Short Science Fiction Fantasy Stories

Harlan Ellison's masterwork of myth and terror as he seduces all innocence on a mind-freezing odyssey into the darkest reaches of mortal terror and the most dazzling heights of Olympian hell in his finest collection. Deathbird Stories is a collection of 19 of Harlan Ellison's best stories, including Edgar and Hugo winners, originally published between 1960 and 1974.

How do you systematically destroy a child with love? It's not something that any parent aspires to do, yet a surprising number come perilously close to achieving it.

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.

Stephen Leeds is perfectly sane. It's his hallucinations who are mad. A genius of unrivaled aptitude, Stephen can learn any new skill, vocation, or art in a matter of hours. However, to contain all of this, his mind creates hallucinatory people - Stephen calls them aspects - to hold and manifest the information. Wherever he goes, he is joined by a team of imaginary experts to give advice, interpretation, and explanation. He uses them to solve problems...for a price. Then a company hires him to recover stolen property - a camera that can allegedly take pictures of the past....

On September 15, 1946, the Wild Card virus was released, spreading a wave of mutations around the globe. "Aces" were endowed with extraordinary powers while "Jokers" were cursed with bizarre mental or physical disabilities. September 15th is now Wild Card Day. With each passing year, the festivities become larger and more fevered. And 1986 - the 40th anniversary - promises to be the biggest Wild Card Day ever.

Setting out into exile is never much fun, but Minalan wants to publicly comply with Prince Tavard's order to leave Sevendor for three years to spare his home any retribution. Instead of using magic to transport himself to his new lands, Minalan decides to leave cross-country in a wagon with his father. Down the Bontal River, Min and his dad make a stop at Robinwing, get snowed in at Barrowbell, and enjoy a few days as guests of Baron Astyral.

When a mysterious photograph leads to a shocking discovery at the Time Displacement Core, Spider-Man joins forces with the X-Men. Together, the heroes must make a perilous journey into the past to prevent Kang the Conqueror from destroying the multiverse and time itself. This audiobook omnibus edition collects the entire trilogy: Time's Arrow: The Past, Time's Arrow: The Present, and Time's Arrow: The Future.

Since the zombie invasion, the island of Manhattan has been turned into a wintery wasteland. The Zombie King has arrived in search of a mythical Opener. A human who can create a bridge to the land of the dead and unleash all its horrors on earth. But, who is the mysterious Giant, and why can no one get onto the island of Manhattan? Then we take a trip to the carnival and learn the origins of the Dead-Killer and why he wants the Zombie King dead forever. And finally, where does the Vamp get her tattoos? And why are they so important?

In Kharkiv, mysterious eyes sprout from the walls of buildings as the Russian invasion of Ukraine intensifies. A cynical spacefarer on a paradox-chasing mission confronts an ancient star—and the limits of human understanding—while his sentient navigator may know more than it’s letting on. A man mistakenly receives a letter meant for another drawing him into the world of a lost tribe who believe writing itself is a sin against God. In Raghast, a civilization of rats grinds to a standstill every three months as the breeding instinct throws them into chaos.

Everyone's favorite werewolf DJ is here to mix it up just one last time. Here you will find, or even newly discover, the irrepressible Kitty Norville with friends and enemies alike: Rick the vampire; Jessi Hardin, paranormal detective; Kitty's husband, Ben; Cormac, the bounty hunter; and the villainous Dux Bellorum. These irresistible tales are full of unpredictable twists and turns: lupines experimenting with astronomy, a cheating boxer with preternatural strength, vampires arriving from the Philippines.

For Fox, Caleb, Gage and the other residents of Hawkins Hollow, the number seven portends doom - ever since, as boys, they freed a demon trapped for centuries when their blood spilled upon The Pagan Stone.

Famine. Death. War. Pestilence. These are the harbingers of the biblical apocalypse, of the End of the World. In science fiction, the end is triggered by less figurative means: nuclear holocaust, biological warfare/pandemic, ecological disaster, or cosmological cataclysm. But before any catastrophe, there are people who see it coming. During, there are heroes who fight against it. And after, there are the survivors who persevere and try to rebuild. THE APOCALYPSE TRIPTYCH will tell their stories. Edited by acclaimed anthologist John Joseph Adams and bestselling author Hugh Howey, THE APOCALYPSE TRIPTYCH is a series of three anthologies of apocalyptic fiction. THE END IS NIGH focuses on life before the apocalypse. THE END IS NOW turns its attention to life during the apocalypse. And THE END HAS COME focuses on life after the apocalypse.

Seven superb stories, from the world's no. one storyteller. Meet the boy who can talk to animals and the man who can see with his eyes closed. And find out about the treasure buried deep underground. A cleaver mix of fact and fiction, this collection also includes how master storyteller Roald Dahl became a writer. With Roald Dahl, you can never be sure where reality ends and fantasy begins.

It’s a day like any other for Eloise Montgomery - until tragedy strikes. While she is recovering from a horrible accident that takes the lives of her husband and oldest daughter, and as she works to help her younger daughter move forward, Eloise experiences her first psychic vision. Though she struggles to understand her newfound gifts, Eloise finds a way use them to save lost women and girls - for whom her help may be the only way out...

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.

In this thrilling collection of original stories, some of today’s hottest paranormal authors delight, thrill and captivate readers with otherworldly tales of magic and mischief.

One night in Lagos, two former friends reunite. Obinna is a dutiful and unsophisticated stay-at-home husband and father married to a powerful businesswoman. Eze is single, a cautious rebel from his university days whose arrival soon upsets the balance in Obinna’s life. In a world where men are constantly under surveillance and subject to the whims of powerful women, more than Obinna’s ordered and accustomed routine might be on the line.

The ex-planet Pluto has a few choice words about being thrown out of the solar system. A listing of alternate histories tells you all the various ways Hitler has died. A lawyer sues an interplanetary union for dangerous working conditions. And four artificial intelligences explain, in increasingly worrying detail, how they plan not to destroy humanity. Welcome to Miniatures: The Very Short Fiction of John Scalzi.

Terraform hones the predictive capacity of science fiction and seeks new, vivid, and visceral ways to depict the future we’re hurtling toward, translating the decay and anxiety that surround us into something else, something unexpected, something that burns like a beacon and upends the conventional ideas of where we’ll end up next. Section by section—Watch/Worlds/Burn—the book takes on surveillance, artificial intelligence, and climate collapse. With a potent roster of established names and rising talents, it confronts the issues that orbit our everyday existence.

As Clayton grows from a wild child to a clever teen who tests his mentor at every turn, he must learn not only to control his animal instincts but to navigate Pack politics - including showing his brutal archnemesis who the real Alpha is.