Cursed by a witch before she was born, Lena has always lived in fear and isolation. But after a devastating mistake, she and her father are forced to flee to a village near the Silence, a mysterious forest with a reputation for luring people into the trees, never to be seen again…​Until the night an enigmatic girl stumbles out of the Silence and into Lena’s sheltered world. Miranda comes from the Gather, a city in the forest brimming with magic. She is on a quest to wake a sleeping princess believed to hold the key to liberating the Gather from its tyrannical ruler—and she offers Lena a bargain. If Lena assists her on her journey, Miranda will help her break the curse.Mesmerized by Miranda and her promise of a new life, Lena jumps at the chance. But the deeper into the Silence she goes, the more she suspects she’s been lied to—about her family’s history, her curse, and her future. As the shadows close in, Lena must choose who to trust and decide whether it’s more important to have freedom…or power.

    These are the stories told to warn children, entertain adults and beguile all. Contents:BluebeardThe Living BookThe Jacaranda WifeRed SkeinThe Chrysanthemum BrideFrozenThe Hummingbird HeartWordsThe Little Match GirlThe Juniper TreeSkinThe Bone MotherThe Dead Ones Don’t Hurt YouLight As Mist, Heavy As HopeDresses, ThreeThe Girl With No HandsCover design by Lisa L. Hannett

    But first they must remember what that is...

    When her brother contracts a plague, she knows her janitor's salary isn't enough to fund his treatment. So she volunteers to become a Scela, a mechanically enhanced soldier sworn to protect and serve the governing body of the Fleet, the collective of starships they call home. If Aisha can survive the harrowing modifications and earn an elite place in the Scela ranks, she may be able to save her brother.Key Tanaka awakens in a Scela body with only hazy memories of her life before. She knows she's from the privileged end of the Fleet, but she has no recollection of why she chose to give up a life of luxury to become a hulking cyborg soldier. If she can make it through the training, she might have a shot at recovering her missing past.In a unit of new recruits vying for top placement, Aisha's and Key's paths collide, and the two must learn to work together--a tall order for girls from opposite ends of the Fleet. But a rebellion is stirring, pitting those who yearn for independence from the Fleet against a government struggling to maintain unity.With violence brewing and dark secrets surfacing, Aisha and Key find themselves questioning their loyalties. They will have to put aside their differences, though, if they want to keep humanity from tearing itself apart.

    Fake relationships. Enemies to lovers. Love triangles and best friends, mistaken identities and missed connections. This collection of genre-bending and original stories celebrates how love always finds a way, featuring powerful flora, a superhero and his nemesis, a fantastical sled race through snow-capped mountains, a golf tournament, the wrong ride-share, and even the end of the world. With stories written by Rebecca Barrow, Ashley Herring Blake, Gloria Chao, Mason Deaver, Sara Farizan, Claire Kann, Malinda Lo, Hannah Moskowitz, Natasha Ngan, Rebecca Podos, Lilliam Rivera, Laura Silverman, Amy Spalding, Rebecca Kim Wells, and Julian Winters this collection is sure to sweep you off your feet.

    But the party isn’t all glamor. Villains lurk in dark corners, evil deals are struck, and starcrossed loves are born.FAIRY TALES INCLUDED:The Ugly Duckling by CJ RobertsBeauty and the Beast by Willow WintersCinderella by Aleatha RomigLittle Red Riding Hood by Karina HalleJack & the Beanstalk by Marley ValentineSnow White by T.M. FrazierRumplestiltskin by Celia AaronKing Midas by Skye WarrenKing Thrushbeard by Cora ReillyPrincess and the Pea by Sierra SimoneSwan Princess by Natasha KnightAttend the ball, wear a red cloak, lose your shoe, spin straw to gold, or fall prey to a witch. In these fairytale retellings from bestselling authors, you will find a prince, but you might choose your happily ever after with the beast.DARK FAIRY TALES is a limited-time anthology of modern fairy tales containing all NEW novellas. Download your copy and tell a book-loving friend, because it won't last long.

    A three-inch tall samurai faces a giant iron ogre with only a sewing needle and a coin. A scientist seeks an antidote to his formula gone wrong, with the help of his partner’s beautiful daughter. All of these stories and more are included in Steampunk Fairy Tales. Written by authors from three different continents, every enchanting tale combines the futuristic Victorian concept of steam and fashion with memorable stories, from the recognizable “Jack and the Beanstalk”, to other popular and unfamiliar works from Germany, France, Italy and Japan. With steam driven gadgets such as mechanical goggles, hoverboards, and an orchestra of automatons. Steampunk Fairy Tales is a charming and unique collection of works for current lovers of the genre, and those just diving in.

     As in their previous critically acclaimed volumes of reconsidered fairy tales, award-winning editors Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling have gathered together remarkable stories that illuminate the more sinister, sensual, and sophisticated aspects of the tales we cherished in childhood; the fables of witches and princes and lost children that we once imagined we knew. "Black Heart, Ivory Bones" showcases twenty beguiling tales for the child-that-was and the adult-that-is, penned by twenty of the most creative artists in contemporary American literature. Here dissected are the darker anatomies of the timeless, seemingly simple stories we have long loved. Here wonder and truth have serious bite. A lovelorn prince seeking his father's blessing concocts a fantastic tale of a witch, a tower, and lustrous long hair... A pair of accursed red boots punishes a beautiful dancer for her pride... A troll-killing, princess-rescuing warrior is compelled to consider events from his adversaries' point of view...In a blistering tell-all memoir, Goldilocks reveals the sordid truth about her brutal foster parent, Papa Bear... Rich, surprising, funny, erotic, and unsettling, these twenty new yarns and poems offer exceptional anew treasures--as they brilliantly reveal lusts and jealousies, foibles, hatreds and dangerous obsessions, the things that slyly lurk in the midnight interior of oft-told tales. The "Snow White, Blood Red" Collection #1. Snow White, Blood Red #2. Black Thorn, White Rose #3. Ruby Slippers, Golden Tears #4. Black Swan, White Raven #5. Silver Birch, Blood Moon #6. Black Heart, Ivory Bones

