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The Great War of the Gods means nothing to the proud people on the mortal planet – until Akhran the Wandering God decrees the union of two mighty feuding clans. Though the families are fierce Warriors, they are few in number. Even the marriage of Khardan and Zohra is not enough to over power the strength of the invading army or prevent the imprisonment of their peoples. Now, with Khardan and Zohra mysteriously missing – seemingly cowards who hid from certain defeat – the two clans have lost all hope of ever again seeing their beloved open skies. But Prince Khardan and Princess Zohra, aided by the wizard Matthew, have been given another mission . . . a mission that at first seems less useful than counting the many grains of the desert sands, but soon proves to be of far more lasting importance.

After the overwhelming defeat of their tribes, Khardan and Zohra find themselves prisoners of an evil god’s disciples – and in danger of losing their honor, their lives and their souls!

Since time began, twenty Gods have ruled the universe. Though each god possessed different abilities, each was all-powerful within his realm. Now one of the Gods has upset the balance of power, leaving the others scrambling for control in the new order…

Here is the epic tale of the Great War of the Gods – and the proud people upon whom the fate of the world depends. When the God of the desert, Akhran the Wanderer, declares that two clans must band together despite their centuries-old rivalry, their first response is outrage. But they are a devout people and so reluctantly bow to his bidding.

Enemies from birth, the headstrong Prince Khardan and impetuous Princess Zohra must unite in marriage to stop Quar, the God of Reality, Greed, and Law, from enslaving their people.

But can Khardan and Zohra keep from betraying each other? Can their two peoples maintain their fragile alliance until the long-awaited flowering of the legendary Rose of the Prophet?

Against the powerful legions of the evil Amir, Khardan and Zohra fight to save the desert people – a fight unexpectedly joined by an exiled wizard named Matthew and the mysterious powers of his alien land.

His name was Tharg, but he was not of any life form we know today. He lived so long ago that the planet Earth had not yet shaped itself. Lava seas roiled and churned, volcanoes spouted and grew, and heavy clouds hung in the hydrogen atmosphere, leaving the planet’s surface dark and dangerous.

On that world Tharg met his death, or something very much like it. He became a disembodied, totally nonphysical intelligence, cut off from all contact with the life he had known. He ‘slept’ for hundreds of millions of years, unconnected with the world, unthinking, hardly existing.

But then he began to awake – for there was new life on Earth, creatures called ‘human’, and Tharg, knowing an ancient promise from the stars, had to tell them of it. But . . . how?

Earth was a weird and dire place after the plagues.

The few humans who survived could not bear the touch of each other; they lived in the enormous, endless caverns hacked out of the bowels of the earth for the bombs that never came.

And on one man rested the hopes of the world, though he did not know it. Sam Sewell only knew he had to journey, despite forbidding perils from the darkness of the past, into the ultimate fastnesses of the unknown to rescue the timeless wisdom of the witch Desponia . . .

Did she hold the key to ecstasy – or to horror?

The people of Gwethym were highly intelligent, rational beings. They worshiped the goddess Neith, not because they believed in such a golden-haired being, but because they recognised the need for religion as a counterbalance to human passions.

So when trouble struck their planet, when they discovered an energy leak which was slowly destroying their world, the Gwethymians turned to science for their answer. If their world was to be saved, the solution must come from the logicians.

Or so they thought, until one day a woman, in the image of their goddess Neith, walked across the waters of the harbour and into their city! Then their trouble was two-fold. Would there be anything left to save of their world if they waited for the scientists? And if they didn’t, if they put their trust in this goddess whom logic told them could not even exist, would they just be sealing their doom that much quicker?

Margaret St Clair is best known for her shorter science fiction and fantasy, much of the latter written under the pen name of Idris Seabright. She has a remarkably ironic sense of humor, and many of her stories have social or philosophical themes.

Contents:
Idris’ Pig (1964)
The Gardener (1949)
Child of Void (1949)
Hathor’s Pets (1950)
The Pillows (1950)
The Listening Child (1950)
Brightness Falls from the Air (1951)
The Man Who Sold Rope to the Gnoles (1951)
The Causes (1952)
An Egg a Month from All Over (1952)
Prott (1953)
New Ritual (1953)
Brenda (1954)
Short in the Chest (1954)
Horrer Howce (1956)
The Wines of Earth (1957)
The Invested Libido (1958)
The Nuse Man (1960)
An Old-Fashioned Bird Christmas (1961)
Wryneck, Draw Me (1980)

Change the Sky is a collection in which you will find:

– A man who has spent his life searching for the world of his dreams and got exactly what he wanted
– A women who found the people around her so boring she changed them
– A righteous minister who preached an old-fashioned Christmas and started an energy crisis – 2000 years in the future

On Venus: An ancient and powerful Venusian race finds its ultimate evolution – but can they accept it?

