Visionary Fiction

Vampires, ghosts, and other horrors abound in this collection of 19th-century fantastic literature, selected and edited by Italo Calvino, a 20th-century master of the speculative.

Gerard sits, fully clothed, in his empty bathtub and pines for Benna. Neighbors in the same apartment building, they share a wall, and Gerard listens for the sound of her toilet flushing. Gerard loves Benna. And then Benna loves Gerard. She listens to him play piano, she teaches poetry, and sings at nightclubs. As their relationship ebbs and flows, through reality and imagination, Lorrie Moore paints a captivating, innovative portrait of men and women in love and not in love.

Liza, an orphan girl living on the cold streets of London in 1834, is able to rise above her squalid surroundings to bring joy to the lives of others. Although only 11, she displays amazing courage as she cares for a younger child and ekes out a bare existence through the approaching winter, guided by the wisdom embodied in letters left to her by her mother. When Liza meets a wealthy gentleman, her mysterious, almost magical manner causes him to re-examine his own life.

Conceived jointly as an opera, The Age of Anxiety deals with mythic and operatic themes. Hallucinations and soundscapes haunt this novel, which on one level is an extended meditation on manic genius and the dark art of creativity.

Rose, Olaf, Verdandi, Sophia, Li, and their friends now embark on the next stage of the Future Humans Quest for the co-creation of a thriving world and planetary home for all. Empowered with the knowledge of the cosmic architecture of life, you'll discover how to decode the economics of domination and the governance of disunity. Explore the new choices and possibilities that open up by developing your future human powers and potentials through the wisdom of the higher heart and cosmic mind, with the help of the Cosmic Architect Tools, the Avatar interface, and transformation practices.

A struggling photographer Thelma searches for direction in her life. She is drawn to a group conducting plant medicine ceremonies on a mysterious farm in Florida’s southern Everglades. After drinking a mescaline tea made from the San Pedro wachuma cactus with the group, she receives an unusual message and meets a young Persian man suffering from kidney failure, named Saman.

Prepare to lose yourself in the heady, mythical expanse of the Vorrh. In B. Catling's twisting, poetic narrative, Bakelite robots lie broken - their hard shells cracked by human desire - and an inquisitive Cyclops waits for his keeper and guardian, growing in all directions. Beyond the colonial city of Essenwald lies the Vorrh, the forest which sucks souls and wipes minds.

Kenji Miyazawa (1896-1933) is one of Japan's most beloved writers and poets, known particularly for his sensitive and symbolist children's fiction. This volume collects stories which focus on Miyazawa's love of space and his use of the galaxy as a metaphor for the concepts of purity, self-sacrifice and faith which were near and dear to his heart.

Holistic health guru Chopra makes his fictional debut with a symbolic tale mixing Arthurian legends with a modern-day detective story.

The Long Form, Kate Briggs's long-awaited debut fiction, unmakes and remakes the novel to meditate on very real social issues, from housing to care-taking, laying bare the settings and support structures that make durational forms of co-existence first thinkable, then possible. At once acrobatic and deeply attentive, The Long Form insists on the creativity inherent in everyday life, showing how the acts of social composition (living arrangements) are continuous with the acts of artistic composition (page arrangements).

Newly married, Saman wants to be a wonderful husband, but serious health concerns are affecting his daily life and marriage. To improve his situation, he undergoes a kidney transplant, but the procedure leads to as many complications as solutions to his problems.

Allison Moore is making it. Barely. The Seattle area architecture firm she started with her best friend is struggling, but at least they’re free from the games played by the corporate world. She’s gotten over her divorce. And while her dad’s recent passing is tough, their relationship had never been easy. Then the bomb drops. Her dad had a secret life and left her mom in massive debt. As Allison scrambles to help her mom find a way out, she’s given a journal, anonymously, during a visit to her favorite coffee shop.

In The Second Rule of Ten, Norbu investigates the unexplained death of his former client, Hollywood mogul Marv Rudolph, and searches for the sister, lost during World War II, of wizened Los Angeles philanthropist Julius Rosen. With two cases and an unforeseen family crisis that sends him back to Tibet, Ten finds himself on the outs with his best buddy and former partner, Bill, who is heading the official police investigation into Marv's death.

“Congratulations, you’ve won the lottery!” shouts the angel Prapura to a formless soul. The soul hasn’t been kicked out of the cycle of rebirth just yet - he’s been given a second chance. He must recall the biggest mistake of his past life while on "homestay" in the body of 14-year-old Makoto Kobayashi. It looks like Makoto doesn’t have a single friend, and his family don’t seem to care about him at all. But as the soul begins to live Makoto’s life on his own terms, he grows closer to the family and the people around him and sees their true colors more clearly.

Eliza Naumann, a seemingly unremarkable 9-year-old, expects never to fit into her gifted family: her autodidact father, Saul, absorbed in his study of Jewish mysticism; her brother, Aaron, the vessel of his father's spiritual ambitions; and her brilliant but distant lawyer-mom, Miriam. But when Eliza sweeps her school and district spelling bees in quick succession, Saul takes it as a sign that she is destined for greatness.

Akira Malone believes in the scientific method, evolution, and Einstein’s theory of relativity. And ghosts. All the logic and reason in the world can’t protect her from the truth — she can see and communicate with spirits. But Akira is sure that her ability is just a genetic quirk and the ghosts she encounters simply leftover electromagnetic energy. Dangerous electromagnetic energy.

Brian Polk had been stateside for barely a year after leaving the Air Force when the unthinkable happened. It was an interstellar invasion. The Earupitans' technology and weaponry was so remarkable, humanity never really had a chance. The aliens now walk brazenly among humans - their reptilian eyes always watchful, always scrutinizing. Humanity now lives in fear - freedom is a thing of the past. And then there are those who have befriended the enemy. But not Captain Brian Polk. When he acquires some of the alien technology, he finally has hope of making some small difference.

Emmanuel Carrère is a renowned writer. After decades of emotional upheaval, he has begun to live successfully—he is healthy; he works; he loves. He practices meditation, striving to observe the world without evaluating it. In this state of heightened awareness, he sets out for a ten-day silent retreat in the French heartland, leaving his phone, his books, and his daily life behind. But he’s also gathering material for his next book, which he thinks will be a pleasant, useful introduction to yoga. Four days later, there’s a tap on the window: something has happened.

Like a River to the Sea is the story of an ordinary man, who, it turns out, has a most extraordinary story to tell. Joshua Davidson was born in Nashville Tennessee; in his 41st year, he is about to die there. This is the story of his life, his loves, his hopes, dreams, and fears. It is also the story of what happens to him at the moment he shuffles off this mortal coil, and then what lies beyond....

"Atlas Hugged signals a revolution in the way we see the world and our rightful place within it. Not a violent revolution, thankfully, but an intellectual revolution." With these words, David Sloan Wilson invites listeners into a fictional world that mirrors events taking place in the real rapid evolution of worldwide cooperation. Wilson is uniquely positioned to tell this story.