Gary Gibson – författare

For a hundred and fifty thousand years, the alien Shoal have been hiding a terrible secret behind a façade of power. In the twenty-fifth century, they dominate the galaxy and control all trade and exploration, possessing the secret of faster-than-light travel. Mankind has established just a handful of interstellar colonies; their freedom and knowledge of the galaxy limited by the Shoal’s punitive colonial charter. Dakota Merrick is a machine-head pilot on the run from one of the Consortium’s most powerful criminals. Desperate for escape, she contracts to ferry an expert team to a remote star system. Her passengers hope to scavenge a functioning FTL-drive from a derelict starship – rumoured to pre date the Shoal. But they’ll expose an ancient genocide the Shoal will do anything to hide. And Dakota will be forced to face demons from her own military past. ‘Packed with massive concepts and dark psychological twists . . . seriously entertaining’ SFX‘Fast, confident, daring, skilful … A big book in scope and imagination’ Vector“The depth and scale of a writer coming into his own’ Sci-Fi-London.com

South Wales Sport Climbs covers the multitude of venues south of the Brecon Beacons, spanning the land and sea cliffs from the River Wye on the Welsh border to Pembrokeshire in the west. The climbing is easily split into four main areas - Valleys Sandstone, Gower, the inland and coastal limestone crags and Camarthenshire?s sea cliffs. This book will be the first book to bring together all these various crags into a single edition with many never having been covered in print before. Areas Covered; Carmarthenshire - Telpyn Point, Morfa Bychan, Pendine Gower - Rhossili Beach, Trial Wall Area, Rams Grove to Fetlock Zawn, Port Eynon, Oxwich in the Woods, Utopia Area, Watch House, Foxhole, Minchin Hole, Bowen's Parlour Area, Bosco's Gulch Area, Pwlldu Bay, Rams Tor, Barland Quarry. Inland and Coastal Limestone - Dinas Rock, Darren Fawr, Taffs Well, Taffs Well West, Gilwern East, Gilwern West, Witches Point, Temple Bay, Castle Upon Alun, Costa del Major. Valleys Sandstone - Craig Cwm, Dyffryn, Abbey Buttress, Pen Pych, Space Mountain, Treherbert Quarry, Gelli, Ferndale, Blaenllechau, Dan Dicks, Trebanog, Glynfach, Trehafod, The Darren, Cwmaman, Mountain Ash, Mount Pleasant, The Gap, Navigation Quarry, Abertysswg, Deri, Bargoed, Ridgeway, Llanbradach, Tyle y Coch, Sirhowy, Cox's Quarry, Cross Keys Quarry, Cwmcarn, Tirpentwys.

For a hundred and fifty thousand years, the alien Shoal have been hiding a terrible secret behind a façade of power. In the twenty-fifth century, they dominate the galaxy and control all trade and exploration, possessing the secret of faster-than-light travel. Mankind has established just a handful of interstellar colonies; their freedom and knowledge of the galaxy limited by the Shoal’s punitive colonial charter. Dakota Merrick is a machine-head pilot on the run from one of the Consortium’s most powerful criminals. Desperate for escape, she contracts to ferry an expert team to a remote star system. Her passengers hope to scavenge a functioning FTL-drive from a derelict starship – rumoured to pre date the Shoal. But they’ll expose an ancient genocide the Shoal will do anything to hide. And Dakota will be forced to face demons from her own military past. ‘Packed with massive concepts and dark psychological twists . . . seriously entertaining’ SFX‘Fast, confident, daring, skilful … A big book in scope and imagination’ Vector“The depth and scale of a writer coming into his own’ Sci-Fi-London.com

Found adrift far from Consortium space, pilot Dakota Merrick and Lucas Corso are taken prisoner by the alien Bandati. There, Dakota discovers that humanity’s knowledge of the galaxy is frighteningly inaccurate. The Shoal has apparently been fighting a frontier war with a rival species, the Emissaries, for thousands of years. As yet, the latter seem unaware of their FTL technology’s full destructive capabilities. But the Bandati now have this information, and they will use it for profit.Dakota realises, to her shock, that the Shoal may therefore hold the Galaxy’s best chance for peace. Forging an alliance with Trader, a Shoal-member, she’s determined to prevent the Bandati’s deadly knowledge from reaching the Emissaries. Yet despite her efforts, a nova war now seems inevitable – a war that will destroy millions of inhabited worlds.

