The Ship has traveled the universe for longer than any of the near-immortal crew can recall, its true purpose and origins unknown. It is larger than many planets, housing thousands of alien races and just as many secrets. Now one of those secrets has been at the center of the Ship is . . . a planet. Marrow. But when a team of the Ship's best and brightest are sent down to investigate, will they return with the origins of the Ship—or will they bring doom to everyone on board? Robert Reed, whose fantastic stories have been filling all the major SF magazines for the past several years, spins a captivating tale of adventure and wonder on an incredible scale in this novel based on his acclaimed novella.

An immortal child is born in the most horrid conditions. But luck delivers her to a world that will embrace her, first as a god and then as an alien. And before she is finished, Mere will help make a society that deserves to live to the ends of time. Then a soft voice asked, “Will you accept a worshipper, madam? I should like very much to see you.” Mere rose and said, “Yes. Always.” Her guest was dressed in a truth-seeker’s gown, but his teeth were orange and there was no wig on his wide head. In his hands was a sheet of green copper, ancient and decorated with old words. Mere recognized the dialect with a glance. It was from the time when she first fell from the sky, and along the top margin of that single sheet was the official mark of the original truth-seeker. Beneath the mark, someone had written, “Should it become necessary, tomorrow or at the end of time, this is how you may kill the god.” Following the newcomer were twenty soldiers armed with keen swords and buckets full of fire. They stood together in a tight, nervous mass. There was a moment when Mere felt that she could convince them to surrender their weapons. But the new truth-seeker threw a platinum coin to the floor, and he said, “In this one shadow of everything, you will become rich men. I promise.”

In The Well of Stars, Hugo award-nominated author Robert Reed has written a stunning sequel to his acclaimed novel Marrow . The Great Ship, so vast that it contains within its depths a planet that lay undiscovered for generations, has cruised through the universe for untold billions of years. After a disastrous exploration of the planet, Marrow, the Ship's captains face an increasingly restive population aboard their mammoth vessel. And now, compounding the captains' troubles, the Ship is heading on an irreversible course straight for the Ink Well, a dark, opaque nebula. Washen and Pamir, the captains who saved Marrow from utter destruction, send Mere, whose uncanny ability to adapt to and understand other cultures makes her the only one for the job, to investigate the nebula before they plunge blindly in. While Mere is away, Pamir discovers in the Ink Well the presence of a god-like entity with powers so potentially destructive that it might destroy the ship and its millions. Faced with an entity that might prevent the Ship from ever leaving the Ink Well, the Ship's only hope now rests in the ingenuity of the vast crew . . . and with Mere, who has not contacted them since she left the Ship… With the excitement of epic science fiction adventure set against a universe full of wonders, the odyssey of the Ship and its captains will capture the hearts of science fiction readers.

Contains the novellas "Eater-of-Bone," "Veritas, ""Truth," and "A Billion Eves." In the Marrow universe, humans are touring the Milky Way inside a derelict machine the fabled Great Ship. They are immortal and durable souls, and as they travel, some become colonists on distant worlds. Eater-of-bone is the brutal, lovely and wrenching story of a lost colony on one ancient, metal-starved world. In that wilderness, humans are nearly indestructible monsters, and they are their own worst enemies, and a young woman survives a brutal assault, finding herself washed to the shore of the oddest island paradise. Veritas is set in a distant, profoundly transformed past. The aging emperor sits before cameras, explaining how a couple of college students in the 21st century could assemble a private army, buy a few time machines, and then invade Rome in the days after the death of Julius Caesar. Which is when the difficult work began. Truth is another invasion-by-time-travel story. But it is our world that is being invaded by temporal Jihadists, or so it seems. A man from the future sits inside a secret prison, telling stories to his American captors, while the world outside goes horribly wrong. What if there was a machine that could take you and your surroundings to an alternate Earth? And what if a frustrated young man used that device to steal away the young women inside a sorority house, setting himself up as the ruler of a new world? A Billion Eves carries that what-if to its logical, borderline-hopeful conclusion.

