Book picks similar to
Angel of the Blockade by Alex Wells
short-stories
sci-fi
science-fiction
short-story
Beyond: the Queer Sci-Fi & Fantasy Comic Anthology
Sfé R. MonsterRachel Dukes - 2015
Featuring 18 stories by 26 contributors, Beyond is a 250+ page, black and white, queer comic anthology, full of swashbuckling space pirates, dragon slayers, death-defying astronauts, and monster royalty. Each story celebrates and showcases unquestionably queer characters as they explore the galaxy, mix magic, have renegade adventures, and save the day!The Beyond Anthology was born from a desire to see stories inspired by people like us (queer people with diverse genders and sexualities) slaying dragons, piloting spaceships, getting into trouble, and saving the day—without having to read for their queerness from between the lines. We wanted to see beautiful, heartwarming, and adventurous stories that reflect and celebrate the many facets of gender and sexuality, without having to worry that their queerness would cast them as a villain, a pariah, or turn them into a cautionary tale. Beyond is edited by Sfé R. Monster, assistant edited by Taneka Stotts, and features a group of 26 contributors who have created 18 exceptional all-ages stories that showcase and celebrate openly and unabashedly queer characters in science fiction and fantasy-based settings.Cover by Levi Hastings, interior of covers by Evan Dahm.
A Guide For Working Breeds
Vina Jie-Min Prasad - 2020
This collection of stories is where robots stand in for us, where both we and they are disadvantaged, and where hope and optimism shines through.
Her Smoke Rose Up Forever
James Tiptree Jr. - 1990
Revisions from the author's notes are included, allowing a deeper view into her world and a better understanding of her work. The Nebula Award–winning short story Love Is the Plan, the Plan Is Death, the Hugo Award–winning novella The Girl Who Was Plugged In, and the Hugo and Nebula Award–winning novella Houston, Houston, Do You Read? are included.The stories of Alice Sheldon, who wrote as James Tiptree Jr. ( Up the Walls of the World ) until her death in 1987, have been heretofore available mostly in out-of-print collections. Thus the 18 accomplished stories here will be welcomed by new readers and old fans. ''The Screwfly Solution'' describes a chilling, elegant answer to the population problem. In ''Love Is the Plan the Plan Is Death,'' the title tells the tale--species survival insured by imprinted drives--but the story's force is in its exquisite, lyrical prose and its suggestion that personal uniqueness is possible even within biological imperatives. ''The Girl Who Was Plugged In'' is a future boy-meets-girl story with a twist unexpected by the players. ''The Women Men Don't See '' displays Tiptree's keen insight and ability to depict singularity within the ordinary. In Hugo and Nebula award-winning ''Houston, Houston, Do You Read?'' astronauts flying by the sun slip forward 500 years and encounter a culture that successfully questions gender roles in ours.ContentsIntroduction by Michael SwanwickThe Last Flight of Doctor Ain (1969)The Screwfly Solution (1977)And I Awoke and Found Me Here on the Cold Hill’s Side (1972)The Girl Who Was Plugged In (1973)The Man Who Walked Home (1972)And I Have Come Upon This Place by Lost Ways (1972)The Women Men Don’t See (1973)Your Faces, O My Sisters! Your Faces Filled of Light! (1976)Houston, Houston, Do You Read? (1976)With Delicate Mad Hands (1981)A Momentary Taste of Being (1975)We Who Stole the Dream (1978)Her Smoke Rose Up Forever (1974)Love Is the Plan the Plan Is Death (1973)On the Last Afternoon (1972)She Waits for All Men Born (1976)Slow Music (1980)And So On, and So On (1971)
The Nine Billion Names of God
Arthur C. Clarke - 1967
CLARKE'S FAVORITE STORIESTHE NINE BILLION NAMES OF GOD -- A short-term course for computer the way to God.TROUBLE WITH TIME -- Martian time proves that crimes doesn't pay!NO MORNING AFTER -- Drink, drink and be merry, for tomorrow there will be no morning after...THE POSSESSED -- Or, why the lemmings drowned.ENCOUNTER AT DAWN -- The day the gods came to Earth.THE SENTINEL -- The story which inspired 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY; when man sets off the galactic burglar alarm, who will answer the call?
