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Shadows of the Past by Sharon Shinn
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Bloodchild and Other Stories
Octavia E. Butler - 1995
Appearing in print for the first time, "Amnesty" is a story of a woman named Noah who works to negotiate the tense and co-dependent relationship between humans and a species of invaders. Also new to this collection is "The Book of Martha" which asks: What would you do if God granted you the ability—and responsibility—to save humanity from itself?Like all of Octavia Butler’s best writing, these works of the imagination are parables of the contemporary world. She proves constant in her vigil, an unblinking pessimist hoping to be proven wrong, and one of contemporary literature’s strongest voices.
Sapience: A Collection of Science Fiction Short Stories
Alexis Lantgen - 2019
In the near future, humanity builds a colony on Europa, one of the moons of Jupiter. They tunnel into the ice to explore the dark oceans beneath the moon's surface, searching for signs of extraterrestrial life. What they find will change them forever, setting humanity on a path to the stars. But the old conflicts and hatreds of Earth are not so easily escaped. Will human colonists on distant planets and moons create a paradise or a horrifying dystopia?
Uncanny Magazine Issue 5: July/August 2015
Lynne M. ThomasScott Lynch - 2015
Featuring new fiction by Mary Robinette Kowal, E. Lily Yu, Shveta Thakrar, Charlie Jane Anders, Delilah S. Dawson, and Sarah Monette, classic fiction by Scott Lynch, essays by Natalie Luhrs, Sofia Samatar, Michael R. Underwood, and Caitlín Rosberg, poetry by C. S. E. Cooney, Bryan Thao Worra, and Sonya Taaffe, interviews with E. Lily Yu and Delilah S. Dawson by Deborah Stanish, a cover by Antonio Caparo, and an editoral by Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas.
McSweeney's Enchanted Chamber of Astonishing Stories
Michael ChabonJason Roberts - 2004
Brite - The Devil of Delery StreetChina Mieville- Reports of Certain Events in LondonJoyce Carol Oates - The Fabled Light-house at Vi–a del MarPeter Straub - Mr. Aickman’s Air Rifle
Tails of Wonder and Imagination
Ellen DatlowKelly Link - 2001
Mystery, horror, science fiction, and fantasy stories have all been written about cats.From legendary editor Ellen Datlow comes Tails of Wonder and Imagination, showcasing forty cat tales by some of today’s most popular authors. With uncollected stories by Stephen King, Carol Emshwiller, Tanith Lee, Peter S. Beagle, Elizabeth Hand, Dennis Danvers, and Theodora Goss and a previously unpublished story by Susanna Clarke, plus feline-centric fiction by Neil Gaiman, Kelly Link, George R.R. Martin, Lucius Shepard, Joyce Carol Oates, Graham Joyce, Catherynne M. Valente, Michael Marshall Smith, and many others.Tails of Wonder and Imagination features more than 200,000 words of stories in which cats are heroes and stories in which they’re villains; tales of domestic cats, tigers, lions, mythical part-cat beings, people transformed into cats, cats transformed into people. And yes, even a few cute cats.Table of Contents:"Through the Looking Glass (excerpt)" - Lewis Carroll"No Heaven Will Not Ever Heaven Be..." - A. R. Morlan"The Price" - Neil Gaiman"Dark Eyes, Faith, and Devotion" - Charles de Lint"Not Waving" - Michael Marshall Smith"Catch" - Ray Vukcevich"The Manticore Spell" - Jeffrey Ford"Catskin" - Kelly Link"Mieze Corrects an Incomplete Representation of Reality" - Michaela Roessner"Guardians" - George R. R. Martin"Life Regarded as a Jigsaw Puzzle of Highly Lustrous Cats" - Michael Bishop"Gordon, the Self-Made Cat" - Peter S. Beagle"The Jaguar Hunter" - Lucius Shepard"Arthur's Lion" - Tanith Lee"Pride" - Mary A. Turzillo"The Burglar Takes a Cat" - Lawrence Block"The White Cat" - Joyce Carol Oates"Returns" - Jack Ketchum"Puss-Cat" - Reggie Oliver"Cat in Glass" - Nancy Etchemendy"Coyote Peyote" - Carole Nelson Douglas"The Poet and the Inkmaker's Daughter" - Elizabeth Hand"The Night of the Tiger" - Stephen King"Every Angel is Terrifying" - John Kessel"Candia" - Graham Joyce"Mbo" - Nicholas Royle"Bean Bag Cats(R)" - Edward Bryant"Antiquities" - John Crowley"The Manticore's Tale" - Catherynne M. Valente"In Carnation" - Nancy Springer"Old Foss is the Name of His Cat" - David Sandner"A Safe Place to Be" - Carol Emshwiller"Nine Lives to Live" - Sharyn McCrumb"Tiger Kill" - Kaaron Warren"Something Better than Death" - Lucy Sussex"Dominion" - Christine Lucas"Tiger in the Snow" - Daniel Wynn Barber"The Dweller in High Places" - Susanna Clarke"Healing" - Benjamin Dennis Danvers"The Puma" - Theodora Goss
