From death robots to giant roaches, from vengeful household appliances to the most chilling manifestations of inhuman evil, Silverthought: Ignition is a collection of some of the finest emerging talent in sf today. Dark and humorous, challenging and entertaining, this anthology represents the best short fiction featured on silverthought.com in its first five years. Ignition fearlessly confronts critical questions about who we are and where we are going.

Silverthought: Ignition

Science Fiction & Fantasy

Science Fiction

Silverthought Press

An author struggles to make amends for the war-torn realities he has written into existence. He leaves his empty life behind and travels across a spectrum of parallel universes in a frantic hunt for Maire, the maniacal architect of the Sixth Extinction, who has forged a new alliance and will stop at nothing to erase all realities from existence. Both a sequel to and a retelling of Enemy and An End, Broken merges the rich, horrifying universes of the previous installments of the Silver trilogy into a haunting story that is part love letter, part handbook for the apocalypse, and part confession. The recipient of the silver medal in the Fantasy/Science Fiction category of the 2006 Independent Publisher Book Awards, Broken: A Plague Journal is the third and final book in the Silver trilogy by Paul Evan Hughes.

broken

Literature & Fiction

Hughes, Paul Evan

Literary

Project Manager Trevor explains a new computer system, EVOLUTION, to his Vice Presidents, who are more interested in how their ties match than the direction of the company. The problem? Trevor is double crossed by ISOFT, the supplier of the software, and when the key "interface" isn't available, Trevor is fired. Trevor's downfall continues as he walks in on his girlfriend cheating on him with his "Best of Porn" music CD playing in the background. Confused and drunk, Trevor inadvertently hires a hit man over the Internet to take care of Jim, the VP of Sales for ISOFT. Trevor sobers up, lands an Executive Producer job in the adult movie industry, and quickly realizes his mistake. However, the possible hit man, who is only known as "Scorned CEO," doesn't accept cancellations. Ethan (Trevor's cross-dressing friend) traces The Scorned CEO to South Beach, where Trevor goes in an attempt to stop any incident, along the way receiving early lessons in the adult movie industry. It all leads to a showdown between Trevor, The Scorned CEO, and a script for the ultimate adult movie.

Corporate Porn

Grant, David S.

Humor & Satire

<p>"Maybe I'm not a murderer, maybe I'm just a survivor with crappy luck." All Benjamin Benson ever wanted to be was a writer. Forced to leave college in the midst of an economic depression, Benson joins the Army and is stationed in Iraq. A mediocre soldier at best, he finds himself poised on the border between Iran and Iraq, preparing to invade Iran, when his unit--and every other unit in a thinly spread Army--receives orders to withdraw to Baghdad. Amid mass confusion and uncertainty, Benson finds himself flying back to America, reluctantly participating in a coup d'etat spearheaded by the Perfect Soldiers, seemingly invincible robot warriors commanded by General Prescott, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the architect of the coup and The Perfect Revolution. Upon returning to the States, Ben finds himself meritorously promoted at a furious pace, but his promotions come with a cost, a deep and deadly moral cost, and as he patrols the streets of his devastated country, Benson is forced to confront the truth behind his meteoric rise to power and his complicity in the wholesale slaughter of innocents that is the real aim of The Perfect Revolution.</p>

The Perfect Revolution

Deadwood, Oscar

<p>Lutz's first novel chronicles the creation and development of a human colony 56 light years from Earth. Slowly, colonists turn the barren ground of their new home into the breadbasket of the system. Across two centuries and including stories both personal and epic, the tale shows the dangers and the promise of the future.</p>

Iota Cycle

Lutz, Russell

Red Ivy Afternoon is a novel of community and disenfranchisement, subversion and revolution in the digital age. The setting is a future we already know: good homes are unaffordable, good jobs are outsourced to other countries, and people anchor themselves to the glowing monitors in their homes to distract themselves. Julian Lightfall, a relatively successful Boston shipping secretary, lives his life from gadget to gadget and bar to bar in a haze of consumerism and boredom. He frequents the Portfolio lounge of the Ultimatum Hotel, playground of the rich and powerful, and throws his attention ineffectually at a sultry and disinterested regular named Christina. Another lone bachelor named Pyndan Calabas moves into the apartment next door. Calabas tells Julian he is a trauma surgeon and the two become friends. But, as Julian soon discovers, his new neighbor hides a secret that will change Julian's life, and the world, forever. Red Ivy Afternoon is a post-modern odyssey through a future that is already upon us.

Red Ivy Afternoon

Brand, Mark R.

