Something is wrong in England. In and around the London area, people are suddenly becoming bad-tempered, with a rapid increase in crime and murder, and a clear decline in self-respect. Linked to this strange behavior is an excavation site, now a mighty smoking crater emitting clouds of noxious gas that appear to be causing the sudden change in human behavior. And then, from within the vast fissure below the crater, there emerge the hideous survi ...
Long before their award-nominated and awarded stories and novels, these two writers word-jammed together, learning the music of story writing and the blood and bones of distinctive prose. And all these early efforts were published! Here they are again, together in one place–ten riveting stories of science fiction–as entertaining as they were fun to write–including the previously unpublished tale, «The Standard Crisis Scenario»! ...
Pamela Sargent published the first novel in her «Venus» trilogy, Venus of Dreams, in 1986; it was followed by Venus of Shadows (1988) and Child of Venus (2001). For the first time, Dream of Venus collects the short fiction set against the backdrop of the author's Venus novels, comprising four stories written after the trilogy had been completed. As Sargent writes in her Introduction: «Characters and stories existing in the interfaces of the ...
Albert Simpkins, a mild-mannered theater projectionist, dreams of the inventions that that he can create–and when he finally has an opportunity to realize his vision, he sets himself up as the «Voice of the Conqueror,» a supposed alien lifeform in orbit around the Earth, whose sole intent is to rid the world of weapons of mass destruction. But even the best-imagined notions sometimes go awry, and when several individuals–including one of Albert& ...
How far would you go to avenge the one you love? Would you go beyond death?<P>Born into the stifling confines of French upper society, Babette Varanus never thought that she would have to answer that question. Surrounded by wealth yet ostracized by her peers, Babette had little interest in love until she met Korbinian, a scandalous German baron with the audacity to regard her as his equal. But when the intrigues of her grandfather's e ...
The Steampunk Megapack collects 26 tales of high adventure through Victorian and Edwardian eras–past, present, and future! Included are:<P> MIDNIGHT AT VALDOSTA'S, by Jay Lake<BR> THE CASE OF THE PECULIAR SAFECRACKER, by G. D. Falksen<BR> THE ACQUISITION OF MANDRAKES AND ASSISTANTS, by Jillian Venters<BR> THE WHISPERER IN DARKNESS, by H. P. Lovecraft<BR> THE BRASS GOGGLE FACTORY WORKER, by John Leavitt< ...
Gordon Fryer, a young, unemployed engineer, finds a post as a scientific guinea pig and assistant to an elderly scientist, Dr. Royd. But the result of Royd’s experiment predicts the exact hour and day of Gordon's death–a mere thirteen years hence–with a series of photographs of the future. Fryer makes a deadly enemy of Royd’s butler, Blessington, who targets him with poison-pen letters, but when his campaign culminates in attempted murder, ...
The people of the Euchronian Millennium had been reminded of the Underworld that existed beneath the platform on which they had constructed their better, cleaner, safer world–leaving the original surface of Earth a dark, dreary, and forgotten place. That awareness had become a political pawn, which many different people were trying to manipulate in their own interests. In the meantime, the search for more information about what actually existed ...
After laboring for thousands of years, the people of Earth, fleeing ecological disaster, have built a new, clean, stable world on a worldwide platform erected over the entire land surface of the Earth. Everything is going well–except for Carl Magner, the man who's been having bad dreams. He shouldn't be having dreams at all, because dreams have been banished from the society of the Euchronian Millennium, but somehow he is, and his drea ...