Traces the earliest days of the first Man-Kzin War, during which humans foil the huge feline warriors' attempt to turn them into slaves by enslaving them instead, until one of the cats turns out to be gifted with mental telepathy

For fifty thousand years the Kzinti Patriarchy thrived on battle fought for conquest. Against all odds the humans stopped them, and for five wars kept on stopping them. With its violent expansion checked internal strains have built up within the Patriarchy, and now they threaten to tear it apart. When the ambitious Kchula-Tzaatz makes a bid for ultimate power the established order comes tumbling down, and the flames of war burn hot in Destiny's Forge. Hammered on that Forge are; Major Quacy Tskombe, battle hardened warrior turned diplomat. His life is duty, his mission takes him to the Citadel of the Patriarch in a last ditch effort to avert war. When it all falls apart he's forced to choose between love and loyalty, with the fate of humanity hanging in the balance. Captain Ayla Cherenkova, starship commander. As talented as she is beautiful, her hatred of the Kzinti has driven her to the top. Her space combat genius is unmatched, but when she's trapped alone in the jungles of Kzinhome her survival will depend on a whole new skillset. Pouncer, First-Son-of-Meerz-Rritt, heir apparent to the galaxy's most powerful empire, now a nameless fugitive with the collapse of his father's dynasty. Survival demands escape, but honor demands vengeance, and the price of his Name will be paid in the blood of worlds. Paul Chafe presents a masterpiece in the grand tradition of epic science fiction. No fan of Larry Niven's best-selling Known Space series can miss Destiny's Forge

Bruno was the most stable linker, but linkers always went catatonic after a certain amount of time connected to high level computers. Bruno knew intellectually that he had to minimize link time. But with the link he was so much more--he could see all. He could extract all possible effectiveness from his ship and maybe save himself and his love from a horrible fate

The ninth shared-world anthology laid in Niven's Known Space universe during the wars against those fighting felinoids, the alien Kzin, offers four notably readable long stories. In the late Poul Anderson's "Pele," a human couple on a research expedition rescue a Kzin with more courage than sense. Hal Colebatch's "His Sergeant's Honor," probably the book's strongest entry, features a Kzin who backs up his race's fanatical concept of honor with keen tactical sense. In Paul Chafe's "Windows of the World," a member of the UN police, ARM captain Joel K. Allson, and Allson's Kzin partner confront a mysterious murder aboard an orbital habitat, along with several conspiracies and a beautiful suspect. Niven's own "Fly-By-Night" features Beowulf Shaeffer rescuing the title character from another Kzin with vaulting ambitions and a keen eye for legal loopholes. For action and military SF fans, these four tales intelligently develop the Kzin, who still have all the ferocity of their carnivorous, predatory ancestors but have assumed more complexity as they carry their civilization into space. At a time when mindless brutality may strike a somewhat negative note with many readers, more sophisticated Kzin will add to the audience for these well-wrought aliens and their human friends and foes. Stephen Hickman's menacing, prosthetically enhanced catlike hero from "His Sergeant's Honor" almost jumps off the jacket

The kzin, formerly invincible conquerors of all they encountered, had a hard time dealing with their ignominious defeat by the leaf-eating humans. Some secretly hatched schemes for a rematch, others concentrated on gathering power within the kzin hierarchy, and some shamefully cooperated with the contemptible humans, though often for hidden motives. In war and in uneasy peace, kzin and humans continue their adventures, as told by Hal Colebatch, Paul Chafe, and Michael Joseph Harrington, expanding on the concepts created by New York Times best-selling writer Larry Niven