I’m known for science fiction and that work ends up as a book or in some story collection. But as over the years I scrabbled around to find my opening I also wrote fantasy and other stuff that doesn’t comfortably take a label. These stories have been mouldering on my hard drive for years and I thought it time to scrub them up and put them out there. It concerned me that some might be a bit duff. Publish them anyway, cried the readers, either out of genuine interest or eager to see me fall flat on my face. Some stories were duff, but I have rewritten them into functionality, I think – there are a few here about which I have my doubts. The one about a twenty-something wannabe artist running away with elves still makes me cringe. I also said I would write waffly introduction to each. Do more waffle, the readers cried, so I did.

Enjoy. . .

Neal Asher 20/04/23