Fantasy Adventure Short Stories

NATIONAL BESTSELLER PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST A bewitching story collection from the author of White Cat, Black Dog and The Book of Love, hailed as “the most darkly playful voice in American fiction” (Michael Chabon) and “our greatest living fabulist” (Carmen Maria Machado)...

Opportunities there are few and far between…that is unless you're willing to put on a uniform. For ace-pilot Deborah Allen Riker (a.k.a “Admiral Dare”), life had never been easy. She's defended Earth against countless enemies, both alien and human alike. Now a civilian and academic living on the fringes of civilized space, she has committed herself to a life of solitude and studying a race of long-dead aliens. Everything was great…until she finds herself dragged into a new conflict. A conflict she never saw coming.

South of Deadwood Take the stagecoach into Deadwood with Ranger Chick Bowdrie to bring a notorious killer back to Texas - and justice. When he meets a beautiful young woman convinced Curly Starr can clear her brother's name, Bowdrie agrees to help. But first he must elude the rest of Starr's...

It takes a lot of effort for Jimmy Crocker to become Piccadilly Jim – nights on the town roistering, headlines in the gossip columns, a string of broken hearts and breaches of promise. Eventually he becomes rather good at it and manages to go to pieces with his eyes open. But no sooner has Jimmy cut a wild swathe through fashionable London than his terrifying Aunt Nesta decides he must mend his ways. He then falls in love with the girl he has hurt most of all, and after that things get complicated. In a dizzying plot, impersonations pile on impersonations....

Jack Pritcher has hit rock bottom, losing his home and job. Just when he believes his sanity might be next, he's presented with an opportunity that sounds utterly unbelievable. The offer on the table is to become a guardian of a Portal, a doorway to another world. But there's a twist–he must keep it a secret. Portals, it turns out, are alive in some way. They possess sentience and dictate their own set of rules that guardians must follow, under the penalty of death.

In what many refer to as one of the first and greatest science fiction thrillers, a mysterious stranger wanders into an inn, wrapped head-to-toe in bandages. What lies beneath the bandages is something even more mysterious. As Wells tackles issues of identity, deception, and the deterioration of the human mind, listeners will be drawn into the story of the mysterious man, whose own mistakes end up whisking him into a whirlwind of deceit, terror, and even murder. In the end, the question will be asked: when your sense of self and identity vanish, who will you become?

In the Hugo Award nominee Forty, Counting Down, computer genius Justin Kloster travels to the past to stop himself from making a terrible mistake. But all actions have their consequences. Then, in Twenty-One, Counting Up, Kloster's college life and romantic dreams are rudely interrupted when the 40-year-old Justin arrives from the future to save him from himself.

For over 40 years, Glen Cook has been among the most well-known, influential, and widely respected authors in science fiction and fantasy. Through classic series such as The Black Company, Garrett P.I., the Dread Empire, Starfishers, Darkwar, and more, his gritty, down-to-earth style left an indelible impression on his listeners around the world, forever shifting the genre landscape and carving out his place as a pioneering icon.

Join the adventure through dystopian worlds, to outer planets and into a speculative future. Welcome to the Future Days Anthology. Seventeen authors imagine a future with thrilling tales, starships, unlikely heroes, and exotic aliens, all of which combine to make Future Days a must-listen sci-fi fantasy short story collection.

The power is out. The government is gone. All that’s left are gangs, violence, and desperation. Lacey doesn’t care about saving the world. She just wants to find her sister and keep her alive. But with every mile north, the bodies pile up and secrets from Lacey’s past come hunting. Family is all she has left, and she will burn what's left of the world to protect it.

The last thing I remember was being cryogenically frozen, but now I was in a strange room, surrounded by advanced technology I had never seen before. My confusion only grew as I explored this new world–a future that was nothing like I ever could have imagined. It didn't take long for me to learn that humanity was extinct and that I was now in the hands of a stunning AI, a siren with camouflaging powers, and a monster girl who happens to be a great engineer–beings that are as fascinating as they are strange.

Join James, our intrepid adventurer, streamer, and bug hunter, as he jumps headfirst into the first true immersion VRMMORPG game and explores the digital reality that the dev's have kept under lock and key. No previews? No class or race info before launch? What could possibly go wrong? Especially starting in the empire inspired by ancient Egypt. Rolling a character reminiscent of an old-school D&D cleric, James takes on the world of Sosaku Online with spear, shield, and holy fire.

The war to end all wars - or so it is hoped. For generations battle broke the once-proud kingdom of Galifar. As nation fought nation, adventure was never far away from those eager to find it.

Hunters of evil, seekers of fortune, loyal soldiers, and those just trying to stay alive. These are their tales. The Tales of the Last War.

First published in the pages of Weird Tales in 1934, C. L. Moore's Jirel of Joiry is the first significant female sword-and-sorcery protagonist and one of the most exciting and evocative characters the genre has ever known. Published alongside seminal works by H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard, the five classic fantasy tales included in this volume easily stand the test of time and often overshadow the storytelling power and emotional impact of stories by Moore's more famous contemporaries.

Stuart Reid is an Iron Master - a Dark Fae with a rare ability to make iron do his bidding. Exiled by the High Fae who fear him, he now lives in a simple house in Shiftertown outside Las Vegas, watching over Peigi, a bear Shifter woman, and the cubs she cares for. Peigi, rescued from an evil Shifter and welcomed into the Vegas Shiftertown, knows Reid and the cubs have helped her survive and heal. When Reid’s people send him a call for help, Peigi senses danger to him - too much of it. She finds she’ll do anything, even sacrifice herself and her happiness, to keep him safe.

Man has always wanted to travel into the unknown and encounter what he has not, and perhaps cannot, experience in the real world. The early 20th century witnessed an explosion of science fiction literature. Authors studied the wonders of scientific and technological progress and imagined worlds that had developed even greater advances. Jules Vernes' and H.G. Wells' fantastic tales well whetted the public's appetite for adventure tales.

Run. Hide. Live the good life online. Early retirement looked so easy on paper. Steal eight million euros from a gangster. Hide inside an online game and enjoy the finer things in life as a bard until the danger had passed. Except Daniel messed up. Now, the gangsters are in the game looking for him and he's stuck with an imbalanced character build in a dead-end starter village. Can Daniel find his own place and a life worth living inside the World of Chains?

It's dangerous to go alone! Take this. You are standing in a room filled with books, faced with a difficult decision. Suddenly, one with a distinctive cover catches your eye. It is a groundbreaking anthology of short stories from award-winning writers and game-industry titans who have embarked on a quest to explore what happens when video games and science fiction collide.

A classic tale featuring two of the most-memorable characters in sword and sorcery, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. Over a span of 50 years, the late Fritz Leiber wrote dozens of adventures, set in the fictional city of Lankhmar, featuring the seven-foot-tall barbarian and the diminuitive thief. The stories were recognized with both the Hugo and Nebula Awards.

Sixteen all-new stories by science fiction's top talents, collected by best-selling author George R. R. Martin and multiple-award-winning editor Gardner Dozois.