SCARFACE In the spring of 1980, under intense pressure from the United States, Cuba opened its port at Mariel Harbor, and thousands set sail for America. They came in search of the American Dream. One of them found it. Those who challenged him, he crushed. Those who tried to stop him, he killed.

The bitter rivalry between Sharpe and the ruthless Frenchman Colonel Leroux is brought to life against the vivid canvas of the Peninsular War.

From Publishers WeeklyThese seven stories, which include two that use characters and situations from her novel Machine Dreams, demonstrate the evolution of the author's gifted style. PW was dazzled, stating that "it seems as though there's nothing Phillips can't do." (February) BANDITS Elmore Leonard. Warner, $4.95 An ex-jewel thief, ex-nun and ex-cop and others cast their greedy glances on the millions of dollars being raised secretly by a Nicaraguan on behalf of the contras. PW's contribution: "This is a top-notch thriller with a real moral resonance." Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Library JournalPhillips's writing has developed chiefly through the voice of her characters: first in the collection Black Tickets ( LJ 1 0/1/79), then the novel Machine Dreams ( LJ 7/84), and now in Fast Lanes , a collection of seven stories. (A limited edition presenting only the story "Fast Lanes" was published under that title by Vehicle Edns. in 1984.) A West Virginian, Phillips is often strongest when treating the isolation of that state's rural communities, as in "Bess," a woman's reminiscence of life in turn-of-the-century Coalton. But the author's voice now broadens, exploring in fluid style a rock star's life and love ("How Mickey Made It"), a woman's yearnings for her unborn child ("Bluegill"), and the drifter's dreamy possession of reality ("Fast Lanes"). Phillips's perspective on contemporary life is refreshingly honest, her style engaging. Paul E. Hutchison, English Dept., Pennsylvania State Univ., University ParkCopyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

He was just a freckle-faced, redheaded kid with green eyes and a strangely campelling stare when Mather Mastiff first saw him an the auctioneer's block. One hundred credits and he was hers.For years the old woman was his only family. She loved him, fed him, taught him everything she knew -- even let him keep the deadly flying snake he called Pip.Then Mother Mastiff mysteriously disappeared and Flinx took Pip to tail her kidnappers. Across the forests and swamps of the winged world called Moth, their only weapons were Pip's venom . . . and Flinx's unusual Talents.From the Inside FlapHe was just a freckle-faced, redheaded kid with green eyes and a strangely campelling stare when Mather Mastiff first saw him an the auctioneer's block. One hundred credits and he was hers.For years the old woman was his only family. She loved him, fed him, taught him everything she knew -- even let him keep the deadly flying snake he called Pip.Then Mother Mastiff mysteriously disappeared and Flinx took Pip to tail her kidnappers. Across the forests and swamps of the winged world called Moth, their only weapons were Pip's venom . . . and Flinx's unusual Talents. About the AuthorAlan Dean Foster work to date includes excursions into hard science-fiction, fantasy, horror, detective, western, historical, and contemporary fiction. He has also written numerous non-fiction articles on film, science, and scuba diving, as well as having produced the novel versions of many films, including such well-known productions as Star Wars, the first three Alien films, Alien Nation, and The Chronicles of Riddick. Other works include scripts for talking records, radio, computer games, and the story for the first Star Trek movie. His novel Shadowkeep was the first ever book adapation of an original computer game. In addition to publication in English his work has been translated into more than fifty languages and has won awards in Spain and Russia. His novel Cyber Way won the Southwest Book Award for Fiction in 1990, the first work of science-fiction ever to do so.Foster's sometimes humorous, occasionally poignant, but always entertaining short fiction has appeared in all the major SF magazines as well as in original anthologies and several "Best of the Year" compendiums. His published oeurve includes more than 100 books.

Everything that lives contains within itself the seeds of its own destruction. It was the fate of the Assyrians and the Hittites, the Greeks and the Romans, the British and the Americans. And so it was for the Polesotechnic League and the Terran Empire. Conception, birth, growth, aging, death: This is the law of life, true for nations, worlds and stellar empires no less than for organisms. For the greatest and the smallest it is the same, differing on it in this: the greater the heights conquered, the greater the fall, the longer and darker the night that follows… The stories contained herein were first published as follows: “The Star Plunderer,” Planet Stories, 1952. “Outpost of Empire,” Galaxy , 1967. “A Tragedy of Errors” Galaxy , 1967. “The Sharing of Flesh,” Galaxy , 1968. Won Hugo and nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novelette in 1969. “Starfog,” Analog, 1967.

Five people are brought from London to participate in a controlled experiment studying prophetic dreaming. But the results are so ominous that the program is cut short. Now a monstrous presence is in the subjects' lives, a creature created by their group dream eleven years ago, drawing them inexorably into its awful vortex.