2016 Locus Recommended Reading List, Best Anthology Contains “Sabbath Wine” by Barbara Krasnoff, 2016 Nebula Award finalist for Best Short Story “Allen’s strange and lovely fifth genre-melding fantasy anthology selects 20 new short stories of unusual variety, texture, compassion, and perception. . . . All the stories afford thought-provoking glimpses into alternative realities that linger, sparking unconventional thoughts, long after they are first encountered.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review “The arrangement is superb. This anthology of 20 stories can resemble a symphony of themes and variations in a wide range of keys, or a tapestry whose elements form patterns of imagery and meaning that shift and offer new insights throughout the book.” —Locus The Clockwork Phoenix anthologies offer homes to “well-written stories occupying multiple subgenres, usually in the same story, often ambiguously,” as Locus Magazine once put it. The ground-breaking, boundary-pushing, award-nominated series has returned for a fifth incarnation, triumphantly risen from the ashes after another successful Kickstarter campaign. This is the largest installment yet, holding twenty new tales of beauty and strangeness. With original fiction from Jason Kimble, Rachael K. Jones, Patricia Russo, Marie Brennan, Benjanun Sriduangkaew, Rob Cameron, A. C. Wise, Gray Rinehart, Sam Fleming, Sunil Patel, C. S. E. Cooney and Carlos Hernandez, Holly Heisey, Barbara Krasnoff, Sonya Taaffe, Alex Dally MacFarlane, Shveta Thakrar, Cassandra Khaw, Keffy R. M. Kehrli, Rich Larson, and Beth Cato. Cover art by Paula Arwen Owen. “And then there is that secret restaurant . . . It is perfection on a plate! And you feel better about yourself and your life and the world every time you go there. Clockwork Phoenix is the name of this restaurant, and Mike Allen is the restaurateur. One sublime dish after another, and yet I still have my favorites that I keep coming back to.” —Little Red Reviewer Table of contents: “The Wind at His Back” by Jason Kimble “The Fall Shall Further the Flight in Me” by Rachael K. Jones “The Perfect Happy Family” by Patricia Russo “The Mirror-City” by Marie Brennan “The Finch’s Wedding and the Hive That Sings” by Benjanun Sriduangkaew “Squeeze” by Rob Cameron “A Guide to Birds by Song (After Death)” by A.C. Wise “The Sorcerer of Etah” by Gray Rinehart “The Prime Importance of a Happy Number” by Sam Fleming “Social Visiting” by Sunil Patel “The Book of May” by C.S.E. Cooney and Carlos Hernandez “The Tiger’s Silent Roar” by Holly Heisey “Sabbath Wine” by Barbara Krasnoff “The Trinitite Golem” by Sonya Taaffe “Two Bright Venuses” by Alex Dally MacFarlane “By Thread of Night and Starlight Needle” by Shveta Thakrar “The Games We Play” by Cassandra Khaw “The Road, and the Valley, and the Beasts” by Keffy R.M. Kehrli “Innumerable Glimmering Lights” by Rich Larson “The Souls of Horses” by Beth Cato