Odyssia, of fair Ithicaa, encounters everything that can get in her way and slow her homecoming -- and realizes with dawning horror that maybe she doesn't want to return. Queen Ene, she who rules the universe, reclaims her husband He of Troiia only to find herself trapped in a place where even the Goddesses cannot see -- a secret world of men gone mad. And as for Queen Gamem, she has a date with her lovelorn wife and a warm bath of her own blood... Told in verse with a visual sensibility that redefines the very possibilities of the comics medium, this gloriously oversized hardcover collects issues #1-12 plus exclusive bonus materials including essays by classicist Dani Colman, teaching aids, and a massive ten-page fold-out only available in the sold-out first issue. "Fraction and Ward are doing wildly imaginative work combining fantastic Greek mythology with futuristic science fiction, and the book has a visual sensibility unlike anything else on the stands." -- A.V. Club

    R. R. Tolkien’s talents is remarkable. Not only was he an accomplished linguist and philologist, as well as a scholar of Anglo-Saxon and medieval literature and Norse folklore, but also a skillful illustrator and storyteller. Drawing on these talents, he created a universe which is for many readers as real as the physical world they inhabit daily.Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth explores the huge creative endeavor behind Tolkien’s enduring popularity. Lavishly illustrated with three hundred images of his manuscripts, drawings, maps, and letters, the book traces the creative process behind his most famous literary works—The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion—and reproduces personal photographs and private papers, many of which have never been seen before in print. Six essays introduce the reader to the person of J. R. R. Tolkien and to main themes in his life and work, including the influence of northern languages and legends on the creation of his own legendarium; his concept of “Faërie” as an enchanted literary realm; the central importance of his invented languages in his fantasy writing; his visual imagination and its emergence in his artwork; and the encouragement he derived from his close friend C. S. Lewis and their literary group the Inklings. The book brings together the largest collection of original Tolkien material ever assembled in a single volume. Drawing on the extensive archives of the Tolkien collections at the Bodleian Libraries, Oxford, which stretch to more than five hundred boxes, and Marquette University, Milwaukee, as well as private collections, this hugely ambitious and exquisitely produced book draws together the worlds of J. R. R. Tolkien – scholarly, literary, creative, and domestic—offering a rich and detailed understanding and appreciation of this extraordinary author. This landmark publication, produced on the occasion of a major exhibition at the Bodleian Libraries in Oxford in 2018 and at the Morgan Library in New York in 2019, is set to become a standard work in the literature on J. R. R. Tolkien.

    Features commentary, color stills, sketches, storyboards, and illustrations used to envision the rich fantasy world of the film. Also includes a complete English-language script.

    Behind everything crouched the brooding, festering horror of the ancient town, and of the moldy, unhallowed garret gable where he wrote and studied and wrestled with figures and formulae when he was not tossing on the meager iron bed. His ears were growing sensitive to a preternatural and intolerable degree, and he had long ago stopped the cheap mantel clock whose ticking had come to seem like a thunder of artillery. At night the subtle stirring of the black city outside, the sinister scurrying of rats in the wormy partitions, and the creaking of hidden timbers in the centuried house, were enough to give him a sense of strident pandemonium. The darkness always teemed with unexplained sound—and yet he sometimes shook with fear lest the noises he heard should subside and allow him to hear certain other fainter noises which he suspected were lurking behind them.

    Even the aid of the wizard Mercury Boltblaster is not enough to combat the Demon Lords and the Dark Magic Society. And to make matters even more dangerous, the Gods decide that Jason must become the Mighty Champion in deed as well as name. He must Overcome All Odds to wrest the magic Superwand from Deadly Enemies. For no one else would be foolish enough to stand against the magical forces to restore the dread power of the long-vanquished Evil Empire!