Sirens and Other Daemon Lovers: Magical Tales of Love and Seduction
Ellen DatlowEllen Steiber - 1998
WeinO for a Fiery Gloom and Thee • (1998) • short story by Brian StablefordPersephone or, Why the Winters Seem to Be Getting Longer • (1998) • short fiction by Wendy FroudPrivate Words • (1998) • novelette by Mark W. TiedemannTaking Loup • (1998) • short story by Bruce GlasscoTastings • (1998) • short story by Neil GaimanThe Eye of the Storm • (1998) • novelette by Kelley EskridgeThe Faerie Cony-Catcher • (1998) • short story by Delia ShermanThe House of Nine Doors • (1998) • short story by Ellen KushnerThe Light That Passes Through You • (1998) • short story by Conrad WilliamsThe Sweet of Bitter Bark and Burning Clove • (1998) • novelette by Doris EganWolfed • (1998) • short story by Tanith Lee
Snake Agent
Liz Williams - 2005
Chen has several problems: in addition to colleagues who don't trust him and his mystical ways, a patron goddess whom he has offended and a demonic wife who's tired of staying home alone, he's been paired with one of Hell's own vice officers, Seneschal Zhu Irzh, to investigate the illegal trade in souls. Political pressures both Earthly and otherworldly seek to block their investigations at every turn. As a plot involving both Singapore Three's industrial elite and Hell's own Ministry of Epidemics is revealed, it becomes apparent that the stakes are higher than anyone had previously suspected.
The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities
Ann VanderMeerChina Miéville - 2011
Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities. Editors Ann and Jeff Vandermeer have gathered together a spectacular array of exhibits, oddities, images, and stories by some of the most renowned and bestselling writers and artists in speculative and graphic fiction, including Ted Chiang, Mike Mignola (creator of Hellboy), China Miéville, and Michael Moorcock. A spectacularly illustrated anthology of Victorian steampunk devices and the stories behind them, The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities is a boldly original, enthrallingly imaginative, and endlessly entertaining entry into a hidden world of weird science and unnatural nature that will appeal equally to fantasy lovers and graphic novel aficionados.
Nightmares: A New Decade of Modern Horror
Ellen DatlowNicholas Royle - 2016
An antique bookseller and a mob enforcer join forces to retrieve the Atlas of Hell. Postapocalyptic survivors cannot decide which is worse: demon women haunting the skies or maddened extremists patrolling the earth.In this chilling twenty-first-century companion to the cult classic Darkness: Two Decades of Modern Horror, Ellen Datlow again proves herself the most masterful editor of the genre. She has mined the breadth and depth of ten years of terror, collecting superlative works of established masters and scene-stealing newcomers alike.Introduction / Ellen Datlow --Shallaballah / Mark Samuels --Sob in the silence / Gene Wolfe --Our turn too will one day come / Brian Hodge --Dead sea fruit / Kaaron Warren --Closet dreams / Lisa Tuttle --Spectral evidence / Gemma Files --Hushabye / Simon Bestwick --Very low-flying aircraft / Nicholas Royle --The Goosle / Margo Lanagan --The clay party / Steve Duffy --Strappado / Laird Barron --Lonegan's luck / Stephen Graham Jones --Mr. Pigsny / Reggie Oliver --At night, when the demons come / Ray Cluley --Was she wicked? Was she good? / M. Rickert --The shallows / John Langan --Little pig / Anna Taborska --Omphalos / Livia Llewellyn --How we escaped our certain fate / Dan Chaon --That tiny flutter of the heart I used to call love / Robert Shearman --Interstate love song (Murder ballad no. 8) / Caitlín R. Kiernan --Shay Corsham Worsted / Garth Nix --The atlas of Hell / Nathan Ballingrud --Ambitious boys like you / Richard Kadrey
Salsa Nocturna: Stories
Daniel José Older - 2012
A half-resurrected cleanup man for Death's sprawling bureaucracy faces a phantom pachyderm, doll-collecting sorceresses and his own ghoulish bosses. Gordo, the old Cubano that watches over the graveyards and sleeping children of Brooklyn, stirs and lights another Malaguena. Down the midnight streets of New York, a whole invisible universe churns to life in Daniel Jose Older's debut collection of ghost noir.
