Shapers of Worlds Volume II
Science fiction and fantasy by authors featured on the Aurora Award-winning podcast The Worldshapers
- Publisher
- Shadowpaw Press
- Initial publish date
- Nov 2021
- Category
- Short Stories, Short Stories
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9781989398289
- Publish Date
- Nov 2021
- List Price
- $29.95
-
Hardback
- ISBN
- 9781989398296
- Publish Date
- Nov 2021
- List Price
- $29.95
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Description
Explore twenty-four imaginative tales crafted by some of today's best writers of science fiction and fantasy, all guests on Aurora Award-winning podcast The Worldshapers during its second year, including international bestsellers and winners of every major award in the field as well as newer authors just beginning what promise to be stellar careers.
There are brand-new stories from Kelley Armstrong, Marie Brennan, Garth Nix, Candas Jane Dorsey, Jeremy Szal, Edward Willett, Bryan Thomas Schmidt, Lisa Foiles, Susan Forest, Matthew Hughes, Heli Kennedy, Helen Dale, Adria Laycraft, Edward Savio, Lisa Kessler, Ira Nayman, James Alan Gardner, and Tim Pratt, plus fiction by Jeffrey A. Carver, David D. Levine, Carrie Vaughn, Nancy Kress, Barbara Hambly, and S.M. Stirling.
A woman seeking the power to see the evil hiding within others regrets receiving it. Letters written by a wizard in the past threaten a queen's reign in the present. Competing for Earth, a human wrestler faces an alien shapeshifter in an interstellar tournament. A guide in Tibet must weigh the good of his people when asked to lead a westerner to the fabled realm of Shangri. An activist imprisoned for illegal genetic modification works with the materials at hand and the threads of the multiverse to make the world-aworld, at least-a better place. A demonic agent sent to help a human turns the tables on his summoner.
Like the "cabinets of curiosities" created by collectors of the sixteenth century, Shapers of Worlds Volume II displays a varied array of thought-provoking delights: tales of humour and sorrow, darkness and light, and hope and despair that are full of adventure, full of life, and sometimes full of regret. There are stories set in alternate histories, in possible futures, near and far, and in the here-and-now, taking place on Earth, on distant planets, or in fantastic realms. All arise from the innate need of human beings to create, to imagine . . . to shape worlds.
About the authors
Edward Willett is the award-winning author of more than sixty books of fantasy, science fiction, and non-fiction for all ages. He won Canada’s top science fiction award, the Aurora Award, for Best Long-Form Work in English in 2009 for Marseguro (DAW Books); the sequel, Terra Insegura, was shortlisted for the same award. Other science fiction books from DAW include Lost in Translation, The Cityborn, and the upcoming Worldshaper (September 2018), which will launch a new series. He’s also the author of the fantasy novels Magebane (written as Lee Arthur Chane) and the Masks of Aygrima trilogy (written as E.C. Blake). Other titles include the five-book Shards of Excalibur series for Regina’s Coteau Books, and the young adult fantasy Spirit Singer, which won the Regina Book Award at the 2002 Saskatchewan Book Awards. Ed began his career as a reporter, photographer, columnist, cartoonist, and eventually editor for the Weyburn Review, then spent five years as communications officer for the then fledgling Saskatchewan Science Centre. He’s been a fulltime freelance writer (and actor and singer) for twenty-five years. His nonfiction runs the gamut from science books and biographies to local history. He lives in Regina with his wife, Margaret Anne Hodges, P.Eng., their teenaged daughter, Alice, and their black Siberian cat, Shadowpaw.
When librarians finally granted Kelley Armstrong an adult card, she made straight for the epic fantasy and horror shelves. She spent the rest of her childhood and teen years happily roaming fantastical and terrible worlds, and vowed that someday she'd write a story combining swords, sorcery, and the ravenous undead. That story began with the New York Times bestselling Sea of Shadows and continues with Empire of Night.
Armstrong's first works for teens were the New York Times bestselling Darkest Powers and Darkness Rising trilogies. She lives in rural Ontario with her husband, three children, and far too many pets.
Kelley Armstrong's profile page
Candas Jane Dorsey is an internationally-known, award-winning author of several novels, four poetry books; several anthologies edited/co-edited, and numerous published stories, poems, reviews, and critical essays. Her most recent fiction includes novels The Adventures of Isabel; What's the Matter with Mary Jane?; and The Man Who Wasn't There; and short fiction Vanilla and Other Stories and . For fourteen years, she was the editor/publisher of the literary press, The Books Collective, including River Books and, for a time, Tesseract Books. She was founding president of SFCanada, and has been president of the Writers Guild of Alberta. She has received a variety of awards and honours for her books and short fiction, including most recently, the 2017 the WGA Golden Pen Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Literary Arts. She was inducted into the City of Edmonton Arts and Cultural Hall of Fame in 2019. She is also a community activist, advocate and leader who has served on many community boards and committees for working for neighbourhoods, heritage, social planning and human rights advocacy. She lives in Edmonton, Alberta.
Candas Jane Dorsey's profile page
Jeffrey A. Carver's profile page
Bryan Thomas Schmidt's profile page
David D. Levine's profile page
Matthew Hughes has lead a successful writing career?first as a journalist, then as a staff speechwriter to the Canadian ministers of justice and environment, and as a freelance corporate and political speechwriter in British Columbia. He resides in a small town on Vancouver Island, off Canada’s west coast.
