A People's Future of the United States: Speculative Fiction from 25 Extraordinary Writers


Victor LaValleTananarive Due - 2019
    K. Jemisin, Charles Yu, Jamie Ford, and more. For many Americans, imagining a bright future has always been an act of resistance. A People's Future of the United States presents twenty never-before-published stories by a diverse group of writers, featuring voices both new and well-established. These stories imagine their characters fighting everything from government surveillance, to corporate cities, to climate change disasters, to nuclear wars. But fear not: A People's Future also invites readers into visionary futures in which the country is shaped by justice, equity, and joy.Edited by Victor LaValle and John Joseph Adams, this collection features a glittering landscape of moving, visionary stories written from the perspective of people of color, indigenous writers, women, queer & trans people, Muslims and other people whose lives are often at risk.Contributors include: Violet Allen, Charlie Jane Anders, Ashok K. Banker, Tobias S. Buckell, Tananarive Due, Omar El Akkad, Jamie Ford, Maria Dahvana Headley, Hugh Howey, Lizz Huerta, Justina Ireland, N. K. Jemisin, Alice Sola Kim, Seanan McGuire, Sam J. Miller, Daniel José Older, Malka Older, Gabby Rivera, A. Merc Rustad, Kai Cheng Thom, Catherynne M. Valente, Daniel H. Wilson, G. Willow Wilson, and Charles Yu.

Withered + Sere


T.J. Klune - 2016
    Purposefully cutting himself off from what remains of civilization, Cavalo resides in the crumbling ruins of the Northern Idaho Correctional Institution. A mutt called Bad Dog and a robot on the verge of insanity comprise his only companions. Cavalo himself is deteriorating, his memories rising like ghosts and haunting the prison cells.It’s not until he makes the dangerous choice of crossing into the irradiated Deadlands that Cavalo comes into contact with a mute psychopath, one who belongs to the murderous group of people known as the Dead Rabbits. Taking the man prisoner, Cavalo is forced not only to face the horrors of his past, but the ramifications of the choices made for his stark present. And it is in the prisoner that he will find a possible future where redemption is but a glimmer that darkly shines.The world has died.This is the story of its remains.Illustrated by Blake Dorner.

27 Hours


Tristina Wright - 2017
    Jude Welton has two dreams: for humans to stop killing monsters, and for his strange abilities to vanish.But in no reality should a boy raised to love monsters fall for a boy raised to kill them.Nyx Llorca keeps two secrets: the moon speaks to her, and she’s in love with Dahlia, her best friend. Braeden Tennant wants two things: to get out from his mother's shadow, and to unlearn Epsilon's darkest secret.They’ll both have to commit treason to find the truth.During one twenty-seven-hour night, if they can’t stop the war between the colonies and the monsters from becoming a war of extinction, the things they wish for will never come true, and the things they fear will be all that’s left.27 Hours is a sweeping, thrilling story featuring a stellar cast of queer teenagers battling to save their homes and possibly every human on Sahara as the clock ticks down to zero.

The Lamb Will Slaughter the Lion


Margaret Killjoy - 2017
    Searching for clues about her best friend’s mysterious and sudden suicide, she ventures to the squatter, utopian town of Freedom, Iowa. All is not well in Freedom, however: things went awry after the town’s residents summoned a protector spirit to serve as their judge and executioner.Danielle shows up in time to witness the spirit—a blood-red, three-antlered deer—begin to turn on its summoners. Danielle and her new friends have to act fast if they’re going to save the town—or get out alive.

The Discreet Lesbian: (Episode 1 in the Mandy Series)


Mackenzie Stone - 2012
    A church steeped in taboos against almost everything, but especially against homosexuality. She has been brought up to make her mother proud – marry, have children, and bring no shame on the family.She marries Scott, the son of a Southern Baptist minister who is the choir director of his dad’s church; Mandy is the director of the Young People’s Department. The church is full of nosy old busy bodies. It is impossible to do anything outside the ordinary without the pack of gossipy old vultures tearing you to pieces. Mandy and Scott, unable to have children, adopt a baby boy and are seemingly happy.However, Mandy unexpectedly encounters her true destiny, a graduate student and also a member of her church, Kathleen Crutchfield. Kathleen brazenly makes a pass at Mandy forever changing her life. Feeling new, deliciously different emotions, Mandy, struggles with the implications of what has happened.Knowing that her life will never be the same, Mandy tries to see if there were clues in her life that should have alerted her to her hidden forbidden identity.Kathleen captures Mandy’s heart and rules her body with a passion she has never known before. They are made only for each other. They know they must find a way to be together, but how will they get the courage to escape Mandy’s marriage, the church, and Kathleen’s powerful family?

The Lodestar of Ys


Amy Rae Durreson - 2013
    It’s a good thing that Celyn is engaged to Sjurd’s brother, not him, because Sjurd loathes the brat, and it’s quite mutual. When an elopement and the threat of invasion force the two princes together, however, they have no choice but to marry and fake true love to keep their countries safe. Can warrior Sjurd and diplomat Celyn find any common ground?

Romancing the Inventor


Gail Carriger - 2016
    Imogene wants to seduce her. Imogene Hale is a lowly parlourmaid with a soul-crushing secret. Seeking solace, she takes work at a local vampire hive, only to fall desperately in love with the amazing lady inventor imprisoned there.Genevieve Lefoux is heartsick, lonely, and French.With culture, class, and the lady herself set against the match, can Imogene and her duster overcome all odds and win Genevieve’s heart, or will the vampires suck both of them dry?New York Times bestselling author Gail Carriger presents this stand-alone lesbian romance is set in her popular steampunk Parasolverse, full of class prejudice, elusive equations, and paranormal creatures taking tea.Supernatural Society stories can be read in any order. Look for surprise appearances from popular Parasol Protectorate characters and the occasional strategic application of cognac.Delicate Sensibilities?This story contains women pleasing women and ladies who know what they want and pursue it, sometimes in exquisite detail.

