Bøker av E W Farnsworth

E. W. Farnsworth's HRETHELSAGA VOLUME I* is a collection of fragmentary tales about the daring Viking monster slayer Hrethel and his men and women. As in other sagas of Norse heroes, these tales often border on the fabulous, but their substance and tone ring true. Never before have the Viking deities been presented with such verisimilitude and conviction. Here you will read about Hrethel the dragon slayer and Hrethel fighting cruel hordes of enemies on all sides. In these stories, shedding blood is the essence of combat. They are not for the timid or faint of heart. *Note: This book is the SECOND EDITION of HRETHELSAGA VOLUME I with an additional four stories included with the original twelve stories. E. W. Farnsworth, a writer living in Ohio, USA, is widely published online and in print. While he is a constant student of the original Old English poetry, including the masterwork Beowulf, Farnsworth imitates the language, tropes, customs and forms of the entire Norse and Icelandic saga tradition in his collection Hrethelsaga. His growing cast of heroes and heroines of the nordic regions includes Hrethel the Viking, Reanna the Red and Wiglaff the Shaman.

E. W. Farnsworth's last published collection of horror tales was 'The Black Marble Griffon' and Other Disturbing Tales (2016), which is still available from Amazon. He continued to publish horror since then in individual stories and poems in a wide variety of congenial vehicles. Farnsworth's repertoire expanded to include cosmic horror, chiefly known through the works of H. P. Lovecraft and his friends. In this line came four years of serialized cosmic horror for Schlock! Webzine in The Picklock Lane Stories, a popular, continuing series being published by AudioArcadia.com. Farnsworth's 'exoteric' cosmic horror tales are appearing sporadically in Gavin Chappell's inspired monthly journal Lovecraftiana. The narration and setting for these tales is based roughly on the author's personal experiences in Allentown, Pennsylvania, during the late Nineteen Seventies and early Eighties. Meanwhile the author's poems come of their own accord. He writes, "My sincere wish is that my readers enjoy the games I play as much as I do writing them." E. W. Farnsworth's new collection of horror stories and poems will delight discerning readers who want to explore dimensions of the horror genre not available through normal channels. The keystone story for this volume, 'Firstborn, ' tells the story of Jure Grando Alilovic, the original vampire, who is still able to conquer his enemies, including a female vampire hunter, and the Viking Sigurd Nillson, who has turned into one of the creatures she is pledged to hunt. Other stories include 'Blue Steaks on St. Valentine's Day' tells of an unusual marriage proposal at a stockyard restaurant--joining a young man, Simon, and a young woman, Ruth, who share the special protection of tentacled creatures. 'The Hamadryad' figures human experimentation with nano-biotics gone wonderfully wrong as three men, janitor Myron Banks, Nano Robotics Chief Science Officer Dr. Charles Lamont and sixteen-year-old woodsman Nick Bounder, have wildly different relationships with the resultant female swamp-dwelling creature. 'The Carrier' is the story of Sherill McCabe, a young Arizona woman surviving a universal pandemic--until her time runs out on a comandeered ocean cruise ship at the northernmost reach of the Gulf of California. 'The Great Rift's Revenge' is about the results of the mission of two professors, Dr. Ophelia Hollins and Dr. Lloyd Stickler, to determine why their predecessors were killed by mysterious gases in the middle of a jungle paradise. Hansel Hedwig and Vilia Hedwig, the brother and sister who meet outside their family crypt for one last adventure, discover the joys of being trapped in a labyrinth. 'Halloween on the Escher Highway' is a puzzle from which only one of the figures will emerge and transform. 'Treasure Hunter' tells the story of the final fourth adventure of Bret Halliwell, the fabled fortune finder, who is betrayed by his lascivious girlfriend Rapunzel Smith and her other randy and unscrupulous boyfriends. Wealthy beyond imagining, the hero struggles to escape a destiny that is closing all around him. 'The ET Eel Infestation' pits ace New York police detective Val Cassidy and Mabel Deuce, his female side-kick, against the latest extra-terrestrial threat, a tangle of cooperating eels that thrive on human contact. 'The Music Master of North Eleventh Street' is an exoteric tale within the continuing cosmic horror of Farnsworth's neighborhood. Dr. Fiedler encounters his own apotheosis among his many students and admirers. The twelve included poems are eight Shakespearean sonnets, two elegies, one ballad and one ode. The elegies were first published in Eber & Wein's Best Poets of America series in 2019 and 2023, respectively.