The nova war spreads across the galaxy, as the Emissaries wage a fierce and reckless campaign. They’ve already reached human-occupied space and forced the alien Shoal into a desperate retreat. And when Dakota leaves to pursue a lead, Corso’s luck turns bad. Now commanding a fleet of human-piloted Magi ships, his authority crumbles before assassination attempts and politically motivated sabotage. Their best hope lies with Ty Whitecloud, currently light years beyond Consortium borders. Only Ty can decipher messages left behind by ancient star travellers – which could be crucial to their cause.But Whitecloud is imprisoned onboard a dying coreship, awaiting execution for war crimes against Corso’s own people. For humanity’s very survival, Corso must get to Whitecloud and keep him alive. If Dakota doesn’t kill him first.‘A sharp, distinctive piece of Sci-Fi, and Gibson has certainly proved himself a name to watch out for’SFX‘Amazing energy … establishes Gary Gibson as a leading light of modern SF’ FantasyBookCritic blog

But this new mode of transportation comes at a price and there are risks. Saul Dumont knows this better than anyone. He’s still trying to cope with the loss of the wormhole link to the Galileo system, which has stranded him on Earth far from his wife and child for the past several years.Only weeks away from the link with Galileo finally being re-established, he stumbles across a conspiracy to suppress the discovery of a second, alien network of wormholes which lead billions of years in the future. A covert expedition is sent to what is named Site 17 to investigate, but when an accident occurs and one of the expedition, Mitchell Stone, disappears – they realise that they are dealing with something far beyond their understanding.When a second expedition travels via the wormholes to Earth in the near future of 2245 they discover a devastated, lifeless solar system - all except for one man, Mitchell Stone, recovered from an experimental cryogenics facility in the ruins of a lunar city.Stone may be the only surviving witness to the coming destruction of the Earth. But why is he the only survivor – and once he’s brought back to the present, is there any way he and Saul can prevent the destruction that’s coming?

In the late twenty-first century, you will find a very different world. Little is as it used to be, and many are not what they seem.Kendrick Gallmon, survivor of an infamous research facility called the Maze, is trying to pick up the pieces of his life, even though he knows the Labrat augments are slowly killing him. Then one day his heart stops beating, forever, and a ghost urges him to return to the source of all his nightmares, a long-abandoned military complex filled with entirely real voices of the dead.

MUST HE DIE TO KNOW THE TRUTH?Archivist Luc Gabion is dying, slowly, victim of a forced technology implant while on assignment. He brought down a powerful terrorist, but at great cost, and this new tech brings unexpected dangers.Luc must investigate the Thousand Emperors, rulers of the Tian Di’s stellar empire. One of their number has been murdered and he needs to find the killer. But the technology he now carries supersedes anything he's encountered, and Luc sees things he knows are forbidden. As the truth emerges, he’s in trouble. Any of these leaders could be guilty – and could execute him on a whim. Worse, the murder victim was brokering the coming Reunification. Two great warring civilisations, separated for centuries, due to unite in a new age of peace.But it becomes clear that someone will do anything to ensure that day never comes.

Pilot Megan Jacinth has three impossible goals. She has to find her friend Bash, who she left for dead to save her own life. She needs to locate a space-faring entity, using Bash to do so. Then she must unlock this Marauder's ancient secrets. And if she doesn't, millions will die. An alien incursion is coming, and the Marauder's knowledge is the key to survival or annihilation. When Megan finds Bash, he's being held captive by Gregor Tarrant. Tarrant wants Megan dead - but not before he finds the entity himself, for his own dark goals. Megan is desperate to reach the Marauder first, but the price for unlocking its secrets may be too high. Megan should know, as she still bears the scars from their last encounter . . .The Times has said Gary Gibson is 'To be considered alongside the leading triumvirate of British hard SF writers: Al Reynolds, Peter Hamilton, and Neal Asher . . . a treat for all fans of intelligent space opera' and SFX has called his work 'Gripping, imaginative and morally complex'.

