More than a century has passed since Liliath crept into the empty sarcophagus of Saint Marguerite, fleeing the Fall of Ystara. But she emerges from her magical sleep still beautiful, looking no more than 19, and once again renews her single-minded quest to be united with her lover, Palleniel, the archangel of Ystara. It's a seemingly impossible quest, but Liliath is one of the greatest practitioners of angelic magic to have ever lived, summoning angels and forcing them to do her bidding. Four young people hold her interest. But none of them know just how Liliath plans to use them....

You'd think being a Prince in a vast intergalactic empire would be about as good as it gets, particularly when Princes are faster, smarter, and stronger than normal humans. Not to mention being mostly immortal. But it isn't as great as it sounds. Princes need to be hard to kill - as Khemri learns the minute he becomes one - for they are always in danger. Their greatest threat? Other Princes. Every Prince wants to become Emperor, and the surest way to do so is to kill, dishonor, or sideline any potential competitor.

It is strange enough that Odo and Eleanor have stumbled upon a sword in a dried-up river outside their village. It is even stranger that Odo is able to remove it from where it's buried. And it's remarkably strange when the sword starts to talk. Odo and Eleanor have unearthed Biter, a famous fighter from earlier times. By finding Biter, Odo instantly becomes a knight - a role he is exquisitely unsuited for. Eleanor, however, would make a perfect knight - but she's not the one with the sword.

Ever since she was a tiny child, Sabriel has lived outside the walls of the Old Kingdom, away from the random power of Free Magic, and away from the Dead who won't stay dead. But now her father, the Mage Abhorsen, is missing, and to find him Sabriel must cross back into that world.

A girl's quest to find her father leads her to an extended family of magical fighting booksellers who police the mythical Old World of England when it intrudes on the modern world.

It’s business as usual on the set of another cheap sword-and-sandal production by Pharos Pictures—until the lead actress suddenly falls into a deep, mysterious sleep. Jordan Harper can talk down high-strung starlets and knock sense into stuntmen, but this…this is the kind of uncanny problem that he’d usually bring to Mrs. Hope. Unfortunately, the preternaturally capable secretary is on a business trip with the studio head. Harper must get to the bottom of the mystery on his own before another cast member succumbs—or worse, they blow the budget.

In a futuristic urban wasteland, evil Overlords have decreed that no human shall live a day past their 14th birthday. On that Sad Birthday, the children of the Dorms are taken to the Meat Factory, where they will be made into creatures whose sole purpose is to kill. The mysterious Shade - once a man, but now more like the machines he fights - recruits the few teenagers who escape into a secret resistance force.

After his parents died, Alex Roth had one desire: become a wizard. Through hard work, he was accepted into the University of Generasi, the world’s greatest academy of wizardry.... Fate, however, had another plan. On his 18th birthday, he is Marked by prophecy as one of his kingdom’s five Heroes, chosen to fight the Ravener, his land’s great enemy. But his brand is "The Fool". Worst of the marks.

After Lady Truthful's magical Newington emerald is stolen from her, she devises a simple plan: go to London to recover the missing jewel. She quickly learns, however, that a woman cannot wander the city streets alone without damaging her reputation, and she disguises herself as a mustache-wearing man. During Truthful's dangerous journey she discovers a crook, an unsuspecting ally, and an evil sorceress - but will she find the emerald?

Poor Princess Anya. Forced to live with her evil stepmother's new husband, her evil stepstepfather. Plagued with an unfortunate ability to break curses with a magic-assisted kiss. And forced to go on the run when her stepstepfather decides to make the kingdom entirely his own. Aided by a loyal talking dog, a boy thief trapped in the body of a newt, and some extraordinarily mischievous wizards, Anya sets off on a quest that, if she plays it right, will ultimately free her land - and teach her a thing or two.

Meet Toadling. On the day of her birth, she was stolen from her family by the fairies, but she grew up safe and loved in the warm waters of faerieland. Once an adult though, the fae ask a favor of Toadling: return to the human world and offer a blessing of protection to a newborn child. Simple, right? If only. Centuries later, a knight approaches a towering wall of brambles, where the thorns are as thick as your arm and as sharp as swords. He's heard there's a curse here that needs breaking, but it's a curse Toadling will do anything to uphold.

The decision to start a new life is never an easy one, but for Joe the transition was far from figurative. Becoming a permanent addition to a game world, it doesn't take long to learn that people with his abilities are actively hunted. In fact, if the wrong people gained knowledge of what he was capable of, assassins would appear in droves.

Rosa Mandolini knows in her heart that her family are the greatest painters of magical illuminations in the city. But the eccentric Studio Mandolini has fallen on hard times and the future is no longer certain. While trying to help her family, Rosa discovers a strange magical box protected by a painted crow. But when she finds a way to open the box, she accidentally releases the Scarling, a vicious monster determined to destroy the Mandolini family at any cost.