    ROGER ZELAZNY, Hugo and Nebula Award winning author, and science fiction artist GRAY MORROW have combined their talents to produce a deluxe, full-colour illustrated book of the most fabulous Zelazny tales and characters.A stunning collection of graphic stories, murals, illustrations and never-before-published Zelazny fiction, this book is one of the most lavish fantasy volumes ever published.Among its features are a new SHADOWJACK adventure, the first illustrated version of A ROSE FOR ECCLESIASTES, the first graphic story version of THE DOORS OF HIS FACE, THE LAMPS OF HIS EYES, and a sweeping series of murals based on Corwin and the Amber worlds.Magnificent art, fantastic stories and a revolutionary format will make this book a treasured collectors edition in years to come.Contents:· Illustrations · Gray Morrow · il · Introduction · Byron Preiss · in · Shadowjack · ss * · An Amber Tapestry · Gray Morrow · il Mediascene · A Rose for Ecclesiastes · nv F&SF Nov ’63; ; Illustrated version-, Heavy Metal Jan ’78 · The Furies · nv Amazing Jun ’65 · A Zelazny Tapestry · Gray Morrow · il * · Zelazny Speaks · ar * · Morrow Speaks · Gray Morrow · ar * · The Doors of His Face, the Lamps of His Mouth · nv F&SF Mar ’65; ; Illustrated version-, Star-Reach · Rock Collector [adapted from “Collector’s Fever”] · ct Galaxy Jun ’64

    The secrets they seek are hidden in mountain ranges and lost in deserts, buried in the ocean floor and lodged deep in polar ice. The aim of The Explorers Guild: to discover the mysteries that lie beyond the boundaries of the known world.Set against the backdrop of World War I, with Western Civilization on the edge of calamity, the first installment in The Explorers Guild series, A Passage to Shambhala, concerns the Guild’s quest to find the golden city of Buddhist myth. The search will take them from the Polar North to the Mongolian deserts, through the underground canals of Asia to deep inside the Himalayas, before the fabled city finally divulges its secrets and the globe-spanning journey plays out to its startling conclusion.The Explorers Guild is a rare publishing opportunity, powered by the creative passion of one of the world’s true storytelling masters, Kevin Costner.

    When a troupe of these deadly warrior-performers discovers a dead Craftworld festering in the webway, they are determined to find the one responsible and exact punishment. Using the ancient craft of their Shadowseer, the trail of destruction leads the troupe to the Sable Marches, a fringe realm of the dark eldar. With several possible suspects of this heinous crime, the Harlequins decide to draw out the guilty one by staging the Masque of Vyle for the archons, a performance that will expose the truth and lead, fatally, to the perpetrator.The Masque of Vyle is archaic ritual performance, used to lure out the guilty to face the fickle justice of the harlequins. Amongst the Dark Eldar however, there are plenty of guilty souls. This tale gives a fascinating insight into both the splinter realms of Commorragh, and the enigmatic rituals of the Laughing Gods followers.

    In his time, Earth is a toxic, abandoned world and humans have fled into the outer solar system to survive, eking out a fragile, doomed existence among the other planets and their moons. Those responsible for delaying humanity’s demise believe time travel holds the key, and they have identified James, troubled though he is, as one of a select and expendable few ideally suited for the most dangerous job in history. James is a chronman, undertaking missions into Earth's past to recover resources and treasure without altering the timeline. The laws governing use of time travel are absolute; break any one of them and, one way or another, your life is over. Most chronmen never reach old age; the stress of each jump through time, compounded by the risk to themselves and to the future, means that many chronmen rapidly reach their breaking point, and James Griffin-Mars is nearing his.On a final mission that is to secure his retirement, James meets Elise Kim, an intriguing scientist from a previous century, who is fated to die during the destruction of an oceanic rig. Against his training and his common sense, and in violation of the chronmen’s highest law, James brings Elise back to the future with him, saving her life, but turning them both into fugitives. Remaining free means losing themselves in the wild and poisonous wastes of Earth, somehow finding allies, and perhaps discovering what hope may yet remain for humanity's home world.

    A world where magic and machines exist side-by-side. Where cybernetics can replace organs or entire limbs with ease, and arcane spells can make the impossible happen. Where the Matrix has become an artificial world of its own, filled with all kinds of pleasure, treasure, and trouble. Where dwarves, elves, orks and trolls walk alongside humans every day. Some work for mega-corporations whose invisible tentacles wrap around every aspect of modern life. Others choose a much less legal career, doing whatever dirty work the corp executives need done—-for a price.Featuring fifteen new stories about the men and women who make their living in the shadows of the Sixth World, Spells & Chrome takes you into the dark and dirty streets of the future. Whether risking their lives to execute a mission for an employer who might be planning to double-cross them anyway, or just doing whatever they need to do to survive another day, shadowrunners use everything they’ve got--cyberware, spells, or a very big gun--to get the job done.