Since the beginning of the universe, the giant starship wandered the emptiest reaches of space, without crew or course, much less any clear purpose. But humans found the relic outside the Milky Way, and after taking possession, they named their prize the Great Ship and embarked on a bold voyage through the galaxy’s civilized hearts. Larger than worlds, the Great Ship is laced with caverns and oceans, scenes of exalted beauty and corners where no creature has ever stood. Habitats can be created for every intelligent species, provided that the passengers can pay for the honor of a berth, and the human captains make the rules and dispense the justice in what soon becomes thousands of alien species joined a wild, unpredictable journey. The first Great Ship story was "The Remoras", published in 1994 by THE MAGAZINE OF FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION. All but the most recent titles in the series have been included in this volume, arranged in a rough chronological order, each story partly rewritten to capture the author’s growing expertise in the starship. New material has been added to bridge the centuries, hopefully enriching the resident confusion. Robert Reed is the author of a dozen science fiction novels, including two titles about the Great Ship: MARROW and THE WELL OF STARS, both from Tor Books. He has also published more than two hundred shorter works, winning a Hugo in 2007 for his novella, "A Billion Eves". Reed is a long-term resident of Lincoln, Nebraska. Contents: Alone (2010) Hoop-of-Benzene (2006) Mere (2004) The Remoras (1994) Rococo (2006) River of the Queen (2004) Night of Time (2003) Aeon's Child (1995) The Caldera of Good Fortune (2007) Camouflage (2005) The Man with the Golden Balloon (2008) Hatch (2007)

Diamond is an odd little boy, a seemingly fragile child—who proves to be anything but. An epic story begins when he steps into the world his parents have so carefully kept him from, a world where gigantic trees each house thousands of humans and another human species, the papio, rule its far edges. Does Diamond hold the promise to remake one species and, perhaps, change all of the Creation?

An immortal boy leads his gang of aliens and mortal humans into the strangest new world. This is Marrow, a secret realm hidden at the heart of a giant star-faring vessel called the Great Ship. Marrow is a violent world built from iron and fire, populated with insects and desperate children as well as ancient entities called dragons. These dragons are gods, any one of them capable of unimaginable destruction. And they need this terrible power. They have the best reasons. Every dragon is defending Marrow against its many enemies. For long eons they have done nothing else, and the system has grown quite stable, even comfortable—in a bloody fashion—right up until a new dragon arrives without warning. THE DRAGONS OF MARROW is the story of Diamond, a mysterious boy full of secrets. It is the direct sequel to THE MEMORY OF SKY, a trilogy published by Prime Books. And the novel is a sequel to earlier novels and shorter works, including MARROW and THE WELL OF STARS, published by Tor Books. Set in Robert Reed's universe of the Great Ship, the immortal captains are waiting: Washen; Pamir, Aasleen, and Miocene. Plus Mere, the relentless explorer, and Till, the ruler behind the bizarre peo;le called the Waywards. "The man wore a wide muscled body and wide brown eyes, bright black hair stolen from his mother, and a narrow face that was all his own. That was a memorable face that always rode the narrow borders between handsome and pretty, and average and plain. Standing on the Great Round, he sang to his enduring people and his AIs. He sang about heroes and sacrifice and the endless struggle to preserve everything everywhere and for all of Time. The most powerful creature on Marrow had the stamina to fill every day with soaring lyrics about commitment and pure objectives. Except nothing good came from overbearing stagecraft. No matter how right and compelling any truth might be, the audience eventually became too familiar and comfortable, and too smug, and worst of all, lazy in the presence of pivotal matters. "The singer always knew when fatigue was stealing his audience. The drift in the eyes, the reflexive quickness of the passion. That’s when the dragon delivered some new flourish—a cutting insight or a jolt of humor that left the multitudes engaged. Charisma. That was a piece in how Till inspired a sprawling nation, and charisma was why he stood above all other dragons. Except this eternal man didn’t carry much fondness for leadership and its trappings. Charm could win any day, but the days rarely mattered. Unity was an ally in defending a frail, aging universe. But perpetual unity was never the goal. That’s why the daily performances only came at the cycle’s beginning. Weave unity into the cultural center, then step away, giving that passion ample room. Outside eyes, looking down from some high ignorant place, might consider the Waywards as being a half-coherent mob of fanatics. “Because we are,” Till would sing, praising people and machines alike. Standing on the Great Round, watched by shameless proselytes, he cultivated the best kinds of mayhem. No leader could shape every mind. Who knew that better? And that’s why every Wayward child was free to shape his beliefs and her beliefs, and more importantly, discover personal doubts and disbeliefs too." Robert Reed is the author of several hundreds published works of fiction. The Great Ship stories are his most popular, and THE DRAGONS OF MARROW moves the saga towards its ultimate ends. Reed lives in Lincoln, Nebraska.

