Description
Description
Discover the vast worlds and pocket universes of Michael Swanwick (Stations of the Tide), the only author to win science fiction's most prestigious award five times in six years. In his dazzling new collection, the master of speculative short stories returns with new tales in which magic and science improbably coexist with myth and legend. [STARRED REVIEW] "All of Swanwick's stories awaken insights into the mystery of being human in an increasingly mind-bending technological world. This is an author at the height of his powers."
--Publishers Weekly In engaging stories, Mischling the thief races through time to defeat three trolls before the sun rises for the first time and turns the inhabitants of her city into stone. A scientist is on the run from assassins, because her research in merging human intelligence with sentient AI is too dangerous. An aging veteran obtains a military weapon from his past: a VR robotic leopard in which he rediscovers the consequences of the hunt. In the biggest heist in the history of the universe, a loser Trickster (and the girlfriend who is better than he deserves) sets out to violate every trope and expectation of fiction possible. With two stories original to this collection, Michael Swanwick aptly demonstrates with poignant humor why he is widely respected as a master of imaginative storytelling.
--Publishers Weekly In engaging stories, Mischling the thief races through time to defeat three trolls before the sun rises for the first time and turns the inhabitants of her city into stone. A scientist is on the run from assassins, because her research in merging human intelligence with sentient AI is too dangerous. An aging veteran obtains a military weapon from his past: a VR robotic leopard in which he rediscovers the consequences of the hunt. In the biggest heist in the history of the universe, a loser Trickster (and the girlfriend who is better than he deserves) sets out to violate every trope and expectation of fiction possible. With two stories original to this collection, Michael Swanwick aptly demonstrates with poignant humor why he is widely respected as a master of imaginative storytelling.
About the Author
About the Author
Michael Swanwick is one of the most acclaimed science fiction and fantasy short-story writers of his generation, having received an unprecedented five Hugo Awards in a six year period. He is also the winner of the British Science Fiction and World Fantasy Awards. Swanwick's stories, published in such collections such as Gravity's Angels, Tales of Old Earth, and Not So Much, Said the Cat, have also appeared in many anthologies and magazines, including OMNI, Penthouse, Amazing, Asimov's Science Fiction, New Dimensions. Swanwick's novels include The Iron Dragon's Daughter, a New York Times Notable Book, the Nebula Award-winner Stations of the Tide, the Darger & Surplus series, Dragons of Babel, and City in the Stars. His work has also been translated into more than ten languages. Swanwick lives in Pennsylvania.
Critical Reviews
Critical Reviews
Advance Praise for The Universe Box "Swanwick is a great science fiction writer. His stories are brilliantly inventive, often hilarious, often profound, and always heartfelt."
--Kim Stanley Robinson, author of The Ministry for the Future
[STARRED REVIEW] "Five-time Hugo Award winner Swanwick (Stations of the Tide) swirls together myth and science in this wildly inventive collection. A frequent theme is the interaction of humanity and technology, which is probed poignantly in the bittersweet 'Artificial People, ' narrated by a newly sentient robot who falls for one of the scientists on her team, and 'The White Leopard, ' about a man who is able to see through the eyes of his leopard-shaped military drone. In 'Requiem for a White Rabbit, ' animatronic escapees flee a life of misery in an amusement park. The epistolary 'Timothy: An Oral History' imagines the consequences of a scientist in an all-female society engineering a male child in a lab. Swanwick's wry humor comes through in 'The Warm Equations, ' a space exploration story helmed by the arrogant Dr. Osborne, and in 'The Star-Bear, ' about a Russian émigré poet who meets a bizarre celestial being. All of Swanwick's stories awaken insights into the mystery of being human in an increasingly mind-bending technological world. This is an author at the height of his powers." (Feb.)
--Publishers Weekly "VERDICT A marvelously varied collection of work by one of the genre's experts of short fiction."
--Library Journal
"Swanwick's natural storytelling ability and wonderful imagination made these tales of strange and fantastic sing, irrespective of their genre."
--Advance the Plot "Virtuoso Swanwick delivers a microcosm in every story of this immaculate collection."
--Cat Rambo, Nebula Award winning author of the Tabat Quartet "Brilliant, multilayered, breathtakingly imaginative, these stories surprise, delight, sometimes shock, and always reward with their insightful humanity."
--Nancy Kress, the multiple award-winning author of Beggars in Spain "A true Mostaster of science fiction and fantasy, he offers up new stories in The Universe Box, stylistically fresh with his trademark wild imagination."
--Jeffrey Ford, author of A Natural History of Hell and The Shadow Year "Short science fiction from an all-time great at the absolute pinnacle of his form. These stories are funny, terrifying, horny, disorienting and intoxicating, often all at once."
--Cory Doctorow, author of Red Team Blues and Enshittification "Most of these stories defy the normal tropes of sf and fantasy. They do, however, reveal the joy and agony of their writing by a man who has won multiple Hugos yet currently holds the record for most nominations that haven't won, which in and of itself boasts of the stature of his works."