On Mars: The people of the Fourth Planet are eminently reasonable in all things – except for the cult of the Sacred Martian Pig, for which ‘fanatic’ would be entirely too reasonable a word.

And on Earth: On the unknown world of one or ten centuries from now, the strangest stories of all become haunting, fascinating reality, as we find out that human beings are, after all, the most alien of creatures . . .

Like so many others before him, reluctant Sam MacGregor was sent on a pilgrimage for the Grail Vision by the Dancers: androids grown from the cells of one man, with the powers of hypnotism and illusion – androids who held the tribes of the Republic of California in thrall.

But soon Sam began to doubt his own identity, for he experienced, in close succession, extra-lives in different corridors of time and space.

And he count not know whom his search would destroy: the Dancers . . . or himself.

They had existed from time immemorial, hidden in a space warp far beneath the the surface of the Earth. Until now, their only form of nourishment had been a strange hallucinogenic grain. Now, they hungered for human flesh. The Earth was to be their stockyard and mankind their meat…

Before the dawn of man . . .

. . . there was a covenant between the land and the sea people – a covenant long forgotten by those who stayed on shore, but indelibly etched in the minds of others – the dolphins of Altair.

Now the covenant had been broken. Dolphins were being wantonly sacrificed in the name of scientific research, their waters increasingly polluted, their number dangerously diminished. They had to find allies and strike back. Allies willing to sever their own earthly bonds for the sake of their sea brothers – willing, if necessary, to execute the destruction of the whole human race . . .

Bonnar had created the Green Queen thoughtlessly – all part of a day’s work. But when his brain-child became a full-grown Frankenstein’s monster, embodied in the girl he loved, Bonnar was terrified. For now she threatened to shatter the whole carefully balanced social structure of Viridis – as well to undermine that radioactive world’s atomic shield!

Only Bonnar could end the holocaust and turn the all-too-grim reality back to the illusion he had originally intended. But to do that he had to destroy the girl he loved – or be destroyed by her.

Don Haig had been content to lie around and drink in the synthetic beauty of the pleasure planetoid Fyon, until a woman came into his life. A woman more beautiful and more perfect than any other female in the galaxy. A woman who brought about a curious change in Don.

For she was a pocket-sized foll – a very strange and miraculous puppet who shed constant tears and held powers that Don never even dreamed of.

But what Don did know was that dangerous alien forces were swiftly focusing on him and his living puppet – and that he had to discover the doll’s super-scientific secret before his own life was smashed into atoms.

Margaret Fielding was tried for the murder of her first husband ten years ago and, innocent, was acquitted for lack of evidence. Now someone is threatening to produce evidence that could convict her.

Classic crime from one of the greats of the Detection Club

Fortunately, Margaret meets Arthur Crook, the detective lawyer to whom the innocent turn, never in vain. When her blackmailer is found murdered, just after she is seen, distraught, leaving the premises, it is to Crook that she tells her tale. But someone knows Crook by reputation, and is anxious that he does not take on Margaret’s case.

It should have been her sanctuary – until things got murderous…

‘Few authors are better than Margaret Yorke in generating a real sense of fear’ SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

‘The mistress of unease’ DAILY TELEGRAPH

Ruth Castle – alone, proud, defiant – is determined to rescue some personal happiness from the wreckage of her life. In Haverbury village, she makes friends with Marjorie and Robert Bretherton, and is soon involved in the affairs of other relatives who come to stay for Christmas.

Family conflicts emerge, and one night, turning to Ruth for support in a sudden crisis, Marjorie realises that things are not as straightforward as she thought – and that her very life is threatened …

‘A star in our galaxy of crime writers’ FINANCIAL TIMES

Superb crime fiction from the CWA Diamond Dagger Award Winner

‘Yorke practised deception artfully and with style’ GUARDIAN

‘Mistress of the skilfully spun suspense novel’ SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

Nesta Falconer, an attractive widow, lives with her fifteen-year-old daughter Philippa, managing brother-in-law Charles Falconer’s household after the breakdown of his marriage. Nesta’s comfortable position is threatened when her sister Claire, returning from America, comes to stay at her cottage.

