Sometimes an animal seems to find the people that need it most. In Welcome Home, Mr. Crackers by Britt Davis, the Barker family is enjoying an autumn walk through the park when Claire spots something unusual near the swings: a dachshund wearing a shiny black...

The age-old question of whether we are alone in a vast universe is examined by Val Jon Farris in Interstellar Consciousness: Lifting the Veil of Separation. He elaborates on what constitutes consciousness, how we are influenced by learned belief systems, and how these can limit...

Peanut Butter and Donner: The Wishing Tree is about a rabbit named Peanut Butter. It is based on a real place and real-life animals. Erin Rosenblum starts the story with a group of friends wandering the redwood canyons. They are looking for a thrill when...

The Blue Lodge Order: The Battle of Great Bridge is a riveting historical fantasy novella by author William J. Pocan. The story is set in Virginia. In December 1775, the warriors led by Lord Dunmore, Virginia's last British governor, attacked the Great Bridge village on...

Sometimes the things that make us feel different are the very things that can lead us where we’re meant to be. In Clancy: A Gift of Christmas Story by A.K. Miller, the camels of Cameltown gather for an exciting tradition. Everyone is waiting to find...

Irina Kvistberg’s Continuum follows Lea Voss, a researcher in the Biological Reserve, one of the few places left outside the smooth routines of an optimized future. When an unexplained perceptual event reaches Lea during synchronization, the System labels it harmless noise, yet sealed records connect...

In David Earl Williams III’s Valor Tale, Dew Wilder wakes in the SWAT TROOPER ELITE Academy Medical Clinic after an attack that left him badly injured. Rena Etteip, the scientist who saved him, has disappeared after leaving a note saying she has gone after Thornton,...

In The Envelopes, Hasu August draws back the veil on modern Chinese life. Jade Bai begins her career in the city as a nurse, but later trains in personnel. She is married to Deeping Dai, who lectures at the local university, and they share an...

Sometimes the biggest life changes begin in the middle of an ordinary day. In You Must Believe in Spring by Steven Hutton, Evan and his girlfriend, Ellen, are trying to figure out their future after discovering that she is pregnant. The news wasn’t planned, and...

In J.M. Erickson’s Deadly Going Dark, ten-year-old David Strong lives in the Great Third Republic, a future America rebuilt after environmental collapse into sealed habitats divided by caste. Born into the ruling patrician class, David is expected to enter military school and uphold the social...

Hunting Armed Men by J. M. Erickson begins with an explosive orbital crisis when First Officer Robert Lee VI spearheads a violent mutiny aboard a heavy cruiser. His main target is Captain Taylor, an egalitarian commander whose elimination of strict class privileges has fueled the...

Sometimes history feels different when it’s told through the eyes of someone who lived through it. In That Damned War by John Gregery Medel, Sarah Ann Hillin looks back on her childhood in East Texas before, during, and after the Civil War. She grows up...

The University of the Arts (UArts) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, closed its doors for good in June 2024. This should be surprising enough, given the institution’s 150-year history, but the sudden closure announcement just a few months earlier made things even more shocking. The administrators alluded...

Marcus Crane’s Broken, Not Ruined: Orichalcum & Obsidian follows science teacher Kyle Walker, whose wife Stephanie is a nurse practitioner. Their ordinary Saturday at a farmers’ market is shattered when a dimensional fracture tears Stephanie from Earth. She awakens in Galta, where a World System...

Benny and the Ducks by Lorrie Brown is based on the true story of friendship between the animals. When Benny came to his new home, he was a small, scared fawn. But the ducks - Pip, Squeak, and Squirt - befriended him, and soon they...

Christoffer Vuolo Junros’s The Delay follows Nash, a prisoner on Serenith, a lethal blue world where molten glass storms batter a vast forced-labor facility. Once a citizen of Bailot, Serenith’s inhabited sister planet, Nash is imprisoned after officials target her family when her brother, Zhilmo,...

Happy Birthday Rambee Boo! by Reena Korde Pagnoni is a delightful and colorful children’s book that tells the story of a small doggie who is getting ready to celebrate his second birthday. As the day approaches, Rambee Boo starts imagining that there are hints of...

The I Ching is an ancient Chinese method of divination that brings clarity to situations. Some sources of reference use language that may be unfamiliar to Western readers, while outcomes may seem contradictory or open to misinterpretation. Xuan Wanyan brings a new dimension and revives...

In Tides, Lies, and Alibis by Taffy Beach, take a trip back to the '90s and visit a small town in Florida. Kate MacGregor is an artist, and while her name gives her a reputation as the last heir of a Florida dynasty, it certainly...

In Carol Maschke’s Witches of the Gaelic Moon, in a quiet town tucked away in rural Ireland, a great stirring is underway. An awakened Gaelic moon with its ancient power could spell disaster in the earthly realm and beyond. Folklore says that when the High...