Urban Short Stories

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.

With the same unforgettable and distinctive prose on display in his other books, Airtight Willie & Me is further evidence that Iceberg Slim was an expert at capturing the language of the streets. Always compelling, sometimes funny, and often bleak, Slim gives us six slices of city life that will leave you thirsting for more.

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 group of mountain climbers, caught in the dark, fight to survive their descent; in the British countryside, hundreds of magpies ascend into the sky, higher and higher, until they seem to vanish into the heavens; a professor and his student track a zombie horde in order to research zombie behavior; an all-girl riding school has sinister secrets; a town rails in vain against a curse inflicted upon it by its founders; and much more.

I thought I’d left my past behind for good. But when my older brother gets killed in a car accident, I’ve got to come back to take over his car-tuning business. But things are not like I remember. There’s something weird going on in Santo Domingo, something that seems connected to the city’s underground street racing scene. There’s the orange-haired mechanic at the tuning shop with the FOXGRRL license plate. There’s the strange black cat hanging around my house, and the dreams I’ve been having about a racer girl with cat ears and a tail.

Enter the Druidverse® and discover a world of magic, mythology, and urban fantasy! This set contains three short story collections and three novellas: Blood Scent (a prequel novella), Druid Blood (a prequel novella), Blood Circus (a short story collection), Blood Ties (a short story collection), Blood Bound (a short story collection), and Colin McCool Saves Christmas (a Christmas novella). The novellas primarily focus on everyone’s favorite down-on-his-luck druid, Colin McCool, while many of the short stories feature supporting characters.

Humans have always been fascinated by darkness. Especially the darkness of a city at night, when the black sky is made ever more inky by the pools of illumination dropped under streetlights. Whether the mean streets be in an alternate past charmed with dark magic or the dirty alleyways of futuristic crowded space stations, the city—and its darkened streets—will always fascinate us. Here then, an anthology of all new stories of science fiction and fantasy with a hardboiled noir twist that acknowledge that the city is a living, breathing entity...and it isn’t always on our side.

Finding seeds of inspiration in the Brothers Grimm, seventeenth-century French lore, and Scottish ballads, Kelly Link spins classic fairy tales into utterly original stories of seekers—characters on the hunt for love, connection, revenge, or their own sense of purpose. Twisting and winding in astonishing ways, expertly blending realism and the speculative, witty, empathetic, and never predictable—these stories remind us once again of why Kelly Link is incomparable in the art of short fiction.

Johannes Cabal, a brilliant scientist and notorious snob, is single-mindedly obsessed in heart and soul with raising the dead. Well, perhaps not soul.... He hastily sold his years ago in order to learn the laws of necromancy. But now, tormented by a dark secret, he travels to the fiery pits of Hell to retrieve it. Satan, who is incredibly bored these days, proposes a little wager: Johannes has one year to persuade 100 people to sign over their souls, or he will be damned forever.

A larval Great Old One is growing day by day in power and just about ready to pop. If Chad Gadenier can't convince "the powers that be" to get involved, not only New Orleans, but the entire world, is going to fall under the power of the nastiest of nasties. Now on the outs with the US government and in exile from his usual job of saving the world, Chad must rally the forces of light against the coming darkness. The problem is one guy with a sword and a sub-gun isn't going to solve this one.

Marooned in a strange land. Rescued by a sexy wood elf and her forest friends. Wes has a perilous journey in front of him to reclaim his home, his honor, and his future. In a world where political corruption is rife and there are dangers in every direction, the wood elf and her friends might not be what Wes was looking for, but they might be just what he needs.

Get four fast-paced druid urban fantasy novels in a boxed set featuring magic, mystery, Celtic mythology, and non-stop paranormal action! Reluctant druid, and sole apprentice of the last living master druid on Earth. Heir to Fionn MacCumhaill’s legacy. Hunted and feared by the Fae, and cursed with Cú Chulainn’s ríastrad. All he wants is to live in his junkyard in peace...but the gods have other plans for the young druid apprentice!

After 130+ years as a vampire, Mercy returns to her hometown of Exeter where she joins Prince Ladinas and his team of underground vampires to stop a host of ancient vampires who've returned from vampire hell.

The Vampire Archives is the biggest, hungriest, undeadliest collection of vampire stories, as well as the most comprehensive bibliography of vampire fiction ever assembled. Dark, stormy, and delicious, once it sinks its teeth into you there’s no escape.

Anne Bishop's "darkly fascinating"* (SF Site) Black Jewel novels have enthralled readers and critics alike with their mixture of fantasy, intrigue, and romance. Now in Twilight's Dawn, Bishop returns to the Blood realm with four all-new captivating novellas.

Kelly Link has won an ardent following for her ability, with each new short story, to take readers deeply into an unforgettable, brilliantly constructed fictional universe. The nine exquisite examples in this collection show her in full command of her formidable powers. In “The Summer People,” a young girl in rural North Carolina serves as uneasy caretaker to the mysterious, never-quite-glimpsed visitors who inhabit the cottage behind her house....

A chilling collection of psychological suspense and literary horror from the multiple award-winning author of the national best seller The Cabin at the End of the World and A Head Full of Ghosts. A masterful anthology featuring 19 pieces of short fiction, Growing Things and Other Stories is an exciting glimpse into Paul Tremblay’s fantastically fertile imagination.

More than a decade after Kelley Armstrong first opened the doors to the Otherworld, fans are still clamoring for more. In response to their demands - and to coincide with the Syfy Network show based on the series - Plume has signed up three Otherworld anthologies, each of which revolves around a different theme. The second in the trilogy, Otherworld Secrets, features fan favorites such as Cassandra, Savannah, and Adam in rare and never-before-published short stories - plus a brand new novella.

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.

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.