Almost all the stories are specially written for the collection and the cases are presented in the order in which Holmes solved them. The result is a life of Sherlock Holmes, with a continuous narrative alongside the stories which identities the gaps in the canon and places the new and hitherto unrecorded cases in their correct sequence - plus there is an invaluable, complete Holmes chronology.(back cover)

    Dick the greatest science fiction mind on any planet. Since his untimely death in 1982, interest in Dick's works has continued to mount, and his reputation has been further enhanced by a growing body of critical attention. The Philip K. Dick Award is now given annually to a distinguished work of science fiction, and the Philip K. Dick Society is devoted to the study and promulgation of his works.Dick won the prestigious Hugo Award for the best novel of 1963 for The Man in the High Castle. In the last year of his life, the film Blade Runner was made from his novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep ?This collection includes some of Dick's earliest short and medium-length fiction, including "We Can Remember it for You Wholesale" (the story that inspired the motion picture Total Recall), "Second Variety" (which inspired the motion picture Screamers), "Paychecks", "The Minority Report", and 21 more.Content: "Fair Game" (1959) "The Hanging Stranger" (1953) ""The Eyes Have It"" (1953) "The Golden Man" (1954) "The Turning Wheel" (1954) "The Last of the Masters" (1954) "The Father-Thing" (1954) "Strange Eden" (1954) "Tony and the Beetles" (1954) "Null-O" (1958) "To Serve the Master" (1956) "Exhibit Piece" (1954) "The Crawlers" (1954) "Sales Pitch" (1954) "Shell Game" (1954) "Upon the Dull Earth" (1954) "Foster, You're Dead!" (1955) "Pay for the Printer" (1956) "War Veteran" (1955) "The Chromium Fence" (1955) "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale" (1966) "The Minority Report" (1956) "Paycheck" (1953) "Second Variety" (1953)

    Only eight years after serving out a prison sentence for murder, Socrates Fortlow lives in a tiny, two-room Watts apartment, where he cooks on a hot plate, scavenges for bottles, drinks and wrestles with his demons. Struggling to control a seemingly boundless rage--as well as the power of his massive "rock-breaking" hands--Socrates must find a way to live an honourable life as a black man on the margins of a white world, a task which takes every ounce of self-control he has. Easy Rawlins fans might initially find themselves disappointed by the absence of a mystery to unravel. But it's a gripping inner drama that unfolds over the pages of these stories, as Socrates comes to grips with the chaos, poverty and violence around him. He tries to get and keep a job delivering groceries; takes in a young street kid named Darryl, who has his own murder to hide; and helps drive out the neighbourhood crack dealer. Throughout, Mosley captures the rhythms of Watts life in prose both lyrical and hard-edged, resulting in a haunting look at a life bounded by lust, violence, fear and a ruthlessly unsentimental moral vision.

    Now he gives birth to a cast of gruesomely sympathetic children – misunderstood outcasts who struggle to find love and belonging in their cruel, cruel worlds. His lovingly lurid illustrations evoke both the sweetness and the tragedy of these dark yet simple beings – hopeful, hapless heroes who appeal to the ugly outsider in all of us, and let us laugh at a world we have long left behind (mostly anyway).

    Exploring natural phenomena and the origins of the universe, these beloved tales relate complex scientific concepts to our common sensory, emotional, human world.Now, The Complete Cosmicomics brings together all of the cosmicomic stories for the first time. Containing works previously published in Cosmicomics, t zero, and Numbers in the Dark, this single volume also includes seven previously uncollected stories, four of which have never been published in translation in the United States. This “complete and definitive collection” (Evening Standard) reconfirms the cosmicomics as a crowning literary achievement and makes them available to new generations of readers.

    The book includes unforgettable stories like "Toba Tek Singh", "The Return", "The Assignment", "Colder Than Ice" and many more, bringing alive the most tragic event in the history of the Indian subcontinent.

    Bolano's narrators are usually writers grappling with private (and generally unlucky) quests, who typically speak in the first person, as if giving a deposition, like witnesses to a crime. These protagonists tend to take detours and to narrate unresolved efforts. They are characters living in the margins, often coming to pieces, and sometimes, as in a nightmare, in constant flight from something horrid.In the short story "Silva the Eye," Bolano writes in the opening sentence: "It's strange how things happen, Mauricio Silva, known as The Eye, always tried to escape violence, even at the risk of being considered a coward, but the violence, the real violence, can't be escaped, at least not by us, born in Latin America in the 1950s, those of us who were around 20 years old when Salvador Allende died."Set in the Chilean exile diaspora of Latin America and Europe, and peopled by Bolano's beloved "failed generation," the stories of Last Evenings on Earth have appeared in The New Yorker and Grand Street.

    The Complete Stories of Bernard Malamud brings together all of Malamud's published stories--from the classic early story "The Magic Barrel," in which he refashioned the American short story in the Yiddish-infected idiom of his boyhood, to later works such as "Rembrandt's Hat" and "Alma Redeemed,' which dramatize the relationship between life and art with matchless intensity and dark comedy. These fifty-three stories are full of the searching eloquence that characterizes this beloved American writer.Contents:Armistice --Spring rain --The grocery store --Benefit performance --The place is different now --Steady customer --The literary life of Laban Goldman --The cost of living --The prison --The first seven years --The death of me --The bill --The loan --A confession of murder --Riding pants --The girl of my dreams --The magic barrel --The mourners --Angel Levine --A summer's reading --Take pity --The elevator --An apology --The last Mohican --The lady of the lake --Behold the key --The maid's shoes --Idiots first --Still life --Suppose a wedding --Life is better than death --The jewbird --Black is my favorite color --Naked nude --The German refugee --A choice of profession --A pimp's revenge --Man in the drawer --My son the murderer --Pictures of the artist --An exorcism --Glass blower of Venice --God's wrath --Talking horse --The letter --The silver crown --Notes from a lady at a dinner party --In retirement --Rembrandt's hat --A wig --The model --A lost grave --Zora's noise --In Kew Gardens --Alms redeemed.

    Now we can revisit those cherished moments with a delightful batch of stories for and about mothers. Celebrity contributions include Barbara Bush, Reba McEntire, Erma Bombeck and Montel Williams.

    Many are unaware, however, that Bertie had a prototype — Reggie Pepper — who stumbled into the same worrying situations involving old school chums with romantic troubles, irate female relatives, threatening suitors, and other troublemakers.This is the only collection to contain the first eight Jeeves short stories as well as the complete Reggie Pepper series. Included are such delightful tales as "Extricating Young Gussie," "The Aunt and the Sluggard," Leave It to Jeeves," "Jeeves and the Hard-Boiled Egg," "Absent Treatment, "Rallying Round Clarence," "Concealed Art," and more.Awash in an eternal glow of old-boy camaraderie, these stories offer hours of delightfully diverting entertainment sure to recaptivate Wodehouse fans of old as well as tickling the fancy of new readers, who will soon find themselves caught up in the splendidly superficial antics of Messrs. Wooster, Jeeves, Pepper, et al.

    These stories will deepen readers' Christian faith and exp

    The stories in this book have their roots in the Indian culture but express universal emotions that are experienced across the boundaries of regions, caste, and creed. Varied emotions of love, heartbreak, aloofness, anxiety, fear, and longing are expressed in this book.There is one story in which movie star Dilip Kumar breaks the heart of a young girl. There is another where a man pushes off another from a moving train. Raavi Paar also tells the story of a Muslim man whose wish is to be cremated after death and not be buried. There is also a story about a married woman who realises that the only reason for her husband to marry her was to use her as cheap labour.The title of this book is an incident from the author’s own life. During the India-Pakistan partition, the author was mistakenly claimed as their own child by another family. Raavi Paar consists of stories which will touch the reader’s hearts due to the simplicity and intricacy of emotions portrayed by the author.Serious, moving, funny and ironic by turns, these stories are replete with the perceptions of a man who has viewed the world with equanimity and compassion.

