"The Green World" is set on a distant planet, characterized by its rich and vibrant green landscape. The story follows a group of human explorers or scientists who are sent to investigate this strange and alien environment. The planet’s ecosystem is highly complex and, at first glance, seems lush and hospitable, but the explorers soon discover that it presents unexpected dangers and challenges.As they delve deeper into the mysteries of the planet, the characters encounter various forms of ...

With degrees in astronomy, chemistry and education, it should come as no surprise that Harry Clement Stubbs - better known to SF readers as Hal Clement - produced some of the field's most compelling, scientifically literate work.This omnibus contains the clever alien-planet-with-a-twist novel ICEWORLD; the ground-breaking CYCLE OF FIRE*,* with its 40-year-long seasons; and CLOSE TO CRITICAL, from his celebrated Mesklin sequence.

A team of scientists are sent to Mercury aboard the Albireo to find out why it's developing an atmosphere. A series of events force the scientists out of their ship and onto the surface of Mercury, where only their courage and intelligence can keep them alive. Clement paints a tense and completely believable image of Mercury. He was simply one of the best hard science fiction writers the field ever produced.

From "a tremendous force in science fiction," a collection set on the high-gravity planet of Mesklin, and an essay by the author on Mesklin's creation ( Poul Anderson, Hugo and Nebula award-winning author of The Broken Sword).Discover MESKLIN—Gravity: 3g at the equator, 700g at the polesHal Clement is a Grand Master of SF, and the one most associated with the subgenre of hard SF. From his classic stories in Astounding magazi...

A scientist's excursion to a treacherous ocean planet leads to more dangers than just pirates in this adventure by a Science Fiction Grand Master."Clement skillfully weaves together challenging science, a unique familial society, and an encounter with a "lost" city in a narrative that allows the reader to puzzle out Mike's questions along with him." — BooklistHal Clement, the dean of hard science fiction, has writt...

About two centuries from now, the human race on Earth is in trouble, perhaps even facing extinction, because of the rapid evolution of diseases.A crew of young men and women travel to the moons of Saturn, to Titan, to investigate the biochemistry of the pre-life conditions there in the slim hope of discovering something that might save Earth. Nearly half of the crew die on the way. They have to do most of their exploration in virtual-reality machinery. The whole story runs at high ...

THE HARD-CORE SCIENCE OF HAL CLEMENTThe supreme practitioner of "hard" science fiction, Hal Clement combines ingenious problem-solving with suspenseful drama and action. These ten stories show the mastery of science and fiction that Clement has displayed in such favourites as Mission of Gravity, Iceworld, and Needle.UNCOMMON SENSEIf your back's to the wall, even a deadly predator can be useful.ANSWER"Know thyself" is great advice...if you don...

Hal Clement was a renowned science-fiction writer.In this collection, you'll find the following stories :AttitudeHot PlanetThe Green WorldThis collection of three short stories has the same length as a full novel, and will please every lover of science-fiction classics.

Shrouded in eternal gloom by its own thick atmosphere, Tenebra was a hostile planet: a place of crushing gravity, 370-degree temperatures, a constantly shifting crust and giant drifting raindrops. Uncompromising - yet there was life, intelligent life on Tenebra. For more than twenty years, Earth scientists had studied the natives from an orbiting laboratory... and had even found a way to train and educate a few of them.

Two ships race in from outer space and crash in the Pacific Ocean. One contains a hunter, entrusted with a vital mission. The other, his quarry - corrupt, evil, a criminal from an unearthly civilisation light years away.Yet both these creatures had one thing in common - they were unable to exist alone. Each needed a host, a human body they could invade and control.

Stranded on an alien planet, light years from home, wandering from blistering heat to searing cold, Nils Kruger was not a happy man. So when he met another being - even though it wasn't human - things seemed to be looking up. The alien might be helpless, or it might be dangerous, but one thing was for sure - they stood a better chance for survival if they worked together.But as the two creatures overcame their mutual suspicion, as they worked together, as the language barrier was b...

Mesklin is a vast, inhospitable, disc-shaped planet, so cold that its oceans are liquid methane and its snows are frozen ammonia. It is a world spinning dizzyingly, a world where gravity can be a crushing 700 times greater than Earth's, a world too hostile for human explorers.But the planet holds secrets of inestimable value, and an unmanned probe that has crashed close to one of its poles must be recovered. Only the Mesklinites, the small creatures so bizarrely adapted to their ha...