    John Difool, a low class detective in a degenerate world, finds his life turned upside down when he discovers an ancient artifact called "The Incal."--Difool's adventures will bring him into conflict with the galaxy's greatest warrior, The Metabaron, and will pit him against the awesome powers of the Technopriests. Can an ordinary man survive such an epic battle? Suggested For Mature Readers.

    This memorable collection will delight Tolkien enthusiasts with its beauty and its range. It contains 48 full-color reproductions of Tolkien's paintings and colored drawings, as well as original pen-and-ink drawings, some published here for the first time. Long out of print, the volume is now re-issued with a revised text by Christopher Tolkien. Pictures will provide a unique and fascinating insight into Tolkien's visual conception of many of the places and characters familiar to readers of The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion. Examples of his art range from delicate watercolours depicting Rivendell, the Forest of Lothlorien, Smaug and Old Man Willow to drawings and sketches of Moria Gate and Minas Tirith. Together they form a comprehensive collection of Tolkien's own illustrations for his most popular books. Also included are many of his beautiful designs showing patterns of flowers and trees, friezes, tapestries and heraldic devices associated with the world of Middle-earth. In their variety and scope they provide abundant visual evidence of the richness of his imagination. Christopher Tolkien's text gives detailed notes on the sources for each picture.

    The agents, or psi-techs, are implanted with telepath technology. The psi-techs are bound to the mega-corps -- that is, if they want to retain their sanity. Cara Carlinni is an impossible thing – a runaway psi-tech. She knows Alphacorp can find its implant-augmented telepaths, anywhere, anytime, mind-to-mind. So even though it’s driving her half-crazy, she's powered down and has been surviving on tranqs and willpower. So far, so good. It’s been almost a year, and her mind is still her own. She’s on the run from Ari van Blaiden, a powerful executive, after discovering massive corruption in Alphacorp. Cara barely escapes his forces, yet again, on a backwater planet, and gets out just in time due to the help of straight-laced Ben Benjamin, a psi-tech Navigator for Alphacorp’s biggest company rival. Cara and Ben struggle to survive a star-spanning manhunt, black-ops raids, and fleets of resource-hungry raiders. Betrayal follows betrayal, and friends become enemies. Suddenly the most important skill is knowing whom to trust.

    Afraid of being thrown into an isolation chamber, Michael goes home, but quickly falls violently ill. By the time he recovers and returns to work scary things are happening. Everyone who has come into contact with that patient is being systematically killed. On the run, he accidentally infects a woman living in the shadows of the underworld. She becomes ill as well, but survives. Then they begin feeling younger-and younger. Why would the government want to suppress something like this? After barely escaping federal gunmen, the two of them set out to discover what kind of infection they are harboring even though it might mean the end of their freedom.

    With "Nightfall," written in 1941, Asimov triggered a spark of awareness in the publishing community that science fiction could be more than Buck Rogers comic books. His "Foundation" series and robot novels (he coined the word "robotics") are acknowledged as the cornerstone of modern science fiction. Asimov's Foundation series was awarded the Best All-time Novel Series Hugo Award in 1966. He was awarded the special lifetime Nebula Grandmaster award in 1987.Over the next fifty years, Isaac Asimov would distinguish himself as one of the most prolific, versatile, and creative authors ever. His broad range of works includes histories, children's books, collections of articles, mysteries, and books concerning the Bible, literature, geography, humor, and nonfiction science material. He managed over his creative lifetime to have at least one book included in each of the Dewey Decimal System's 10 major library classifications. He was known for his profound knowledge of Shakespeare, the Bible, Gilbert and Sullivan, limericks, and history, whether it be Roman, Greek or American. Isaac Asimov died in 1992 at the age of 72.Volume 1 of "Isaac Asimov: Short Stories" contains the Hugo and Nebula Award Nominee, Locus Poll Award Winner and Asimov's Reader's Choice Award Winner "Robot Dreams," the Hugo Award Winner and Locus Poll Award Nominee "Gold," the Locus Poll Award Nominee "Potential," the Asimov's Reader's Choice Award Nominated "Kid Brother," and more excellent short science fiction, including arare 1974 Saturday Evening Post four-part series, collectively entitled the "The Dream."