Part of the Shadows Beneath - The Writing Excuses Anthology

    After witnessing a profoundly traumatic event, a boy is left alone in a remote house on a hilltop with his increasingly deranged parent. When a stranger knocks on his door, the boy senses that his days of isolation are over—but by what authority does this man keep the meticulous records he carries? Is he the boy’s friend? His enemy? Or something altogether other?

    Well, Dale has a lot of problems. Addiction. Rent. A girlfriend he let slip away.But Dale has a solution. It's a Box. And it will let him go back 10 minutes in time. Enough to fix his new mistakes as they happen. And give him an edge to fix the old ones that haunt him.Oh, and one other problem: Where did these other Dales come from?Walter Bard has a problem. Well, Walter has twenty problems. Each of them a body buried in a pumpkin patch. And... they're all the same. Down to the teeth. But Walter has a solution. It's his job. Solutions. He's a detective, after all.

    This is true.Other true things about hippos: they are savage, they are fast, and their jaws can snap a man in two.This was a terrible plan.Contained within this volume is an 1890s America that might have been: a bayou overrun by feral hippos and mercenary hippo wranglers from around the globe. It is the story of Winslow Houndstooth and his crew. It is the story of their fortunes. It is the story of his revenge.

    Vaccination and treatment are widely available, not held in reserve for the chosen few. There are still monsters left to fight, but the old ones, the simple ones, trouble us no more.Or so we thought. For with the reduction in danger comes the erosion of memory, as pandemics fade from memory into story into fairy tale. Those old diseases can’t have been so bad, people say, or we wouldn’t be here to talk about them. They don’t matter. They’re never coming back.How wrong we could be.It begins with a fever. By the time the spots appear, it’s too late: Morris’s disease is loose on the world, and the bodies of the dead begin to pile high in the streets. When its terrible side consequences for the survivors become clear, something must be done, or the dying will never stop. For Dr. Isabella Gauley, whose niece was the first confirmed victim, the route forward is neither clear nor strictly ethical, but it may be the only way to save a world already in crisis. It may be the only way to atone for her part in everything that’s happened.She will never be forgiven, not by herself, and not by anyone else. But she can, perhaps, do the right thing.We live in an age of monsters.

    The headless undead, a gruesome flea circus, flesh-eating insects, and a menacing house that won’t stay put. These are just some of the tales that will reveal as much about the teller as they do the mysteries behind that frayed curtain we call reality.BEYOND THE DOOR is a story about how we connect with one another through storytelling—and tantalize ourselves with the unknown.

    Become entranced with the basic struggle of good vs. evil as you travel to a galaxy far, far away.

    What kind of world have we made, where human beings can live centuries if only they can afford the fix? What kind of creatures have we become? The same as we always were, but keener.In the ancient heart of Oxford University, the ultra-rich celebrate their vastly extended lifespans. But a few surprises are in store for them. From Nina and Alex, Margo and Fidget, scruffy anarchists sharing living space with an ever-shifting cast of crusty punks and lost kids. And also from the scientist who invented the longevity treatment in the first place.Everything Belongs to the Future is a bloody-minded tale of time, betrayal, desperation, and hope that could only have been told by the inimitable Laurie Penny.At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

    Okay yes, all that stuff too, but I'm not talking about that right now. The government has also been lying to us about space aliens. Aliens have landed on the National Mall and are asking to speak with the President of the United States. For the sake of the planet, diplomat Michael Wallenson is tasked with keeping them away from Donald Trump at all costs. Will Michael succeed? Or will these heavily armed, easily offended aliens succeed in reaching our leader? Building the border dome, coal-powered missiles, and the true identities of the men in black - all in Take Us To Your Trump, another hilarious satirical comedy from author Andrew Stanek.

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    After ecological disasters nearly destroyed the Earth, 26 survivors—the last of humanity—are trapped by an alien race in a sterile enclosure known as the Shell. Fifteen-year-old Pete is one of the Six—children who were born deformed or sterile and raised in the Shell. As, one by one, the survivors grow sick and die, Pete and the Six struggle to put aside their anger at the alien Tesslies in order to find the means to rebuild the earth together. Their only hope lies within brief time-portals into the recent past, where they bring back children to replenish their disappearing gene pool. Meanwhile, in 2013, brilliant mathematician Julie Kahn works with the FBI to solve a series of inexplicable kidnappings. Suddenly her predictive algorithms begin to reveal more than just criminal activity. As she begins to realize her role in the impending catastrophe, simultaneously affecting the Earth and the Shell, Julie closes in on the truth. She and Pete are converging in time upon the future of humanity—a future which might never unfold. Weaving three consecutive time lines to unravel both the mystery of the Earth's destruction and the key to its salvation, this taut post-apocalyptic thriller offers a topical plot with a satisfying twist.

    As the story begins, Leeds and his 'aspects' are drawn into the search for the missing Balubal Razon, inventor of a camera whose astonishing properties could alter our understanding of human history and change the very structure of society"--From publisher's description

    “The Situation” is based on a short story by Jeff VanderMeer which Margo Lanagan called “darkly hilarious” and Kevin Brockmeier “a work of surreal humor, bemused sadness, and meticulous artifice...as if the workplace novels of Sinclair Lewis and Joshua Ferris had been inverted, shaken, and diced until they came out looking like a Terry Gilliam creation.”

    A ferocious riff on women in superhero comics.A series of linked stories from the points of view of the wives and girlfriends of superheroes, female heroes, and anyone who’s ever been “refrigerated”: comic book women who are killed, raped, brainwashed, driven mad, disabled, or had their powers taken so that a male superhero’s storyline will progress.

    A story set in the same world as the novel Lamentation, although taking place several thousand years earlier than the events in the book.Also contained in Diving Mimes, Weeping Czars and Other Unusual Suspects