Book list: books featuring flying cities

Admit it, who doesnt love the idea of a floating city? Even the lumbering building in Howls Moving Castle'was enough for me, and I was pleased to see that China Mievilles Iron Council'had a bit of the mobile city going on. (And then theres The Nox from Stargateoh, Im showing my geek here) But lets do things properly here, and take a look at some books where whole cities happily float aloft. Feel free to add your recommendations in the comments!

The Battle of Blood and Ink: A Fable of the Flying City by'Jared Axelrod

If you're visiting the flying city of Amperstam without the latest printing of'The Lurker's Guide, you might as well be lost. This one-sheet is written, edited, and printed by Ashe, a girl raised on the streets of the flying city, and is dedicated to revealing its hidden treasures and deepest secrets'including many that the overcontrolling government doesn't want anyone to know. The stakes are raised when Ashe accidentally uncovers the horror of exactly how Amperstam travels among the skies and garners the attention of those who would rather that secret be kept in the hands of the city's powerful leaders.'Soon Ashe is on the run from thugs and assassins, faced with the choice of imperilling her life just to keep publishing, or giving in to the suggestion of a rich patron that she trade in her voice and identity for a quiet, comfortable life. It's a war of confusion for Ashe, but one thing is very clear: just because you live in a flying city, you can't always keep your head in the clouds.

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Cities in Flight'by James Blish

Originally published as four volumes nearly fifty years ago, Cities in Flight brings together the famed Okie novels of science fiction master James Blish. Named after the migrant workers of Americas Dust Bowl, these novels convey Blishs history of the future, a brilliant and bleak look at a world where cities roam the Galaxy looking for work and a sustainable way of life.

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The Elder Scrolls: The Infernal City'by'Greg Keyes

Four decades after the Oblivion Crisis, Tamriel is threatened anew by an ancient and all-consuming evil. It is Umbriel, a floating city that casts a terrifying shadow'for wherever it falls, people die and rise again.'And it is in Umbriel's shadow that a great adventure begins, and a group of unlikely heroes meet. A legendary prince with a secret. A spy on the trail of a vast conspiracy. A mage obsessed with his desire for revenge. And Annaig, a young girl in whose hands the fate of Tamriel may rest . . . .

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Ringworld Engineers'by Larry Niven

It's been twenty years since the quixotic and worlds-weary Louis Wu discovered the Ringworld. Now he and Speaker-to-Animals are going back, captives of the Hindmost, a deposed puppeteer leader.'With Louis' help, the Hindmost intends to regain his status by bringing back such extraordinary treasures from the Ringworld that his fellow puppeteers will have to be impressed. But when they arrive, Louis discovers that the Ringworld is no longer stable'and will destroy itself within months. To survive, he must locate the control center of the legendary engineers who built the planet. His quest becomes a wild and gripping venture blended with the mysteries and spectacular technologies that only Larry Niven can conjure.

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The Secrets of Droon #4: City in the Clouds'by'Tony Abbott

Uh-oh! Neal has a problem. Hes turned into a bug-again. Eric and Julie hope someone in Droon can help. Princess Keeah thinks there might be a cure in the City in the Clouds. Too bad the friends only have one day before the city disappears!

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Sly Mongoose'by Tobias Buckell

Welcome to Chilo, a planet with corrosive rain, crushing pressure, and deadly heat. Fortunately, fourteen-year-old Timas lives in one of the domed cities that float 100,000 feet above the surface, circling near the edge of a monstrous perpetual storm. Above the acidic clouds the temperature and pressure are normal. But to make a living, Timas like many other young men, is lowered to the surface in an armored suit to scavenge what he can.'Timas's life is turned upside down when a strange man crash lands on the city. The newcomer is fleeing an alien intelligence intent on invading the planet and discovering the secret hidden deep inside the perpetual storm'a secret that could lead to interplanetary war.'As the invaded cities fall silent one by one, Chilo's citizens must race against time to stop the enemy. And Timas will find out what kind of man he has become in the harsh conditions of Chilo's surface.

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The Floating Islands'by Rachel Neumeier

When Trei loses his family in a tragic disaster, he must search out distant relatives in a new land. The Floating Islands are unlike anything Trei has ever seen: stunning, majestic, and graced with kajurai, men who soar the skies with wings.'Trei is instantly sky-mad, and desperate to be a kajurai himself.' The only one who fully understands his passion is Araene, his newfound cousin.' Prickly, sarcastic, and gifted, Araene has a secret of her own . . . a dream a girl cannot attain.'Trei and Araene quickly become conspirators as they pursue their individual paths.' But neither suspects that their lives will be deeply entwined, and that the fate of the Floating Islands will lie in their hands. . . .Filled with rich language, and told in alternating voices,'The Floating Islands'is an all-encompassing young adult fantasy read.

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The Wingless Boy'by Jay Amory

These fast-paced, thrilling fantasy adventures feature'a city high in the sky comprised of pristine white spires, bathed in glorious golden sunlight'a city above the cloud layer, looking down on the ever-changing cloud formations below. From up here, the worst thunderstorms are little but flashes of light among the cloud cover, their force directed away from the cities and the tiny two- and four-seater aircraft its inhabitants use for travel. The world below the clouds may be disturbed, but in the tranquil world above, populated by winged people, life is good. Life isnt so good for Azreal Gabrielson, however; hes one of the Airborn too. With a stretch and a beat of their eight-foot wings his people can flit effortlessly around their cities, living a life of airy ease and beauty'but in this world Az is an oddity, a painfully isolated exception: Az Gabrielson is a wingless boy,'and hes about to be sent on a mission.

