Thirteen-year-old Benjamin is pulled from his old life and forced to attend a special boarding school in the middle of nowhere. That's confusing enough. Then, he's fed instructions through an earbud and thrown into etiquette classes alongside an angry, spike-covered creature. Despite wearing purple dresses and having the unassuming name of Eve, the creature is horrifying and, as Eve quickly demonstrates, dangerous.   With the help of his new friends Lorena and Persephone, Ben must overcome his own anxieties and uncover the truth about Eve’s origin. But he learns that the school's agenda is much bigger than he ever thought possible. Ben needs to earn Eve’s trust, and fast. The fate of the world depends on it.

A enchanting new short story from Hugo Award-winning author Will McIntosh. Enter a world of moving cities. The war is over and Hitler is dead, but rumors are flying that Chicago has just attacked Boston. That Moscow has crossed into the US and attacked Chicago. And New York is on the way to chase down the Windy City. Some cities are rumbling that they don't feel like part of the USA anymore. But what form of energy is giving them the power of locomotion?

A captivating new short story from Hugo Award winner Will McIntosh. An unlikely crew has met up in Las Vegas to pull off the ultimate robbery. The target? Life itself.

Faller is a new gripping standalone, science fiction thriller by Hugo Award-winning author Will McIntosh.Day One: No one can remember anything—who they are, family and friends, or even how to read. Reality has fragmented and Earth consists of an islands of rock floating in an endless sky. Food, water, electricity—gone, except for what people can find, and they can't find much.Faller's pockets contain tantalizing clues: a photo of himself and a woman he can't remember, a toy solider with a parachute, and a mysterious map drawn in blood. With only these materials as a guide, he makes a leap of faith from the edge of the world to find the woman and set things right.He encounters other floating islands, impossible replicas of himself and others, and learns that one man hates him enough to take revenge for actions Faller can't even remember.

In the future, love is complicated and death is not necessarily the end. Love Minus Eighty follows several interconnected people in a disquieting vision of romantic life in the century to come.There's Rob, who accidentally kills a jogger, then sacrifices all to visit her in a cryogenic dating facility, seeking forgiveness but instead falling in love.Veronika, a shy dating coach, finds herself coaching the very woman who is stealing the man she loves.And Mira, a gay woman accidentally placed in a heterosexual dating center near its inception, desperately seeks a way to reunite with her frozen partner as the years pass.In this daring and big-hearted novel based on the Hugo-winning short short story, the lovelorn navigate a word in which technology has reached the outer limits of morality and romance.

SUMMARY: What happens when resources become scarce and society starts to crumble? As the competition for resources pulls America's previous stable society apart, the "New Normal" is a Soft Apocalypse. This is how our world ends; with a whimper instead of a bang.

A chilling new short story from Hugo Award winner Will McIntosh. The settlers of Cyan have not ventured far beyond the perimeter fence that keeps the planet's strange creatures at bay. But one unlucky woman is about to find out what lies beyond...Word Count ~ 7,109

Thirteen-year-old twins Vick and Tara have built an incredible machine—a loyal robotic watchdog named Daisy. But, when local crime boss Ms. Alba schemes to add Daisy to her robot army, Vick and Tara must go to great lengths to protect their prized pet. Because Daisy is more than just any robot—she's their constant protector, and together the three make a great team. Vick and Tara are determined to stop the mob from tearing their little family apart. And they might just succeed! Sure, the evil Ms. Alba has more robot watchdogs, but none are as smart—or as faithful—as their Daisy. Plus, if things get too dangerous, Tara could always upgrade their pet. With her mechanical skills, she could make Daisy bigger, stronger, and a lot more intimidating!

A new epic of alien invasion and human resistance by Hugo Award-winning author Will McIntosh. Our Darkest Hour.Our Only Hope.The invaders came to claim earth as their own, overwhelming us with superior weapons and the ability to read our minds like open books. Our only chance for survival was to engineer a new race of perfect soldiers to combat them. Seventeen feet tall, knowing and loving nothing but war, their minds closed to the aliens. But these saviors could never be our servants. And what is down cannot be undone.