E. W. Farnsworth's HRETHELSAGA VOLUME II is a collection of fragmentary tales about the daring Viking monster slayer Hrethel and his men and women. As in other sagas of Norse heroes, these tales often border on the fabulous, but their substance and tone ring true. Never before have the Viking deities been presented with such verisimilitude and conviction. Likewise, never before have the events surrounding the discovery of America as Vineland been sorted out along practicable, credible lines. Here you will read about Hrethel the dragon slayer and Hrethel fighting cruel hordes of enemies on all sides. The hero knows the family of Eric the Red and his son Leif. The commerce between the north countries of Europe and the distant lands of the New World is brisk by the time Leif made his voyage. Sorcery and witchcraft helped the heroes blaze their trail to glory. In these stories, shedding blood is the essence of combat. They are not for the timid or faint of heart.

The nineteen satirical stories in this volume first appeared in Gavin Chappell's monthly Schlock! Webzine, a product of Rogue Planet Press in the UK. These tales document the challenges, horrors, vexation and hilarity of managing the integration of extra-terrestrial aliens into daily human life on earth. The focus for this comic exploration is the character Fatty Millstone, the moon-faced, single-tentacle sheriff who holds forth from his table towards the rear of the Cracked Bell pub on Picklock Lane. The sheriff, a card-carrying member of the new Transparency political party, cloaks the fact that he is an alien though he must use his tentacle to perform his enforcement duties and signs of his reproduction by fission are also sometimes difficult to hide. The tenement where Sheriff Fatty Millstone lodges on Picklock Lane is full of his clones conducting larceny as well as voluminous record keeping about crime in the city. As Millstone is constantly exercising his curiosity and intelligence and requires little sleep, he often spends his nights wandering foggy Picklock Lane and its adjacent city park with its octopus-filled river and Butterfly Paradise. Millstone's friends are a mix of aliens and humans, including MP Sir Douglas and Lady Lucille Hudibras, who sponsor pro-alien attitudes in Parliament and at the Hudibras estate, just off Picklock Lane. Naturally, the host, tapsters and numerous waitresses at the Cracked Bell pub play continual roles, as do rabidly intrusive tabloid reporters like Straight and Crenshaw, who alternately stoke fear of aliens and support the heroism of rogue tentacles through the yellow press. The tabloid press with its faux news and sensationalism is a major butt of satire, but the people's credulity is an inseparable part of its success and therefore a target for satire as well. Medicine for the alien population is administered quietly by Dr. Erblik, an alien who must keep her patients' conditions strictly private. More than one romance buds and flourishes though one or both partners know nothing of the alien background of the other. These tales have a rich literary heritage, and they are allusive. Politics and the political process are also prime subjects for ridicule in the vein of Clive James' Britannia Bright's Bewilderment in the Wilderness of Westminster (1976), only without the rhyming couplets. Some readers may savour the literary heritage, for example, behind the name 'Hudibras, ' which is taken from Samuel Butler's long octosyllabic rhyming couplet poem Hudibras (1663-80) satirizing religion (Puritans), inter alia. The timeless themes of intolerance and xenophobia are justly held up to ridicule. While in traditional science fiction, aliens are characterized as hostile, selfish, and with complete disregard for humanity, in The Picklock Lane Stories no such prejudice is countenanced. In fact, the tales subscribe to beneficent alien populations which have the periodic option to be reclaimed by space vehicles to be redistributed elsewhere in the universe. Author E. W. Farnsworth writes in many genres and mixed genres. In these short stories, he uses science fiction tropes to make his satires intelligible. The stories may be read individually or in binge fashion as a series. The Picklock Lane stories continue to appear in Schlock! Webzine. Further collections like this one can be anticipated in due course.