The Murders of Molly Southbourne
Tade Thompson - 2017
Experience the horror of Tade Thompson's The Murders of Molly Southbourne.The rule is simple: don't bleed.For as long as Molly Southbourne can remember, she's been watching herself die. Whenever she bleeds, another molly is born, identical to her in every way and intent on her destruction.Molly knows every way to kill herself, but she also knows that as long as she survives she'll be hunted. No matter how well she follows the rules, eventually the mollys will find her. Can Molly find a way to stop the tide of blood, or will she meet her end at the hand of a girl who looks just like her?
Geist
Philippa Ballantine - 2010
They have been dispatched to the isolated village of Ulrich to aide the Priory with a surge of violent geist activity. With them is Raed Rossin, Pretender to the throne that Sorcha is sworn to protect, and bearer of a terrible curse.But what greets them in the strange settlement is something far more predatory and more horrifying than any mere haunting. And as she uncovers a tradition of twisted rituals passed down through the dark reaches of history, Sorcha will be forced to reconsider everything she thinks she knows.And if she makes it out of Ulrich alive, what in Hell is she returning to?
The Serpent
Claire North - 2015
There, fortunes are made and fortunes are broken over games of chess, backgammon and every other game under the sun.But those whom fortune favours may be invited to compete in the higher league... a league where the games played are of politics and empires, of economics and kings. It is a league where Capture the Castle involves real castles, where hide and seek takes place on a scale as big as the British Isles. Not everyone proves worthy of competing in the higher league. But one woman, who is about to play, may just exceed everyone's expectations.Though she must always remember: the higher the stakes, the more deadly the rules...
Nice Dragons Finish Last
Rachel Aaron - 2014
But this meek behavior doesn't fly in a family of ambitious magical predators, and his mother, Bethesda the Heartstriker, has finally reached the end of her patience. Now, sealed in human form and banished to the DFZ--a vertical metropolis built on the ruins of Old Detroit--Julius has one month to prove that he can be a ruthless dragon or kiss his true shape goodbye forever. But in a city of modern mages and vengeful spirits where dragons are considered monsters to be exterminated, he’s going to need some serious help to survive this test. He only hopes humans are more trustworthy than dragons...
Blood Lite III: Aftertaste
Kevin J. AndersonHeather Graham - 2012
Banks, Kelley Armstrong, and many more! Horror fiction explores the dark side of human nature, often pushing the limits of violence, graphic gore, and extreme emotions. But with the popularity of shows and movies, such as "The Walking Dead," "True Blood," "Twilight," "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," audiences have demonstrated their love for the genre--especially accompanied with a dose of humor to tone down the terror."Blood Lite III: Aftertaste" continues to put the fun back into dark fiction, featuring a wide range of humorous and highly entertaining horror-filled tales. Edited by Horror Writers Association founding member and award-winning author Kevin J. Anderson, the stories vary in tone from wry to downright laugh-out-loud funny. Featuring such well-known horror writers as Jim Butcher, Sherrilyn Kenyon, Christopher Golden, and many others, this collection of tales is perfect for anyone who enjoys being entertained as much as they love a good scare.Contents:I was a teenage Bigfoot / Jim Butcher --Blood-red greens / Joel A. Sutherland --V plates / Kelley Armstong --Put on a happy face / Christopher Golden --Devil's contract / E.S. Magill --Nine-tenths of the law / Eric James Stone --Scrumptious bone bread / Jeff Strand --Let that be a lesson to you / Mark Onspaugh --Mint in box / Mike Baron --Great zombie invasion of 1979 / J.G. Faherty --Dating after the apocalypse / Stephen Dorato --Typecast / Jeff Ryan --Making the cut / Mike Resnick, Lezli Robyn --Acknowledgments / Will Ludwigsen --Mannequin / Heather Graham --Short term / Daniel Pyle --Distressed travelers / Nina Kiriki Hoffman --Bayou brawl / L.A. Banks --Steeple people / John Alfred Taylor --For sale / David Sakmyster --Man who could not be bothered to die / Norman Prentiss --Last demon / Don D'Ammassa --Misadventure to call your own / Adrian Ludens --Smoke and mirrorballs / Chris Abbey --Brians!!! / D.L. Snell --Still life / Ken Lilli-Paetz --Day in the life / Sherrilyn