    Which may help explain why he is also one of the most brilliant, innovative, and eloquent writers on earth. Slippage simply presents recent, typical Ellison. In a word, masterful. The 21 stories in this 1997 collection, which is encased in black boxes, show Ellison at the height of his powers, with several of the stories (no surprise here) major award-winners. Highlights include a black mind reader who pays a visit to a white serial killer, a husband who falls prey to a vampiric personal computer, and a love affair between a young man and a woman who may be more undead than alive. Perhaps even more fascinating are the painfully candid snapshots of autobiography running throughout the volume. Even if Ellison's unsettling fictions are not enough to dazzle you, his often bizarre life experiences as an author will still keep you compulsively turning the page like a polite voyeur. --Stanley WiaterContents:The Man Who Rowed Christopher Columbus Ashore (1992)Anywhere but Here, with Anybody but You (1996)Crazy as a Soup Sandwich (1989)Darkness upon the Face of the Deep (1991)The Pale Silver Dollar of the Moon Pays Its Way and Makes Change: Version 1 (1997)The Pale Silver Dollar of the Moon Pays Its Way and Makes Change: Version 2 (1994)The Lingering Scent of Woodsmoke (1996)The Museum on Cyclops Avenue (1995)Go toward the Light (1996)Mefisto in Onyx (1993)Where I Shall Dwell in the Next World (1992)Chatting with Anubis (1995)The Few, the Proud (1989)The Deadly "Nackles" Affair (1987) essayNackles (1964)Nackles (1987)Sensible City (1994)The Dragon on the Bookshelf (1995) with Robert SilverbergKeyboard (1995)Jane Doe #112 (1990)The Dreams a Nightmare Dreams (1997)Pulling Hard Time (1995)Scartaris, June 28th (1990)She's a Young Thing and Cannot Leave Her Mother (1988)Midnight in the Sunken Cathedral (1995)

    . . a man tracks his wife through a winter wilderness . . . an ancient ocean buried in the foothills of the Appalachians becomes a battleground for a young wildcat oilman and his aging mentor. Here is Bass at his magical, passionate, and lyrical best.

    The poems are full of melancholic beauty whether in the disturbing images of death and events beyond the grave described in 'The Raven' and 'Lenore', or in the hypnotic fantasy of works such as 'The Bells', 'The City in the Sea' and 'Annabel Lee'.Possessed of a powerful, richly inventive imagination, Edgar Allan Poe explored the darkest corners of the human psyche and is recognized as one of the first writers to offer a genuine American voice.

    The characters here appear to be well-adjusted on the surface, but Tomine takes us deeper into their lives, subtly examining their struggle to connect with friends and lovers.

    Product Condition: Yellow Pages.

    Beginning with the first writings to assimilate and rework Western literary traditions, through the flourishing of the short story genre in the cosmopolitan atmosphere of the Taisho era, to the new breed of writers produced under the constraints of literary censorship, and the current writings reflecting the pitfalls and paradoxes of modern life, this anthology offers a stimulating survey of the development of the Japanese short story.Various indigenous traditions, in addition to those drawn from the West, recur throughout the stories: stories of the self, of the Water Trade (Tokyo's nightlife of geishas and prostitutes), of social comment, love and obsession, legends and fairytales. This collection includes the work of two Nobel prize-winners: Kawabata and Oe, the talented women writers Hirabayashi, Euchi, Okamoto, and Hayashi, together with the acclaimed Tanizaki, Mishima, and Murakami.The introduction by Theodore Goossen gives insight into these exotic and enigmatic, sometimes disturbing stories, derived from the lyrical roots of Japanese literature with its distinctive stress on atmosphere and beauty.

    . . a fierce new voice of the American West.”—OutsideExploding with an unsettling exuberance, Brady Udall’s stories traverse a geography of lost love, fragmented lives, and satisfying revenge. From the night a six-foot-three Apache Indian holding a goat steps into a moonlit Arizona backyard in "Midnight Raid" to the pivotal moment when a man, delirious from a dental extraction, gets rescued by a stranger in the title story, Udall injects his stories and characters with equal parts darkness and humor. These are sad and sweet stories, moving from the familiar to surprising destinations. But even when disaster looms, Udall's fine comic sense sustains his men and women in their sometimes extravagant efforts to connect and cope. Plunged in the moment, these stories have velocity; they spray gravel as they take off.

    Not exactly crazy, they become obsessed and irrational as their inner logic leads them astray. In the title novella, a woman living in a psychiatric halfway house writes to a man she has met only once. Proceeding in brief vignettes that link and illuminate, she recounts her peculiar life with the other patients. The accretions of anecdote lead deeper and deeper into the psyche and history of the narrator, gradually revealing the reason for her urgent letter.

    Originally published with Current 93's 1997 album of the same name.

    Unwaveringly optimistic at his chance of survival, the risky surgery that saves his life also ends the euphoric bliss, leaving his brain with a cavernous hole where the pleasure centers used to be. The 18 years of sadness that follow are a downward spiral of despair, and as a last resort he agrees to another treatment that gives him conscious control over what makes him happy. As he attempts to re-enter the world beyond the hospitals and his gloomy apartment, he faces the ultimate dilemma of self-control ... how happy would you be if you could make yourself as happy as you want? Locus Poll Award Nominee

    Among contributions by Gwendolyn Bennett, Countee Cullen, Langston Hughes, and Wallace Thurman, "Sweat" stood out both for its artistic accomplishment and its exploration of rural Southern black life. In "Sweat" Hurston claimed the voice that animates her mature fiction, notably the 1937 novel Their Eyes Were Watching God; the themes of marital conflict and the development of spiritual consciousness were introduced as well. "Sweat" exemplifies Hurston's lifelong concern with women's relation to language and the literary possibilities of black vernacular.This casebook for the story includes an introduction by the editor, a chronology of the author's life, the authoritative text of "Sweat," and a second story, "The Gilded Six-Bits." Published in 1932, this second story was written after Hurston had spent years conducting fieldwork in the Southern United States. The volume also includes Hurston's groundbreaking 1934 essay, "Characteristics of Negro Expression," and excerpts from her autobiography, Dust Tracks on a Road. An article by folklorist Roger Abrahams provides additional cultural contexts for the story, as do selected blues and spirituals. Critical commentary comes from Alice Walker, who led the recovery of Hurston's work in the 1970s, Robert Hemenway, Henry Louis Gates, Gayl Jones, John Lowe, Kathryn Seidel, and Mary Helen Washington.

    The stories range from adventurous to introspective, humorous to suspenseful, but all share Beagle's gift for language and his ability to bring his characters to life.—Don D'Ammassa

    Grimm's Grimmest presents nineteen of the original, unsanitized, unholy tales as they were first collected by the Brothers Grimm -- all fiendishly illustrated in full color. Grimm's Grimmest has the irresistible look and feel of a creaky old leatherbound volume, perhaps discovered in a forgotten trunk or dusty attic. With aged paper and a leathery stamped case, this delightfully shocking collection harkens back to a time when travelers risked roasting or worse and bad manners could yield frightful consequences. From the true horror of Aschenputtel (the original Cinderella story) to Rapunzel's dark secret, here are the authentic stories born long ago in the land of the Black Forest, at a time when fairy tales were not necessarily for children.

    An irresistible collection of real-life love stories, mixed with Robert Fulghum's own quirky insights and unmistakable homespun observations, True Love tells the many unpredictable tales of love. Here it is: the intriguing story of the woman who marries her mother's high school flame; a man who learns that "old love" and new pajamas are a dangerous mix; a man who miraculously reunites with his first love (after 20 years) on an LA freeway; the touching tale of a husband's love for his wife after her disabling stroke; a 14-year-old's philosophy of looking for love on the boardwalk; the brief moment of connection of a smile shared at a stoplight; and so many more.

     Ennis del Mar and Jack Twist, two ranch hands, come together when they're working as sheepherder and camp tender one summer on a range above the tree line. At first, sharing an isolated tent, the attraction is casual, inevitable, but something deeper catches them that summer. Both men work hard, marry, and have kids because that's what cowboys do. But over the course of many years and frequent separations this relationship becomes the most important thing in their lives, and they do anything they can to preserve it. The New Yorker won the National Magazine Award for Fiction for its publication of "Brokeback Mountain," and the story was included in Prize Stories 1998: The O. Henry Awards. In gorgeous and haunting prose, Proulx limns the difficult, dangerous affair between two cowboys that survives everything but the world's violent intolerance.

