Urban Short Stories

Inequality. Influence. Fraud. Sabotage. These are the themes of great fiction and our modern economy. In this collection of short stories by some of today’s most scintillating writers, the rich get poorer and the poor get richer. Yeah, right! From the heartbreaking to the hilarious, here are eight instantly classic battles over currency, class, privilege - and social distance.

In a world of criminals, thugs, con artists, cheats, and swindlers, there must be a man to stand against the powers of darkness and corruption. A man not afraid to walk the mean streets—whether they be those of 1930s Los Angeles, an ancient fantasy realm, or some far-flung planet of a future star empire. He is a man who knows that a “good man” is not always a “nice guy”. But when the chips are down, he understands that a hero does the right thing, even if it means losing everything.

Saving the world - by repossessing earth-shattering magical artifacts! In a modern world where magic coexists with technology, Finley Viggio Agard is among the best government agents in the Arcanum Repository. He is assigned to retrieve powerful magical artifacts and prevent their misuse. And save the world in the process.

Soar among the redwoods in this bite-sized adventure with Chloe, the recently divorced fairy inventor. She's the one who'll discover the encroaching zombie horde, but what will she do when she does? Come for the campy creature face-off. Stay for the inventiveness, adventure, romance, and intrigue. Torn between her handsome ex-husband and the brave and beautiful captain of the fairy guard, Chloe must fight to save her unborn young and the rest of the fairies.

Ever loved and lost? If presented with the chance to get it all back, would you consider it? Zach is a novelist who’d purposefully sequestered himself to a cabin in the lofty pine-filled hills. Yet, not everything is quite what it seems up there, as his revived wife becomes the last of his worries.

Entrapped within the luxurious confines of the Vertico condo complex, together with Ron and the rest of the staffers, expect to be dragged into a world of unnerved and unnerving characters. This mildly prosaic short story reeks of solitude, love (a dash), death, and possibly the supernatural? Are some curious cats luckier than others?

Come one, come all! The Carniepunk Midway promises you every thrill and chill a traveling carnival can provide. But fear not! Urban fantasy's biggest stars are here to guide you through this strange and dangerous world....

Alortia, an evil and cunning monster collects champions in his menagerie in the underworld. Who's next? Beowulf.

Black, like a select few other beings, is a soul reaper, whose sole predilection is to claim human souls. However, his life is turned upside down in a chance encounter with a human woman. Black’s memories of his past human life come flooding back to him. Will he continue to hunt human souls or will he turn against the authority and now hunt the hunters? This is the tale of the beginnings of Black’s journey as a changed reaper.

Take a trip into theheart of passion as seductive samba rhythms pulse in the warm evening breezes. Escape and savor these three scintillating stories set against the beautifulbackdrop of Brazil.... Two weeks in Rio - surely that's enough time for marketing VP Sydni Lawson to forge a lucrative merger. But instead of sweet-talking real estate mogul Gabriel St. James, she's being swept away by their sizzling and unexpected attraction.

The first three novels and the prequel novella in the Preternatural Chronicles: I'm Glad You're Dead, Dawn and Quartered, Shadow of a Doubt, and Deliverance.

The Fogg River Seminary, a girls’ school in a small Illinois town, is supposed to be just another stop on Maryse and Vasyl’s endless travels. They’ve made lucrative use of Maryse’s “foreign” looks in their melodramatic séance act—and an act is all it is. Then, during their performance, a blizzard sweeps in and cuts them off from town completely. In the freezing halls, there’s a voice speaking the secrets of the dead, and Maryse has no choice but to listen…because this time, the voice is real.

Peter, Quinn, Romeo, and Sam are four (lame) shapeshifters (platypus, mosquito, piranha, sloth) who also happen to be best friends and members of a (terrible) garage band. But the local Battle of the Bands is happening on the full moon, and the boys are forced to turn to Sam's non-were (Goth) sister Natalie to help them out.

Luck has never favored River. She doesn't believe it exists, or she didn't believe until the night it came to her aid in the form of a stray dog. Now, she has company on her journey to find her biological father and try to stay out of the hands of the man who hunts her for the lucky charm she doesn't believe in.

A modern romance short story about teenagers from two minorities. They meet at an afternoon job. Both are poor and underprivileged. She balances his anger, and he provides safety and security. This short story of a relationship ended before its time.

From her first days at Virginia’s Hampton University, impressionable, creative Nia falls smitten with Chris Eidos Alleyne, an athlete and a scholar. “Love is sweet nothings and beautiful promises”, Nia writes in her journal. What her girlfriends know, and her mother doesn’t, is that Chris’s expression of love is deeply physical. Wielding powerful charisma, Chris soon has Nia abandoning innocence for experience.

In this reincarnation story, Goovu and Katala’s destined life together is cut short by transatlantic slave traders, who were traitors and cousins from a couple of villages away. The couple’s home village was ravaged to smithereens. Five hundred years later, and in the present-day United States, could there be a chance for the two souls to reunite? After a fateful car accident sends a youth, Jason, into a coma, the young man begins to remember a past life, which now haunts him to seek out the woman of his actual dreams.

This short story unfolds as journal entries. The journal’s author takes you through his grief stricken teenage life, having lost his girlfriend to the afterlife. The lad uncovers something fascinating about the magical book that he’d found in his attic, but what are the consequences to all this newfound power?

A young boy with special abilities to see a world beyond the veil, and a realm teeming with shadow formed beasts, undergoes an emotional roller coaster ride in this coming-of-age short story tale. Will Tommy forever remain haunted by these demons from beyond, or will he somehow find a way to best them?

Scott is devastated when his wife is horrifically struck and killed by a car on their Caribbean honeymoon. In desperation, he gives into his grief and listens to a mysterious suggestion from a morgue janitor that he could have his wife "cured of death". Against all of his reservations and common sense, he feels he has nothing left to lose, but what he finds is that there are unnatural things worse than death.