Most Popular Books by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough

Spam the cat thought he''d seen a lot of the world in his nine months of life. After all, he was the foremost vampire hunter of Port Deception, WA. (SPAM VS THE VAMPIRE)! This was his first Christmas, however, and from what he''d heard on TV, on Christmas all was supposed to be calm, all was supposed to be bright. The deer and Renfrew the raccoon had other ideas however. In an attempt to keep Renfrew, aka "The UPS Bandit" from ruining a lot of Christmases, Spam begins a task that leads to his being the sole protection of a new mother and child, and a less-than-warm-and-fuzzy reunion with his feral father. Altogether, his first Christmas eve is a less than Silent Night.

Scarborough Fair and Other Stories includes ten works by the author of the Nebula Award–winning The Healer’s War and many other novels. In “Final Vows,” Mu Mao the Magnificent, the feline bodhisattva from Scarborough’s novel Last Refuge, helps guide a reincarnated cat in solving the mystery of his own betrayal and murder. “Whirlwinds” takes place on the Diné Trail of Tears, when the US military force-marched ninety-five hundred Navajo people from their ancient, sacred homeland to the barren Bosque Redondo area surrounding New Mexico’s Fort Sumner. A coveted princess packs on pounds when a disgruntled suitor casts an evil spell on her in “Worse Than the Curse.” How is a plump princess to cope? And “Long Time Coming Home,” cowritten with Scarborough’s fellow Vietnam veteran Rick Reaser, is a story of the battles and ghosts many vets face after returning from the war. These and other stories capably demonstrate Scarborough’s breadth of skill.

Elizabeth Ann Scarborough’s Godmother puts a new twist in contemporary fantasy with the assertion that fairy godmothers exist here and now, and they have magical power that allows them to intervene in real-world problems. What if someone wished for a fairy godmother would help the entire city of Seattle? An overworked, overstressed social worker named Rose Samson does just that when she makes an idle wish on a mustard seed. Felicity Fortune of Godmothers Anonymous shows up to help. Rose Samson is neither fashion model beautiful nor a twit, and she happily joins forces with Felicity Fortune, a “Godmother” who demonstrates that Grimm’s fairy tales are still relevant in our humdrum modern world. Fairy godmothers are on a magical budget, so every possible way they can get human beings or animals to assist one another, they will try, rather than using up their magical means. Felicity encounters many strangely familiar situations: a pretty stablehand named Cindy Ellis is mistreated by her cruel stepsisters. A rock star’s daughter, scared of the supermodel she married, runs away from home and encounters seven Vietnam veterans at an encounter session and retreat. One of them might be a big bad wolf, who knows? In all their encounters, Rose and Felicity try to blend their magical aid with realistic human initiative and social responsibility. Scarborough’s fully realized settings and the humor built into the mix of magical solutions and grim reality make this work an entertaining and compelling read.

In a world where unemployment is obliterated by putting all jobless people in the military to maintain the endless ongoing warfare, Warrant Officer Viveka Vanachek finds herself in a weirder place yet. Captured, raped, and interrogated she is finally exiled to a remote snow-bound prison camp where she is placed in solitary confinement. It seems like the end of the world when she also becomes too sick to eat and starts seeing ghosts and hearing mysterious chanting within the noises of the camp. But her dreams tell her there is more to her prison than there seems to be and soon her delusions and reality start trading places.

In NOTHING SACRED, Elizabeth Ann Scarborough took a detour from her humorous classic and contemporary fantasies to write her "obligatory science fiction writer''s end-of-the-world book." The bad news is the world has ended. The good news is LAST REFUGE is the sequel.

What started in the States ends in the States. The song-saving musicians are back home, with heads and hands full of songs they saved with the help of the Phantom Banjo, Lazarus. The soul-destroying devils haven t given up on killing off the music though, along with everything else that s maybe a little fun or keeps people human and sane. Even the debauchery devil, AKA Torchy Burns, AKA Lulubelle Baker (of Lulubelle Baker s Petroleum Puncher s Palace in west Texas) AKA Lady Luck AKA, believe it or not, the Queen of Faerie, has fallen on hard times. Her fellow devils are willing to see her demoted to the lower levels of hell, where a girl can t even get a decent mani-pedi. Her only hope is to convince one of the musicians--that would be Willie MacKai--to become her human sacrifice tithe to hell so she can get back her faerie kingdom. Once the magic banjo self-destructs, Willie decides to cooperate with Torchy. But the phone-in ghost of Sam Hawthorne and the music aren t done with Willie yet, though it takes a ghost train full of cowboy poets and all of his friends to save him.

