A helpful list of honorable mentions and Gardner Dozois's insightful summation of the year in science fiction round out the volume, making it indispensable for anyone interested in science fiction today.Contents ix • Summation: 1995 • (1996) • essay by Gardner Dozois1 • A Woman's Liberation • [Yeowe and Werel • 4] • (1995) • novella by Ursula K. Le Guin51 • Starship Day • (1995) • novelette by Ian R. MacLeod68 • A Place with Shade • [The Remarkables] • (1995) • novelette by Robert Reed100 • Luminous • (1995) • novelette by Greg Egan129 • The Promise of God • (1995) • shortstory by Michael F. Flynn143 • Death in the Promised Land • (1995) • novelette by Pat Cadigan195 • For White Hill • (1995) • novella by Joe Haldeman231 • Some Like It Cold • (1995) • shortstory by John Kessel243 • The Death of Captain Future • [The Captain Future Duet] • (1995) • novella by Allen Steele281 • The Lincoln Train • (1995) • shortstory by Maureen F. McHugh293 • We Were Out of Our Minds with Joy • [North American future] • (1995) • novella by David Marusek341 • Radio Waves • (1995) • novelette by Michael Swanwick360 • Wang's Carpets • (1995) • novelette by Greg Egan389 • Casting at Pegasus • (1995) • novelette by Mary Rosenblum414 • Looking for Kelly Dahl • (1995) • novella by Dan Simmons452 • Think Like a Dinosaur • (1995) • novelette by James Patrick Kelly470 • Coming of Age in Karhide • [Hainish] • (1995) • novelette by Ursula K. Le Guin489 • Genesis • (1995) • novella by Poul Anderson575 • Feigenbaum Number • (1995) • shortstory by Nancy Kress589 • Home • (1995) • shortstory by Geoff Ryman595 • There Are No Dead • (1995) • shortstory by Terry Bisson602 • Recording Angel • (1995) • novelette by Paul J. McAuley627 • Elvis Bearpaw's Luck • (1995) • novelette by William Sanders645 • Mortimer Gray's "History of Death" • (1995) • novella by Brian Stableford698 • Honorable Mentions: 1995 • (1996) • essay by Gardner Dozois

    A deft, masterful mix of both bizarro and horror."--Brian Keene, author of The Rising and Ghoul"Dark and grim and surreal." --Electric LiteratureMondays suck. You get mugged, your car won't start, you miss the bus, and your stylist burns a bald spot into your head. Suddenly you're single and unemployed, and the only friend you have left is a cat. By Tuesday, you've been murdered. But death isn't the end. You find yourself on an odyssey between weird worlds, reborn each time you die, stalked obsessively by the man who killed you.Even in death, you just can't seem to catch a break. Call it Mercury in retrograde, call it Murphy's law, call it . . .SHIT LUCK

    Our issues are also filled with author interviews, art features, book reviews and tips for writers. This month, we feature an exclusive interview with Brandon Sanderson on his latest journey to the United Arab Emirates. We also include short stories from Wall Street Journal bestselling author Jeff Wheeler* ("The Beesinger's Daughter"), Amazon bestselling Carrie Anne Noble ("The Perfect Specimen"), and Cecilia Dart-Thornton who came out of hiding to let us publish her latest ("The Churchyard Yarrow"). We also feature stories this month by Steve Yeager ("Rain Dance") and Brendon Taylor ("The Apothecant"). You'll also get two articles, one written by NYT bestselling author Anthony Ryan and the other by David Pomerico, Harper Voyager US's Executive Editor. Still not convinced to give it a try? We'll also be publishing an extended sample of Wall Street Journal bestselling author Charlie N Holmberg's** latest novel ("Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet"). * Wall Street Journal, June 2016 ** Wall Street Journal, June 2015

    He is homeless, stuck in a city where he is forgotten.On Thanksgiving, a small miracle happens. An unusual man named Scott McKenzie offers him a ride to a place in Oregon called the Oasis.The Oasis is in Middle Falls. Miracles happen in Middle Falls.The Final Christmas of Robert Burke was originally released to Shawn Inmon's newsletter subscribers. It is now being released in ebook and audiobook form for the first time. Like all Middle Falls stories, it is a standalone story and can be read at any point in the series.