A young star ship officer is given a small, apparently routine job. Washen needs to convince an alien passenger to surrender his home for a brief visit by a high-ranking official. But the alien, Hoop-of-Benzene, has no interest in allowing anyone inside his abode, and there is a story behind his stubbornness, thousands of years old and still horribly fresh. "Even among his species, Hoop-of-Benzene was an enormous creature—a towering biped whose muscular body was covered with glistening armored plates and long golden spines. The broad black eyes stared at the young captain. Beneath the eyes were two mouths, the top mouth for speaking and breathing, the other intended for eating and delivering the worst insults imaginable." The Great Ship stories are on ongoing venture by Robert Reed.

The largest star ship in the universe has a single passenger. That shape-shifting machine walks in solitude until the humans arrive, and their robots, and increasingly strange aliens. Then after thousands of years and a sequence of odd adventures, our hero arrives at a point where he understands the purpose of the Great Ship. “Who are you?” the walker asked. “My name is Wune.” “Where are you?” “Find the blue-white star on the horizon,” it said. “Are you that star?” “No, no.” Wune could do nothing but laugh for a few moments. “Look below it. Do you see me?” Except for a few crevices and delicate wrinkles, the crater floor was flat. Standing at the far end was a tiny figure clad in hyperfiber. It was shaped like a female. One arm lifted high. What might have been a hand waved slowly, the gesture purely human. “My name is Wune,” the stranger repeated. “Are you human?” “I’m a Remora,” said Wune. “And what exactly are you, my friend? I don’t seem to recognize your nature.” “My nature is a mystery,” it agreed. “Do you have a name?” “I am,” it began. Then it hesitated, considering this wholly original question. And with sudden conviction, it said, “Alone.” It rose up from the ridge, proclaiming, “My name is Alone.” "Alone" is the first story in the Great Ship saga. Robert Reed has written two dozen stories and six novels in this endless universe. One story — "Marrow" — was nominated for the Hugo Award.

Humans have piloted the Great Ship for nearly 100,000 years. But at long last, they realize that the world-sized starship is carrying a secret cargo. An entire planet hides at the core. Named Marrow, for where blood is born. And a picked team of captains will explore the mysterious body, and Marrow will try its best to kill them. Be aware: This is a significantly reworked version of the original novella. That was done in part because the first "Marrow" was written in a blur more than 20 years ago, and it needed editing. But more importantly, all of the Great Ship stories have been retooled to fit a grand plan, and after considerable work, this particular Marrow now belongs with its siblings. "Washen never lost consciousness. With numbed curiosity, she watched her legs and arms break, and a thousand bruises spread into a single violet tapestry, every rib crushed to dust and her reinforced spine splintering until she was left without pain or a shred of mobility. Washen couldn't move her head, and her words were slow and watery, the sloppy mouth filled with cracked teeth and leaking blood. "Abandon," she muttered. Then, "Ship," and she laughed feebly. Desperately. A gray sensation rippled through her body. Emergency talents were awake, finding their home in shambles. Storehouses of power focused on protecting the bioceramic brain, flooding it with electrical blankets and comforting narcotics. Then the vital organs and spine were repaired, cannibalizing meat for raw materials and energy, while the captain's body was wracked with fever, sweating saltwater and blood while the body quickly grew small." Robert Reed has written hundreds of science fiction stories. His Great Ship stories are among the most popular, and "Marrow" was nominated for the Hugo Award.

A brilliant alien mind forgets one tiny detail, and the human named Ash—a reformed torturer and expert in memory—digs deep and finds the most amazing secret. "Shadow leaned forward slightly. On the bright road below, a pack of 31-3s was dancing along, voices like brass chimes rising through the wind. Ash recognized his neighbors. He threw a little stone at them, to be polite." Robert Reed has written quite a lot over the last thirty years. The Great Ship universe is his most popular, and "Night of Time" is one of its smaller, quieter stories.

The Dawsheen come from a world where brutal ice ages descend according to a set schedule. Civilization ends, and then civilization always begins again, carried into the new summer by the Queen. But now tragedy claims the next queen, and two human tourists, Perri and Quee Lee, are thrown into the hunt for justice. "The lane was covered with hard sheets of living wood, turquoise and photosynthetic when the weather was warm, but now turning black and soggy in the cold. No one shared the way with them. Heaps and ridges of hard dirty snow stood to the sides, and behind the snow were vegetable masses, dome-shaped and crenulated where the domes pushed through, their sides punctured with doorways leading into chambers of every size. What passed for leaves had died with the first hard freeze. The masses themselves were dying, choking under the snow while their roots froze with the soil. But the hollow chambers in their wooden hearts remained inhabited. Sheets were draped across the doorways, the heated air inside making the fabric ripple, and the sloppy, half-melted ice on the thresholds was littered with the long, faintly human prints of busy feet." Robert Reed has written quite a few stories and novels about the Great Ship. Quee Lee and Perri are among his most beloved characters.

