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The vast and mysterious universe is explored in this reprint anthology from award-winning editor and anthologist Neil Clarke (Clarkesworld magazine, The Best Science Fiction of the Year). The urge to explore and discover is a natural and universal one, and the edge of the unknown is expanded with each passing year as scientific advancements inch us closer and closer to the outer reaches of our solar system and the galaxies beyond them. Generations of writers have explored these new frontiers and the endless possibilities they present in great detail. With galaxy-spanning adventures of discovery and adventure, from generations ships to warp drives, exploring new worlds to first contacts, science fiction writers have given readers increasingly new and alien ways to look out into our broad and sprawling universe. The Final Frontier delivers stories from across this literary spectrum, a reminder that the universe is far large and brimming with possibilities than we could ever imagine, as hard as we may try. [Contains tables.]

“The exciting beginning of a promising new epic fantasy series. Prepare for ancient mysteries, innovative magic, and heart-pounding heists.”—Brandon Sanderson “Complex characters, magic that is tech and vice versa, a world bound by warring trade dynasties: Bennett will leave you in awe once you remember to breathe!”—Tamora Pierce In a city that runs on industrialized magic, a secret war will be fought to overwrite reality itself — the first in a dazzling new series from *City of Stairs *author Robert Jackson Bennett. Sancia Grado is a thief, and a damn good one. And her latest target, a heavily guarded warehouse on Tevanne’s docks, is nothing her unique abilities can’t handle. But unbeknownst to her, Sancia’s been sent to steal an artifact of unimaginable power, an object that could revolutionize the magical technology known as scriving. The Merchant Houses who control this magic — the art of using coded commands to imbue everyday objects with sentience — have already used it to transform Tevanne into a vast, remorseless capitalist machine. But if they can unlock the artifact’s secrets, they will rewrite the world itself to suit their aims. Now someone in those Houses wants Sancia dead, and the artifact for themselves. And in the city of Tevanne, there’s nobody with the power to stop them. To have a chance at surviving — and at stopping the deadly transformation that’s under way — Sancia will have to marshal unlikely allies, learn to harness the artifact’s power for herself, and undergo her own transformation, one that will turn her into something she could never have imagined.

Stranded on a desert island, a young man yearns for objects from his past. A local from a small coastal town in England is found dead as the tide goes out. A Norwegian whaling ship is stranded in the Arctic, its crew threatened by mysterious forces. In the nineteenth century, a ship drifts in becalmed waters in the Indian Ocean, those on it haunted by their evil deeds. A surfer turned diver discovers there are things worse than drowning under the sea. Something from the sea is creating monsters on land. In The Devil and the Deep, award-winning editor Ellen Datlow shares an all-original anthology of horror that covers the depths of the deep blue sea, with brand new stories from New York Times bestsellers and award-winning authors such as Seanan McGuire, Christopher Golden, Stephen Graham Jones, and more.

It’s a long, hot summer in the Peak District, but the blue skies are darkened by police helicopters and the sound of birdsong is drowned out by the increasing hysteria of a full-scale search operation for a missing teenage girl. Laura Vernon is smart, sexy and the keeper of many secrets, but now she’s lying dead in a thicket in the heart of the country. Harry Dickinson found the body, but what instincts make him so bent on obstructing the police investigation into Laura’s murder? And what do he and his two fellow retired lead miners find to talk about on those long, balmy nights in the pub, hunched over their game of dominoes? Graham Vernon is a man who knows all about secrets, and the police are at a loss to understand the attitude of this powerful businessman and his glamorous wife to the death of their precious daughter. The Vernons are holding something back. But what could be more important that the discovery of Laura’s brutal murderer? Ben Cooper, a young Detective Constable living with tragedy, has known the villagers all his life, but his instinctive feelings about the case are called into question by the arrival of Diane Fry, a ruthlessly ambitious DC from outside the division. As Ben and Diane take the first steps in a complicated dance of suspicion, attraction and frustration, they discover that to understand the present, they must also understand the past — and in a world where no one is entirely innocent, pain and suffering can be the only outcome.

