Fantasy Adventure Short Stories

‘We are now about to visit the most marvellous places and see the most wonderful things!’ This edition of James and the Giant Peach, part of The Roald Dahl Classic Collection, is perfect for Dahl fans old and new. So, enter a world where invention and mischief can be found throughout the book and where magic might be at the very tips of your fingers.

Cholera. Flooding. Worldwide economic downturn. Yet Emperor Franz Josef insists that the upcoming 1873 World Expo goes ahead. A cholera epidemic grips the majestic city. The River Danube threatens to burst its banks. An economic crisis looms on the world stage. Yet Emperor Franz Josef is insistent that the upcoming World Expo goes ahead. After all, it glorifies his name and his nation! Behind the scenes, a team of the brightest minds - including our hero, Jed, and young Marie - gather to stop the spread. Together, they seek to prevent a disaster and, in addition, to foil a deeper ...

>The Screwtape Letters, now in its 70th anniversary year, is an iconic classic on spiritual warfare and the power of the devil. This profound and striking narrative takes the form of a series of letters from Screwtape, a devil high in the Infernal Civil Service, to his nephew Wormwood, a junior colleague engaged in his first mission on Earth trying to secure the damnation of a young man who has just become a Christian. Although the young man initially looks to be a willing victim, he changes his ways and is ‘lost’ to the young devil.

What happens when a robot begins to question its creators? What would be the consequences of creating a robot with a sense of humour? Or the ability to lie? How do we truly tell the difference between man and machine? In I, Robot, Asimov sets out the Three Laws of Robotics - designed to protect humans from their robotic creations - and pushes them to their limits and beyond.

The angry drunk. The shameless womanizer. The coward who ran away and got his comrades killed. The ice-cold assassin for hire. And me, the girl with abandonment issues as deep and wide as the Southern Sea. The five us are all so different, we shouldn't work together. Most of the time, we don't. And yet, every once in a while, I get a glimpse of what might be, if we manage to move beyond our difficult pasts long enough to become the family our dragons need.

When Alveria is plunged into a pitch-black darkness, can a dragon-shifter labelled as "Untameable" and the dragon-hunter sent to kill her, bond together to save their world? Laini Unclaimed, a maid at the Alveria Palace, thought supervising a kid's birthday party of young dragons was going to be the hardest part of her day. Then a never-ending darkness falls across Alveria, and an army of monsters are unleashed from the underworld.

The world of Arkaria is a dangerous place, filled with dragons, titans, goblins and other dangers. Those who live in this world are faced with two choices: live an ordinary life or become an adventurer and seek the extraordinary. The guild of Sanctuary is replete with an amazing cast of adventurers, wanderers and rogues. In their pasts linger secrets that define them and shape the course of their lives. For every one of them has a tale, each with something different to show - and even in the most honorable guild of Sanctuary, not everyone is exactly what they seem to be. AUTHOR'S NOTE: This...

Ignite your senses and surrender to a world transformed by fiery desire. In the wake of a cataclysmic meteor's arrival, humanity finds itself locked in an unending battle against alien creatures from another world. For forty-two years, survival has been a fierce struggle. Amidst the chaos, a single spark of hope emerges: the Starters. Extraordinary women who possess the ability to tap into their deepest desires, channeling their passions into elemental powers strong enough to stave off the impending invasion. Alanna, a tenacious young woman, dares to dream of becoming a Starter. However, ...

Lisa Peterson is a teenage girl who is coming to terms with the tragic loss of her mother in a riding accident. Lisa swore she would never ride again, but everything changes when she moves to the island of Jorvik and meets Starshine, a mysterious steed with a blue mane. In the stable, Lisa befriends Alex, Linda, and Anne, and together they start to realize that they all have magical connections with their horses—and each other.

A collection of short stories gathered from the far reaches of the Space Team Universe. Some of these stories have been available elsewhere over the past few months, while others are new for this collection.