    They have to—he’s cursed. Every man must respect him. Every woman must desire him. One look, and all is lost.Ember would rather carve out a piece of her soul than be enslaved by passions not her own. She turns to the dark arts to save her heart and becomes the one woman in the kingdom able to resist the Prince’s Charm.Poor girl. If Ember had spent less time studying magic and more time studying human nature, she might have guessed that a man who gets everything and everyone he wants will come to want the one woman he cannot have.Novella / 32,000 wordsWarning: This story contains sex, violence, and naughty words.It’s based on a fairytale, but it isn’t for kids.

    Reed has crafted a new fairy tale for our times that manages to be ethereal, romantic and ripped-from-the-headlines realistic.Beau is a down-on-his-luck street artist living on the streets of Seattle, drawing portraits of tourists to make enough money to live hand-to-mouth. He has a knack for capturing his subjects’ “very souls” on paper. One rainy night, he is accosted by a group of fag-bashing thugs, intent on robbing him of his art supplies and humiliating Beau for who he is. Beau is beaten into unconsciousness......And awakens in a beautiful bedroom, his head bandaged and with no memory of how he got there. Outside his window pine trees and mountain vistas beckon.Beau’s tale grows even more mysterious when a large, muscular man begins bringing the injured Beau his food. The man says nothing—and wears a wolf mask. When he finally does speak, it’s only to tell Beau to call him “Beast.”What secrets does the wolf mask hide? What do these two outsiders have in common? And will their odd circumstances bring them to the brink of love—or tear them apart? The answers lie in Rick R. Reed’s haunting love story that reveals that beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder.

    Until I find him (yes, I am gay, my pack is pretty much open to sexuality), I am allowed to have fun with other guys. I’m known as a player but that’s okay because once I find my mate, my wolf and I will be truly monogamous.Then I find him. My mate (You can decide how we meet— make it meet-cute type). But then my mate says that he is an asexual. What the hell? What does he mean, asexual? Does he mean that I cannot have sex with him ever? That he will never enjoy sex with me? How can I make him fall in love with me then?But my wolf and I are determined to romance my mate; even if I have to join AVEN forum (which I thought at first as forum for AVIAN shifters) and talk around to couples with asexual lovers for tips. Because I will have my HEA with him, right, dear author?Photo Description: A young man and a wolf appear close together. The young man is dark-haired the wolf has pure white fur and amber eyes. The young man is holding the wolf close to himself in an almost possessive manner. They seem like they belong together.This story was written as a part of the M/M Romance Group's "Love is an Open Road" event. Group members were asked to write a story prompt inspired by a photo of their choice. Authors of the group selected a photo and prompt that spoke to them and wrote a short story. This story may contain sexually explicit content and is intended for adult readers. It may contain content that is disagreeable or distressing to some readers. The M/M Romance Group strongly recommends that each reader review the General Information section before each story for story tags as well as for content warnings.

    When he’s whisked away to the bizarre land, his best chance for escape is to ally himself with the person called the Mad Hatter. Hatter—an odd but strangely attractive fellow—just wants to avoid execution. If that means delivering “Boy Alice” to the Queen of Hearts at her Red Castle, Hatter will do what he has to do to stay alive. It doesn’t matter if Henry and Hatter find each other intolerable. They’re stuck with each other.Along their journey, Henry and Hatter must confront what they’ve always accepted as truth. As dislike grows into tolerance and something like friendship, the young men see the chance for a closer relationship. But Wonderland is a dangerous place, and first they have to get away with their lives.

    A Phoenix First Must Burn will take you on a journey from folktales retold to futuristic societies and everything in between. Filled with stories of love and betrayal, strength and resistance, this collection contains an array of complex and true-to-life characters in which you cannot help but see yourself reflected. Witches and scientists, sisters and lovers, priestesses and rebels: the heroines of A Phoenix First Must Burn shine brightly. You will never forget them.Authors include Elizabeth Acevedo, Amerie, Dhonielle Clayton, Jalissa Corrie, Somaiya Daud, Charlotte Davis, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Justina Ireland, Danny Lore, L.L. McKinney, Danielle Paige, Rebecca Roanhorse, Karen Strong, Ashley Woodfolk, and Ibi Zoboi.

    She will be forced to live as a beast forever, unless she agrees to marry a man of her mother's choosing before her eighteenth birthday.Tevin Dumont has always been a pawn in his family's cons. The prettiest boy in a big family, his job is to tempt naïve rich girls to abandon their engagements, unless their parents agree to pay him off. But after his mother runs afoul of the beast, she decides to trade Tevin for her own freedom.Now, Tevin and Merit have agreed that he can pay off his mother's debt by using his con-artist skills to help Merit find the best match . . . but what if the best match is Tevin himself?

    Discovering music, a magnificent palace of glass and limestone, and a troubled human prince, she is driven by love to consult the elusive sea-witch who secretly dominates the entire species of merfolk. Upon paying an enormous price for her humanity, the little mermaid begins a new life, uncovering secrets of sexuality and the Immortal Soul. As a deadly virus threatens to contaminate the bloodstreams of the whole merfolk race, the little mermaid must choose between the lives of her people, the man she loves, or herself.A complete reinvention of Hans Christian Andersen's classic fairy tale, this is a magical-realist fable that captures the essence of sacrifice and the price of humanity.