Search Worlds Without End

The Maze was, is, and will be. When the magnablock exploded into infinity, the Maze was formed. "There was light" - and the light shone upon the Maze. Coeval and coexistent, neither of the same substance nor the same essence; having the attributes, the incidents, the accidents of neither terrene nor contra-terrene matter, the Maze is both immanent and transcendent of both. It traverses space, it transects time. Ancient of years, the worlds form around it...

Generation after generation, generation before generation, north and south and up and down, the early and the latter rains, and the great red slow-rolling sun of the End of Days, have seen, see, and have yet to see the Masters of the Maze at their work. They explore, they plot their courses, they watch. Perhaps this above all. They watch. They guard.

Masters of Everon, announces the brass plate on the door of the original Everon colonists' corporate headquarters. But somehow Everon resisted all their efforts; it was as if the planet itself fought against human efforts to establish a foothold. Some settlers want to return the favour, wrecking Everon's ecology in revenge, but Jef Roboni loves the great cat-like maolots of Everon, and the planet itself; he believes that settlers and planet can coexist.

Now time is running out - and even the hints that Jef has uncovered are not enough to prepare him for the incomprehensible strangeness and wonder of the true Masters of Everon.

Three Masters of Military Science Fiction
Three Great Science Fiction Series:

• Honor Harrinqton
• Hammer's Slammers
• Belisarius

Three Short Novels in One Volume

Before she saved the galaxy, she was "Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington"-- New York Times bestselling author David Weber reveals how Honor Harrington's long and brilliant career began with an encounter with "pirates" who turned out to be much more than they seemed....

Another day, another planet at war. But in David Drake's "Choosing Sides," Lieutenant Huber stepped off the starship right into an ambush. The attackers didn't survive, but neither did far too many of Huber's troops--and Slammers aren't supposed to get caught in ambushes. Now, to redeem himself, Huber is being sent on a special mission that may be his last. But even so, the enemy will learn the cost of killing even a single one of Colonel Hammer's Slammers....

If the enemy thought General Belisarius was tough, wait until they meet the wife of one of his soldiers in Eric Flint's "Island." She was wed just before her husband left with Belisarius to fight an evil from beyond time. Now her husband is wounded, and she is going to travel a thousand miles to reach his side--and few who get in her way will live to regret it....

Contents:

• 1 - Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington - [Honor Harrington Universe Short Fiction] - (2001) - novella by David Weber
• 145 - Islands - [Belisarius] - novella by Eric Flint
• 215 - Choosing Sides - [Hammer's Slammers] - novella by David Drake

"After the alien ambassador had finished with the platitudes about galactic unity, the first significant word was THEM.

Alliance Intelligence had not garnered much information about THEM. The Theriomorph Hellbent Enemy Mission had appeared one day from the endless unexplored reaches of the galaxy. Until then the Alliance had traded with each other, occasionally engaging in a bit of sharp practice, but never believing that warfare between stars could be practical.

While THEM scorched planet after planet the Alliance had tried every known means of signalling. THEM answered no signals. THEM accepted no surrender. THEM ships self-destructed when they were losing. From odd debris the Alliance concluded THEM were not human. No one knew what they looked like, or anything except that they could be stopped.

The ambassador thought Earth might have ten months.

The Alliance was overextended, fighting for survival. But they could lend a few officers for training Earth to run the ships they could furnish. If Earth buckled down and learned to operate the Alliance ships there was-just barely-a chance.

And now even that chance was gone, Art thought gloomily, as he and Jorf watched the holo screen as the bulk of the Earth fleet was annihilated in the space of a few minutes. Earth was finished. There were habitable planets somewhere in the galaxy, but Art didn't know where. And even if they could find one the Nishrub's crew were all men."

This novel originally appeared in Ace Double M-109 (1965).

The special research vessel ALICE was the oddest ship that ever flew the ensign of the U.S. Navy: small, wooden-hulled and sail-powered, she would have been less out of place in the Navy of a hundred years ago - if it weren't for the electrician's nightmare of a christmas tree hanging from her main boom.

The purpose of the 'christmas tree' was to detect enemy submarines. it wasn't very good at that, but when lightning struck it proved itself highly efficient at... something else.

For when the smoke cleared, there off the port bow was a long-ship. Full of Vikings. VIKINGS THROWING THINGS!

The USS ALICE had become the Ship That Sailed the Time Stream!

The Masters had ruled all space with an unconquerable iron fist. But the Masters were gone. And this new, young race who came now to take their place -- could they hope to defeat the ancient Enemy of All?

You are cordially invited to explore the many worlds of modern fantasy, with an array of the field's brightest stars as your guides. Masters of Fantasy presents a glittering roster of today's most popular fantasy writers, offering brand new adventures set in their most popular series.

Table of Contents:

• 1 - From Category to Genre in a Bookselling Sense or When Sales and Popularity Begin to Command Respect - essay by Brian M. Thomsen
• 5 - Out of the Deep - [Valdemar] - novelette by Mercedes Lackey
• 29 - Earthborne - [Witch World Universe] - short story by Andre Norton
• 47 - Mything in Dreamland - [Myth Adventures] - novelette by Robert Asprin and Jody Lynn Nye
• 69 - Race for the Sky - [The Bifrost Guardians] - novelette by Mickey Zucker Reichert
• 95 - Shadamehr and the Old Wive's Tale - [Sovereign Stone] - short story by Don Perrin and Margaret Weis
• 115 - Serenade - [Spellsinger] - novelette by Alan Dean Foster
• 145 - Child of Prophecy - [The Wars of Light and Shadow] - novelette by Janny Wurts
• 169 - The Afterlife of St. Vidicon of Cathode - [Saint Vidicon] - novelette by Christopher Stasheff
• 197 - The Elf House - [Lord of the Isles] - short story by David Drake
• 211 - Gifts - [Paksenarrion Universe] - novelette by Elizabeth Moon
• 233 - The Amorous Broom - [John Justin Mallory] - short story by Mike Resnick
• 245 - Web of Deception - [Bahzell - 5] - novel by David Weber

Viola Marek is a struggling real estate agent, and a vampire. But her biggest problem currently is that the house she needs to sell is haunted. The ghost haunting the house has been murdered, and until he can solve the mystery of how he died, he refuses to move on.

Fox D'Mora is a medium, and though is also most-definitely a shameless fraud, he isn't entirely without his uses--seeing as he's actually the godson of Death.

When Viola seeks out Fox to help her with her ghost-infested mansion, he becomes inextricably involved in a quest that neither he nor Vi expects (or wants). But with the help of an unruly poltergeist, a demonic personal trainer, a sharp-voiced angel, a love-stricken reaper, and a few high-functioning creatures, Vi and Fox soon discover the difference between a mysterious lost love and an annoying dead body isn't nearly as distinct as they thought.

Never will so many have given so much for so few. The aliens came to Earth not for conquest, but simply to create a way and watch it played out by humans. But they are prohibited from using any technology not developed on the planet - and 20th century armaments are too primitive for good sport. The answer is to persuade the Earth's leaders to found a thing tank group secretly guided by them to produce 22nd century tech.

He was thirty-two. His name was Jerg Algan. He had done almost nothing except roam the Earth like anyone, without the slightest glory

And then one day he had to leave the refuge of men. He landed in the star galaxy - in the most distant fold of space, in this strange place where perhaps the solutions of time-honored problems lay. There were vast black citadels there, like gigantic pawns erected on the squares of an endless chessboard.

So Jerg Algan undertook the last phase of his struggle: the gambit of the stars.

Black comedy, dealing with privatisation and the rise of the multinational megastate. Barmaid Jet Black possesses the only copy of a book by Julius Caesar, which may make her fortune or cost her life.

1917 France, Lamar Jimmerson finds a little book of Atlantean puzzles, Egyptian riddles, alchemical metaphors, and the Codex Pappus said to be the sacred Gnomonic text. He expands the noble brotherhood, survives scandalous schism, bids for governor of Indiana, and sees Gnomons gather in an East Texas mobile home. This is an America of misfits and con men, oddballs and innocents.

Contents:

• Masters of Time - interior artwork by Edd Cartier
• 11 - Masters of Time - (1942) - novella by A. E. van Vogt
• 129 - The Changeling - [Pendrake] - (1944) - novella by A. E. van Vogt

Larson McCade, enhanced troubleshooter and wandering grandson of a nameless refugee, has come to the decadent planet of Seltique, culturally isolated from the rest of the galaxy after its bid for political mastery two thousand years ago. He claims to be researching a pro-galaxy group known as The Core, which was exterminated in an historic revolution, and makes several powerful friends along the way--including an attractive young lady named Valyn Dixon. But McCade is actually looking for The Book of Aradka, an alien artifact that could make him a wealthy man for the rest of his life.

The Ship That Sailed the Time Stream

Ensign Joe Rate, captain of the experimental Navy yawl *Alice*, figured that everything that could happen to him in one day had already happened. First, after a freak electrical storm at sea the *Alice* had somehow been thrown a thousand years back in time, and it looked as if they were stranded in the past. They had provisions for two weeks at most. Then there was the voluptuous barbarian girl they'd saved from captivity--her presense on board a ship full of normal sailors wasn't likely to lessen the problems of the situation.

Then he saw the four Viking raiding ships bearing straight for him, and in a few minutes the first spear thunked into the *Alice*'s foredeck...

Stranger Than You Think

Contents:

• The Misfit
• From Caribou to Carry Nation
• The Galactic Calabash
• The Sign of the Goose
• The Country Boy
• The World Must Never Know
• The Third Bubble

First came the news that a flying saucer had landed in Iowa. Then came the announcement that the whole thing was a hoax. End of story. Case closed.

Except that two agents of the most secret intelligence agency in the U.S. government were on the scene and disappeared without reporting in. And four more agents who were sent in also disappeared. So the head of the agency and his two top agents went in and managed to get out with their discovery: an invasion is underway by slug-like aliens who can touch a human and completely control his or her mind. What the humans know, they know. What the slugs want, no matter what, the human will do. And most of Iowa is already under their control.

Sam Cavanaugh was one of the agents who discovered the truth. Unfortunately, that was just before he was taken over by one of the aliens and began working for the invaders, with no will of his own. And he has just learned that a high official in the Treasury Department is now under control of the aliens. Since the Treasury Department includes the Secret Service, which safeguards the President of the United States, control of the entire nation is near at hand . . .

Masters of Evolution

Alvah Gustad was typical of New York City's twenty million citizens. He took for granted such luxuries as synthetic foods and robot-servants, and he knew beyond a doubt that the Cities offered the only acceptable way of life for civilized man.

But roaming the vast plains between the continent's five Cities, ever growing and expanding, were the dreaded tribes of Muckfeet. In direct antithesis to the City dwellers, these illiterate savages actually GREW food and RAISED animals. And how they smelled! It was so bad that Alvah could feel his stomach churn at the mere mention of their name.

There was one thing in the Muckfoot territory that the Cities did need, though-metal ores. And Alvah, faced with the job of liason to the tribes around New York, had to somehow make his patriotism outweigh his nausea. If he succeeded, the Cities would be monuments to eternity; if he failed...

Fire in the Heavens

Race against doomsday!

Masters of the Lamp

Send a spy to find a god.

A Harvest of Hoodwinks

Collection including:

• Foreword - essay
• Archimedes' Lever - (1968) - shortstory
• Mar-ti-an - (1964) - shortstory
• The Star Party - (1964) - shortstory
• Futility Is Zuck - (1970) - shortstory
• Snowbird and the Seven Warfs - (1970) - shortstory
• The Locator - (1968) - shortstory
• Appointment at Ten O'Clock - (1964) - shortstory
• Only a God - (1970) - shortstory
• The Fall of All-Father - (1970) - shortstory
• Because of Purple Elephants - (1970) - shortstory
• Rolling Robert - (1970) - shortstory
• Debut - (1966) - shortstory

The Dragon Masters

Men have been at war for centuries with the reptilian race called "Basics." As conquerors always have, the winners of each bloody encounter have made slaves of the losers--but in this far-future war, each side has improved upon its slaves with genetic engineering.

And so at last there came to be two neighboring worlds: Aerlith, where men have raised a race of fearsome dragons to be their servants, and nearby Coralyne, where the descendants of those very dragons are served by strong, savage mutants who once were human. Inevitably, those two worlds would meet in one final contest...

The Last Castle

For 700 years the Meks served without complaint; they were indispensable, for no gentleman would demean himself with toil. But now they turn against the strongholds of civilization--Castle Halcyon, then Sea Island, Morninglight, and Maraval--one by one the proud castles of Earth fall; last standing is Castle Hagedorn.

The Five Gold Bands

The galaxy is full of wealthy planets and haughty aliens who guard the technology of interstellar travel. Earth must pay a price for use of the space drive, and this rubs Paddy Blackthorn the wrong way- so he sets out to steal the secret. The powerful Shauls capture and dump him on a barren planet- yet here he acquires five golden bands containing the very data he is after. The information is coded- and while Paddy solves the puzzle he must evade a galactic manhunt!

The Dragon Masters

The race of man is growing old, but it's not yet ready to die - not while there are dragons still to kill!

The cross-bred dragon armies of the Men of Aerlith are the most appalling horrors ever to threaten the sanity of our future:

Termagents ~ three hundred reptilian giants with six legs apiece, the most fecund breeders of them all

Jugglers ~ eighteen of them, growling amongst themselves, waiting for an opportunity to snap off a leg from any unwary groom

Murderers (striding and long-horned) ~ eighty-five of each, with scaly tails and eyes like crystals

Fiends ~ fifty-two powerful monsters, their tails tipped with spike steel balls

Blue Horrors, Basics, Spider Dragons.

