When she fails to return, her consort Moon, along with Stone and a party of warriors and hunters, must track them down. Finding them turns out to be the easy part; freeing them from an ancient trap hidden in the depths of the Reaches is much more difficult.The Tale of Indigo and Cloud explores the history of the Indigo Cloud Court, long before Moon came to Court. In the distant past, Indigo stole Cloud from Emerald Twilight. But in doing so, the reigning Queen Cerise and Indigo are now poised for a conflict that could ruin everything.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 two brand-new novellas, Martha Wells shows that the world of Raksura has many more stories to tell...Contains: The Falling World #3.6The Tale of Indigo and Cloud #0.1The Forest Boy #0.2Adaptation #0.4Appendices

    WOMEN OF POWERTwo sisters, one a mercenary, one a practitioner of earth magic, learn that the irony of love knows no justice...A sorceress must come to the aid of a creature out of legend...A seeress has her life forever changed by a "voice" she never dreamed she would hear...A spell-gifted swords-woman learns that even an ancient magical inheritance can change in nature...Join Mercedes Lackey, Elisabeth Waters, Jennifer Roberson, Diana L Paxson and their fellow venturers to the lands where women of power - whether practitioners of the magical arts, or professionally trained with sword and dagger - need ask no protection from any man, in 22 original stories of honor, bravery, justice, and adventures

     Introduction · Marion Zimmer BradleyEquona’s Mare · Diana L. PaxsonThe Hand of Fatima · Shariann LewittCommencement · Lynne Armstrong-JonesA Lesser of Evils · Morning Glory ZellAnd Sáavüld Danced… · Kier NeustaedterStone of Light · Linda GordonChange of Command · Nancy Jane MooreThe Starry King · Vera NazarianMirror Image · Nina BoalSleeping Dogs · Jennifer RobersonShadowlands · Elisabeth WatersThe Making of a Legend [Vows and Honor] · Mercedes LackeyBurnt Offerings · Mary FenoglioRatsbane [Cynthia] · Dorothy J. HeydtWolf Hunt · Bobbi MillerPearl · Carl ThelenName of the Demoness · Jessie D. EakerHands · Lois TiltonWolfrunner · Mary E. ChooUntil We Meet Again · J.A. BrebnerBlack Wolf · Gemma TarlachArtist: Corey Wolfe

    OverstreetValley of the Shadow · Jennifer RobersonThe Song and the Flute [Cynthia] · Dorothy J. HeydtJourneytime · Dana Kramer-RollsOrpheus · Mary Frances ZambrenoScarlet Eyes · Millea KeninThe River of Tears · Anodea JudithFresh Blood · Polly B. JohnsonThe Mist on the Moor · Diana L. PaxsonBargains · Elizabeth MoonA Woman’s Privilege · Elisabeth WatersTalla · J. Edwin AndrewsTupilak · Terry TafoyaSword Sworn [Vows and Honor] · Mercedes LackeyA Tale from Hendry’s Mill · Melissa CarpenterS.A.R. · Patricia B. CironeMore’s the Pity · L.D. WoeltjenMarwe’s Forest · Charles R. SaundersThe Hunters · Mavis J. Andrews

    Here is a society as complex and troubled as any on our world, peopled with unforgettable characters struggling to become fully human. For the disgraced revolutionary Abberkam, the callow "space brat" Solly, the haughty soldier Teyeo, and the Ekumen historian and Hainish exile Havzhiva, freedom and duty both begin in the heart, and success as well as failure has its costs.CONTENT Betrayals Forgiveness Day A Man of the People A Woman's Liberation Notes on Werel and YeoweIn this stunning collection of four intimately interconnected novellas, Ursula K. Le Guin returns to the great themes that have made her one of America's most honored and respected authors.

    Here you will venture forth with priestesses and assassins. Here be unicorns and mythical beasts of darkness.Here is adventure!Fifteen original tales by such writers as C.J. Cherryh, Diana Paxson, Phyllis Ann Karr, Charles Saunders, Jennifer Roberson, and more, selected and introduced by the Wise Woman of Darkover, Marion Zimmer Bradley herself.Marion Zimmer Bradley's Sword and Sorceress series has always featured the best in contemporary women's fantasy, and this outstanding new volume carries on the tradition! These original stories of brave, talented, and heroic women will take readers through enchanted realms of the imagination into danger both physical and mystical, where the only way to survive is through the power of sword and spell.Introduction · Marion Zimmer BradleyA Night at Two Inns · Phyllis Ann KarrThe Red Guild · Rachel PollackShadow Wood · Diana L. PaxsonUnicorn's Blood · Bruce D. ArthursThe Unshadowed Land · C.J. CherryhShimenege's Mask · Charles R. SaundersThe Black Tower · Stephen L. BurnsThe Lady and the Tiger · Jennifer RobersonFireweb · Deborah WheelerCold Blows the Wind [Angharad] · Charles de LintSword of the Mother · Dana Kramer RollsHunger · Russ GarrisonOn First Looking into Bradley's Guidelines, or Stories I Don't Want to Read Either · Elizabeth ThompsonThe Chosen Maiden · Raul ReyesRed Pearls · Richard CorwinWound on the Moon · Vera Nazarian

    Peter Hamilton takes us on a journey from a murder mystery in an alternative Oxford in the 1800s to a story featuring Paula Myo, Deputy Director of the Intersolar Commonwealth's Serious Crimes Directorate.

