Lacuna Series

"Never again attempt to develop this kind of technology." It is with these words that an unknown alien attacker destroys the Earth cities of Tehran, Sydney and Beijing. Fifty million people die... and nothing is ever the same again. Some call them Demons, some call them Aliens, but to Chinese Naval Captain Melissa Liao they are the enemy. She is given command of one of three great warships built to fight the "demons", the TFR Beijing. Her task is simple. Find who attacked Earth and why... then stop them. Book one of the Lacuna series. - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (new release!) - Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (coming 2014!) Don't miss these short stories set in the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Imperfect - Faith

Drawn to a desert world by the legacy of a traitor, the crew of the TFR Beijing discover something abandoned, something forgotten... something mysterious. Buddha once said, "An insincere and evil friend is more to be feared than a wild beast... ... for a wild beast may wound your body, but an evil friend will wound your mind." The scars of betrayal runs deep... and Captain Melissa Liao will find out just how far the slighted will go for revenge. Book two of the Lacuna series. - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (new release!) - Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (coming 2014!) Don't miss these short stories set in the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Imperfect - Faith

Humanity has rebuilt on the world of Velsharn, forging the colony of Eden from the ashes of Earth. On Velsharn's verdant soil children are born, alliances are made and for a time, peace reigns. In high orbit, the debris of an entire Toralii fleet stands as mute testament to humanity's sovereignty; their right to this planet is unquestioned. Above the TFR Beijing, now the centrepiece in a flourishing city, the inky void of space is eerily silent. As Commander Melissa Liao recovers from her ordeals, the universe continues its roiling machinations unhindered by her suffering. The end is coming, but before the final chapter in the Lacuna series begins, the stage must be set and the players must be in their places. So much work is left unfinished and Melissa Liao has more trials to endure before her pain is over. Before the end of war and steel, Eternity awaits. Book five of the Lacuna series. - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity - Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (new release!) - Lacuna: The Requiem of Steel (coming 2015!) Don't miss these short stories set in the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Magnet: Marauder - Magnet: Scarecrow - Imperfect - Faith

The words of a construct, an artificial mind, ring truer than ever. Humanity has angered a powerful foe and cannot weather the growing storm. The Toralii are coming. But instead of warships, the Toralii Alliance send an ambassador to the Sol system. The message it brings is a startling, marked departure from all other contact with the species... and one that heralds a shift in the balance of power in the Milky Way, the most significant in hundreds of years. The Toralii face a larger threat. A something their ships cannot catch, their weapons cannot touch and gravimetric interference cannot stop. The Toralii, for the first time in centuries, know the crushing grip of fear. The TFR Beijing must face an old enemy, an enemy who has not been idle; an imperfect being whose ambition seems matched only by his capabilities. Liao's child is born into an era of war and fear, and the spectre of oblivion looms over all mankind. Book three of the Lacuna series. - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (new release!) - Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (coming 2014!) Don't miss these short stories set in the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Imperfect - Faith  

Humans thought that they could stand amongst the older races. They believed, in their hubris, that the perils of interstellar travel could be mastered within a single generation. That they would be spared the wrath of the Toralii. Now humanity lies in ashes. The cradle of our civilization, Earth, is nothing more than a charred husk, a dead world in an empty solar system in an unremarkable corner of the galaxy. The war is over. We lost. Captain Melissa Liao and the remaining band of Humans, numbering barely in the tens of thousands, hold the future of their entire species in their hands. They must settle a new world, encounter friends and enemies new and old, and plant the seeds of hope in the ashes of humanity. Book four of the Lacuna series. - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (new release!) - Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (coming 2014!) Don't miss these short stories set in the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Magnet: Marauder - Imperfect - Faith

Peace in our time. The Toralii guns are silent. Humanity’s home of Velsharn is secure. There are no more battles. No more wars. The machinations of a dying man have traded a single life for a species; Captain Melissa Liao’s world is four iron walls and pain, but her suffering buys life for mankind. Her legacy is one of struggle, selflessness, and sacrifice. Held in the grasp of the Toralii Alliance, she takes little comfort in this. Is this the swansong for war, for steel and blood and gunpowder? Is this the price of peace? Amongst the crew of the TFR Beijing, the TFR Tehran, and the TFR Washington, a chorus rings: No one gets left behind. The climactic sixth, and final, book of the Lacuna series. - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity - Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity - Lacuna: The Requiem of Steel (now available for preorder!) Don't miss these short stories set in the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Magnet: Marauder - Magnet: Scarecrow - Magnet: Ironheart (coming soon) - Imperfect - Faith

It's 2037. I'm Mike Williams, but you can call me 'Magnet'. Everyone else does. It's short for 'Chick Magnet'. Good old-fashioned military humour at its finest. At age fifteen, my face picked a fight with the propeller of my family's boat, on a shoal near Broome, off Western Australia. It was an accident, but, needless to say, the propeller won. Twelve years later, I was a not-so-ruggedly-handsome fighter pilot assigned to the TFR Sydney. Not the Captain, or flight leader, or anything similarly exciting. Nobody special, just one mostly-unmemorable pilot among the many nameless, faceless masses. I'm Magnet. This is the beginning of my story. A 5500 word story in the Lacuna universe, set during the events of Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi but suitable to read as a stand-alone story.                Parts of the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Imperfect - Faith The Lacuna series: - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion (New Release!) - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (coming 2013!)

On Belthas IV, the great forge world in the inner sphere of Toralii space, thousands of constructs -- artificial slaves -- are manufactured every week. They are initially identical and indistinguishable from the other until each is implanted with a stock neural net. From that moment onward every construct is different. They all have one thing in common, though; all constructs are bound by rules. They serve. They do not question their place. They do not betray. Each construct is different, but some are more different than others... A 4,000 word short story set in the Lacuna universe but suitable to read as a stand-alone story. Parts of the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Imperfect - Faith The Lacuna series: - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion (New Release!) - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (coming 2013!)