Contents:

• 5 - Dark of the Moon - (1957) - shortstory
• 19 - The Highest Mountain - (1952) - shortstory
• 35 - The Last Laugh - (1951) - shortstory
• 54 - Back to Nature - (1956) - shortstory
• 65 - The Last Quarry - (1956) - shortstory
• 77 - Star Bright - (1951) - shortstory
• 92 - Jack the Giant Killer - (1955) - shortstory
• 109 - The Barrier - (1951) - shortstory
• 118 - Earth Needs a Killer - (1950) - novelette
• 151 - Dreadful Therapy - (1953) - novelette
• 189 - Last Call - (1952) - shortstory
• 204 - The Last Hero - (1954) - shortstory
• 214 - Doomsday 257 A.G.! - (1952) - novelette
• 244 - To Each His Star - (1952) - shortstory
• 256 - They Will Destroy - (1952) - novelette
• 299 - The Passion of Orpheus - (1954) - novelette

Contents:

• 5 - Small War - (1954) - shortstory
• 20 - Laboratory - (1955) - shortstory
• 45 - Can Such Beauty Be? - (1953) - shortstory
• 62 - The Holes Around Mars - (1954) - shortstory
• 83 - Where There's Hope - (1953) - shortstory
• 91 - —And All for One - (1950) - shortstory
• 107 - The Good Dog - (1954) - shortstory
• 115 - Nightride and Sunrise - (1952) - novelette by Jerome Bixby and James Blish [as by Jerome Bixby]
• 145 - The Second Ship - (1952) - shortstory
• 152 - The Bad Life - (1963) - novelette
• 190 - Zen - (1952) - shortstory
• 200 - Mirror, Mirror - (1954) - shortstory
• 212 - Halfway to Hell - (1954) - novelette
• 240 - Angels in the Jets - (1952) - shortstory
• 256 - The Battle of the Bells - (1954) - shortstory
• 274 - One Way Street - (1953) - shortstory
• 299 - The Slizzers - (1953) - shortstory
• 310 - The Monsters - (1953) - shortstory

Contents:

• 5 - Seventh Victim - [Victim] - (1953) - shortstory
• 26 - Diplomatic Immunity - (1953) - novelette
• 54 - One Man's Poison - (1953) - shortstory (variant of Untouched by Human Hands)
• 74 - The Perfect Woman - (1953) - shortstory
• 80 - Cost of Living - (1952) - shortstory
• 94 - What a Man Believes - (1953) - shortstory
• 105 - What Goes Up - (1953) - shortstory
• 128 - Warrior Race - (1952) - shortstory
• 144 - Writing Class - (1952) - shortstory
• 148 - Final Examination - (1952) - novelette
• 176 - Specialist - (1953) - shortstory
• 199 - Beside Still Waters - (1953) - shortstory
• 205 - Restricted Area - (1953) - shortstory
• 228 - Watchbird - (1953) - novelette
• 259 - Keep Your Shape - (1953) - novelette (variant of Shape)
• 286 - The Hour of Battle - (1953) - shortstory
• 296 - We Are Alone - (1952) - shortstory

Contents:

• 5 - The Man in the Moon - (1950) - novelette
• 29 - Please to Remember - (1953) - shortstory
• 41 - Tourists to Terra - (1950) - shortstory
• 50 - The Hatchetman - (1951) - novelette by Fredric Brown and Mack Reynolds
• 97 - Mercy Flight - (1951) - shortstory
• 109 - One of Our Planets Is Missing! - (1950) - shortstory
• 121 - Final Appraisal - (1952) - shortstory
• 134 - Six-Legged Svengali - (1950) - shortstory by Fredric Brown and Mack Reynolds
• 145 - Troubador - (1951) - shortstory
• 157 - The Word from the Void - (1950) - shortstory
• 162 - Your Soul Comes C.O.D. - (1952) - shortstory
• 168 - Desperate Remedy - (1954) - novelette
• 202 - After Some Tomorrow - (1956) - shortstory
• 219 - Off Course - (1954) - shortstory
• 229 - United We Stand - (1950) - shortstory
• 237 - Optical Illusion - (1953) - shortstory
• 241 - I. Q. - (1961) - shortstory
• 261 - Stowaway - (1953) - novelette
• 289 - Halftripper - (1951) - shortstory
• 298 - Ask Me No Questions! - (1951) - shortstory
• 310 - D. P. from Tomorrow - (1953) - shortstory

Contents:

• 5 - The Test Colony - (1954) - novelette by Winston K. Marks
• 7 - The Test Colony - interior artwork by Frank Kelly Freas [as by Freas]
• 52 - The Pompous Asteroid - (1954) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 69 - Eight Million Dollars from Mars! - (1954) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 83 - Slay Ride - shortstory by Winston K. Marks (variant of Slay-Ride 1953)
• 95 - The Water Eater - (1953) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 103 - The Water Eater - (1953) - interior artwork by Balbalis
• 109 - Breeder Reaction - (1954) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 113 - Breeder Reaction - interior artwork by Frank Kelly Freas [as by Freas]
• 125 - Tabby - (1954) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 129 - Tabby - interior artwork by Rudolph Palais [as by Palais]
• 140 - ... So They Baked a Cake - (1954) - shortfiction by Winston K. Marks
• 157 - The Deadly Daughters - (1958) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 158 - The Deadly Daughters - (1958) - interior artwork by Novick
• 171 - King Bee - (1957) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 188 - Forsyte's Retreat - (1954) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 205 - Forsyte's Retreat - interior artwork by Frank Kelly Freas [as by Freas]
• 208 - The Mind Digger - (1958) - novelette by Winston K. Marks
• 208 - The Mind Digger - interior artwork by D. Bruce Berry [as by uncredited]
• 229 - Brown John's Body - (1955) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 230 - Brown John's Body - interior artwork by W. E. Terry [as by uncredited]
• 247 - Unbegotten Child - (1953) - shortstory by Winston K. Marks
• 248 - Unbegotten Child - (1953) - interior artwork by Vidmer
• 260 - Mate in Two Moves - (1954) - novelette by Winston K. Marks
• 260 - Mate in Two Moves - (1954) - interior artwork by Ashman
• 274 - Mate in Two Moves [2] - (1954) - interior artwork by Ashman
• 289 - Mate in Two Moves [3] - (1954) - interior artwork by Ashman
• 298 - All Around a Pig's Tail - shortstory by Winston K. Marks (variant of All Around a Pig's Tale 1957)

Contents:

• 5 - The Moon Is Green - (1952) - shortstory
• 25 - What's He Doing in There? - (1957) - shortstory
• 33 - The Improper Authorities - (1959) - shortstory
• 48 - Bazaar of the Bizarre - [Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser] - (1963) - novelette
• 79 - The Goggles of Dr. Dragonet - [Dr. Dragonet] - (1961) - shortstory
• 104 - Deadly Moon - (1960) - novelette
• 138 - Bread Overhead - (1958) - shortstory
• 156 - Nice Girl with 5 Husbands - (1951) - shortstory (variant of Nice Girl with Five Husbands)
• 172 - Appointment in Tomorrow - (1951) - novelette
• 206 - The Big Engine - (1962) - shortstory
• 212 - The Creature from Cleveland Depths - (1962) - novelette
• 264 - The Mind Spider - [Change War] - (1959) - shortstory
• 283 - Kreativity for Kats - [Gummitch the Cat] - (1961) - shortstory
• 294 - Martians Keep Out - (2012) - shortfiction (variant of Martians, Keep Out! 1950)

Contents:

• 5 - The Band Played On - (1957) - novelette
• 46 - Operation Distress - (1951) - shortstory
• 61 - The Deadliest Female - (1951) - shortstory
• 78 - Imitation of Death - (1950) - shortstory
• 100 - Absolutely No Paradox - (1951) - shortstory
• 106 - Forgive Us Our Debts - (1952) - shortstory
• 125 - Earthbound - (1963) - shortstory
• 128 - I Am Tomorrow - (1952) - novelette
• 182 - Keepers of the House - (1956) - shortstory
• 199 - And There Was Light - (1951) - shortstory
• 212 - Last Lunacy - shortfiction (variant of The Last Lunacy 1951)
• 226 - Let 'em Breathe Space - (1953) - novella
• 282 - Shadows of Empire - (1950) - shortstory
• 303 - Battleground - (1954) - shortstory

Contents:

• 5 - "A" as in Android - (1951) - shortstory
• 19 - Voices in the Void - (1951) - novelette
• 49 - The Double Occupation - (1955) - novelette
• 89 - No-Risk Planet - (1955) - novelette
• 111 - The Music of the Spheres - (1956) - shortstory
• 124 - Code of the Bluster World - (1956) - shortstory
• 142 - All Flesh Is Brass - (1952) - shortstory
• 155 - It's Raining Frogs - shortfiction
• 188 - Anything Your Heart Desires - (1951) - shortstory
• 204 - Black Eyes and the Daily Grind - (1952) - shortstory
• 222 - The Impossible Weapon - (1952) - shortstory
• 240 - From Hidden Worlds - (1951) - novelette
• 277 - Pen Pal - (1951) - shortstory
• 295 - My Sweetheart's the Man in the Moon - (1956) - shortstory

Contents:

• 5 - The Star Beast - (1950) - novelette
• 36 - The Nest - (1953) - novelette
• 66 - Honorable Enemies - [Dominic Flandry] - (1951) - novelette
• 94 - Lord of a Thousand Suns - (1951) - novelette
• 128 - The Long Return - (1950) - novelette
• 166 - Earthman, Beware! - (1951) - novelette
• 193 - Terminal Quest - (1951) - shortstory
• 216 - World of the Mad - (1951) - novelette
• 241 - Sentiment, Inc. - (1953) - novelette
• 275 - Duel on Syrtis - (1951) - shortstory
• 297 - The Valor of Cappen Varra - [Cappen Varra] - (1957) - shortstory

Contents:

• 5 - Time Tolls for Toro - (1950) - novelette
• 43 - Find Me in Eternity - (1951) - novelette
• 87 - The World of Reluctant Virgins - (1950) - shortstory
• 104 - The Soul Makers - (1950) - shortstory
• 132 - The Diamond Images - (1959) - shortstory
• 149 - When the Spoilers Came - (1952) - novelette
• 179 - To the End of Time - (1950) - shortstory
• 204 - The Metal Martyr - (1950) - shortstory
• 220 - Danger Is My Destiny - (1950) - novelette
• 268 - This Way Out - (1950) - novelette
• 300 - The Man from Space - (1957) - shortstory

The final fight will change their perception forever.

Everything Elle Hartmut and her friends thought they knew about the alien menace--and the nature of their universe--is wrong.

With mounting evidence that the aliens behind the Darkness reside on a hyperdimensional plane above spacetime, Elle and the Dark Sentinels will need a new approach to win. However, preventing the impending alien invasion will test their team in ways they never imagined.

The ancient artifacts wielded by the Dark Sentinels may hold the key to victory. If they can understand and master their true abilities, they may still be able to save the Hegemony and their loved ones before the invasion's final stage consumes them all.

When mages, mechanics, and myths collide

Someone wants to kill Mari, a young Steam Mechanic in the Guild that controls all technology. She has learned that her world of Dematr is headed for a catastrophe and that Mages really can alter reality for short periods. Someone also wants to kill Alain, a young Mage who has learned that Mechanics are not frauds, and that Mechanic Mari is the only person who can prevent an oncoming disaster.

While trying to learn the truth about their world so they can save it, Mari and Alain realize that the answers they seek are in the dead city of Marandur. But Marandur is guarded by Imperial Legions who have sealed it off from the rest of the world for more than a century. Mari and Alain's only hope may rest with the unseen Masters of Marandur.

Among Mercedes Lackey's many novels, few are as critically acclaimed and beloved as those about the Elemental Masters. The novels in this series are loosely based on classic fairy tales, and take place in a fantasy version of turn-of-the-century London, where magic is real and Elemental Masters control the powers of Fire, Water, Air, and Earth. Now other authors join Mercedes Lackey to add their own special touches to this delightful alternate history, in a world where magic is always just around the corner...

In March 1987, Mercedes Lackey, a young author from Oklahoma, published her first novel, Arrows of the Queen. No one could have envisioned that this modest book would be the beginning of a fantasy career that would span decades and more than a hundred novels, with no signs of slowing yet.

And among Ms. Lackey's many novels, few are as critically-acclaimed and beloved as those of the Elemental Masters. The novels in this series are loosely based on classic fairy tales, and take place in a fantasy version of turn-of-the-century London, where magic is real and Elemental Masters control the powers of Fire, Water, Air and Earth.

Now the voices of other authors join Mercedes Lackey to add their own special touches to this delightful alternate history, in a world where magic is always just around the corner...

Accepting employment as a governess after hard times hit her family, medieval scholar Rosalind Hawkins is surprised when she learns that her mysterious employer has no children, no wife, and she is not to meet with him face to face. Instead, her duties are to read to him, through a speaking tube, from ancient manuscripts in obscure, nearly-forgotten dialects.

A requirement for the job was skill in translating medieval French, and she now understands the reason for that requirement, and assumes her unseen employer's interest in the descriptions of medieval spells and sorcery is that of an eccentric antiquary. What she does not realize is that his interest is anything but academic. He has a terrible secret and is desperately searching for something that can reverse the effects of the misfired spell which created his predicament.

Beauty Meets Beast in San Francisco

Accepting employment as a governess after hard times hit her family, medieval scholar Rosalind Hawkins is surprised when she learns that her mysterious employer has no children, no wife, and she is not to meet with him face to face. Instead, her duties are to read to him, through a speaking tube, from ancient manuscripts in obscure, nearly forgotten dialects.

A requirement for the job was skill in translating medieval French, and she now understands the reason for that requirement, and assumes her unseen employer's interest in the descriptions of medieval spells and sorcery is that of an eccentric antiquary. What she does not realize is that his interest is anything but academic. He has a terrible secret and is desperately searching for something that can reverse the effects of the misfired spell which created his predicament.

For seventeen years, Marina Roeswood had lived in an old, rambling farmhouse in rural Cornwall in the care of close friends of her wealthy, aristocratic parents. As the ward of bohemian artists in Victorian England, she had grown to be a free thinker in an environment of fertile creativity and cultural sophistication. But the real core of her education was far outside societal norms. For she and her foster parents were Elemental Masters of magic, and learning to control her growing powers was Marina's primary focus.

But though Marina's life seemed idyllic, her existence was riddled with mysteries. Why, for example, had she never seen her parents, or been to Oakhurst, her family's ancestral manor? And why hadn't her real parents, also Elemental Masters, trained her themselves? That there was a secret about all this she had known from the time she had begun to question the world around her. Yet try as she might, she could get no clues out of her guardians.

But Marina would have answers to her questions all too soon. For with the sudden death of her birth parents, Marina met her new guardian--her father's eldest sister Arachne. Aunt Arachne exuded a dark magical aura unlike anything Marina had encountered, a stifling evil that seemed to threaten Marina's very spirit.

Slowly Marina realized that her aunt was the embodiment of the danger her parents had been hiding her from in the backwoods of Cornwall. But could Marina unravel the secrets of her life in time to save herself from the evil that had been seeking her for nearly eighteen years?

Eleanor Robinson's life had shattered when Father volunteered for the Great War, leaving her alone with a woman he had just married. Then the letter came that told of her father's death in the trenches and though Eleanor thought things couldn't get any worse, her life took an even more bizarre turn.

Dragged to the hearth by her stepmother Alison, Eleanor was forced to endure a painful and frightening ritual during which the smallest finger of her left hand was severed and buried beneath a hearthstone. For her stepmother was an Elemental Master of Earth who practiced the darker blood-fueled arts. Alison had bound Eleanor to the hearth with a spell that prevented her from leaving home, caused her to fade from people's memories, and made her into a virtual slave.

Months faded into years for Eleanor, and still the war raged. There were times she felt she was losing her mind--times she seemed to see faces in the hearth fire.

Reginald Fenyx was a pilot. He lived to fly, and whenever he returned home on break from Oxford, the youngsters of the town would turn out to see him lift his aeroplane--a frail ship of canvas and sticks--into the sky and soar through the clouds.

During the war, Reggie had become an acclaimed air ace, for he was an Elemental Master of Air. His Air Elementals had protected him until the fateful day when he had met another of his kind aloft, and nearly died. When he returned home, Reggie was a broken man plagued by shell shock, his Elemental powers vanished.

Eleanor and Reginald were two souls scourged by war and evil magic. Could they find the strength to help one another rise from the ashes of their destruction?

The letter that introduced twelve-year-old Sarah Jane Lyon-White to Isabelle Harton, who ran the Harton School in central London, seemed quite simple and straightforward. But it was what was not written in the letter that resonated to Isabelle's own finely tuned "extra" senses: "Sarah has gifts we cannot train," the letter whispered to her, "nor can anyone we know. Those we trust tell us that you can...."

And it was true, for the Harton School was far from ordinary. It was Isabelle's job to train children who possessed the odd types of magic that could not be trained by London's powerful Elemental Masters: clairvoyants, telepaths, those with the ability to sense hidden danger, the vision to see into the past, and even that rarest of all talents: the ability to see and communicate with the dead.

But Isabelle was uneasy, for though she knew that Sarah Jane had a touch of telepathy, there seemed to be something else about the girl--something that had not yet manifested.

And Isabelle was right to be worried, for as soon as Sarah's full talents became evident, there was an attempt made on her life. For Sarah was that rarest of magicians: a true medium, and for some reason, a powerful Elemental Master wanted her dead.

