Book picks similar to
Dim Shores Presents Volume 1 by Paul L. BatesJonathan Raab
horror
short-stories
dim-shores
fantasy
The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories
Jeff VanderMeerWilliam Gibson - 2010
Together these stories form The Weird, and its practitioners include some of the greatest names in twentieth and twenty-first century literature.Exotic and esoteric, The Weird plunges you into dark domains and brings you face to face with surreal monstrosities. You won't find any elves or wizards here... but you will find the biggest, boldest, and downright most peculiar stories from the last hundred years bound together in the biggest Weird collection ever assembled. The Weird features 110 stories by an all-star cast, from literary legends to international bestsellers to Booker Prize winners: including William Gibson, George R. R. Martin, Stephen King, Angela Carter, Kelly Link, Franz Kafka, China Miéville, Clive Barker, Haruki Murakami, M. R. James, Neil Gaiman, Mervyn Peake, and Michael Chabon.
The Bad Graft
Karen Russell - 2014
All aspects, all directions. On either side of Highway 62, the sand cast up visions of evaporated civilizations, dissolved castles that lay buried under the desert. Any human eye, goggled by a car’s windshield, can graft such fantasies onto the great Mojave. And the girl and the boy in the Dodge Charger were exceptionally farsighted. Mirages rose from the boulders, a flume of dream attached to real rock.And hadn’t their trip unfolded like a fairy tale? the couple later quizzed each other, recalling that strange day, their first in California, hiking among the enormous apricot boulders of Joshua Tree National Park. The girl had got her period a week early and was feeling woozy; the boy kept bending over to remove a pebble from his shoe, a phantom that he repeatedly failed to find. Neither disclosed these private discomforts. Each wanted the other to have the illusion that they might pause, anywhere, at any moment, and make love. And while both thought this was highly unlikely—not in this heat, not at this hour—the possibility kept bubbling up, every place they touched. This was the only true protection they’d brought with them as they walked deeper into the blue-gold Mojave.On the day they arrived in Joshua Tree, it was a hundred and . . .
Dreams from the Witch House: Female Voices of Lovecraftian Horror
Lynne JamneckEllie Knightsbridge - 2016
Kiernan, Molly Tanzer, Lois H. Gresh, Nancy Kilpatrick, Elizabeth Bear, Gemma Files and many more fully color illustrated by Daniele Serra, Dreams from the Witch House highlights some of the very best women writers of weird fiction and Lovecraftian horror. The history of the Old World is shrouded in secrecy. Creatures and forces unimaginable inhabited this realm for eons, long before any human navigated the surface of the earth. As the Old Ones have slumbered or observed from afar, humans have assembled civilization upon this fragile planet. Yet the whispers from the elders have been growing stronger, their energy once again seeping into the world. These whispers are being felt throughout the earth; from the roots of our flora to the dreams of our children. They are preparing us for what is to come. In Dreams from the Witch House: Female Voices of Lovecraftian Horror the most intuitive dreamers have been assembled to give us glimpses into these ancient terrors and their whispered warnings. Featuring authors Joyce Carol Oates, Caitlín R. Kiernan, Lois Gresh, Gemma Files, Nancy Kilpatrick, Elizabeth Bear, Storm Constantine and others accompanied by the lavish artwork of Daniele Serra, Dreams from the Witch House: Female Voices of Lovecraftian Horror is a representation of some of the finest cosmic horror and weird fiction from female authors in the field today.
The Electric Ant
Philip K. Dick - 1969
Dick. First published in Fantasy and Science Fiction magazine in October 1969. In 2010 Marvel Comics adapted "The Electric Ant" as a limited series. The comic books were produced by writer David Mack (Daredevil) and French artist Pascal Alixe (Ultimate X-Men), with covers provided by artist Paul Pope (THB).