    It also features the original whimsical Chesley Award-winning cover illustration by talented Bay Area artist Michael Dashow. "The Last Unicorn, Beagle's most beloved novel, was an underground bestseller in the late 1960s and 1970s. This collection includes two of Beagle's popular unicorn stories, "Professor Gottesman and the Indian Rhinoceros" and "Julie's Unicorn," as well as "Lila the Werewolf," which is anthologized in the "Oxford Book of Fantasy, and a tribute to J. R. R. Tolkien, "The Naga."ContentsIntroduction: “Under the Zucchini” by Patricia A. McKillipFiction“Come Lady Death”“Julie’s Unicorn” “Lila the Werewolf”“My Daughter’s Name Is Sarah”“Pittsburgh Stories (a Recollection)”“Professor Gottesman and the Indian Rhinoceros”“Telephone Call”“The Naga”Essays“D. H. Lawrence in Taos” “Learning a Trade” “My Last Hero”“The Poor People’s Campaign”

    They are sword-wielding defenders or sorcerous spell-casters - roles too often considered the exclusive province of men.In 26 original stories of bold and talented women, Diana Paxson, Deborah Wheeler, Elisabeth Waters, Adrienne Martine-Barnes and their fellow word-weavers lead their readers through bespelled realms of the imagination into dangers both physical and sorcerous, where all the powers of Avalon lie in a woman's hands...a talisman of love can banish a demon's deadly threat...an otherworldly hunter catches different game than she bargained for...a mother's scorn begets a daughter's magic...The Bargain • (1997) • short story by Laura J. UnderwoodThe Impression of Power • (1997) • short story by Lee MartindaleThe Naming of Names • (1997) • short story by Adrienne Martine-BarnesChangelings • (1997) • short story by Diana L. PaxsonDeath-Hunt • (1997) • short story by Raul ReyesA Single Soul • (1997) • short story by Deborah WheelerThe Needle and the Sword • (1997) • short story by Jessie D. EakerSmall Considertions • (1997) • short story by Judith Fielder LeggettIf You Can't Stand the Heat… • (1997) • short story by P.E. CunninghamSilver Bands • (1997) • short story by Syne MitchellThe Hand of a Lady • (1997) • short story by Anne CutrellTo Have and To Hold • (1997) • short story by K.D. BarnesA Knight on Tower Hill • (1997) • short story by Kathrina BoodThe Longest Night • (1997) • short story by Lisa S. SilverthorneBlood Moon • (1997) • novelette by Cynthia WardBy the Skin of her Teeth • (1997) • short story by Heather Rose JonesFriends in High Places • (1997) • short fiction by Christina KruegerThe Blade of Unmaking • (1997) • novelette by Elisabeth WatersThe Stone-Weaver's Tale • (1997) • short story by Cynthia McQuillinThe Hollow Dancer • (1997) • short story by Mary Soon LeeLa Faie Suiateih • (1997) • short story by Lisa DeasonVengeance • (1997) • short story by Dorothy J. HeydtThe Moongate Troll • (1997) • short story by Patricia Duffy NovakLifestone • (1997) • short story by Mary CatelliWhite Elephants • (1997) • short story by Christopher KempkeTraveler's Aide • (1997) • short story by Kathi ThompsonAfterword: The Last Word (Sword & Sorceress XIV) • (1997) • essay by Rachel E. Holmen

    Animated short story narrated by the author.From SF Signal:In 2006, filmmaker Christopher Salmon really, really wanted to create a 3D CG animated film of Neil Gaiman’s short story, “The Price”. So he created this proof-of-concept short animation to convince Neil to grant him the rights to the story.Salmon posted his touching proof-of-concept short online. http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2013...

    In each of these stories, Davis reveals an empathic, sometimes shattering understanding of human relationships.

    These 49 short stories, poems, interviews and essays—fiction and nonfiction—make up a powerful collection of original and new writing by 41 women. does your mama know? is ready to take its place in the halls of literary African-American lesbian voices.

    -- "The Times" Barbara Erskine's second volume of short stories creates a wide and vivid range of worlds and emotions, from love, romance, loneliness and grief, to betrayal, passion, adventure and compelling suspense. Contemporary, historical, spooky, humorous, there are over thirty delightful stories, each one guaranteed to capture the reader's imagination, and all demonstrating Erskine's unique powers as a storyteller.

    *Translated and introduced by Gayatry Chakravorty Spivak*As Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak points out in her introduction, the breast is far more than a symbol in these stories - it is the means of harshly indicting an explotative social system.In "Draupadi", the protagonist, Dopdi Mejhen, is a tribal revolutionary, who, arrested and gang-raped in custody, turns the terrible wounds of her breast into a counter-offensive,In "Breast-giver", a woman who becomes a professional wet nurse to support her family, dies of painful breast cancer, betrayed alike by the breasts that had for years been her chief identity and the dozens of 'sons' she had suckled.In "Behind the Bodice", migrant labourer Gangor's 'statuesque' breasts excite the attention of ace photographer Upin Puri, triggering off a train of violence that ends in tragedy.Spivak introduces this cycle of 'breast stories' with thought-provoking essays which probe the texts of the stories, opening them up to a complex of interpretation and meaning.

    In "Zanduce at Second, " a baseball player turned killer-by-accident undergoes a surprising transformation. We root for escaped felon Ray ("A Note on the Type") as he carves his name on a culvert wall. We drive through the sweltering summer streets of Phoenix as a nineteen-year-old narrator goes through an unsettling sexual awakening ("Oxygen"). In these and other stories, whether his characters are getting sabotaged by nightcaps or encountering nudists on a rafting trip, Ron Carlson takes us to a generous array of places in a new way. Finally, in "The Chromium Hook, " he takes us to a lovers' lane where he solves an ancient mystery. Carlson's work has always made a difference. His men and women are resourceful creatures, driven and derided by conscience, comforted by the possibility of love, and at all times ready for the next thing.

    Marks the seasons of the author's life, her early writing, her work as active media practitioner, and her religio-spiritual writing.

    Imagine mephitic gardens where the sarcophage, selenotrope, and necrophilium bloom. Then throw in star-crossed lovers, crazed zealots, stalwart heroes, bloodthirsty renegade armies, hideous monsters, and likeable misfits. You've got just a hint of the wondrous and original visions in the dark fantasy world of Brian McNaughton. Horror scholar S. T. Joshi, in the afterword to this collection of stories, notes the strong influence of Clark Ashton Smith, Lord Dunsany, H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, and Greco-Roman decadent works such as Petronius's Satyricon. "McNaughton seems to have mastered one of the most difficult of literary arts: to draw upon the classics of the field without losing his own voice.... The world that McNaughton has created in this book is the world of the ghoul; and who knows but that The Throne of Bones will become the standard textbook for the care and feeding of ghouls just as Dracula has become that for vampires?"Contents:Ringard and Dendra (1996)The Throne of Bones (1997)The Vendren Worm (1990)Meryphillia (1990)Reunion in Cephalune (1997)The Art of Tiphytsorn Glocque (1997)A Scholar from Sythiphore (1995)Vendriel and Vendreela (1988)The Retrograde Necromancer (1993)The Return of Liron Wolfbaiter (1997)

    And nowhere is Bester funnier, speedier, or more audacious than in these seventeen short stories—two of them previously unpublished—that have now been brought together in a single volume for the first time.Read about the sweet-natured young man whose phenomenal good luck turns out to be disastrous for the rest of humanity. Find out why tourists are flocking to a hellish little town in a post-nuclear Kansas. Meet a warlock who practices on Park Avenue and whose potions comply with the Pure Food and Drug Act. Make a deal with the Devil—but not without calling your agent. Dazzling, effervescent, sexy, and sardonic, Virtual Unrealities is a historic collection from one of science fiction's true pathbreakers.CONTENTS:Disappearing ActOddy and IdStar Light, Star Bright (1953)5,271,009 (1954)Fondly Fahrenheit (1954)Hobson's Choice (1952)Of Time and Third Avenue (1952)Time is the Traitor (1953)The Men Who Murdered Mohammed (1958)The Pi Man (1959)They Don't Make Life Like They Used To (1963)Will You Wait? (1959)The Flowered Thundermug (1964)Adam and No Eve (1941)And 3 1/2 to GoGalatea Galante (1979)The Devil Without Glasses

     Snow White, Blood Red #2. Black Thorn, White Rose #3. Ruby Slippers, Golden Tears #4. Black Swan, White Raven #5. Silver Birch, Blood Moon #6. Black Heart, Ivory Bones

    Two stories of rural life from the author of WATCH WITH ME and FIDELITY, newly available in paperback from Gnomon. As a celebrator of the land and the turning of the seasons that govern us still, Wendell Berry is, indeed, our writer for all seasons -- Wade Hall, Lexington Herald-Leader. Wallace Stegner writes, It's hard to say whether I like [Berry] better as a poet, an essayist, or a novelist. He is all three, at a high level.