Dear Rosie, Being an apprentice fairy godmother is complicated. Not only do I have to go out and find good deeds to do, but for a sidekick I have that hit man that Felicity changed into a toad. I wanted to take the cat but she seems to have had a big funeral to attend. Felicity isn t around much. She keeps disappearing through a door in the guestroom that opens on the side of a hill. The swimming pool is weird too, and I could have sworn I saw someone dancing on the bottom. I am enjoying riding the flying horse and helping a boy who plays squeezebox and talks to swans though, so things are--you should pardon the expression--looking up.

Available for the first time as an ebook pairing, these two short stories by author Elizabeth Ann Scarborough serve as an mystical introduction to her work. In MUMMIES OF THE MOTORWAY, a woman and her niece and nephew travel to an English resort where something ancient and bandaged awaits in the mist. SCARBOROUGH FAIR finds the author helping a woman reconnect with her past at the story’s namesake fair along the English seaside.

A portentous song sparks an unlikely adventure in this lighthearted contemporary fantasy by the Nebula Award–winning author of The Healer’s War. Colin Songsmith sings a song to an old witch who takes an unlikely revenge. The witch’s granddaughter rescues him from the dire threat of being eaten alive by the cat. She hears the song, which happens to concern her recently married sister and a gypsy. Convinced that she has to save her sister, she takes the minstrel, the cat, and her magical resources to Rowan Castle. The story is rich with descriptive details of setting and encounters with magical and fantastic creatures such as a talking cat, a lovesick dragon, and a bear prince. The characters speak in contemporary slang, which plays nicely against the traditional fantastic settings.

SA science fiction thriller that feels like a futuristic James Bond . . . The idea of two minds inhabiting one body is a fascinating premise. The way they blend together and respect each other "s personality makes Elizabeth Ann Scarborough "s latest work a fascinating, often humorous speculative fiction. Midwest Book Review SScattered throughout the narrative, Scarborough provides amusing asides from the viewpoints of the Cleopatras. The modern day is filled with marvels from the viewpoints of the ancient queens, and Scarborough does a marvelous job of giving the world we take for granted a new angle of understanding . . . [She] has done a fabulous job of researching the past, and through the observations of the two Cleos paints a heartrending picture of loss and yet at the same time presents awe-inspiring descriptions of wonders that have managed, despite war, neglect, and outright vandalism, to survive for millennia to the modern day. SF Revu S[An] exciting speculative thriller . . . Scarborough deftly weaves her suspenseful web and then untangles the threads with her clear and concise prose, preventing a plot with dual-identity characters from spinning out of control. The DNA-blending concept is fascinating. . . retains the breathless action, frenetic pacing, and dry wit, [of its predecessor] with homages to Elizabeth Peters and Indiana Jones, and will appeal to a wide audience.

Pilot, navigator, engineer, doctor, scientist—ship''s cat? All are essential to the well-staffed space vessel. Since the early days of interstellar travel, when Tuxedo Thomas, a Maine coon cat, showed what a cat could do for a ship and its crew, the so-called Barque Cats have become highly prized crew members. Thomas''s carefully bred progeny, ably assisted by humans—Cat Persons—with whom they share a deep and loving bond, now travel the galaxy, responsible for keeping spacecraft free of vermin, for alerting human crews to potential environmental hazards, and for acting as morale officers. Even among Barque Cats, Chessie is something special. Her pedigree, skills, and intelligence, as well as the close rapport she has with her human, Janina, make her the most valuable crew member aboard the Molly Daise. And the litter of kittens in her belly only adds to her value. Then the unthinkable happens. Chessie is kidnapped—er, catnapped—from Dr. Jared Vlast''s vet clinic at Hood Station by a grizzled spacer named Carl Poindexter. But Chessie''s newborn kittens turn out to be even more extraordinary than their mother. For while Chessie''s connection to Janina is close and intuitive, the bond that the kitten Chester forms with Carl''s son, Jubal, is downright telepathic. And when Chester is sent into space to learn his trade, neither he nor Jubal will rest until they''re reunited. But the announcement of a widespread epidemic affecting livestock on numerous planets throws their future into doubt. Suddenly the galactic government announces a plan to impound and possibly destroy all exposed animals. Not even the Barque Cats will be spared. With the clock racing against them, Janina, Jubal, Dr. Vlast, and a handful of very special kittens will join forces with the mysterious Pshaw-Ra—an alien-looking cat with a hidden agenda—to save the Barque Cats, other animals, and quite possibly the universe as they know it from total destruction. BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Anne McCaffrey and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough''s Catacombs.