Isabelle knew that to protect her ward she would have to seek help from the Elemental Masters of the city. That meant she would also see Lord David Alderscroft, the man she had once loved, but who had inexplicably chilled toward her and broken her heart long ago--for he was the leader of the city's Elemental Masters, the man who was now called the Wizard of London.

Ninette Dupond was a dancer with the Paris Opera Ballet. She had been very lucky--if she had not been pretty, and a natural dancer, she could only have become what her mother had been: a washerwoman.

But Ninette's good luck ended the day that the lead dancer sprained her ankle and Ninette was chosen to dance her part at a matinee. Her reviews had been very good--too good. Shortly thereafter, Ninette had been fired in an attempt to soothe the wounded ego of the ballet's primary soloist.

Alone, unemployed, and filled with despair, Ninette had returned to her apartment to find a thin, rangy, tabby-striped tomcat sitting on her windowsill. He seemed like just another stray, until abruptly he spoke to her, mind-to-mind.

Ninette though she was going mad, but the cat offered her an alternative to a life of destitution, albeit a very odd one. He proposed that she impersonate a renowned Russian ballerina, Nina Tchereslavsky, and go to work in a specific music hall in Blackpool, England. The cat also told her that he would take care of her in every way--he would somehow convey the English and Russian languages to her, supply her with money, and guide her every move. With no other option open to her, she place her life in his paws.

What Ninette didn't know was that the cat was an Elemental Spirit sent to protect her, and that the music hall in Blackpool was owned by an Elemental Master. But she also didn't know that the real Nina Tchereslavsky no longer existed. For the real Nina had been "absorbed" by an Elemental Spirit of the darkest kind that was now bent on Ninette's destruction....

Susanne Whitestone, an Earth Master magician, had always lived in Whitestone Manor and liked nothing more than to keep the land itself and its animal inhabitants thriving. For the last eleven years, she has had a special teacher in the forest--a powerful fae known only as Robin. Susanne, at twenty-one, doubted any mortal Earth Master could find fault with the practices that Robin taught her.

But though Susanne was her father's only child, she had never set eyes on him, for Richard Whitestone lived as a recluse in a sectioned off wing of the manor. Richard Whitestone was also an Earth Master, but since his beloved wife's death in childbirth, he had lived a kind of half-life. He hated even the thought of the child who had ended his wife's life. His own life had withered, and as he had grown bitter, and blighted, so had everything he could see from his windows--the once-beautiful private garden was now as stark and wizened as his heart.

But as the years passed, Richard found that there was one thing that gave him solace--the thought, an obsession, that he could bring his Rebecca back to life through necromancy. He would need an appropriate vessel for her spirit, a young woman, preferably one who looked like she did and was approximately the same age that Rebecca has been at the time of her death--twenty-one... and Susanne was the image of her mother.

For as long as she could remember, Mari Prothero had seen things--tiny manlike creatures that were mischievous and wore only seaweed, and beings that seemed to be made of water. Mari had grown up in a tiny Welsh fishing village where she lived alone with her father, Daffyd, a master fisherman--her mother and brother having drowned when she was a child.

On the morning of her eighteenth birthday, her father finally told her the great secret of the Prothero family. Her family had an ancient covenant with magical shape-shifters, the Selch. Her lost mother and brother were not truly dead, but neither were they human. Now Mari must abide by her family's magical compact or face dire consequences.

But Mari is not without protectors. The tiny creatures she had seen her whole life counseled her to bargain with the Selch. While in faraway London, the head of the Elemental Masters had dispatched some very unique champions to come to Mari's aid....

Katie Langford had been part of her family's acrobatic troupe working in a small traveling circus--until a terrible fire killed her parents. Years later, still with the circus but stuck in an abusive marriage, Katie fled from her increasingly dangerous husband to Brighton. As a seaside resort town, Brighton's music halls meant no circus needed to visit. It was as safe a place as she could find.

Lionel Hawkins was a professional magician who had a permanent job at the Palace Music Hall in Brighton. His shows never failed to enchant the ever-changing crowds, for his magic was more than just tricks. Lionel was an Air Magician, and he wasn't the only one at the Palace who had magical abilities. Jack Prescott, the Palace doorman who had lost a leg in the Boer Wars, had preternatural awareness of all flame, which had saved the Palace from burning on more than one occasion.

When Katie answered the Palace's call for a new assistant with stage experience, it seemed like all her problems were solved. But it soon became clear that Katie was a Fire Magician like Jack and that something had blocked Katie's access to her own abilities--a dangerous situation for everyone around her. Fire, the most volatile of all the elements, was a power that could easily turn deadly when fueled by strong emotion. And Lionel and Jack could tell that Katie was hiding something. Something that frightened her. Something that could set their whole world ablaze if they couldn't help her master her Element in time.

Rosamund is an Earth Master in the Schwarzwald, the ancient Black Forest of Germany. Since the age of ten, she has lived with her teacher, the Hunt Master and Earth Magician of the Schwarzwald Foresters, a man she calls "Papa." Her adoptive Papa rescued her after her original Earth Master teacher, an old woman who lived alone in a small cottage in the forest, was brutally murdered by werewolves. Rosa herself barely escaped, and this terrifying incident molded the course of her future.

For like her fellow Earth Masters of the Schwarzwald Lodge, Rosa is not a healer. Instead, her talents lead her on the more violent path of protection and defense-- "cleansing" the Earth and protecting its gentle fae creatures from those evil beings who seek to do them harm.

And so Rosa becomes the first woman Hunt Master and the scourge of evil creatures, with a deadly specialty in werewolves and all shapeshifters.

While visiting with a Fire Master--a friend of her mentor from the Schwarzwald Lodge-- Rosa meets a pair of Elemental Magicians from Hungary who have come looking for help. They suspect that there is a dark power responsible for a string of murders happening in the remote countryside of Transylvania, but they have no proof. Rosa agrees to help them, but there is a catch: one of the two men asking for aid is a hereditary werewolf.

Rosa has been taught that there are three kinds of werewolves. There are those, like the one that had murdered her teacher, who transform themselves by use of dark magic, and also those who have been infected by the bite of these magical werewolves--these poor victims have no control over their transformative powers. Yet, there is a third kind: those who have been born with the ability to transform at will. Some insist that certain of these hereditary werewolves are benign. But Rosa has never encountered a benign werewolf!

Can she trust this Hungarian werewolf? Or is the Hunter destined to become the Hunted?

Giselle had lived fourteen years of her life in an abandoned tower. Her mother kept Giselle, a young Air Master still growing into her abilities, isolated for the sake of herself and others.

This life left her unprepared when a handsome young man appeared at the base of her tower. But when the young stranger entered her window, he tried to force himself on her. She was saved by Mother, an Earth Master, who hurled the man out the window he had climbed in.

The Foresters of the Black Forest were Earth Masters whose job it was to cleanse the ancient forest of evil elementals, and over the next four years, they shared their fighting expertise to teach Giselle self-defense. By the age of twenty, Giselle was an expert markswoman, and it was this skill that she used to survive when Mother died. Cutting her long hair, she masqueraded as a boy to enter shooting competitions, and used the prize money to support herself.

But she could not forget the first man who assaulted her, for when that stranger had fallen from her tower long ago, his body had never been found. In Giselle's heart, she was certain his magic had helped him to survive the fall. Surely, it was only a matter of time before he found her and sought revenge. Was she prepared to stand against him?

Psychic Nan Killian and Medium Sarah Lyon-White--along with their clever birds, the raven Neville and the parrot Grey--have been agents of Lord Alderscroft, the Elemental Fire Master known as the Wizard of London, since leaving school.

Now, Lord Alderscroft assigns them another commission: to work with the famous man living at 221 Baker Street--but not the one in flat B. They are to assist the man living in flat C. Dr. John Watson and his wife Mary, themselves Elemental Masters of Water and Air, take the occult cases John's more famous friend disdains, and they will need every skill the girls and their birds can muster!

Nan and Sarah's first task: to confront and eliminate the mysterious and deadly entity that nearly killed them as children: the infamous Haunt of Number 10 Berkeley Square. But the next task divides the girls for the first time since they were children. A German opera star begs Sarah for help, seeking a Medium's aid against not just a single spirit, but a multitude.

As Sarah becomes more deeply entwined with the Prima Donna, Nan continues to assist John and Mary Watson alone, only to discover that Sarah's case is far more sinister than it seems. It threatens to destroy not only a lifelong friendship, but much, much more.

Christmas is a very special time of year. It is special for Psychic Nan Killian and Medium Sarah Lyon-White and their ward Suki, who are determined to celebrate it properly. It is special for their friends, Doctor John Watson, and his wife Mary, both Elemental Masters, who have found great delight in the season seeing it through young Suki's eyes.

It is also special to others...for very different reasons.

For Christmas Eve is also hallowed to dark forces, powers older than mankind, powers that come awake on this long, cold night. Powers best left alone. Powers that could shake the foundations of London and beyond.

It begins slowly. Women disappearing in the dark of night, women only missed by those of their own kind. The whispers only begin when they start to reappear--because when they do, they are no longer sane. And when Nan and Sarah and the Watsons are called on to examine these victims, they discover that it was no ordinary horror of the streets that drove them mad.

But then, the shadows reach for other victims--girls of good, even exalted families, who vanish from concerts, lectures, and evening balls. And it will take the combined forces of Magic, Psychic Powers, and the world's greatest detective to stop the darkness before it can conquer all.

The threat of Moriarty is gone--but so is Sherlock Holmes.

Even as they mourn the loss of their colleague, psychic Nan Killian, medium Sarah Lyon-White, and Elemental Masters John and Mary Watson must be vigilant, for members of Moriarty's network are still at large. And their troubles are far from over: in a matter of weeks, two headless bodies of young brides wash up in major waterways. A couple who fears for their own recently-wedded daughter hires the group to investigate, but with each new body, the mystery only deepens.

The more bodies emerge, the more the gang suspects that there is dangerous magic at work, and that Moriarty's associates are somehow involved. But as they race against the clock to uncover the killer, it will take all their talents, Magic, and Psychic Powers--and perhaps some help from a dearly departed friend--to bring the murderer to justice.

While Sherlock is still officially dead, John and Mary Watson and Nan Killian and Sarah Lyon-White are taking up some of his case-load--and some for Lord Alderscroft, the Wizard of London.

Lord Alderscroft asks them to go to Dartmoor to track down a rumor of evil magic brewing there. Not more than four hours later, a poor cottager, also from Dartmoor, arrives seeking their help. His wife, in a fit of rage over the children spilling and spoiling their only food for dinner that night, sent them out on the moors to forage for something to eat. This is not the first time she has done this, and the children are moor-wise and unlikely to get into difficulties. But this time they did not come back, and in fact, their tracks abruptly stopped "as if them Pharisees took'd 'em." The man begs them to come help.

They would have said no, but there's the assignment for Alderscroft. Why not kill two birds with one stone?

But the deadly bogs are not the only mires on Dartmoor.

Anna May Jones is the daughter of a coal miner, but a sickly constitution has kept her confined to the house for most of her life. Hoping to improve her daughter's health--and lessen the burden on their family--Anna's mother sends her to live with her Aunt Jinny, a witchy-woman and an Elemental Master, in a holler outside of Ducktown.

As she settles into her new life, Anna learns new skills at Aunt Jinny's side and discovers that she, too, has a gift for Elemental magic that Jinny calls "the Glory". She also receives lessons from a mysterious and bewitching woman named Jolene, who assures her that, with time, Anna could become even more powerful than her aunt.

But with Anna's increasing power comes increasing notice. Billie McDaran, the foreman of the Ducktown mine, begins to take an interest in Anna and her abilities--even though Anna has already fallen in love with a young man with a talent for stonecarving.

If she wants to preserve the life she has come to love, Anna must use her newfound powers to oppose the foreman and protect those around her.

Annie Oakley has always suspected there is something "uncanny" about herself, but has never been able to put a name to it. But when Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show goes on tour through Germany, Bill temporarily hires a new sharpshooter to be part of his "World Wide Congress of Rough Riders": a woman named Giselle, who also happens to be an Elemental Master of Air. Alongside this new performer, Annie discovers that she and her husband, Frank, are not simply master marksman, but also magicians of rare ability.

As they travel and perform, Annie must use her newfound knowledge and rare skill to combat creatures of the night scattered across the countryside, who threaten both the performers and the locals. Annie's got her gun, and it's filled with silver bullets.

The race of man is growing old, but it's not yet ready to die - not while there are dragons still to kill!

The cross-bred dragon armies of the Men of Aerlith are the most appalling horrors ever to threaten the sanity of our future:

Termagents ~ three hundred reptilian giants with six legs apiece, the most fecund breeders of them all

Jugglers ~ eighteen of them, growling amongst themselves, waiting for an opportunity to snap off a leg from any unwary groom

Murderers (striding and long-horned) ~ eighty-five of each, with scaly tails and eyes like crystals

Fiends ~ fifty-two powerful monsters, their tails tipped with spike steel balls

Blue Horrors, Basics, Spider Dragons...

Nine stories describe the experiences of Jeb Stuart, Copernicus, Richard Burton, Napoleon, Yuri Andropov, and Augustus try to adapt to the alternate world known as Hell.

Contents:

• The Ransom of Hellcat - novelette by Chris Morris
• Take Two - novelette by Bill Kerby
• Hellbike - short story by George Foy
• Houseguests - novelette by Nancy Asire
• Spitting in the Wind - novelette by Lynn Abbey
• God's Eyes - novelette by Michael Armstrong
• Bargain - novelette by David Drake
• Pawn in Play - novelette by C. J. Cherryh
• Sea Change - novelette by Janet Morris

A young mage-in-training is unwittingly pulled into a violent political upheaval, in the first book of this new epic fantasy trilogy by Miles Cameron, author of the Traitor Son Cycle.

Aranthur is a promising young mage. His talents compel him to attend University to develop his abilities further. But the world is not safe for a mage, and after a confrontation leaves him no choice but to display his skill with a blade, Aranthur is instructed to train under a renowned Master of Swords.

During his intensive training he begins to question the bloody life he's chosen. And while studying under the Master, Aranthur is conscripted to the City Militia. Soon after, he finds himself thrown into the middle of a political revolt that will impact everyone he's come to know.

To protect his friends, Arnathur will be forced to decide if he can truly follow the Master of Swords into a life of violence and cold-hearted commitment to the blade.

The next book in the Masters & Mages series that started with Cold Iron, from the master of fantasy Miles Cameron.

Only fools think war is simple or glorious.

On the magic-drenched battlefield, information is the lifeblood of victory, and Aranthur is about to discover that carrying messages, scouting the enemy, keeping his nerve, and passing on orders is more dangerous, and more essential, than an inexperienced soldier could imagine... especially when everything starts to go wrong.

A young mage-in-training is unwittingly pulled into a violent political upheaval, in the third book of this epic fantasy trilogy by Miles Cameron, author of the Traitor Son Cycle.

Aranthur and his friends have come together across different continents and realms with one purpose: to strike back against the forces that have torn a hole in the heavens and threaten to rip the world apart.

Ultimate victory will require enemies to trust one another, old foes to fight together, spies to reveal the truth, and steadfast allies to betray long-corrupt rules. But will Aranthur, a twenty-year-old student, really be able to bring them all together? And what will they do when their plans inevitably fall to pieces?

The most complete version ever published.

An Egyptologist, attempting to raise from the dead the mummy of Tera, an ancient Egyptian queen, finds a fabulous gem and is stricken senseless by an unknown force. Amid bloody and eerie scenes, his daughter is possessed by Tera's soul, and her fate depends upon bringing Tera's mummified body to life.

