Science Fiction Monsters

Sound interesting? The author thinks so too! Listen to Devil's Desk 3 and experience the apocalyptic world of monsters.

"If you like your heroes effortlessly cool and your monsters terrifyingly real, the action brutal and prose dripping with gore, you’ll love Award-Winning Film Director Kely McClung’s LOOP. " A Devastating Computer Virus Jumps to Humans... When the small college town of Mazevlle, home to a Defense department research lab and an reclusive A.I. pioneer, becomes ground zero for a zombie-like plague, the fate of the town, and maybe the world, lies in the hands of a one-legged badass, a nearly naked Interpol agent, a waif-like retro-gaming genius, and the military scientist that started it ...

Eric is a physicist, an angel vivisectionist, and an architect of the future. He's also an accidental time traveler, stuck in the past and trying to re-create his own future. Now he's got to save the world for a better tomorrow, but not like everyone does, in general, every day. Oh, no. He has to make a better tomorrow that looks exactly the way he remembers it, or there may be no yesterday, no today, and no Eric! There is a reason he hates time travel, and it has nothing to do with physics.

Syl has conquered the forest, survived goblin treachery, and infiltrated a town, disguised as an elf. Now Syl has set their sights upon the next big goal—conquer a flying island! Pegasus, harpies, ghouls and tricky pixies abound, all as Syl hunts for the elusive yellow slime. The allure of Lightning is too great, and Syl will stop at nothing to add the yellow core to their ever growing collection. What other secrets lie in wait for the slimy hero on this unexplored land?

Washington D. C., 1925. Clara Johnson talks to spirits, a gift that saved her during her darkest moments in a Washington D. C. jail. Now a curse that’s left her indebted to the cunning spirit world. So, when the Empress, the powerful spirit who holds her debt, offers her an opportunity to gain her freedom, a desperate Clara seizes the chance. The task: steal a magical ring from the wealthiest woman in the District.

Pawning my grandma's bracelet was supposed to be temporary—not contractually bind me to a breathtaking naga. Now I'm working off my debt at Sundar’s pawn shop, trying not to stare at his powerful tail, or imagine all the wicked ways he could pin me down with it... But Sundar isn’t just hard to resist—he’s impossible to read. One moment he’s cold-blooded and controlled. The next, his possessive instincts are wrapping tighter than his coiled tail. I know better than to fall for my boss. But the more time I spend under his golden gaze, the more I wonder...

War makes for strange alliances - and so it is for the free city of the Colonnade, which must turn to the Mother of Nightmares and her dynasty of monsters to defend themselves against the hordes of Chaos. The Colonnade, a free city, is the jewel of Ghur, obsessed with purity in a realm of bestial savagery. But now, it faces annihilation at the hands of an unstoppable beastherd. In a desperate gamble, Councillor Atella Reigehren requests the aid of a being anathema to the Colonnade. She seeks Lauka Vai, the Mother of Nightmares, and her dynasty of monsters, the Avengorii.

Life is finally going right for Lazarus Kerrigan, necromancer and Pale Horseman. Business is booming, and no gods have tried to kill him for a whole month. But the past is catching up to him. There's a serial killer on the loose in New Orleans, one that targets children and leaves behind only bones. When the case develops eerie similarities to his sister's murder, Laz knows the police are in over their heads. They need help, and the dead aren't talking. Well, except for the ghost of a 200-year-old pirate, and Laz doesn't like what he has to say.

Alchemist Zoe Faust is no stranger to magical mayhem, but when her boyfriend's new tea shop is vandalized and his special tea blends stolen, she plunges into a baffling mystery to save him. The clues lead Zoe and her gargoyle sidekick Dorian to an eerie mansion high in the Portland hills, filled with creeping carnivorous plants and enigmatic topiary monsters. When they stumble across a corpse in the conservatory that appears to have been killed by sinister shrubbery, an estranged member of the family is implicated in the murder.

Victor Wolfe has roamed his country for twelve years now. Ever since leaving his tiny village to escape to a life that felt worthwhile, he has been traveling the lands, fighting battles, plundering old tombs, and bedding fierce adventuresses. It's been quite the life. But that all changes when he has an intimate encounter with a monster girl, a dryad who opens his eyes to the possibilities of pleasure that only monster girls can provide. Now he is headed north, towards the famed Hinterlands.

In this striking and bleak, yet luminous debut collection, Nathan Ballingrud, winner of the inaugural Shirley Jackson Award, uses the trappings of the Gothic and the uncanny to investigate a distinctly American landscape: The loneliest and darkest corners of contemporary life. Ballingrud’s stories are love stories. They’re also monster stories. Sometimes the monsters collected here are vampires or werewolves.

The sweeping romance of Passenger meets the dark fantasy edge of This Savage Song in this stunning contemporary fantasy debut from Vanessa Len, where the line between monster and hero is razor thin.

Dive into a world where love is universal, but trust is not. Desperation led Emma to sign up, but did she trade her earthly troubles for something more perilous... or serendipitous? Escaping a stagnant life on Earth, she leaps at a chance for something more—fruit, food, water, sunshine, and a new start on an intergalactic stage. As she steps off the spacecraft, the otherworldly vista isn't the only thing that grasps her attention. Shimmering scales adorn a broad chest and silver eyes lock onto hers, paralyzing her with their mysterious depths. The purple-skinned alien before her is ...

They say fire rained from the sky for seven days signaling the arrival of the monsters. They say humanity fought hard to beat them. They say the celestials saved us. They say a lot of things. Me? I deal in the present. In scouting for useful things and keeping my team alive outside the protective walls of our base. I might not have a fancy monster-killing blade like the Sweepers do, but I've avoided getting my face eaten off so far, so I call that a win. But when my base is taken by monsters, my scout skills are the only thing standing between imminent demise and survival.

This third edition to the Prince Roger Series takes the Bronze Barbarians across the Eastern Ocean of Marduk, facing giant sea monsters, pirates, and the barbarian nations that dwell on the other side. Their destination is a spaceport held by humans of questionable loyalties. As Roger comes nearer to making his way home, he learns that his attempted assassination was part of a larger plot. Not all is as it seems on Earth or on Marduk.

Ben is really coming into his title of Draco Rex. Not only has he discovered a new species of dragon, but now Jemma has bonded to the baby fire-breather named Tirian. And there are more dragons out there just waiting to be found.

Jack Miller has spent his entire nine years in the same house on the same street in the same town with the same best friend. One day, while delivering papers on his same ordinary paper route, Jack finds himself amidst a very unordinary world. A world where strange and silly monsters become his friends. In this story, Jack and Annabelle meet Orville, who will stop at nothing to keep the humans from returning to Monster World.

"Perfect deadpan marks the opening of Ali Simpson’s The Monster'" writes Susan Merrell of The Southampton Review in her introduction to this issue of Recommended Reading.

Lukan Gardova is a cardsharp, academy dropout, and—thanks to a duel that ended badly—the disgraced heir to an ancient noble house. His days consist of cheap wine, rigged card games, and wondering how he might win back the life he threw away. When Lukan discovers that his estranged father has been murdered in strange circumstances, he finds fresh purpose. Deprived of his chance to make amends for his mistakes, he vows to unravel the mystery behind his father's death. His search for answers leads him to Saphrona, fabled city of merchant princes, where anything can be bought if one has the coin.

Stolen from the mortal world by the fae, the last thing I expect is a crown. Enslaved at a mine and with no hope of escape, my life is a grim exercise in survival until the magic of the Court chooses an unexpected ruler: Me.