This is a fantasy series about a bunch of folk musicians, good pickers and flawed but likable human beings, trying to reclaim songs destroyed by the evil forces (or devils, including but by no means limited to the Expediency Devil, the Stupidity and Ignorance Devil, and the Debauchery Devil) that want humanity to lose its humanity. Hauntings abound, as they do in the folk songs.

Winner of the 1989 Nebula Award Award for Best Novel of 1988. “A brutal and beautiful book” that follows the surreal, fantastical journey of a Vietnam War nurse (Minneapolis Star-Tribune). A literary departure for acclaimed fantasy author Elizabeth Ann Scarborough, The Healer’s War draws on her personal experience as an army nurse in Da Nang to create a classic novel of the Vietnam War, enriched with a magical, mystical twist. Lt. Kitty McCulley, a young and inexperienced nurse tossed into a stressful and chaotic situation, is having a difficult time reconciling her duty to help and heal with the indifference and overt racism of some of her colleagues, and with the horrendously damaged soldiers and Vietnamese civilians she encounters during her service at the China Beach medical facilities. She is unexpectedly helped by the mysterious and inexplicable properties of an amulet, given to her by one of her patients, an elderly, dying Vietnamese holy man, which allows her to see other people’s “auras” and to understand more about them as a result. This eventually leads to a strange, almost surrealistic journey through the jungle, accompanied by a one-legged boy and a battle-seasoned but crazed soldier—as McCulley struggles to find herself and a way to survive through the madness and destruction.

Fantasy-roman.

“[A] solid start of a new series . . . fast-paced adventure.”—Publishers Weekly Twin brother and sister Ronan and Murel are true children of Petaybee, the sentient planet that is their home. Like their father, they are changelings, able to converse telepathically with creatures and to transform into seals. The Petaybeans wish to protect the twins from curious scientists, but no one realizes that Ronan and Murel hunger to discover the origins of their shape-shifting talent—and that their search for knowledge will place them in the path of peril. Meanwhile, Petaybee is changing. To investigate its sudden evolution, the twins’ father heads out to the open water in his seal form—and is presumed lost. Only Ronan and Murel, with their remarkable talents of transformation, can hope to find him and bring him home . . . if they dare to risk exposure and face the dangers of the newly unstable sea. “The story is exciting and generously laced with humor, but besides those qualities, the characters . . . and their interactions are so well realized as to utterly charm readers.”—Booklist

From the Hugo and Nebula award-winning authors comes the Petaybee series, full of gripping fantasy and daring adventure. Strange things are happening on the icy planet of Petaybee: Unauthorized genetically engineered species have been spotted; geologic survey teams sent to locate newly detected mineral deposits are either coming up empty or disappearing altogether. And the locals aren’t talking—especially not to the company bent on exploiting the planet. Disabled combat veteran Yanaba Maddock seems to be the perfect spy for the company. The frailty that was a liability in the military allows her to gain the trust of the Petaybean natives. But miraculously, with Yana’s relocation to the arctic planet comes the return of her health and strength. And the closer she gets to the people of Petaybee, the more determined she is to protect her new home. For something unusual and wonderful is happening on Petaybee. Something worth fighting for, even dying for—but especially, something worth living for. . . .

As if it wasn’t bad enough already that because of her frost giant heritage from her father the king’s side of the family she was 6 feet tall when she was only 12 years old, poor Princess Bronwyn (the Bold) of Argonia was cursed at birth to tell nothing but lies. With her father away at war and her mother heavily pregnant, Bronwyn is even more in the way than usual, so she gets packed off.

In these stories, a parade of fascinating felines tell tales of their lives. Guinevere’s cat, Gray Jane, tells what really happened at Camelot from her cat’s eye view atop the queen’s canopy bed. An Egyptologist’s cat, Shuttle, wards off a vengeful mummy by doing a favor for Bastet, the cat goddess. A Scottish cat, Tinkler Tam, stalks body snatchers through a gothic Edinburgh. Mu Mao the Magnificent, a bodhisattva cat who is the last tomcat in the world, searches for a mate in one story while in three others he assists his fellow felines during the transition to their next incarnations. A murdered cat named Mustard returns to avenge himself on his killer and protect his former household. The old soldier hero of a fairy tale discovers the secret of the 12 dancing princesses with the help of his trusty cat companion, Captain Shadow. These are the stories mother cats tell their kittens to provide them with role models, inspiring them to hold their heads and tails high.

