Short Stories Science

Not one to let being banged up in Sick Bay stop her, Max has had a brilliant idea. But she needs Markham to execute it on her behalf. The subject of this cunning plan is Peterson, struggling with another bereavement and not doing very well. What’s needed to get him through it is sympathy, sensitivity, tact and understanding. Step forward Mr Markham, for whom sympathy, sensitivity, etc., are things that happen to other people.

Warren is just a guardsman with a haunted past eager for a new castle to defend. All that changes when he's summoned to the edges of the kingdom, where walls protect cities against the diabolical foes of the wildlands. His mission is simple: save the Dragon Farm he just inherited, settle down as a lord, and help his new city thrive. As a soldier who normally lives by the blade, he's out of his element but up to the task... especially since tame dragons seem to like him.

This collection includes the first four books in the Return of the Elves romantic fantasy series: Soulbound, Sundered, Exiled, and Seared.

For over 60 years, readers of all ages have been enchanted by the magical realms, the epic battles between good and evil, and the unforgettable creatures of Narnia. This box set includes all seven titles in The Chronicles of Narnia - The Magician's Nephew; The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe; The Horse and His Boy; Prince Caspian; The Voyage of the Dawn Treader; The Silver Chair; and The Last Battle.

The Grand Hotel is a horror novel by esteemed best-selling author Scott Kenemore ( Zombie, Ohio) that takes the reader on a thrilling ride through an interconnected series of stories narrated by the desk clerk and the residents of the hotel itself. And while it is not known whether or not the desk clerk is actually the devil incarnate, it is strange that so many visitors who come for a tour of the hotel have a way of never leaving.

This book contains 26 of the greatest science fiction stories ever written. They represent the considered verdict of the Science Fiction Writers of America, those who have shaped the genre and who know, more intimately than anyone else, what the criteria for excellence in the field should be. The authors chosen for the Science Fiction Hall Fame are the men and women who have shaped the body and heart of modern science fiction; their brilliantly imaginative creations continue to inspire and astound new generations of writers and fans.

New research has uncovered deeply buried military secrets—both the Allied and Axis special operations during WWII included monsters. Did the Soviets use a dragon to win the Battle of Kursk? Did a vampire fight for the Canadians in Holland? Did the US drop the second atomic bomb on a kaiju? This collection takes real events from World War II and injects them with fantastical creatures that mirror the “unreality” of war itself. Each story—and two poems—feature mythical, mystical, and otherwise unexplainable beings that change the course of history.

Like the creation myths they supersede, the revelations of science are seared into our collective imagination through storytelling. From Archimedes' bath to Newton's apple, vivid accounts of scientific discovery help us understand the principles behind each theory, and add to the larger narrative of how the universe works, and how we came to be here. This anthology draws out and distils science's love of narrative from a wide range of scientific disciplines, weaving theory into very human stories.

In this sweeping, threaded narrative of the global phenomenon known as the Vampire Wars, mankind is unwittingly infected by a millennia-old bacteria unknowingly exhumed by a scientific expedition in Antarctica. Now, in some rare cases, a person’s so-called junk DNA becomes activated. Depending on their racial and ethnic heritage, they begin to manifest one of the many diverse forms of the "others" that are the true basis for the legends of supernatural creatures. These aren’t your usual vampires and werewolves - it goes much deeper than that.

Stranded on the distant planet Tschai, young Adam Reith is the sole survivor of a space mission who discovers the world is inhabited - not only by warring alien cultures but by human slaves as well, taken early in Earth's history. Reith must find a way off the planet to warn Earth of Tschai's deadly existence.

Pitting ordinary men and women against a carnivorous, chaotic cosmos, Occultation's eight tales of terror (two never before published) include the Theodore Sturgeon and Shirley Jackson Award-nominated story "The Forest" and Shirley Jackson Award nominee "The Lagerstatte."

Stop me if you’ve heard this one. A thief, a candlemaker, an ex-mercenary, and a pig farmer walk into a trap…and what happens is no joke. When Riyria is hired to retrieve a jester’s treasure, Royce and Hadrian must match wits with a dwarf who proves to be anything but a fool. Difficult choices will need to be made, and in the end those who laugh last do so because they are the only ones to survive.

Louis was just a normal high school kid, making his tenuous way in the world, until the day when he tripped and cracked through an invisible alien egg in his bedroom. It hadn't been there before. Until the moment he hit it, the egg was completely invisible to him, but now he could see that the world was something far different than what he had thought. When he tried to show the egg to others, they were confused. Nobody else could see what he could see. What could he do? His quest to help others know what he now knew would lead him on an adventure he never expected to have...

After traveling across the entirety of the Sealance Empire and the deserts of Lowenthal, Larek has returned home to the Kingdom of Androthe to find that the situation is quite different from what he remembered. Not only are there massive Apertures called Calamities consuming large portions of the landscape, but most of his friends are also scattered to locations unknown around the Kingdom. Worse yet, they have no idea who he is because of the Dominion magic used on them before he was transported to the Empire.

29 Brand-New Sci-Fi Horror Stories. The future is now, and it's not what we were promised. The optimistic science fiction of old was wrong. Progress is not linear, technology creates as many problems as it solves, and the concept of a better tomorrow has become an abstraction that is in no way guaranteed. When looking at the future now, we no longer ask what is possible, we wonder how we'll cope. Contained within this anthology are 29 never-before-published works by supremely talented authors.

Royce Melborn, a cynical ex-assassin, and Hadrian Blackwater, an idealistic ex-mercenary, are a pair of rogues-for-hire known as Riyria (its elvish for two). This duo makes a living taking nefarious jobs for conspiring nobles. Doing so usually involves stealing something, but when a young heiress asks them to steal her . . . well, that is a first for the pair.

Laurel is stabilizing a patient in the ER when the power goes out. When the rest of the hospital evacuates, she refuses to leave her patients behind—especially her sick mother. She’s determined to fight for their lives. Even if it means putting her own in danger… In a remote mountain cabin hundreds of miles away, Laurel’s husband, Bear, begins a grueling trek across Minnesota. He’ll do whatever it takes to reunite his family. But it’s a dangerous journey, and he’s all alone save for his loyal dog, Jessamine, and Trent, an orphaned boy he finds along the way.

This exciting collection presents two previously unpublished stories by SF legend Octavia E. Butler. A Necessary Being precedes the events of Survivor, Butler's third (famously disowned) installment in her Patternist series, and includes characters from it, focusing exclusively on the Kohn, aliens who build their social hierarchies on the blueness of their fur. In Childfinder, a black woman with the gift of identifying children with latent psychic ability refuses to share her skill with an organization of white telepaths.

These stories and more are featured in the third short story anthology for the System Apocalypse, continuing the saga of survival in a world transformed by the arrival of the System. Humanity has adapted to a new reality filled with Classes, magic and monsters, but the struggle for life, love and purpose never ends. This anthology brings together gripping tales from returning authors and two new short stories by Tao Wong.

Oren was a dominant force in the bustling digital realm of NEO, commanding wealth, prestige, and high levels. But when fate deals him a cruel blow, trapping him in the body of a lowly goblin and depriving him of his ability to log out, Oren is forced to fight for survival. Stripped of his immense powers and cast into a hostile, monster-ridden wilderness, with the constant risk of the game frying his nervous system, his only way out of the virtual purgatory is to win.