Skip to main content Skip to search Skip to search

Fiction Short Stories

Shapers of Worlds

actor Edward Willett

Publisher
Shadowpaw Press
Initial publish date
Nov 2020
Category
Short Stories, Short Stories
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781989398067
    Publish Date
    Nov 2020
    List Price
    $22.95

Add it to your shelf

Where to buy it

Description

Within these pages lie eighteen stories, from eighteen worlds shaped by some of today's best writers of science fiction and fantasy, all guests on the Aurora Award-winning podcast The Worldshapers during its first year. There are never-before-seen stories by Tanya Huff, Seanan McGuire, David Weber, L.E. Modesitt, Jr., John C. Wright, D.J. Butler, Christopher Ruocchio, Shelley Adina, and Edward Willett, plus outstanding fiction by John Scalzi, Joe Haldeman, David Brin, Julie E. Czerneda, Fonda Lee, Gareth L. Powell, Dr. Charles E. Gannon, Derek Künsken, and Thoraiya Dyer. Among these authors are international bestsellers , and winners of and nominees for the Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, Aurora, Sunburst, Aurealis, Ditmar, British Science Fiction Association, and Dragon Awards. Some have been writing for decades, others are at the beginning of their careers. All have honed their craft to razor-sharpness.

A teenage girl finds something strange in the middle of the Canadian prairie. An exobiologist tries to liberate a giant alien enslaved on its homeworld by humans. The music of the spheres becomes literal for an Earth ship far from home. A superhero league interviews for new members. Strangers share a drink on a world where giant starships fall. Two boys, one a werewolf, one a mage, get more than they bargained for when they volunteer to fight an evil Empire. A man with amnesia accepts a most unusual offer. A young woman finds unexpected allies as she tries to win a flying-machine race in steampunk London . . .

Ranging from boisterous to bleak, from humorous to harrowing, from action-filled to quiet and meditative; taking place in alternate pasts, the present day, the far, far future, and times that never were; set on Earth, in the distant reaches of space, in fantasy worlds, and in metaphysical realms, each of these stories is as unique as its creator. And yet, they all showcase one thing: the irrepressible need of human beings to create, to imagine, to tell stories:

To shape worlds.

About the author

EDWARD WILLETT is the author of more than sixty books of science fiction, fantasy, and nonfiction for readers of all ages. Marseguro (DAW Books) won the Aurora Award (honouring Canadian science fiction and fantasy) for Best Long-Form Work in English; his young adult fantasy Spirit Singer won a Saskatchewan Book Award. Several other of his books have been shortlisted for those and other awards.

Ed's most recent novel is the far-future humorous outer-space adventure The Tangled Stars (DAW Books). Other recent titles include Star Song, a finalist for both the Aurora Award and Saskatchewan Book Award for Young Adult Literature, published by Shadowpaw Press; Blue Fire (written as E.C. Blake), also from Shadowpaw Press; and the Worldshapers series (Worldshaper, Master of the World, and The Moonlit World) from DAW. His nonfiction runs the gamut from science books to biographies to history. He hosts Aurora Award-winning podcast The Worldshapers podcast (theworldshapers.com), in which he talks to other science fiction and fantasy authors about their creative process, and has Kickstarted several Shapers of Worlds anthologies featuring guests of the podcast.

In addition to being a writer, Ed is a professional actor and singer who has performed in numerous plays, musicals, and operas, and sung in several auditioned choirs, including the Canadian Chamber Choir. He lives in Regina, Saskatchewan, with his wife, Margaret Anne Hodges, P. Eng., a past president of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Saskatchewan. They have one daughter, Alice, and a black Siberian cat, Shadowpaw. You can find Ed online at www.edwardwillett.com.

Edward Willett's profile page

Other titles by

Shapers of Worlds Volume V

edited by Edward Willett
illustrated by Wendi Nordell

Shapers of Worlds Volume IV

Science fiction and fantasy by authors featured on the Aurora Award-winning podcast The Worldshapers

edited by Edward Willett
illustrated by Wendi Nordell

Soulworm

by (author) Edward Willett

Song of the Sword

by (author) Edward Willett

Lake in the Clouds

by (author) Edward Willett

Twist of the Blade

by (author) Edward Willett

Cave Beneath the Sea

by (author) Edward Willett

Door into Faerie

by (author) Edward Willett

Shapers of Worlds Volume III

Science fiction and fantasy by authors featured on the Aurora Award-winning podcast The Worldshapers

edited by Edward Willett
by (author) Jane Yolen, James Morrow, Griffin Barber, Miles Cameron, Sebastien de Castell, Doctorow Cory, K. Eason, Kristi Charish, David Ebenbach, Mark Everglade, Joseph Hurtgen, Frank J. Fleming, Violette Malan, Anna Mocikat, Jess E. Owen, Robert Penner, Cat Rambo, K.M. Rice, Walter Jon Williams & F. Paul Wilson

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