Each of the tales implores us to continue our human legacy, reminding us of the virtuous nature that is inherently ours but is often hidden by life’s daily struggles.This book set in medieval times contains spiritual stories that can change lives, involving Indian kings, mystics, princes, and farmers. Stripping away the distractions of the present day, author Santhosh K. Komaraju provides a poignant look at what truly matters and encourages us to seek the essence of who we really are.

    A year after her divorce, and more out of boredom and curiosity than anything else, she agrees to a meeting with her ex's new wife. She has no idea that the encounter will lead to murder. And she has decidedly mixed emotions when her ex-husband is arrested for the crime. Instead of accepting the lead detective's advice to book a Club Med vacation and leave the investigation to the professionals, Gwen decides to work the case on her own. Her life is about to get a lot less predictable and a lot more dangerous.

    Funny, poignant and smart, full of unforgettable characters, these stories explore the violence of family, the constraints of small-town life and the elusive promise of escape.In "Ice Cream Man," an adolescent girl struggles to come to terms with her mother's death and her father's seeming indifference while conducting a secret affair with an older man from the local arena. Gerald, the young boy in "Big Dog Rage," goes to extreme and reckless measures to thwart the expectations of his parents, teachers, and the local priest, leaving his childhood friend to look longingly on. And in the title story, Bethany sees her gentle fiancé anew as she enters the raucous world of his hard-drinking family. Receiving a sharp shot to the mouth from her future sister-in-law Bethany finds her place in this clan secured.With her incisive, resonant prose, Lynn Coady elicits laughter, sadness, and compassion. Play the Monster Blind is a keenly observed, imaginative collection from one of the most distinctive talents to arrive on Canada's literary scene in years.

    Plus, this year featuring more all-new material than ever before!Contributors to the 2017 calendar include:Kelly Link (Get in Trouble, Magic for Beginners)Jim Gavin (Middle Men, AMC's forthcoming Lodge 49)Carmen Maria Machado (Her Body and Other Parties)Ken Liu (The Paper Menagerie, The Grace of Kings)Maggie Shipstead (Astonish Me, Seating Arrangements)and [REDACTED x 19]!As always, each booklet is sealed, so you won't know what story you're getting until the morning you open it. Calendars are available in a one-time print run, which means that once they're gone, they're gone forever. The 2017 edition has also been reimagined, design-wise—did someone say translucent vellum sleeve? Yes. It was us.

    The first few chapters are available as 'The Chronicles of Engella Rhys (Preview).' Would you sacrifice your future to save your past? Engella Rhys is alone, adrift and on the run. Pursued by a secret agency, known only as the Hunters, she must stay ahead to stay alive. As she travels through space-time using dangerously experimental technology, she only has one wish: to be reunited with her lost parents. After a close shave with a Hunter on the streets of New Shanghai, Engella escapes to find herself on a deserted beach. When she meets a kind stranger, who offers her food and shelter, Engella feels safe and protected for the first time in years. But who is this woman? And why did their paths cross at the most convenient of times? Engella soon discovers their lives are intertwined in more ways than she could ever imagine.

    These eleven stories continue the adventures of Silas Ermineskin and his sidekick Frank Fencepost, as Kinsella returns to the Cree Indian reserve in Hobbema, Alberta, where his cast of zany characters, last seen in The Fencepost Chronicles and The Miss Hobbema Pageant, is at its wry best.Here Frank Fencepost, true to form as a fast-talking con artist, outwits the Alberta Supreme Court in a hilarious cattle-insemination case in "Bull." In the title story he becomes an evangelizing Robin Hood, turning the government-sponsored K-U-G-H radio show into a scheme to use listeners' donations to fund listeners' wishes (and incidentally line his pockets), and in "Miracle on Manitoba Street" he visits a Montana reserve where he carves a picture of the Virgin Mary on a derelict Frigidaire and convinces the local medicine woman it's a miracle—one worthy of an admission charge.Not all the stories are humorous: "Dream Catcher" grapples with sexual violence when Silas's twelve-year-old sister is assaulted and Mad Etta, the community's four-hundred-pound medicine woman, provides a nightmare "cure" for the would-be rapist; "Ice Man" depicts gender discrimination, as Jason Twelve Trees fights to participate in a cooking competition despite his father's wish for him to become a mechanic; and "The Rain Birds" shows the consequences of the government's computer-driven corporate farms riding roughshod over the human and natural environment in western Canada.

    With his unflinching attention to emotional detail, Redhill proves once again to be "a writer of considerable humanity and insight" (A.L. Kennedy) .

    Featuring a revolving cast of characters—the newly retired couple, the church warden, the musician, the small-town girl with big city dreams—Carney’s keen observations of the personalities and dramas of coastal life are instantly recognizable to readers who are familiar with life in a small community. With her narrative of dock fights, pet shows, family feuds, logging camps and the ever-present tension between islanders and property-owning “off-islanders,” Carney’s witty and perceptive voice describes how the islanders weather the storms of coastal life.Carney writes evocatively of the magical landscape of the British Columbia coast, where she has lived and worked for five decades. At the same time, she addresses the less-idyllic moments that can also characterize coastal life: power outages, winter storms, isolation. On Island brings the West Coast landscape—human and natural—to life, and gives islanders and mainland dwellers alike a taste of what it means to be “on island.”