Borderline
Mishell Baker - 2016
Just when she's sure the credits have rolled on her life story, she gets a second chance with the Arcadia Project: a secret organization that polices the traffic to and from a parallel reality filled with creatures straight out of myth and fairy tales.For her first assignment, Millie is tasked with tracking down a missing movie star, who also happens to be a nobleman of the Seelie Court. To find him, she'll have to smooth talk Hollywood power players and uncover the surreal and sometimes terrifying truth behind the glamour of Tinseltown. But stronger forces than just her inner demons are sabotaging her progress, and if she fails to unravel the conspiracy behind the noble's disappearance, not only will she be out on the streets, but the shattering of a centuries-old peace could spark an all-out war between worlds.No pressure.
The Witness for the Dead
Katherine Addison - 2021
Thara Celehar found the truth, though it did him no good to discover it. He lost his place as a retainer of his cousin the former Empress, and made far too many enemies among the many factions vying for power in the new Court. The favor of the Emperor is a dangerous coin.Now Celehar lives in the city of Amalo, far from the Court though not exactly in exile. He has not escaped from politics, but his position gives him the ability to serve the common people of the city, which is his preference. He lives modestly, but his decency and fundamental honestly will not permit him to live quietly. As a Witness for the Dead, he can, sometimes, speak to the recently dead: see the last thing they saw, know the last thought they had, experience the last thing they felt. It is his duty use that ability to resolve disputes, to ascertain the intent of the dead, to find the killers of the murdered.Now Celehar’s skills lead him out of the quiet and into a morass of treachery, murder, and injustice. No matter his own background with the imperial house, Celehar will stand with the commoners, and possibly find a light in the darkness.Katherine Addison has created a fantastic world for these books – wide and deep and true.At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Her Silhouette, Drawn in Water
Vylar Kaftan - 2019
Chela says that they’re telepaths and mass-murderers; that they belong here, too dangerous to ever be free. Bee has no reason to doubt her—until she hears the voice of another telepath, one who has answers, and can open her eyes to an entirely different truth.
Allies
S.J. Kincaid - 2013
J. Kincaid’s fast-paced and humorous sci-fi Insignia trilogy, the earth is in the middle of World War III when teen gamer Tom Raines is recruited to train with other young cadets as a pivotal member of the elite combat corps, the Intrasolar Forces. At the Pentagonal Spire’s training academy, he makes the best friends of his life—fellow government weapons-in-training Wyatt Enslow, Vik Ashwan, and Yuri Sysevich.In this 47-page prequel novella to the series, budding genius Wyatt Enslow—intensely loyal and hyperintelligent if occasionally, hilariously, socially awkward—takes center stage as S. J. Kincaid reveals Wyatt’s life before she found her place, and her own inner strength, among her devoted band of friends at the Spire.
Men Who Wish to Drown
Elizabeth Fama - 2012
Supposedly corroborating the mermaid story, a ship's log (in the collections of the Provincetown Historical Museum) of the schooner Hannah, which plucked Mr. Stanton from South Weepecket in 1788, indicates that the crew saw two figures on the island prior to his rescue, but failed to locate a second victim. However, regarding accuracy and reliability, this is the same crew, under Captain John Merriweather, that reported sightings of a ghost ship and not one, but two sea monsters. ~~James S. Rucker, Archivist, Family Collections, Falmouth Historical Society, 1924Companion story to Monstrous Beauty.
Time Was
Ian McDonald - 2018
Brought together by a secret project designed to hide British targets from German radar, the two founded a love that could not be revealed. When the project went wrong, Tom and Ben vanished into nothingness, presumed dead. Their bodies were never found.Now the two are lost in time, hunting each other across decades, leaving clues in books of poetry and trying to make their disparate timelines overlap.