Some of E W Farnsworth's cross-genre short stories have confused readers with expectations narrowly confined to traditional genres. The selections in this volume are meant to exemplify how such stories can legitimately entertain without becoming subject to the rules of tiresome new categories of writings that are merely the products of the author's imagination. The first four stories take their origins in science fiction, but each departs from such a model in a different way. 'The Tholochs Come' stems from the idea that extra-terrestrial aliens are well established on Earth and communicating with sympathetic humans who have been institutionalized. 'Not Another Shade of Green' posits a testing relationship between an alien with a tentacle and his artistic, human girlfriend. 'The Guest Lecturer' explores the notion of regular communication across borderless outer space. 'Hieroglyph' is based on recent findings in forensic anthropology as under-ice artifacts in Antarctica come to life in order to summon an alien culture to destroy its creations before their effects can be fully understood on host planet Earth. The other included works are predicated on the relatively new concept of "cosmic horror" along the lines of H P Lovecraft and his friends. These, set in Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley, portray a menacing environment alive with immanent creatures and affects. The factual bases of these fabrications were experienced by the author personally and transformed fictionally during the interval since he lived in Allentown. 'Rose-Cross Knight on Eleventh Street, ' 'Liar, Liar, Hair on Fire, ' 'The Dirty Dutchwoman, ' 'Gray Day in the Valley, ' 'Hydriotaphia, ' 'Egregiously Fat Women' and 'Stop the Presses!' were inspired by an enlightened editor of the magazine Lovecraftiana. He asked whether E W Farnsworth had ideas like those expressed in his story, 'Exoterics, ' the first of many answering the editor's informal call for more in the same vein. Other such stories are scheduled for publication in Lovecraftiana, and those not accepted there form a distinctive group of outliers such as the seven included here.As some readers are aware, the author wrote five volumes of stories about the action-adventure hero, Ritchie Walgreen, aka Al Katana, a vigilante wielding two Japanese swords. He planted martial arts studios worldwide to nurture like-minded agents. Abira Katana is one of the master's most adept protégées. The included story about her exploits in Africa, Mexico and France is only one example of the heroics that can be expected from others in Al Katana's global stable of vigilantes.'The Two Tulips Affair' is a tribute to the noir radio mystery writer Richard Breen and his penchant for wise-cracking black humor. Those who have experienced the audio versions of the 'Pat Novak for Hire Mysteries, ' recorded in 1946-49, will recognize how far short Farnsworth has fallen from his model. 'Curing Claudia's Samhainophobia' began as a plain-vanilla Halloween horror story, but its graphic truth-a mother's inability to listen when her child needed her most-easily broke out of the trivial holiday form and begged for broader appreciation as a psychological exposé. This collection is not the first miscellany the author has presented to a wider readership than the anthologies to which he is accustomed to use as his publishing platforms, and it will not be the last.

Fairy tales and myths are quintessential literary creations evoking the deepest human emotions. They require only a few essential details to flesh out their spare but irresistible storylines, and they beg to be repeated like a child's favorite bedtime readings, bearing endless nightly repetitions ahead of the vast all-enveloping void of slumber. In every case the author knows of, publishing fairy tales is a labor of love. Sabrina Bingham, editor of Curating Alexandria, has struggled successfully to publish while battling personal health problems. Clara O'Leary, curator of Fantasia Fairy Tales, puts it well about fairy tales: "They're often the first stories we hear and the ones that remain with us, deep in our subconscious. Princesses and princes, evil villains, dragons, hidden realms, mystical beings, battles between good and evil...these are the classic elements of fairy tales that are meant to suspend our imaginations in a world of fantasy and teach listeners to beware of the evils that lurk in the dark corners of our world." The tales in this collection by E. W. Farnsworth include three about dragons, two about unicorns, two about elves, five Chandra stories, and two singleton classics: the title story, 'The Gold Worker, ' and the final story about Ronaami and the winter lights. Some of the stories in this collection were written to answer calls for anthologies which were never published. For example, 'Elfin Forest, Sacred Grove' and 'The Other Elven War' were accepted for publication in Zimbell House's The Elven Wars anthology while 'Hunting the Unicorn' and 'Prince Valiant and the Unicorn' were slated for Chipper Press's The Unicorn anthology, which never appeared. Others like the Chandra stories, 'Icarus, ' 'Chandra's Initiation' and 'Winding Stair, ' were not included in the anthology in which their two companion tales, 'Name of the TOR' and 'Owls' Tower' were published. All these stories are original and mostly stem from Northern European or Nordic fairy tale traditions. Written for both adults and children, they are meant to be enjoyed before bedtime so their power can infuse the reader's dreams.