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Calenture'by Storm Constantine

Casmeer is the only living soul left in Thermidore, high atop the mountains of Overhang. So it has been for hundred of years. Immortal historian and chronicler, Casmeer is the self-appointed keeper of the citys remains and its crystalline inhabitants. Finnigin is a young terranaut, whose people collect the crystal fragments from Thermidore that wash down from the mountains to use as pilot stones to guide the floating cities across the Flatlands. Finnigin is forced to leave his people on an initiation of manhood, to journey across the plains and confront the mystery of the pilot stones. Ays is a Priest of Hands, a consoler to the dying, in the floating city of Min. His faith shaken by the words of a dying man, he undertakes a journey of his own, and leaves his floating city to face the unknown on the Flatlands. But as both Ays and Finnigin travel throughout their world, they are huanted by a mysterious figure who seems to know more about them than they do themselves. And as Ays and Finnigin cross paths, they find their lives linked in ways they could not have imagined. While in Thermidore, Casmeer, the last immortal, has one last chronicle to write.

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The Strength of Stones'by Greg Bear

In a theocratic world far into the future, cities control their own movements and organization. Constantly moving, growing and decaying, taking care of every need their inhabitants might think of, the cities have decided that humans are no longer a necessary part of their architecture, casting them out to wander in the wilderness and eke out a meager subsistence. To the exiled humans, the cities represent a paradisiacal Eden, a reminder of all they cannot attain due to their sinful and unworthy natures. But things are beginning to change. People are no longer willing to allow the cities to keep them out, choosing instead to force an entry and plunder at will. The cities are starting to crumble and die because they have no purpose or reason to continue living without citizens.'One woman, called mad by some and wise by others, is the only human allowed to inhabit a city. From her lonely and precarious position at the heart of one of the greatest cities ever, she must decide the fate of the relationship between human society and the ancient strongholds of knowledge, while making one last desperate attempt to save the living cities.

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Absolution Gap'by Alastair Reynolds

Mankind has endured centuries of horrific plague and a particularly brutal interstellar war but there is still no time for peace and quiet. Stirred from aeons of sleep, the Inhibitors ancient alien killing machines have begun the process of ridding the galaxy of its latest emergent intelligence: mankind. As a ragtag bag of refugees fleeing the first wave of the cull head towards an apparently insignificant moon light-years away, they discover an avenging angel, a girl born in ice. She has the power to lead mankind to safety, and the ability to draw down their darkest enemy. And on a planet where vast travelling cathedrals crawl towards the treacherous fissure known as Absolution Gap, an unsettling truth becomes apparent: to beat one enemy, it may be necessary to forge an alliance with something much, much worse

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Jack Blank and the Imagine Nation by Matt Myklusch

All Jack Blank knows is his bleak, dreary life at St. Barnaby's Home for the Hopeless, Abandoned, Forgotten, and Lost'an orphanage in the swampland of New Jersey. Covertly reading old comic books is Jack's only solace. But his life changes forever when he meets an emissary from a secret country called the Imagine Nation, an astonishing place where all the fantastic and unbelievable things in the world originate. Including Jack.'Jack soon discovers that he has an amazing ability'one that could make him the saviour of Imagine Nation and the world beyond'or the biggest threat they've ever faced.

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Saturns Children'by Charlie Stross

Sometime in the twenty-third century, humanity went extinct'leaving only androids behind. Freya Nakamichi 47 is a femmebot, one of the last of her kind still functioning. With no humans left to pay for the pleasures she provides, she agrees to transport a mysterious package from Mercury to Mars. Unfortunately for Freya, she has just made herself a moving target for some very powerful, very determined humanoids who will stop at nothing to possess the contents of the package.

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Mortal Engines'by Philip Reeve'(see our review)

The great Traction City lumbers after a small town, eager to strip its prey of all assets and move on. Resources on the Great Hunting Ground that once was Europe are so limited that mobile cities must consume one another to survive, a practice known as Municipal Darwinism. Tom, an apprentice in the Guild of Historians, saves his hero, Head Historian Thaddeus Valentine, from a murder attempt by the mysterious Hester Shaw only to find himself thrown from the city and stranded with Hester in the Out Country. As they struggle to follow the tracks of the city, the sinister plans of Londons leaders begin to unfold

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Above/Below

A city has fallen from the sky.

In the wreckage, two men ' Devian Lell, a window cleaner in the floating cities of Loft, and Eli Kurran, a security guard in one of the polluted, ground-based cities of Dirt ' will find their lives changed. Devian, who has done what few in the floating landscape have by stepping outside the sanctuary of his home, will be drawn into the politics of Loft, as he is recruited to be the assistant for Dirt's political representative. On the ground, Kurran, still mourning the death of his wife, tries to remove himself from the violent politics of Dirt even as he is blackmailed into providing security for the diplomatic representative of Loft, a woman three times his age, and the oldest living person he has ever met.