Chris Fairbanks is a lonely young man who joins the Navy in search of travel, adventure, and women-but mostly to escape his lower middle-class existence, his loveless family, and to find some meaning in his otherwise meaningless life. The Navy sends Chris to a small communications base in Scotland, where he is befriended by a disillusioned Catholic chaplain, Father Alexander Crowley. Crowley joined the Navy for his own sinister reasons-including his desire to incite a race war that will consume the world. Blinded by his search for friendship and acceptance, Chris reluctantly finds himself drawn into Crowley's white supremacist group and his alcohol-fueled plans for genocide. After realizing the depths of Crowley's madness and struggling with his own complicity in this reign of terror, Chris appeals to his chain of command. Met with indifference and disbelief, he takes matters into his own hands, leading The Trinity to an apocalyptic and fiery end. Set against the turbulent backdrop of the Cold War and the pastoral beauty of eastern Scotland, The Trinity is a contemplative exploration of the complexity of human evil.

The Trinity

LaBounty, David

Genre Fiction

The ghosts of lonesome British soldiers wander the rubble-strewn beach of Dunkirk. A black wave grows to devour a Japanese fleet. Only divine intervention can save the citizens of a charred Dresden. Something dark prowls the bowels of the Fuhrer's bunker. Radioactive mutants hunt fresh flesh through the streets of Hiroshima. In the pulp tradition of Weird War Tales, and filled with mystery, madness and the macabre, A DARK AND DEADLY VALLEY hovers along the borderland between horror and history. Editor Mike Heffernan has brought together horror's best-known authors to explore the violence of the second world war and its lasting affect on collective memory. They report back from the fright-filled front lines to illuminate the past with a dark light, put fresh meat on its bones and make it come alive through shock and suspense. So Have your Enfields clutched tight, boys, your bayonets fixed. And keep your heads low. There's some dark stuff lurking in these pages.

A Dark and Deadly Valley

Brian Keene

et.al.

Brian Hodge

Mort Castle

Rick Hautala

"EXPOSED! shines a harsh light on the myriad horrors of modern society and reports back from the fearful frontlines with wicked wit and paranoid power. From the murky waters of New Orleans to the scarred psyches of our own image-obsessed existence, EXPOSED! is the last headline we get to read before reality comes tumbling down." -Jeremy Robert Johnson, author of Extinction Journals and Angel Dust Apocalypse  "With EXPOSED!, Mike Heffernan delivers a heady mélange of Swiftian satire blended with the outré oddness of Caro and Jeunet's cinematic outings. EXPOSED! imagines a world where even Z-grade celebrities are hunted down for crimes of narcissism, the elderly and insane are processed like psychedelic chattel, and labor conflicts are worse than ever. Must-read stuff for the post-apocalyptic set." -B.H. Fingerman, author of Recess Pieces and Bottomfeeder  "Among the 'writers to watch' in the realm of strange storytelling. Interrogates the hazy borderland between the human and the inhumane. A crafty form of social commentary." -Michael A. Arnzen, author of Play Dead and Grave Markings  expose, v.t. (F. exposer): To deprive of concealment; to discover; to lay open to public inspection, or bring to public notice.  Hope and promise are drowned in the black floodwaters of New Orleans and the churning concrete of expansion. The underclass is force-fed to the grinding machines of progress. Youth are slashed to ribbons by poverty.  Autocratic governments sell addiction to the masses to numb them into complacency. Shopping sprees and material excess are the new cults. Reality television microwaves brains into plastic left-on-the-heater mush.   Liberation has a price only a few are willing to pay.  In Exposed!, a collection of horror fiction from Mike Heffernan, the smog clears just a bit, we're cut wide open like a vivisection and our dirty insides are on display.

Exposed!

Heffernan, Mike

This is a story about living. Fans of fluffy romance novels and that all-too-familiar, over-hyped, edge-of-the-seat crap should steer clear. This is life at its most jaded. Offense Mechanisms, an imprint of Silverthought Press, is proud to present Bleach | Blackout by David S. Grant, two novels about drugs, sex, revenge, the corporate crunch, and the inevitable unpleasantness of life and death. Bleach and Blackout are presented here in one double format (tête-bêche) volume. Bleach opens during the last sixty seconds of 2003 in a bathroom where Jeremy, our jaded navigator through the endless repulsiveness of the world, watches a girl lay dying. Before diving into an explanation of what the hell is going on, Jeremy doubles back eight days. The entire story builds up to the climax of Sharon Winkler's infamous annual New Year's Eve party, where all the men are dressed as prostitutes, all the women look like pimps, decadence and debauchery dictate the rules, and the next guy through the door is sure to have a gun. Written in a cynical voice that rings true with today's young business class, Bleach is a story that encompasses the sentiments of a generation while examining the meaning of life in a world driven by greed. Blackout begins in Las Vegas, where Stoner and friends celebrate his bachelor party in a blur of strippers, crack cocaine, a little Thai, and Nic Cage. The next morning in Los Angeles brings an unwelcome surprise when Stoner's friends Chip and Jeremy wake to find police officers and a dead body for which they are allegedly responsible. Chip is charged with murder and his trial is being fast-tracked... What would Steven Tyler do? Beneath the stories of hangovers and death, this is a story about living for the moment and having a story to tell. Blackout is a fast-paced ride that will leave you wanting more-and maybe a cold beer.

Bleach / Blackout

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