EVERY STEP... Paul Davis forgets things — he gets confused, he has sudden panic attacks. But he wasn’t always like this. TAKES YOU CLOSER... Eight months ago, Paul found two dead bodies in the back of a co-worker’s car. He was attacked, left for dead, and has been slowly recovering ever since. His wife tries her best but fears the worst... TO THE TRUTH... Therapy helps during the days, but at night he hears things — impossible things — that no one else can. That nobody else believes. Either he’s losing his mind — or someone wants him to think he is. Just because he’s paranoid doesn’t mean it’s not happening...

Will the secrets of a dark night ever be revealed? When rock idol Scott Silver is found murdered, the prime suspect lies dead next to him. For Silver’s killer broke into his mansion home on the South Devon coast and it appears that the rock star’s mesmerising widow Angel killed the intruder in self defence. However, gradually an intense and complex tale of intrigue and deception evolves. Local paper journalist John Kelly, a man with a past which still haunts him, begins to investigate. Soon he finds himself falling under the spell of the beautiful but dangerous Angel. Kelly becomes embroiled in a sexual obsession so overwhelming that it threatens to destroy him. Yet he continues to seek the truth about the night two men died a brutal death...

John Carr, aka Oliver Stone-once the most skilled assassin his country ever had-stands in Lafayette Park in front of the White House, perhaps for the last time. The president has personally requested that Stone serve his country again on a high-risk, covert mission. Though he’s fought for decades to leave his past career behind, Stone has no choice but to say yes. Then Stone’s mission changes drastically before it even begins. It’s the night of a state dinner honoring the British prime minister. As he watches the prime minister’s motorcade leave the White House that evening, a bomb is detonated in Lafayette Park, an apparent terrorist attack against both leaders. It’s in the chaotic aftermath that Stone takes on a new, more urgent assignment: find those responsible for the bombing. British MI-6 agent Mary Chapman becomes Stone’s partner in the search for the unknown attackers. But their opponents are elusive, capable, and increasingly lethal; worst of all, it seems that the park bombing may just have been the opening salvo in their plan. With nowhere else to turn, Stone enlists the help of the only people he knows he can trust: the Camel Club. Yet that may be a big mistake. In the shadowy worlds of politics and intelligence, there is no one you can really trust. Nothing is really what it seems to be. And Hell’s Corner truly lives up to its name. This may be Oliver Stone’s and the Camel Club’s last stand.

In “The Virtual Swallows of Hog Island,” a programmer finds himself working for the self-proclaimed “Bad-Boy of Virtual-Reality Therapy.” While his boss is breaking new ground and breaking the rules and his coworkers are engaging in questionable uses of the latest technology, the lonely programmer is in a state of mourning over his deep personal losses and must figure out his own form of therapy. At the Publisher’s request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

The Mangans, having fought on the losing side of the American War of Independence, sail to the Bahamas, where they settle and prosper. Several generations later, Tom Mangan is the affluent proprietor of a number of luxury hotels, whose future looks even brighter with the injection of fifty million dollars provided by a well-heeled Texan family. The day Mangan clinches the deal with his friend, Bill Cunningham, should be the happiest day of his life, but a family tragedy followed by a series of misfortunes and disasters eventually leads him to suspect a conspiracy to ruin him, or, perhaps, something even more horrifying

After much tragedy and violence, Jack Taylor has at long last found contentment. Of course, he still knocks back too much Jameson and dabbles in uppers, but he has a new woman in his life, a freshly bought apartment, and little sign of trouble on the horizon. But once again, trouble comes to him, this time in the form of a wealthy Frenchman who wants Jack to investigate the double-murder of his twin sons. Jack is meanwhile roped into looking after his girlfriend’s nine-year-old son, and is in for a shock with the appearance of a character from his past. The plot is a chess game and all of the pieces seem to be moving at the behest of one dangerously mysterious player: a vigilante called ‘Silence’, because he’s the last thing his victims will ever hear.

