In this grizzly anthology of the undead, four fascinatingly horrid dystopian universes are described, with zombies taking centre stage.Included are:What Will Come After - Scott EdelmanIn this most personal of zombie stories, the author imagines himself as the protagonist, looking ahead to what would happen after his own death . . . and rebirth.Christmas with the Dead - Joe R. LansdaleThe ultimate in ho...

Finalist for the National Book Award, The Yellow Birds is the harrowing story of two young soldiers trying to stay alive in Iraq."The war tried to kill us in the spring." So begins this powerful account of friendship and loss.In Al Tafar, Iraq, twenty-one-year old Private Bartle and eighteen-year-old Private Murphy cling to life as their platoon launches a bloody battle for the city. Bound together since basic training when Bartle makes a promise t...

From America's master storyteller and writer of historical fiction comes the epic story of the Crown family—first introduced in the New York Times bestseller Homeland.As the second generation comes of age, the Crowns strive to find theirplace in a turbulent America which stands at the dawn of a new century. From thespeedways of Detroit to the unbridled glamour of a young Hollywood, to the daringheights of early aviation—theirs is a story of passio...

For more than eighty years H.P. Lovecraft has inspired writers of supernatural fiction, artists, musicians, filmmakers, and gaming. His themes of cosmic indifference, the utter insignificance of humankind, minds invaded by the alien, and the horrors of history—written with a pervasive atmosphere of unexplainable dread—remain not only viable motifs, but are more relevant than ever as we explore the mysteries of a universe in which our planet is infinitesimal and climatic change is overwhelm...

**"An exhilarating spectacle of greatness discovering its powers." —New Republic"Funny and wise enough to charm the gravity from a rainbow...All five of the pieces have unusual narrative vigor and inventiveness." —The New York Times**Compiling five short stories originally written between 1959 and 1964, Slow Learner showcases Thomas Pynchon’s writing before the publication of his first novel V. The stories compiled here are “The Small Rai...

I wrote 'Christmas with the Dead' simply because I wanted to write a holiday horror story," Lansdale admits. "This was the result.

Man from the South is a short, sharp, chilling story from Roald Dahl, the master of the shocking tale.In Man from the South, Roald Dahl, one of the world's favourite authors, tells a sinister story about the darker side of human nature. Here, a man takes part in a very unusual bet, one with appalling consequences . . .Man from the South is taken from the short story collection Someone Like You, which includes seventeen other devious and s...

From the award-winning author of The Face in the Frost comes the story of three brothers who rescue a talking gargoyle from their neighborhood junkyardMichael, David, and Alphonsus Jr. (aka Fonsy) are spending the summer trying to blow up the town dock and playing marathon Monopoly games. On the brink of death-by-boredom, they head to the local dump in search of treasures—such as oil cans that Michael can use to build a submarine. But what they find is far ...

Volume 5 in the successful and critically acclaimed series of Lovecraftian horror anthologies by the most prominent acolytes of the horror master.H. P. Lovecraft's brand of cosmic horror has long forced readers to an inexorable truth—there are powers in the universe whose immensity dwarfs petty human conflicts. Inspired by Lovecraft and brought together by editor S. T. Joshi, the stories in Black Wings of Cthulhu 5 explore the very essence of fear.Between the...

Steven Heighton is already recognized as one of the best writers to come to the fore in the nineties, a winner of numerous literary awards, whose work is widely translated. In The Shadow Boxer, he delivers a stunning portrait of the artist in the tradition of such great tales as Jude the Obscure, Candide and even Don Quixote, and gives literary life to the Northern Ontario landscape of "the Soo", and the demanding, muscular life of Lake Superior where giant ore-b...

The living dead are more alive than ever! Zombies have become more than an iconic monster for the twenty-first century: they are now a phenomenon constantly revealing as much about ourselves—and our fascination with death, resurrection, and survival—as our love for the supernatural or post-apocalyptic speculation. Our most imaginative literary minds have been devoured by these incredible creatures and produced exciting, insightful, and unflinching new works of zombie fiction. We've again d...

Over its twenty-issue and seven-year lifespan, Something Wicked magazine published over 150 stories from new and established authors across the world. Volume Two marks the official transition of Something Wicked from magazine to annual anthology. The contributors are seasoned veterans and first-timers brought together in a single book containing tales of post-apocalyptic dystopias, alternate realities, far-future science fiction and good old-fashioned blood-chilling horror, edited and comp...