Collins Creek: Three Volumes of Short Stories From Ron Collins

Here are twenty eight short stories scattered across three very different collections. Every piece has a connection to the Fiction River original anthology magazine project, having either appeared in their pages, having been written during the workshop, or having been originally written for them only to appear in other professional venues.

When I first sat down to design the books, I intended the project to be two volumes split into those actually published in Fiction River volumes, and those published in other professional venues. But in putting them together I realized that to make the pieces feel right, I needed three books. Hence:

If modern day or historical settings for traditional real-world stories are your thing, this is your volume.

I’m also really happy to note that this volume also includes two stories with my favorite collaborator ever, my mega-talented daughter, Brigid. I’m really proud of everything in this volume, but both “Us vs. Them” and “The Year that Went Into Extra Innings” are among my favorites simply because they are things I don’t think either of us would have come up with on our own.

That it’s introduced and blurbed by Kristine Kathryn Rusch just makes it that much cooler.

Bookended by the Derringer award-nominated “The White Game” and the spy-game thriller “The Spy Who Walked into the Cold,” the currents of Collins Creek are filled with mystery and crime, romance and danger, and even a little baseball.

This one is chock-full of science fiction and contemporary fantasy stories, with a lean toward the fantastic.

I think the range here is a great example of why I loved the whole Fiction River conceit. It includes my first and only entry into the Steam Punk thing, as well as some pretty hard science fiction.

Then there’s “Some of This Is True,” which I admit I still kind of wonder about. It’s one of my own stories that I still go back and read now and again.

Introduced by my longtime friend Lisa Silverthorne, without whom I would have never found the project to begin with.

From the Grand Dangoolie to a prohibition demon to a genetically engineered Special Forces agent, the characters in these pages will take you on a collection of wild and unpredictable rides.

As Dean Wesley Smith’s introduction to this volume says: Rejection Means Nothing.

Want proof? All of these stories were written for Fiction River anthologies but didn’t quite hit the mark for folks who were editing them. Subsequently, though, they found homes in places like Analog, Galaxy’s Edge, and Pulphouse. One (“The Colossal Death Ray” even made a “Best of” cut). Ultimately you’ll find a whole lot of science fiction here.

From quantum entanglement to cloning and genetic engineering, these stories explore technology, space, and their impact on the people who live with them (hey, aliens are people, too!).