Irregular Verbs and Other Stories

Featured are 22 stories of speculative fiction drawn from across the author's decade and a half of work. In this diverse collection, refugees from ancient Rome struggle to adapt to a modern world, time travelers struggle to comprehend fractured causality, a dreadful disease pits cold reason against common decency, explorers court death and a wife is given the dreadful job of providing her husband with escape from the trap his invulnerable body has become. With settings in the New World, the Old and beyond, ranging from science fiction to fantasy, the author proves capable in a number of genres. Surprisingly, although the author has seen print in such venues as Asimov's Science Fiction and The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction and is regularly praised by luminaries from Rich Horton to Gardner Dozois, this is his first collection. With an introduction by Helen Marshall, these stories represent if not the totality of the author's stories to date, then a very healthy majority. Readers interested in modern speculative fiction would be strongly recommended to make this their next choice. (July)