My name is Mike “Magnet” Williams. I've come a long way. These days I have my own ship, the Rubens. We stole it from the Toralii Alliance. For the last year the Rubens has been tasked with ‘counter-logistical privateering’ against the Toralii Alliance, attacking their military supply network. We hit them hard, we get out, we do it all over again. Modern day buccaneers given total autonomy. We're alone, without another Human within a thousand light years. If only that were true. Somewhere out in the black, around a remote moon covered in ice that's kilometres thick, we found something. Something that was not supposed to be there. Something we were not supposed to find. Scarecrow. I can take a lot of pressure. Fighter pilots are supposed to be able to do that. Whatever the universe throws at me, I can handle it. So far I've faced aliens, friendly and otherwise, and I've seen things that so very few Humans have. I've dealt with it all. But not this. Not my own conscience. 15,700-word story in the Lacuna universe, set after the events of Magnet: Marauder and Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity, but suitable for reading as a stand-alone story. Parts of the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Magnet: Marauder - Magnet: Scarecrow (new release!) - Imperfect - Faith The Lacuna series: - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (new release!) - Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (coming soon!)

Pro tip: Never volunteer for anything. That's the first thing they told me in flight school. It's 2037. I'm Mike Williams, but you can call me 'Magnet', and I'm a fighter pilot on the TFR Sydney. Our flight leader, Iron, has a mission: Volunteer only. It's the usual gig. High risk, lots of unknowns, an opportunity to make history or die trying. Hopefully the former, but sometimes it's a little of column A, a little of column B, you know? The mission's going to a place no Human's been, hoping to earn ourselves some desperately needed allies. Pretty simple on paper. Fly out to a rendezvous at a distant world, pick up an alien and take him to his blushing bride. Although, come to think of it, I don't know if psychotic waist-high reptilians can blush. A 13,700-word story in the Lacuna universe, set after the events of Magnet but suitable for reading as a stand-alone story. Parts of the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Imperfect - Faith The Lacuna series: - Lacuna: Demons of the Void - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion (New Release!) - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (coming 2013!)

My name is Mike “Magnet” Williams. I’m a lot of things: fighter pilot. Ugly bastard. Lord of all I survey. I fly the F-88 Wasp, although recently I've been doing a stint as a gunner in the Broadsword gunship Piggyback. I was back on Earth on an important mission after a long time in space. Real important. But now Fleet Command have another special mission for me. Apparently I’m a glutton for punishment. See, there’s a Toralii freighter, somewhere deep in space, and it’s vulnerable. Someone got the bright idea to steal it. Guess all their best people were unavailable, since they picked me and the crew of the Piggyback. Since, you know, we did so well at the last mission. We’re going way out of my comfort zone for this one. I'm happiest when I'm in a cockpit, but this is something else. Something important. If we succeed, we’re doing to be doing something special, living out on the edge, hitting the Toralii where it hurts. We’re taking the fight to them, and we’re taking something they use to fight. If we fail, nobody will ever find our bodies. 17,200-word story in the Lacuna universe, set after the events of Magnet and Magnet: Special Mission but suitable for reading as a stand-alone story. Parts of the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Magnet: Marauder (new release!) - Imperfect - Faith The Lacuna series: - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (coming soon!)

It's 2037. I'm Mike Williams, but you can call me 'Magnet'. Everyone else does. It's short for 'Chick Magnet', which is good old-fashioned military humour at its finest. At age fifteen, my face picked a fight with the propeller of my family's boat, on a shoal near Broome, off Western Australia. It was an accident, but, needless to say, the propeller won. Twelve years later, I was a not-so-ruggedly-handsome fighter pilot assigned to the TFR Sydney. Not the Captain, or flight leader, or anything similarly exciting. Nobody special, just one mostly-unmemorable pilot among the many nameless, faceless masses. I'm Magnet. This is my story. Contains: Magnet Magnet: Special Mission Magnet: Marauder Magnet: Scarecrow and a bonus story, "Magnet Saves Christmas"! This novel length collection of Magnet stories is interwoven into the Lacuna universe, taking place between Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi and Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity, but is suitable for reading as a standalone collection. Parts of the Lacuna universe: - Magnet - Magnet: Special Mission - Magnet: Marauder - Magnet: Scarecrow - Magnet Omnibus I (new release!) - Imperfect - Faith The Lacuna series: - Lacuna - Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi - Lacuna: The Spectre of Oblivion - Lacuna: The Ashes of Humanity (new release!) - Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (coming soon!)

"A brilliant introduction to David Adams's immediately likable characters and wonderful writing, New Fleece on Life is the perfect What-If story. Anyone fond of happier endings should give it a read; anyone eager to catch a star on the rise should follow David's writing career closely." - Hugh Howey, author of Wool and the Silo series. One day, on Kboards, I started a Lacuna/Wool crossover as a joke. It was literally a few lines thrown together from the top of my head and a poorly photoshopped cover. It was one of many joke threads and I had no idea where it was going. The readers--including Hugh himself--wanted more, so I posted more. And they kept wanting more. So I posted more. And they asked for more. And here we are. Wool and the canonical tale of Holston is over, but this is what could have happened if everyone involved lost their minds. In the true tradition of terrible fanfiction shipping, New Fleece on Life is poorly written and poorly structured, everyone acts wildly out of character and, in the interests of the 'ship', all previous emotional and romantic entanglements are disregarded so that all involved can throw themselves into a flimsily constructed, hasty and poorly thought out fling with little thought to the consequences. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed, in a sincere and genuine way, writing it.