Books by Mike Ashley

The Mammoth Book of New Jules Verne Adventures: Return to the Center of the Earth and Other Extraordinary Voyages, New Tales by the Heirs of Jules Verne

by Mike Ashley, Eric Brown

Jules Verne, one of the founding fathers of science fiction, was the author of such thrilling and perennial favorites as Around the World in Eighty Days, Journey to the Center of the Earth, and Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, as well as more than sixty other novels of adventure and exploration. One hundred years after his death, this magnificent new collection celebrates Verne's amazing vision. A host of today's top science fiction authors pay homage to Verne's genius with a series of stories inspired by his groundbreaking imagination and original characters. In this anthology are extraordinary voyages of discovery and adventure from the four corners of the globe, and even within it. Following the tradition of Verne's original tales, Ian Watson tells of a journey deep into the center of the Earth, where Verne himself does battle with occultist Nazis, and Adam Roberts takes us to latter-day California, where a descendant of Verne's character Hector Servadac is preparing for the end of the world as we know it. These and many more compelling adventures add up to an anthology that will introduce a new generation to the wonder of Jules Verne and delight readers already familiar with the master.

The Mammoth Book of More Historical Whodunnits

by Mike Ashley

Three dozen mystery writers—among them Elizabeth Peters, Edward D. Hoch, Tom Holt, Margaret Frazer, Susanna Gregory, Derek Wilson, Marilyn Todd, and Michael Jecks—contrive deadly conundrums in the original stories commissioned especially for the volume. Its chilling, suspenseful pages include lethal doings in old Byzantium, the case of a serial killer loose in Elizabethan London, and terror in Celtic Wales, while inexplicable killings in medieval Sherwood Forest make sleuths of Robin Hood and Maid Marion and a perplexing murder in ancient Rome turns the orator Quintilian into Perry Mason. Readers of the immensely popular first Mammoth Book of Historical Whodunnits will welcome back Steven Saylor's Gordianus the Finder and his occasional employer, the lawyer Cicero (in a story never collected before in book form), Peter Tremayne's Sister Fidelma in medieval Ireland, and Mary Reed and Eric Mayer's John the Eunuch, the Emperor Justinian's Lord Chamberlain. Edward Hoch, Keith Taylor, and Cherith Baldry also turn such familiar historical figures as Christopher Columbus, John de Mandeville, and Geoffrey Chaucer into detectives in this new Mammoth collection of historical mysteries.

The Mammoth Book of NEW Historical Whodunits

by Mike Ashley

Selected by best-selling editor Mike Ashley, these stories include brand new contributions as well as rare reprints, from writers such as Ian Rankin, Lynda Robinson, Sharan Newman, Gail Frazer, Gillian Linscott, and Peter Tremayne. Featuring such towering historical figures as the Queen of Sheba, Attila the Hun, Hildegarde of Bingen, Geoffrey Chaucer, Henry the Navigator, and Benjamin Franklin, The Mammoth Book of New Historical Whodunits is a brilliant collection of thirty stories of mystery and intrigue spread over three thousand years, from ancient Egypt to the Titanic, that is sure to please fans of this unique genre.

Steampunk Prime: A Vintage Steampunk Reader

by Mike Ashley

Discover original steampunk tales in this anthology of stories written before there were actual rocketships, atomic power, digital computers, or readily available electricity. The modern day steampunk genre is a reinventing of the past through the eyes of its inventors and adventures, but this collection is from real Victorians and Edwardians who saw the future potential of science and its daring possibilities. Steam-powered automobiles, submarines, and robots are featured alongside great airships and spaceships in these bold and creative stories of hope, triumph, and disaster.

Fighters of Fear: Occult Detective Stories

by Mike Ashley

A Retrospective Collection of Classic Occult and Supernatural Detective Stories by Some of the Field’s Greatest and Best-Known Weird Fiction Authors

Since the gaslit nights at the end of the nineteenth century, the occult detective has been a beloved and recurring archetype. Mixing the best aspects of the detective tale and weird or supernatural fiction, and capitalizing in part on the massive popularity of Sherlock Holmes, these stories portrayed men and women pitted against surreal and horrifying foes, usually with little to defend them but their own savvy, experience, and know-how.

From William Hope Hodgson’s Thomas Carnacki, to Seabury Quinn’s fearless Frenchman Jules de Grandin, to Jessica Salmonson’s Penelope Pettiweather, the occult detective has taken a variety of forms, investigated a wide array of supernatural and otherworldly cases, and entertained generations of readers. This new collection compiles thirty-one all-time classic occult detective stories as it traces the genre’s growth from its nineteenth-century origins to the late twentieth century, showcasing the work of acclaimed pioneers of weird tales alongside cult favorites and exciting modern talents.

So, step into the shadows, join us on this journey into the dark, and become a fighter of fear . . .