When The Jewel of Seven Stars was first released in 1903 the publishers received a great deal of criticism from both critics and readers because of its gruesome ending. Shortly before his death in 1912 when Stoker attempted to republish the book he was told that he would have to change the ending if he didn't want it to go out of publication. As a result, Stoker removed Chapter XVI "Powers - Old and New" and gave the book a new and happier ending. For many years the original ending was unavailable to most readers. Now, for the first time ever, we have included the endings from the first and second editions in this volume.

Contents:

• You're All Alone - (1953) - novel
• Four Ghosts in Hamlet - (1965) - novelette
• The Creature from Cleveland Depths - (1962) - novelette

You're all Alone has also been published as The Sinful Ones. This collection has different content than other versions.

A tired old man and a brash young girl...he was the Vigen of Darst and she is his apprentice, Kyala, the first female ever chosen to learn the magic power of glassmaking.

Into the mountains of Winterkill they went, seeking the rare pigment astablak to protect the people of Darst from the revening Lame Ones, who stalked the forests with clawed feet and burning eyes.

The way was long and treacherous, through the terrible crags and beyond to the mysterious town of Vanikval, where a renegade glassmaker held the people under his dread command.

There began a contest that shook the foundations of their world. Good against evil, man against beast, it would determine who were the true...Masters of Glass.

The Eyes of Death

Beads of magic...wit ha color that can steal your soul...Only the Vigens, the Masters of Glass, could look into the eyes of men and beasts and then make the unique talismans that could control their lives.

That was why Kyala, Mistress of Glass, joined the desperate scheme to slay the monsters sent by the sea god Etma. For if she could see the horror's eyes, then she could forge the true bead that would tame the beast forever. Yet when the demon rose to destroy its foolish human challengers, all of Kyala's nightmares were fulfilled. Never had she seen such eyes before, burning with the fires of doom. And even with all her skill, Kyala feared it was not in her power to conquer a creature from the depths of hell...

For his characters alone in this book, Anthony Boucher deserves awards. They are other-worldly (a ghost who gets killed--?); an air-breathing squid-like Martian who is a brilliant bartender of mixes for two humans who revolutionize the use of robotics and androids; some mummified creatures who have a cannibalistic way of coming alive when unexpected; a Lilliputian demon who can't manage the simplest of tasks when asked; and of course, the title player, a college professor-turned-werewolf for love. Not enough? How about a murder that costs the killer more than his life by summoning a creature from his own imagination? Just ask Gorgo, Dugg Quinby, Wolfe Wolf, Guzub, and Snulbug (but don't ask the latter for tomorrow's newspaper. He might bring it and a lot of surprises too.)

Contents:

• 7 - The Compleat Werewolf - [Fergus O'Breen] - (1942) - novella
• 63 - The Pink Caterpillar - [Fergus O'Breen] - (1945) - shortstory
• 74 - Q. U. R. - (1943) - shortstory
• 99 - Robinc - (1943) - shortstory
• 119 - Snulbug - (1941) - shortstory
• 136 - Mr. Lupescu - (1945) - shortstory
• 141 - They Bite - (1943) - shortstory
• 154 - Expedition - (1943) - shortstory
• 170 - We Print the Truth - (1943) - novella
• 240 - The Ghost of Me - (1942) - shortstory

An Early Collection of Horror by Campbell.

Contents:

• At First Sight - (1973) - shortstory
• Concussion - (1973) - shortstory
• Made in Goatswood - (1973) - shortstory
• Potential - (1973) - shortstory
• The Enchanted Fruit - (1973) - shortstory
• The End of a Summer's Day - (1973) - shortstory
• The Franklyn Paragraphs - (1973) - shortstory
• The Guy - (1973) - shortstory
• The Interloper - (1973) - shortstory [as by Errol Undercliffe]
• The Lost - (1973) - shortstory
• The Old Horns - (1973) - shortstory
• The Second Staircase - (1973) - shortstory
• The Sentinels - (1973) - shortstory
• The Stocking - (1968) - shortstory
• Foreword (Demons By Daylight) - (1990) - essay

Meg's odd-looking, white-haired twins, conceived by artificial insemination, behave like adults when they are four years old. They are strangely anti-social and derive satisfaction and "tingles" from disasters (especially bloody ones) that befall others...

Songs of a Dreamer was Thomas Ligotti's first collection of supernatural horror stories. When originally published in 1985 by Harry Morris's Silver Scarab Press, the book was hardly noticed. In 1989, an expanded version appeared that garnered accolades from several quarters. Writing in the Washington Post, the celebrated science fiction and fantasy author Michael Swanwick extolled: "Put this volume on the shelf right between H. P. Lovecraft and Edgar Allan Poe. Where it belongs."

Contents:

• ix - Introduction (Songs of a Dead Dreamer) - (1985) - essay by Ramsey Campbell
• 3 - The Frolic - (1982) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 19 - Les Fleurs - (1981) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 28 - Alice's Last Adventure - (1985) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 49 - Dream of a Mannikin - (1982) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 66 - The Chymist - [The Nyctalops Trilogy - 1] - (1981) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 79 - Drink to Me Only with Labyrinthine Eyes - [The Nyctalops Trilogy - 2] - (1982) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 90 - Eye of the Lynx - [The Nyctalops Trilogy - 3] - (1983) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 100 - Notes on the Writing of Horror: A Story - (1985) - novelette by Thomas Ligotti
• 125 - The Christmas Eves of Aunt Elise: A Tale of Possession in Old Grosse Pointe - (1983) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 135 - The Lost Art of Twilight - (1986) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 155 - The Troubles of Dr. Thoss - (1985) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 168 - Masquerade of a Dead Sword: A Tragedie - (1986) - novelette by Thomas Ligotti (variant of Masquerade of a Dead Sword)
• 191 - Dr. Voke and Mr. Veech - (1983) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 202 - Professor Nobody's Little Lectures on Supernatural Horror - (1985) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 213 - Dr. Locrian's Asylum - (1987) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 224 - The Sect of the Idiot - [Azathoth] - (1988) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 236 - The Greater Festival of Masks - (1985) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 244 - The Music of the Moon - (1987) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 253 - The Journal of J. P. Drapeau - (1987) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti
• 260 - Vastarien - (1987) - shortstory by Thomas Ligotti

Venture at your own risk into a realm where the sun sinks into oblivion -- and all that is unholy, unearthly, and unspeakable rises. These rare, hard-to-find collaborations of cosmic terror are back in print, including:

• Wentworth's Day - A fellow figures his debt to a dead man is null and void, until he discovers just how terrifying interest rates can be.
• The Shuttered Room - A sophisticated gentleman must settle his grandfather's estate, only to find that the house shelters dark secrets.
• The Dark Brotherhood - A beautiful woman and her companion meet the likes of Edgar Allan Poe, in a tale as terrifying as anything Poe himself ever created.
• Innsmouth Clay - A sculptor returns from Paris to create a statue not entirely of this world -- and not at all under his control.
• Witches' Hollow - A new schoolteacher puts his soul in peril while trying to save one of his students from a ravenous creature.

Table of Contents:

• Foreword - essay by April Derleth
• The Lurker at the Threshold - [Cthulhu Mythos] - (1945) - novel by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Survivor - (1954) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• Wentworth's Day - (1957) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Peabody Heritage - (1957) - novelette by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Gable Window - (1957) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Ancestor - (1957) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Shadow Out of Space - (1957) - novelette by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Lamp of Alhazred - (1957) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Shuttered Room - (1959) - novelette by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Fisherman of Falcon Point - (1959) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• Witches' Hollow - (1962) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Shadow in the Attic - (1964) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Dark Brotherhood - (1966) - novelette by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Horror from the Middle Span - (1967) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• Innsmouth Clay - (1971) - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft
• The Watchers Out of Time - short story by August Derleth and H. P. Lovecraft

Table of Contents:

• Prima Belladonna - (1956)
• The Thousand Dreams of Stellavista - (1962)
• Cry Hope, Cry Fury! - (1967)
• Venus Smiles - (1957)
• Studio 5, The Stars - (1961)
• The Cloud-Sculptors of Coral D - (1967)
• Say Goodbye to the Wind - (1970)
• The Screen Game - (1963)

The year is 1976 and we are alive in an all-Catholic world. The Reformation never took place because Martin Luther made a deal with Rome and became Pope Martin I. The "alteration" proposed to Hubert Anvil, brilliant 10-year-old boy soprano, is that most feared by all males. Pope John XXIV wishes Hubert to preserve the purity of his voice to glorify the Church on a permanent basis; Hubert wishes to share his talent but he has some disquieting thoughts about Pope John's proposal.

When CIA agent Chuck Rittersdorf and his psychiatrist wife, Mary, file for divorce, they have no idea that in a few weeks they'll be shooting it out on Alpha III M2, the distant moon ruled by various psychotics liberated from a mental ward. Nor do they suspect that Chuck's new employer, the famous TV comedian Bunny Hentman, will also be there aiming his own laser gun.

How things came to such a darkly hilarious pass is the subject of Clans of the Alphane Moon, an astutely shrewd and acerbic tale that blurs all conventional distinctions between sanity and madness.

Named one of science fiction's 100 best books by noted genre editor David Pringle, Thomas M. Disch's On Wings of Song is at once allegory, social satire, political fable, and brilliantly written science fiction of the ultimate out-of-body experience. In Disch's dazzlingly imagined future America, Daniel Weinraub dreams of escaping the repressive midwest of the mid-twenty-first century through an electronic device with which the user takes flight into cyberspace when activated with a quasi-musical code called "The Symphonette." Daniel's adventures take him from Iowa's God-fearing police state and its "correctional" labor camps for the sinful to Manhattan's mean streets and "cyberspatial flight paths."

The Golden Helix is a selection of Sturgeon's own favorites from among his many beautiful and unabashedly romantic fantasies. Each story is prefaced with a brief discussion by the author. "A master storyteller certain to fascinate all sorts of readers..." -- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

Contents:

• Introduction (The Golden Helix) - (1979) - essay
• The Golden Helix - (1954) - novella
• The Man Who Lost the Sea - (1959) - shortstory
• And Now the News... - (1956) - novelette
• The Clinic - (1953) - shortstory
• ...And My Fear Is Great... - (1953) - novella
• The Ultimate Egoist - (1941) - novelette
• The Skills of Xanadu - (1956) - novelette
• The Dark Room - (1953) - novelette
• Yesterday Was Monday - (1941) - shortstory
• "I Say... Ernest..." - (1973) - essay

Anguished by hyper-lucidity, a disemboded science fiction writer taps out the letters "LENA THOMAS" and instantly finds himself "warped" to the female astronaut's domane of the 40th century. Lena and the writer's subconscious then develop a strange intimacy while they attempt to explore a mysterious "black galaxy." But theirs is a fleeting and rarified relationship, constantly hounded by greedy, homicidal bureaucrats committed to the expansion of bureaus and tormented by the idea of fragmentation.

Curiosity was discouraged in the Greene tribe. Its members lived out their lives in cramped Quarters, hacking away at the encroaching ponics. As to where they were - that was forgotten.

Roy Complain decides to find out. With the renegade priest Marapper, he moves into unmapped territory, where they make a series of discoveries which turn their universe upside-down...

Non-Stop is the classic SF novel of discovery and exploration; a brilliant evocation of a familiar setting seen through the eyes of a primitive.

What if you discovered that everything you knew about the world was a lie? That's the question at the heart of Philip K. Dick's futuristic novel about political oppression, the show business of politics and the sinister potential of the military industrial complex. This wry, paranoid thriller imagines a future in which the earth has been ravaged, and cities are burnt-out wastelands too dangerous for human life. Americans have been shipped underground, where they toil in crowded industrial ant hills and receive a steady diet of inspiring speeches from a President who never seems to age. Nick St. James, like the rest of the masses, believed in the words of his leaders. But that all changes when he travels to the surface - where what he finds is more shocking than anything he could possibly imagine.

Winner of both the Hugo and John W. Campbell awards for best novel, widely regarded as the premiere science fiction writer of his day, and the object of cult-like adoration from his legions of fans, Philip K. Dick has come to be seen in a literary light that defies classification in much the same way as Borges and Calvino. With breathtaking insight, he utlizes vividly unfamiliar worlds to evoke the hauntingly and hilariously familiar in our society and ourselves.

Where Paul Heisenberg had stood there was now a silver statue, dressed in the same white tunic, but reflecting from the surface that had, once been bare flesh all the light which had been carefully directed to compose the glowing nimbus.

The glow was even brighter now, and in the stillness which followed the interruption of the beautiful voice, there was a profundity which seemed terrible ...'

In front of 80,000 people Heisenberg, the new Messiah, the darling of the media, had gone into a trance of immeasurable depth. His body had gone into limbo, awaiting some future awakening, and it wasn't long before others had similarly gone into stasis and followed him.

Soon there were thousands fleeing through the aeons, congregating at meeting points hundreds of years ahead and then leaping off ever further into the future until finally they reached the very end of time.

But then where would they go? And where were the people they'd left behind?

In this biting satire, the Cold War may have ended, but the eastern and western governments never told their citizens. Instead they created an elaborate ruse, wherein each side comes up with increasingly outlandish doomsday weapons-weapons that don't work. But when aliens invade, the top designers of both sides have to come together to make a real doomsday device-if they don't kill each other first.

With its combination of romance, espionage, and alien invasion, The Zap Gun skewers the military-industrial complex in a way that's as relevant today as it was at the height of the Cold War.

A terrifying vision of the future from one of our most renowned writers - J G Ballard, author of 'Empire of the Sun' and 'Crash'.

Following the energy crisis of the late twentieth-century America has been abandoned. Now, a century later, a small group of European explorers returns to the deserted continent. But America is unrecognisable - the Bering Strait has been dammed and the whole continent has become a desert, populated by isolated natives and the bizarre remnants of a disintegrated culture. The expedition sets off from Manhattan on a cross-continent journey, through Holiday Inns and abandoned theme parks. They will uncover a shocking new power in the heart of Las Vegas in this unique vision of our world transformed.

A two-man mission to Venus fails and is aborted. When it returns, the Captain is missing and the other astronaut, Harry M. Evans, is unable to explain what has happened. Or, conversely, he has too many explications. His journal of the expedition -- compiled in the mental institution to which NASA has embarrassedly committed him -- offers contradictory stories: he murdered the Captain, mad Venusian invaders murdered the Captain, the Captain vanished, no one was murdered and the Captain has returned in Evans' guise....

As the explanations pyramid and as the supervising psychiatrist's increasingly desperate efforts to get a straight story fail, it becomes apparent that Evans's madness and his inability to explain what happened are expressions of humanity's incompetence at the enormity of space exploration.

Ian Watson's brilliant debut novel was one of the most significant publications in British SF in the 1970s. Intellectually bracing and grippingly written, it is the story of three experiments in linguistics, and is driven by a searching analysis of the nature of communication. Fiercely intelligent, energetic and challenging, it immediately established Watson as a writer of rare power and vision, and is now recognized as a modern classic.

Bob Shairp--a writer and dreamer--has agreed to be a guinea-pig in a military experiment to find out if his personality can be turned into data and stored on computer. But a computing error quickly destroys Shairp's physical body, leaving his mind stranded in an encoded world. Can the process be reversed?

An unusually brilliant and mind-stretching metaphysical quest from one of the most exciting talents in science fiction.