    There are 14 stories in all, ranging from straight SF to tales that stray into the fantasy and horror genres. Of special note is the title story, which earned the 1996 Hugo Award for Best Novelette, the 1995 Nebula Award nomination for Best Novelette, among several other awards and nominations as well. But all of the stories are excellent in their own right. An insightful forward by James Patrick Kelly's friend and sometimes collaborator John Kessel (Corrupting Dr. Nice) leads off the collection and explores Kelly's somewhat underrated career.Contents:Think Like a Dinosaur (1995)Heroics (1987)Pogrom (1991)Faith (1989)Big Guy (1994)Dancing with the Chairs (1989)Rat (1986)The First Law of Thermodynamics (1996)Breakaway, Backdown (1996)Standing in Line with Mister Jimmy (1991)Crow (1984)Monsters (1992)Itsy Bitsy Spider (1997)Mr. Boy (1990)

    Knut Hamsun published only three collections of short stories during his lifetime and abandoned the form entirely after 1906. Most of these stories are translated into English for the first time ans this is the first publication for them outside Norway. Providing a fascinating commentary on the novels Hamsun was writing at the time and with forebodings of his much later work these stories are indispensable.

    This edition contains important lessons on the nature of friendship and love, the importance of belief in the future, and the value of respect for oneself and others, and much more.

    Le Guin, Maureen F. McHugh, Mike Resnick, and others.Contents ix • Summation: 1996 • essay by Gardner Dozois1 • Immersion • (1996) • novella by Gregory Benford47 • The Dead • (1996) • shortstory by Michael Swanwick56 • The Flowers of Aulit Prison • [Probability Universe] • (1996) • novelette by Nancy Kress82 • A Dry, Quiet War • (1996) • novelette by Tony Daniel99 • Thirteen Phantasms • (1996) • shortstory by James P. Blaylock109 • Primrose and Thorn • [Primrose] • (1996) • novelette by Bud Sparhawk142 • The Miracle of Ivar Avenue • (1996) • novelette by John Kessel167 • The Last Homosexual • (1996) • shortstory by Paul Park178 • Recording Angel • (1996) • shortstory by Ian McDonald188 • Death Do Us Part • (1996) • shortstory by Robert Silverberg203 • The Spade of Reason • (1996) • shortstory by Jim Cowan218 • The Cost to Be Wise • (1996) • novelette by Maureen F. McHugh254 • Bicycle Repairman • [Chattanooga] • (1996) • novelette by Bruce Sterling279 • The Weighing of Ayre • (1996) • novelette by Gregory Feeley311 • The Longer Voyage • (1996) • novelette by Michael Cassutt330 • The Land of Nod • [Kirinyaga • 10] • (1996) • novelette by Mike Resnick350 • Red Sonja and Lessingham in Dreamland • (1996) • shortstory by Gwyneth Jones362 • The Lady Vanishes • (1996) • shortstory by Charles Sheffield373 • Chrysalis • (1996) • novelette by Robert Reed407 • The Wind Over the World • [Silurian Tales] • (1996) • novelette by Steven Utley430 • Changes • (1996) • shortstory by William Barton445 • Counting Cats in Zanzibar • (1996) • shortstory by Gene Wolfe457 • How We Got In Town and Out Again • (1996) • novelette by Jonathan Lethem475 • Dr. Tilmann's Consultant: A Scientific Romance • (1996) • novelette by Cherry Wilder492 • Schrödinger's Dog • (1996) • novelette by Damien Broderick518 • Foreign Devils • [War of the Worlds] • (1996) • novelette by Walter Jon Williams535 • In the MSOB • (1996) • shortstory by Stephen Baxter539 • The Robot's Twilight Companion • (1996) • novella by Tony Daniel590 • Honorable Mentions: 1996 • essay by Gardner Dozois

    Now, years later, it's a jilted lover's turn to turn Valentine's Day into a time for rekindling lost love. In Donna Hill's Masquerade, Joi Holliday, a shy book editor, finds the man of her dreams on the Internet. But can she change from a plain Jane into a confident, desirable woman by the time they meet at a Valentine's Day ball? In Janice Sim's To Love Again, a San Francisco caterer, Alana Calloway, embittered by the death of her policeman husband, receives flowers from a secret admirer. It will take a stunning revelation to help her let go the past and learn to love again.

    M. Kornbluth. Many of the stories are SF "classics", such as "The Marching Morons," "The Little Black Bag," "Two Dooms," "The Mindworm," "Thirteen O'Clock," and, of course, "That Share of Glory". His Share of Glory includes all of Kornbluth's solo short science fiction, fifty-six works of short SF in all, with the original bibliographic details including pseudonymous by-line. The introduction is by noted SF writer and life-long friend and collaborator of C. M. Kornbluth-Frederik Pohl. Hardbound with cover art by Richard Powers.

    Selections include works of history, memoirs, letters, and essays, as well as fiction, poetry, and drama. Adding to the importance of the volume are several selections from rare and little-known texts that have been translated into English for the first time.

    Yet interesting things do happen in Travers Corners, all the time, and this remarkable first collection of stories by Scott Waldie builds a true sense of a small town and the wonderful characters who fill it: Jud, who left to travel the world and returned to build boats and fly fish; Sarah, an emigrant from New York City who needed to find some peace; her uncle Sal, the local bartender with the Brooklyn accent and Yankee baseball cap; Dolores, the town beauty of years past and present; Junior, the general store owner who has a thorough knowledge of fly fishing but no discernible skill; and many, many more.Written with warmth, wit, and a shrewd eye for rural characters, "Travers Corners" will remind some readers of Winesburg, Ohio, and others of A River Runs Through It. And for fly fishers anywhere. Travers Corners will be a second home.

    These two stories are perhaps even better known as films (The Birds by Alfred Hitchcock and Don't Look Now by Nic Roeg), but here we bring you the full terrifying texts, superbly read by Peter Capaldi, who brings the true dimension of these works to the imagination.

    language shoots up and through the body in these fictions of desire inwhich women bleed, bruise, and burn their way beyond culturally sanctioned girl slots. wicked love stories and the crack and split of new intellects emerge in the wake of a sea of "isms." yuknavitch's stories leave questions like marks on the flesh of characters whose stories aren't pretty--they are raw, terrible, a different beauty than we've yet imagined. freudian shudders; these mouths penetrate.