CONTENTS
Introduction, Mike Ashley
Green Tea, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
The Shining Pyramid, Arthur Machen
The Haunted Child, Arabella Kenealy
The Mystery of the Felwyn Tunnel, L. T. Meade & Robert Eustace
The Story of Yand Manor House, E. & H. Heron
The Tapping on the Wainscott, Allan Upward
Samaris, Robert W. Chambers
The Whistling Room, William Hope Hodgson
The Woman with the Crooked Nose, Victor Rousseau
The Sorcerer of Arjuzanx, Max Rittenberg
The Ivory Statue, Sax Rohmer
The Stranger, Claude & Alice Askew
The Swaying Vision, Jessie Douglas Kerruish
The Sanatorium, F. Tennyson Jesse
The Villa on the Borderive Road, Rose Champion de Crespigny
The Room of Fear, Ella Scrymsour
The Seven Fires, Philippa Forest
The Subletting of the Mansion, Dion Fortune
The Jest of Warburg Tantavul, Seabury Quinn
The Soldier, A. M. Burrage
The Horror of the Height, Sydney Horler
The Mystery of Iniquity, L. Adams Beck
The Thought-Monster, Amelia Reynold Long
The Shut Room, Henry S. Whitehead
Dr. Muncing, Exorcist, Gordon MacCreagh
The Case of the Haunted Cathedral, Margery Lawrence
The Shonokins, Manly Wade Wellman
The Dead of Winter Apparition, Joseph Payne Brennan
The Garden of Paris, Eric Williams
St. Michael and All Angels, Mark Valentine
Jeremiah, Jessica Amanda Salmonson

Lost Mars: Stories from the Golden Age of the Red Planet

by Mike Ashley

“I was suddenly struck with the sight of a trail of rich red vegetation of several miles in the midst of the eternal snows. I approached with curiosity this oasis in the frozen desert.”
An antique-shop owner gets a glimpse of the Red Planet through an intriguing artifact. A Martian’s wife contemplates the possibility of life on Earth. A resident of Venus describes his travels across the two alien planets. From an arid desert to an advanced society far superior to that of Earth, portrayals of Mars have differed radically in their attempts to uncover the truth about our neighboring planet.
Since the 1880s, after an astronomer first described “channels” on the surface of Mars, writers have been fascinated with the planet, endlessly speculating on what life on Mars might look like and what might happen should we make contact with the planet's inhabitants. This wonderful collection offers ten wildly imaginative short stories from the golden age of science fiction by such classic sci-fi writers as H.G. Wells, Ray Bradbury, and J. G. Ballard, as well as hard-to-find stories by unjustly forgotten writers from the genre.
Assembled and introduced by acclaimed anthologist Mike Ashley, these stories vividly evoke a time when notions of life on other planets—from vegetation and water to space invaders and utopian societies—were new and startling. As we continue to imagine landing people on Mars, these stories are well worth revisiting as gripping and vivid dispatches from futurists past.

Bewitched: The Ghostly Tales of Edith Wharton

by Edith Wharton, Mike Ashley

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Fear in the Blood Tales from the Dark Lineages of the Weird

by Mike Ashley

*Timothy followed, in his dream, and saw the ungainly, yet agile creature clamber in through the cat-flap... He could hear the flip-flop as it went up the stairs, and he woke himself, screaming, in a tangle of sheet and blanket. On Sunday night the dream was even worse.*



Through eighteen dark tales bubbling with the ghostly and the occult, Mike Ashley traces the phenomenon of families in which a talent for channeling the Weird passes down the generations, showcasing six lineages whose names echo through the halls of speculative fiction: Dickens, Hawthorne, Le Fanu, Pangborn, Marryat and Aiken.



With a story each from selected members of these families along with introductions on the history of their bloodlines, this collection explores unexpected connections and the strange influences that define us while offering a rare selection of chilling Weird fiction.

From the Depths And Other Strange Tales of the Sea

by Mike Ashley, Michael Ashley

From atop the choppy waves to the choking darkness of the abyss, the seas are full of mystery and rife with tales of inexplicable events and encounters with the unknown.

In this anthology we see a thrilling spread of narratives: sailors are pitched against a nightmare from the depth, invisible to the naked eye; a German U-boat commander is tormented by an impossible transmission via Morse Code; a ship ensnares itself in the kelp of the Sargasso Sea and dooms a crew of mutineers, seemingly out of revenge for her lost captain.

The supernatural is set alongside the grim affairs of sailors scorned in these salt-soaked tales, recovered from obscurity for the 21st century.

Queens of the Abyss Lost Stories from the Women of the Weird

by Mike Ashley, Michael Ashley

It is too often accepted that during the 19th and early 20th centuries it was the male writers who developed and pushed the boundaries of the weird tale, with women writers following in their wake--but this is far from the truth. This new anthology follows the instrumental contributions made by women writers to the weird tale, and revives the lost authors of the early pulp magazines along with the often overlooked work of more familiar authors. See the darker side of The Secret Garden author Frances Hodgson Burnett and the sensitively-drawn nightmares of Marie Corelli and Violet Quirk. Hear the captivating voices of Weird Tales magazine contributors Sophie Wenzel Ellis, Greye La Spina, and Margaret St Clair, and bow down to the sensational, surreal, and challenging writers who broke down the barriers of the day. Featuring material never before republished, from the abyssal depths of the British Library vaults.