In this tenth volume of John Fulghum, PI, Mysteries, E. W. Farnsworth's Greater-Boston-area detective, John Fulghum, solves unusually challenging crimes with the help of brilliant and beautiful girlfriend Sylvia Blackwood, archivist of the Boston Globe, Nigel Pounce of Boston Police homicide, Ken Mander and Sheila McCaw of the Central Intelligence Agency, and Dr. Sundt and Dr. Asplundh of an unnamed, highly classified US government agency, and continues his unparalleled record of solutions. Farnsworth's taut, savvy, action-packed mysteries also push out the limits of technology in crime fighting. Arizona author E. W. Farnsworth is widely published online and in print. A prize-winning short story writer in many genres and mixed genres, his detectives all break the mold for sleuth stereotypes, for example, John Fulghum of Greater Boston, Val Cassidy of the New York Police Department, 'Wild Eagle' of Arizona, Manny Farstar, the Galactic Edgemaster, Samantha 'Sam' Singleton and CIA agents code-named Anderson and Rachel. Farnsworth's ten published John Fulghum, PI, Mysteries volumes include three noir novels, several novellas and Farnsworth's inimitable short stories. The first seven volumes were published by Zimbell House Publishing, LLC, while Volume VIII, Volume IX and Volume X were published by AudioArcadia in the UK. The author is now working on a new John Fulghum, PI, novel, which will be Volume XI in the John Fulghum, PI, Mysteries series.

E. W. Farnsworth's DarkFire Warrior follows the pattern of the visionary science fiction tales and poems he established in DarkFire and DarkFire Continuum. Humans and intelligent machines cannot coexist peacefully on Earth, so a brave few of each kind escape. The epic Voyage of the Spaceship Arcturus is the enfolding structure for Farnsworth's creations. As Earth is destroyed by inevitable nuclear war, Arcturus slips through the evil space empire to discover that the edge of the universe is the gateway to a new, pristine realm. Meanwhile, the voyagers evolve into symbiotic organisms worthy of inhabiting the New Eden waiting for them at the end of their trek. A surprise reunion of The Avatar and The Dweeb rounds out the spaceship's journey, which starts where it began, but with everything changed. In this third volume, Farnsworth explores the logical backgrounds of the major characters and the execution of their plan for escaping Earth.

A wormhole casting a malicious pall over a once normal life. A secret safe haven for those seeking shelter from deadly superbugs. Billionaires greedily latching onto money making schemes at the crux of the new millennium. A resource for the truth behind September 11th, 2001. A massive multiplayer game that takes cute fairy tales to the dark, dangerous level. A website that brings your written fantasies to life—but are they the fantasies you really want? The mysterious offering of a life that answers the question, “why”—and the dangerous actions that must precede this life.Seven writers dive into their own interpretation of the world of W.com.Maybe you’ll log off, maybe you won’t.Featured ContributorsTodd SalviaJoshua WilliamsE. W. FarnsworthErin Darby GesellKyra LerouxLuis Manuel TorresandAspen Beaulieu 

1929 was the end of a golden age. Six aspiring writers spin tales set in a time in history when changes were afoot. While some sought the American Dream, others had to deal with vampiric siblings. Facing lost loves and gaining new freedoms define the beginning of a new age. Of course, the government was going through some changes itself in The Black Chamber, while everyday heroes could be confused with the Devil. Which will be your favorite?Featured Contributors:A. FarrierBen FineCarol-Louise McPhersonE. W. FarnsworthJames Pylesand Matt McGee

Baro Xaimos: A Novel of the Gypsy Holocaust follows the almost miraculous survival path of a group of Roma, led by Tobor Mericano, through the Nazi years, including World War II.The novel opens in the 1930’s on the eve of the formation of the Marzahn Camp.  This camp is the prototype for a system of concentration camps designed to contain, oppress and ultimately kill all Roma within Nazi occupied Europe.  The gypsies manage to escape the traps set by the German government to find a base of operations in the USSR.  From there, gypsies are dispatched by Moscow Center to operate as intelligence gatherers and assassins against the Nazis.These brave souls achieve a semblance of normalcy while in a Russia full of intrigue, by marrying, having children and staying on the move.Baro Xaimos focuses on the love of Tobor Mericano for Drina Mettbach and on the exploits of Tobor’s sister, Nadya Hanstein, a widowed fortune teller who encounters both Hitler and Stalin in her professional role and accidentally changes the course of history.