--Booklist "Barbed whimsicality, offbeat eroticism, swanwicked sense of humor, epiphanic final sentences, and ironclad commitment to making strangeness feel even stranger."
--James Morrow, author of The Last Witchfinder "Truly one of the all-time great writers of short sf."
--Andy Duncan, author of An Agent of Utopia "For all his narrative adventurousness and sly wit, Swanwick can also be a master of evocative, graceful prose."
--Locus "Swanwick's wondrous tales climb every imaginable rung of the cosmic distance ladder leading to our innermost constellations."
--Alvaro Zinos-Amaro, author of Being Michael Swanwick Praise for the short fiction of Michael Swanwick "Swanwick's wildly imaginative and beautifully written short stories have been, for several years, one of the primary joys of the field."
--Washington Post Book World "One of contemporary sf's greatest short-story writers."
--Interzone "One of the most powerful and consistently inventive short story writers of his generation."
--Gardner Dozois, editor of the Year's Best Science Fiction series "By turns funny, clever, mysterious, and possessing hidden depths."
--Jeff VanderMeer, author of Annihilation
--Kim Stanley Robinson, author of The Ministry for the Future
[STARRED REVIEW] "Five-time Hugo Award winner Swanwick (Stations of the Tide) swirls together myth and science in this wildly inventive collection. A frequent theme is the interaction of humanity and technology, which is probed poignantly in the bittersweet 'Artificial People, ' narrated by a newly sentient robot who falls for one of the scientists on her team, and 'The White Leopard, ' about a man who is able to see through the eyes of his leopard-shaped military drone. In 'Requiem for a White Rabbit, ' animatronic escapees flee a life of misery in an amusement park. The epistolary 'Timothy: An Oral History' imagines the consequences of a scientist in an all-female society engineering a male child in a lab. Swanwick's wry humor comes through in 'The Warm Equations, ' a space exploration story helmed by the arrogant Dr. Osborne, and in 'The Star-Bear, ' about a Russian émigré poet who meets a bizarre celestial being. All of Swanwick's stories awaken insights into the mystery of being human in an increasingly mind-bending technological world. This is an author at the height of his powers." (Feb.)
--Publishers Weekly "VERDICT A marvelously varied collection of work by one of the genre's experts of short fiction."
--Library Journal
"Swanwick's natural storytelling ability and wonderful imagination made these tales of strange and fantastic sing, irrespective of their genre."
--Advance the Plot "Virtuoso Swanwick delivers a microcosm in every story of this immaculate collection."
--Cat Rambo, Nebula Award winning author of the Tabat Quartet "Brilliant, multilayered, breathtakingly imaginative, these stories surprise, delight, sometimes shock, and always reward with their insightful humanity."
--Nancy Kress, the multiple award-winning author of Beggars in Spain "A true Mostaster of science fiction and fantasy, he offers up new stories in The Universe Box, stylistically fresh with his trademark wild imagination."
--Jeffrey Ford, author of A Natural History of Hell and The Shadow Year "Short science fiction from an all-time great at the absolute pinnacle of his form. These stories are funny, terrifying, horny, disorienting and intoxicating, often all at once."
--Cory Doctorow, author of Red Team Blues and Enshittification "Most of these stories defy the normal tropes of sf and fantasy. They do, however, reveal the joy and agony of their writing by a man who has won multiple Hugos yet currently holds the record for most nominations that haven't won, which in and of itself boasts of the stature of his works."
--Booklist "Barbed whimsicality, offbeat eroticism, swanwicked sense of humor, epiphanic final sentences, and ironclad commitment to making strangeness feel even stranger."
--James Morrow, author of The Last Witchfinder "Truly one of the all-time great writers of short sf."
--Andy Duncan, author of An Agent of Utopia "For all his narrative adventurousness and sly wit, Swanwick can also be a master of evocative, graceful prose."
--Locus "Swanwick's wondrous tales climb every imaginable rung of the cosmic distance ladder leading to our innermost constellations."
--Alvaro Zinos-Amaro, author of Being Michael Swanwick Praise for the short fiction of Michael Swanwick "Swanwick's wildly imaginative and beautifully written short stories have been, for several years, one of the primary joys of the field."
--Washington Post Book World "One of contemporary sf's greatest short-story writers."
--Interzone "One of the most powerful and consistently inventive short story writers of his generation."
--Gardner Dozois, editor of the Year's Best Science Fiction series "By turns funny, clever, mysterious, and possessing hidden depths."
--Jeff VanderMeer, author of Annihilation
Publishing Information
Publishing Information
Publisher:
Tachyon Publications
Pub date:
2026-02-03
Length:
304 pages
The Allstora Membership
Membership Perks:
- Save 30% on all online store purchases
- Exclusive access to author's content
- You pay less, but authors still earn double
Membership Terms:
First Month:
$0.00
Monthly price:
$5.00
- To access membership discount simply log in and add to cart, discount applied automatically.
- One month free trial, cancel anytime. Membership renews on the 15th of each month.