     And that’s just a quarter of the thrills. Edited and compiled by Amazon bestselling author Dan Alatorre, this anthology of scary tales brings together the minds and pens of twenty authors, including bestseller Allison Maruska (The Fourth Descendant), bestselling author Jenifer Ruff (Everett), Lucy Brazier (PorterGirl), J. A. Allen, Juliet Nubel, TA Henry, Ann Marie Andrus, Heather Hackett, Barbara Anne Helberg, Scott Skipper, Joanne R. Larner, Christine Valentor, Adele Marie Park, Curtis Bausse, Annette Robinson, Frank Parker, Eric Daniel Clarke, and Maribel C. Pagan. Perfect for Halloween or any time, these stories will make you think twice before walking alone on the beach at night, reading a diary, or innocently watching a train from your car. Consider yourselves warned. NOTE: Warning! American and British spelling ahead. A few stories words are olde English, too. The story The Death Of Mrs. Billen by Mr. Alatorre is from his novel An Angel On Her Shoulder, used with permission.

    Illustrator and writer's Carolyn Marie Castagna's first shared short story.A small icicle hanging from a roof peers inside a window at a small reading room, and learns about magical human qualities, and the importance of the one most special human feeling.

    Arbitrating judgments for horse breeders in Isfaridesh can't compare to his journeymen circuit riding the disputed Nabosian border, and his partner, Gisa Protz, can't stand him. His thoughts are with his troubled sister Ella as he arrives in the small town of Keman, but what awaits him in a luthier's shop will change his life forever."The Luthier of Keman" is a short story that takes place twenty years before Shatter (The Children of Man, #1).

    This study guide includes the following sections: Plot Summary, Chapter Summaries & Analysis, Characters, Objects/Places, Themes, Style, Quotes, and Topics for Discussion.

    The advanced AI system was supposed to protect a fleet of survivors who’d escaped the deadly attack on Kerenza IV. AIDAN was supposed to be infallible. But in the chaotic weeks and months that followed, it became clear that something was terribly, terribly wrong with AIDAN…

    Time is very short for me now, the final part of the ritual draws near... I cannot pretend that I am not frightened.” There were these two British writers, one lived in the country, the other in the city. The country writer loved to visit the city and partake of brandy and Greek kebabs in the local hostelry. The city writer liked to visit the country and guzzle ale and barbecued steak under the apple trees. The two writers needed an excuse for these indulgences, and so they invented one, and this excuse was called “collaborating on a story” ... It soon emerged that the story was to be about a legendary tree, which they both vaguely recalled from the tales their grandfathers used to tell them of mystery and myth. Soon they were delving with suppressed excitement into old documents at the British Museum and began to come up with some frightening discoveries. The first of these finds was in studying the original text, in Anglo-Saxon, of the Old English poem “The Dream of the Rood”. The marrying of the “tree” (crucifixion cross) and the “thorn” (a runic character) was too elaborately regular to be an accident of metre or alliterative language. Other discoveries followed, and the story gradually surfaced, like a dark secret from its burial mound. The Ragthorn: a dark and unsettling World Fantasy Award-winning novella by Robert Holdstock and Garry Kilworth. Also included in this volume, two bonus stories: “The Fabulous Beast” by Garry Kilworth, and “The Charisma Trees” by Robert Holdstock. Robert Holdstock: ‘Britain’s best fantasist … these are the visions of a real artist.’ – The Times ‘Our finest living mythmaker. His narratives – intense, exuberant, earthy, passionate, dense with metaphor – are new trails through the ancient forest of our imaginations. An essential writer.’ – Stephen Baxter ‘No other author has so successfully captured the magic of the wildwood.’ – Michael Moorcock ‘A new expression of the British genius for true fantasy.’ – Alan Garner, on Mythago Wood Garry Kilworth: ‘Garry Kilworth is arguably the finest writer of short fiction today, in any genre.’ – New Scientist ‘Kilworth is one of the most significant writers in the English language.’ – Fear Magazine ‘Probably one of the finest writers of short stories Britain has ever produced.’ – Bookstove Online ‘Kilworth is a master of his trade.’ – Punch Magazine

    All of their rituals to summon an ancient malice and help it unmake reality have accomplished little beyond annoying the upstairs neighbor. When a charismatic sacrifice talks her way off the dark altar and into a leadership position, the Cabal's fortunes turn around, as do their ideas about what it means to serve the greater evil. The Cabal of Thotash is a wickedly funny novelette that peers beneath the hood of an evil cult and finds the inevitable collisions between orthodoxy and modern culture.