InterGal Corporation has long desired to exploit the resource-rich Petaybee. But the planet and its guardians, led by Yana Maddock and Sean Shongili, along with their twin children, Ronan and Murel, have successfully thwarted every attempt by the Corporation to impose its iron-fisted dominion. Until now. With a bold move, InterGal’s military arm has dispatched an invading force to subdue the planet once and for all. While their parents work to foil the assault, Ronan and Murel are captured and sent to a desolate prison world where an old enemy, Dr. Mabo, waits to continue her cruel experiments on the shape-changing siblings. The twins’ only hope of escape lies in the uncharted seas of the prison planet. But in the murky depths, something else is waiting. . . .

As sheriff of Edinburgh, budding author, Walter Scott, makes a grisly discovery. Bones, bodies, and parts of bodies are found on the banks of the half-frozen loch. At first, Scott assumes the horror is the work of grave robbers. Then living women begin to go missing. A young gypsy, Midge Margret, makes the vanishings the talk of the town, telling of a mysterious black coach in the forest.

“Riveting . . . exciting . . . The writing and characterization, as well as the infusions of Celtic u00adand Inuit lore, remain of high quality.”—Booklist Petaybee is growing up. Day by day, the feeling planet—like any child—is learning to recognize and understand the meaning of outside stimuli, to respond to those stimuli, to communicate its own needs and desires . . . even to use human speech. Yanaba Maddock has appointed herself defender of her adopted planet, and has even succeeded in proving its sentience to nonbelievers. But despite her efforts, few outsiders truly care for the emotions and intelligence of what they perceive to be a giant hunk of rock. Then Yanaba is kidnapped. The price of her freedom: control of the planet itself. But the only one who can speak for Petaybee is Petaybee—and no one knows what a living planet can do once it finds its voice. . . . “Anne McCaffrey and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough collaborate seamlessly to tell a first-rate sf adventure.”—Library Journal, on Power Lines

In Changelings, bestselling authors Anne McCaffrey and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough returned to the sentient planet Petaybee with a story of growth and transformation in the face of deadly new threats. The telepathic, shapeshifting twins Murel and Ronan found that Petaybee had plans for them as well. Now those plans begin to bear fruit with fresh possibilities . . . and dangers. Now that Petaybee is forming a new equatorial island, the planet has agreed to harbor a group of new refugees, workers indentured to the powerful InterGal Corporation. But the mission to collect the immigrants becomes a rescue operation when it is revealed that InterGal is doing nothing to help these survivors of a world devastated by a meteor shower. Murel and Ronan set out to persuade the frightened refugees to come out of hiding, leave their world, and bring along their sacred totem animals, the gifted sea turtles called the Honus. But the twins discover that they’ve taken on more than they expected: The Honus are not the only animals sacred to the refugees. There are also the Manos, intelligent sharks who have lost none of their predatory habits–and who cannot be left behind to die. When the Manos are released into Petaybee’s waters, a tragic misunderstanding endangers the whole resettlement operation. At the same time, the mysterious sea otters who once rescued the twins’ father are suddenly revealed to be much more than they appear to be. Now it is up to Ronan and Murel, with the intrepid assistance of their river otter friend Sky, to smooth the waters before a maelstrom of revenge destroys Petaybee’s harmonious way of life. But even as the twins uncover startling new facts about Petaybee’s past that will change everything they thought they knew about the planet, the forces of InterGal are gathering, preparing to strike. . . .

The spellbinding sequel to “Powers That Be,” by Hugo and Nebula Award-winning authors Anne McCaffrey and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough. The natives of Petaybee claimed their planet was sentient, but the officials of Intergal did not believe them . . . or want to believe them. The planet was rich in valuable ore, and Intergal was determined to mine that ore no matter what the cost. Yanaba Maddock, once a company spy, was adopted by the planet and its people as one of their own. Now her loyalties are to Petaybee, not Intergal, and she is dedicated to keeping Intergal from killing the world she has come to love. But without proof of the planet''s sentience, Intergal will proceed with its mining operations. Can Yana find a way to convince Intergal of Petaybee''s sentience before it is too late?