John Deacon uses hypnosis to help his patients reach altered states of consciousness. One of his subjects, Michael Peacocke, is unusually susceptible and in their first session together, Michael recalls a "close encounter"--in both senses of the term--with an alien. Deacon, skeptical of the story, dismisses it as an adolescent sexual fantasy. But then strange things begin to happen and Deacon is forced to reconsider. Could UFOs be symbols projected from the collective unconscious? Are they messages from the biomatrix? Does the mind have the ability to project objects and people that are physically real...yet somehow illusory?

A wonderfully fascinating, mind-bending voyage.

A careful selection of what the author considered was his most telling short work from the mid-Seventies.

Table of Contents:

• Author's Note - (1977) - essay by Brian W. Aldiss
• Last Orders - (1976)
• Creatures of Apogee - (1977)
• Within the Black Circle - (1975)
• Killing Off the Big Animals - (1975)
• What Are You Doing? Why Are You Doing It? - (1975)
• Enigma 2: Diagrams For Three Stories - (1974) - essay by Brian W. Aldiss
• The Girl in the Tau-Dream - (1974)
• The Immobility Crew - (1974)
• A Cultural Side-Effect - (1974)
• Live? Our Computers Will Do That for Us - (1974)
• The Monsters of Ingratitude IV - (1974)
• Waiting for the Universe to Begin - (1975)
• But Without Orifices - (1975)
• Aimez-Vous Holman Hunt? - (1975)
• Backwater - (1977)
• The Eternal Theme of Exile - (1973)
• All Those Enduring Old Charms - (1973)
• Nobody Spoke Or Waved Goodbye - (1973)
• The Expensive Delicate Ship - (1973)
• Carefully Observed Women - (1975)
• The Daffodil Returns the Smile - (1975)
• The Year of the Quiet Computer - (1975)
• Appearance of Life - (1976)
• Wired for Sound - (1974)
• Journey to the Heartland - (1976)

The story of an experiment gone wrong--a planet seeded with primitive bacterial, plant, and insect life forms, then forgotten until a spaceship crash-lands, stranding its crew. The crew must fight to survive in a savage nightmare world. From the Hugo Award-winning author, Murray Leinster.

A space vehicle from Earth's distant future is trapped in the 18th Century, lands in the Caribbean Sea, and it's crew boards the pirate ship Orinda. The unwitting pirate, Captain Fletcher, must cope with the uncanny problems posed by time-displacement, an alien "cabin boy," captives sentenced to walk the plank who drown but do not die, and an ominous battleship that had sneaked in from a differnt point in the galaxy.

How the "cabin boy" struggles to restore his ship, flight off the enemy battleship, and prevent Earth's history from being irrevocably changed, makes for a wonderful adventure that blends futuistic time-travel with the swashbuckling excitement of 18th-Century pirates.

Contents:

• 9 - The Moon Is Hell! - novel by John W. Campbell, Jr.
• 147 - The Elder Gods - (1973) - novella by John W. Campbell, Jr. and Arthur J. Burks

What would intelligent life-forms on another planet look like? Would they walk upright? Would they wear clothes? Or would they be hulking creatures on six legs that wallow in their own excrement?

Upon first contact with the Utod -- intelligent, pacifist beings who feel no pain -- mankind instantly views these aliens as animals because of their unhygienic customs. This leads to the slaughter, capture and dissection of the Utod. But when one explorer recognizes the intelligence behind their habits, he must reevaluate what it actually means to be "intelligent."

With a New Introduction from the Author!

In 1890 the Russian author Chekhov undertook an historic journey across Siberia to the convict island of Sakhalin. A hundred years later, in an isolated artist's retreat, a Soviet film unit prepares to commemorate his journey by using a technique that will cause their chosen actor to not only play the role of the playwright, but to believe that he is Chekhov. But the situations Mikhail acts out diverge wildly from known biographical facts when Chekhov hears of an explosion in the Tunguska region of Siberia. Yet the real Tunguska explosion occurred in 1908 - so how could Chekhov have possible heard of it in 1890?

The god Ptath is flung into the far future by a deadly rival and given the mind of a 20th century man. Stranded in this alien world, he must fight to regain his powers before the rival goddess sends the world spinning into chaos and darkness.

Truro Daine, a dangerous criminal who has been confined to imprisonment, escapes his incarceration by inventing a computer-generated dream world, which he rules as the Night Mayor.

This first novel is a highly entertaining and imaginative journey between fact, fiction, and fantasy in the depths of a city where it is always two-thirty in the morning and always raining. "The conventions of film noir are lovingly exploited in this entertaining novel".--New York Times Book Review.

Originally appeared in Ace Double D-31 (1953).

Did you ever hear of the Inter-Time Society for Psychological Adjustments? Well, neither had Morton Cargill in 1953 when he accidentally killed a girl. A year later that very girl turned up, apparently alive, and announced that the mysterious society had condemned him to death! Cargill's astounding adventures began when he escaped the execution chamber to find himself in the far future. Three conflicting societies were hunting for him, to use him in their own desperate schemes. There were the Floaters, a nation of aerial vagabonds. There were the Tweeners, who dreamed of world conquest. And finally, interwoven through everything, were the sinister figures of the Shadow Men-supermen without visible substance.

The government ordered it built: a thinking machine that could foresee catastrophe and eliminate human error. Research trainee Joe Carter sees another possibility--create a machine that will make ordinary people telepathic--and immortal.

This Galaxy Novel is available for free on the Internet Archives.

A classic adventure from a Sci-Fi Hall-of-Famer. The only connecting links between the galaxy's countless colonized new worlds are the Med ships--lone starships each carrying one man and one beast. Roving the uncharted vastness of deep space, Calhoun and his tormal are one such pair, and at each planetfall, they fight not only plagues and epidemics, but humans bent on death and destruction.

Contents:

• 3 - The Mutant Weapon - [Med Service - 2] - (1959) - novel
• 101 - Plague on Kryder II - [Med Service] - (1964) - novella
• 155 - Ribbon in the Sky - [Med Service] - (1957) - novelette
• 203 - Quarantine World - [Med Service] - (1966) - novella

This novel is set in a future world where the equipment of ordinary, everyday life has become indestructible; there are everlasting lightbulbs and infallible cars, but no-one knows where they have come from.

First published in 1953, this most celebrated of Sturgeon's works won the International Fantasy Award, as has been touted as "a masterpiece of provocative storytelling" (The Herald Tribune).

A group of remarkable social outcasts band together for survival and discover their combined powers renders them superhuman.

One of the finest writers in the golden age of science fiction--and inventor of the intricatley plotted form of SF known as the "space opera"--offers the story of a flawed hero possessing almost superhuman strength. When his wife is kidnapped, war veteran Jim Pendrake embarks upon a search that takes him to a lost colony on the moon--and a secret, sinister society.

Also published as Moonbeast.

A thrilling tale of a struggle to save Earth from Armageddon, written by one of the crucial authors of the Golden Age of Science Fiction. Disaster is quickly approaching and the only ones who know of it are Allison Stephens and a group of ancient sinister aliens. Now the aliens plan to abandon Earth and seek a new home.

Also published as "The Mating Cry" and "The Undercover Aliens"

En route to an interplanetary research mission, a scientist is abducted by a strange, shadowy race of aliens and taken to a previously uncharted planet, a storehouse of information that would be invaluable--even to an Earth so advanced that time travel allows goblins, dinosaurs, even Shakespeare to coexist.

Dr. Walter T. Goodwin is a botanist on an expedition to examine the varieties of a certain flower which grows in the Middle East. Starting from Tehran in Persia (Iran) Goodwin plans to wander through several countries until he comes to the Himalayas in Tibet. While in a valley in the Himalayas Goodwin comes upon Richard Drake, the son of an old friend who has recently died. Liking one another they decide to combine their expeditions and see where fate leads them. One evening they witness the light of the setting sun behaving oddly. Goodwin offers the explanation that it is the result of some unusual atmospheric effect, but Drake remarks that it almost seemed to be orchestrated by some intelligent force. That night the two hear strange noises, but do not see the source of the sound. The next day they come upon what seems to be a huge footprint from a creature of great weight. Later the same day the two explorers come upon Martin and Ruth Ventnor hiding in the ruins of a stone fortress. This brother and sister are trying to escape from soldiers who fantastically seem to be a throwback to time of Darius, complete with armor, swords and bows and arrows. The four flee from these ancient Persian worriers but are almost captured, when, appearing out of nowhere, an other-worldly woman and a shape-changing metal monster come to their aid. The soldiers are gruesomely annihilated. The strange woman's name is Norhala. Is Norhala the four's savior, or is she an even more dangerous enemy? Even more, what is the nature and secret of the metal monster?

David Marin risks his career to defend Wade Trask, a scientist being tried for sedition, but when Trask switches their brains, Marin finds himself branded an enemy of the state.

Earth: expensive, elite graveyard to the galaxy. Ravaged 10,000 years earlier by war, Earth was reclaimed by its space-dwelling offspring as a planet of landscaping and tombstones. None of them fully human, Fletcher, Cynthia, and Elmer journey through this dead world, discovering human traits and undertaking a quest to rebuild a human world on Earth.

In 1951 John Wyndham published his novel The Day of the Triffids to moderate acclaim. Fifty-two years later, this horrifying story is a science fiction classic, touted by The Times (London) as having "all the reality of a vividly realized nightmare."

Bill Masen, bandages over his wounded eyes, misses the most spectacular meteorite shower England has ever seen. Removing his bandages the next morning, he finds masses of sightless people wandering the city. He soon meets Josella, another lucky person who has retained her sight, and together they leave the city, aware that the safe, familiar world they knew a mere twenty-four hours before is gone forever.

But to survive in this post-apocalyptic world, one must survive the Triffids, strange plants that years before began appearing all over the world. The Triffids can grow to over seven feet tall, pull their roots from the ground to walk, and kill a man with one quick lash of their poisonous stingers. With society in shambles, they are now poised to prey on humankind. Wyndham chillingly anticipates bio-warfare and mass destruction, fifty years before their realization, in this prescient account of Cold War paranoia.

In less than a century, 50 percent of the human race fled the aged and autocratic Terra, settling wherever they could establish a world of their own choosing. The following centuries result in hundreds of independent new civilizations--too independent for an ambitious Terran government out to conquer an empire.

The strange but beautiful purple blossoms now grew wild in his backyard. One day Brad Carter tripped and fell into an alternate world, a world peopled by these very flowers.

Theodore Sturgeon's dark and foreboding look at the vampire myth was an instant classic when originally published in 1956. When George Smith is arrested for assaulting a senior officer, a military psychiatrist is assigned to the case. The secret of George's past is unearthed, and a history of blood lust and murder. Innovatively told through letters, interviews, and traditional narrative, Some of Your Blood effectively portrays the tragic upbringing of George Smith to his attempts at a stable life and the great love of his life to his inevitable downfall. Millipede Press is proud to present this masterpiece of macabre literature in a brand new edition.

After several years' absence and the loss of his memory, Andrew Blake returns to earth only to find himself accused of being a werewolf.

Poet, actor, playwright, chess expert, master of fantastic fiction. Fritz Leiber was a true Renaissance Man. His writing crossed all boundaries, from horror to sword and sorcery. This book goes deep into Leiber's underrated science fiction oeuvre. It's a comprehensive, page- turning cache that captures Leiber's thoroughly original style- - altogether mystical, beautiful, and sometimes disturbing.

"The Foxholes of Mars" is a literary assault: a frightening, nitro- fueled tale of war on Mars, with one soldier questioning the futility and purpose of the battle against bug- eyed aliens- - a distant mirror- image of our own times. "Space- Time for Springers" is told through the glaring eyes of Gummitch, a cat who happens to possess a genius IQ and a voracious appetite for scientific knowledge. "Night Passage" takes us on a dark journey into a Las Vegas where Earthlings and extra- terrestrials mingle and gamble- - and where one man takes a moonlit ride with a mystery woman from Mercury, tailed by some very scary pursuers. "The Mutant's Brother" is a malevolent mix of horror and SF, a tale of identical twins who each carry a frightful chromosome. One of them is also a monstrous serial killer. The literally chilling "A Pail of Air" takes place in an underground nest, where a family fights to survive in a sunless, moonless, post- apocalyptic world where even helium and carbon dioxide become crawling, shapeless threats.

Fritz Leiber was a storyteller and prophet for the ages. His work will never be dated or irrelevant. Treat this book like a crystal ball. These pages chronicle the world to come. You've been warned.

Fritz Leiber (1910-1992) was an American writer of fantasy, horror, and science fiction. He is regarded as one of the fathers of sword and sorcery fantasy. He excelled in all fields of speculative fiction, writing award- winning work in fantasy, horror, and science fiction.

Table of Contents:

• Yesterday House - 1952
• The Snowbank Orbit - 1962
• Wanted - An Enemy - 1945
• The Ship Sails at Midnight - 1950
• The Foxholes of Mars - 1952
• Far Reach to Cygnus - 1965
• Femmequin 973 - 1957
• Mysterious Doings in the Metropolitan Museum - 1974
• The Big Trek - 1957
• Space - 1958
• Moon Duel - 1965
• Poor Superman - 1951
• Night Passage - 1975
• The Mutant's Brother - 1943
• Coming Attraction - 1950
• The Black Ewe - 1950
• Bullet with His Name - 1958
• Mariana - 1960
• Sanity - 1944
• Time in the Round - 1957
• Ship of Shadows - 1969
• The Good New Days - 1965
• Catch That Zeppelin! - 1975
• Deadly Moon - 1960
• The Man Who Was Married to Space and Time - 1979
• Black Glass - 1978
• Friends and Enemies - 1957
• A Rite of Spring- 1977
• America the Beautiful - 1970
• A Pail of Air - 1951
• The Winter Flies - 1967
• Time Fighter - 1957
• The Far Reach of Fritz Leiber - essay by John Pelan

What you're holding in your hands is part of a science fiction revolution. James Patrick Kelly is much more than an award-winning author. He's an SF visionary. His writing has redefined the cyberpunk genre, with a uniquely edgy, outré style. This book is a literal treasure trove of Kelly's most memorable stories and novellas. Here you'll see classic science fiction blended with New Age technology--and an unparalleled understanding of human psychology.

"Think Like a Dinosaur" takes us on a troubling, sometimes terrifying interstellar journey, as we track a young woman's transformation into an alien life-form, with some unexpected results. "The Last Judgment" is a startlingly original meld of noir and cyberpunk, as a tough private eye gets embroiled in a world dominated by a race of robots. Kelly also adds some murderous extra-terrestrials to the mix. In "Ten To The Sixteenth To One," it's 1962, and a young science fiction fan is shoring up his mundane world with comic books and pulp magazines--until he's visited by a creature that will alter the fate of the human race. "Daemon" is a piece of first-person fiction, in which Kelly himself is the lead character, attending a book signing and confronted by a fan from Hell. In "Going Deep," Kelly explores teen-age rebellion in outer space, with a compelling, complex, and cloned heroine whose talent for mind-melds makes texting look antiquated. "Mr. Boy" is Peter Cage, who's been surgically altered to remain forever young. Ever wish you were twelve years old again? Eternal youth isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Unplug your mobile devices and plug into James Patrick Kelly's vision of our future. Your head will never be the same again.