The ex-captain wears a borrowed face and life, allowing him to sit in public while hiding from the Ship's authorities. But then one of the most powerful captains comes to the fugitive with a mission. There is a corpse that needs to be studied. There is a nameless passenger who needs unspecified help. And there is a conspiracy involving aliens and humans and family ties and millions of years of painful history. "Built in the upper reaches of Fall Away, overlooking the permanent clouds of the Little-Lot, the facility was an expansive collection of natural caverns and minimal tunnels. Strictly speaking, the Faith of the Many Joinings wasn’t a church or holy site, though it was wrapped securely around an ancient faith. Nor was it a commercial house, though money and barter items were often given to its resident staff. And it wasn’t a brothel, as far as the Ship’s codes were concerned. Nothing sexual happened within its walls, and no one involved in its mysteries gave his or her body for anything as crass as income. Most passengers didn’t even realize that such a place existed. Among those who did, most regarded it as an elaborate and very strange meetinghouse—like-minded souls would pass through its massive wooden door to make friends, and when possible, fall in love. But for the purposes of taxes and law, the captains had decided on a much less romantic designation. Borrowing an ancient human word, the space was labeled to be an accredited library." Robert Reed has written more than two dozen Great Ship stories and novels. "Camouflage" is focused on Pamir, the ex-captain who is always ready for a fight.

Thousands of years have passed since the Great Ship fled the galaxy. That world-sized machine is still covered with the ocean-like remains of its enemy, the Polypond. Humans and other aliens survive only in a rough city perched high on one of the rocket nozzles, and to feed themselves and grow, those refugees send out raiders to steal treasures from the giant beneath them. And then one day, without warning, something new emerges, and everything is changed. "The black mass, smooth-faced and distinctly iridescent, was punching its way through a scattering of high clouds. Some of those clouds were alive—vividly colored bodies as light as aerogel and easily shredded. Other clouds were water stained gray and red with salts and iron, dead cells and other detritus pushed skyward by the mayhem. Their target was tiny compared to the entire hatch, but it was already the tallest feature, and nothing like it had ever been seen before. Raiders bound for distant hunting grounds were noticing it. From hundreds of kilometers overhead, the energies and wild violence were obvious. And even from inside a cocoon of superheated gas, two human eyes could appreciate the beauty of so many frantic bodies doing whatever it was they were doing." Robert Reed has published scores of stories, quite a few set in the Great Ship universe. THE MEMORY OF SKY is 3 novels published as one volume. THE DRAGONS OF MARROW is soon to arrive.

An explorer of alien worlds finds something far stranger: An alien artifact, abandoned but still holding a mystery that will shake everything that she knows about the universe and her own existence. "Rich emptiness stretched out before Mere. Sunless worlds of many ages, many constitutions, had assembled themselves into a ribbon-like cluster perfectly aligned for a long careful flyby. Some of those worlds were large and naturally warm in their hearts, nourishing oceans of methane or water as well as vigorous life forms. Colder places might conceal little colonies of hermits and refugees and other tall-technology oddballs. And there was always the promise of some full civilization struggling not to be found. But the hot and frigid signatures that she mentioned to the captains were lies. Mere had seen nothing interesting while looking up from the disappointing first world, and she didn’t even bother synthesizing data to give her fable a spine. This was her mission. This was her ship, if not by title then at least by every measure that mattered. A steady watchful journey along the dark ribbon would give her hundreds of large targets and millions of comets. The odds of success—some good worthwhile and profitable triumph—seemed just short of inevitable." Robert Reed has written many science fiction stories and novels, and without question, the Great Ship remains his most popular invention.

Ash is a professional interrogator and at times has served as a torturer. He enlists an alien friend to help him cope with one of his victims, and the alien, one of the peculiar 31-1s, is witness to a pivotal moment in the lives of two immortal humans. "Objects were responsible for nothing but their locations, fixed and outside time. The giant starship didn’t plunge through vacuum at any fraction of light-speed. No, the Great Ship was set where it was needed, where the universe demanded it to be, and the competent mind inside the Ship had found a rich location, and that’s where he remained. Rigid as a statue, he stood inside a succession of brilliant days and the nights that were nearly as bright as day. The avenue beneath him was paved with glowing shells and frozen resins. The locals were dissimilar in appearance from one another and relatively poor compared to the typical passenger. These creatures had never seen a 31-1, and many of them did not see this 31-1. They were too busy or too indifferent to notice his existence in one place and another place and a third location midway between the two. They didn’t see him watching faces for the one face that mattered. But of course all faces mattered, each being a mask obscuring long rich lives that he would never understand. Not in any reality worth the calculation, that is." The Great Ship is an ongoing project. Robert Reed has written numerous stories set on that gigantic starship, and a few more astonishments remain to be told.