The year is 1917. Ten years after leaving his home on bad terms, Klim Rogov returns to Russia to claim his inheritance after his wealthy father’s death. As a famous journalist now holding Argentinean citizenship, he wants nothing to do with the ongoing Great War, Tsar Nicholas II, or the collapsing Russian Empire. Klim knows that he should leave the country as soon as possible, but then he meets Nina, a young businesswoman, and falls in love with her. She is, in some ways, an “immigrant” too—a brave soul who dared to enter the hostile, man-dominated world of business and succeeded despite the odds. But all of her achievements are ruined during a gloomy October night when the Reds seize power and ban all private property. People like Klim and Nina suddenly become public enemies. As a foreign citizen, Klim has a chance to escape the civil war unleashed by the Bolshevik revolution, though now he feels like a first-class passenger on the Titanic, who has to save only himself or die. Time is running out, and Klim must make a fateful decision that will cost him dearly either way.

Welcome to an awe-inspiring world of Shanghai in the roaring 1920s. White colonialists see themselves as the supreme race exploiting China for its cheap labor and reaping the rewards of its opium market. But then Russians come and ruin the perfect world Europeans and Americans built for themselves in China. Fleeing the Bolsheviks, Russian refugees arrive in thousands, noblemen and common laborers alike, ready to take any job and get their hands dirty. They don’t care if it made other white people look not so exceptional in front of the locals. Klim Rogov, a Russian journalist famous for his wit, used to be a rich man who won the heart of a brilliant, passionate young business woman, Nina Kupina. Now, they find themselves in a rusty refugee ship anchoring in Shanghai harbor without money, documents, and any prospect in the near future, but Klim believes that he and Nina can cope with any challenge as long as they are together. One night, Nina disappears from the ship amidst strange circumstances, and Klim’s fellow refugees suspect that she ran away with another man. Once in the city, Klim is rejected by both the whites and the Chinese, and his only dubious ally is a difficult teenage dancer who decides to seduce him for sport. Klim knows that the “fallen gods” should keep a low profile, but he is obsessed with winning his life back and finding out what happened to Nina. He writes a diary, which becomes a whimsical China travel guide to the world of weapon smugglers, opium traders, corrupt police, and communist agents doing everything possible to ignite a civil war in China. But when Klim discovers Nina’s dark secret, he begins to doubt if he can handle it. And to make things worse, the Chinese nationalists gather an army and launch an attack on defenseless Shanghai.

With the advent of Joseph Stalin to power in 1927, the Soviet Union begins to turn into a monstrous totalitarian state eager to enslave its own population and consume the neighboring countries. But the world is not aware of what is going on since Soviet Russia closely guards its secrets and knows how to deal with the inquisitive. Nina Kupina, a Russian political exile, is abducted by the Soviet agents in China who bring her to Moscow. She takes refuge at the house of Oscar Reich, an American millionaire who, unaccountably, has a privilege to run a private enterprise in the USSR. Nina suspects that Mr. Reich is not who he pretends to be, and there is some shady deal between him and the Bolsheviks. But she accepts his advances, knowing that he is the only person able to help her return home to her husband, Klim, who is living in Shanghai. Little does she know that Klim is already in Russia looking for her. To make inquiries about Nina’s whereabouts, he takes a position in the United Press as a correspondent in Moscow. His search leads him not to the reunion with his wife but to his imminent arrest as a spy. And Oscar Reich is ready to do everything to make sure Klim gets into the trap set by the OGPU (the predecessor of the KGB).

The mountain of Kinder Scout offers the most incredible views of the Peak District, but when thick fog descends there on a walking party led by enigmatic Darius Roth, this spectacular landscape is turned into a death trap that claims a life. For DI Ben Cooper however, something about the way Faith Matthew fell to her death suggests it was no accident, and he quickly discovers more than one of the hikers may have had reason to murder their companion. To make things worse, his old colleague DS Diane Fry finds herself at centre of an internal investigations storm that threatens to drag Cooper down with it.

