Showing results for title "James" in Anthologies & Short Stories

Beginning with the unforgettable title story—a wry and chilling horror tale about cloning and alien invasion that inspired the classic teleplay "The Duplicate Man" from the television series The Outer Limits—Simak propels the listener on a breathtaking journey across the galaxies and into the future. He then enthralls us with the strange chronicle of twin siblings, one tied to the Earth, the other drawn to the stars; imaginings of a volatile reunion of two former enemies who must join forces on Jupiter's moon or face extinction; and the story of a house in the middle of nowhere.

This novelette won the Hugo award in 1996 and has been hailed by many as a science-fiction classic. Intelligent dinosaurs from outer space offer humanity the chance to use their transporter technology to join the galactic culture, but at a terrible price. When a routine transport goes wrong, one man must face the consequences of becoming too much like an alien.

In a hard-edged cyberpunk future, a courier is has stolen a load of the most dangerous, most dazzling drug ever invented and is smuggling it into New York City. Pursued by a hired hit woman disguised as a young girl and a federally-appointed vigilante, he must find his way through the mean streets of Manhattan to his lair. He is ruthless, amoral, and a rat. Not just figuratively, but literally: a two-foot-long, walking, talking rat. Hearing is believing.

He's a simple man, trying to live a simple life. He works at a dry cleaner and lives by himself. He doesn't have any friends and doesn't dare to reach out to others because there's a monster inside of him, a bloody-minded creature he's fighting a losing battle to control. He prays to God for help knowing that, unless his prayers are answered very soon, he will go on a killing spree. A taut tale of suspense and the fantastic, that will keep you on the edge of your seat until the very last sentence.

It's Christmas and one of the aliens wants to go shopping at the mall to get in the proper holiday spirit. The trouble is, he doesn't know an elf from an elephant. Here's a wacky Yule story about intelligence, diversity, and too many tins of fruitcake.

What is love? A profound and life-changing emotion, or a heady brew of neurochemicals washing through your brain? Two young medical students take a break from their studies to enjoy a night out at a neuromance palace, where for a mere $40 you can fall deeply in love and out again in a single carefree evening. Here's a romantic comedy about sales techniques, square-dancing, and hormones gone wild.

Where did all the people go? In a bizarre outpost perched on top of a mountain, the survivors of some cyber-cataclysm ponder the fate of humanity. Although all their needs are taken care of, their memories have been so compromised that they question their very reality. When one of them begins a project that will change everything, the mysterious keepers arrive to restore order.

In this charming romantic comedy, a divorced single mom decides to re-enter the dating scene via an ad in the personals section of her local paper. Among the many men who answer the ad is the mysterious Gardiner, who writes poems, breeds daylilies, and has the unsettling ability to know exactly the right thing to say to win a woman's heart. What is his secret?

Bernardo has gone and his intelligent house misses him desperately. Designed to meet all her master's needs, she is his cook, maid, secretary, lover, and secret refuge from the world. Now she struggles to cope with his loss. On the edge of madness, she is saved by the arrival of a damaged young girl, who will teach her what it means to be human.

Talisha is shocked when she finds mechdream pills in the bottom of her husband's underwear drawer. Designed to create a unique virtual reality based on his wildest fantasies, they will allow him to plumb the depths of his pleasure centers. The only problem is, he's spending the rent money building his virtual paradise. Just what are her husband's deepest desires? Talisha isn't sure she wants to know.

Imagine a race of marsupial-like aliens who have not two, but three sexes: father, birth-mother, and nurture-mother. The difficulties of married life are further complicated by adding another partner, but this culture has worked out its own unique solution. The arrival of a new race of space-faring aliens, however, will change everything.

You live on a lake and it's Christmas. You go skating and you happen upon a man frozen under the ice. Who is he? No, don't ask! You're in a horror story.

As humankind's first starship accelerates past the speed of light, an astronaut wakes up and finds that he is all alone. The crew is gone, the sensors give no readings, and he is trapped. Alone? Not quite. His imaginary wife keeps him company and helps him keep a tenuous hold on his sanity.

StoryPod 1.0 brings you 13 mind-bending stories from Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author James Patrick Kelly! Kelly not only narrates each story, he adds exclusive commentary that takes you inside his creative process.

Where did all the men go? When aliens make all men disappear from Earth, the women left behind struggle to rebuild the shattered human culture. Years later, private investigator Fay Hardaway is hired by a grieving mother to investigate the mysterious suicide of her daughter. The aliens take an interest in the case as well, as does a religious cult bent on breaking the aliens' stranglehold on Earth.

An illustrator at an ad agency creates a drawing of a woman taking a selfie for a smart phone ad campaign. Then he comes across a real-life, living version of the exact same woman in “The Selfie”, a romantic science fiction thriller. Sixteen-year-old babysitter Gina Zeneski takes the kids for a day at the amusement park and gets more than she bargained for in “Rollercoaster”, a pulse-pounding story of harrowing action. A cult space opera TV series becomes real life for super fan Alex Bell in “Starfighter”. A greedy oil executive gets a lesson about life and love in “The Green ...

Stonehenge is possibly the most mystical place on Earth. Its call has echoed through the ages and will continue as long as the stones continue to stand. The drug artist Tony Cage is almost as obsessed with Stonehenge as he is with his offspring Wynne, whom he had cloned from his own cells but then tweaked her sex chromosome from XY to XX. Is she his daughter or something entirely different? Tony will find the answer at Stonehenge on the Solstice Day.

The Sixties are ending badly. It's the eve of the Kent State shootings, and Space Cowboy is on the prowl for the most powerful drug in the universe - the one that can make him who he is destined to be. A psychedelic romp with a sense of wonder ending.

An overweight draftsman with a love for science fiction answers an ad in the back of his favorite magazine. It promises an incredible weight-loss miracle, but the return address is from Brimstone, Texas. In this wacky tale of diet and revenge, getting what you wish for might cost your immortal soul.

This is the story of Thumb the Great. He gave his people the bow and arrow and taught them the ways of war. When the battle madness took him, there was no one so fierce. He was a man filled with luck. A Cro-Magnon cave painter encounters the last mammoth on earth in this thrilling story of a man reluctantly coming to terms with destiny.