Finalist for the 2017 Epigram Books Fiction Prize Sofia is an ordinary schoolgirl living in a future Singapore where the population is divided into three social strata. When she inadvertently unlocks the gateway to a new world, she realises she must escape the government’s radar. She ventures into the lowest rung of society, the Voids, and meets with the eccentric Uncle Kirk and the resourceful Father Lang. While on the run, she learns why her father disappeared seven years ago and why the new world exists in the first place.

From the myth of Arcadia through to the twenty-first century, ideas about sustainability – how we imagine better urban environments – remain persistently relevant, and raise recurring questions. How do cities evolve as complex spaces nurturing both urban creativity and the fortuitous art of discovery, and by which mechanisms do they foster imagination and innovation? While past utopias were conceived in terms of an ideal geometry, contemporary exemplary models of urban design seek technological solutions of optimal organisation. The Venice Variations explores Venice as a prototypical city that may hold unique answers to the ancient narrative of utopia. Venice was not the result of a preconceived ideal but the pragmatic outcome of social and economic networks of communication. Its urban creativity, though, came to represent the quintessential combination of place and institutions of its time. Through a discussion of Venice and two other works owing their inspiration to this city – Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities and Le Corbusier’s Venice Hospital – Sophia Psarra describes Venice as a system that starts to resemble a highly probabilistic ‘algorithm’, that is, a structure with a small number of rules capable of producing a large number of variations. The rapidly escalating processes of urban development around our big cities share many of the motivations for survival, shelter and trade that brought Venice into existence. Rather than seeing these places as problems to be solved, we need to understand how urban complexity can evolve, as happened from its unprepossessing origins in the marshes of the Venetian lagoon to the ‘model city’ that endured a thousand years. This book frees Venice from stereotypical representations, revealing its generative capacity to inform potential other ‘Venices’ for the future.

The widespread opinion is that Northrop Frye’s influence reached its zenith in the 1960s and 1970s, after which point he became obsolete, his work buried in obscurity. This almost universal opinion is summed up in Terry Eagleton’s 1983 rhetorical question, "Who now reads Frye?" In The Reception of Northrop Frye, Robert D. Denham catalogues what has been written about Frye – books, articles, translations, dissertations and theses, and reviews – in order to demonstrate that the attention Frye’s work has received from the beginning has progressed at a geomantic rate. Denham also explores what we can discover once we have a fairly complete record of Frye’s reception in front of us – such as Hayden White’s theory of emplotments applied to historical writing and Byron Almén’s theory of musical narrative. The sheer quantity of what has been written about Frye reveals that the only valid response to Eagleton’s rhetorical question is "a very large and growing number," the growth being not incremental but exponential.

A selection of notable science fiction, fantasy, and horror stories, which were translated into and first published in English in 2020. This anthology features the winning entry and the stories shortlisted for the Science Fiction and Fantasy Rosetta Awards. The following stories are included: ROESIN by Wu Guan, translated from the Chinese by Judith Huang WHALE SNOWS DOWN by Kim Bo-Young, translated from the Korean by Sophie Bowman THE GREEN HILLS OF DIMITRY TOTZKIY by Eldar Safin, translated from the Russian by Alex Shvartsman RAISING MERMAIDS by Dai Da, translated from the Chinese by S. Qiouyi Lu MATER TENEBRARUM by Pilar Pedraza, translated from the Spanish by James D. Jenkins VIK FROM PLANET EARTH by Yevgeny Lukin, translated from the Russian by Mike Olivson BIOGRAPHY OF ALGAE by Martha Riva Palacio Obón, translated from the Spanish by Will Morningstar THE POST-CONSCIOUS AGE by Su Min, translated from the Chinese by Nathan Faries JUST LIKE MIGRATORY BIRDS by Taiyo Fujii, translated from the Japanese by Emily Balistrieri THE WITCH DANCES by Thiago Ambrósio Lage, translated from the Portuguese by Iana Araújo FORMERLY SLOW by Wei Ma, translated from the Chinese by Andy Dudak MENOPAUSE by Flore Hazoumé, translated from the French by James D. Jenkins THE MOLE KING by Marie Hermanson, translated from the Swedish by Charlie Haldén THE ANCESTRAL TEMPLE IN A BOX by Chen Qiufan, translated from the Chinese by Emily Jin NO ONE EVER LEAVES PORT HENRI by K.A. Teryna, translated from the Russian by Alex Shvartsman COUSIN ENTROPY by Michèle Laframboise, translated from the French by N. R. M. Roshak THE CURTAIN FALLS, THE SHOW MUST END by Julie Nováková, translated from the Czech by the author

