Wishing everyone health and good fortune in the Year of the Tiger!

Lunar New Year poster by Gynn Stella, artist for Zephyr & Reginald: Minions for Hire.

Rick Silva’s short story, “Roadkill” is one of twenty tales of urban legends with alien explanations to be featured in the upcoming Close Encounters of the Urban Kind anthology from Apex Publications.

Close Encounters of the Urban Kind is edited by Jennifer Brozek. Other writers whose stories appear in the anthology include Alma Alexander, Nathan Crowder, Carole Johnstone, Pete Kempshall, Jennifer Pelland, Erik Scott de Bie, Bev Vincent, and Ivan Ewert.

The book is scheduled for release on April 4, 2010.

Apex is currently taking pre-orders at a special discounted price.

You can order place our order from Apex Publications here.

The new issue of The Edge of Propinquity includes the first episode of Four Visitors, my new serial fiction. Four Visitors is a tale of small town life, high school romance, family conflict, government conspiracies, and psychic powers. Hope you give my new tale, and the other stories on the site, a look!

Issue 49: January 2010 Welcome to the Edge of Propinquity. Issue 49 is now published. This year, we return with Solstice by Ivan Ewert and two new universes by returning authors Rick Silva and Nick Bergeron. Finally, we are pleased to introduce new TEoP author Seanan McGuire and her new universe story Sparrow Hill Road. The beginning is a delicate time. It sets the stage for what is to come. This month, we have a gift in winter, the birth of a god, a sudden attack, roads less traveled and a man on a hunt.

Four Visitors – Singularity, Part One – by Rick Silva Una Blanco is new in town, a senior in high school, a star basketball player, and a girl who’s willing to make a stand for what is right. She also has a tendency of burning out lightbulbs when she walks into a room. Nick Lorem wants nothing to do with Una Blanco, but Nick’s girlfriend has struck up a friendship with Una. And Nick’s brother has just arrived back in town with an interest in Una as well. A government interest. The kind of interest that ends with people in jail. Or dead.

Solstice – Winter, Part Four – by Ivan Ewert Winter in the valley is a time of cold and of darkness. Though once the light of the sun would return fierce and brightly, these days she must be coerced and tempted to show her face to Solstice. Stephanie MacIntyre is not a woman used to coercion or subtlety, and this mask begins to fray – along with her loyalty to Mayor Long.

Mnemosyne – Old Wounds Revisited – by Nick Bergeron In which our Hero begins his tale. Like any good story, he gives you the Cliff Notes in how he came into himself. I’m sure that he included me in the description. Or perhaps he didn’t, as his exclusion of me was the beginning of the problem in the first place. After he tells you the sordid story of me, you will see a healing, which is of course the beginning of the end.

Sparrow Hill Road – Good Girls Go to Heaven – by Seanan McGuire Everyone on the road knows the story of the Girl in the Diner, but how many know the truth behind it? One man, Larry Vibber, is about to learn exactly how the story goes as he rides with Rose Marshall down the midnight road that runs between the layers of America.

Guest Author – Subway Hunter by Justin Bernstein Beneath the eyes of the oblivious subway crowds, a hero hunts the beasts that prey upon the innocent. While he hunts, memories of his former life come to him like snowflakes on the wind. The choice is clear but what is the cost?

Have you ever looked over the edge and seen something looking back at you?