What is it about the cat that captivates the creative imagination? No other creature has inspired so many authors to take pen to page. Mystery, horror, science fiction, and fantasy stories have all been written about cats.

From legendary editor Ellen Datlow comes Tails of Wonder and Imagination, showcasing 40 cat tales by some of today's most popular authors. With uncollected stories by Stephen King, Carol Emshwiller, Tanith Lee, Peter S. Beagle, Elizabeth Hand, Dennis Danvers, and Theodora Goss and a previously unpublished story by Susanna Clarke, plus feline-centric fiction by Neil Gaiman, Kelly Link, George R. R. Martin, Lucius Shepard, Joyce Carol Oates, Graham Joyce, Catherynne M. Valente, Michael Marshall Smith, and many others.

Tails of Wonder and Imagination features more than 200,000 words of stories in which cats are heroes and stories in which they're villains; tales of domestic cats, tigers, lions, mythical part-cat beings, people transformed into cats, cats transformed into people. And yes, even a few cute cats.

Table of Contents:

"Through the Looking Glass (excerpt)" - Lewis Carroll
"No Heaven Will Not Ever Heaven Be..." - A. R. Morlan
"The Price" - Neil Gaiman
"Dark Eyes, Faith, and Devotion" - Charles de Lint
"Not Waving" - Michael Marshall Smith
"Catch" - Ray Vukcevich
"The Manticore Spell" - Jeffrey Ford
"Catskin" - Kelly Link
"Mieze Corrects an Incomplete Representation of Reality" - Michaela Roessner
"Guardians" - George R. R. Martin
"Life Regarded as a Jigsaw Puzzle of Highly Lustrous Cats" - Michael Bishop
"Gordon, the Self-Made Cat" - Peter S. Beagle
"The Jaguar Hunter" - Lucius Shepard
"Arthur's Lion" - Tanith Lee
"Pride" - Mary A. Turzillo
"The Burglar Takes a Cat" - Lawrence Block
"The White Cat" - Joyce Carol Oates
"Returns" - Jack Ketchum
"Puss-Cat" - Reggie Oliver
"Cat in Glass" - Nancy Etchemendy
"Coyote Peyote" - Carole Nelson Douglas
"The Poet and the Inkmaker's Daughter" - Elizabeth Hand
"The Night of the Tiger" - Stephen King
"Every Angel is Terrifying" - John Kessel
"Candia" - Graham Joyce
"Mbo" - Nicholas Royle
"Bean Bag Cats(R)" - Edward Bryant
"Antiquities" - John Crowley
"The Manticore's Tale" - Catherynne M. Valente
"In Carnation" - Nancy Springer
"Old Foss is the Name of His Cat" - David Sandner
"A Safe Place to Be" - Carol Emshwiller
"Nine Lives to Live" - Sharyn McCrumb
"Tiger Kill" - Kaaron Warren
"Something Better than Death" - Lucy Sussex
"Dominion" - Christine Lucas
"Tiger in the Snow" - Daniel Wynn Barber
"The Dweller in High Places" - Susanna Clarke
"Healing" - Benjamin Dennis Danvers
"The Puma" - Theodora Goss