Caliban's War (The Expanse, 2)

Caliban's War (The Expanse, 2)

With over 10 million copies sold, The Expanse has become one of the biggest science fiction phenomenons of the decade. The second book in the New York Times bestselling Expanse series, Caliban's War shows a solar system on the brink of war, and the only hope of peace rests on James Holden and the crew of the Rocinante's shoulders. Now a Prime Original series. We are not alone. On Ganymede, breadbasket of the outer planets, a Martian marine watches as her platoon is slaughtered by a monstrous supersoldier. On Earth, a high-level politician struggles to prevent interplanetary war from reigniting. And on Venus, an alien protomolecule has overrun the planet, wreaking massive, mysterious changes and threatening to spread out into the solar system. In the vast wilderness of space, James Holden and the crew of the Rocinante have been keeping the peace for the Outer Planets Alliance. When they agree to help a scientist search war-torn Ganymede for a missing child, the future of humanity rests on whether a single ship can prevent an alien invasion that may have already begun . . . Hugo Award Winner for Best Series The Expanse Leviathan Wakes  Caliban's War  Abaddon's Gate  Cibola Burn  Nemesis Games  Babylon's Ashes  Persepolis Rising  Tiamat's Wrath ​ Leviathan Falls  Memory's Legion The Expanse Short Fiction Drive  The Butcher of Anderson Station Gods of Risk The Churn The Vital Abyss Strange Dogs Auberon  The Sins of Our Fathers​ "This breakneck tale will have readers itching for book three."― Publishers Weekly " Caliban's War is even better than Leviathan Wakes . It's old-fashioned space opera, the kind of SF that I cut my teeth on, a real page-turner set in a vividly imagined solar system... superlatively written."― George R.R. Martin, New York Times bestselling author of A Game of Thrones "A worthy sequel to Leviathan's Wake. Compelling characters and a plot that combines political intrigue with military sf create a memorable story that begs for film adaptation."― Library Journal "Tense and thrilling"― SciFi Now James S. A. Corey is the pen name of Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck. In addition to writing the novels and short stories of The Expanse, they wrote and produced the television series of the same name. Daniel lives with his family in the American southwest. Ty will tell you where he lives when and if he wants you to come over. Caliban's War By Corey, James S.A. Orbit Copyright © 2012 Corey, James S.A. All right reserved. ISBN: 9780316129060 Prologue: Mei Mei?” Miss Carrie said. “Please put your painting work away now. Your mother is here.” It took her a few seconds to understand what the teacher was saying, not because Mei didn’t know the words—she was four now, and not a toddler anymore—but because they didn’t fit with the world as she knew it. Her mother couldn’t come get her. Mommy had left Ganymede and gone to live on Ceres Station, because, as her daddy put it, she needed some mommy-alone-time. Then, her heart starting to race, Mei thought, She came back . “Mommy?” From where Mei sat at her scaled-down easel, Miss Carrie’s knee blocked her view of the coatroom door. Mei’s hands were sticky with finger paints, red and blue and green swirling on her palms. She shifted forward and grabbed for Miss Carrie’s leg as much to move it as to help her stand up. “Mei!” Miss Carrie shouted. Mei looked at the smear of paint on Miss Carrie’s pants and the controlled anger on the woman’s broad, dark face. “I’m sorry, Miss Carrie.” “It’s okay,” the teacher said in a tight voice that meant it wasn’t, really, but Mei wasn’t going to be punished. “Please go wash your hands and then come put away your painting work. I’ll get this down and you can give it to your mother. It is a doggie?” “It’s a space monster.” “It’s a very nice space monster. Now go wash your hands, please, sweetheart.” Mei nodded, turned, and ran for the bathroom, her smock flapping around her like a rag caught in an air duct. “And don’t touch the wall!” “I’m sorry, Miss Carrie.” “It’s okay. Just clean it off after you’ve washed your hands.” She turned the water on full blast, the colors and swirls rushing off her skin. She went through the motions of drying her hands without caring whether she was dripping water or not. It felt like gravity had shifted, pulling her toward the doorway and the anteroom instead of down toward the ground. The other children watched, excited because she was excited, as Mei scrubbed the finger marks mostly off the wall and slammed the paint pots back into their box and the box onto its shelf. She pulled the smock up over her head rather than wait for Miss Carrie to help her, and stuffed it into the recycling bin. In the anteroom, Miss Carrie was standing with two other grown-ups, neither of them Mommy. One was a woman Mei didn’t know, space monster painting held gently in her hand and a polite smile on her face. The other was Doctor Strickland. “No, she’s b