She Walks in Shadows
Silvia Moreno-GarciaAngela Slatter - 2015
The pale and secretive Lavinia wanders through the woods, Asenath is a precocious teenager with an attitude, and the Ancient Egyptian pharaoh Nitocris has found a new body in distant America. And do you have time to hear a word from our beloved mother Shub-Niggurath?Defiant, destructive, terrifying, and harrowing, the women in She Walks in Shadows are monsters and mothers, heroes and devourers. Observe them in all their glory. Iä! Iä!TABLE OF CONTENTS“Bitter Perfume” Laura Blackwell“Violet is the Color of Your Energy” Nadia Bulkin“Body to Body to Body” Selena Chambers“Magna Mater” Arinn Dembo“De Deabus Minoribus Exterioris Theomagicae” Jilly Dreadful“Hairwork” Gemma Files“The Head of T’la-yub” Nelly Geraldine García-Rosas (translated by Silvia Moreno-Garcia)“Bring the Moon to Me” Amelia Gorman“Chosen” Lyndsey Holder“Eight Seconds” Pandora Hope“Cthulhu of the Dead Sea” Inkeri Kontro“Turn out the Lights” Penelope Love“The Adventurer’s Wife” Premee Mohamed“Notes Found in a Decommissioned Asylum, December 1961″ Sharon Mock“The Eye of Juno” Eugenie Mora“Ammutseba Rising” Ann K. Schwader“Cypress God” Rodopi Sisamis“Lavinia’s Wood” Angela Slatter“The Opera Singer” Priya Sridhar“Provenance” Benjanun Sriduangkaew“The Thing in The Cheerleading Squad” Molly Tanzer“Lockbox” E. Catherine Tobler“When She Quickens” Mary Turzillo“Shub-Niggurath’s Witnesses” Valerie Valdes“Queen of a New America” Wendy N. Wagner
The Best Bizarro Fiction of the Decade
Cameron PierceAndrea Kneeland - 2012
It’s a nightmare reflection of the society you inhabit, a surreal explosion of pop, punk, and the post-apocalypse. Over the last decade, Bizarro Fiction has changed the definition of avant garde, it’s abolished the traditional prose of yesterday and established a new precedent for awesome. Collected in this anthology is some of the best weird fiction from the past decade. Award-winning writers, cult prodigies and burgeoning talents all collected together in one place. This is what you’ve done with the last ten years of your life.With stories by:D. Harlan Wilson, Alissa Nutting, Joe R. Lansdale, Carlton Mellick III, Kevin L. Donihe, , Ryan Boudinot, Vincent Sakowski, Cody Goodfellow, Amelia Gray, Robert Devereaux, Mykle Hansen, Athena Villaverde, Matthew Revert, Garrett Cook, Roy Kesey, Jeremy Robert Johnson, Aimee Bender, Ian Watson & Roberto Quaglia, Jeremy C. Shipp, Andersen Prunty, Jedediah Berry, Andrea Kneeland, Kurt Dinan, David Agranoff, Ben Loory, Kris Saknussemm, Stephen Graham Jones, Bentley Little, David W. Barbee, and Tom Piccirilli.
Disperse: The Cesmial Accords: A LitRPG Gamelit Adventure
Kevin Sinclair - 2021
Unhealthy for Lyewax, at least.It’s not every day that violent earthquakes cause a rare and potent energy to leak from the planet's core. One that immediately kills over half the world's population while gifting the survivors with incredible powers.That energy is Cesmial. One of the most highly sought-after resources in the universe. Its sudden appearance has attracted attention.Enter the monsters. Huge, fearsome creatures with one purpose. Remove the Earth’s current occupants, so the Cesmial can be harvested.Humanity is on the back foot. They need heroes. They need leaders. They need Lyewax Vix. But he has more problems than you can poke a stick at. Embroiled in a game of cat and mouse with an unknowable enemy. Trapped in a loop of someone else’s making. If he can survive, then perhaps humanity has a chance too.
