Some days you find out that the world is nothing like what you think it is.
An archaeologist named Tamara working near Hadrian’s Wall is approached by a very annoyed-looking, silver-haired woman with an incomprehensible message: The game is moving on, the time has come to play a hand, and Tamra is on point. Time to find the Necessary Arthur and get down to business!
Former Academician Anna Kim’s research into AI cost her everything. Now, years later, the military has need of her expertise in order to prevent the destruction of their AI-powered fleet.
All her life Sylvia has made sure to never let anyone see the centipedes that emerge from her body. It’s gross and impolite. Until finally she reaches her breaking point. This is a speculative exploration of rape culture and hiding pain in favor of others’ pleasure.
“The Story of Kao Yu” is a new fantasy short story by the legendary Peter S. Beagle which tells of an aging judge traveling through rural China and of a criminal he encounters. Of the story, Beagle says it “comes out of a lifelong fascination with Asian legendry — Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Indian, Indonesian — all drawn from cultures where storytelling, in one form of another, remains a living art. As a young writer I loved everything from Robert van Gulik’s Judge Dee mysteries to Lafcadio Hearn’s translations of Japanese fairytales and many lesser-known fantasies. Like my story ‘The Tale of Junko and Sayuri,’ ‘The Story of Kao Yu’ is a respectful imitation of an ancient style, and never pretends to be anything else. But I wrote it with great care and love, and I’m still proud of it.”
A Locus Awards Finalist, this short story was originally published on Tor.com in December 2016.
In a dark future America where consumerism and gun culture are unchecked, a young family teams up to celebrate the first shopping day of the Christmas season in the most patriotic way possible.
Originally published on Tor.com in May 2018
Security through physicality. Security through redundancy. Security through obscurity.
How do immortal artificial intelligences defend themselves? With an air gap. With a security force that has no connection to anything that can harm them. With a young woman, trained to fight and to die who, along with her cohort must keep them safe. But In Xanadu things don’t always go as planned…
A nine-year-old girl wakes in the middle of the night, absolutely positive it's the middle of the morning. Soon it becomes clear that she's possessed of a body clock detached from all Circadian rhythms. And so is a fifth of the world's population.
Anger is an energy. A young girl, a slave in the South, is presented with a moment where she can grasp for freedom, for change, for life. She grabs it with both hands, fiercely and intensely, and the spirit world is shaken.
In a dark future America where consumerism and gun culture are unchecked, a young family teams up to celebrate the first shopping day of the Christmas season in the most patriotic possible.