When a woman’s bones are found in the icy dregs of the noxious Nor’ Loch, newly appointed sheriff of Edinburgh, Walter Scott, is called upon. Are these the remains of a drowned witch or religious heretic, or are they perhaps linked to something more recent and sinister? For although Edinburgh is known to be the center of literature, science, and medicine, it is also the haunt of body snatchers who prey upon the living and the dead alike, selling their victims for study by the student physicians at the medical school. When a band of Travelling People is forced to winter near the city, two young women are taken, one from her bed while she sleeps near her family. Justice from the settled people is rarely accorded to gypsies and the Travellers fear they will be murdered one by one by the ghouls stalking their people. A young gypsy named Midge Margret is sure that Scott will care. He befriended her family before and once more he promises to help find the murderer who prowls the snowy forest in a black coach. When a patchwork woman with supernatural strength begins hunting the streets as well, Scott and Midge Margret know the crimes are rooted in bloody dark magic. In order to catch the killer, the butchered victims themselves must testify. By Nebula Award winning author Elizabeth Ann Scarborough. Publisher''s Weekly says, "Skillfully cross-stitching history, mystery and old-time urban legend... tension mounts steadily... an artful work."

The Unicorn Girl undertakes her most serious mission yet--a journey that will lead her to discover an evil conspiracy that reaches far into space and time and an ancient secret that could lead her to her missing beloved lifemate.

Fantasy-roman.

What you see (at first) is not what you get in this collection of nine previously published tales of shape shifting and transformation. An Alaskan student of wildlife biology finds it difficult to write convincingly about what she knows. A proud and beautiful princess loses her popularity when cursed (in a way probably familiar to many readers) by a wicked enchanter. A lonely Cajun fiddler has a close encounter with his royal but scaly ancestor. In the secret story of the railroad that transformed the American West, Chinese and Irish workers compete to complete the job with a little help from supernatural friends. A lowly jeweler creates a wondrous bauble for the sultan''s favorite, but his reward, an exalted royal elephant, eats him out of house and home until he unlocks her secret. An Irish nurse discovers the identity of the lone fiddler who plays at the bedside of a critically ill patient. A middle-aged woman, suddenly invisible, improves her love and social life during Mardi Gras. And a predatory bill collector meets his match in a story so dark that the author even changed her name. In these shifty stories, you''ll be wondering who happens next!

From the Nebula Award winning author comes this modern Christmas classic. The chief executive of a Seattle-based high-tech company, Monica Banks is a workaholic who has closed herself off to any kind of home life, family, or love. Then one snowy Christmas Eve, she discovers a ghost in her office computer. The ghost is none other than Ebenezer Scrooge. Awakened by a bright and lonely eight-year-old girl named Tina using the password “Humbug,” Scrooge is ready and willing to take his turn as a Christmas spirit. But he finds that the world has changed a lot since his day, and though he knows that the spirit of love, generosity, and forgiveness is eternal, it will take more than a little tech support for him to convince Monica before the morning light. “Reading Scarborough is a joy.”—Anne McCaffrey “[A] modern Christmas Carol…a beautiful story.”—Midwest Book Review

The ancient ballads of England, Scotland and Ireland are great stories to visit but nobody in their right mind would want to live there. There s a high body count for every ballad and a happy ending usually involves boy meets girl and they end up sharing a grave. The musicians who go to retrieve the songs, with the help of the magic banjo, Lazarus, know this, but the fact is, the songs also contain a great deal of magic useful in defeating the devils who are out to dehumanize humanity by stealing the music. The Queen of the Fairies, aka the Debauchery Demon, Torchy Burns, makes them a deal they can t refuse and the reluctant heroes find themselves thrust into the lives and deaths of ballad people they know are going to end badly. It s enough to make a picker take up accounting!