John Fulghum Mysteries presents neo-noir short stories dedicated to the Private Investigator, John Fulghum, that just happens to be a decent, brilliant former war hero and gumshoe. Working out of an unlikely second-story office in Greater Boston, he solves crimes that no one else will handle because they fall outside the parameters or jurisdiction of normal police work. They're dirty crimes, involving savage methods and little-understood societal forces most people would rather ignore than address. In the process of solving his crimes, Fulghum, often at the risk of his life, works with his like-minded friends, Officer Nigel Pounce of Boston Homicide, Randy Mortenson-the ex-Special Forces soldier, or Kenneth Mander-the shadowy clandestine CIA operative. Fulghum operates on the edge of the law and always beyond the limits of propriety. While his solutions do not extend to politically-correct society, they're the ones that condone and often harbors the evil criminals that Fulghum hunts down. His solace for being a cleaner-up of filth lies in his racing forms, his Jack Daniels whisky, and his Marlboro cigarettes. His life is a series of journeys and returns, but the center of his universe remains the same: honor and justice in a world without either.

Finding Harry Diamond, John Fulghum Mysteries, Volume V continues with the intriguing exploits of hard-boiled Boston area private investigator, John Fulghum.Fulghum must track down Harry Diamond, an infamous and ruthlessly effective CIA assassin, before the man decides to make Fulghum his next target. Tracking down his ‘double’ with the help of his friend, CIA agent Ken Mander, leads Fulghum into close quarters with beautiful women, secret engagements with the Mob, and the horrors of advanced black technology that can get a man killed just for holding a thumb drive.E. W. Farnsworth continues to write John Fulghum, PI mysteries. In John Fulghum Mysteries, Volume 6, he returns to the tradition of a short story collection.

The Perfect Teacher, John Fulghum Mysteries, Vol. IV, by E. W. Farnsworth takes you through the intriguing exploits of hard-boiled Boston area private investigator, John Fulghum with the services of his friends, Ken Mander of the CIA, and Nigel Pounce of Boston Homicide, to unravel the secrets of Fulghum’s latest case. Fulghum, and his long-time girlfriend, Boston Globe archivist Sylvia Blackwood, go undercover to solve a murder at a small Catholic college in the Greater Boston area. The case puts both their lives in danger as their performances in their respective classrooms earns them respect and even adulation among their students, fellow faculty and the administration alike. From this experience, Blackwood sees the path to her third Pulitzer Prize, while Fulghum returns to Jack Daniels and Marlboro cigarettes in his smoky office above Joe’s Ice Cream Shop in Bedford. Can Fulghum’s longstanding relationship with Blackwood be sustained after their trial by fire? Or will the dark facts of life as a private investigator overshadow their bond?

Private Investigator John Fulghum knows it is more than good fortune that brings a beautiful, intelligent Korean woman to his seedy second-story office above Joe’s Malt Shop. The executive assistant and unlikely wife of a wealthy Boston centenarian -that just happens to be a Korean War hero, and now a murder victim- Kim Su Baek spins Fulghum an incredible tale with roots in the ancient Korean royal family. Yet Fulghum believes her incredible tale and accepts the case to prove her innocent of murder.To solve this case and exonerate his client, the Jack Daniels-loving gumshoe’s investigation must balance relationships among his Pulitzer-Prize winning girlfriend/reporter, Sylvia Blackwood; his friends-Boston Homicide Officer, Nigel Pounce, and CIA Agent, Ken Salamander; and his client, as they become drawn into a deadly labyrinth designed by both sides of the conflict on the Korean peninsula. The plot finally focuses on a plethora of suspects at the deceased man’s estate in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. The murky intrigue of this case causes a nail-biting succession of horrific deaths, culminating in attempts on the very lives of all our major characters. Who will survive and who is guilty?E. W. Farnsworth, creator of the John Fulghum Mysteries series, a noir detective collection of short stories, presents Blue Is for Murder, John Fulghum Mysteries, Vol. III, his first full-blown John Fulghum novel. His fans, clamoring for more John Fulghum, are thrilled to know that three more novels are coming soon.

John Fulghum Mysteries presents neo-noir short stories dedicated to the Private Investigator, John Fulghum, that just happens to be a decent, brilliant former war hero and gumshoe. Working out of an unlikely second-story office in Greater Boston, he solves crimes that no one else will handle because they fall outside the parameters or jurisdiction of normal police work. They're dirty crimes, involving savage methods and little-understood societal forces most people would rather ignore than address.In the process of solving his crimes, Fulghum, often at the risk of his life, works with his like-minded friends, Officer Nigel Pounce of Boston Homicide, Randy Mortenson-the ex-Special Forces soldier, or Kenneth Mander-the shadowy clandestine CIA operative.Fulghum operates on the edge of the law and always beyond the limits of propriety. While his solutions do not extend to politically-correct society, they're the ones that condone and often harbors the evil criminals that Fulghum hunts down. His solace for being a cleaner-up of filth lies in his racing forms, his Jack Daniels whisky, and his Marlboro cigarettes.His life is a series of journeys and returns, but the center of his universe remains the same: honor and justice in a world without either.

