Sometimes a hero must burn all she holds dear.

Unrest brews in the city-state of Uitenbach, but its magi continue their work, even though the world outside the hallowed grounds of their academy seems to be tearing itself to pieces.

Newly divorced and still smarting from her philandering ex-husband’s rejection, Maga Liese ten Haven doesn’t want to draw attention to herself. When the mysterious Atroyan tribesman Malagai reveals to Liese that she is the heir to a forbidden magical legacy, she is thrust into a conspiracy that may foment a civil war. If she fails, her magic will consume her.

But what if the only way to right the wrongs her people have done to the Atroyan nation is to sacrifice everything?

The blasted expanse of the Shadow Barrens has menaced the Kingdom of the Blue Rose for generations. Legends of its sinister residents and the fallen glories of long-lost Mount Oritaun have provoked both fear and wistful hope. Now, an envoy from that lost kingdom has made contact, and a history long forgotten by all but a few scholars has been brought to light. But the armies of Shadow loom over Mount Oritaun, and its lunar light may soon be extinguished forever. Tales from the Mount features nine short stories which visit the deadly Shadow Barrens, wicked fallen Austium, and the lunar glories of Mount Oritaun. These are the tales of a people lost, the shattered pieces of an ancient and proud civilization, and the sinister stain that has crept over those legacies in the generations since the Doom of Faenaria. Come explore some of the most tragic parts of the Blue Rose setting with us. Authors for this anthology include Natania Barron, Nerine Dorman, Georgina Kamsika, Rhiannon Louve, Michael Matheson, Tiffany Trent, Caias Ward, and Suzanne Willis. This anthology is tied to the Envoys to the Mount campaign book for Blue Rose: The Roleplaying Game of Romantic Fantasy from Green Ronin Publishing.

Terra Incognita is the second collection of short stories to be published by Short Story Day Africa. This carefully curated collection of nineteen stories is harvested from entries to the project’s annual short story competition, which in 2014 called for speculative fiction exploring a theme Terra Incognita, and ancient cartographic term denoting uncharted territories. The collection includes well-known and award-winning and authors Cat Hellisen, Diane Awerbuck and Gail Dendy, alongside emerging stars like Dilman Dila, Nick Mulgrew and Chinelo Onwaulu. The stories in the collection encompass all forms of speculative fiction, from literary magical realism to science fiction to dark horror, and pulsing through each is a new African paradigm. Here be vampires, tokoloshi, ghosts, unnatural obsessions and the unspeakable things that lurk beneath land and in the water.

Nuri survives in the desolate barrens surrounding a farfuture city by running with a gang, meaning that she steals and can get away with the packages. Her unknown parentage (she’s halfhuman and half mysterious alien) makes her feel alone and out of place, until she is called to a highsecurity facility by strange psychic forces. At the facility, she discovers that she is a contender to bond with an alien starjumper and have a life among the stars. First she has to make friends, survive hazing and stay alive against powerful elites that want her out.