The New Lovecraft Circle
Robert M. PriceDonald R. Burleson - 1996
P. Lovecraft was the eerily prescient genius who first electrified readers in Weird Tales magazine. His tales changed the face of horror forever and inspired the bloodcurdling offerings of a new generation. These brilliant dark visionaries forge grisly trails through previously uncharted realms of mortal terror. THE PLAIN OF SOUND by Ramsey Campbell: In the beginning they could find no source for the throbbing vibrations; in the end they could find no escape. THE HORROR ON THE BEACH by Alan Dean Foster: Along the coast of Santa Barbara, the mighty Pacific Ocean can no longer contain—or conceal—an ancient, insatiable evil stirring in its depths.THE KISS OF BUGG-SHASH by Brian Lumley: It mattered not how innocent the students’ motives seemed; the demon had been summoned, and the price had to be paid—every last red drop of it.THE FISHERS FROM OUTSIDE by Lin Carter: A man obsessed with unlocking the secrets of a race older than time would not be disappointed—doomed perhaps, devoured possibly, but definitely not disappointed. AND TWENTY-ONE MORE TALES OF FEAR . . . THE STONE ON THE ISLAND by Ramsey Campbell THE STATEMENT OF ONE JOHN GIBSON by Brian Lumley DEMONIACAL by David Sutton THE SLITHERER FROM THE SLIME by H. P. Lowcraft THE DOOM OF YAKTHOOB by Lin Carter THE KEEPER OF THE FLAME by Gary Myers DEAD GIVEAWAY by J. Vernon Shea THOSE WHO WAIT by James Wade THE KEEPER OF DARK POINT by John Glasby THE BLACK MIRROR by John Glasby I’VE COME TO TALK WITH YOU AGAIN by Karl Edward Wagner THE HOWLER IN THE DARK by Richard L. Tierney THE WHISPERERS by Richard A. Lupoff LIGHTS! CAMERA! SHUB-NIGGURATH! by Richard A. Lupoff SAUCERS FROM YADDITH by Robert M. Price VASTARIEN by Thomas Ligotti THE MADNESS OUT OF SPACE by Peter H. Cannon ALIAH WARDEN by Roger Johnson THE LAST SUPPER by Donald R. Burleson THE CHURCH AT GARLOCK’S BEND by David Kaufman THE SPHERES BEYOND SOUND (THRENODY) by Mark Rainey
The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, July/August 2018
C.C. FinlayAshley Blooms - 2018
BeckettNOVELETS"Visible Cities" by Rachel Pollack"Broken Wings" by William LedbetterSHORT STORIES"The Phobos Experience" by Mary Robinette Kowal"The Prevaricator" by Matthew Hughes"The Queen of the Peri Takes Her Time" by Corey Flintoff"The Adjunct" by Cassandra Rose Clarke"Bedtime Story" by James Sallis"Morbier" by R.S. Benedict"Hainted" by Ashley BloomsPOEMS"Red Rising" by Mary Soon LeeDEPARTMENTS"Books to Look For" by Charles de Lint"Musing on Books" by Michelle West"Science: Why Do Kites Fly?" by Jerry Oltion"Films: In the Queue" by David J. Skal"Coming Attractions""Curiosities" by Paul Di FilippoCARTOONSNick Downes, Bill Long, Danny Shanahan,COVER"Big Mars" by Bob Eggleton
Twice 22: The Golden Apples of the Sun / A Medicine for Melancholy
Ray Bradbury - 1948
CONTENTSTHE GOLDEN APPLES OF THE SUNThe Fog HornThe PedestrianThe April WitchThe WildernessThe Fruit at the Bottom of the BowlInvisible BoyThe Flying MachineThe MurdererThe Golden Kite, The Silver WindI See You NeverEmbroideryThe Big Black And White GameA Sound Of ThunderThe Great Wide World Over TherePowerhouseEn La NocheSun And ShadowThe MeadowThe Garbage CollectorThe Great FireHail And FarewellThe Golden Apples Of The SunA MEDICINE FOR MELANCHOLYIn The Season Of Calm WeatherThe DragonA Medicine For MelancholyThe End Of The BeginningThe Wonderful Ice Cream SuitFever DreamThe Marriage MenderThe Town Where No One Got OffA Scent of SarsaparillaIcarus Montgolfier WrightThe HeadpieceDark They Were, And Golden-EyedThe SmileThe First Night of LentThe Time Of Going AwayAll Summer In A DayThe GiftThe Great Collision of Monday LastThe Little MiceThe Shoreline At SunsetThe Strawberry WindowThe Day It Rained Forever
Planet of the Apes: Tales from the Forbidden Zone
Rich HandleyRobert Greenberger - 2017
Each writer will explore a different facet of the post-apocalyptic world, so readers will be treated to a wide and variety of action-adventure short stories.
