THE REMNANTS of the human race live on orbiting space ships in Brightly Burning by Alexa Donne (Titan, £7.99), waiting for the ruined planet to be inhabitable again.

For some of those in the poorer and less sustainable ships, the wait proves too long. This is a future in which to be working class is to risk your dilapidated refuge burning up during involuntary re-entry.

Seventeen-year-old engineer Stella jumps at the chance of leaving her failing hulk to become a governess on a private vessel. Yet once aboard the Rochester, and falling in love with its mysterious and moody captain, causes her enough problems — and what is the secret of the disembodied laughter that haunts the corridors at night?

Aimed at teenage and adult readers, this seamless blend of romance, adventure and science fiction with class conflict at its absolute heart is a terrific read.

In another version of our space-based future, The Rig by Roger Levy (Titan £8.99), people of all the planets of the System are united by only one thing — the Afterlife, a sophisticated combination of lottery and reality show which offers a chance of resurrection for a small number.

It provides hope in a hard life and takes the place of religion in policing moral behaviour. But there are conspiracies within conspiracies here and very little is as it seems, other than the harsh certainties of organised crime, obsessive love and awful betrayal.

Self-consciously epic, with a good balance of ideas and action, Levy's novel often reads like a more human version of Philip K Dick.

One for those who like their books to have some meat on the spine, Christopher Ruocchio's debut, Empire Of Silence (Gollancz, £16.99), is 800 pages long — and this is only episode one.

Combining space opera with epic fantasy, it introduces us to a far-future human diaspora where technology is strictly controlled by a powerful interplanetary clergy.  Computers and interstellar travel exist, for instance, but not for the plebs. The political system is correspondingly feudal, with planets ruled by various gradations of landed gentry all owing their allegiance to a distant emperor.

Narrator Hadrian is the son of a lord who flees his father's brutal plans for him, only to find that life outside the castle is harder than he could have imagined.

With lots of swordplay and daring escapes — and plenty of political and philosophical musings — this is a highly readable example of "fat fantasy" in a formula freshened by its SF elements.

A more traditional sword-and-sorcery story (also part one of a series) is A Demon In Silver by R.S.Ford (Titan, £7-99).

In this particular mediaeval world there's been no magic for 100 years, until rumours arise of a farm girl with strange powers. On a war-wracked continent, everyone wants control of Livia: the dukes, the mercenaries, the religious death cults — and even the fabled gods themselves.     

Featuring more eviscerations per page than the minutes of a Tory Cabinet meeting, and with no expletives deleted, this is heroic fantasy at its bloodiest, muddiest, rudest and most entertaining.