James Patrick Kelly has won the Hugo, Nebula and Locus awards; his fiction has been translated into twenty-two languages. He writes a column on the internet for Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine and is on the faculty of the Stonecoast Creative Writing MFA Program at the University of Southern Maine.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction by Robert Reed
• Think Like a Dinosaur - (1995)
• Crow - (1984)
• St Theresa of the Aliens - (1984)
• Rat - (1986)
• Daemon - (1987)
• Lovestory - (1998)
• Itsy Bitsy Spider - (1997)
• 10¹⁶ to 1 - (1999)
• Feel the Zaz - (2000)
• Undone - (2001)
• The Pyramid of Amirah - (2002)
• Men Are Trouble - (2004)
• The Wreck of the Godspeed - (2004)
• The Last Judgment - (2012)
• Going Deep - (2009)
• Death Therapy - (1978)
• Homo Neuter - (1981)
• The Biggest - (2012)
• Solstice - (1985)
• Afterword by John Pelan

The late Richard Wilson's fifty-year career began with "Retribution" in Oswald Train's zine Science Adventure Stories and finished in 1988 with "The Name on the Book" in Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone Magazine.

Wilson's writing was particularly noteworthy for its consistently high level of quality. Whether working at novel length or with short stories, Wilson was incapable of writing anything less than professional, highly polished work.

This volume collects nearly two dozen of his best stories, ranging from "The Hoaxters," "The Inhabited," and "Those Idiots from Earth" to his brilliant posthumously-published novella "At the Sign of the Boar's Head Nebula," originally slated for The Last Dangerous Visions and kindly made available to us by Harlan Ellison.

"At the Sign of the Boar's Head Nebula" is considered by several knowledgeable critics of the genre to be the finest single work that Mr. Wilson produced. It is in remarkably good company, joined with two other powerful novellas, "The Far King" and "The Nineteenth-Century Spaceship," giving Richard Wilson a fair claim to being one of the founding fathers of steampunk.

Along with the stories, this collection includes several highly regarded novelettes, including the Nebula Award-winning "Mother to the World," "The Story Writer," "Gone Past," "If A Man Answers," "It's Cold Outside," "A Man Spekith," and "See Me Not." Rounding out the book are a selection of the author's finest short pieces, making this a cornerstone volume for any serious collection of modern science fiction.

Richard Wilson (1920-1987), a member of the near-legendary Futurians, is considered by many to have been one of the most consistently excellent writers of science fiction. A journalist by trade, Wilson brought to his fiction a crisp economy of style and a precise language in a field often criticized for overly-florid prose. With stories running the gamut from the humorous to bone-chilling horror and everything in between, Richard Wilson could quite accurately be said to have written something for everyone.

In the 1950s, Kate Wilhelm began publishing science fiction after she read a story in a magazine and said, "I can do better than that." She quickly proved that she could do better, selling "The Mile-Long Spaceship" to John W. Campbell at Astounding. "You have an easy, pleasing and readable style, one that would, moreover, be a marked change in science fiction," John W. Campbell wrote to her in 1957. Soon she was invited to attend a Milford writers conference in Pennsylvania and there she met Damon Knight, whom she eventually married.

Working with Knight as he edited his Orbit anthology series, Kate Wilhelm came into her own as a writer, publishing stories that grounded their extrapolations in strong naturalistic depictions of the here-and-now. In tales such as "Ladies and Gentlemen, This Is Your Crisis" and "Baby, You Were Great," she demonstrated her facility with speculation and science-fictional ideas, while tales like "The Village" and "The Funeral" spoke with great relevance to social and political matters. She received a Nebula Award in 1969 for "The Planners," one of her many well-crafted stories of scientific inquiry.

Kate Wilhelm once said she didn't set out to cross genre lines with her fiction, she just had a blind spot when it came to genre boundaries. Consequently, her stories often blend elements of mystery, crime, and the supernatural with the scientific rigor of science fiction, and readers never know what to expect when they start to read stories like "The Gorgon Field" or "The Day of the Sharks" or "The Look Alike." There's no telling where these characters will take you.

Many of Kate Wilhelm's classics tell the tale of a young woman drawn into a web of scientific intrigue, and here you'll find "The Winter Beach," "The Fullness of Time," and "The Bird Cage," prime examples of this storytelling mode.

The depth of characterization and the psychological insight in stories like "The Downstairs Room" and "The Infinity Box" firmly established her at the forefront of her generation. The San Francisco Chronicle dubbed her "One of the masters of psychological fiction in America."

Over the next five decades, Wilhelm went on to fulfill the promise -- many times over -- of her first wave of top-flight work. With forty-one stories across two volumes, these books amply show the breadth and range of her fiction... and the power of her storytelling, too.

With forty-one stories (reprinted from a wide variety of sources), a perceptive introduction by Jack Dann, and an informative afterword by editor John Pelan, these two volumes are troves of reading pleasure for everyone lucky enough to get their hands on them.

In the field for over six decades, Kate Wilhelm carved out a remarkable career highlighted not only by the quality of her own work, but by her tireless efforts to give back to the field and smooth the way for those who would follow. Equally well-known as an author of mysteries, she still found time to revisit the genre of speculative fiction. She also founded the Clarion Workshop with her husband Damon Knight and writer Robin Scott Wilson.

In the 1950s, Kate Wilhelm began publishing science fiction after she read a story in a magazine and said, "I can do better than that." She quickly proved that she could do better, selling "The Mile-Long Spaceship" to John W. Campbell at Astounding. "You have an easy, pleasing and readable style, one that would, moreover, be a marked change in science fiction," John W. Campbell wrote to her in 1957. Soon she was invited to attend a Milford writers conference in Pennsylvania and there she met Damon Knight, whom she eventually married.

Working with Knight as he edited his Orbit anthology series, Kate Wilhelm came into her own as a writer, publishing stories that grounded their extrapolations in strong naturalistic depictions of the here-and-now. In tales such as "Ladies and Gentlemen, This Is Your Crisis" and "Baby, You Were Great," she demonstrated her facility with speculation and science-fictional ideas, while tales like "The Village" and "The Funeral" spoke with great relevance to social and political matters. She received a Nebula Award in 1969 for "The Planners," one of her many well-crafted stories of scientific inquiry.

Kate Wilhelm once said she didn't set out to cross genre lines with her fiction, she just had a blind spot when it came to genre boundaries. Consequently, her stories often blend elements of mystery, crime, and the supernatural with the scientific rigor of science fiction, and readers never know what to expect when they start to read stories like "The Gorgon Field" or "The Day of the Sharks" or "The Look Alike." There's no telling where these characters will take you.

Many of Kate Wilhelm's classics tell the tale of a young woman drawn into a web of scientific intrigue, and here you'll find "The Winter Beach," "The Fullness of Time," and "The Bird Cage," prime examples of this storytelling mode.

The depth of characterization and the psychological insight in stories like "The Downstairs Room" and "The Infinity Box" firmly established her at the forefront of her generation. The San Francisco Chronicle dubbed her "One of the masters of psychological fiction in America."

Over the next five decades, Wilhelm went on to fulfill the promise -- many times over -- of her first wave of top-flight work. With forty-one stories across two volumes, these books amply show the breadth and range of her fiction... and the power of her storytelling, too.

With forty-one stories (reprinted from a wide variety of sources), a perceptive introduction by Jack Dann, and an informative afterword by editor John Pelan, these two volumes are troves of reading pleasure for everyone lucky enough to get their hands on them.

In the field for over six decades, Kate Wilhelm carved out a remarkable career highlighted not only by the quality of her own work, but by her tireless efforts to give back to the field and smooth the way for those who would follow. Equally well-known as an author of mysteries, she still found time to revisit the genre of speculative fiction. She also founded the Clarion Workshop with her husband Damon Knight and writer Robin Scott Wilson.

"Sheckley was a fantasist not entirely unknown to the public. For fifty years he had pursued his calling, inventing worlds both characteristic of the genre and unique to himself. From his brain had come planets of pleasure and worlds of pain. Nor had he neglected the multitudinous possibilities between."

So wrote Robert Sheckley in 2005, and so it was. And oh, those possibilities between!

From his first published work of fiction in 1952 until his death in 2005, Robert Sheckley gave us more than two hundred short stories, along with dozens of novels. He is generally known as one of the great humorists in the science fiction field -- his comedies are sometimes wry and often gonzo. They were very influential (Douglas Adams's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy shows signs of Sheckley's sway) and you'll find them in fine form in such stories as "The Day the Aliens Came," "What Is Life?," and "The Two Sheckleys."

But Robert Sheckley's short fiction did more than just make us laugh. His stories, scared, thrilled, amused, excited, beguiled, inveigled, alarmed, charmed, and disarmed readers of science fiction anthologies and magazines for the better part of a century... and with this collection, they'll continue to do so.

Robert Sheckley wrote frequently of everyman heroes caught in a world they don't understand, and you'll find honest, hard-working joes in stories here like "The Altar," "A Ticket to Transai," and "The Mountain without a Name."

But he also liked to explore mythology and the nature of heroism, which you'll find in full force in such stories as "Agamemnon's Run," "The Quijote Robot," and "The Never-Ending Western Movie." Two other topics that interested Sheckley were the ways in which humans interact with their machines, and the ways in which humans interact with each other. Both themes are on grand display in stories like "Watchbird," "The Girls and Nugent Miller," and "Seventh Victim."

With thirty-one of his best stories -- including the short novels Dramocles and Minotaur Maze -- this collection is equally good for readers revisiting old friends and for those discovering Sheckley's work for the first time. From the dangers of courtship to the perils of the surveillance state, from the troubles with utopia to the meaning of life, these stories offer rewards for every reader.

Robert Sheckley was born in Brooklyn in 1928 and began publishing fiction in 1951. His short stories appeared in magazines such as Galaxy, Fantasy & Science Fiction, and Playboy. He published more than twenty novels and edited Omni magazine. His stories were adapted for television and film many times, most notably in the movies Freejack and The Tenth Victim. He received the Author Emeritus career honor from the Science Fiction Writers of America in 2001. He died in 2005.

In 1972, Jack Dann was a law school student and aspiring writer who had published stories in Fantastic when a story he had sent to Damon Knight for his famed Orbit anthology series was published. These early stories eventually led to a Nebula Award for his novella "Da Vinci Rising" in 1997 and to increasing acclaim as one of science fiction and fantasy's most original writers.

Jack Dann's imagined worlds are so rich in detail as to become hallucinatory; a reader doesn't so much peruse a Dann story as experience it. In "The Dybbuk Dolls," the owner of a sex shop in a future ghetto finds himself involved with weird customers, a political feud, alien dolls, and a number of complicated and often hilarious events. "Jumping the Road" and "Timetipping" also draw on Dann's Jewish heritage and his gift for humor, while "Amnesia," a darker tale in which a man searching for his dead wife plugs into a dying man's mind, demonstrates Dann's range, as does "Blind Shemmy," a story of gamblers playing for the highest of stakes.

In "Bad Medicine," a man searching for meaning in his life embarks on a spiritual quest with a Native American shaman, while the Ditmar Award-winning "The Diamond Pit," an homage to F. Scott Fitzgerald set in the 1920s, is an adventure story of an aviator shot down and confined by an eccentric millionaire in a luxurious prison from which he and other confined flyers must escape.

All of the stories in this volume reveal Dann's ability to draw the reader completely into his settings and the minds of his characters; even when we're not quite sure of where we are going, we are compelled to go along for the ride. John Kessel calls Dann's fiction "stories of transcendence, spiritual exploration, harrowing psychological transformations. Rebirth and conceptual breakthrough. And yet they are grounded in a developed sense of personal relationships, the rag and bone shop of the human heart." Set in places as diverse as Renaissance Italy, upstate New York, near-future Paris, Nazi Germany, modern-day Athens, and Hollywood in the 1950s, here are compulsively involving stories by a master storyteller.

Jack Dann's highly praised novels include Junction, The Man Who Melted, The Silent, Counting Coup, Shadows in the Stone, and the international bestseller The Memory Cathedral.

He has also been honored with the Nebula Award, the World Fantasy Award (twice), the Australian Aurealis Award (three times), the Chronos Award, the Darrell Award for Best Mid-South Novel, the Ditmar Award (five times), the Peter McNamara Achievement Award and also the Peter McNamara Convenors' Award for Excellence, the Shirley Jackson Award, and the Premios Gilgames de Narrativa Fantastica award. Having grown up in the United States, he now lives in Australia with his partner, author and anthologist Janeen Webb. The complete contents appear below. Note: Jack Dann wrote two stories called "Visitors." They are completely different stories. That is why you see the title listed twice in the table of contents below.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction: Meet Jack Dann (by George Zebrowski)
• Going Under (1981)
• The Dybbuk Dolls (1975)
• A Quiet Revolution for Death (1978)
• Camps (1979)
• Amnesia (1981)
• Fairy Tale (1981)
• Blind Shemmy (1983)
• Bad Medicine (1984)
• Tea (1988)
• Kaddish (1989)
• Jumping the Road (1992)
• Voices (1991)
• Timetipping (1975)
• Da Vinci Rising (1995)
• Marilyn (2000)
• The Diamond Pit (2001)
• Trainspotting in Winesburg (2016)
• Visitors (1987)
• Visitors (1977)
• The Carbon Dreamer (2019)
• Tattoos (1986)
• The Island of Time (2013)
• Jubilee (1995)
• Mohammed's Angel (2009)
• Café Culture (2007)
• Waiting for Medusa (2013)
• Ting-a-Ling (2001)
• The Confession of a Stalker (Afterword by John Pelan)

Checklist of Sturgeon's fiction and nonfiction published in books and periodicals (including fanzines) and annotated listing of secondary material.

Clifford D. Simak (1904-88) was a prolific science-fiction/fantasy author and, in addition, an editor for the Minneapolis Star and Tribune Newspapers for over 36 years.

This informative bibliography is an extremely helpful tool for students, researchers and the curious admires of his many highly regarded novels and stories.

An informative introduction and an interview with the author add greatly to the detailed listings of Simak's published works.

When asked by Muriel Becker which of his stories pleased him more that others, Simak answered "A Choice of Gods" - his 1971 fictional rumination of the future of mankind.

Street magician Missy Masters inherited more than the usual genetic cocktail from her estranged grandfather. She also got his preternatural control of shadow and his legacy as the vigilante hero, Mr Mystic. Problem is, being a pulp hero takes more than a good fedora and a knack for witty banter, and Missy lacks the one thing Mr Mystic had: experience. Determined to live up to her birthright, Missy journeys to China to seek the aid of Lung Huang, the ancient master who once guided her grandfather.

Lung Huang isn't quite as ancient as Missy expected, and a romantic interlude embroils her in the politics of Lung Huang and his siblings, the nine dragon-guardians of creation. When Lung Di-Lung Huang's brother and mortal enemy-raises a magical barrier that cuts off China from the rest of the world, it falls to the new Mr. Mystic to prove herself by taking down the barrier.

As Missy prepares to confront Lung Di, she faces a tough decision: remain loyal to Lung Huang and see China destroyed, or side with the bad guy and save the world.

The line between enemy and ally is thinner than a shadow's edge.

Ever since she saved the spirit guardians of China by selling out to her worst enemy, Missy Masters -- a.k.a. the pulp hero Mr. Mystic -- has been laying low. But when knights serving the Conclave of Shadow steal secret technology from a museum exhibit on the Argent Aces, everyone looks to Mr. Mystic for help. If Missy doesn't want her masquerade blown, she'd better track down the thieves, and fast.

But stolen tech turns out to be the least of her problems. Recent events have upset the balance of power in the Shadow Realms, removing the barriers that once held the ravenous Voidlands in check. Their spread threatens destruction in the mortal realm as well... and only the Conclave stands ready to push them back.

In a world of shadow, telling friends from enemies is easier said than done. But if she wants to save San Francisco, Missy will have to decide who to trust. Including her own instincts, which tell her that something is stalking her with murder in mind...