Cindy Ellis knows about fairy godmothers. Her almost-stepdaughter is studying to be one and she is a close personal friend of Felicity Fortune, an Irish godmother. But she didn t suspect when she picks up Grandma Webster that the elderly, seemingly lost American Indian woman in traditional dress was a magical godmother too. When a self-serving skinwalker/witch inflames tensions between neighbors and pits sisters against each other in the best fairy tale fashion, Grandma enlists Cindy s help, along with that of a Navajo doctor, a Hopi rancher, and an unlikely champion, a dude who is related to coyotes and dreams of a home shopping network empire. Together they must defeat the evil that is threatening to destroy their world forever. Characterization, pacing, and folkloric expertise are all up to the series high standards, so Godmother-followers and others should greet this book joyfully. --Booklist

The Tour Bus of Doom rolls into a small coastal town, spewing zombies to rampage down the main street. To the beat of eerie drum music, they loot, kidnap, and zombie-fy innocent citizens. Spam the cat, self-appointed feline defender of the town, watches in horror from the rooftops. When the zombies abduct Spam''s jeweler friend and take over the nursing home, Spam is certain they are also responsible for the disappearance of his next-door neighbor Mr. Barker, partner of retired police dog, Officer Bubba. Then Marigold, Spam''s half sister, reports that her human family, who went missing while on a mission of mercy to earthquake ravaged Haiti, has finally returned home, just long enough to take their valuables. And They. Don''t. Even. Recognize. Her. All of that is dire enough, but then the zombies go too far and take over the bodies of the owner and server at Spam''s favorite fish''n''chips place. Searching for help from his vampire friend Maddog, Spam meets a new cat in town, the sinuous Havana Brown Erzullie, who arrived with the zombies. Aided (sort of) by her, Renfrew the raccoon, the urban deer cat taxi service, Rocky the vampcat, and his half-siblings Marigold and Mat, the heroic feline must investigate, before the zombie apocalyps-o destroys not only his town, but his home and his beloved Darcy. Just when he thinks he may have the situation well in paw, the zombie hunters from Seattle arrive, responding to a bounty on the heads of the zombies. What they don''t realize is that they have the wrong brand of zombies, the un-plagued un-dead, who could revive as long as they keep their heads.

The spacefaring Barque Cats are valued members of every vessel’s crew, thanks to their special bond with humans. Then Pshaw-Ra, a mysterious cat with highly advanced knowledge, gives the felines the power of telepathy. When panic over a virulent plague drives the government to exterminate animals, Pshaw-Ra guides the cats and humans of the starship Ranzo to safety on his home planet, Mau. But Pshaw-Ra has a hidden agenda. His ultimate goal? Mate the Barque Cats with their godlike counterparts who rule on Mau and create a superior race to conquer the universe. His plans, however, may be doomed by his daughters’ battle royal to become queen, by a suspicious Barque Cat with an equally curious human friend—and by something stirring deep beneath the city with a hunger to devour all life . . . and an undying hatred for cats.

In Song of Sorcery, Book 1 of Songs from the Seashell Archives, hearthwitch Maggie Brown met minstrel Colin Songsmith and a unicorn named Moonshine while saving both her sister and the kingdom. All in a quest''s work for a girl who can magically do anything she can convince her power is housework. To reward Maggie, the king makes her a princess, and therefore a good catch for the local noble bachelors. Only problem is, she doesn''t want to get married. She wants to be with Moonshine, whose Unicorn Creed, as he understands it, forbids him to consort with anyone except a chaste maiden. It''s rather a touchy situation, and so Princess Maggie abandons her crown and with Moonshine, she and Colin set out to see if they can find a loophole in Moonshine''s creed. Of course, in the process they have to try to save the land of Argonia again, this time from a were-man, a revolutionary nymph, a town''s worth of zombies, an ice worm and an evil wizard.

The six-volume set of the Songs From the Seashell Archives, all together as one volume! Magic, Dragons, Unicorns, Dastardly villains and more! Songs of the Seashell Archives is a six book collection of some of the finest fantasy writing you''ll ever read. Includes Song of Sorcery; The Unicorn Creed; Bronwyn''s Bane; The Christening Quest; The Dragon, The Witch, and the Railroad; and The Redundant Dragons.

Progress has transformed Queenston, capital city of Argonia. Once the land of witches, wizards, fairies, and other magical people and animals, since the Great War, the country has changed. Queenston, particularly, is now the city of contraptions and conveyances, including a modern international railroad. In the Great War Argonia''s dragons allied with the armies to push back an invasion. For their assistance, the beasts shared what food remained as the country rebuilt itself. But with the war won, the allies came to "recover" the war-torn country, bringing with them new ideas and inventions, most of which only needed a supply of iron and a reliable source of heat for their boilers. The dragons were again recruited, tamed, altered and virtually enslaved to power Progress. Verity Brown is a modern girl. The magic of her witchy foremothers has become, if not actually illegal, highly unfashionable. The only magic that matters to Verity is her own curse, forcing her to know and tell the truth regardless of convenience. On Verity''s 16th birthday, a hot-air balloon crash kills her father. The balloon''s dragon and wrangler rescue Verity, but are blamed and sentenced to be put to death. Her honorable quest to save them and find her father''s murderer takes her straight into the den of the wild and ferocious Dragon Vitia.

