Books Tagged With format - short stories

Word Count: Click here to reveal4500 (Click here to hide)

Summary: In love, time is relative, until they run out… Regulations limit time digger Ish and time cop Kabal, born years and worlds apart, to two dates a year, making every date precious. But when Kabal announces his retirement at their tenth anniversary, what should have been a happy occasion might be their last night together. Previously appeared in Storm Moon Press' Sweethearts & Seduction anthology

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Summary: Garrison "Gunner" Reed thought the Anferthian invasion of Earth was life-changing, but that was nothing compared to rescuing April Buroski from the invaders' slave ship. Now, he can't get the petite, honey-blonde woman out of his mind. But, April's pregnant with her deceased boyfriend's child, and there doesn't seem to be room in her life for another man. April will never forget the man she lost in the invasion, her first love, Dave. Yet, when the chips are down, Garrison is there for her and her baby. The emotions stirring in her heart for the former Army colonel war with her feelings for Dave. Can she let go of the past and embrace her future before it's too late?

Word Count: Click here to reveal70000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Ray M. Holler is an interstellar shipping freelancer, expert smuggler, and an occasional thief with a troubled past which means that his life is far from the boring, mundane exploits of your average denizen of the Orion-Sagittarius Union, a political alliance of intelligent species inhabiting the Milky Way galaxy. In fact, more often than not, he finds himself up to his neck in situations that require wit, courage, and a decent amount of luck to maneuver out of in one piece. Throughout his adventures in a universe where a safe, peaceful life is possible but not guaranteed, Ray gets to meet a variety of interesting individuals, make new friends, reunite with old acquaintances, and maybe—just maybe—face his own demons. All Quiet In the Milky Way: Ray M. Holler’s Adventures vol. 1 brings forth five stories, accompanied by an equal amount of side vignettes. This collection will take you on an exciting journey to remote worlds that, in some aspects, may not be all that dissimilar from the one we live in today.

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Summary: Androids & Aliens is Scott's third short story collection - eight sci fi and sci-fantasy shorts that run the gamut from cyborgs to (comedic) alien invasions: Rise: The rise in sea levels caused by climate change swallowed Venice beneath the lagoon half a century ago. But what if we could bring it back? Ping: I was a real estate agent by day, and a museum curator in the evening at a sci-fi museum. What I saw one night changed everything. What the Rain Brings: Miriam struggles to make a living in post-climate-change Vancouver. But her friend Catalina has it even worse in the Arizona desert. So Miri hatches a plan. High Seven: Zan dreams of making full reals - immersive live virtual reality skins - but his low score may doom him to a life of cheap coding. Full Real: Dek's given up his life of spying for the city. But one more case awaits him. Will he regret it more if he takes it, or turns it down? Shit City: The Bay Area is being walloped by a hurricane, and seventeen-year-old Jason Vasquez has been relocated to a refugee city in the Nevada Desert. Will it be temporary shelter, or change his life? Firedrake: Kerry has always wondered about his deadly powers. But a mysterious bunch of violet roses starts him on the path to discovery - even if he's not sure he's going to like what he finds. The Last Human Heart: I'm one of the Remainers, the few cyborg humans still living on this busted planet. But if my still-human heart finally gives out, I may not live to find out the truth about who I am. This is the first time all of these stories have all been collected in one place, and the first publication of the Pacific Climate Tryptich - What the Rain Brings, High Seven, and Full Real - in any form.

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Summary: When do dreams become reality? Orin sells dandelion latex at a no-name market, barely scraping by. Mette is a princess. Maybe. What Orin does know is that for thirty seconds every night, Mette visits Orin in xir dreams. Orin has long since written the fancy ghost woman off as a recurring nightmare, but when Mette insists upon meeting in real life, Orin's inner world turns out to be more substantive than imaginary. Along with best friend Blathnaid, Orin embarks on a journey to discover the truth behind xir otherworldly connection--determined to free xir mind and finally get a good night's sleep. But it's an ancient, planetary magic that binds Orin to Mette, and Orin's dandelions may be their only chance to survive the separation. If you want a fun, queer romp through a sci-fi planet with magic and dragons (of a sort), download Awry with Dandelions today! Note: this book uses xie/xir pronouns for Orin. Genres: Space Opera / Science Fiction / Romance / LGBT Lesbian Non Binary Market: Adult and New Adult