Under his own name and numerous pseudonyms, John Brunner (1934-1995) was one of the most prolific and influential science fiction authors of the late twentieth century. During his exemplary career, the British author wrote with a stamina matched by only a few other great science fiction writers and with a literary quality of even fewer, importing modernist techniques into his novels and stories and probing every major theme of his generation: robotics, racism, drugs, space exploration, technological warfare, and ecology.

In this first intensive review of Brunner's life and works, Jad Smith carefully demonstrates how Brunner's much-neglected early fiction laid the foundation for his classic Stand on Zanzibar and other major works such as The Jagged Orbit, The Sheep Look Up, and The Shockwave Rider. Making extensive use of Brunner's letters, columns, speeches, and interviews published in fanzines, Smith approaches Brunner in the context of markets and trends that affected many writers of the time, including Brunner's uneasy association with the "New Wave" of science fiction in the 1960s and '70s.

This landmark study shows how Brunner's attempts to cross-fertilize the American pulp tradition with British scientific romance complicated the distinctions between genre and mainstream fiction and between hard and soft science fiction and helped carve out space for emerging modes such as cyberpunk, slipstream, and biopunk.

The leading figure in the development of cyberpunk, William Gibson (born in 1948) crafted works in which isolated humans explored near-future worlds of ubiquitous and intrusive computer technology and cybernetics. This volume is the first comprehensive examination of the award-winning author of the seminal novel Neuromancer (and the other books in the Sprawl trilogy, Count Zero and Mona Lisa Overdrive), as well as other acclaimed novels including recent bestsellers Pattern Recognition, Spook Country, and Zero History. Renowned scholar Gary Westfahl draws upon extensive research to provide a compelling account of Gibson's writing career and his lasting influence in the science fiction world.

Delving into numerous science fiction fanzines that the young Gibson contributed to and edited, Westfahl delivers new information about his childhood and adolescence. He describes for the first time more than eighty virtually unknown Gibson publications from his early years, including articles, reviews, poems, cartoons, letters, and a collaborative story. The book also documents the poems, articles, and introductions that Gibson has written for various books, and its discussions are enriched by illuminating comments from various print and online interviews. The works that made Gibson famous are also featured, as Westfahl performs extended analyses of Gibson's ten novels and nineteen short stories. Lastly, the book presents a new interview with Gibson in which the author discusses his correspondence with author Fritz Leiber, his relationship with the late scholar Susan Wood, his attitudes toward critics, his overall impact on the field of science fiction, and his recently completed screenplay and forthcoming novel.

Gregory Benford is perhaps best known as the author of Benford's law of controversy: "Passion is inversely proportional to the amount of real information available." That maxim is a quotation from Timescape, Benford's Nebula and Campbell Award-winning 1980 novel, which established his work as an exemplar of "hard science fiction," dedicated to working out the consequences of modern science rather than substituting pseudoscience for fantasy. An astrophysicist by training and profession, Benford published more than twenty novels, over one hundred short stories, some fifty essays, and myriad articles that display both his scientific rigor as well as a recognition of literary traditions.

In this study, George Slusser explores the extraordinary, seemingly inexhaustible display of creative energy in Gregory Benford's life and work. By identifying direct sources and making parallels with other works and writers, Slusser reveals the vast scope of Benford's knowledge, both of literature and of the major scientific and philosophical issues of our time. Slusser also discusses Benford's numerous scientific articles and nonfiction books and includes a new interview with Benford.

Greg Egan (1961- ) publishes works that challenge readers with rigorous, deeply-informed scientific speculation. He unapologetically delves into mathematics, physics, and other disciplines in his prose, putting him in the vanguard of the hard science fiction renaissance of the 1990s.

A working physicist and engineer, Karen Burnham is uniquely positioned to provide an in-depth study of Egan's science-heavy oeuvre. Her survey of the author's career covers novels like Permutation City and Schild's Ladder and the Hugo Award-winning novella "Oceanic," analyzing how Egan used cutting-edge scientific theory to explore ethical questions and the nature of humanity. As Burnham shows, Egan's collected works constitute a bold artistic statement: that narratives of science are equal to those of poetry and drama, and that science holds a place in the human condition as exalted as religion or art.

The volume includes a rare interview with the famously press-shy Egan covering his works, themes, intellectual interests, and thought processes.

As much as any individual, Ray Bradbury brought science fiction's ideas into the mainstream. Yet he transcended the genre in both form and popularity, using its trappings to explore timely social concerns and the kaleidoscope of human experience while in the process becoming one of America's most beloved authors.

David Seed follows Bradbury's long career from the early short story masterpieces through his work in a wide variety of broadcast and film genres to the influential cultural commentary he spread via essays, speeches, and interviews. Mining Bradbury's classics and hard-to-find archival, literary, and cultural materials, Seed analyzes how the author's views on technology, authoritarianism, and censorship affected his art; how his Midwest of dream and dread brought his work to life; and the ways film and television influenced his creative process and visually-oriented prose style. The result is a passionate statement on Bradbury's status as an essential literary writer deserving of a place in the cultural history of his time.

Readers have awarded Lois McMaster Bujold four Hugo Awards for Best Novel, a number matched only by Robert Heinlein. Her Vorkosigan series redefined space opera with its emotional depth and explorations of themes such as bias against the disabled, economic exploitation, and the role of women in society.

Acclaimed science fiction scholar Edward James traces Bujold's career, showing how Bujold emerged from fanzine culture to win devoted male and female readers despite working in genres -- military SF, space opera -- perceived as solely by and for males. Devoted to old-school ideas such as faith in humanity and the desire to probe and do good in the universe, Bujold simultaneously subverted genre conventions and experimented with forms that led her in bold creative directions. As James shows, her iconic hero Miles Vorkosigan -- unimposing, physically impaired, self-conscious to a fault -- embodied Bujold's thematic concerns. The sheer humanity of her characters, meanwhile, gained her a legion of fans eager to provide her with feedback, expand her vision through fan fiction, and follow her into fantasy.

One of science fiction's undisputed grandmasters, Frederik Pohl built an astonishing career that spanned more than seven decades. Along the way he won millions of readers and seemingly as many awards while producing novels, short stories, and essays that left a profound mark on the genre.

In this first-of-its-kind study, Michael R. Page traces Pohl's journey as an author but also uncovers his role as a transformative figure who shaped the genre as a literary agent, book editor, and in Gardner Dozois' words, "quite probably the best SF magazine editor who ever lived."

Alfred Bester's classic short stories and the canonical novel The Stars My Destination made him a science fiction legend. Fans and scholars praise him as a genre-bending pioneer and cyberpunk forefather. Writers like Neil Gaiman and William Gibson celebrate his prophetic vision and stylistic innovations.

Jad Smith traces the career of the unlikeliest of SF icons. Winner of the first Hugo Award for The Demolished Man, Bester also worked in comics, radio, and TV, and his intermittent SF writing led some critics to brand him a dabbler. In the 1960s, however, New Wave writers championed his work, and his reputation grew. Smith follows Bester's journey from consummate outsider to an artist venerated for foundational works that influenced the New Wave and cyberpunk revolutions. He also explores the little-known roots of a wayward journey fueled by curiosity, disappointment with the SF mainstream, and an artist's determination to go his own way.

"I began writing about power because I had so little," Octavia E. Butler once said. Butler's life as an African American woman--an alien in American society and among science fiction writers -- informed the powerful works that earned her an ardent readership and acclaim both inside and outside science fiction.

Gerry Canavan offers a critical and holistic consideration of Butler's career. Drawing on Butler's personal papers, Canavan tracks the false starts, abandoned drafts, tireless rewrites, and real-life obstacles that fed Butler's frustrations and launched her triumphs. Canavan departs from other studies to approach Butler first and foremost as a science fiction writer working within, responding to, and reacting against the genre's particular canon.

The result is an illuminating study of how an essential SF figure shaped themes, unconventional ideas, and an unflagging creative urge into brilliant works of fiction.

Finalist for Hugo Award for Best Related Work

The 1987 publication of Iain M. Banks's Consider Phlebas helped trigger the British renaissance of radical hard science fiction and influenced a generation of New Space Opera masters. The thirteen SF novels that followed inspired an avid fandom and intense intellectual engagement while Banks's mainstream books vaulted him to the top of the Scottish literary scene.

Paul Kincaid has written the first study of Iain M. Banks to explore the confluence of his SF and literary techniques and sensibilities. As Kincaid shows, the two powerful aspects of Banks's work flowed into each other, blurring a line that critics too often treat as clear-cut. Banks's gift for black humor and a honed skepticism regarding politics and religion found expression even as he orchestrated the vast, galaxy-spanning vistas in his novels of The Culture.

In examining Banks's entire SF oeuvre, Kincaid unlocks the set of ideas Banks drew upon, ideas that spoke to an unusually varied readership that praised him as a visionary and reveled in the distinctive character of his works. Entertaining and broad in scope, Iain M. Banks offers new insights on one of the most admired figures in contemporary science fiction.

Prophetic short stories and apocalyptic novels like The Crystal World made J. G. Ballard a foundational figure in the British New Wave. Rejecting the science fiction of rockets and aliens, he explored an inner space of humanity informed by psychiatry and biology and shaped by Surrealism. Later in his career, Ballard's combustible plots and violent imagery spurred controversy--even legal action--while his autobiographical 1984 war novel Empire of the Sun brought him fame. D. Harlan Wilson offers the first career-spanning analysis of an author who helped steer SF in new, if startling, directions. Here was a writer committed to moral ambiguity, one who drowned the world and erected a London high-rise doomed to descend into savagery--and coolly picked apart the characters trapped within each story. Wilson also examines Ballard's methods, his influence on cyberpunk, and the ways his fiction operates within the sphere of our larger culture and within SF itself.

Already renowned for his science fiction and scientific nonfiction, Arthur C. Clarke became the world's most famous science fiction writer after the success of 2001: A Space Odyssey. He then produced novels like Rendezvous with Rama and The Fountains of Paradise that many regard as his finest works. Gary Westfahl closely examines Clarke's remarkable career, ranging from his forgotten juvenilia to the passages he completed for a final novel, The Last Theorem.

As Westfahl explains, Clarke's science fiction offered original perspectives on subjects like new inventions, space travel, humanity's destiny, alien encounters, the undersea world, and religion. While not inclined to mysticism, Clarke necessarily employed mystical language to describe the fantastic achievements of advanced aliens and future humans. Westfahl also contradicts the common perception that Clarke's characters were bland and underdeveloped, arguing that these reticent, solitary individuals, who avoid conventional relationships, represent his most significant prediction of the future, as they embody the increasingly common lifestyle of people in the twenty-first century.

Experimental, strange, and unabashedly feminist, Joanna Russ's groundbreaking science fiction grew out of a belief that the genre was ideal for expressing radical thought. Her essays and criticism, meanwhile, helped shape the field and still exercise a powerful influence in both SF and feminist literary studies.

Award-winning author and critic Gwyneth Jones offers a new appraisal of Russ's work and ideas. After years working in male-dominated SF, Russ emerged in the late 1960s with Alyx, the uber-capable can-do heroine at the heart of Picnic on Paradise and other popular stories and books. Soon, Russ's fearless embrace of gender politics and life as an out lesbian made her a target for male outrage while feminist classics like The Female Man and The Two of Them took SF in innovative new directions. Jones also delves into Russ's longtime work as a critic of figures as diverse as Lovecraft and Cather, her foundational place in feminist fandom, important essays like "Amor Vincit Foeminam," and her career in academia.

Award-winning epics like the Mars Trilogy and groundbreaking alternative histories like The Days of Rice and Salt have brought Kim Stanley Robinson to the forefront of contemporary science fiction. Mixing subject matter from a dizzying number of fields with his own complex ecological and philosophical concerns, Robinson explores how humanity might pursue utopian social action as a strategy for its own survival.

Robert Markley examines the works of an author engaged with the fundamental question of how we--as individuals, as a civilization, and as a species--might go forward. By building stories on huge time scales, Robinson lays out the scientific and human processes that fuel humanity's struggle toward a more just and environmentally stable world or system of worlds. His works invite readers to contemplate how to achieve, and live in, these numerous possible futures. They also challenge us to see that SF's literary, cultural, and philosophical significance have made it the preeminent literary genre for examining where we stand today in human and planetary history.

Challenging convention with the SF nonconformist

Roger Zelazny combined poetic prose with fearless literary ambition to become one of the most influential science fiction writers of the 1960s. Yet many critics found his later novels underachieving and his turn to fantasy a disappointment. F. Brett Cox surveys the landscape of Zelazny's creative life and contradictions. Launched by the classic 1963 short story "A Rose for Ecclesiastes," Zelazny soon won the Hugo Award for Best Novel with …And Call Me Conrad and two years later won again for Lord of Light. Cox looks at the author's overnight success and follows Zelazny into a period of continued formal experimentation, the commercial triumph of the Amber sword and sorcery novels, and renewed acclaim for Hugo-winning novellas such as "Home Is the Hangman" and "24 Views of Mt. Fuji, by Hokusai." Throughout, Cox analyzes aspects of Zelazny's art, from his preference for poetically alienated protagonists to the ways his plots reflected his determined individualism.

Clear-eyed and detailed, Roger Zelazny provides an up-to-date reconsideration of an often-misunderstood SF maverick.

Brian W. Aldiss wrote classic science fiction novels like Report on Probability A and Hothouse. Billion Year Spree, his groundbreaking study of the field, defined the very meaning of SF and delineated its history. Yet Aldiss's discomfort with being a guiding spirit of the British New Wave and his pursuit of mainstream success characterized a lifelong ambivalence toward the genre.

Paul Kincaid explores the many contradictions that underlay the distinctive qualities of Aldiss's writing. Wartime experiences in Asia and the alienation that arose upon his return to the cold austerity of postwar Britain inspired themes and imagery that Aldiss drew upon throughout his career. He wrote of prolific nature overwhelming humanity, believed war was madness even though it provided him with the happiest period of his life, and found parallels in the static lives of Indian peasants and hidebound English society. As Kincaid shows, contradictions created tensions that fueled the metaphorical underpinnings of Aldiss's work and shaped not only his long career but the evolution of postwar British science fiction.

Contents:

• 3 - Introduction (Masters of Science Fiction: Essays on Six Science-Fiction Authors) - essay by Brian Stableford
• 6 - Edmond Hamilton and Leigh Brackett: An Appreciation - essay by Brian Stableford
• 15 - Locked in the Slaughterhouse: The Novels of Kurt Vonnegut - essay by Brian Stableford
• 24 - Insoluble Problems: Footnotes to Barry Malzberg's Career in Science Fiction - (1977) - essay by Brian Stableford
• 32 - The Metamorphosis of Robert Silverberg - essay by Brian Stableford
• 43 - Utopia--and Afterwards: Socioeconomic Speculation in the SF of Mack Reynolds - essay by Brian Stableford

In this milestone sequel to Slaves of Sleep, Jan Palmer finds himself in possession of the "Two World Diamond", a talisman more powerful and dangerous than anything any human has seen before -- and the key to his becoming master of day and night.

Young, wealthy, and good-looking, Jan Palmer leads the kind of life most of us would die for. He has it all - except for one thing: happiness. Trapped under the weight of his responsibilities to his family, his business, and his life, he wishes only to escape to another world.

But you have to be careful what you wish for. Waking out of a deep sleep, Jan finally finds escape - into a living nightmare.

He surprises a prowler who has broken into his mansion, attempting to steal from his priceless collection of antiques. There is a scuffle. An ancient copper jar is opened...and all hell breaks loose. For not just any copper jar, it has long imprisoned a powerful and ruthless Jinni, whose anger has been bottled up for centuries. The Jinni kills the thief and curses Jan to eternal wakefulness.