An alien world is inhabited living, highly-intelligent rivers. Those rivers have made a deal with the Great Ship: Send them a mortal human as a sacrifice, and humanity will be given planets and moons as gifts. But who would willingly volunteer for such a duty? A stubborn man named Amund, it turns out. And before it is over, this ordinary mortal holds the lives of billions in his grasp. "Amund was little more than a boy when the captain visited his home. But that boy had a finished body, and being healthy as well as crafty-smart, he had several eager young women helping plan out his promising life. His future seemed to be locked inside one kind of wonderful, and Amund thought he understood what his story would be. But then Washen strode into the Highland of Little Sins. That was a remarkable occasion on its own merit. Captains never visited the sanctuary, certainly not a captain as powerful and famous as this entity. Knowing voices claimed that she was one the Master Captain’s favorites, and Washen brought a famous history as well as that very famous face. Amund knew the face well enough to recognize it from the high ledge. That’s where the children were told to gather while the important adults stood below, forming a tidy half-circle around an immortal machine carrying a lady’s face and a god’s invincible powers." Robert Reed has written quite a few tales about the Great Ship—a world-sized vessel crossing the Milky Way on a many-thousand-year voyage. "The Speed of Belief" is a very recent title.

An odd, ancient machine with three minds comes to the Great Ship, offering a rare gift in exchange for a home and passage. But the fabled Miocene handles the interview, and this ancient captain is impossible to impress. "Her long legs waded across the ash and the short, sun-starved grass beneath. The ground dipped very slightly, falling into a broad depression filled with rainwater and wet ash, churned up mud and fresh corpses. The barrel-shaped rhinoceroses numbered in the dozens, the hundreds. One of the rhinoceroses was healthy, standing tall on four legs. She saw him at a distance, and he saw her. His powerful body wore crisscrossing belts and four arms. One pair of arms came from each end of the body. The posterior arms had small busy hands that worked with shifting emblems on some kind of crystalline control panel. The creature’s front arms were thicker, the hands more robust, and those hands wove their fingers together, creating a bowl with the palms." Robert Reed has written many stories about the Great Ship, plus several novels, including MARROW and THE MEMORY OF SKY.

A difficult job needs to be done. Tools are hired and paid well for their trouble. But one tool, an ancient AI, has a cautionary story to tell, and she tells it to one of the few humans who can appreciate what she is saying. "The contractor wasn’t ancient, certainly not compared to the Great Ship or this well-traveled tool. But he was quite a lot older than his apparent age. His born name was Pamir and he had been an important captain serving the Great Ship, but certain troubles caused him to leave that life and the greatest profession. Hiding ever since, he had worn a wild variety of names and jobs, lives and passions. One of the galaxy’s great experts in wearing carefully contrived life stories, he earned what he could to thrive, and that included hoarding secret funds and prebuilt lives ready for the moment his present lies began to crumble. Pamir leaned back, looking like a man who had nowhere else to be." For more than twenty years, Robert Reed has been writing about the Great Ship. This recent tale gives a fresh perspective on many things, including the power of two voices quietly talking to one another.

Immortal humans colonize a bizarre world, but the colony collapses. Tens of thousands of years later, what remains are scattered bands and individuals fighting the natives and fighting one another. Every day is desperate. But every day also offers great beauty in an alien wilderness, and small moments of kindness. "With the knife in her right hand, she crept close to the yddybddy and paused, staring at the dense yellow folds of fungus tucked behind the finger-like branches. Her mind and then her mouth imagined the feast to come. She would eat today and tomorrow too, and the fungus’ hard fibrous heart would remain as traveling rations. Close to tears, she took a tiny step forward, feeling the ground and trapdoor sag slightly—just as she expected. Then she took another step and heard what might have been a soft fart, and she turned in time to watch a single coil of elastic nanofibers spring from the ground beside her. She leaped back in time to save her leg but fell into another trap built along the same fierce lines. A second spring unraveled and flung out blindly, grabbing her by the right arm and yanking her down, and she kicked and flopped and dove back against the burning pressure as a thousand rit-hairs ate into her bicep and the burning joint of her elbow."