Extinction Game is a riveting, action-packed post-apocalyptic survival story from master of SF, Gary Gibson.When your life is based on lies, how do you hunt down the truth?Jerry Beche should be dead. Instead, he's rescued from a desolate Earth where he was the last man alive. He's then trained for the toughest conditions imaginable and placed with a crack team of specialists on an isolated island. Every one of them is a survivor, as each withstood the violent ending of their own alternate Earth. And their new specialism? To retrieve weapons and data in missions to other apocalyptic versions of our world.But what is 'the Authority', the shadowy organization that rescued Beche and his fellow survivors? How does it access timelines to find other Earths? And why does it need these instruments of death?As Jerry struggles to obey his new masters, he begins to distrust his new companions. A strange bunch, their motivations are less than clear, and accidents start plaguing their missions. Jerry suspects the Authority is feeding them lies, and team members are spying on him. As a dangerous situation spirals into catastrophe, is there anybody he can trust?

Survival Game by Gary Gibson is the second book in the gripping apocalyptic duology that began with Extinction Game. Katya is a scientist, working on a classified project for the Russian Empire. She's also desperate. Her bosses want to exploit her knowledge and send her on an incredible, dangerous mission. And if she refuses, her father's life will be forfeit. Katya must retrieve an artefact that will grant new life to the dying Russian tsar. She's therefore being sent deep undercover on an alternate version of Earth, to an American-controlled island. Here Borodin, the tsar's spymaster, will be watching her.On the island Katya and Jerry, an American adventurer, form an uneasy alliance. They discover the artefact will call down terror from the depths of space, yet Katya's superiors refuse to listen. But Katya and Jerry's worlds face extinction, so the artefact must be destroyed - at any cost. Two civilizations depend upon it.

But this new mode of transportation comes at a price and there are risks. Saul Dumont knows this better than anyone. He’s still trying to cope with the loss of the wormhole link to the Galileo system, which has stranded him on Earth far from his wife and child for the past several years.Only weeks away from the link with Galileo finally being re-established, he stumbles across a conspiracy to suppress the discovery of a second, alien network of wormholes which lead billions of years in the future. A covert expedition is sent to what is named Site 17 to investigate, but when an accident occurs and one of the expedition, Mitchell Stone, disappears – they realise that they are dealing with something far beyond their understanding.When a second expedition travels via the wormholes to Earth in the near future of 2245 they discover a devastated, lifeless solar system - all except for one man, Mitchell Stone, recovered from an experimental cryogenics facility in the ruins of a lunar city.Stone may be the only surviving witness to the coming destruction of the Earth. But why is he the only survivor – and once he’s brought back to the present, is there any way he and Saul can prevent the destruction that’s coming?

MUST HE DIE TO KNOW THE TRUTH?Archivist Luc Gabion is dying, slowly, victim of a forced technology implant while on assignment. He brought down a powerful terrorist, but at great cost, and this new tech brings unexpected dangers.Luc must investigate the Thousand Emperors, rulers of the Tian Di’s stellar empire. One of their number has been murdered and he needs to find the killer. But the technology he now carries supersedes anything he's encountered, and Luc sees things he knows are forbidden. As the truth emerges, he’s in trouble. Any of these leaders could be guilty – and could execute him on a whim. Worse, the murder victim was brokering the coming Reunification. Two great warring civilisations, separated for centuries, due to unite in a new age of peace.But it becomes clear that someone will do anything to ensure that day never comes.

Pilot Megan Jacinth has three impossible goals. She has to find her friend Bash, who she left for dead to save her own life. She needs to locate a space-faring entity, using Bash to do so. Then she must unlock this Marauder's ancient secrets. And if she doesn't, millions will die. An alien incursion is coming, and the Marauder's knowledge is the key to survival or annihilation. When Megan finds Bash, he's being held captive by Gregor Tarrant. Tarrant wants Megan dead - but not before he finds the entity himself, for his own dark goals. Megan is desperate to reach the Marauder first, but the price for unlocking its secrets may be too high. Megan should know, as she still bears the scars from their last encounter . . .The Times has said Gary Gibson is 'To be considered alongside the leading triumvirate of British hard SF writers: Al Reynolds, Peter Hamilton, and Neal Asher . . . a treat for all fans of intelligent space opera' and SFX has called his work 'Gripping, imaginative and morally complex'.