    He hires the husband-and-wife detective team of Ted and Cynthia Randall to follow him and find out. But Ted and Cynthia are mystified when they find that their own memories of what happens during their investigation do not match. There is a thirteenth floor to Jonathan's building that does not exist, there are mysterious and threatening beings living inside mirrors, and all of reality is not what they thought it was.Contents...And He Built a Crooked House... (1941)They (1941)The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag (1942)Our Fair City (1949)The Man Who Traveled in Elephants (1957)...All You Zombies... (1959)

    In most of Norton's works, alienated outsiders undertake a journey through which they realize their full potential. Many planets in the books are Earth-like places, where humans can live without special protection, and have extensive flora and fauna which are described in considerable detail and often have substantial bearing on the plot.On February 20, 2005, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, which had earlier honored her with its Grand Master Award in 1983, announced the creation of the Andre Norton Award, to be given each year for an outstanding work of fantasy or science fiction for the young adult literature market, beginning in 2006. Nobody today is telling better stories of straight-forward interstellar adventure.Included in this volume:Book One: Storm Over Warlock - Stranded on the alien world of Warlock, Shann Lantree's expedition camp has been wiped out by the Throgs, beings so alien that humans have yet to communicate with them. Lantree must quickly learn how to survive under harsh conditions while being chased by the Throgs -- and how to distinguish the real from the dreamed when he meets the mysterious Wyverns. A satisfying and mature novel which readers will seize upon if they want to enjoy a good adventure story...Book Two: Star Born - When the oppressive global dictatorship of Pax took over Earth they put a stop to space exploration. Still, a few rebels escaped in the sleeper ships to found free new colonies -- or perish in the attempt. Those few colonists that reached inhabitable worlds were cut off for centuries, and in that isolation and freedom they developed the mysterious mental powers that "civilization" had all but destroyed...Book Three: Star Hunter - Somewhere on the jungle world of Jumala, there was a man in hiding--a man whose mind had been reconditioned with another's brain pattern and for whom there was a fabulous reward. Star Hunter is a thrill-packed account of that other-worldly game of hide-and-seek between a man who did not know all his own powers and an interstellar safari that sought something no man had a right to find...Book Four: Plague Ship - A fast-moving suspense tale, full of unusual detail and unexpected turns. Several highlights make the book really shine: the sunset gorp hunt on the reefs of an oily sea; a raid on an asteroid's emergency station; and a landing in the Big Burn, resulting in an encounter with the mutant life-forms that reside there...Book Five: Voodoo Planet - Dane Thorson of the space-trader 'Solar Queen' found himself embroiled in a desperate battle of minds between the rational science of the spaceways and the hypnotic witchcraft of the mental wizard that ruled the Voodoo Planet...Book Six: The Gifts of Asti - Varta, the last priestess of Asti, lives alone with Lur, a telepath of the lizardfolk, in Asti's isolated mountain retreat. Decadent Memphir has long since drifted away from the austere paths of Asti, and now the barbarians of Klem are sacking the city, and the smoke of its burning drifts up to the temple...Book Seven: The People of the Crater - "Send the Black Throne to dust; conquer the Black Ones, and bring the Daughter from the Caves of Darkness." These were the tasks Garin must perform to fulfill the prophecy of the Ancient Ones--and establish his own destiny in this hidden land!This are the original and unabridged versions of these tales.

    Her novellas and short stories contain all the elements fans have come to love from the Raksura books: courtly intrigue and politics, unfolding mysteries that reveal an increasingly strange wider world, and threats both mundane and magical.“The Dead City” is a tale of Moon before he came to the Indigo Court. As Moon is fleeing the ruins of Saraseil, a groundling city destroyed by the Fell, he flies right into another potential disaster when a friendly caravanserai finds itself under attack by a strange force. In “The Dark Earth Below,” Moon and Jade face their biggest adventure yet; their first clutch. But even as Moon tries to prepare for impending fatherhood, members of the Kek village in the colony tree’s roots go missing, and searching for them only leads to more mysteries as the court is stalked by an unknown enemy.Stories of Moon and the shape changers of Raksura have delighted readers for years. This world is a dangerous place full of strange mysteries, where the future can never be taken for granted and must always be fought for with wits and ingenuity, and often tooth and claw. With these two new novellas, Martha Wells shows that the world of the Raksura has many more stories to tell…Contains: The Dead City #0.3Mimesis #3.4 Trading Lesson #3.5 The Almost Last Voyage of the Wind-ship Escarpment #3.8The Dark Earth Below #3.7Appendices

    Five years ago, a celestial event, dubbed the White Flash, bathed the Earth in its awesome glow. Almost immediately, some people began changing ... and the Paranormal Effect had no discernable pattern. Age, race, gender ... none of it mattered. Anyone can change ... At any time ... In any way ... Now, the world is trying desperately to adjust. The United States government has formed the Paranormal Control Agency to deal with the new breed of paranormal criminals - rogues - but with precious few paranormal agents of their own ... At the heart of the maelstrom stand four people: Vortex, a young man with a vision; Ensign Michael Takayasu and Shockwave, two agents of the PCA; Powerhouse, a new paranormal desperate to protect his family. Paranormals The world will never be the same.