2012 World Fantasy Award Winner In his first new collection since 2005, Tim Powers, the master of the secret history, delves into the mysteries of souls, whether they are sacrificed on the pinnacle of Mount Parnassus or lodged in a television cable box. With two new stories and short fiction only previously available in limited editions, the cornerstone of the collection is a postscript to his harrowing novel of the haunting of the Romantic poets, The Stress of Her Regard. After Byron and Shelley break free of the succubus that claimed them, their associate, Trelawny, forges an alliance with Greek rebels to reestablish the deadly connection between man and the nephilim. Meanwhile, in a Kabbalistic story of transformation, the executor of an old friend’s will is duped into housing his soul, but for the grace of the family cat. A rare-book collector replaces pennies stolen from Jean Harlow’s square in the Hollywood Walk of Fame—and discovers a literary mystery with supernatural consequences. In a tale of time travel between 2015 and 1975, a tragedy sparked by an angel falling onto a pizza shop is reenacted—and the event is barely, but fatally, altered.
2012 World Fantasy Award Winner In his first new collection since 2005, Tim Powers, the master of the secret history, delves into the mysteries of souls, whether they are sacrificed on the pinnacle of Mount Parnassus or lodged in a television cable box. With two new stories and short fiction only previously available in limited editions, the cornerstone of the collection is a postscript to his harrowing novel of the haunting of the Romantic poets, The Stress of Her Regard. After Byron and Shelley break free of the succubus that claimed them, their associate, Trelawny, forges an alliance with Greek rebels to reestablish the deadly connection between man and the nephilim. Meanwhile, in a Kabbalistic story of transformation, the executor of an old friend’s will is duped into housing his soul, but for the grace of the family cat. A rare-book collector replaces pennies stolen from Jean Harlow’s square in the Hollywood Walk of Fame—and discovers a literary mystery with supernatural consequences. In a tale of time travel between 2015 and 1975, a tragedy sparked by an angel falling onto a pizza shop is reenacted—and the event is barely, but fatally, altered.
World Fantasy Award Winner Michael Crawford is forced to flee when discovers his bride brutally murdered in their wedding bed. Yet it is not the revengeful townspeople he fears but the deadly embrace of the malignant spirit that is claiming him as her bridegroom. Crawford will not travel alone; soon he is aided by his fellow victims, the greatest poets of his day--Byron, Keats, and Shelley. Together they embark upon a desperate journey, crisscrossing Europe and battling the vampiric fiend who seeks her ultimate pleasure in their ravaged bodies and imperiled souls. Telling a secret history of passion and terror, Tim Powers (The Anubis Gates, Declare, Three Days to Never) masterfully recasts the tragic lives of the Romantics into a uniquely frightening tale. Back in print for the first time since 1994, this newly revised edition of The Stress of Her Regard will thrill both Powers fans and newcomers to this gripping Gothic tour de force.
Take a dazzling journey through time with Tim Power’s classic, Philip K. Dick Award-winning tale... “There have been other novels in the genre about time travel, but none with The Anubis Gates’ unique slant on the material, nor its bottomless well of inventiveness. It’s literally in a class by itself, a model for others to follow, and it's easy to see how it put Powers on the map.”—SF Reviews Brendan Doyle, a specialist in the work of the early-nineteenth century poet William Ashbless, reluctantly accepts an invitation from a millionaire to act as a guide to time-travelling tourists. But while attending a lecture given by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1810, he becomes marooned in Regency London, where dark and dangerous forces know about the gates in time. Caught up in the intrigue between rival bands of beggars, pursued by Egyptian sorcerers, and befriended by Coleridge, Doyle somehow survives and learns more about the mysterious Ashbless than he could ever have imagined possible...