Finding Harry Diamond, John Fulghum Mysteries, Volume V continues with the intriguing exploits of hard-boiled Boston area private investigator, John Fulghum. Fulghum must track down Harry Diamond, an infamous and ruthlessly effective CIA assassin, before the man decides to make Fulghum his next target. Tracking down his 'double' with the help of his friend, CIA agent Ken Mander, leads Fulghum into close quarters with beautiful women, secret engagements with the Mob, and the horrors of advanced black technology that can get a man killed just for holding a thumb drive.  In Finding Harry Diamond, Farnsworth begins to blend mystery with science-fiction and shows how it will soon be science-fact as a world containing this black technology is on our doorstep. E. W. Farnsworth continues to write John Fulghum, PI mysteries. In John Fulghum Mysteries, Volume 6, he returns to the tradition of a short story collection.

The Perfect Teacher, John Fulghum Mysteries, Vol. IV, by E. W. Farnsworth takes you through the intriguing exploits of hard-boiled Boston area private investigator, John Fulghum with the services of his friends, Ken Mander of the CIA, and Nigel Pounce of Boston Homicide, to unravel the secrets of Fulghum’s latest case. Fulghum, and his long-time girlfriend, Boston Globe archivist Sylvia Blackwood, go undercover to solve a murder at a small Catholic college in the Greater Boston area. The case puts both their lives in danger as their performances in their respective classrooms earns them respect and even adulation among their students, fellow faculty and the administration alike. From this experience, Blackwood sees the path to her third Pulitzer Prize, while Fulghum returns to Jack Daniels and Marlboro cigarettes in his smoky office above Joe’s Ice Cream Shop in Bedford. Can Fulghum’s longstanding relationship with Blackwood be sustained after their trial by fire? Or will the dark facts of life as a private investigator overshadow their bond?

Private Investigator John Fulghum knows it is more than good fortune that brings a beautiful, intelligent Korean woman to his seedy second-story office above Joe's Malt Shop. The executive assistant and unlikely wife of a wealthy Boston centenarian -that just happens to be a Korean War hero, and now a murder victim- Kim Su Baek spins Fulghum an incredible tale with roots in the ancient Korean royal family. Yet Fulghum believes her incredible tale and accepts the case to prove her innocent of murder.To solve this case and exonerate his client, the Jack Daniels-loving gumshoe's investigation must balance relationships among his Pulitzer-Prize winning girlfriend/reporter, Sylvia Blackwood; his friends-Boston Homicide Officer, Nigel Pounce, and CIA Agent, Ken Salamander; and his client, as they become drawn into a deadly labyrinth designed by both sides of the conflict on the Korean peninsula. The plot finally focuses on a plethora of suspects at the deceased man's estate in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. The murky intrigue of this case causes a nail-biting succession of horrific deaths, culminating in attempts on the very lives of all our major characters. Who will survive and who is guilty?E. W. Farnsworth, creator of the John Fulghum Mysteries series, a noir detective collection of short stories, presents Blue Is for Murder, John Fulghum Mysteries, Vol. III, his first full-blown John Fulghum novel. His fans, clamoring for more John Fulghum, are thrilled to know that three more novels are coming soon.

E W Farnsworth's DarkFire at the Edge of Time brings together twenty-five visionary science fiction stories focusing on events leading up to and following the launch of the Spaceship Arcturus, destined to an epic voyage through space to the edge of the universe and back again. Avatars and AIs mature by programming themselves and acquiring human characteristics as they discover romance, sex, joy and pain. While alluding to works by Arthur C Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Norbert Wiener, H P Lovecraft and Alan Turing, Farnsworth's brainy stories break new ground. Amongst the twenty-five stories, "The Joys of Rayovision" explores early experimentation in teleportation; "Shell Game" features using DNA for encoding messages in outer space; and numerous other stories postulate the practicality of a neutrino communicator. The reader can read sequentially or delve into this collection in any direction. The variety of perspectives caters for every mood, inclination and intellectual capacity.