The Icarus Job

Hoping to take possession of a new alien star-hopping portal, Roarke and Selene are tasked with transporting an assassin, who is herself being targeted.

For years Gregory Roarke and his Kadolian partner Selene worked as crocketts, combing through the atmospheres of uninhabited worlds for places that might be colonized or hold valuable resources. Now, they work for the Icarus Group, a top-secret government organization hunting for portals created by a long-vanished alien race, portals that can teleport a person hundreds or thousands of light-years in the blink of an eye.

Usually, those hunts are long and tedious. But Roarke has now been handed an intriguing offer. A criminal boss, Robertine Cherno, will hand over a hitherto unknown portal to the Icarus Group in exchange for Roarke and Selene agreeing to transport a passenger named Nikki across the Spiral.

There’s only one catch. Nikki is a professional, high-priced, highly feared assassin. And she’s on the job.

That would have been bad enough. But when the alien Patth also move to gain possession of the portal, bad quickly promises to go to worse.

Especially when it becomes clear that Nikki herself is being hunted by someone.

It’s up to Roarke and Selene to untangle the mysteries and get to the truth before they become someone’s collateral damage.

At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management).


Praise for The Icarus Plot:

“This is Zahn at his best—great characters and settings, great worldbuilding, great suspense, and just a ton of action and space opera fun . . . It’s also a passion project for the author, so if you enjoy Zahn, it’s not to be missed.” —Analog SF&F

“There are plenty of little things to delight the longtime Zahn reader, while also bringing new fans in a way that is perfectly accessible . . . Zahn remains one of the best writers of action I have ever had the pleasure of reading . . . The Icarus Plot is pure fun in the way that only one of the genre’s greatest yarn-weavers can do.” —Warped Factor

“Timothy Zahn is a mainstay in the field of science fiction.” —Seattle Book Review

“Anyone who has ever been interested in noir science fiction and espionage should read this. Take the espionage of John le Carre, the deduction of Sherlock Holmes, the twisty nature of The Sting, and you have The Icarus Plot.” —Upstream Reviews

Praise for Timothy Zahn:

“Zahn fans will enjoy the variety of small-unit combat scenes in the action-packed third and final Cobra Rebellion military SF adventure . . . [a] gripping series.” —Publishers Weekly

“Zahn keeps the story moving at a breakneck pace, maintaining excitement.” —Publishers Weekly

“ . . . you can count on Timothy Zahn for three things: clean, sparse prose; good pacing; and great action scenes. The first book in the Cobra War series hits all those marks in admirable style and makes for a quick, entertaining sci-fi novel.” —BlogCritics

“[Conqueror’s Heritage] is another finely wrought space adventure . . . [with] social, political, and emotional complications, all of which Zahn treats with his usual skill.” —Booklist

“Zahn paints every detail [in Angelmass] with gleamy realism . . . scientific dialogue that streams with starship hardware and military trooper talk . . . immensely appealing.” —Kirkus Review


Timothy Zahn is a Hugo Award winner and the author of the New York Times #1 bestseller, Heir to the Empire, as well as the best-selling Star Wars: Thrawn series of novels. Born in Chicago, he earned a B.S. in physics from Michigan State University and an M.S. in physics from the University of Illinois. He sold his first story to Analog in 1978, and immediately attracted attention as a new writer of science fiction based on real, cutting-edge science. Baen published his popular Cobra trilogy in one volume. His other popular series include the Conqueror and  Dragonback novels. With David Weber and Thomas Pope, he is the author of novels A Call to Duty, A Call to Arms, A Call to Vengeance, and A Call to Insurrection. Zahn has written more than 50 novels, including the recent Cobra Rebellion series entries Cobra Outlaw and Cobra Traitor.