Against Gravity is a stunning sci-fi thriller from Gary Gibson, author of the Shoal Sequence.In the late twenty-first century, you will find a very different world. Little is as it used to be, and many are not what they seem.Kendrick Gallmon, survivor of an infamous research facility called the Maze, is trying to pick up the pieces of his life, even though he knows the Labrat augments are slowly killing him. Then one day his heart stops beating, forever, and a ghost urges him to return to the source of all his nightmares, a long-abandoned military complex filled with entirely real voices of the dead.

Shoreline of Infinity Science Fiction Magazine is published in Edinburgh, Scotland. It features short fiction, articles, poetry, art, reviews and more. The first issue was published in the summer of 2015; already we have published some astonishingly good stories from new and more well known writers, from Scotland and from around the world.We also run a monthly science fiction cabaret, Event Horizon.This is a special edition produced in partnership with the Edinburgh International Book Festival.We have fantastic sci-fi stories, articles and poems from Pippa Goldschmidt, Adam Roberts, Ken MacLeod, Ada Palmer, Nalo Hopkinson, Charles Stross, Jo Walton and Jane Yolen (all of whom are appearing at the Book Festival). This issue also shows off some of the fine Scottish science fiction talent we have been privileged to publish. Tips of the hat go to: Caroline Grebbell, Iain Maloney, Russell Jones, Dee Raspin, Gary Gibson, Thomas Clark, Katie Gray and Andrew J Wilson for their stories. We are also delighted to use this issue as an excuse to re-publish Ruth EJ Booth’s BSFA award winning story, The Honey Trap. Ruth writes a regular well-loved column on the boulder-strewn path to becoming a writer.This special issue is also an opportunity for the editorial team to reflect. Iain Maloney, takes a look at Scottish dystopian fiction, Russell Jones talks about SF poetry and, as MC and organiser, tells us about Event Horizon. Monica Burns brings us up to date with SF Caledonia, our project on early Scottish science fiction, and Mark Tonerexplores the artwork of Shoreline of Infinity.

For an age, humanity has borrowed from caches of alien technology found in space. Among these artefacts are portals known as Stations, which our spacecraft now use to traverse the galaxy. The ‘Angels’ who created this technology vanished aeons ago, but they left behind powerful enemies with long memories. These are about to target the Stations with a wave of destruction – and nearby worlds will suffer the same fate.One Station orbits the distant planet Kaspar, now occupied by scientists and armed militia who monitor life on the surface. Here, ignorant of our existence, the only known sentient species other than humankind is slowly evolving. But things are about to change. As devastation sweeps the galaxy, Kaspar’s mysterious ‘Citadel’ may be key to repelling this threat. But at what cost to its native inhabitants – and its human guardians?

Found adrift far from Consortium space, pilot Dakota Merrick and Lucas Corso are taken prisoner by the alien Bandati. There, Dakota discovers that humanity’s knowledge of the galaxy is frighteningly inaccurate. The Shoal has apparently been fighting a frontier war with a rival species, the Emissaries, for thousands of years. As yet, the latter seem unaware of their FTL technology’s full destructive capabilities. But the Bandati now have this information, and they will use it for profit.Dakota realises, to her shock, that the Shoal may therefore hold the Galaxy’s best chance for peace. Forging an alliance with Trader, a Shoal-member, she’s determined to prevent the Bandati’s deadly knowledge from reaching the Emissaries. Yet despite her efforts, a nova war now seems inevitable – a war that will destroy millions of inhabited worlds.