    This year, E. Annie Proulx's selection includes dazzling stories by Tobias Wolff, Donald Hall, Cynthia Ozick, Robert Stone, Junot Diaz, and T. C. Boyle as well as an array of stunning new talent. In her introduction, Proulx writes that beyond their strength and vigor, these stories achieve "a certain intangible feel for the depth of human experience, not uncommonly expressed through a kind of dry humor." As ever, this year's volume surprises and rewards.100 Distinguished Stories Citations, including How to Have Heart Disease (Without Really Trying), Jane Eaton Hamilton

    Millions of readers around the world have relished Jeffrey Archer's short stories. His first collection, A Quiver Full of Arrows, was acclaimed by The Times as 'stylish, witty and entertaining...Jeffrey Archer has a natural aptitude for short stories.' Publishers Weekly wrote: 'Somerset Maugham never penned anything so swift or urbanely witty as this.' Of his second collection, A Twist in the Tale, the New York Times said: 'Jeffrey Archer plays a subtle cat-and-mouse game with the reader in twelve original stories that end, more often than not, with our collective whiskers twitching in surprise', and The Times concluded that it was 'certain to delight his many fans'. His third, Twelve Red Herrings, was described by the Daily Express as 'outstanding...white-knuckle suspense and witty denouements', and by the Daily Mail as 'an exemplary collection of short stories'. These thirty-six stories show Jeffrey Archer at the peak of his form. His mastery of characterisation and suspense, combined with a gift for the unexpected plot twist, demonstrate why he is Britain's bestselling author, and will provide a feast of entertainment for readers old and new.

    Against a backdrop of major events in Alexandria's history, from the halcyon days of the late 1930s, through the alarums of the War, to the 1952 Revolution and the dispersion of almost the entire foreign community of the city, Tzalas weaves his stories peopled with characters from his youth. These are ordinary people, people of different nationalities and faiths, but all Alexandrians, living side by side in the Great City. In describing each character with great sensitivity and perception, Tzalas succeeds not only in capturing the essence of the city itself, but in poignantly foretelling the fundamental changes and exodus that were to come. The events surrounding, among others, a German family caught in the city during the Second World War, three French monks, an old Greek musician, and a group of cultivated elderly Alexandrian gentlemen, are told with an affection often tinged with sadness. Through these characters, Tzalas tells the story of everyday lives caught up in the turbulent currents of history and the transformation of a beloved city--the end of an era. Each of the eleven stories is accompanied by an evocative illustration by Anna Boghiguian.

    Originally published in African American newspapers, periodicals, and journals between 1880 and 1953, these enchanting Christmas tales are part of the black literary tradition that flourished after the Civil War.Edited and assembled by esteemed historian Dr. Bettye Collier-Thomas, the short stories and poems in this collection reflect the Christmas experiences of everyday African Americans and explore familial and romantic love, faith, and more serious topics such as racism, violence, poverty, and racial identity. Featuring the best stories and poems from previous editions along with new material including "The Sermon in the Cradle" by W. E. B. Du Bois, A Treasury of African American Christmas Stories celebrates a rich storytelling tradition and will be cherished by readers for years to come.

    Young and old, on two legs or four, they grope for love and tenderness, knowing that all connection is fraught with danger and all relationship random and evanescent. Yet the heart wants what it wants. The title novella, a wrenching account of the end of love, traces a gentle dog's transformation into a vicious beast as the couple who owns him breaks apart.In The Happiness Game the tenuous bonds between husband and wife are undermined by black crows and weak hearts, while Matti presents a chorus of voices—doctors, nurses, jilted wife, dying husband—that recounts an old man's passion for his lover, a fifteen-year-old Lolita. Wise and deft, Housebroken navigates the moments of decision, betrayal, longing, and jealousy that torment the souls of wounded lovers.

    Her characters, whether they are walking in the streets of Manhattan or seemingly abandoned in foreign countries, continually make disquieting and sometimes life-threatening discoveries about themselves, discoveries that illuminate not only their own lives but also the wider net of relationships in which they are enmeshed.

    The lyricism of A Man and a Dog makes it a must read.”Graeme CampbellFilm Director“Acceptance of oneself and others is the central message of this evocative, crisply written novella … A Man and a Dog is one of those books that demands to be read at a single sitting, and then reread for an appreciation of its depths. Hewitt … is a writer to watch.”Canadian Book Review AnnualA Man and a Dog is the simple story of a homeless man and the mysterious, talking dog that befriends him, offering companionship, consolation, and counseling as they move from place to place. Strongly suggesting allegory with imagery that is clear and defined, this simple and yet poignant tale is dedicated to “the homeless and those who believe in them,” and will make its own unique claim on the hearts of its readers with the universal appeal of its theme.Duane Hewitt is the author of five other works of fiction, including the novels Savage and The Chaos of Days. He lives in Toronto.

    "Because God loves stories." Storytelling has been part of Jewish religion and custom from earliest times and it remains a defining aspect of Jewish life. In Because God Loves Stories, folklorist Steve Zeitlin assembles the work of thirty-six Jewish storytellers, each of whom spins tales that express his or her own distinctive visions of Jewish culture. Contemporary storytellers re-interpret stories from the Talmud for modern sensibilities, the Grand Rabbi of Bluzhov tells tales of the Holocaust, beloved comedian Sam Levenson regales readers with hilarious vignettes of Jewish life in America, and much more.

    Focusing on characters both young and old, gay and straight, single and married, he discovers the dramas that are obscured by life's daily struggles. These beautifully crafted stories depict the surface of the world we all know, but go on to reveal the mysteries lurking beneath life's deceptively placid surface - the half we don't know.

    In film, television, novels, and short stories, he keeps coming back to life, fed by the vital imaginative energies of a world-wide audience that cannot seem to resist his abominable charms. Aristocratic and urbane, deeply erotic and profoundly evil, Dracula's bloodsucking savagery has cast a mesmerizing fascination not only over his victims but over his readers as well. And, as Leonard Wolf suggests, "Vampire fiction...exerts an amazing pull on readers for a reason that we may find disturbing. The blood exchange—the taking of blood by the vampire from his or her victim is, all by itself, felt to be a singularly symbolic event. Symbolic and attractive!" Now, in Blood Thirst; One Hundred Years of Vampire Fiction, Leonard Wolf brings together thirty tales in which vampires of all varieties make their ghastly presence felt;male and female, human and non-human, humorous and heroic;all of them kin to the dreadful bat. From Lafcadio Hearn, Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman, Edith Wharton, August Derleth, and Ray Bradbury to such contemporary masters as Anne Rice, Stephen King, Joyce Carol Oates, John Cheever, and Woody Allen, and in settings as diverse as rural New England and outer space, this collection offers readers a dazzling compendium of vampire stories. Wolf organizes the collection into six categories;The Classic Adventure Tale, The Psychic Vampire, The Science Fiction Vampire, The Non-Human Vampire, The Comic Vampire, and The Heroic Vampire;which allows readers to see the many guises Dracula's descendants have assumed and the many ways they can be interpreted. In his penetrating introduction, Wolf argues that such an arrangement enables us to see the evolution of the vampire from an unmitigated evil to a creature we are more likely to identify with. "In a century in which God and Satan have become increasingly irrelevant in the popular arts, there has been an accompanying secularization of the vampire idea. And, as the stories in Blood Thirst will show, sympathy for the vampire has grown as we have become increasingly interested in the workings of the mind." Indeed, the vampire's ability to change over time, to draw into itself such a richness of symbolic meanings, to conjure itself into so many diabolical shapes, may account for the enduring appeal of the literature written about it. Here, then, is a definitive collection for aficionados and novices alike, and whether readers find the vampires who inhabit these pages sympathetic or horrific, psychologically intriguing or spiritually repellent, morbidly seductive or comically absurd,Blood Thirst gives us all something to sink our teeth into.

    Jarman doesn't just write about people. He puts us in their skin so that we feel their frailty and courage. No other contemporary Canadian short story writer slices up the imaginative excitement, cultural hybridity, and Joycean play of language we see in 19 Knives. Including one story shortlisted for the U.S.'s prestigious O. Henry Prize, and several other prize-winners, this collection brings a major emerging fiction writer to the fore.

    Focusing on paradigmatic figures ranging from Mary Wollstonecraft and Margaret Fuller to Germaine Greer and Susan Sontag, preeminent scholar Elaine Showalter uncovers common themes and patterns of women's lives across the centuries and discovers the feminist intellectual tradition they embodied. The author brilliantly illuminates the contributions of Eleanor Marx, Zora Neale Hurston, Simone de Beauvoir, Margaret Mead, and many more.Showalter, a highly regarded critic known for her provocative and strongly held opinions, has here established a compelling new Who's Who of women's thought. Certain to spark controversy, the omission of such feminist perennials as Gloria Steinem, Susan B. Anthony, Robin Morgan, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Virginia Woolf will surprise and shock the conventional wisdom.

