John Michael Scalzi II is an American author of humorous science fiction novels and former president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. His novel, Redshirts, won a Hugo award for Best Novel, and he served as a creative consultant for Stargate Universe.
Redshirts is set in a far flung future and is a parody of Star Trek, focusing on the eponymous trope that was named for the series.
Welcome to the starship Intrepid, flagship of the Universal Union. Captained by Lucius Abernathy, the ship seems to have an unusually high number of casualties on her away missions. Because of this, five new ensigns have been transferred aboard the ship. When one of them dies gruesomely, they begin to hear rumours among the rest of the non-command ranked crew that at least one person dies on every mission, but never one of the main officers. When they try to question this curse, they’re found by Officer Jenkins, who suffered a mental breakdown after his wife died on an away mission and has a theory about why things are the way they are aboard the Intrepid.
The Android’s Dream is an action science-fiction novel named for the original title of Blade Runner — Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Harry Creek works for the American State Department as the bearer of bad news to visiting officials from other planets. He likes his job, he finds it quite interesting, but he might have to find a different one because he’s starting to be recognised and turned away at the door. Unknown to him, there’s a job that that will require his particular skill set, and not the one he’s currently using. He used to be a soldier and, thanks to an interspecies treaty, he was in a war where he lost his best friend. Now those same allies who dragged Earth into their territory dispute need someone to find them a blue sheep to use in their coronation ceremony. Now he, Robin Baker, a small pet shop owner, and an AI modelled on the brain of his dead friend are being dragged into the interplanetary intrigue that’s set to destroy Earth.
Old Man’s War is a military sci-fi novel and the first in the series of the same name.
John Perry is a 75 year old retired advertising writer who put his name down to volunteer for the Colonial Defence Forces ten years ago. Now, after a bizarre series of physical and psychological tests, he’s in a genetically engineered new body with a group of other retiree volunteers calling themselves the Old Farts. After a week of frivolity in getting used to their new bodies, they’re sent into basic training and then on into the stars, never to return to Earth, to fight hostile alien forces.
Space and Dragons 