THE DEMOLISHED MAN

Penguin SF paperback, 1974 reprint. Cover illustration by
David Pelham.

"'It's lucky for the world i'm willing to stop at one murder. Together we could rape the universe.' 

Ben Reich, head of Monarch utilities and resources, risks everything in a last-ditch take-over bid for the massive D'Courtney Cartel. When it fails only murder, blackmail and bribery are left. 

So Reich sets himself against the whole sophisticated paraphernalia of twenty-fourth century crime fighting, conducted by the peepers - trained telepathists with a strict code of ethics. And even if he can find a bent peeper, there's still the ultimate penalty if he fails - Demolition."

A FALL OF MOONDUST

Pan SF paperback, 10th printing, 1976. Cover painting
by Dean Ellis (thanks: Mark).

"The setting is the Moon in the 21st century and it is depicted with brilliant imagination. 

But the vital core of the novel is this: will the crew and passengers of the Dust-cruiser 'Selene', buried fifteen metres down in the Sea of Thirst, be rescued before half a dozen possible catastrophes overcome them?"

LIFEBOAT

Orbit paperback, 1977. Cover artist uncredited. Possibly
Paul Lehr?

"A saboteur's bomb ripped through the hull of the seemingly indestructible galactic liner, leaving bare minutes for the survivors of the alien crew and human cargo to evacuate ship. 

Giles Steel Ahsad, Adelman, found himself adrift in a tiny lifeboat with a group of human slaves and two Albanareth crewmen. Only the aliens knew how to pilot the vessel - and they had lost the will to live... 

Gordon Dickson, author of the DORSAI trilogy, and Harry Harrison, creator of the DEATHWORLD stories, combine their talents in a magnificent novel of disaster and survival in the vastness between the stars."

DESTINATION: VOID

Penguin SF paperback, 1967. Cover design by Alan Aldridge.

"PROBLEM - to build a complete human consciousness out of computer hardware and desperation! By the author of DRAGON IN THE SEA and DUNE. 

Soon after the start, they went mad. The three powerful, disembodied human brains that should have guided them for the 200-year journey to Tau Ceti. Could they manufacture a replacement before emerging from the Solar System into nothingness? Would the circuits reproduce the characteristics they needed, characteristics like conscience, love and guilt? Or would they end up with a zombie? A monster? A power-crazy fanatic? - or a genius? What they did build was fantastic, unguessable. Yet, looking back, it was always on the cards."