Jan finds himself straddling two parallel dimensions. On earth he is his mild-mannered self, falsely imprisoned for murder. But in the world beyond, where the sleep-souls of humans are enslaved by the Jinn, he is a swashbuckling warrior facing death at every turn.

In an exotic world of dark arts, deadly secrets, and dangerous dancing girls, he is drawn into the great battle between the Masters of Sleep and the Slaves of Sleep. He will uncover clues to the magic at the heart of history - and discover that the destiny of all humankind lies in his hands. Abounding in untold mystery and revelation, this eye-opening tale may just wake you out of a dead sleep.

Contents:

• Slaves of Sleep - (1939) - novel
• The Masters of Sleep - (1950) - novel

The Time of Danger Is at Hand

Mervyn, wizard and Fluxlord, leader of the Nine Who Guard, faces the ultimate threat of the opposing Seven Who Wait: the opening of the Hellgates to World. Closed more than 2,000 years ago, they are portals to unknowable danger and, perhaps, great power.

Mervyn must gather the shattered forces of guardianship, dispersed and reeling after the battle with Coydt: Cassie, once the powerful saint and crusader, now the brainwashed slave of an oppressive male dictatorship; Spirit, her daughter, controlled by her mysterious Soul Rider; Jeff, Spirit's son; Matson, he will lead the entire force of the Stringers Guild to war, if need be. But all of them are doomed to death unless they can become Masters of Flux & Anchor.

The plague is coming. Every tribe of the Forest people can sense it, and they all know that their holistic and herbal medicines will have no effect. The City has medical technologies and pharmaceuticals that can fight the disease. But a Force Field surrounds it, and its inhabitants show no sign of wanting to help. What can the Forest people do?

Set in a post-holocaust USA, the first volume depicts a conflict between rural followers of a diseased mutant form of Christianity and a city in which a science-based world view is encapsulated; in the second, a personal drama and an interesting half-breed protagonist intensify the grain of narrative, but peculiarly diminish the sense, given off by the earlier book, of a large sf occasion.

The Nebula Awards are voted on, and presented by, active members of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, Inc. The Grand Master Award is given to a living author for a lifetime's achievement in science fiction and/or fantasy. Frederik Pohl, an eminent figure in SF, has been authorized by the SFWA to edit an anthology in three big volumes featuring substantial selections of the work of all the first fifteen Grand Masters. Volume One, presenting the first five writers to receive the award, features the fiction of:

Robert A. Heinlein
Jack Williamson
Clifford D. Simak
L. Sprague de Camp
Fritz Leiber

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Robert A. Heinlein 1907-1988 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• The Roads Must Roll - (1940) - novelette by Robert A. Heinlein
• The Year of the Jackpot - (1952) - novelette by Robert A. Heinlein
• Jerry Was a Man - (1947) - novelette by Robert A. Heinlein
• The Farthest Place - (1992) - essay by Robert A. Heinlein
• The Long Watch - (1949) - short story by Robert A. Heinlein
• Recommended Reading by Robert A. Heinlein - essay by uncredited
• Jack Williamson b. 1908 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• With Folded Hands ... - (1947) - novelette by Jack Williamson
• Jamboree - (1969) - short story by Jack Williamson
• The Mañana Literary Society - (1984) - essay by Jack Williamson
• The Firefly Tree - (1997) - short story by Jack Williamson
• Recommended Reading by Jack Williamson - essay by uncredited
• Clifford D. Simak 1904-1988 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Desertion - (1944) - short story by Clifford D. Simak
• Founding Father - (1957) - short story by Clifford D. Simak
• Grotto of the Dancing Deer - (1980) - short story by Clifford D. Simak
• Recommended Reading by Clifford D. Simak - essay by uncredited
• L. Sprague de Camp b. 1907 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• A Gun for Dinosaur - (1956) - novelette by L. Sprague de Camp
• Little Green Men from Afar - (1976) - essay by L. Sprague de Camp
• Living Fossil - (1939) - short story by L. Sprague de Camp
• Recommended Reading by L. Sprague de Camp - essay by uncredited
• Fritz Leiber 1910-1992 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Sanity - (1944) - short story by Fritz Leiber
• The Mer She - (1978) - novelette by Fritz Leiber
• A Bad Day for Sales - (1953) - short story by Fritz Leiber
• Recommended Reading by Fritz Leiber - essay by uncredited

The Nebula Awards are voted on, and presented by, active members of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, Inc. (or SWFA)?and the Grand Master Award is given by the SWFA to a living author for a lifetime's achievement in science fiction and/or fantasy.

Frederik Pohl, one of the world's finest SF authors and editors, has been authorized to edit an anthology in three large-format volumes featuring substantial selections of the work of all the first fifteen Grand Masters. These are the seminal writers within the modern SF field, those whose works are of dominant importance and lasting influence.

Volume Two, presenting the second five writers to receive the award, offers fiction by Andre Norton, Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Alfred Bester, and Ray Bradbury.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Andre Norton b. 1912 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Recommended Reading by Andre Norton - essay by uncredited
• Mousetrap - (1954) - short story by Andre Norton
• Were-Wrath - (1984) - novelette by Andre Norton
• All Cats Are Gray - (1953) - short story by Andre Norton
• Serpent's Tooth - (1987) - novella by Andre Norton
• Arthur C. Clarke b. 1917 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Recommended Reading by Arthur C. Clarke - essay by uncredited
• Rescue Party - (1946) - novelette by Arthur C. Clarke
• The Secret - (1963) - short story by Arthur C. Clarke
• Reunion - (1971) - short story by Arthur C. Clarke
• The Star - (1955) - short story by Arthur C. Clarke
• A Meeting With Medusa - (1971) - novelette by Arthur C. Clarke
• Isaac Asimov 1920-1992 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Recommended Reading by Isaac Asimov - essay by uncredited
• The Last Question - (1956) - short story by Isaac Asimov
• It's Such a Beautiful Day - (1955) - novelette by Isaac Asimov
• Strikebreaker - (1957) - short story by Isaac Asimov
• The Martian Way - (1952) - novella by Isaac Asimov
• Alfred Bester 1913-1987 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Recommended Reading by Alfred Bester - essay by uncredited
• Disappearing Act - (1953) - short story by Alfred Bester
• Fondly Fahrenheit - (1954) - novelette by Alfred Bester
• Comment on Fondly Fahrenheit - (1970) - essay by Alfred Bester
• The Four-Hour Fugue - (1974) - short story by Alfred Bester
• Hobson's Choice - (1952) - short story by Alfred Bester
• Ray Bradbury b. 1920 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Recommended Reading by Ray Bradbury - essay by uncredited
• The City - (1950) - short story by Ray Bradbury
• The Million-Year Picnic - (1946) - short story by Ray Bradbury
• All Summer in a Day - (1954) - short story by Ray Bradbury
• There Will Come Soft Rains - (1950) - short story by Ray Bradbury
• The Affluence of Despair - (1998) - essay by Ray Bradbury

The Nebula Awards are voted on, and presented, by active members of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, Inc. The Grand Master Award is given to a living author for a lifetime's achievement in science fiction and/or fantasy.

Frederik Pohl, an eminent figure in science fiction, has been authorized by the SFWA to edit an anthology in three big volumes featuring substantial selections of the work of all the first fifteen Grand Masters. These are the seminal writers of the modern SF field, whose works are of dominant importance and influence. This series of collections is a permanent record of greatness in SF.

Volume Three, presenting the last five writers to receive the Grand Master award, features the fiction of Lester Del Rey, Frederik Pohl, Damon Knight, A. E. Van Vogt, Jack Vance.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Lester del Rey 1915-1993 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Recommended Reading by Lester del Rey - essay by uncredited
• The Faithful - (1938) - short story by Lester del Rey
• The Pipes of Pan - (1940) - short story by Lester del Rey
• The Coppersmith - (1939) - short story by Lester del Rey
• For I Am a Jealous People! - (1954) - novella by Lester del Rey
• Frederik Pohl b. 1919 - essay by Elizabeth Anne Hull
• Recommended Reading by Frederik Pohl - essay by uncredited
• Let the Ants Try - (1949) - short story by Frederik Pohl
• The Tunnel Under the World - (1955) - novelette by Frederik Pohl
• Day Million - (1966) - short story by Frederik Pohl
• The Gold at the Starbow's End - (1972) - novella by Frederik Pohl
• Damon Knight - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Recommended Reading by Damon Knight - essay by uncredited
• The Handler - (1960) - short story by Damon Knight
• Dio - (1957) - novelette by Damon Knight
• Not With a Bang - (1950) - short story by Damon Knight
• I See You - (1976) - short story by Damon Knight
• Masks - (1968) - short story by Damon Knight
• A. E. van Vogt 1912-2000 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Recommended Reading by A. E. van Vogt - essay by uncredited
• Black Destroyer - (1939) - novelette by A. E. van Vogt
• Far Centaurus - (1944) - short story by A. E. van Vogt
• Vault of the Beast - (1940) - novelette by A. E. van Vogt
• Dear Pen Pal - (1949) - short story by A. E. van Vogt
• Jack Vance b. 1916 - essay by Frederik Pohl
• Recommended Reading by Jack Vance - essay by uncredited
• Sail 25 - (1962) - novella by Jack Vance
• Ullward's Retreat - (1958) - novelette by Jack Vance
• The Miracle Workers - (1958) - novella by Jack Vance

In Knoxville, Tennessee, the men involved in the top-secret Ridgerunner project are about to complete work on the first rocket designed to probe beyond the solar system and Secret Service agents in that city are becomming frantic over the presence of one Gilbert Nash, a man without a past.

The investigation of Nash began wen it was discovered that he subscribed to every journal of science currently published in the free world -- archeology, geology, astronomy, meteorology, chemistry, medicine, and most distrubing of all, nuclear physics. Was he merely shogin a healthy interest in science, or perhaps something more sinister? Determined to find out, the government agents are soon plunged into the most baffling and frustrating case of an of their careers.

Every fact they uncover only adds to the mystery surrounding Nash's identity. He seems to have come into existence our of nowhere on March 8th, 1940, the date the United States decide in earnest to build an atomic bomb, and them migrated to Knoxville just in advance of the establishement of the Ridgerunner project. On the door to his office appear anly his name and the word "investigations." And, although Nash fave his age as 31 in 1940, he appears no to have aged a day since that time.

THE BOMBINGS FORMED A STRANGE, INEXORABLE PATTERN-

Each explosion came on a rainy night
Each was related to the others
Each struck in a "restricted" area
Each was directed at a leader of a fanatic organization, misnamed "Sons of America"
Each was fatal
And each left no clues!

Without clues, you can catch a killer only one way: at the scene of the crime. But how can you stop a criminal who moves through time and space to murder his victims --- completely and irrevocably --- days before the moment of actual death?

A Short Sharp Shock:

A man tumbles through wild surf, half drowned, to collapse on a moonlit beach. When he regains consciousness, he has no memory of who he is or where he came from. he know only that the woman who washed ashore with him has disappeared sometime in the night, and that he has awakened in a surreal landscape of savage beauty -- a mysterious watery world encircled by a thin spine of land. Aided by strange tribesmen, he will journey to the cove of the spine kings, a brutal race that has enslaved the woman and several of the tribesmen. That is only the beginning of his quest, as he struggles to find her identity in this wondrous and cruel land -- and seeks out the woman whose hold on his imagination is both unfathomable and unshakable.

The Dragon Masters:

The race of man is growing old, but it's not yet ready to die - not while there are dragons still to kill!

The cross-bred dragon armies of the Men of Aerlith are the most appalling horrors ever to threaten the sanity of our future:

Termagents ~ three hundred reptilian giants with six legs apiece, the most fecund breeders of them all

Jugglers ~ eighteen of them, growling amongst themselves, waiting for an opportunity to snap off a leg from any unwary groom

Murderers (striding and long-horned) ~ eighty-five of each, with scaly tails and eyes like crystals

Fiends ~ fifty-two powerful monsters, their tails tipped with spike steel balls

Blue Horrors, Basics, Spider Dragons...

The balance of power is shifting, with bold new alliances, unknown invaders, and the rumored return of the galaxy's ancient masters. When black-ops spy Amina Azad saves a Hacan ambassador from assassination, she draws him into her investigation of a vast conspiracy: unseen forces are destabilizing the whole galaxy, at the worst possible time. Pursued by agents from dozens of other factions, they can only make progress by allying with their apparent enemies. But even they might be compromised--duped into action by a secret puppet-master. How can they trust an alliance when they can't trust themselves?

Life can kick us when we are down.

In Shawn Speakman's case, he is fighting back.

Lacking health insurance and diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2011, Speakman beat the disease as well as the massive medical debt he amassed from its treatment. He did this by publishing Unfettered, an anthology featuring short stories donated by some of the best science fiction and fantasy writers working today.

The fight will not stop there. In an effort to pay forward the aid he received--and to memorialize his mother who passed away from stomach cancer in early 2016--Speakman has again collaborated with celebrated genre authors to publish Unfettered II. All proceeds from the anthology will either help eliminate medical debt for other authors or be donated to cancer research hubs around the world.

Twenty original new tales comprise this amazing collection and, as the title suggests, the writers were again free to contribute whatever they wished.

Table of Contents:

• Foreword: Remembering Kathy Speakman - essay by Terry Brooks
• Introduction: The End of Magic's Beginning - essay by Shawn Speakman
• Castle Coeurlieu - novelette by Naomi Novik
• A Slow Kill - short story by Peter Ourllian
• And Men Will Mine the Mountain for Our Souls - short story by Seanan McGuire
• Day One - short story by Jim Butcher
• Brightwine in the Garden of Tsitsian Village - novelette by Bradley P. Beaulieu
• Aokigahara - short story by John A. Pitts
• The Decoy - short story by Janny Wurts
• The King's Despatcher - short story by David Farland
• Figures - short story by Rachel Caine
• The Red-Rimmed Eyes of Tóu Ma - short story by Aidan Moher
• Magic Beans - short story by Django Wexler
• The Hedgewitch - short story by Sarah Beth Durst
• Victim with a Capital V - short story by Scott Sigler
• A Duel of Evils - short story by Anthony Ryan
• The Raven - short story by Erin Lindsey
• Bulletproof - short story by Mark Lawrence
• The Gunnie - short story by Charlaine Harris
• Little Wren and the Big Forest - short story by Michael J. Sullivan
• The Thrill - short story by Brandon Sanderson
• The Last Flowers of the Spring Witch - short story by Shawn Speakman

Under constant pressure from its enemies, the human Empire maintains mighty armies to protect itself. Crucial among these troops are the Imperial battle wizards, trained to rain fiery death upon their foes, or summon the fury of the heavens. When Grey wizard Lothar and his colleagues ride to war against a massive orc invasion, can the wizards control their rivalry and ambition long enough to defeat the enemy?

Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion returns in the form of Michael Kane, a brilliant Earthman stranded on the treacherous deserts of Ancient Mars! In this sweeping, epic sword-and-planet adventure in the tradition of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Kane and his blue giant companion Hool Haji must travel to the far reaches of the Red Planet to halt the hideous Green Death, an unstoppable disease that rots the mind as well as the body. From gorgeous Karnala, City of Green Mists, to the empty streets of tainted Cend-Amrid to the forgotten weird-science laboratories of the lost, highly advanced Yaksha culture, Masters of the Pit promises stunning locales, disgusting Martian creatures, and relentless action from the Nebula and World Fantasy Award-winning creator of Elric of Melnibone!

alternate title: Barbarians of Mars

originally published under the pseudonym Edward P. Bradbury