    In these stories of powerful sudden impact, Benedetti plumbs with deep psychological insight both the dreams and frustrations of the middle-class in a bureaucratic society, as well as the pain and disorientation of political exile.

    This is the story of the murders, their aftermath, and the handful of people who kept faith amid the unthinkable.

    Radically original and surprising, comic and sensuous, Davenport's virtuoso talent charms us into a world both familiar and strange. Whether in the timelessness of deep woods or fleeing the bloody dreamscape of battle, Davenport's characters embody life's contradictions.

    Ms. Frank creates subtle calibrations of the inner spaces and silences separating people, and the haunting undercurrents of feeling that hold them together. In the concluding novella, The Map Maker, those undercurrents exert an especially powerful tow, washing up a lost cargo of familial misunderstandings.

    At the center of the stories is Denny Ring, a young man nobody quite knows. Other characters include John Corey, a contractor who renovates old houses in New Haven, Connecticut; his younger brother Eugene, a volunteer at a soup kitchen; and his older brother Cameron, who is a lawyer specializing in obnoxious law. Johns assistant, Tom, is in love with his former English teacher, Ida Feldman, and Charlotte LoPresti, a social worker who interviews the Corey brothers and their aged father, is friends with Pam Shepherd, a social worker whos in charge of the house for psychiatric patients that John and Tom are renovating.

    From the author of Bad Behavior comes a new compilation of clever and cutting-edge stories propelling readers into a world of men and women where the ways of desire are sometimes distasteful and complex.Tiny, smiling daddy --Because they wanted to --Orchid --The blanket --Comfort --The girl on the plane --The dentist --Kiss and tell --The wrong thing Turgor --Respect --Processing --Stuff

    Gail Jones explores the role of obsession the inescapable loves and torments she calls fetishes - in the lives of both the famous and the ordinary. Structured around a series of lyrical echoes and repeated images, her stories weave fact and speculation to recreate little-known events in the lives of such figures as Marcel Proust, Walt Whitman, and Elvis Presley that may have motivated their art and obsessed them as individuals.

    One is a tale of murderous obsession while the other tells of a masquerade party that is visited by Death himself.

    It is the genre that stands in opposition to literary modernism." So says David G. Hartwell in his introduction to The Science Fiction Century, an anthology spanning a hundred years of science fiction, from its birth in the 1890s to the future it predicted.David G. Hartwell is a World Fantasy Award-winning editor and anthologist who has twice before redefined a genre--first the horror field with The Dark Descent, then the subgenre of hard science fiction with The Ascent of Wonder, coedited with Kathryn Cramer. Now, Hartwell has compiled the mother of all definitive anthologies, guaranteed to change not only the way the science fiction field views itself but also the way the rest of literature views the field.Contents 17 • Introduction (The Science Fiction Century) • (1997) • essay by David G. Hartwell 21 • Beam Us Home • (1969) • shortstory by James Tiptree, Jr. 31 • Ministering Angels • (1955) • shortstory by C. S. Lewis 39 • The Music Master of Babylon • (1954) • novelette by Edgar Pangborn 57 • A Story of the Days to Come • (1899) • novella by H. G. Wells 112 • Hot Planet • (1963) • shortstory by Hal Clement 127 • A Work of Art • (1956) • novelette by James Blish 139 • The Machine Stops • (1909) • novelette by E. M. Forster 161 • Brightness Falls from the Air • (1951) • shortstory by Margaret St. Clair 166 • 2066: Election Day • (1956) • shortstory by Michael Shaara 177 • The Rose • (1953) • novella by Charles L. Harness [as by Charles Harness ] 232 • The Hounds of Tindalos • (1929) • shortstory by Frank Belknap Long 242 • The Angel of Violence • (1978) • shortstory by Adam Wisniewski-Snerg 252 • Nobody Bothers Gus • [Gus] • (1955) • shortstory by Algis Budrys 261 • The Time Machine • (1954) • shortstory by Dino Buzzati 265 • Mother • (1953) • novelette by Philip José Farmer 285 • As Easy as A.B.C. • (1912) • novelette by Rudyard Kipling 304 • Ginungagap • (1980) • novelette by Michael Swanwick 327 • Minister Without Portfolio • (1952) • shortstory by Mildred Clingerman 333 • Time in Advance • (1956) • novelette by William Tenn 352 • Good Night, Sophie • (1973) • novelette by Lino Aldani (aka Buonanotte Sofia 1963 ) 369 • Veritas • (1987) • novelette by James Morrow 382 • Enchanted Village • (1950) • shortstory by A. E. van Vogt 393 • The King and the Dollmaker • (1970) • novella by Wolfgang Jeschke (aka Der König und der Puppenmacher 1961 ) 435 • Fire Watch • [Time Travel] • (1982) • novelette by Connie Willis 462 • Goat Song • (1972) • novelette by Poul Anderson 486 • The Scarlet Plague • (1912) • novella by Jack London 518 • Drunkboat • [The Instrumentality of Mankind] • (1963) • novelette by Cordwainer Smith 539 • Another World • (1962) • novelette by J. H. Rosny aîné (aka Un Autre Monde 1895 ) 558 • If the Stars Are Gods • [Bradley Reynolds] • (1974) • novelette by Gordon Eklund and Gregory Benford 585 • I Still Call Australia Home • (1990) • shortstory by George Turner 598 • Liquid Sunshine • (1982) • novelette by Alexander Kuprin (aka Zhidkoe solntse 1913 ) 632 • Great Work of Time • (1989) • novella by John Crowley 683 • Sundance • (1969) • shortstory by Robert Silverberg 694 • Greenslaves • (1965) • novelette by Frank Herbert 716 • Rumfuddle • (1973) • novella by Jack Vance 754 • The Dimple in Draco • (1967) • shortstory by R. S. Richardson [as by Philip Latham ] 765 • Consider Her Ways • (1956) • novella by John Wyndham 805 • Something Ending • (1973) • shortstory by Eddy C. Bertin 812 • He Who Shapes • (1965) • novella by Roger Zelazny 869 • Swarm • [Shaper/Mechanist] • (1982) • novelette by Bruce Sterling 886 • Beggars in Spain • [Sleepless] • (1991) • novella by Nancy Kress 939 • Johnny Mnemonic • (1981) • shortstory by William Gibson 952 • "Repent, Harlequin!" Said the Ticktockman • (1965) • shortstory by Harlan Ellison 961 • Blood's a Rover • (1952) • novella by Chad Oliver 993 • Sail the Tide of Mourning • [Bentfin Boomers] • (1975) • shortstory by Richard A. LupoffThe story The Angel of Violence by Adam_Wiśniewski-Snerg was translated from Polish to English by Thomasz Mirkowicz for this anthology.The story Good Night, Sophie by Lino Aldani was translated from Italian to English by L. K. Conrad.The story Liquid Sunshine by Alexander Kuprin was translated from Russian to English by Leland Fetzer.

    This is the first fiction anthology in more than three decades from the magazine that has defined the American short story for almost a century. As noteworthy for its range as for its excellence, Nothing But You features a stunning array of present and past masters writing about love in all its varieties, from the classic love story to dislocated narratives of weird modern romance. Taken separately, these stories suggest the infinite variety of the human heart. Taken together, they are a literary milestone, a comprehensive review of the way we live and love now.

    Note that this book of very short yet splendid tales of the uncanny is included in the first and third editions (but not the second) of Tartarus Press's compilation RITUAL.