At the Mouth of the River of Bees: Stories
Kij Johnson - 2012
These stories feature cats, bees, wolves, dogs, and even that most capricious of animals, humans, and have been reprinted in The Year's Best Fantasy & Horror, Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year, and The Secret History of Fantasy. Kij Johnson's stories have won the Sturgeon and World Fantasy awards. She has taught writing; worked at Tor, Dark Horse, and Microsoft; worked as a radio announcer; run bookstores; and waitressed in a strip bar.Contents:The Man Who Bridged the Mist (2011)Wolf Trapping (1989)The Empress Jingu Fishes (2004)The Bitey Cat (2012)Chenting, in the Land of the Dead (1999)My Wife Reincarnated as a Solitaire—Exposition on the Flaws in my Spouse's Character—The Nature of the Bird—The Possible Causes—Her Final Disposition (2007)Schrödinger's Cathouse (1993)Names for Water (2010)Fox Magic (1993)Spar (2009)The Horse Raiders (2000)26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss (2008)At the Mouth of the River of Bees (2003)The Evolution of Trickster Stories among the Dogs of North Park after the Change (2007)The Cat Who Walked a Thousand Miles (2009)Ponies (2010)
The System Apocalypse Short Story Anthology, Volume 1
Tao Wong - 2019
A Galactic dark elf. A woman who has given up her humanity to become something more. These stories and more are available in the first short story anthology for the System Apocalypse, covering year one on Earth. When the world ends, humanity steps up, finding new ways to survive in a world with Classes, magic and monsters. The anthology features exciting, new stories by five new writers and a new, never publicly released short story by Tao Wong. The System Apocalypse world was first introduced in 'Life in the North' and is a LitRPG science fiction and fantasy post-apocalyptic work that features monsters, science fiction technology, character sheets, supernatural races and ancient myths in one heady, LitRPG brew. Stories and writers featured in this anthology include: Craig Hamilton - "Hunting Monsters" has our protagonist doing what he does best. Finding those who would exploit the System and the people within. Except this time, there are even more complications than normal. Alexis Keane - "Tooth and Claw" is a heart-warming tale of friendship that knows no bounds of race or distance. Ix Phoen - "Rebel Within" tells a tale of hardship in South America, where the monsters are not always the ones outside the walls. Tao Wong – “Debts & Dances” covers the arrival of the System from the perspective of our favorite Truinnar Lord. R.K. Billiau – “Phoenix Rising” covers an unconventional hero, one whose mind is slipping from him before the apocalypse. Will the apocalypse be his salvation? Or doom? L.A. Batt - “Overture to Obliteration” brings us to far-off New Zealand to glimpse the wreckage the System has wrought.
Saffron and Brimstone: Strange Stories
Elizabeth Hand - 2006
This new collection (an expansion of the limited-release Bibliomancy, which won the World Fantasy Award in 2005) showcases a wildly inventive author at the height of her powers. Included in this collection are "The Least Trumps," in which a lonely women reaches out to the world through symbols, tattooing, and the Tarot, and "Pavane for a Prince of the Air," where neo-pagan rituals bring a recently departed soul to something very different than eternal rest. Written in the author's characteristic poetic prose and rich with the details of traumatic lives that are luminously transformed, Saffron and Brimstone is a worthy addition to an outstanding career.* Elizabeth Hand's work has been selected as a Washington Post Notable Book and a New York Times Notable Book, and she has been awarded a Nebula Award and two World Fantasy Awards.
Shadow Show: All-New Stories in Celebration of Ray Bradbury
Sam WellerKelly Link - 2012
. . Bradbury?You might see rockets to Mars. Or bizarre circuses where otherworldly acts whirl in the center ring. Perhaps you travel to a dystopian future, where books are set ablaze . . . or to an out-of-the-way sideshow, where animated illustrations crawl across human skin. Or maybe, suddenly, you're returned to a simpler time in small-town America, where summer perfumes the air and life is almost perfect . . . "almost."Ray Bradbury--peerless storyteller, poet of the impossible, and one of America's most beloved authors--is a literary giant whose remarkable career has spanned seven decades. Now twenty-six of today's most diverse and celebrated authors offer new short works in honor of the master; stories of heart, intelligence, and dark wonder from a remarkable range of creative artists.TABLE OF CONTENTSSam Weller and Mort Castle - IntroductionRay Bradbury - Second HomecomingNeil Gaiman - The Man Who Forgot Ray BradburyMargaret Atwood - HeadlifeJay Bonansinga - HeavySam Weller - The Girl In The Funeral ParlorDavid Morrell - The CompanionsThomas F. Monteleone - The ExchangeLee Martin - Cat on a Bad CouchJoe Hill - By The Silver Water Of Lake ChamplainDan Chaon - Little AmericaJohn McNally - The Phone CallJoe Meno - Young PilgrimsRobert McCammon - Children Of The Bedtime MachineRamsey Campbell - The Page Mort Castle - LightAlice Hoffman - ConjureJohn Maclay - MaxJacqueline Mitchard - Two Of A KindGary Braunbeck - Fat Man And Little BoyBonnie Jo Campbell - The TattooAudrey Niffenegger - Backwards In SevilleCharles Yu - Earth: (A Gift Shop)Julia Keller - Hayleigh's DadDave Eggers - Who Knocks?Bayo Ojikutu - Reservation 2020Kelly Link - Two HousesHarlan Ellison - Weariness