Stand-alone novels
 Golden Fleece — (1990) Publisher: Aboard Argo, a colonization ship bound for Eta Cephei IV, people are very close — there's no other choice. So when Aaron Rossman's ex-wife dies in what seems to be a bizarre accident, everyone offers their sympathy, politely keeping their suspicions of suicide to themselves. But Aaron cannot simply accept her death. He must know the truth: Was it an accident, or did she commit suicide? When Aaron discovers the truth behind her death, he is faced with a terrible secret — a secret that could cost him his life.
 End of An Era — (1994) Publisher: Archaeologist Brandon Thackery and his rival Miles 'Klicks' Jordan fulfill a dinosaur lover's dream with history's first time-travel jaunt to the late Mesozoic. Hoping to solve the extinction mystery, they find Earth's gravity is only half its 21st century value and dinosaurs that behave very strangely. Could the slimey blue creatures from Mars have something to do with both?
The Terminal Experiment — (1995) Publisher: Dr. Peter Hobson has created three electronic simulations of his own personality. But they all have escaped from Hobson's computer into the web — and one of them is a killer.
 Starplex — (1996) Publisher: The Aurora Award-winning science fiction novel, Starplex, is back in print! Human space exploration has expanded quickly over the last twenty years as they have made use of newly discovered artificial worm-holes. No one knows who created them, and they bring the far-reaches of the galaxy tantalizingly close. Discovery, however, is outstripping understanding, and when an unknown vessel — a ship with no windows, seams or visible means of propulsion — arrives, the already battle-scarred Starplex could be the starting point of an interstellar war…
 Frameshift — (1997) Publisher: Geneticist Pierre Tardivel may not have long to live — he’s got a fifty-fifty chance of having the gene for Huntington’s disease. But if his DNA is tragic, his girlfriend’s is astonishing: Molly Bond has a mutation that gives her telepathy. Both of them have attracted the interest of Pierre’s boss, Dr. Burian Klimus, a senior researcher in the Human Genome Project who just might be hiding a horrific past. Avi Meyer, a dogged Nazi hunter, thinks Klimus was the monstrous “Ivan the Terrible” of the Treblinka Death Camp. As Pierre races against the ticking clock of his own DNA to make a world-changing scientific breakthrough, Avi also races against time to bring Klimus to justice before the last survivors of Treblinka pass away.
Illegal Alien — (1997) Publisher: When a disabled spaceship enters Earth's atmosphere, seven members of the advanced Tosok race are welcomed by the world. Then a popular scientist is murdered, and all evidence points to one of the Tosoks. Now, an alien is tried in a court of law-and there may be far more at stake than accounting for one human life.
 Factoring Humanity — (1998) Publisher: In the near future, a signal is detected coming from the Alpha Centauri system. Mysterious, unintelligible data streams in for ten years. Heather Davis, a professor in the University of Toronto psychology department, has devoted her career to deciphering the message. Her estranged husband, Kyle, is working on the development of artificial intelligence systems and new computer technology utilizing quantum effects to produce a near-infinite number of calculations simultaneously.
When Heather achieves a breakthrough, the message reveals a startling new technology that rips the barriers of space and time, holding the promise of a new stage of human evolution. In concert with Kyle's discoveries of the nature of consciousness, the key to limitless exploration — or the end of the human race — appears close at hand.
Sawyer has created a gripping thriller, a pulse-pounding tour of the farthest reaches of technology. Factoring Humanity is a 1999 Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel.
 Flashforward — (1999) Publisher: The basis for the hit ABC TV series and the Aurora Award-winning novel that started it all! FLASHFORWARD.
Two minutes and seventeen seconds that changed the world.
Suddenly, without warning, all seven billion people on Earth black out for more than two minutes. Millions die as planes fall from the sky, people tumble down staircases, and cars plow into each other.
But that’s the least of the survivors’ challenges. During the blackout, everyone experienced a glimpse of what his or her future holds — and the interlocking mosaic of these visions threatens to unravel the present.
 Calculating God — (2000) Publisher: An alien shuttle craft lands outside the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. A six-legged, two-armed alien emerges and says, in perfect English, “Take me to a paleontologist.”
In the distant past, Earth, the alien’s home planet, and the home planet of another alien species, all experienced the same five cataclysmic events at the same time (one example: the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs). Both alien races believe this proves the existence of God: i.e., he’s obviously been playing with the evolution of life on each of these planets. From this provocative launch point, Sawyer tells a fast-paced, morally and intellectually challenging story of ambitious scope and touching humanity. Calculating God is SF on a grand scale. Calculating God is a 2001 Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel.