Once, there were four worlds, nestled like pages in a book, each pulsing with fantastical power and connected by a single city: London. Until the magic grew too fast and forced the worlds to seal the doors between them in a desperate gamble to protect their own. The few magicians who could still open the doors grew more rare as time passed and now, only three Antari are known in recent memory—Kell Maresh of Red London, Delilah Bard of Grey London, and Holland Vosijk, of White London.

Stephen Oakwood is a young man on the edge of this hidden world. He has talent and potential, but turning that potential into magical power takes money, opportunity, and training. All Stephen has is a minimum wage job and a cat. But when a chance encounter with a member of House Ashford gets him noticed by the wrong people, Stephen is thrown in the deep end. For centuries, the vast corporations and aristocratic Houses of the magical world have grown impossibly rich and influential by hoarding their knowledge.

Betrayal cuts deepest when someone you love wields the knife. For Kellik, a once-rising star of Port Gloom's guild of thieves, it also leaves him floating in the bay, bleeding out and without hope or allies. Saved by an urchin and healed by a disgraced saint, Kellick is consumed by a single desire: to find out why his guild master ordered him cut down moments after passing his initiation trial. Burning with injustice, Kellik recruits a number of gorgeous rogues to his side: fallen assassins, dark elf witches, and unnervingly polite necromancers.

The race is on to free Lord Stelan from the grip of a wasting curse, and only his old, half-elf mercenary companion Elyana has the wisdom - and swordcraft - to solve the mystery of his tormentor and free her old friend before three days have passed and the illness takes its course.

You define life or it defines you. In Shawn Speakman’s case, it was both. Lacking health insurance and diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 2011, Shawn quickly accrued a massive medical debt that he did not have the ability to pay. That’s when New York Times best-selling author Terry Brooks offered to donate a short story that Shawn could sell to help alleviate those bills—and suggested he ask the same of his other writer friends. Unfettered is the result: An anthology built in order to relieve that debt, featuring short stories by some of the best fantasy writers in the genre.

Born with a deformed hand and an utter lack of the family's blood magic, Isabelle is despised by her cruel father. She is happy to be neglected so she can secretly pursue her illicit passion for math and science. Then, a surprising offer of an arranged royal marriage blows her life wide open and launches her and Jeane-Claude on an adventure that will take them from the Isle des Zephyrs in l'Empire Céleste to the very different Kingdom of Aragoth, where magic deals not with blood but with mirrors.

Once there were three worlds, each with their own human species. Then, fleeing out of the void came a fourth species, the Charon. Desperate, on the edge of extinction, they changed the balance between the worlds forever. Karan, a sensitive with a troubled heritage, is forced to steal an ancient relic in repayment of a debt. It turns out to be the Mirror of Aachan, a twisted, deceitful thing that remembers everything it has ever seen.

Seventeen years have passed since the Necromancer Queen Talia was overthrown and slain, and her capital city destroyed by the Knights of the Order of Eternal Vigilance. Anskar DeVantte, raised in the sacred disciplines of the Order, is now ready to face the brutal initiation trials to become a consecrated knight-sorcerer. But the further Anskar rises in the ranks the more his faith wavers. As troubling powers awaken within him, a schism grows between Anskar and his hallowed Order, and he draws the hungry gaze of the vanquished queen’s fanatical followers.

After a century of imprisonment, demons have broken free of the wardstones surrounding the Worldwound. As fiends flood south into civilized lands, Count Varian Jeggare and his hellspawn bodyguard, Radovan, must search through the ruins of a fallen nation for the blasphemous text that opened the gate to the Abyss in the first place - and which might hold the key to closing it. In order to succeed, however, the heroes will need to join forces with pious crusaders, barbaric local warriors, and even one of the legendary god callers.

Two hundred years after the Forbidding was broken, Santhenar is locked in war with the lyrinx - intelligent, winged predators who will do anything to gain their own world. Despite the development of battle clankers and mastery of the crystals that power them, humanity is losing. Tiaan, a lonely crystal worker in a clanker manufactory, is experimenting with an entirely new kind of crystal when she begins to have extraordinary visions.

When the death of Iron Queen Sarelin Brey fractures the realm of Elira, Lysande Prior, the palace scholar and the queen’s closest friend, is appointed Councillor. Publically, Lysande must choose the next monarch from amongst the city-rulers vying for the throne. Privately, she seeks to discover which ruler murdered the queen, suspecting the use of magic. Resourceful, analytical, and quiet, Lysande appears to embody the motto everything in its place. Yet while she hides her drug addiction from her new associates, she cannot hide her growing interest in power.

To an experienced thief like Krunzle the Quick, the merchant nation of Druma is full of treasures just waiting to be liberated. Yet when the fast-talking scoundrel gets caught stealing from one of the most powerful prophets of Kalistrade, the only option is to undertake a dangerous mission to recover the merchant lord's runaway daughter - and the magical artifact she took with her.

On a mysterious errand for the Pathfinder Society, Count Varian Jeggare and his hellspawn bodyguard, Radovan, journey to the distant land of Tian Xia. When disaster forces him to take shelter in a warrior monastery, "Brother" Jeggare finds himself competing with the disciples of Dragon Temple as he unravels a royal mystery. Meanwhile, Radovan - trapped in the body of a devil - must serve a twisted master by defeating the land's deadliest champions and learning the secret of slaying an immortal.