The nova war spreads across the galaxy, as the Emissaries wage a fierce and reckless campaign. They’ve already reached human-occupied space and forced the alien Shoal into a desperate retreat. And when Dakota leaves to pursue a lead, Corso’s luck turns bad. Now commanding a fleet of human-piloted Magi ships, his authority crumbles before assassination attempts and politically motivated sabotage. Their best hope lies with Ty Whitecloud, currently light years beyond Consortium borders. Only Ty can decipher messages left behind by ancient star travellers – which could be crucial to their cause.But Whitecloud is imprisoned onboard a dying coreship, awaiting execution for war crimes against Corso’s own people. For humanity’s very survival, Corso must get to Whitecloud and keep him alive. If Dakota doesn’t kill him first.‘A sharp, distinctive piece of Sci-Fi, and Gibson has certainly proved himself a name to watch out for’SFX‘Amazing energy … establishes Gary Gibson as a leading light of modern SF’ FantasyBookCritic blog

For an age, humanity has borrowed from caches of alien technology found in space. Among these artefacts are portals known as Stations, which our spacecraft now use to traverse the galaxy. The ‘Angels’ who created this technology vanished aeons ago, but they left behind powerful enemies with long memories. These are about to target the Stations with a wave of destruction – and nearby worlds will suffer the same fate.One Station orbits the distant planet Kaspar, now occupied by scientists and armed militia who monitor life on the surface. Here, ignorant of our existence, the only known sentient species other than humankind is slowly evolving. But things are about to change. As devastation sweeps the galaxy, Kaspar’s mysterious ‘Citadel’ may be key to repelling this threat. But at what cost to its native inhabitants – and its human guardians?

Extinction Game is a riveting, action-packed post-apocalyptic survival story from master of SF, Gary Gibson.When your life is based on lies, how do you hunt down the truth?Jerry Beche should be dead. Instead, he's rescued from a desolate Earth where he was the last man alive. He's then trained for the toughest conditions imaginable and placed with a crack team of specialists on an isolated island. Every one of them is a survivor, as each withstood the violent ending of their own alternate Earth. And their new specialism? To retrieve weapons and data in missions to other apocalyptic versions of our world.But what is 'the Authority', the shadowy organization that rescued Beche and his fellow survivors? How does it access timelines to find other Earths? And why does it need these instruments of death?As Jerry struggles to obey his new masters, he begins to distrust his new companions. A strange bunch, their motivations are less than clear, and accidents start plaguing their missions. Jerry suspects the Authority is feeding them lies, and team members are spying on him. As a dangerous situation spirals into catastrophe, is there anybody he can trust?

Survival Game by Gary Gibson is the second book in the gripping apocalyptic duology that began with Extinction Game. Katya is a scientist, working on a classified project for the Russian Empire. She's also desperate. Her bosses want to exploit her knowledge and send her on an incredible, dangerous mission. And if she refuses, her father's life will be forfeit. Katya must retrieve an artefact that will grant new life to the dying Russian tsar. She's therefore being sent deep undercover on an alternate version of Earth, to an American-controlled island. Here Borodin, the tsar's spymaster, will be watching her.On the island Katya and Jerry, an American adventurer, form an uneasy alliance. They discover the artefact will call down terror from the depths of space, yet Katya's superiors refuse to listen. But Katya and Jerry's worlds face extinction, so the artefact must be destroyed - at any cost. Two civilizations depend upon it.

The superfamily Chalcidoidea (Insecta, Hymenoptera) contains in excess of 26,000 described species worldwide, but with an estimated total diversity of more than 500,000 species the vast majority of species have yet to be discovered and described. Most chalcidoid species are parasitoids of hosts in at least 12 different insect orders, attacking the egg, larval or pupal stages, though phytophagy and other life cycles and hosts are known. Iran is the 18th largest country in the world and has a rich and diverse insect fauna, including Chalcidoidea. It is extremely interesting from a biogeographic point of view, and a paradise for an entomologist. This book summarizes the results of all prior research concerning species diversity of Iranian Chalcidoidea, including host records and distribution records by province in Iran as well as world distribution by country for 1,351 species of Chalcidoidea recorded from Iran through the end of 2019. The faunal diversity for each of the 20 families of Chalcidoidea known from Iran is also compared with that known for 15 adjacent countries. In addition, general information on world diversity, recognition, phylogenetic relationships and host relationships are given for each family. As such, the book will be an invaluable source of information for all those involved with chalcidoids, for anyone with an interest in insect systematics, and all those working in crop protection, especially biological control and Integrated Pest Management.