Twenty pulse-pounding, mind-bending tales of science fiction, twisted metaphysics, and supernatural wonder from the two-time World Fantasy and Philip K. Dick Award winning author of The Anubis Gatesand On Stranger Tides. A complete palette of story-telling colors from Powers, including acclaimed tale “The Bible Repairman,” where a psychic handyman who supernaturally eliminates troublesome passages of the Bible for paying clients finds the remains of his own broken soul on the line when tasked with rescuing the kidnapped ghost of a rich man’s daughter. Time travel takes a savage twist in “Salvage and Demolition,” where the chance discovery of a long-lost manuscript throws a down-and-out book collector back in time to 1950s San Francisco where he must prevent an ancient Sumeric inscription from dooming millions in the future. Humor and horror mix in “Sufficient unto the Day,” when a raucous Thanksgiving feast takes a dark turn as the invited ghosts of relatives past accidentally draw soul-stealing demons into the family television set. And obsession and vengeance survive on the other side of death in “Down and Out in Purgatory,” where the soul of a man lusting for revenge attempts to eternally eliminate the killer who murdered the love of his life. Wide-ranging, wonder-inducing, mind-bending—these and other tales make up the complete shorter works of a modern-day master of science fiction and fantasy. At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management). About Tim Powers: "Powers writes in a clean, elegant style that illuminates without slowing down the tale. . . . [He] promises marvels and horrors, and delivers them all."—Orson Scott Card ". . . immensely clever stuff.... Powers' prose is often vivid and arresting . . . All in all, Powers' unique voice in science fiction continues to grow stronger.”—Washington Post Book World “Powers is at heart a storyteller, and ruthlessly shapes his material into narrative form.”—The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction “On Stranger Tides . . . immediately hooks you and drags you along in sympathy with one central character's appalling misfortunes on the Spanish Main, [and] escalates from there to closing mega-thrills so determinedly spiced that your palate is left almost jaded."—David Langford "On Stranger Tides . . . was the inspiration for Monkey Island. If you read this book you can really see where Guybrush and LeChuck were -plagiarized- derived from, plus the heavy influence of voodoo in the game. . . . [the book] had a lot of what made fantasy interesting . . .”—legendary game designer Ron Gilbert “Powers's strengths [are] his originality, his action-crammed plots, and his ventures into the mysterious, dark, and supernatural.” Los Angeles Times Book Review "[Powers’ work delivers] an intense and intimate sense of period or realization of milieu; taut plotting, with human development and destiny . . . and, looming above all, an awareness of history itself as a merciless turning of supernatural wheels. . . . Powers' descriptions . . . are breathtaking, sublimely precise . . . his status as one of fantasy's major stylists can no longer be in doubt.”—SF Site
The year's best, and darkest, tales of terror, showcasing the most outstanding new short stories by both contemporary masters of the macabre and exciting newcomers. As ever, this acclaimed anthology also offers a comprehensive overview of the year in horror, a necrology of recently deceased luminaries, and a list of indispensable addresses horror fans and writers. The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror remains the world's leading annual anthology dedicated solely to presenting the best in contemporary horror fiction.
Strange Itineraries takes you on an unforgettable excursion into the strange and dangerous worlds of Tim Powers. Vengeful and cooperative spirits, mutant tomatoes, and the ever-mysterious Ether Bunnies roam these pages, treading paths both frightening and droll. This fully retrospective Powers collection also features three collaborations with James Blaylock, author of The Paper Grail and The Last Coin.
F. Paul Wilson's engaging, self-employed, off-the-books fixer, Repairman Jack, returns for another intense, action-packed adventure just a little over the border into the weird, in The Haunted Air. First introduced years ago in the bestseller The Tomb, Jack has been the hero of a series of exciting novels set in and around New York City including Legacies, Conspiracies, All the Rage, and Hosts. "Repairman Jack is a wonderful character, ultracompetent but still vulnerable. Wilson strolls into X-Files territory and makes it his own, keeping the action brisk and the level of suspense steadily rising," said the San Francisco Examiner & Chronicle. In Astoria, Queens, the lively ethnic neighborhood just across the river from Manhattan, a house is being haunted by the ghost of a nine-year-old girl in riding clothes. More than two decades before, she'd been abducted from stables in Brooklyn. Now it's up to Jack to uncover the truth of her story and liberate the pretty, blond spirit. Perhaps the answer is in the odd little store called the Shurio Coppe? Ah, but that would be telling. Jack does things no human being should be able to do, but we watch, in horrified fascination, as the forces of evil seem about to triumph and fill the world with eternal darkness. And then-- but you must read the book. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Pulitzer Prize-winning critic Michael Dirda has been hailed as "the best-read person in America" (The Paris Review) and "the best book critic in America" (The New York Observer). His latest volume collects fifty of his witty and wide-ranging reflections on a life in literature. Reaching from the classics to the post-moderns, his allusions dance from Samuel Johnson, Ralph Waldo Emerson and M. F. K. Fisher to Marilynne Robinson, Hunter S. Thompson, and David Foster Wallace. Dirda's topics are equally diverse: literary pets, the lost art of cursive writing, book inscriptions, the pleasures of science fiction conventions, author photographs, novelists in old age, Oberlin College, a year in Marseille, writer's block, and much more. As admirers of his earlier books will expect, there are annotated lists galore—of perfect book titles, great adventure novels, favorite words, books about books, and beloved children's classics, as well as a revealing peek at the titles Michael keeps on his own nightstand.Funny and erudite, Browsings is a celebration of the reading life, a fan's notes, and the perfect gift for any booklover.