Word Count: Click here to reveal100000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Ghosts are only one way the dead refuse to leave us. From cursed homes and forgotten roads to monsters, memories, and grief that refuses to loosen its grip, Bound, Broken, and Haunted explores the ghosts that follow us long after the darkness should have passed. This collection gathers seven supernatural suspense and dark fantasy tales of love that refuses to let go, loss, redemption, and tangled memories—including After His Funeral, an original full-length novel in which a grieving college student begins hearing the voice of her dead twin brother, only to discover that not every voice calling us home speaks from love. Inside you'll find: Revelry Unmasked — A Halloween masquerade hides a predator who feeds on emotions instead of blood. Ad Infinitum — Sometimes a decision in your life is so important, you just can’t get past it. The House with Gas Lights — A lonely woman inherits a Victorian house where every light reveals another reason to fear the dark. A trio of stories about the Travis siblings: Parson's Trap, Devil's Contract — Some monsters wear faith more convincingly than the faithful. Three Threads of the Turnpike Man — All the fallen must pay the price for salvation somehow. Twig the Cull Maneuvering the Apostles — Paperwork, promises, and forgotten debts become far more dangerous than claws or fangs. A haunting psychological horror novel: After His Funeral — A grieving twin struggles to distinguish memory from something far more dangerous as the voice of her brother lingers long after he's passed. Perfect for readers who enjoy atmospheric supernatural fiction where the greatest horrors are often heartbreak, memory, and the impossible choices love demands.

Word Count: Click here to reveal12000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Fifteen years ago, the Cyborg uprising fractured the Jovian Empire beyond repair when their freedom fighter leader detonated a devastating biological bomb on Callisto. Now, a chance encounter with a dying human while escaping the decrepit Io Station will force Veracity Veran to question everything believes in – if her human saviour doesn’t kill her first. A tale from the Jovian Empire.

Word Count: Click here to reveal7700 (Click here to hide)

Summary: A lion sleeps in the hearts of brave men. When Prince Theodorin refuses to wed the general's youngest son because he loves another, he is trapped on a cursed island. He spends his days trying to escape, his nights listening to his lover’s soothing voice echoing through the forest. His attempts to escape only lead back to where he started… until an encounter with a lion reveals a crack in the illusion. Theo has to believe, or he may never find his way home. Previously appeared in Wilde City Press' Bedtime Stories anthology

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Summary: Eclectic, imaginative, and unexpected, Community of Magic Pens features forty genre-spanning flash and short stories--including fantasy, humor, science fiction, romance, historical fiction, satire, and mystery--bringing together a rich group of diverse voices from a wide range of backgrounds and intersections. Fountain pens, markers and ink, charcoals, spy pens, a braille writer, a printing press, virtual reality, and a supernatural pizza: whether revealing unspoken truths, fighting injustice, or finding friendship and love, our pens have power. Join us as a recent graduate of superhero school struggles to understand her gift, a disabled android interviews for a job, a queen’s conscripted artist must pull reality from illustrations on parchment, and a grandmother’s secret room is…better kept a secret. Tales of struggle and triumph, compassion and hope: Community of Magic Pens is a celebration of our shared story.

Word Count: Click here to reveal80000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: The pandemic came and the world changed. Lives have changed; work has changed. The boundaries between reality and fantasy have become as blurred as those between life and work. Corporate Catharsis: The Work From Home Edition explores the impact of the COVID pandemic on everyone's personal and professional lives through speculative fiction. Featuring stories by Alicia Adams, Antaeus, Pauline Barmby, Steven D. Brewer, Dominick Cancilla, Adrienne Canino, Graham J. Darling, Derek Des Anges, Manny Frishberg, Alex Grehy, Jon Hansen, Alexa Kellow, Jack Nash, Helen Obermeier, Frank Sawielijew, William Shaw, Steve Soult, N.L. Sweeney, Kimberley Wall, and Richard Zaric.

Word Count: Click here to reveal51,180 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Elvis impersonators, art-fueled lust, forbidden longings, hot women, unexpected love, rekindled flames, magic, all these and more populate the pages of DESIRE. Meet thieves and goddesses, activists and actors, ex-spies and tourists in this spicy collection of 11 tales of sensual lesbian erotica by author Emily L. Byrne. Table of Contents: Viva Las Vegas The Further Adventures of Miss Scarlet Summer Stock Spoonbridge and Cherry An Evening in Estelí A Room with a View Treehugger Diplomacy The Old Spies Club Heart’s Thief The Goddess Within

Word Count: Click here to reveal132,000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Rules were made to be broken. From terraformed outposts to magical realms, journey to worlds where deadly plants, rampant biodiversity, or failed colonies have created irresistible opportunities for those brave enough to seize them. New worlds, found family, mystical secrets, and deadly science weave together in this lesbian-centric anthology focusing on a very different kind of first time—a first encounter with a world, or being, entirely unlike our own. If you like diverse stories with lesbian heroines practicing science, magic, and seduction, buy Distant Gardens today!

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Summary: Earth on the Cusp of the Twenty-Second Century Just think how the world has changed in the last seventy-six years. In 1948, scientists ran the first computer program, and "the Ultimate Car of the Future," the futuristic, three wheeled Davis Divan, debuted. Since then, a succession of inventions—the personal computer, the internet, the World Wide Web, smart phones and social media—have transformed every aspect of our lives. How might the next seventy-six years change us, in ways we can barely even begin to imagine, as culture, climate change, politics and technology continue to reshape the world? Earth in 2100 will be as unrecognizable to us as today would be to someone from 1948. Eighteen writers tackled this challenge, creating an amazing array of sci-fi possibilities. From emotional AI's to photosynthetic children, from virtual worlds to a post-urban society, our writers serve up compelling slices of life from an Earth that's just around the corner. So dive in and and take a wild ride into these amazing visions of our collective future.

