The Birdcage Heart & Other Strange Tales

Description

What if you woke up to a city overgrown with briars and a dragon overhead? What if mermaids unleashed their wrath against Copenhagen using mechanoid war-machines? What if the man you loved wanted nothing more than running away to live with the faeries, but you were the one they wanted to take with them?

The Birdcage Heart & Other Strange Tales gathers together twelve wild and genre-bending fantasy tales from the pen of Peter M Ball, the Ditmar and Aurealis Award-winning author of the cult hit Horn and the Keith Murphy urban fantasy thrillers.

These scintillating tales draw inspiration from myth, pop-culture, magic realism and Lovecraftian horrors, showcasing Peter M. Ball’s talent for blurring the line between genres and finding the sublime in both the everyday and the extraordinary.

Come meet a man with a birdcage where his heart should be, the resident of Isla Tortuga’s most dangerous bordello, clockwork goats and smokestack magi, dragonkeepers, vengeful musicians, and frustrated public servants. Walk paths through steampunk cities, deceptively ordinary towns, and an endless stairwell populated by tourists. Prepare yourself for the wickedly inventive magic and startlingly human moments.

Whether you’re already a fan of Peter M. Ball, or you’re just about to become one, The Birdcage Heart & Other Strange Tales is a debut collection that shouldn’t be missed.

PRAISE FOR PETER M. BALL

“Only Peter M. Ball’s fiction makes falling down the rabbit hole feel like flying. Funny and surprising, with moments of extraordinary grace.” Angela Slatter, Author of the World Fantasy Award-winning The Bitterwood Bible and Other Recountings

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• The Last, Great House of Isla Tortuga
• On the Destruction of Copenhagen By the War-Machines of the Merfolk
• The Seventeen Executions of Signore Don Vashta
• It’s Not A Bad Job, Really
• The Dragonkeeper’s Wife
• On the Finding Of Photographs Of My Former Loves
• The Clockwork Goat & The Smokestack Magus
• The Birdcage Heart
• On the Cliffs, By The Sea
• Briar Day
• L’esprit de L’escalier
• On the Arrival of the Paddle-Steamer on the Docks of V—