    No more than eeny, meeny, miney, mo and who we were supposed to catch by the toe.Wish Mooney’s earliest memory in life is finding a corpse in the Waterford River. Jarring stuff for a four-year-old, yet far from the most shocking or bizarre he would witness growing up in west end St. John’s next door to the Waterford Hospital. Or, as it was unabashedly labelled before the advent of political correctness: the Mental.An unfortunate moniker, but one legitimately derived from the original name of the place—the Hospital for Mental and Nervous Diseases—when it opened in 1854. Not until 1972 would it be renamed after the river that runs by it. But in Mooney’s world, which revolved mostly in and around the asylum’s drab, depressing confines in the mid-1970s, it was colloquially the Mental, just as its largely despondent inhabitants were the mental patients.Thus was the oft-surreal environment that unavoidably enveloped Wish and the rest of the Irish Catholic Mooney clan, including the quietly acknowledged other realities of the place—the sad, the tragic, the maniacal. Little did Wish ever consider that any or all of that would come full circle later in life when, as the court reporter for the Daily News, he would be thrust into the middle of his own life story, replete with shocking conclusion.

     (No previous DEAD CLOWN BARBECUE reading experience required.) This 21,000-word collection contains the first-ever publication of "Gave Up The Ghost," the basis for the horror/comedy short movie directed by Gregory Lamberson, that will appear in the upcoming anthology film CREEPERS. In addition to a report from the movie set, this collection contains... "The Car." A pair of vampires get together for an evening of vicious fun. "The Loneliest Jackalope." Bunnies with antlers! You can't go wrong with bunnies with antlers. "Inside the Boxes." Whatever is in there can't be good... "A Bit of Christmas Mayhem." Andrew Mayhem vs. a trio of axe-wielding Santa Clauses. "Scrumptious Bone Bread." It's not just for giants anymore. "A Flawed Fantasy." Sometimes, two girls at once isn't the best idea. "Tin Cans." What will you hear when you put one to your ear?

    But what if a monster isn’t enough? Shadows gather, winter deepens, and Assevan falls farther into the dark. Pitted against monsters and men, Konrad faces deeper challenges. Darker foes. Some can rival even the Malykant’s power. Pushed beyond his endurance, challenged beyond his sanity, at long last Death’s Avenger might need a little help... Konrad Savast returns for another chilling set of adventures in the second volume of the Malykant Mysteries.

    He's confronted the HOA. He's even taken on Santa himself. He doesn't usually win. These are the tales of the Dumb White Husband and they are all available here in this collected edition.This handsome volume includes:Dumb White Husband vs. the Grocery Store - John would rather sit and watch the game, but his wife needs some things at the store. Can he complete the list and get back in time to see the end of the game?Dumb White Husband vs. Halloween - Every Halloween, Chris has the scariest house on the block and gives out the best candy. But, this year, someone is showing him up and he'll stop at nothing to find out who.Dumb White Husband vs. Santa - Erik has planned the perfect Christmas for his family. The plan is foolproof, bulletproof and flame retardant. Nothing can undo the hours of planning and preparation. Nothing except maybe odd-shaped packages, ill-timed fruitcakes or an errant neighborhood Santa Claus.Dumb White Husband vs. the Tooth Fairy - Erik always has a plan and he's sure he would have figured out the whole Tooth Fairy thing eventually. But, when his three-year-old son takes a frisbee to the mouth, he's forced to speed things up. Between neighborhood kids with big mouths and unhelpful dentists he's going to need to improvise. Will he bend to the pressure of inflation? Will he get caught in the act? And, what do you do with those teeth anyway?Dumb White Husband for President (A novella) - There comes a time in every man's life when he must stand for the things he believes in. John doesn't believe in bagging his grass. So, when a new allergy-prone neighbor gets the HOA to require it, there's only one thing he can do - run for President of The Creeks of Sage Valley Phase II.John, Chris and Erik put aside most of their differences to run a campaign that they hope will see John elected as President and end the meddling of the rule-loving new kid on the block. Will they succeed? It's doubtful.

    If you enjoy small 'bite-size' stories, or are a fan of micro-fiction and flash fiction, you'll appreciate these sharply written, miniature creations from a "masterful wordsmith."

    It has the potential to be groundbreaking in its raw, honest portrayal of a just-barely-functioning family. Billy Lombardo is interested in the beauty of words. He is also a great observer of the world around him, and he is exquisite and precise in getting that world onto the page.Billy Lombardo is the author of The Logic of a Rose: Chicago Stories, a Chicago Tribune “Best Fiction of 2005” selection. His novel Man With Two Arms is due from The Overlook Press in 2010.

    Between jobs and marriages, states of sobriety, joy and anguish; between who they are and who they want to be. Kris Bertin's unforgettable debut introduces us to people at the tenuous moment before everything in their lives changes, for better or worse.Kris Bertin's stories have appeared in the Walrus, the Malahat Review, the New Quarterly, PRISM International, and other magazines. He lives and writes in Halifax, Nova Scotia.