Excerpt: Shapers of Worlds Volume II: Science fiction and fantasy by authors featured on the Aurora Award-winning podcast The Worldshapers (by (author) Edward Willett, Kelley Armstrong, Marie Brennan, Garth Nix, Candas Jane Dorsey, Jeremy Szal, Jeffrey A. Carver, Bryan Thomas Schmidt, David D. Levine, Lisa Foiles, Susan Forest, Matthew Hughes, Heli Kennedy, Helen Dale, Adria Laycraft, Edward Savio, Lisa Kessler, ira Nayman, Carrie Vaughn, Nancy Kress, James Alan Gardner, Tim Pratt, Barbara Hambly & S.M. Stirling)
Introduction
By Edward Willett
Back in the sixteenth century, learned men were known for creating “cabinets of curiosities,” collections of notable objects: relics of archaeological interest, fascinating geological specimens, stuffed animals, valuable books, works of art, and more. These cabinets (at the time, the term referred to rooms, not just pieces of furniture) were precursors to modern museums. They were also a form of entertainment: “learned entertainment,” as the Royal Society in London termed it.
These collections might or might not have a strong central theme. It depended on the collector and his or her specific interests. Some might largely be collections of one type of thing; others might be collections of many different types of things.
Anthologies, it seems to me, are rather like cabinets of curiosities, the collector being the editor. Many anthologies have a strong central theme, such as “stories set on Mars,” or “stories about ancient deities making their way in the modern world,” or “alternate histories of the Civil War.” The curiosities collected in such cabinets are all related to this central theme, and thus, readers know what to expect as they move from tale to tale.
This anthology, and its precursor, Shapers of Worlds, published last year, are far more eclectic. The stories collected here are stories connected not by theme but by something more concrete: every author was a guest during the second year of my podcast, The Worldshapers, where I interview other science fiction and fantasy authors about their creative process.
Both anthologies grew out of a presentation to the annual general meeting of SaskBooks, the association of Saskatchewan publishers of which I’m a member, in 2019. A publisher from Winnipeg explained how she had successfully Kickstarted an anthology of short fiction, and I thought, Hey, I know some authors!
I reached out to the guests from the first year of my podcast, which had begun in August 2018, and eighteen authors agreed to take part, with nine offering to write new stories and nine to provide reprints. After climbing the somewhat steep Kickstarter learning curve, I successfully crowdsourced Shapers of Worlds in early 2020 and published it through my own Shadowpaw Press last fall.
Having done it once, I thought I could do it again, so I reached out to my second-year guests. This time, eighteen authors agreed to write new stories, and six offered reprints, and that’s the volume you now hold in your hand (or are viewing on your ebook reader of choice).
To return to my metaphor, these stories are those which the authors themselves chose to be displayed in this cabinet of curiosities. The result, I think you’ll find, is as varied as the strange assortment of oddities and discoveries those long-ago collectors placed in their personal showcases, ranging from far-future science fiction to modern-day fantasy to stories of alternate histories to tales set in magical realms. Here you will find darkness and danger, but also light and hope; grimness, but also humour; rollicking adventure alongside quieter tales conducive to contemplation.
It has been a great honour both to interview these authors and to collect and edit these stories. I couldn’t be prouder to present Shapers of Worlds Volume II to the world.
And, of course, none of this could have been possible without the generosity of all those who backed the Kickstarter earlier this year that provided the funds to pay the authors and produce this book. I hope you’ll find your support was well worthwhile.
Another term for a cabinet of curiosities was “cabinet of wonder.” In the stories that follow, you will find a great deal of wonder: they are, literally, wonder-full.
Editorial Reviews
Praise for Shapers of World (Volume I):
"One of the most wide-ranging volumes I've encountered in terms of sub-genre. It's rather like a speculative fiction buffet, offering steampunk, fantasy, military fiction, magic, space opera, post-apocalyptic, hard science fiction, and others . . . Inventive and varied, the collection has a lot to offer for those seeking an interesting, entertaining, and thought-provoking read." - Lisa Timpf, The Future Fire
Other titles by Edward Willett
Shapers of Worlds Volume III
Right to Know
Falcon's Egg
Shapers of Worlds
From the Street to the Stars
Master of the World
Spirit Singer
One Lucky Devil
The First World War Memoirs of Sampson J. Goodfellow
Paths to the Stars
Twenty-Two Fantastical Tales of Imagination
I Tumble Through the Diamond Dust
Other titles by Kelley Armstrong
The Final Trial
Royal Guide to Monster Slaying, Book 4
The Poisoner's Ring
A Rip Through Time Novel
Someone Is Always Watching
Murder at Haven's Rock
A Novel
A Rip Through Time
A Novel
The Deepest of Secrets
A Rockton Novel
A Stranger in Town
A Rockton Novel
The Serpent's Fury
Royal Guide to Monster Slaying, Book 3
Wolf's Curse
The Gryphon's Lair
Royal Guide to Monster Slaying, Book 2
Other titles by Candas Jane Dorsey
He Wasn’t There Again Today
An Epitome Apartments Mystery
The Story of My Life Ongoing, by C. S. Cobb
The Story of My Life Ongoing, by C.S. Cobb
What’s the Matter with Mary Jane?
An Epitome Apartments Mystery
Seasons Between Us (Large Print)
Tales of Identities and Memories
Seasons Between Us
Tales of Identities and Memories
The Adventures of Isabel
An Epitome Apartments Mystery
Tesseracts 8
Tesseracts 3
A Paradigm of Earth
Other titles by Jeremy Szal
Other titles by Jeffrey A. Carver
Other titles by Susan Forest
Seasons Between Us (Large Print)
Tales of Identities and Memories
Seasons Between Us
Tales of Identities and Memories
Flights of Marigold
Bursts of Fire
Shades Within Us
Tales of Migrations and Fractured Borders
The Sum of Us
Tales of the Bonded and Bound
The Sum of Us
Tales of the Bonded and Bound
Strangers Among Us
Tales of Underdogs and Outcasts