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Summary: A collection of five speculative short stories by H. L. Moore, including award-winning tales Entente and No Place of Honour.

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Summary: “My many keys clang like a wind chime as I descend the stairs. Every door in our house has a key.” Here’s your key… ENTER THE CHAMBER…if you dare. Within these fifteen strange and dark tales live horror, humor, and the grotesque. These are stories of life stages and generational trauma, of reclamation, longing, metamorphosis and adaptation. Inside, you’ll find the supernatural and fantastical, shapeshifters and elder gods living amongst us. Beginning with a whisper reminding us of what we’ve left behind and ending with what we inadvertently pass to others, from the curiosity of an imaginative child, learning about power in an unjust world to the precocious teen breaking the chains of family expectations, to a mother, desperately seeking a better world for her offspring, to an elder gasping for a few more breaths of freedom, these are intimate stories in worlds that slant sideways, warp, and change the fabric of one's existence. Most of all, these are stories of survival, even when becoming the monster one fears. ENTER THE CHAMBER and greet what waits inside…

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Summary: Here you’ll find tales of the supernatural, betrayal and murder; the mistakes that lead to the fall of empires and the constant tug of war that haunts mankind. There’s a blend of science fiction, fantasy and horror - from a modern day detective facing a serial killer to a future utopia filled with disloyalty. Lovers of romance will find a little something for them too, but within these bright sparks of hope shades of darkness lurk.

Word Count: Click here to reveal97000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: The seas spell freedom. Pirates and kraken, boats and submarines, deadly sirens, mermaids, and the women who face them all. These are our heroes. High seas adventure, fantasy, and magic weave together in this sapphic anthology focusing on the joy of the unbounded oceans. If you like diverse stories with lesbian and sapphic heroines exploring oceans, battling sea monsters, and seducing pirates, buy Farther Reefs today! With stories by: Sarah Day and Tim Pratt, Kim Pritekel, Kyoko M. Sara Codair, William C. Tracy, N.L. Bates, Robin C.M. Duncan, Vanessa Ricci-Thode, Margaret Adelle, and J.S. Fields Genres: Science Fiction / Fantasy / Adventure / Lesbian / LGBT and Non Binary Market: Adult

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Summary: What happens when an AI assistant is always whispering in your ear? Does hacking into the structure of reality help you get a prom date? When your world is dying, how far are you willing to go to save its people? What is the nature of identity, and who are you, anyway? Flashes in Time explores these questions and more in sixteen imaginative short stories set atop a fourfold table of science fiction and fantasy, contemporary and far off. A diverse cast of characters explores the limits of what it means to be human, and what our choices make of us. From darkness to light and lingering in between, the scenarios and thought experiments take the reader on a journey with surprising yet inevitable twists.

Word Count: Click here to reveal13200 (Click here to hide)

Summary: In Space, No One Can Hear You Sing … Grayson Eck's life is a drag, in all the best possible ways. He's perfectly happy working in the belt alone as a wildcatter, prospecting asteroids by … well, not exactly by day. At night, he transforms into the Inner System's most famous Valeriana Storm — a secret identity that even his closest friends and family don't know about. When someone tries to steal one of Greyson's mining scores, he has half a mind to just toss the guy off his rock and into open space. But that all changes when he discovers the stranger's identity — and that he knows Greyson's secret. Now he's being chased by a pirate, and has to decide what to do with the apparent thief while also putting on his show. What's a space drag queen to do?

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Summary: “I have great responsibilities, but my path ahead is as foggy and blurred as the path behind me.” With forester Taruif freed, Kelnaht has claimed him openly at Solstice before tribe and Ma’terra as his partner, but with their third, Ianys, bound by an old promise, their triad is still incomplete. Sneaking around puts the most strain on Ianys. He and Kelnaht must keep their relationship a secret or he will lose his daughter, Atèn. When several children fall ill with more than a summer bug, truth seeker Kelnaht is assigned once more to investigate. What he finds is deadly and threatens the life of every underage child in the tribe, including Atèn. Then a wounded traveller is found in the forest, left to die after a vicious attack. With Taruif and his apprentice on the hunt for a cure, Kelnaht focusses on the attacks, but the clues are few and more children are infected. Nothing seems to connect until both the traveller and Atèn dream of the same grey-haired elf. Driven by fear for his daughter, Ianys pulls away from his lovers. Kelnaht can only pray Ma’terra will guide him to a solution that brings them all together and keeps Atèn safe from harm. This is the single ebook release of the third Act of A Triad in Three Acts