In this terrifyingly timely tale for fans of The Eye of Minds, a teen and his group of friends find themselves on the run after using a genius lie-detector contraption to expose their corrupt government.In a Putin-esque near-future America, the gifted and talented high school has just been eliminated, and Sam and his friends have been using their unexpected free time to work on a tiny, undetectable, utterly reliable lie detector. They're all in it for the money—except Theo, their visionary. For Theo, it's about creating a better world. A BS-free world, where no one can lie, and the honest will thrive.Just when they finish the prototype and turn down an offer to sell their brainchild to a huge corporation, Theo is found dead. Greedy companies, corrupt privatized police, and even the president herself will stop at nothing to steal the Truth App. Sam sets his sights on exposing all lies and holding everyone accountable.But he and his friends quickly...

Two years ago, on the same day but miles apart, Finn Darby lost two of the most important people in his life: his wife Lorena, struck by lightning on the banks of the Chattahoochee River, and his abusive, alcoholic grandfather, Tom Darby, creator of the long-running newspaper comic strip Toy Shop. Against his grandfather's dying wish, Finn has resurrected Toy Shop, adding new characters, and the strip is more popular than ever, bringing in fan letters, merchandising deals, and talk of TV specials. Finn has even started dating again.When a terrorist attack decimates Atlanta, killing half a million souls, Finn begins blurting things in a strange voice beyond his control. The voice says things only his grandfather could know. Countless other residents of Atlanta are suffering a similar bizarre affliction. Is it mass hysteria, or have the dead returned to possess the living? Finn soon realizes he has a hitcher within his skin... his grandfather. And Grandpa isn't terribly happy about the changes Finn has been making to Toy Shop. Together with a pair of possessed friends, an aging rock star, and a waitress, Finn races against time to find a way to send the dead back to Deadland... or die trying!ReviewHitchers is a great read -- and one that really shows off Will McIntosh's range as a writer.      -Stefan Raets, Tor.comHugo-winner McIntosh delivers a moving tale of individual grief and recovery against the backdrop of a devastated world.     -Publisher's Weekly (Starred review)"You will never read a novel quite like Hitchers - it is a singularly unique work of genius."   -Paul Goat Allen, freelance book reviewer for The Chicago Tribune, PW, Kirkus Reviews, and BarnesandNoble.com. About the AuthorWill McIntosh is a Hugo Award winner and Nebula Award finalist whose debut novel, Soft Apocalypse, was published by Night Shade in 2011. His short fiction has appeared in Asimov’s (where his story “Bridesicle” won the 2010 Reader’s Award, as well as the 2010 Hugo Award for Best Short Story), Strange Horizons, Science Fiction and Fantasy: Best of the Year, and others. A New Yorker transplanted to the rural south, Will is a psychology professor at Georgia Southern University, where he studies Internet dating, and how people’s TV, music, and movie choices are affected by recession and terrorist threat. In 2008 he became the father of twins.

For fans of The Maze Runner and The Fifth Wave, this debut YA novel from Hugo Award winner Will McIntosh pits four underprivileged teens against an evil billionaire in the race of a lifetime. Sully is a sphere dealer at a flea market. It doesn't pay much--Alex Holliday's stores have muscled out most of the independent sellers--but it helps him and his mom make the rent. No one knows where the brilliant-colored spheres came from. One day they were just there, hidden all over the earth like huge gemstones. Burn a pair and they make you a little better: an inch taller, skilled at math, better-looking. The rarer the sphere, the greater the improvement--and the more expensive the sphere. When Sully meets Hunter, a girl with a natural talent for finding spheres, the two start searching together. One day they find a Gold--a color no one has ever seen. And when Alex Holliday learns what they have, he will go to any lengths, will use all...

A captivating new short story from Hugo Award winner Will McIntosh in the same world as Defenders.The Luyten came from the stars and quickly overran mankind. Now, a small remnant of the Army huddle in the dark and work to fight back as best they can. A former fast food manager leading a troop of children. The only people left to defend us. But rumors have reached them, word of a secret ally, supers soldiers who can turn the tide of the war.