Quinn Morgan is just barely scraping by from day to day. She’s never had much money, and although a little more would certainly ease her stress levels, she’s never cared about being wealthy. So when her grandfather passes away and leaves her his multimillion dollar estate, Quinn isn’t quite sure how to navigate this new life. Making her transition easier is Ivan, the half human, half machine butler who came with the estate. As he helps Quinn navigate the new trials and tribulations of being an heiress, she comes to trust and care for him more than she’s ever trusted or cared for ...

Valrin was born of the sea. Raised by his adopted elven aunt on a small fishing island, he knows nothing of his past and wonders of his future...until the unexpected arrival of a mysterious ship changes everything. Joining a misfit crew running from a dangerous dwarven empire, Valrin learns quickly what it means to be Stormborn. In this epic three-book set, you will meet the strangest of the strange.

From the moment John Varley burst onto the scene in 1974, his short fiction was like nothing anyone else was writing. His stories won every award the science fiction field had to offer, many times over. His first collection, The Persistence of Vision, published in 1978, was the most important collection of the decade and changed what fans would come to expect from science fiction.

Here is the precursor to Jurassic Park. Victorian explorers have heard there is a remote plateau where dinosaurs still survive, and a group set outs on a dangerous mission to find out more about it.

Return to the world of Mortal Engines in this new book of short stories about the rebellious young aviatrix, Anna Fang. In a dangerous future world where gigantic, motorized cities attack and devour each other, London hunts where no other predator dares. But Anna Fang - pilot, adventurer, spy - isn't afraid. The three stories show gripping, moving, exciting moments in Anna Fang's life: her childhood as a slave aboard the moving city Arkangel, a showdown against a robotic Stalker that is terrifyingly out of control, and her free life as an intelligence agent for the Anti-Traction league....

The squad of Corporal Jetei is tasked with breaking through the wall surrounding an enemy town, but once they are through, the real dangers begin. A powerful sorceress has holed up within her own mansion and it is Jetei’s squad’s job to go in and eliminate this magical threat. Yet Jetei is only a squad mage, so how can she and her comrades hope to stand against a strong magical enemy within that enemy’s very home? From the author of The Kobalos Trilogy

The Town of Ostton burned; this pleased Ephret. Meet Jano Borian, a quarterstaff-wielding vigilante who roams the continent of Hazaorok in search of people to aid and wrongs to right. Many take one look at his thuggish countenance and dismiss him as a common criminal, though his shining armor suggests a nobler ancestry. Both would be wrong of his origin, however: he is an enigmatic—and arguably deluded—figure driven by his faith to a god which may or may not exist. In the Aftdengal Forest, a giant elephantine tyrant named Ephret leads his army upon the town of Ostton, burning it and ...

Rule #1 - Never enter Lupin Forest during the night of a full moon… Unfortunately, innocent good girl Scarlet Mantle is about to find out exactly why you shouldn’t break Steamydale’s number one town rule. ~*~ Who’s afraid of the big bad wolf? Not me. Everyone knows that Steamydale’s town rules are archaic and outdated, made a long time ago when the original settlers had to worry about actual wolves. Nowadays I’m more worried about whether they’ll get my latte right at the local cafe. But when I stay out a little too late before heading to my grandmother’s house one night, ...

It takes a lot of effort for Jimmy Crocker to become Piccadilly Jim – nights on the town roistering, headlines in the gossip columns, a string of broken hearts and breaches of promise. Eventually he becomes rather good at it and manages to go to pieces with his eyes open. But no sooner has Jimmy cut a wild swathe through fashionable London than his terrifying Aunt Nesta decides he must mend his ways. He then falls in love with the girl he has hurt most of all, and after that things get complicated. In a dizzying plot, impersonations pile on impersonations....

A classic tale featuring two of the most-memorable characters in sword and sorcery, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. Over a span of 50 years, the late Fritz Leiber wrote dozens of adventures, set in the fictional city of Lankhmar, featuring the seven-foot-tall barbarian and the diminuitive thief. The stories were recognized with both the Hugo and Nebula Awards.