The Peacock Cloak


Chris Beckett - 2013
    In doing so, the book triumphed over a very strong shortlist, including collections by one Booker Prize winner in Anne Enright and two authors who have been Booker shortlisted in Shena Mackay and Ali Smith (the latter a winner of the Whitbread Prize).When announcing the winner, one of the judges – James Walton, journalist and chair of BBC Radio 4’s The Write Stuff – said, “I suspect Chris Beckett winning the Edge Hill Prize will be seen as a surprise in the world of books. In fact, though, it was also a bit of surprise to the judges, none of whom knew they were science fiction fans beforehand.”In 2012 the Sunday Times named Chris’ latest novel Dark Eden the best science fiction novel of the year, and it is currently shortlisted for the BSFA Award in the same category. NewCon Press are delighted to be publishing The Peacock Cloak, the latest collection from one of Britain’s most distinguished and accomplished genre authors. Contains twelve stories (85,000 words) all previously uncollected.

Indigo Springs


A.M. Dellamonica - 2009
    . . until Astrid's father dies and she moves into his house. She discovers that for many years her father had been accessing the magic that flowed, literally, in a blue stream beneath the earth, leaking into his house. When she starts to use the liquid "vitagua" to enchant everyday items, the results seem innocent enough: a "'chanted" watch becomes a charm that means you're always in the right place at the right time; a "'chanted" pendant enables the wearer to convince anyone of anything . . .But as events in Indigo Springs unfold and the true potential of vitagua is revealed, Astrid and her friends unwittingly embark on a journey fraught with power, change, and a future too devastating to contemplate. Friends become enemies and enemies become friends as Astrid discovers secrets from her shrouded childhood that will lead her to a destiny stranger than she could have imagined . . .

Bleeding Earth


Kaitlin Ward - 2016
    Within twenty-four hours, the blood made international news. All over the world, blood appeared out of the ground, even through concrete, even in water. Then the earth started growing hair and bones.Lea wants to ignore the blood. She wants to spend time with her new girlfriend, Aracely, in public, if only Aracely wasn't so afraid of her father. Lea wants to be a regular teen again, but the blood has made her a prisoner in her own home. Fear for her social life turns into fear for her sanity, and Lea must save herself and Aracely whatever way she can.

Out Now: Queer We Go Again!


Saundra MitchellFox Benwell - 2020
    Vampires crash prom, aliens run from the government, a president’s daughter comes into her own, a true romantic tries to soften the heart of a cynical social media influencer, a selkie and the sea call out to a lost soul. Teapots and barbershops, skateboards and VW vans, Street Fighter and Ares’s sword: Out Now has a story for every reader and surprises with each turn of the page!

Night Vision


Laura Adams - 2008
    Every night. All night. Painful and perplexing, the nightmares of a woman in captivity calling for help escalate until she is having them during the day, wide awake. Doctors prescribe pills. Therapists theorize about past lives and post-traumatic stress. Fortune tellers predict she will meet a tall, mysterious stranger. Julia would prefer to blame her ex, her job, even the Santa Ana winds.In spite of her long history as a loner, she turns to a support group for women with sleep disorders. To her amazement she learns that the other lesbians in the group—and only the lesbians—are having similar nightmares. No longer believing these vivid night visions are in their heads, the women join forces to find the source of their disturbance.Since Julia knows that her dreams focus on the woman she's named Sirena, finding Sirena is her number one priority. Convincing the other lesbians to help her comb the Mojave Desert is only the beginning of the adventure.Karin Kallmaker's story pits the power of sisterhood—and love—against the savagery of fear and hate.

Her Kiss: A Lesbian Romance (Lesbian Sex Stories Book 1)


Willow Hawke - 2014
    Janet ran away from forbidden love 15 years ago. She did what her parents wanted, married the boy who got her pregnant and became a mom. Now a working single parent struggling to take care of her father and a teenage boy, she is still trying to do the right thing and keep everyone happy while denying her own true desire.It’s only when her boy gets in trouble with the law that she realizes that she can’t do it alone. Everyone needs love and to feel desire. When Officer Susan Carter reenters her life, will she take the safe way out or risk everything to experience the heart-melting passion she had so long ago?HER KISS is a short story by author Willow Hawke and contains sexual themes. It is not intended for readers under the age of 21.

Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories


Kelly LinkDylan Horrocks - 2011
    Where tinkerers and dreamers craft and re-craft a world of automatons, clockworks, calculating machines, and other marvels that never were. Where scientists and schoolgirls, fair folk and Romans, intergalactic bandits, utopian revolutionaries, and intrepid orphans solve crimes, escape from monstrous predicaments, consult oracles, and hover over volcanoes in steam-powered airships.

When You Were Pixels


Julio Alexi Genao - 2013
    Antho is no murderer, but in watching the killer stumble he recognizes something that links them together.When he rescues the assassin in secret, he finds the monster on his screen is only a young man, cursed with the effects of a trauma as outsized as his deadly skill—and somehow linked to the stirring of a terrifying power. Unable to walk away, Antho makes a choice that could cost them both their lives:He takes the assassin home.Revised Second Edition