Showing results by author "Jack L. Chalker" in All Categories

At the heart of a bizarre planet lay the goal of every being that had ever lived.… Below average in height and unprepossessing in appearance, Nathan Brazil is an unassuming if cynical starship owner, carrying passengers and cargo for a living - hardly the sort of person to hold the fate of the entire universe in his hands. But when Nathan detours from his route to answer a distress call, a hidden stargate hurls him and his passengers to the Well World, the master control planet for the cosmos. Billions of years ago, a godlike race unlocked all the secrets of space and time and remade the universe according to their grand design.

Mavra Chang was once a master criminal, notorious throughout the galaxy. But for 11 long years she has been trapped in a nonhuman body on the Well World - the master control planet for the universe, where untold numbers of strange races exist, separated by barriers erected by the mysterious, vanished race that built the Well World billions of years ago. Orbiting the planet is a planetoid concealing Obie, a supercomputer that could restore Mavra Chang to her original form - if she can reach it. Unfortunately, the only spaceship on the planet is hidden in the northern hemisphere, a place no living creature can survive.

Antor Trellig, head of a ruthless interstellar syndicate, has seized a supercomputer with godlike powers that could make him omnipotent. The Council offers master criminal Mavra Chang any reward she desires if she can stop Trellig - and horrible, lingering death if she fails. But neither Trellig nor Mavra has taken the Well World into consideration. Built by the ancient Markovians, the Well World controls the design of the cosmos. When the opponents are drawn across space to the mysterious planet, they find themselves in new, alien bodies and in the middle of a battle where strange races fight desperately.

Aliens are spying on Earth from one of the four worlds that make up the Warden Diamond. But it is impossible to send agents to any of the four worlds because of unique microscopic symbionts that make it impossible for visitors to leave the Diamond. Seeking a unique solution, each of the four worlds making up the Diamond is sent a person whose mind has been stripped of everything and who is now controlled by an agent of the Confederacy. Lilith is the first planet to be visited.

They took the body of Park Lacoch and stripped away his mind. Then they stuck him aboard a spaceship and exiled him to Charon, from which no return was possible. And just when he thought things couldn't get any worse, Park found himself transformed into a changeling - a half-beast, half-man, with the beast rapidly gaining ascendancy....

Cassie did not feel the soul rider enter her body...but suddenly she knew that Anchor was corrupt, and that, far from being a formless void from which could issue ony mutant changelings and evil wizards, Flux was the soure of Anchor's very existence.

The price of her new knowledge is exile, yet Cassie and the Rider of her soul are the only hope for the redemption of both Flux and Anchor.

Four worlds that cannot be visited. Four worlds that must be visited. Aliens are spying on Earth from one of the four worlds that make up the Warden Diamond. But it is impossible to send agents to any of the four worlds because of unique microscopic symbionts that make it impossible for visitors to leave the Diamond. Seeking a unique solution, each of the four worlds making up the Diamond is sent a person whose mind has been stripped of everything and who is now controlled by an agent of the Confederacy.

Four worlds that cannot be visited. Four worlds that must be visited. Aliens are spying on Earth from one of the four worlds that make up the Warden Diamond. But it is impossible to send agents to any of the four worlds because of unique microscopic symbionts that make it impossible for visitors to leave the Diamond. Seeking a unique solution, each of the four worlds making up the Diamond is sent a person whose mind has been stripped of everything and who is now controlled by an agent of the Confederacy. This frozen world is the last of the four worlds to be explored. But are Tarin Bul and his controller up to the job?

In the struggle between good and evil, the united forces of good have not consolidated their final victory as the Nine, rulers of hell, form their own empire and plan to invade the world.

The last great battle of the Hellgates has been won and Flux and Anchor are at peace - for now. But someone has found the key to the magic of Flux. If they succeed in harnessing this fearsome power, the delicate balance could be destroyed. Who will stand when the horror of Flux is unleashed?

The strange and haunted place called World has been a land divided between the stability of Anchor and the chaos of Flux - a land of near magic, where reality yields to madness. It is in this universe that courageous men and women battle treachery, rebellion, and hellish forces to establish a New Eden.

Mervyn, wizard and Fluxlord, leader of the Nine Who Guard, faces the ultimate threat of the opposing Seven Who Wait: the opening of the Hellgates to World. Closed more than 2,000 years ago, they are portals to unknowable danger and, perhaps, great power. Mervyn must gather the shattered forces of guardianship, dispersed and reeling after the battle with Coydt....