Featuring stories from USA, the UK, China, Sweden, and Cuba. "A Friend on the Inside" by Will McIntosh (USA) "Four-Letter Word" by Alexy Dumenigo (Cuba), translated by Toshiya Kamei "Rat's Tongue" by Xing Fan (China), translated by Judith Huang "Vagrants" by Lavie Tidhar (UK) "The Sweetness of Berris and Wine" by Jo Miles (USA) "Paean for a Branch Ghost" by Filip Wiltgren (Sweden) Cover art: Oleksandr Kulichenko (Ukraine) Cover design: Jay O'Connell (USA)

An Oprah Daily Top 25 Fantasy Book of 2022 From an award-winning team of authors, editors, and translators comes a groundbreaking short story collection that explores the expanse of Chinese science fiction and fantasy. In The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories, you can dine at a restaurant at the end of the universe, cultivate to immortality in the high mountains, watch roses perform Shakespeare, or arrive at the island of the gods on the backs of giant fish to ensure that the world can bloom. Written, edited, and translated by a female and nonbinary team, these stories have never before been published in English and represent both the richly complicated past and the vivid future of Chinese science fiction and fantasy. Time travel to a winter's day on the West Lake, explore the very boundaries of death itself, and meet old gods and new heroes in this stunning new collection. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Future SF is a magazine focusing on international science fiction. In this oversized issue we've collected stories from the established masters as well as some exciting up-and-comers in China, Japan, and South Korea. From machine societies to ocean depths, from interstellar migrations to genetically engineered mermaids, these tales envision very different, often dark, but always fascinating futures. Includes the following stories: Rœsin by Wu Guan (translated from Chinese by Judith Huang) Raising Mermaids by Dai Da (translated from Chinese by S. Quouyi Lu) Butterfly Blue by Gustavo Bondoni (Argentina) Reflection by Gu Shi (translated from Chinese by Ken Liu; reprint) Whale Snows Down by Kim Bo-Young (translated from Korean by Sophie Bowman) Formerly Slow by Wei Ma (translated from Chinese by Andy Dudak) Just Like Migratory Birds by Taiyo Fujii (translated from Japanese by Emily Balistrieri)

A visionary work that combines speculative fiction with deep philosophical inquiry, The Sparrow tells the story of a charismatic Jesuit priest and linguist, Emilio Sandoz, who leads a scientific mission entrusted with a profound task: to make first contact with intelligent extraterrestrial life. The mission begins in faith, hope, and beauty, but a series of small misunderstandings brings it to a catastrophic end. Praise for The Sparrow “A startling, engrossing, and moral work of fiction.”—The New York Times Book Review “Important novels leave deep cracks in our beliefs, our prejudices, and our blinders. The Sparrow is one of them.”—Entertainment Weekly “Powerful . . . The Sparrow tackles a difficult subject with grace and intelligence.”—San Francisco Chronicle “Provocative, challenging . . . recalls both Arthur C. Clarke and H. G. Wells, with a dash of Ray Bradbury for good measure.”—The Dallas Morning News “[Mary Doria] Russell shows herself to be a skillful storyteller who subtly and expertly builds suspense.”—USA Today