AustLit

'“Thank you,” said Arthur. “There’s always hope.” He’d always hated that facile truism, but said it because he’d thought it was expected. From the Croatian’s startled expression, he knew how gruesomely wrong he was.

'That night Mrs Ma’s butterfly brooch came to him in a dream—flying in, pinless, through the open window. It landed on his open palm and closed its wings in repose. Such a comforting sign, Melmet would say. But she read Turkish coffee mud.'(Publication summary)

'For a reason she wished she'd never learned, her name was Gunzen Rozes, and she hated being dead, a state she'd attained two thousand five hundred fifty-six (counting a leap-day) nights ago (or maybe it was days - too dark to read, but the streetlights were never on; maybe they were only there for the poles).' (Introduction)

'It’s been over ten years since the release of Tambour’s first collection, Monterra’s Deliciosa & Other Tales . Her novel, Crandolin, published by Chomu Press was shortlisted for the 2013 World Fantasy Award. All of Tambour’s books have been Locus Recommended Reading List selections. The world is well and truly ready for this latest instalment of Tambour’s weird and fantastic.

'The Finest Ass in the Universe will comprise over two dozen stories including four new works.

'Elation, compulsion, exploration, love and exquisitely timed bullying, a lascivious oyster, a man called Eggplant, the dangers of smelling like honey pudding, the enticement of innocent toadlets, the unending day of deadness. The daughter of a part-time magician and a Las Vegas showgirl turns to science. Destiny points a young man to brassiere design. Suddenly orphaned siblings try to protect their most vulnerable. Fortunes craze in neighbourhoods living cheek-by-jowl. Unintendeds abound, as life cavorts in all its unclassifiable contrariness.' (Publication summary(

'“The Walking-Stick Forest,” by Anna Tambour, is a dark fantasy about a recluse who creates collectible walking sticks in post-WWI Scotland by manipulating the woods somewhat like bonsais. He refuses a commission from a very rich, powerful man, never considering or caring about the consequences.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'A story 'about the horrors that could ensue were the irritating machines in our lives sentient and granted personhood' (Tsana Dolichva, Tansa's Reads and Reviews).

'In a medieval cookbook in a special-collections library, near-future London, jaded food and drink authority Nick Kippax finds an alluring stain next to a recipe for the mythical crandolin. He tastes it, ravishing the page. Then he disappears... So begins an 'adwentour' that quantum-leapfrogs from Central Asia in the Middle Ages to Russia under Gorbachev, from the secrets of confectionery to the agonies of making a truly great moustache, from maidens in towers to tiffs between cosmic forces. Food, music, science, fruitloopery, superstition, railways, bladder-pipes and birth-marked Soviet statesmen; all are present in an extraordinary novel that is truly 'for the adwentoursomme'.' (Publication summary)

A fantasy story in which the protagonists visual handicap is construed as mystical virtue.