    As a teacher, Oates emphasizes the importance of reading widely with enthusiasm, pleasure, and purpose. Telling Stories reflects this emphasis, introducing students to a variety of models for their own writing and encouraging them to concentrate on details, revise often, make material their own, experiment with genre, and ultimately find their own voice. Edited by a contemporary master of the storyteller's art who defines herself primarily as a friend of the text and a friend of the writer, Telling Stories is the perfect anthology for creative writing workshops and fiction classes and a wellspring of inspiration for any beginning writer.The love of storytelling--to hear stories, and to tell them--is universal in our species. Those with an apparent talent for writing. . . are not of a special breed but simply mirror the common human desire. [If] you have a natural talent for writing, and a love of the imagination, you risk a lifelong deprivation if you fail to cultivate it as vigorously as you can. Write your own 'great American novel'. . . you're talented, you're intelligent, you have the driving passion, and you know as much as anyone about American life. Your story belongs uniquely to you. --Joyce Carol Oates, from the Introduction

    This unabridged collection of Cather's best-known works include MY ANTONIA, "Sculptor's Funeral", "Paul's Case", and "The Garden Lodge".

    . . . their white meal runs wet with the knowledge of the language of the land, but people do not listen.”Vaz’s beautiful, intensely conscious language often delicately slips her stories into the realm of the fado, the Portuguese song about fate and longing.  “Listen for the nightingale that presses its breast against the thorns of the rose,” on character sings, “that the song might be more beautiful.”  Such a verse might describe Vaz’s own motive behind her willingness to confront her subject’s ambiguities and her characters’ conflicts - the simultaneous joy and sorrow of some of life’s discoveries, the pain sometimes hidden within passion and pleasure.

    

    With a pitcher who is knocked off the mound with every hit, a fielder who has never caught a ball, and a beagle playing shortstop, they don't stand much of a chance--but they'll entertain with their attempts! Insights From The Outfield celebrates the humor and spirit of America's favorite pastime.

    Offers a collection of mini-essays originally read over National Public Radio that address everyday issues and experiences ranging from summer camp to the mysteries of the universe.

    Huysmans, most appearing for the first time in English. It traces the full development of a genre that initially appeared in the aftermath of the French Revolution, and has been used to explore the most terrifying aspects of science and social life.CONTENTSIntroduction · Terry Hale · in *The Lamp of Saint Just · Frédéric Soulié; trans. by Liz Heron · ss *The Travels of Claude Belissan · Eugène Sue; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *Solange · Alexandre Dumas · nv The London Journal, 1849Monsieur de l’Argentière, Public Prosecutor · Pétrus Borel; trans. by Terry Hale · nv *The Covetous Clerk · Alphonse Royer; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *One Eye Between Two · Xavier Forneret; trans. by Liz Heron · nv *Dorci, or the Vagaries of Chance · Marquis de Sade; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *Mademoiselle Scalpel · Charles Baudelaire; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *The Penitent · Catulle Mendès; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *The Astonishing Moutonnet Couple · Villiers de l’Isle-Adam; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *Constant Guignard · Jean Richepin; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *The Hanged Man · Charles Cros; trans. by Liz Heron · ss *Monsieur Mathias · Jules Lermina; trans. by Liz Heron · ss *A Burnt Offering · Léon Bloy; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *A Family Treat [from Becalmed] · J. K. Huysmans; trans. by Terry Hale · ex, 1992; revisedThe Prisoner of his Own Masterpiece · Edmond Haraucourt; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *Jacques Cazotte’s Prophecy · La Harpe; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *The Story of Hélène Gillet · Charles Nodier; trans. by Liz Heron · ss *The Green Monster · Gérard de Nerval; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *The Invisible Eye · Erckmann-Chatrian; trans. by Anon. · ss Temple Bar Dec, 1870The Reincarnation of Doctor Roger · Henri Rivière; trans. by Terry Hale · nv *The Head of Hair · Guy de Maupassant; trans. by Terry Hale · ss *Mademoiselle Dafné · Théophile Gautier; trans. by Liz Heron · nv *One Possessed · Jean Lorrain; trans. by Liz Heron

    When the Southern Bells brought the modern age to Waynesville, North Carolina, in 1953, the telephone company didn't count on was the chatty Leatherwood sisters.

    In "Miserere," a widowed librarian with an unspeakable secret undertakes an unusual and grisly role in the anti-abortion crusade. "Under the Pitons" is the harrowing story of a reluctant participant in a drug-running scheme and the grim and unexpected consequences of his involvement. The title story is a riveting account of the tangled lines that weave together the relationship of a father and his grown daughter.

    This collection brings together twenty-one of Lardner’s best pieces, including the six Jack Keefe stories that comprise You Know Me, Al, as well as such familiar favorites as “Alibi Ike,” “Some Like Them Cold,” and “Guillible’s Travels.”

    The king's house had many other doors, but this was the door for petitions. Since the king spent all his time sitting at the door for favors (favors being offered to the king, you understand), whenever he heard someone knocking at the door for petitions, he would pretend not to hear . . ." Why the petitioner required a boat, where he was bound for, and who volunteered to crew for him, the reader will discover in this delightful fable, a philosophic love story worthy of Swift or Voltaire.

    "This" lad especially. At home, his mum is always embarrassing him, his dad is not around, and money is scarce. At school, the bully is always thumping him, and his best friend, Tony, is put into a different classroom; the class scapegoat is always making him feel guilty. The one time he actually sticks up for someone, he ends up getting sent to the geadmaster. No wonder he can't wait to swap. On the school exchange, he'll swap houses for a week with some lad from London. There, he'll get to live in a posh house, like a mansion, with three toitlets. "With a bit of luck, " his mum says, "I'll get a nice young man who'll keep his room tidy and make his bed. . . .Now "that'd" be a grand swap." But when he finally gets to swap, he's horrified to find himself fighting tears on the entire bus ride, same as Keith Hopwood, who's blubbering behind him. Least he doesn't throw up, like Keith Hopwood. . . .George Layton brilliantly captures the balancing act of one boy's eleventh year, when he faces prejudice and poverty and pride, and unwittingly discovers who he is. . .and who he isn't.

    In these surreal, dystopian tales, characters find their way into and out of Plato’s cave, mental hospitals, interspecies love affairs, plane crashes and Gypsy kidnappings. These narratives, which shapeshift and interpenetrate, contain everything form the rhapsodies of a night nurse, to a lyrical meditation on the egg, to lists of wryly named sexual positions. Krusoe’s universe is full of amazing chaos and deadpan astonishment.When you enter Jim Krusoe’s wittily indeterminate world, your first instinct is to grope around for a literary coordinate. At first he reminds you of Kafka: the dreamlike inconsequentiality and gentle-sinister comedy—the half-human animals and evanescent temptresses. But the America that Krusoe inhabits is spelt with a C, not a K. He is robustly situated in his time and place, and he has a lilt that is all his own. In the end, he stopped reminding me of anyone. Jim Krusoe is an original. — Martin Amis

    She has written one of the 20th century's greatest high-fantasy series, the Chronicles of Great Alta (Sister Light, Sister Dark, White Jenna, and The One-Armed Queen). Her first collection of short fiction for adults is Sister Emily's Lightship and Other Stories. It assembles 28 stories, three of which are original to this volume, many of which take the form of folk or fairy tales, and all of which are excellent. Sometimes dark, sometimes humorous, the stories are always beautifully written, sharp, and wise. "Snow in Summer" portrays a modern, Appalachian Snow White with a fringe-Fundamentalist snake-handling stepmother. "Granny Rumple" reveals the grim origin of Rumplestiltskin. A prequel to the Chronicles of Great Alta, "Blood Sister" explores both love and the nature of narrative. In "The Gift of the Magicians, with Apologies to You Know Who," Beauty and the Beast meet with a horrifically suitable O. Henry twist. The Nebula Award winning "Lost Girls" revisits Peter Pan's Neverland with a feminist slant. "Dick W. and His Pussy; or, Tess and Her Adequate Dick" is an amusingly naughty retold fairy tale. In the Nebula Award winner "Sister Emily's Lightship," the poet Emily Dickinson finds a strange and otherworldly inspiration. --Cynthia WardContents:The Traveler and the Tale (1995)Snow in Summer (2000)Speaking to the Wind (2000)The Thirteenth Fey (1985)Granny Rumple (1994)Blood Sister (1994)Journey into the Dark (1995)The Sleep of Trees (1980)The Uncorking of Uncle Finn (1986)Dusty Loves (1988)The Gift of the Magicians, with Apologies to You Know Who (1992)Sister Death (1995)The Singer and the Song (2000)Salvage (1984)Lost Girls (1998)Belle Bloody Merciless Dame (1997)Words of Power (1987)Great Gray (1991)Under the Hill (2000)Godmother Death (1997)Creationism: An Illustrated Lecture in Two Parts (1990)Allerleirauh (1995)Sun/Flight (1982)Dick W. and His Pussy; or, Tess and Her Adequate Dick (1997)Become a Warrior (1998)Memoirs of a Bottle Djinni (1988)A Ghost of an Affair (2000)Sister Emily's Lightship (1996)

    Selected from the acclaimed of anthologies mystery and suspense, The Best of Sisters In Crime offers a killer collection of award-winning authors and 21 short stories of felonious, yet feminine, mystery fiction.