Queen Verity is queen only because her mother has said she has to be. She agrees because, after all, somebody has to liberate the dragons who have long toiled in the boiler room bowels of the city. Now that they are free, nobody has any idea what to do with them or how to feed them. Everyone is used to dragons being docile cogs in the machinery of industry, tamed into tranquility by food treated with a hypnotic tranquilizer, now largely destroyed, leaving a lot of huge hungry beasts roving the capital city of Queenston. Verity needs to act fast, before the dragons remember what dragons once did to feed themselves. The crown has scarcely mussed her hair before her political enemies have her shanghaied and sold to an outward bound vessel, leaving the kingdom to the random mercies of her erstwhile assistant, Malady Hyde.

Focuses on the adventures of the brave unicorn girl, Acorna, as she faces her most difficult challenge ever. She has defeated slavers, a deadly international conspiracy, and the vicious alien Khleevi, only to endure the loss of her beloved Aari, distant in both time and space. Having rescued her people from their enemies, Acorna is disturbed by sinister changes that are demonstrated by her beloved lifemate. Aari, a situation that is complicated by the workings of a vicious criminal and the deadly Khleevi.

Going on a quest with a handsome prince might sound like a dream, but Prince Rupert''s cousin Carole comes to feel it isn''t all it''s cracked up to be. Carole agrees to accompany her hunky cousin to Miragenia to christen his baby niece. But it is really hard to even explain the situation to anyone; how the little Princess was stolen from her mother''s side by Miragenians who demanded fifteen years of the first-born''s life in exchange for a bit of help during wartime. Or how the baby was taken before magical christening gifts could be bestowed upon her for her protection and character development. The ladies surrounding Rupert (also known as Rowan the Romantic and Rowan the Rake) don''t care about some baby and don''t hear anything about the mission because they''re too busy sighing over him. Crowd control is an obvious problem, as is extricating Rupert from more than one involuntary engagement. When at last the two, with the help of dubious questing companions including a love-stricken pink and purple dragon, arrive at the theocracy of Gorequartz where the baby had been fostered out to a queen, they find themselves in trouble of a completely different complexion. Their most deadly nemesis is none other than a giant crystal "god" seemingly created in Rupert''s own image!

Our mysteries this issue include Josh Pachter’s “The Secret Lagoon” (Michael Bracken’s pick), Larry Allen Tyler’s “Just a Little Before Winter’s Set In” (selected by Barb Goffman) and a solve-it-yourself from Hal Charles (the writing team of Hal Blythe and Charlie Sweet). A futuristic detective tale by Larry Tritten, and a classic Nick Carter novel from 1903, The Plot That Failed, round things out. On the science fiction & fantasy side, we have a vampire classic by Carl Jacobi, “Revelations in Black” (which was also the title story of one of his Arkham House collection); “Bullard Reflects,” by Malcolm Jameson, which is classic SF from Astounding; “Strike,” by Richard Wilson, about newspaper reporters coming a shipping strike in space; and “Three Bananas,” by Larry Tritten—which is one of his gonzo cross-genre mashups. Fun stuff. Plus the already-mentioned “Extended Family,” by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough. (Did we mention that this is one of those stories you won’t want to miss?) Here’s the complete lineup: Mysteries / Suspense “The Secret Lagoon,” by Josh Pachter [short story] “The Game’s Afoot,” by Hal Charles [Solve-It-Yourself Mystery] “Just a Little Before Winter’s Set In,” by Larry Allen Tyler [Barb Goffman Presents short story] The Plot That Failed, by Nicholas Carter [novel] “Three Bananas,” by Larry Tritten [short story] Science Fiction & Fantasy “Extended Family,” by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough [Cynthia Ward Presents, short story] “Bullard Reflects,” by Malcolm Jameson [short story] “Three Bananas,” by Larry Tritten [short story] “Strike,” by Richard Wilson [short story] “Revelations in Black,” by Carl Jacobi [short story]