This is an Advanced Reader's Edition. Official Release 23 June 2026
The Sixth Nik by Daniel Kraus is a science fiction novel set aboard a living spaceship called The Sickness, which is woven from biomatter and can react to its human crew's needs.
The story follows Sisilla, a nine-year-old cultist with a brain enhanced by arcane technology called "niks". She boards the ship to investigate Fém, a plague-riddled planet that has gone rogue. The crew is mysterious and includes a faceless assassin, a plastic-surgery-modified engineer, a peyote-addicted medic, and a non-modified captain with a score to settle with Sisilla.
Dangers abound as a hacked robot believes Sisilla is its daughter, The Sickness begins mutating (possibly pregnant), and the secret of Fém proves more horrific than imagined. To survive, Sisilla must forsake her predetermined fate. The novel has been described as a hybrid of the Alien franchise and Ender's Game.