Charles realises that Nesta is a menace to Philippa’s happiness, and that she has been responsible for much distress. His mother, a formidable old lady, plays a part in revealing Nesta not only to her family but to herself as a negative person who contributes little to the happiness of others.

She lost her memory – will she lose her life?

Superb crime fiction from ‘A star in our galaxy of crime writers’ FINANCIAL TIMES

‘The mistress of unease’ DAILY TELEGRAPH

Mrs Anderson is starting to forget where she has put things, what she has bought, or even eaten. Living alone in a rambling mansion, she is isolated from the town.

But Mrs Anderson has a visitor. A young man comes every night, through the dining room window. He helps himself to food and money, and has even made himself comfortable in the attic. A young man who enjoys power, he might take over the whole house and make it his. It’s a place where no one will think to look for him, where no one will find him – no matter what he’s done.

A bank holiday – memorable for murder…

‘Few authors are better than Margaret Yorke in generating a real sense of fear’ SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

‘A star in our galaxy of crime writers’ FINANCIAL TIMES

It’s August Bank Holiday, and the great Bramsbourne Fete and Flower Show. But this one is going to be particularly memorable.

Everyone takes part in the preparations, and families gather from far and near. Brigadier and Mrs Trent welcome their daughter Susan, her husband and two children, and their daughter-in-law Elizabeth. Only their son Victor is absent, a sorrow they silently agree not to mention.

Into this carefree scene comes a man on the run. His efforts to evade the tightening police net affect, one after another, everyone in the village. But Brigadier Trent and his wife, and the war-disabled vicar, are more concerned than anyone …

As always, Jesse Falkenstein and Sergeant Clock have a score of cases on their hands, but Jesse is mainly interested in the murder of Margaret Brandon, a trance medium. He was her lawyer and liked her, and someone had gone to great efforts to make her death seem accidental.

But with so many suspects – the egocentric writer, the young lout, the nephew in line for an inheritance – both Falkenstein and Clock are at their wit’s end until their old acquaintance Mr Walker sends his comments from Hawaii – which might be just what they need to get a lead . . .

‘My favourite American crime-writer’ New York Herald Tribune

It all started with the baby shower that friends gave Sergeant Hackett. There, Alice Mendoza, bride of Lieutenant Luis Mendoza, met the insufferable Margaret Chadwick.

But the next morning, Miss Chadwick’s body was discovered in the Southern Pacific freight yards, neatly strangled and minus a single clue. That was when Mendoza was called in . . .

‘A Luis Mendoza story means superlative suspense’ Los Angeles Times

A blackmailer – murdered. And the suspect in fear for her life…
Classic crime from one of the greats of the Detection Club

Margaret Ross knew she had to pay off the blackmailer, Samson, or else her beloved son would go to jail for forgery.

The next night she rang the bell at Samson’s sinister house on Margate Street. There was no answer. Slowly she entered the house and went up the stairs. Samson was waiting at his desk – murdered. She found the incriminating letters and the cheque and escaped with them. But she had been seen.

The dangers gather like wasps around Margaret and it takes all of Detective Arthur Crook’s genius to get to her in time.

‘Amusing and zestful, with an unexpected and exciting climax’ Daily Telegraph

‘A touch of Margaret Millar . . . worth watching’ Sunday Telegraph

Ex-cop turned author Kevin Bryce and sculptress Katharine Craig now live in rural Ireland. After a row Katherine disappears and the next Bryce hears is that her car has been found, with bloodstains on the seat. With a psychopathic IRA renegade on the loose, Bryce and the Gardai embark on a desperate search for the missing woman.

Meanwhile, in Dublin, Mick Cronin ponders the miseries of his existence. Embittered by life and love he is an unstable man with a grudge against women…

‘A touch of Margaret Millar . . . worth watching’ Sunday Telegraph

San Francisco artist Roxanne Gautier’s startling paintings of male prostitutes has sent shock waves throughout the art world – and in her personal life. When Taylor Adams, her favourite model, commits suicide – or so it appears – her husband is frightened she may be connected with the death and asks ex-policeman Kevin Bryce to investigate.
Taylor’s fellow prostitutes, including the beautiful and dangerous Angel, and the revealing pages of Roxanne’s diary take Bryce into a psychosexual nightmare world of corruption, blackmail and moral decay.