinated generations of readers with its clever blend of social satire and mathematical theory. A Penguin Classic A work that continues to pose provocative questions about perception and reality, Flatland is a brilliant parody of Victorian society where all existence is limited to length and breadth—its inhabitants unable even to imagine a third...

A deluxe hardcover edition of the best-selling science-fiction book of all time—part of Penguin Galaxy, a collectible series of six sci-fi/fantasy classics, featuring a series introduction by Neil Gaiman Winner of the AIGA + Design Observer 50 Books | 50 Covers competition Science fiction’s supreme masterpiece, Dune will be forever considered a triumph of the imagination. Set on the desert...

A definitive annotated edition of one of the greatest of Terry Pratchett's multi-million-bestselling Discworld novels. Commander Sam Vimes of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch is in hot pursuit of a serial killer. The trouble is, a well-timed lightning strike has thrown both policeman and pursued into the city's past. Now Vimes must relive the history that made him—a cruel regime, a...

While walking in the Swiss Alps, two English travellers fall into a space-warp, and suddenly find themselves in another world. In many ways the same as our own— even down to the characters that inhabit it—this new planet is still somehow radically different, for the two walkers are now upon a Utopian Earth controlled by a single World Government. Here,...

90 classic titles celebrating 90 years of Penguin Books 'Assuming that I was sane and awake, my experience on that night was such as has befallen no man before.' After five years of 'strange amnesia', Nathaniel Wingate Peaslee remains haunted by madness and memories that cannot be real. Desperate for answers, he travels to Western Australia, joining an archaeological excavation...

A collection of brilliant short stories from one of America's greatest ever science fiction writers. Often considered to be Robert Sheckley's best short story collection, Untouched By Human Hands displays all of the author's signature surreal humour and eye for the unreal. Featuring human space exploration from the perspective of appalled aliens, darkly comic dystopias, and wry fables of technological...

When Dr Philip Raven, an intellectual working for the League of Nations, dies in 1930 he leaves behind a powerful legacy: an unpublished 'dream book'. Inspired by visions he has experienced for many years, it appears to be a book written far into the future: a history of humanity from the date of his death up to 2105. The Shape...

A much-loved classic from a giant of European science fiction. Stanislaw Lem is perhaps the most original and influential European science fiction writer of the twentieth century. His ornate, phantasmagorical writing probes the furthest reaches of the universe while remaining deeply and particularly human. The Cyberiad, one of Lem's most beloved works, follows the exploits of Trurl and Klapaucius—two ingenious...

A definitive collection of stories from the unrivalled master of twentieth-century horror in a Penguin Classics Deluxe edition with cover art by Travis Louie. Frequently imitated and widely influential, Howard Philips Lovecraft reinvented the horror genre in the 1920s, discarding ghosts and witches and instead envisioning mankind as a tiny outpost of dwindling sanity in a chaotic and malevolent universe....

New in Penguin Japanese Classics - a surreal work of apocalyptic science fiction. Introducing Penguin Japanese Classics - a collection of some of Japan's most celebrated and ground-breaking 20th-century writers, with covers inspired by Japanese art and design. Taking us from a sun-drenched affair in a seaside town to an underground 'ark' full of shadows and eccentrics, with stops at...

An outrageous adventure across the stars from the master of witty science fiction. Announced in a thunderclap out of another day's tedium, hapless New Yorker Tom Carmody learns that he is the winner of the Intergalactic Sweepstake. Accepting with a shrug, he is whipped across the universe to collect his prize. The catch? There's no way home. Enlisting the help...

Hoban's first book for adults mixes playful fantasy with an insightful meditation on fathers and sons. The Lion of Boaz-Jachin and Jachin-Boaz begins with the note, "I have gone to look for a lion." In a world where lions have become extinct, the map-maker Jachin-Boaz nevertheless abandons his wife and son to find one, leaving just this message. However, his...

A richly strange and funny novel follows one man grappling with love, life and creativity. On an ordinary day in a strangely unfamiliar London, Kleinzeit is fired from his advertising job and told he must go to hospital with a skewed hypotenuse. There on Ward A4, he falls in love with the divine, rosy-cheeked Sister and is sent spinning into...

New to Penguin Modern Classics, to tie in with the release of the Steven Spielberg film, and with a new introduction by Brian Aldiss. Matthew's parents are worried. At eleven, he's much too old to have an imaginary friend, yet they find him talking to and arguing with a presence that even he admits is not physically there. This presence...

First Modern Classics edition for one of Vonnegut's most entertaining novels Told with deadpan humour and bitter irony, Kurt Vonnegut's cult tale of global destruction preys on our deepest fears of witnessing Armageddon and, worse still, surviving it... Dr Felix Hoenikker, one of the founding 'fathers' of the atomic bomb, has left a deadly legacy to the world. For he...

New selection of the best science fiction stories of the last sixty years. This new edition of Brian Aldiss's classic anthology, A Science Fiction Omnibus, brings together a diverse selection of science fiction spanning over sixty years, from Isaac Asimov's 'Nightfall', first published in 1941, to the 2006 story 'Friends in Need' by Eliza Blair. Including authors such as Clifford...

Science fiction meets magical realism in this brilliant novel from one of Latin America's best-loved science-fiction writers. In the cafes and bars of Rosario, Argentina, there are sure to be many tall tales told. But none, perhaps, quite as spectacular as those recounted by Trafalgar Medrano. With a coffeepot and a pack of cigarettes to hand, he will nonchalantly tell...

A darkly entertaining vision of human weakness, envy, and governmental interference taken to their most chilling extremes. You'll never be happy until you can think and feel and look like other people. Jael 97 is an Alpha. Deemed over-privileged for her beauty, she is compelled to report to the Ministry of Facial Justice, where her face will be reconstructed. For...