Mankind has lorded over the land of Illian for a thousand years, building on the ruins left by the elves, as if it were their birthright. A thousand years is a long time for an immortal race to see the truth of things, a truth that has remained unsaid for a millennium - elves are superior. They are faster, stronger, and connected to the magical realm in a way that man could never grasp. Illian should belong to them.

When a mysterious monster carves a path of destruction across the southern River Kingdoms, desperate townsfolk look to the famed elven ranger Elyana and her half-orc companion Drelm for salvation. For Drelm, however, the mission is about more than simple justice - it's about protecting the frontier town he's adopted as his home, and the woman he plans to marry.

Nikolis’ parents are dead - murdered before his eyes. What’s worse, they were traitors to the crown. At least that’s what he hears the village folk saying moments before he is whisked away to the castle of Highkeep. There he finds himself before the aged King Alginor, a man brought to a boil by his very presence.

The Red Swords came with the sunrise and took everything Shawna Llewan held dear. Her family massacred, her home destroyed, she escapes with nothing but her mother’s heirloom and the desire for vengeance. When she’s found by Dormael, a Warlock of the Conclave, she learns that her mother’s keepsake - the very reason her family was killed - holds the power to unleash boundless destruction.

A plucky farm boy will find more than he's bargained for on his quest to awaken the sleeping princess in her cursed tower. First there's the Dark Lord, who wishes for the boy's untimely death...and also very fine cheese. Then there's a bard without a song in her heart but with a very adorable and fuzzy tail, an assassin who fears not the night but is terrified of chickens, and a mighty fighter more frightened of her sword than of her chain-mail bikini. This journey will lead to sinister umlauts, a trash-talking goat, and the Dread Necromancer Steve....

Hot on the heels of Gardner Dozois's acclaimed anthology The Book of Swords comes this companion volume devoted to magic. How could it be otherwise? For every Frodo, there is a Gandalf... and a Saruman. For every Dorothy, a Glinda... and a Wicked Witch of the West. What would Harry Potter be without Albus Dumbledore... and Severus Snape? Figures of wisdom and power, possessing arcane, often forbidden knowledge, wizards and sorcerers are shaped - or misshaped - by the potent magic they seek to wield.

Somewhere on the frontier between thought and reality exists the Discworld, a parallel time and place that might sound and smell very much like our own, but which looks completely different. Particularly as it’s carried though space on the back of a giant turtle (sex unknown). It plays by different rules. But then, some things are the same everywhere. The Disc’s very existence is about to be threatened by a strange new blight: the world’s first tourist, upon whose survival rests the peace and prosperity of the land.

Everything has a spirit: the willow tree with leaves that kiss the pond, the stream that feeds the river, the wind that exhales fresh snow. But the spirits that reside within this land want to rid it of all humans. One woman stands between these malevolent spirits and the end of humankind: the queen. She alone has the magical power to prevent the spirits from destroying every man, woman, and child. But queens are still just human, and no matter how strong or good they are, the threat of danger always looms.

It is strange enough that Odo and Eleanor have stumbled upon a sword in a dried-up river outside their village. It is even stranger that Odo is able to remove it from where it's buried. And it's remarkably strange when the sword starts to talk. Odo and Eleanor have unearthed Biter, a famous fighter from earlier times. By finding Biter, Odo instantly becomes a knight - a role he is exquisitely unsuited for. Eleanor, however, would make a perfect knight - but she's not the one with the sword.

When Russ Wesley finds an unusual artifact in his grandfather’s collection of rare antiquities, the last thing he expects is for it to draw the attention of a ferocious alien from a distant planet. Equally surprising is the adventurous team of intergalactic exterminators dispatched to deal with the alien threat. They’re a little wild, and a little reckless. Worse yet, they’re so impressed with Russ’s marksmanship that they insist he join their squad . . . whether he wants to or not.

I was the most powerful healer in my world—the best, having devoted my entire life to mastering the art of healing. And yet, for whatever reason, my brother feared that I sought to claim his throne, and he marshaled his forces against me.

As the city prepares to celebrate Queen Victoria's golden jubilee, Veronica Speedwell is marking a milestone of her own. After burying her spinster aunt, the orphaned Veronica is free to resume her world travels in pursuit of scientific inquiry - and the occasional romantic dalliance. As familiar with hunting butterflies as she is fending off admirers, Veronica wields her butterfly net and a hatpin with equal aplomb, and with her last connection to England gone, she intends to embark upon the journey of a lifetime.

A supernatural swarm. A treacherous scheme. A tinker's apprentice may be the village's only hope. This collection includes Steamborn, Steamforged, and Steamsworn. Grab it and crank up a whimsical thrill-ride today!

Evie is happiest when she is healing people, diagnosing symptoms and prescribing medications, with the help of her devoted friend (and test subject) Wormy. So when Wormy unexpectedly proposes to her, she kindly turns him down; she has far too much to do to be marrying anyone. And besides, she simply isn’t in love with him.