Love, Murder & Mayhem: Cosmic Tales of the Heart Gone Deadly Wrong

For this light and breezy collection, Colchamiro (Crossline) gathers 15 high-energy and sentimental stories of love, fatal crimes of passion, and paranormal troublemaking. Among several routine terrestrial and interstellar police procedurals, standout stories weave in urban fantasy, time travel, superheroes, and rogue robots. In Colchamiro’s own trippy “The Hardwicke Files,” an interdimensional PI partners with an arson investigator on the eve of Astropalooza to learn who killed an amorous singer. In Glenn Hauman’s short and creepy “Make It Didn’t Happen,” a teenager receives a message from her future self that warns of an impending attacker. In Patrick Thomas’s romantic “As Time Goes By,” an ex-con who can manipulate time turns his skills to saving his wife’s life. Lois Spangler’s melancholy murder investigation, “A Matter of Principle,” finds AI detective Dani questioning an older model AI who admits guilt but wants to protect her beloved employer. In “DuckBob: Killer Service,” Aaron Rosenberg continues the slapstick adventures of his duck-headed alien abductee, now at the mercy of his literal-minded and murderous automatic house system. Colchamiro’s crew provides an entertaining mix of styles for fans of cross-genre SF/F. (BookLife)