    Abbott's community is pure Americana, a wild world inhabited by gloriously street-smart smartasses: overeducated, underemployed men mourning for the confident women who have left them - or have they? - but knowing that equally confident women are just around the corner - or are they?

    His series of "fairy books" is generally regarded as among the richest collections in the English language. Gathered from around the world — from Norse and Icelandic sources, from the Far East, Mideast, Europe, Africa, Australia, and many other areas — these books not only introduced generations of youngsters to the enchanting world of fairyland but gave adults an opportunity to return to the wonderful realm of make-believe.This delightful selection of six popular tales from Lang's Blue Fairy Book includes charming versions of "Cinderella," "The Bronze Ring," "Felicia and the Pot of Pinks," "The White Cat," "The Story of Pretty Goldilocks," and "Snow-white and Rose-red." New illustrations by Marty Noble capture all the romance and magic of these time-honored tales.Reset in large, easy-to-read type, these perennial favorites will delight today's young audiences just as they enthralled readers when first published over a century ago.

    As if to balance the somber themes of madness and death, Furui also shows a great sensitivity to the dark humor inherent in everyday life.Yōko is the story of a sensitive young man’s relationship with a beautiful young woman beset by an unidentified mental illness linked to the traumatic transition from carefree child to responsible adult. Her vivid but distorted perceptions of the world highlight the process by which reality and identity are created and provide the centerpiece for a touching, if somewhat unusual, tale of a young couple’s deepening love. Yōko won the Akutagawa Prize in 1971.Furui explores a range of human experiences on the borderline between life and death, the present and the past. Here, in particular, we find a surprisingly vital legacy of the literature and culture of premodern Japan coexisting with modern concrete and commuter trains.

    Her fiction has appeared in magazines like Mademoisclle, Ploughshares, American Short Fiction, and TriQuarterly. One of her stories was dramatized in the Stories-on-Stage series at the Organic Theater in Chicago. Another was selected for radio broadcast in the "Sound of Writing" series. She currently teaches creative writing at Loyola University in Chicago and to public-school students as an Artist-in-Education, She edits Another Chicago Magazines with her husband, poet Barry Silesky, and takes care of their ten-year-old twin boys."Like emotional spelunkers, the women in Sharon Solwitz's first collection of stories tirelessly explore the dark corners of their personal relationships, bravely feeling their way along the unlighted passageways connecting husbands, wives, lovers, parents, and children. A flair for dark comedy and the ability to turn on a dime are prized qualities for these unpredictable characters; time and again, their intrepid investigations lead them into uncharted territory where bizarre dramatic action seems to be the only possible move. Solwitz's fine-toothed examinations of complex emotional states are dead on, and she has a sharp eye for details. . . . Keeping her narratives at a steady simmer, she ponders the mysteries of human intimacy, turning up the flame at the last minute for a sudden blast of revelatory action. . . . [T]he results are absorbing, a well-wrought reminder that no matter how peculiar the circumstances, we all have more incommon than we think."-The New York Times Book Review

    

    Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

    Since then, however, it has been revived four times, proving the enormous popularity of a genre that encompasses science fiction, mystery, horror, and the occult. This anthology includes the best of the most frightening stories that have made the famous pulp magazine a household name for more than 70 years. Contributors include H.P. Lovecraft, Tanith Lee, Ray Bradbury, Nancy Springer, Robert Bloch, Mary E. Counselman, Steve Rasnic Tem, and others.

    In the following decades, Freeman drew widespread praise for her intimate portraits of women and her realistic depictions of rural New England life. She published short stories, essays, novels, plays, and children’s books. Her stories, written in a clear and direct prose, are remarkable for their unpretentious, sympathetic portrayals of the lives of ordinary New Englanders of Freeman’s era. Many of the stories depict rebellion against oppressive social and private conditions. Others describe conflicting desires for independence and lasting relationships. This volume of twenty-eight stories is the first to provide a representative sample of Freeman’s finest work, from all phases of her career. It makes plain why Freeman (in the words of editor Mary R. Reichardt) is widely recognized as an important figure “in the history of American women’s fiction . . . and the development of the American short story.”

    Sigrid Harald and the winner of the Edgar Award for Best Novel, Margaret Maron writes with sensitivity about how time and place influence people and events, and how the domestic situation can breed both warmth and quiet despair. Shoveling Smoke contains 22 of Margaret Maron's best short stories, including all of the short cases of Sigrid Harald and Deborah Knott. The book concludes with a new story about Deborah Knott and a checklist of Margaret Maron's mystery novels and short stories. Introduction and prefaces to each story by the author.

    We have no captive audience. We do not teach. We write to be readable and to engage the interest of what Virginia Woolf called 'the common reader.'"    In a life that spanned almost the entire course of the twentieth century--he was born in 1900 and died in 1997--Sir Victor Pritchett mastered nearly every form of literature: the novel, short fiction, travel writing, biography, criticism, and memoir. Now, Sir Victor's son Oliver has selected representative samples to illustrate the tremendous scope of his father's brilliance. Included in this volume are sections of Pritchett's memoirs, A Cab at the Door and Midnight Oil; his reflections on turning eighty; and an account of a visit to the Appalachians written in 1925. There are also portraits of Dublin, New York, the Amazon, and Spain; selections from the novels Dead Man Leading and Mr. Beluncle; thirteen complete short stories; excerpts from biographies of Turgenev and Chekhov; and critical pieces on Twain, Scott, Dickens, Eliot, Henry James, Tolstoy, Saul Bellow, Salman Rushdie, and others.    "Pritchett has lived as a man of letters must, by his pen, and he has done it with a freshness of interest and an infectious curiosity that have never waned," observed novelist Mar- garet Drabble. Taken together with Oliver Pritchett's appreciation of his father, and John Bayley's "In Memoriam," The Pritchett Century stands as the most comprehensive collection of Sir Victor's work available in one volume.The Modern Library has played a significant role in American cultural life for the better part of a century. The series was founded in 1917 by the publishers Boni and Liveright and eight years later acquired by Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer. It provided the foun-dation for their next publishing venture, Random House. The Modern Library has been a staple of the American book trade, providing readers with affordable hard-bound editions of important works of liter-ature and thought. For the Modern Library's seventy-fifth anniversary, Random House redesigned the series, restoring as its emblem the running torchbearer created by Lucian Bernhard in 1925 and refurbishing jackets, bindings, and type, as well as inau-gurating a new program of selecting titles. The Modern Library continues to provide the world's best books, at the best prices.From the Hardcover edition.

    

    The heartwarming and tender treasury -- another release in the bestselling Stories for the Heart series from Alice Gray -- includes stories by several of America's most respected and loved Christian communicators. Divided into three sections, "Christmas Treasures," "Once Upon a Christmas Time," and "Christmas Reflections," it's the perfect holiday gift to give or to keep for readers who want to curl up by a crackling fire and renew their faith, hope, and love for the holiday season.Rekindle the warmth of Christmas. Curl up by the fire and warm your heart and soul this holiday season with these wonderful stories. Tender and uplifting, this collection will greatly renew your faith, hope, and love for the Christmas season.From the Hardcover edition.