Steampunk »

Ann VanderMeer is the publisher of Buzzcity Press and the fiction editor for Weird Tales. Jeff VanderMeer is the founder and editor for Ministry of Whimsy Press. He is the author of City of Saints and Madmen, Secret Life, Shriek, and Veniss Underground. He is the editor of the Leviathan series and The Thackery T. Lambshead Pocket Guide to Eccentric & Discredited Diseases. Coeditors of the Best American Fantasy series, they both live in Tallahassee, Florida.

Replete with whimsical mechanical wonders and charmingly anachronistic settings, this pioneering anthology gathers a brilliant blend of fantastical stories. Steampunk originates in the romantic elegance of the Victorian era and blends in modern scientific advances—synthesizing imaginative technologies such as steam-driven robots, analog supercomputers, and ultramodern dirigibles. The elegant allure of this popular new genre is represented in this rich collection by distinctively talented authors, including Neal Stephenson, Michael Chabon, James Blaylock, Michael Moorcock, and Joe R. Lansdale.

Publishers Weekly

The VanderMeers (The New Weird) have assembled another outstanding theme anthology, this one featuring stories set in alternate Victorian eras. Michael Moorcock, the godfather of steampunk, is represented by an excerpt from his classic novel The Warlord of the Air. In "Lord Kelvin's Machine," a fine tale from prolific steampunk author James P. Blaylock, mad scientists plot to throw the Earth into the path of a passing comet, declaring that "science will save us this time, gentlemen, if it doesn't kill us first." Michael Chabon's vivid and moving "The Martian Agent, a Planetary Romance" recounts the lives of two young brothers in the aftermath of George Custer's mutiny against Queen Victoria, while historical fantasist Mary Gentle describes a classic struggle between safety and progress in "A Sun in the Attic." This is a superb introduction to one of the most popular and inventive subgenres in science fiction. (June)

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