Search Worlds Without End

From the booker Prize-winning author of Possession comes this richly imaginitive story collection that transports the reader to a world where opposites--passion and loneliness, betrayal and loyalty, fire and ice--clash and converge.

A beautiful ice maiden risks her life when she falls in love with a desert prince, whose passionate touches scorch her delicate skin. A woman flees the scene of her husband's heart attack, leaving her entire past behind her. Striving to master color and line, a painter discovers the resolution to his artisitc problems when a beautiful and magical water snake appears in his pool. And a wealthy Englishwoman gradually loses her identity while wandering through a shopping mall. Elegantly crafter and suffused with boundless wisdom, these bewitching tales are a testament to a writer at the hieght of her powers.

This short story originally appeared in Tin House (2012) and was reprinted in Lightspeed, January 2014. It can also be found in the anthology The Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy 2013, edited by Rich Horton.

Read the full story for free at Lightspeed.

After a bizarre and disturbing incident at the funeral of matriarch Marian Savage, the McCray and Savage families look forward to a restful and relaxing summer at Beldame, on Alabama's Gulf Coast, where three Victorian houses loom over the shimmering beach. Two of the houses are habitable, while the third is slowly and mysteriously being buried beneath an enormous dune of blindingly white sand. But though long uninhabited, the third house is not empty. Inside, something deadly lies in wait. Something that has terrified Dauphin Savage and Luker McCray since they were boys and which still haunts their nightmares. Something horrific that may be responsible for several terrible and unexplained deaths years earlier - and is now ready to kill again...

Volumes 1 and 2 of The Book of Elementals

1. Sorcerer's Son
2. The Crystal Palace

Cray lived with his mother, the sorceress, Delivev, in castle Spinweb. He needed to find the father he had never known: the knight who pledged eternal love to his mother and never returned from mission for his own Lord. But his fate could only be discovered by light of the demon fire.

Cray and his friend Feldar Sepwin, a seer, craft a mirror of silver, wood and spider web, enchanted to show the viewer his or her heart's desire. Yet for Cray the mirror showed nothing for years. Then one day he was drawn to it to see the image of a young girl. But who she was and where she dwelled remained mysteries. In time, as the girl grew into a beautiful woman, Cray discovered her home with the help of demons of Fire, Air and Ice-a magnificent palace in the realm of Ice. Cray discovered that she was Aliza, a sorceress dedicated solely to the study of her craft. And Cray realized that his quest had just begun-for Aliza was as much prisoner as mistress of her Crystal Palace, and even Cray might not master the power to break the spell and set her free...

Everyone in Vallen knows that ice wolves and scorch dragons are sworn enemies who live deeply separate lives.

So when twelve-year-old orphan Anders takes one elemental form and his twin sister, Rayna, takes another, he wonders whether they are even related. Family or not, Rayna is Anders's only true friend. She's nothing like the brutal, cruel dragons who claimed her as one of their own and stole her away.

To rescue her, Anders must enlist at the foreboding Ulfar Academy, a school for young wolves that values loyalty to the pack above all else. But for Anders, loyalty is more complicated than obedience, and friendship is the most powerful shapeshifting force of all.

After the fateful battle between the ice wolves and the scorch dragons, Anders and his twin sister, Rayna, have been reunited. But there's no time to celebrate.

The temperature all over Vallen is starting to drop. And Anders quickly learns that the wolves have stolen a weather-altering artifact called the Snowstone, and every dragon, including Rayna, is now in danger. Desperate to broker peace, Anders enlists the help of a few new flame-breathing friends to stop the wolves' next plan of attack.

Together, these former rivals must go on a dangerous quest to find the scattered pieces of the Sun Scepter, the only artifact that can counteract the Snowstone. Because if either device goes unchecked, all hope for a truce will be lost.

Though Anders and his friends have delayed a war between ice wolves and scorch dragons, their mission is far from over. With adults on both sides looking for them, they've sought refuge in Cloudhaven, a forbidden stronghold that could hold the key to saving their home.

Meanwhile, Holbard has been ravaged, and its citizens are reeling. Many have been forced into bleak camps outside the city, and food is running short.

To rebuild Vallen and unite scorch dragons, ice wolves, and humans, Anders and Rayna must put everything on the line... before the damage done is beyond repair. But the price of peace may hit closer to home than they could've ever imagined.