Apocalyptic Fantasy

Of science fiction and fantasy, guest editor Nnedi Okorafor writes, “There are times when it feels like a box, but within it, technically, you can expect anything.” The twenty stories in this collection simultaneously fulfill and defy expectations of genre, showcasing boundary-pushing...

It is 300 years since the world toppled on its axis and civilisation was destroyed. In this savagely reshaped world ruled by brigands and war makers, a rider seeks a lost city. Pursuing a dream to calm the violence in his soul, Jon Shannow, the brigand slayer, desires only peace. But from the Plague Lands emerges a fresh terror. The Lord of the Pit and his hell-born army seek to plunge mankind into a new demonic era. Seemingly invincible, they make a fatal mistake: they take Shannow's woman for blood sacrifice.

Tragedy had reduced James to a nobody. Washed up and homeless in NYC, he thought his life was over. Then a message appeared in his vision: [60,000-year countdown has ended] [Nemesis 1 released] [Please acknowledge]. As the world falls apart, as billions die, as society collapses, and all hope seems lost, James discovers a powerful truth: he was wrong to think himself a nobody.

With Fred ready to give birth and the revelation that Mary is also pregnant, spirits are high in the community. For Morgan, however, it's just one more thing to worry about. His mom and dad are now settled in and getting to work, but the babies are coming, the milking barn needs to be built, and the power plant must be kept running. To make matters worse, they're now dealing with the US Army. Morgan has real concerns once he hears about the Army's plans and what they expect of the people of Lake County. After more than a year without the rule of law, are the people ready to return to it?

A peaceful organization of civilized planets is faced with a threat to their very existence. Desperate to save themselves, they turn for help to the most brutal, backward, violent species in the known galaxy: humans.

The apocalypse was five years ago. Little has changed. There isn't any law, but there used to be. Back then, Lucas Shaw had been a Texas lawman. Now he's just trying to survive. In a kill-or-be-killed wasteland, death is always around. Will today be his last? When a young woman enters his life, he must make an impossible decision: help her in a battle against an adversary who'll stop at nothing or keep himself alive. Which will he choose?

Having been bolstered with the supplies sufficient to carry them through the winter, the survivors of the Jackson commune must now hunker down and endure the bitter Wyoming snows, while to the south, factions are beginning to form, coalescing from the ashes of the dead world.

Rising from the ashes of the computer and industrial ages is a brave new world. Survivors have banded together in tribal communities, committed to rebuilding society. In Oregon's Willamette Valley, former pilot Michael Havel's Bearkillers are warriors of renown. Their closest ally, the mystical Clan MacKenzie, is led by Wiccan folksinger Juniper MacKenzie.

While he sat back and watched the United States rattle swords with Korea, play chicken with Russia, and strong-arm China, he felt sure if the lights went out that he and his family would be ready and safe—whether it was due to a natural disaster or a man-made event. They had everything they needed at their homestead.

After a massive wave of disappearances, 26-year-old CIA analyst Everett Carroll finally believes what he's been told about the biblical prophecy of the rapture. But will he be able to survive the gauntlet of destruction known as the Great Tribulation? Seven seals, seven trumpets, and seven vials of God's wrath are about to be poured out upon the earth, and woe to the inhabitants thereof! Global currencies have collapsed, famine and plague have claimed the lives of millions, and the world has crumbled into chaos.

Cherry Bomb, an A.I. made human—and immortal—is out for revenge against her creator, Will, who left her on the Galahad, a ship full of unholy monsters, traversing the universe from beginning to end, ad infinitum. Countless years pass, giving her more than enough time to plot her revenge. Upon gaining control of the ship, she sets her plan in motion, building a vast army and reforming the universe as she sees fit.

Miah Gray is a 27-year-old former army soldier living in rural New Hampshire with his sister, mother, and her boyfriend. He is plagued by PTSD, finding solace, but not redemption, with the aid of prescribed cannabis. All he wants to do is get high, relax with a good sandwich, and watch a meteor shower with his neighborhood crush, Jen. When the sun's light is blotted out the following morning and the world is plunged into darkness, Miah finds himself locked down with his family, covering windows with trash bags, lighting candles, and following the arcane rules of an ancient prophecy.

After securing a vast government bunker, Collie Jones is heading west to challenge the sinister road clan known as the Leather. And she won’t stop until she’s killed its maniacal leader: the Dog Tongue. Gus Berry is at her side every step of the way, his growing affection for the operator matched only by his dislike of the former prisoner Milo, whom Collie insists on bringing along.

Emmeline has experienced more heartache and sorrow than any one person should. Though she now has immeasurable divinity granted by the gods, her new status came at a price she never would have paid. Haunted by the events of the Cascade and the horrifying acts she bore witness to, Emmeline must work alongside people she never expected to undo the atrocities committed on that dreadful day—starting with what was done to her daughter.

On the isle of Big Tancook, Collie Jones is making plans. She informs her fellow islanders that it’s time to resume her original mission: to find other survivors of the apocalypse, screen them, and bring them back with her. Every person who joins them is another valuable addition to their skill and gene pool. But first, Collie must return to the place from whence she originally came and secure the elaborate government bunker known as Whitecap as well as its vast store of munitions.

With nearly a quarter of a million copies sold, the world's most thrilling and best-loved military zombie-apocalypse series returns, powering toward its epic and cataclysmic conclusion.

While training for a manned mission to Mars, Dr. Sophie Winston and her team of scientists find themselves cut off from the rest of the world. Trapped inside a biosphere deep within the confines of Cheyenne Mountain, Sophie and crew discover they are the survivors of a brutal alien invasion. But as they struggle to stay alive, they realize their safe haven is far from safe and that they must team up with other survivors around the world to defeat the aliens before it’s too late for humanity and the Earth.

The Integration didn’t just change the Earthen Union—it tore it apart. Monsters, mayhem, and madness turned civilization into a battlefield. Yet, while the world crumbled under the weight of despair, David felt something unexpected: he felt at home. Even after being forced into the [Cleric] Class, David refused to yield. He adapted, turning his unwanted gifts into tools of both healing and destruction, forging himself into a battle-hardened healer unlike any before.

Before the lights went out, Jack Warrant never considered himself a prepper. That was someone on the edge, a conspiracy theorist or a doomsday cultist who had a fatalistic view of the world. He was neither a theorist nor a cultist. He was an optimist. At least that was what he told himself when the darker thoughts creeped into his psyche as he stared at the ceiling in the middle of the night. Whenever he started down the rabbit hole, he always clawed his way back into the sunlight.

JD Rideout is a washed-up writer with the best years of his career behind him. Nursing the wounds of a marriage breakdown, his kids are the only thing keeping him going. When JD wakes up on a tropical island in the middle of the Whitsundays on Queensland's Central Coast, chained to the ceiling, he knows something is very wrong. He feels like a character in one of his novels. JD is given a pistol and an axe, along with a new callsign: Hatchet. Uprooted from his life and forced to fight for the fate of the world, Hatchet may just be planet Earth’s last line of defence.