PhoenixMama

Best-selling writer Orson Scott Card founded the online magazine Intergalactic Medicine Show in 2006. It has been a big success, drawing submissions from well-known science fiction and fantasy writers, as well as fostering some amazing new talents. This collection contains some of the best of those stories.

As a vampyr who was born to fulfill a prophecy, my life was planned before I was created. I obeyed every rule, and I became the perfect vampyr, but one night changed everything. Rejected by the man who was destined for me, who was supposed to love me forever, I do the only thing I can. I flee into the night, nursing my broken heart. Being a rejected mate corrupts the soul, however, and in this game of Courts and Kings, nobody wins. Nobody except the monsters in the shadows.

Alice knows Wonderland is just a virtual world operated inside an asylum to which she’s been wrongfully committed, but she can’t find her way out—can’t find her way back to the life she lived before she woke beneath titanic trees and towering flowers. With the terrifying Red King searching for her and chaos all around, her only hope of escape lies in Shadow, a tall, mysterious being with glowing eyes, sharp claws, and a haunting grin who may be the maddest of them all. But even if Wonderland isn’t real, her growing feelings for Shadow—and his desire for her—are.

As princess of Krashna, Maeva has always gotten her way. But when she is sent to marry the third prince of Jora, Haruk, she has little choice in the matter. Due to an impending war against another kingdom, it is her duty to marry him and solidify the alliance between Jora and Krashna. However, the third prince proves to be unenthusiastic, lazy, seemingly unemotional, and extremely unmotivated. Still, Maeva hopes that by getting close to him and gaining his love, her country would benefit politically. Yet she can't shake the that there is more behind his expressionless, dark eyes....

Evie and her daughter, Asteria, are fleeing an abusive cult when they meet a stranger in an abandoned Arizona shopping mall. Fate hasn’t set Nameless on their trail. It’s a premonition, and a chance to make reparations for a failure from his past he can’t even remember. This time, Nameless must do everything in his power not to fail those who trust him with their lives.

In this evocative, personal piece, Dr. Sanjay Gupta reflects on his life as a parent during this unprecedented time. He shares his fears and questions about raising his three young daughters amid our current public health crisis - and gives listeners a candid glimpse into how he’s navigating the pandemic at home.