Ill-fated ex-cop Jack Taylor is broke and working nightshifts as a security guard when he receives an unexpected commission — find The Red Book, an infamous blasphemous text stolen from the Vatican archives. The thief, a rogue priest, is now believed to be hiding out in Galway. Despite Jack’s distaste for priests of any stripe, the money is just too good to turn down. It won’t be hard for a man with Jack’s skills to track down the errant churchman, but Jack has underestimated The Red Book’s toxic lure and will be powerless to stem the wave of violence unleashed in its wake — a wave that will engulf Jack and all those around him.

Mankind comes face to face with extraterrestrial life in this short fiction reprint anthology from Clarkesworld publisher Neil Clarke. They Are Strangers from Far Lands… Science fiction writers have been using aliens as a metaphor for the other for over one hundred years. Superman has otherworldly origins, and his struggles to blend in on our planet are a clear metaphor for immigration. Earth’s adopted son is just one example of this “Alien Among Us” narrative. There are stories of assimilation, or the failure to do so. Stories of resistance to the forces of naturalization. Stories told from the alien viewpoint. Stories that use aliens as a manifestation of the fears and worries of specific places and eras. Stories that transcend location and time, speaking to universal issues of group identity and its relationship to the Other. Nearly thirty authors in this reprint anthology grapple both the best and worst aspects of human nature, and they do so in utterly compelling and entertaining ways. Not One of Us is a collection of stories that aren’t afraid to tackle thorny and often controversial issues of race, nationalism, religion, political ideology, and other ways in which humanity divides itself.

Mrs. Murphy thinks the new man in town is the cat's meow.... Maybe she should think again. Small towns don't take kindly to strangers--unless the stranger happens to be a drop-dead gorgeous and seemingly unattached male. When Blair Bainbridge comes to Crozet, Virginia, the local matchmakers lose no time in declaring him perfect for their newly divorced postmistress, Mary Minor "Harry" Haristeen. Even Harry's tiger cat, Mrs. Murphy, and her Welsh Corgi, Tee Tucker, believe he smells A- okay. Could his one little imperfection be that he's a killer? Blair becomes the most likely suspect when the pieces of a dismembered corpse begin turning up around Crozet. No one knows who the dead man is, but when a grisly clue makes a spectacular appearance in the middle of the fall festivities, more than an early winter snow begins chilling the blood of Crozet's very best people. That's when Mrs. Murphy, her friend Tucker, and her human companion Harry begin to sort through the clues . . . only to find themselves a whisker away from becoming the killer's next victims.

‘Eeny, meeny, miny, moe...’ It is thirty years since FBI special agent Atlee Pine’s twin sister, Mercy, was taken from the room they shared as young children. Notorious serial killer Daniel James Tor, was caught and convicted of other murders, and while there’s no proof, Atlee believes he knows what happened to Mercy. Tor still resides in a high-security prison in Colorado. Assigned to the remote wilds of the western United States, Atlee has never stopped the search for her sister, and, wracked with survivor’s guilt, she has spent her life hunting down those who hurt others. She will always ask herself, ‘Why her, and not me?’. Now, Atlee is called in to investigate a case in the Grand Canyon when a mule is found dead with strange carvings on its body, and its rider missing. She knows about killers and perhaps understands them better than any profiler in the FBI, but it soon becomes clear that she will need to put her skills to the ultimate test in this investigation. It seems that Atlee will now have to confront a new monster. And face the one of her nightmares.

Повість «Дорогі ви, наші цьоцю» – це картина із життя львівських міщан. У ній висвітлені перші роки незалежності України і ностальгія за зниклим світом юності головних героїв.

Ця повість – про психологічні взаємовідносини в людей, які не змінюються з летом років і є складними в будь-яку епоху. Читач переноситься у двадцяте століття, де події розвиваються на фоні часів тоталітаризму.