    He has defeated all foes, has united the entire world beneath his rule, and has mastered the arcane arts. He spends his time sparring with his nemesis, who keeps trying to invade Kai's world.Except for today. Today, Kai has to go on a date.Forces have conspired to require him to meet with his equal—a woman from another world who has achieved just as much as he has. What happens when the most important man in the world is forced to have dinner with the most important woman in the world?

    Blaylock"The Giving Mouth" by Ian R. MacLeod "A Sun in the Attic" by Mary Gentle "The God-Clown is Near" by Jay Lake"The Steam Man of the Prairie and the Dark Rider Get Down: A Dime Novel" by Joe R. Lansdale"The Selene Gardening Society" by Molly Brown"Seventy-Two Letters" by Ted Chiang"The Martian Agent, A Planetary Romance" by Michael Chabon"Victoria" by Paul Di Filippo"Reflected Light" by Rachel E. Pollock"Minutes of the Last Meeting" by Stepan Chapman"Excerpt from the Third and Last Volume of Tribes of the Pacific Coast" by Neal Stephenson"The Steam-Driven Time Machine: A Pop Culture Survey" by Rick Klaw"The Essential Sequential Steampunk: A Modest Survey of the Genre within the Comic Book Medium" by Bill Baker

    Now, in search of some new pets to satisfy his cruel pursuit of amusement, Simon finds a new shop in the city where he is intrigued by a new lifeform he has never heard of before... a collection of multi-colored sandkings. The curator explains that the insect-like animals, no larger than Simon's fingernails, are not insects, but animals with a highly-evolved hive intelligence capable of staging wars between the different colors, and even religion - in the form of worship of their owner. The curator's warning to Simon about the regularity of their feeding, unfortunately, was not taken seriously...Contents:- The Way of Cross and Dragon (1979)- Bitterblooms (1977)- In the House of the Worm (1976)- Fast-Friend (1976)- The Stone City (1977)- Starlady (1976)- Sandkings (1979)Cover illustration by Michael Whelan

    He is the author of such classics as Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles, The Illustrated Man, Dandelion Wine, and Something Wicked This Way Comes. Bradbury has once again pulled together a stellar group of stories sure to delight readers young and old, old and new. In One More For The Road we are treated to the best this talented writer has to offer : the eerie and strange, nostalgic and bittersweet, searching and speculative. Here are a father's regrets, a lover's last embrace, a child's dreams of the future 栬l delivered with the trademark Bradbury wit and style.First day --Heart transplant --Quid pro quo --After the ball --In memoriam --Tete-a-tete --Dragon danced at midnight --Nineteenth --Beasts --Autumn afternoon --Where all is emptiness there is room to move --One-woman show --Laurel and Hardy alpha centauri farewell tour --Leftovers --One more for the road --Tangerine --With smiles as wide as summer --Time intervening --Enemy in the wheat --Fore! --My son, Max --F. Scott/Tolstoy/Ahab accumulator --Well, what do you have to say for yourself? --Diane de Foret --Cricket on the hearth --Afterword: Metaphors, the breakfast of champions

    They are many heroines of SWORD AND SORCERESS - brave women who have adopted the daring roles so often deemed to be the exclusive province of men.Join Diana L Paxson, Esther M Friesner, Rosemary Edghill, Leslie Fish, Dorothy j Heydt and their fellow spell-weavers as they carry on Marion Zimmer Bradley's proud, feminist tradition in the twenty-three original, swashbuckling and magical stories of SWORD AND SORCERESS XXI, where:A family of thieves is sorely disappointed by their daughter's wizarding ambitions...A warrior with amnesia is taught a lesson she could never have learned if she remembered her past...A girl is turned down by a school of magic because of her sex, only to become the disciple of a far more powerful mentor...An arrogant mage is taught that even the most powerful of sorcerers sometimes needs the help of material weapons...The best-selling "Sword & The Sorceress series continues with this thrilling 21st edition of all-original stories of action-packed adventure, ultimate magic, and fearsome, sword-wielding women by some of the best names in fantasy today.

    When Enrique’s experimental bioengineered creatures go missing, the pair discover that the zone still conceals deadly old secrets. This novella falls after Captain Vorpatril’s Alliance in the Vorkosigan series timeline, but may be read entirely independently.

    Most victims die, others experience physical or psychic changes: aces have useful powers, deuces minor maybe entertaining abilities, jokers uglified, disabled, relegated to ghettos.

    The People escaped the destruction of their home planet and crashed on Earth in the Southwest just before the turn of the century. Fully human in appearance, they possessed many extraordinary powers. Henderson's People stories tell of their struggles to fit in and to live their lives as ordinary people, unmolested by fearful and ignorant neighbors. The People are "us at our best, as we hope to be, and where (with work and with luck) we may be in some future."Ingathering contains all seventeen of the People stories, including one, "Michal Without," which has never before been published.