Introduction by Robert Silverberg. Afterwords by Norman Spinrad, Vonda N McIntyre, Robert Sheckley, Philip Jose Farmer, Thomas M Disch, and Edward Bryant.

    A time for joy. A time for tears. A time for reflection. A time for hope.And a time for miracles.This Christmas season Dave and Karen Brenner have welcomed a stranger into their lives. A stranger who may change their lives forever.

    Some move toward the future heartened by what they learn from those around them--a tattoo artist, an invented medicine man, zoo animals, strangers, fellow outsiders. Deftly rendered, these stories abound with oddness and grace.In “Tattooizm,” included in The Best American Short Stories 2006, a young woman struggles with a promise that her boyfriend is determined to make her keep. In the Nelson Algren Award–winning “Space,” a reluctantly undertaken errand forces a young man to finally confront the death of his mother. And in “The Medicine Man,” hailed by the Times (U.K.) as “perfectly pitched and perfectly written,” a man recounts his manic attachment to his sister.Moffett’s closely observed stories are candid and complex, funny and moving. The world of Permanent Visitors is an idiosyncratic and generous one, its inhabitants searching for constancy in a place crowded with contradiction.

    He grew up with his brother, Alvin, and his sister Julia, in the small Maine town of Baxter, confident in his own capabilities, especially regarding music. He took his happy life for granted, as lucky children often do. But everything changed when he was ten and his dad died in a freak accident. Soon, trouble, mostly in the form of a violent stepfather, found a home--his home. As an escape, the Shaw kids turned to music lessons with family friend Uncle Gus, but it turns out no one can escape the violence and grief that rains down on the Shaws. Blue Summer is the story of the Shaw family's undoing, and Cal's struggle to grow up in a world determined to break him. Even his music threatens to take him down with booze-filled nights and one-night stands. As Cal tries to make sense of his existence, living as far away from his family as he can, a snippet of melody comes to him--timeless and haunting. But before he can finish it, his past asserts itself with a phone call that Uncle Gus is dying and it's time to come home and face an altogether different kind of music. In this story, author Jim Nichols writes a riveting coming-of-age novel that examines the melancholy fate of a boy torn apart by loss and domestic abuse, and the justice he eventually delivers, all the while writing a beautiful melody to counter it all, a song he calls 'Blue Summer.'

    A few weeks hiking and swimming should restore her.But then the hotel’s new owner, Patrick Cross, takes Felicity for the replacement barmaid, and things don’t turn out quite to plan. With a grumpy chef, a waiter with love troubles, and the old Tudor building in need of renovation, Felicity’s quiet break soon turns into a working holiday.But Patrick’s dreams lie beyond the mountains, and Felicity’s loyalties lie with her family, and anyway, holidays can’t last forever...can they?

    Come, sit around the fire with Kamal, Shashi, Anil, Madhu and Vijay while they listen to Javed Khan's stories of the monkey bride, the man who got swallowed by a mosquito, the bent-up double beggar who angered a ghost, and many other tales from Kashmir and beyond.

    Intelligent and brutally direct talk to a reader about our times, Russia, the Russians, and much more.

    Short story from "If it bleeds".

    The walking wounded. These are the stories of ordinary people.

    The Goon Squad 2014 Summer Special contains an introduction to the Squad, and four short stories: "Red Wolf, Red Wolf, Does Whatever a Red Wolf Can," "Changes," "No-No Dojo," and "Tale of Terror." Join Puppet Girl, the Revenant, Red Wolf, and Talos as they protect the fairly innocent, are sharply critical about modern newspapers, talk to a door in Salford, and recount the day the city nearly blew up.

    These people tell us the truth–not only about themselves, their relationships, and their lives, but about ourselves as well. A Perfect Stranger powerfully and affectingly examines the complex, intricate network of experiences that binds us to one another. These stories are tender, raw, lovely, fine–and they reaffirm Roxana Robinson’s place at the forefront of modern literature.

    He collects stamps. He used to have a dog, until the dog walker walked off with him. Then he soldiered on alone.It's his profession that sets him apart. He's a hit man. He kills strangers for a living.And he's a Guilty Pleasure for an ever-increasing number of readers. "I don't think I ought to like Keller," readers tell me. "But I can't help myself..." In the fourth Keller novel, HIT AND RUN, Keller's whole life in New York came to an abrupt end; by the time he'd sorted things out, he was married and living in New Orleans, with a kid on the way. And now, for the first time since the substance hit the fan, he's back in New York—once his home, and now the most dangerous place on the planet for him. And his job is impossible. He has to break into a monastery in the middle of Murray Hill and kill the abbott.Lots of luck, Keller...This edition of KELLER'S HOMECOMING (which was incorporated into the book Hit Me) includes as a bonus the opening sequence of another Keller adventure, KELLER'S DESIGNATED HITTER.

    . . a beautifully wrought hymn of praise to readers and book-lovers in the most sacred of places, the libraries where we find both." --Cassandra King, author of the best-selling novels The Sunday WifeWHEN ADELE COVINGTON becomes an author in her sixties, she goes on a book tour to speak to the Friends of the Library groups in ten small towns in her home state of Mississippi. Chasing her personal demons through the Christ-haunted South of her childhood, Adele befriends an eclectic group of wounded people and decides to tell their stories. From Eupora to Meridian, from a budding artist with an abusive husband to a seven-year-old with a rare form of cancer, each story contains elements of hope and healing and honors the heart, soul, and history of the Magnolia State.

    With Zach's mom in Bali and the woman of his dreams gone AWOL, he's facing a Christmas alone with Ringo—until Tessa the cute veterinarian appears at his door with an offer he and Ringo can't refuse.It's a Christmas he'll never forget....

    When it's heard that the builders are coming to work on the deserted house next door, everyone has an opinion.