Everyone's favorite lethal SecUnit is back in the next installment in Martha Wells' bestselling and award-winning Murderbot Diaries series. Having someone else support your bad decision feels kind of good. Having volunteered to run a rescue mission, Murderbot realises that it will have to spend significant time with a bunch of humans it doesn't know. Including human children. Ugh. This may well call for... eye contact! (Emotion check: Oh, for f—)

Murderbot—the sardonic, almost-homicidal, media-loving android created by Martha Wells—has proven to be one of the most popular characters in 21 st century science fiction. Everything that makes this protagonist (it would be wrong to call Murderbot a hero) beloved of fans is on display in Compulsory. While trying to watch episode 44 of The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon, Murderbot is—again, what is it with humans?—distracted by something that is technically outside its purview. A miner is suddenly in danger following a pointless (to Murderbot’s way of thinking) argument, and the choice is to risk discovery and leap into action, which would require hitting the pause button during a very exciting part of SanctuaryMoon, or to follow orders and stay still. This is a tougher choice than it seems. But then, when has Murderbot ever been faced with an easy choice? A shorter version of this story originally appeared in Wired magazine.

"Morning and evening Maids heard the goblins cry: “Come buy our orchard fruits, Come buy, come buy... Experience the temptation, pleasure, punishment, and redemption of Christina Rossetti's brilliant poetic masterpiece. First published in 1862, the work is the phantasmagoric tale of two maidens seduced by lewd goblin men, and it provides a startling glimpse into the depths of the Victorian psyche. For children, the story offers a captivating adventure into a land of fantasy. For adults, it's a lyrical and sensual allegory of temptation, sacrifice, and salvation. Christina Rossetti (1830–1894) was one of the most important women poets writing in nineteenth-century England. She was born in London December 5, 1830, within a family of poets, artists, and critics. Today she is best remembered by her infamous poem 'Goblin Market' (1862), but also by 'Complete Poems' and 'Selected Poems of Christina Rossetti' (1970).

The Rāmāyana, an ancient epic of India, with audiences across vast stretches of time and geography, continues to influence numberless readers socially and morally through its many re-tellings. Made available in English for the first time, the 16th century version presented here is by Candrāvatī, a woman poet from Bengal. It is a highly individual rendition as a tale told from a woman's point of view which, instead of celebrating masculine heroism, laments the suffering of women caught in the play of male ego. This book presents a translation and commentary on the text, with an extensive introduction that scrutinizes its social and cultural context and correlates its literary identity with its ideological implications. Taken together, the narrative and the critical study offered here expand the understanding both of the history of women’s self-expression in India and the cultural potency of the epic tale. The book is of interest equally to students and researchers of South Asian narratives, Rāmāyana studies and gender issues.

An exuberant novel about a young woman’s quest to carve her own path—even if she needs to step over a few dead bodies along the way It’s 1974 and San Francisco is full of mystery and menace. Nineteen-year-old Celia Dent keeps telling herself how lucky she is to be married to Drew, a man who says he loves her. But Celia’s contentment with her little life is shattered when a woman she knows is murdered in a love tryst gone awry. What would that be like, Celia wonders, to die—or kill—for love? What would it be like to live each moment passionately and with full knowledge that each breath is bringing her closer to her final breath? Before Celia knows it her musings about love-and-death happenings are bleeding into daily life. She’s practicing her marksmanship at a local gun range. She's searching for a love tryst of her very own. She's thinking about how good it would feel to bury something sharp inside her domineering husband’s ear. It’s all pretend, though, until the night comes when Celia finally goes too far, and she and Drew are set on a deadly collision course. Exhilarating, surreal, and bitingly clever, Evil Genius is a comic noir about obsession and desire—and what happens when a sweetly seditious young woman dares to imagine a better life for herself. Claire Oshetsky is also the author of the novels Poor Deer and Chouette, which was longlisted for the PEN/Faulkner Award.

In the vein of The Pisces and The Vegetarian, Chlorine is a debut novel that blurs the line between a literary coming-of-age narrative and a dark unsettling horror tale, told from an adult perspective on the trials and tribulations of growing up in a society that puts pressure on young women and their bodies... a powerful, relevant novel of immigration, sapphic longing, and fierce, defiant becoming.Ren Yu is a swimmer. Her daily life starts and ends with the pool. Her teammates are her only friends. Her coach, her guiding light. If she swims well enough, she will be scouted, get a scholarship, go to a good school. Her parents will love her. Her coach will be kind to her. She will have a good life. But these are human concerns. These are the concerns of those confined to land, those with legs. Ren grew up on stories of creatures of the deep, of the oceans and the rivers. Ones that called sailors to their doom. Ones that dragged them down and drowned them. Ones that feasted on their flesh. Ones of the creature that she's always longed to become: mermaid. Ren aches to be in the water. She dreams of the scent of chlorine--the feel of it on her skin. And she will do anything she can to make a life for herself where she can be free. No matter the pain. No matter what anyone else thinks. No matter how much blood she has to spill.

What will the end of the world look like? Will it be an old man slowly turned to gold, flowers raining from the sky, or a hole cut through the wire fencing that keeps the monsters out? Is it someone you love wearing your face, or a good old fashioned inter-dimensional summoning? Does it sound like a howl outside the window, or does it look like coming home? This startling and irresistibly witty collection from the phenomenally talented Moïra Fowley is an exploration of all our darkest impulses and deepest fears.