Author: Alex Acks

Haelewise is a strange, weak little girl, whose black eyes and fainting spells leave her shunned by her village, with only her overprotective mother to care about her and tell her stories of an ancient tower where women can find shelter if they are sufficiently brave. When her mother dies, Haelewise sets out to find this legendary tower, which is named Gothel, and there she finds shelter under the tutelage of a wise woman. But she isn’t the only woman to seek shelter there…

Schuyler wakes up in New York safe and sound… but at the price of having sacrificed the love of her life in order to defeat Lucifer. Worse, she quickly realizes that she’s not actually in her own body… and this is not her life she’s walking around in. Because somehow, she’s ended up in an alternate reality, one where Lucifer is stubbornly undefeated… and the mayor of New York City.

Violet is a witch who has gotten herself a position in the royal court with clever phrased and selectively truthful prophecies and divinations. But Prince Cyrus is onto her and plans to eject her from the court as soon as he’s crowned. Violet takes her opportunity to strike back at him when the king asks her to prophecy Cyrus’s love story for a ball… and the false tale she weaves awakens a curse that could destroy or save the kingdom.

Sigrid was born an ordinary girl with an ordinary fate — she was even paired with the plainest possible horse instead of the winged mare of a valkyrie. She had nothing to look forward to but life as a stablehand… until Vanaheim is invaded and she sees a vision of herself leading the valkyries into battle. But to find this new destiny, the must face a fallen valkyrie who has allied herself with Vanaheim’s enemies.

When Sol disappears, their wife Lumi, who was born on Earth, sets out to find them. Through letters and other extracts, Lumi chronicles her journey from the affluent colony of Mars to the environmentally devastated Earth, which takes her deep into Sol’s past among underground environmental groups — and her own.

Raqi’s parents died when she was just four years old, and she was sent to be raised by her uncle, Dodge, a drug addict who is a member of an all-white, racist motorcycle club call the Lawless. Raqi leaves that world behind as soon as she can and eventually becomes a partner at an LA law firm. Then she gets a call from the leader of the Lawless with the news that Dodge is dead, and she’s expected to come on the Grieving Ride for him — and if she does go, she will finally receive the address of her long-lost Mexican grandfather. But the Grieving Ride is nothing like she expected, a cross-country journey into herself and her family.

Carlota Moreau is the daughter of a researcher who might be a brilliant scientist or an utter madman… or perhaps both, operating under the patronage of the wealthy Lizalde family. She knows only the hybrids, part-animal, part-human monstrosities created by her father, and the alcoholic overseer Laughton, but her life is peaceful enough. But when the charming — and careless — son of the Lizalde family, Eduardo, arrives, that peace quickly begins to unravel.

On a remote island at the edge of the Northern Atlantic, an outwardly harmonious community is infected by a strange disorder–and the infection causes the secrets of the islanders, from the banal to the dark, to come to light. When the island loses contact with the mainland, the inconvenience quickly becomes a nightmare and the community begins to unravel — and it becomes a real question of who will even survive.

In Seri’s world, the beasts prowl the forests and the valiant kill them to protect the People who live in trees. She’s the assistant to Eshai Unbroken, a famous commander who tries to keep the People safe… until she meets Tsana, a stranger from a world unknown who can communicate with the beasts. As she grows closer to Tsana, Seri begins to doubt everything she’s ever known… and she’ll have to find a way to craft a new peace.

The Tea Monk Sibling Dex and their friend Mosscap, a robot on a quest to discover what humanity needs, continue to travel to the villages of their home moon. It’s a peaceful journey of making friends, learning many new things, and… exploring the entropic nature of the universe.

A series of interconnected short stories by acclaimed writer and poet Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam, which ranges from past to future, from living to dead, and covers robot assassins, a group of friends stalked by the bones of extinct animals, a world where the rain can kill, and a woman who turns into a man-eating monster when she returns to her repressive hometown.

A collection of science fiction short stories by eight Chinese authors, newly published in English. The stories are by Shuang Chimu 双翅目, Liu Xiao 刘啸, Yang Wanqing 杨晚晴, Hui Hu 灰狐, Congyun “Mu Ming” Gu 慕明, Liang Qingsan 梁清散, Shi Heiyao 石黑曜, and Liao Shubo 廖舒波.

Vesper is the child of failed revolutionaries. She’s already lost her mother, who was captured by the queen’s soldiers and chose to avoid death at the hands of the hangman instead by accepting the death of being flung into the endless, cursed storm that surrounds the city. Twelve years later, her father is caught and will soon face that same choice — if Vesper doesn’t save him by arming herself with dangerous magic and infiltrating the cold-hearted prince’s soldiers.

A retired soldier named Alex rushes to the ancestral home of the Ushers when they receive word that their childhood friend, Madeline Usher, is dying. What they find on arrival is terrifying wildlife possessed by fungus, and Madeline sleepwalking and streaking in voices that aren’t hers. It’s up to Alex to unravel this horrifying mystery before the fungus consumes them and everyone nearby.

When dragon prince Thuan and his demon husband Asmodeus go on a family holiday, they don’t expect to encounter anything more challenging than babysitting and the usual family politics. What they get instead is a hungry ghost haunting a ruined shrine, who is the only witness to a murder that happened there. It’s up to the husband team to solve the mystery–and hopefully keep everyone alive through it.

Raine has spent her life hiding, lying, and on the run, trying to keep her ability to see and speak with the dead hidden—because if she doesn’t, she’ll be killed for it. But one of the few times she tries to help someone, aiding an injured woman she finds in the snow, may well be her doom. The woman she helped is on the run, herself, from the monastery of Redwinter, and from the warrior magicians who live there, who will stop at nothing to reclaim what she’s stolen.

Tanvi was kidnapped and made into a dream runner for the realm of Nagalok seven years ago. With no memories or emotions, she and the other runners collect mortal dreams for the naga court’s entertainment. But when Tanvi suddenly recovers some of her memories during a dream harvest gone wrong, she turns to the only person she can think of in Nagalok: Venakt, the dreamsmith. But together, what they begin to figure out a terrifying truth that may turn dreams to nightmares.

The Logi are telepathic aliens who maintain a diplomatic presence on Earth. Lydia, a woman with few qualifications and fewer talents, works as the translator for the Logi cultural attaché, interpreting his thoughts into English. But when something terrible happens to the Logi, she finds herself in the middle of a locked room mystery that she is also deeply unqualified to handle… but she’d better figure it out if she wants to avoid jail.

Ivy is a normal suburban girl until her summer break starts off with a stranger appearing suddenly in the middle of the road, in the middle of the night — and things get weirder from there. From then on, Ivy must struggle with some strange happenings and corroded memories, all of which point to her mother being more than she’s ever admitted to. And she’s right to wonder; when Dana was sixteen, she stepped into the supernatural with two of her friends, and what was intended to be a summer fling turned far, far darker.

While the Gearbreakers might have won against the empire on Heavensday, the cost to them was incalculable and they survive only by hiding in the mountains. The victory also almost killed Eris, who has been held prisoner since–and things only become worse when she discovers the girl she loves, Sona, has been corrupted and cybernetically brainwashed by Zenith, the last surviving leader of Godolia. To win this war, Eris must find a way to bring Sona back to herself across the battle line.