Urban Short Stories

When things go bump in the night, there's only one federal agency that stands between the supernatural and humankind...CERBERUS. C.E.R.B.E.R.U.S. stands for “Clandestine Enforcement and Reconnaissance Bureau, Extranormal Rampart Division of the United States”—the American law enforcement unit that was created to deal with all things magical and unexplained. Follow along as Deputy Marshal Tony Mendoza is inducted into the supernatural underworld by the shadowy agency and its enigmatic leader, Director Strickland.

In Trio of Sorcery, Mercedes Lackey presents three exciting short urban fantasy novels, including the return of Diana Tregarde and the debut of a brand-new heroine for the twenty-first century.

There's a saying in Brooklyn that if you come from my part of town, you're from around the way. Well Lyric, Juicy, and Precious are all from around the way. They all live in Crown Heights, one of the most notorious sections of Brooklyn, but to them it's just a place they call home. Around the Way Girls 2 is a fast-paced look at the life of some street-smart women who think they know it all but are about to get the lessons of their lives.

The world isn't how they left it. When the bunker airlocks release them after 20 years in hibernation, the survivors find a silent, barren world outside. But they are not alone. There is a presence here, alive in the dust - spirits of the earth, benevolent and malicious as they interact with the human remnant.

In the dark corners of an obscure bookshop, where forgotten tales gathered dust and whispered secrets, there lay a peculiar collection. It was a compendium of bizarre and unsettling tales, shrouded in mystery and curiosity, known only as the “Uncollected Oddities.” Many claimed that these macabre stories were the creation of Edgar Allan Poe himself, his lost works banished from the public eye.

Nedra Harris, a 23-year-old business executive, has experienced her share of heartache in her quest to find a soul mate. Just when she’s about to give up on love, she runs into Simeon Mathews, a gentleman she met in college years earlier. She remembers his warm smile and charming nature, but she soon realizes that Simeon possesses a dark side that will eventually make her life a living hell.

How hard do you have to shake the family tree to find the truth about the past?

Symone Davenport is a 22-year-old college senior who has set herself up for a very secure future, but all her achievements feel more like a duty than a labor of love. It takes the help of Jaylen Richards, the handsome new choir director, to not only unlock her talent and try to bring her into the spotlight but to unlock her heart. Janice was never very thin. With a gorgeous face, personality, and brains, she isn't lacking friends, but her insecurities about her weight gain get in the way of things reaching the next level with men.

A masterful anthology featuring 19 pieces of short fiction, Growing Things is an exciting glimpse into Paul Tremblay's fantastically fertile imagination. From global catastrophe to the demons inside our heads, Tremblay illuminates our primal fears and darkest dreams in startlingly original fiction that leaves us unmoored. As he lowers the sky and yanks the ground from beneath our feet, we are compelled to contemplate the darkness inside our own hearts and minds.

Carl Weber brings the best of urban street lit authors together, all telling their own dramatic tales of life in the streets in known cities across the USA. The second installment continues with Treasure Hernandez telling the tale of the Dirty South.

Many a confident urban lesbian in New York, San Francisco, and Chicago was once a wide-eyed newcomer. Every year thousands of young women arrive in these queer-friendly cities, seduced by downtown life and its erotic possibilities. In Where the Girls Are, D.L. King collects explicit memoirs and stories about these newly arrived country girls. Here are stories of first times, initiations, bars, dance clubs, and parties, reading (or misreading) the codes - and sometimes teaching those city girls a thing or two in the process.

It’s fate when a man accidentally drops his phone off the bridge. It’s fortune when it’s retrieved by a friendly shape sloshing in the muck underneath. From that day forward, as they share a coffee every morning, an unlikely friendship blooms. Considering the reality for the man above, where life seems perfect, and that of the sharp-witted creature below, how forever after can a happy ending be?

That there is darkness at the heart of the Yuletide season should not surprise. Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol is filled with scenes that are unsettling. The hideous children - Want and Ignorance - beneath the robe of the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. In the finest versions of this story, the best parts are the terrifying parts. Best-selling author and editor Christopher Golden shares his love for Christmas horror stories with this anthology of all-new short fiction from some of the most talented and original writers of horror today.

Whether you believe in ghosts or not, it’s tough not to get freaked out when you’re alone and you hear something bump in the night or even hear a voice. The stories below will freak you out so it’s best to read these with someone. Preferably a friend and not a stranger you’ve decided to creep up behind on the street. My house was built in 1904. It is a single family home, wood frame setting on a concrete block foundation. I have been living here for about 12 years. Of all the weird things that my siblings and me have seen or heard in this house this one event is my favorite.

With these captivating initial glimpses into her storytelling psyche, Jo Walton shines through subtle myths and reinvented realities. Through eclectic stories, subtle vignettes, inspired poetry, and more, Walton soars with humans, machines, and magic-rising from the every day into the universe itself.

Tessa Graham has loved Malus for years. They were once a wildly popular band, topping the charts and leaving broken hearts in their wake. But for the past five years, they've been playing the same old hits, incapable of creating anything new. As an assistant working for the band's record label, Tessa is given the opportunity of a lifetime. Her boss informs her that she must help the band write and record a new album - and she only has seven months to do it. If she succeeds, she's in line for a huge promotion. If she fails, she's fired. And so is the band.

From best-selling author W.J. May - each shade is a different genre of the fantasy, paranormal and romance - all from different series!

This bundle includes books 1-3 in the Hex Files series, a fast-paced paranormal mystery series with a kickass heroine, hilarious sidekicks, and an immersive world that will pull you in faster than you can say pizza: Wicked Never Sleeps, Wicked Long Nights, and Wicked State of Mind.

With only two hundred dollars, Unique packed her suitcase and headed to New York City for a brand-new start. It's there that Unique meets big-time boxing promoter Kennard, and it is love at first sight.... After nine months of living in the lap of luxury with Kennard, skeletons from Unique's past show up, and it will cost her a cool million dollars to keep not only her relationship but her life.... Unique isn't about to lose it all. With the help of her best friend, she devises a major heist; to pull it off all she has to do is stay alive....

A magical Christmas tale with supernatural paramedic Dean Flynn. Bryce, a Christmas elf, fell from his shelf. His leg is broken and he can’t give his report to Santa in time for Christmas Eve. Lucky for him, Extreme Medical Services paramedic to the supernatural Dean Flynn is on the job. With a few of his friends along for the ride, Dean responds to the call for help. Will he help Bryce in time to meet the “Big Guy” and his sleigh? Find out in this heart-warming Christmas tale. Pick up this urban fantasy holiday short story now!