In a universe where corporate scions hold aristocratic titles and wield absolute power, a young princess embarks on a mission of mercy to find a new home for the refugees created by her father’s many wars. To her dismay, an invitation to an isolated planetoid that could serve as the perfect home for the poor exiles turns out to be a ploy by the infamous Baron Von Schmidt to add yet another outrage to his repertoire. What starts as an exclusive party in her honor is soon revealed to be something far more sinister: a depraved auction where the item on sale is her royal highness and the bidders are a who’s who of the galaxy’s worst scoundrels!

With only enemies in sight and no way to call for help, the young princess has no choice but to rescue herself. This will not be easy.

Her foes include a Chinese space pirate, a young Russian duelist, a high-tech samurai, a Venusian Mafioso, two expert French poisoners recently returned from the horror vacui, a floating Swiss banker of unimaginable wealth, and a British gentleman who also happens to be a pterodactyl.

Her arsenal consists of vague memories from classes she mostly slept through, a pile of gadgets for which she’s never read the user manual, and a ferret.

As a young man, Tirren, the son of the ruler of Thiery, was abducted and seduced by an Elven woman, Yslaaran. The unsettling event turned life-changing when she reappeared a year later and handed him his infant son, though the reasons for her actions remained a mystery.

For seventeen years, Tirren has met the challenge of raising his half-Elven son in a land that hates and fears the Elves, but his son’s struggle for acceptance is only one source of Tirren’s pain. The other is his unfading desire for the immortal lover who spent one night with him and vanished. When a neighboring ruler threatens war, Tirren rides to the skirmishes with his son at his side, but Yslaaran learns of the growing political strife and fears it will unravel her long-laid plans. She returns at last to Thiery and shares with her son her secret hopes for his future. Her dreams come to ruin, though, when a betrayal reveals her plans and the Elves rise up against the mortals, trapping Tirren and his realm between two deadly enemies.

Kevin J. Anderson is one of the best-selling science fiction novelists working in the field today, but over the course of his long career he has also produced a steady stream of short fiction, ranging from hard science fiction, to fantasy, to horror, dark fantasy, and humor. He has won or been nominated for the Hugo Award, Nebula Award, Bram Stoker Award, Shamus Award, Colorado Book Award, Scribe Award, New York Times Notable Book, and many others.

This first volume of Anderson’s selected short fiction focuses on his science fiction stories, from flash fiction to novella length, written solo or with collaborators. These stories showcase his range of writing talent from military science fiction, to dystopian fiction, space adventure, humor, alternate timelines, and political and psychological extrapolation.

When the six-year-old daughter of a billionaire nanotech magnate is kidnapped, ueber-consultant Jonathan Knox and counterterrorism agent Marianna Bonaventure must team up with an experimental artificial intelligence to rescue her, never suspecting the little girl is the key to a plot that could destroy the NSA’s most advanced cryptanalysis capability — and go on to kill every man, woman, and child in the United States.

In his undead quest for justice, Felix Gomez—detective-vampire extraordinaire—has traveled from dusty desert battlefields to gritty urban barrios to the deepest corners of outer space. Now he’s about to embark on his wildest adventure yet: back to an alternative past of steam-powered technology, telepathic magic, and intrigue more deadly and unforgiving than any he has ever encountered. There, he’s a renowned pistolero hired to find the missing daughter of notorious Chinese gangster Wu-Fei.

Accompanied by philosopher-gunfighter Malachi Hunter and mercenary femme fatale Hermosa Singer, Felix follows clues through the reimagined Southwest of Aztlan to the Gulf of California. The fate of Wu Fei’s daughter is known only to the sex slaves imprisoned on Isla Tiburón—Shark Island—the fortress home of a mad scientist whose ambitions are as twisted as her evil genius.

Getting on the island proves tough. Getting off the island proves impossible. But to learn what happened to Wu Fei’s daughter, Felix must brave a gauntlet of murderous henchmen, infernal machines, and ferocious prehistoric monsters. And don’t forget the sharks.