The world's own optimist

The Sea is Not Full
In Requiems for the Departed, ed. Mike Stone and Gerard Brennan

“Requiems for the Departed contains seventeen short stories, inspired by Irish mythology, from some of the finest contemporary writers in the business.

Watch the children of Conchobar return to their mischievous ways, meet ancient Celtic royalty, and follow druids and banshees as they are set loose in the new Irish underbelly, murder and mayhem on their minds.”

Buy the book: Morrigan Books.

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War Without End
In Conflicts, ed. Ian Whates

“Thirteen tales of human striving, of ingenuity, brilliance, desperate action, violence, and resolution.”

Forty years after the war he lost, Mark Shard returns to the scene of the crime to discover that historical record and memory can hide deep, dark truths.

Buy the book: NewCon Press.

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The Great Gig in the Sky
In Subterfuge, ed. Ian Whates

“Tales of subtlety, of misdirection and deceit, revealing secrets of the past and visions of the future; tales of alien worlds and to realms where magic holds sway…”

What happens if your tribute band is better than you ever were? A ghost story about some of my favourite things: folk music, sensitive young men, and the unreal city which I and others haunt…

Buy the book: NewCon Press

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The Slave War
In Doctor Who: The Quality of Leadership, ed. Keith R. A. DeCandido

An anthology of Doctor Who stories on the subject of leadership.

The Doctor (Patrick Troughton), Ben, Polly, and Jamie visit Italy in the first century BCE, at the height of the Spartacus rebellion. But what can the companions do, in the face of inevitable defeat? Is it possible to change history? What kind of victory can be stolen from disaster?

Buy the book: Big Finish Books

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Sea Change
In The Year’s Best Science Fiction, Vol. 25, ed. Gardner Dozois

In a near-future Britain, a teenage girl learns how the boundaries between haves and have-nots are not fluid, and discovers her shark potential.

This story first appeared in a special issue of Foundation: the International Review of Science Fiction, ed. Farah Mendlesohn.

Buy the book: Amazon.com · Amazon.co.uk

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Torch Song
In Glorifying Terrorism, ed. Farah Mendlesohn

“We kissed for a while to see how it played/Then pulled the pin on another grenade” (Aimee Mann). Love and bombings.

The anthology in which this story appeared, Glorifying Terrorism, was published in response to the 2006 Terrorism Act, which included the controversial ban on the “glorification of terrorism” in the UK.

Buy the book: Rackstraw Press (e-book)

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Face Value
In Prophecy and Change, ed. Marco Palmieri

Trapped on Cardassia Prime, with the enemy at the door, Garak, Kira and Damar will have to work together and ignore their old enmities if they want to survive.

But the spectre of a dead girl is haunting them. Will the murder of Tora Ziyal turn out to be too much for their temporary alliance to bear? Can enemies ever become friends?

Buy the book: Amazon.com · Amazon.co.uk