 Mindscan — (2005) Publisher:
Robert J. Sawyer's Hominids, the first volume of his bestselling Neanderthal Parallax trilogy, won the 2003 Hugo Award, and its sequel, Humans, was a 2004 Hugo nominee. Now he's back with a pulse-pounding, mind-expanding standalone novel, rich with his signature philosophical and ethical speculations, all grounded in cutting-edge science.
Jake Sullivan has cheated death: he's discarded his doomed biological body and copied his consciousness into an android form. The new Jake soon finds love, something that eluded him when he was encased in flesh: he falls for the android version of Karen, a woman rediscovering all the joys of life now that she's no longer constrained by a worn-out body either.
But suddenly Karen's son sues her, claiming that by uploading into an immortal body, she has done him out of his inheritance. Even worse, the original version of Jake, consigned to die on the far side of the moon, has taken hostages there, demanding the return of his rights of personhood. In the courtroom and on the lunar surface, the future of uploaded humanity hangs in the balance. Mindscan is vintage Sawyer — a feast for the mind and the heart.
Rollback — (2005) Publisher: Dr. Sarah Halifax decoded the first-ever radio transmission received from aliens. Thirty-eight years later, a second message is received and Sarah, now 87, may hold the key to deciphering this one, too... if she lives long enough. A wealthy industrialist offers to pay for Sarah to have a rollback — a hugely expensive experimental rejuvenation procedure. She accepts on condition that Don, her husband of sixty years, gets a rollback, too. The process works for Don, making him physically twenty-five again. But in a tragic twist, the rollback fails for  Sarah, leaving her in her eighties. While Don tries to deal with his newfound youth and the suddenly vast age gap between him and his wife, Sarah struggles to do again what she’d done once before: figure out what a signal from the stars contains.
 Rollback
Robert J. Sawyer is a very reliable writer. His books rarely blow you away, but they're always thought provoking, well crafted and very readable — and Rollback is no exception. In this novel, the SETI effort finally pays off when a message arrives from the distant star Sigma Draconis. Professor Sarah Halifax is instrumental in decoding the message and composing a response, but because the star is over 18 light years removed from Earth, it'll take nearly 40 years before a response can be expected.
At the start of the story, the now 88 year-old Professor Halifax is informed that a new message has been received. A wealthy benefactor offers her a "rollback" procedure, which is basically a rejuvenation process that will turn her biological clock back by about 50 years. This way, she can help compose a response and still be around when the "Dracons" answer. Professor Halifax agrees but demands that her husband Don (who is the point of view character for 99% of the novel) also gets the procedure. Unfortunately, when they both get the very expensive treatment, it only works for Don, who begins to rejuvenate, while his wife Sarah remains elderly.
All of this happens in the first few chapters. After this, the book turns into a surprisingly moving and humane story about how to deal with being young again when the love of your life is still elderly. It's a well-told story, at times very emotional, at others funny, and realistic to the point of making you dislike the main character.
The main problem with the novel is that Robert J. Sawyer occasionally writes very clunky dialogue: his characters sometimes sound as if they are reciting essays at each other. Still, he is very deft at throwing in pop science facts and cultural references, so you often end up feeling as if you are learning something while reading.
At only about 300 pages, Rollback is a fast read, at times very moving, and always entertaining. If you’re not familiar yet with the works of Robert J. Sawyer, this is a great place to start. —Stefan Raets
 Triggers — (2012) Publisher:
On the eve of a secret military operation, an assassin's bullet strikes President Seth Jerrison. He is rushed to the hospital, where surgeons struggle to save his life.
At the same hospital, researcher Dr. Ranjip Singh is experimenting with a device that can erase traumatic memories.
Then a terrorist bomb detonates. In the operating room, the president suffers cardiac arrest. He has a near-death experience — but the memories that flash through Jerrison's mind are not his memories. It quickly becomes clear that the electromagnetic pulse generated by the bomb amplified and scrambled Dr. Singh's equipment, allowing a random group of people to access one another's minds.
And now one of those people has access to the president's memories — including classified information regarding the upcoming military mission, which, if revealed, could cost countless lives. But the task of determining who has switched memories with whom is a daunting one- particularly when some of the people involved have reason to lie...
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Robert J. Sawyer was born in Toronto, Canada. He studied Radio and Television Arts, and after graduating in 1982 he began a lucrative career in journalism. He began writing science fiction in 1988 and is now a full-time writer. Sawyer has twice won the Aurora, the Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy Award; and in 1993 he won the Arthur Ellis Award for Best Short Story, by the Crime Writers of Canada. He won the 1995 Nebula Award for his novel 'Terminal Experiment'. Learn about his science fiction stand-alone novels at Robert J. Sawyer's website.
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