Skip to main content

story identification - Anthology: Vampirism as a cure for HIV; house full of odd characters; arrows on a path through the afterlife


In the mid-90's, I read a wonderful collection of stories that I've been trying to find since. The book was titled something like Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Stories, I believe published in some time in the 1980's or early 1990's.



Some of the stories I remember included:



  • A women tries to convince a vampire to transform her as a way to cure her HIV infection.

  • A man with the power to control minds comes upon a house populated by other strange characters, including a sentient radio, an old man with a lightning bolt tattoo who flies around the world to keep the Earth's plates stitched together, and a woman in the attic who uncontrollably shape-shifts into the love of whoever she talks to.

  • A story in the afterlife, where people are endlessly walking down a path, and two characters begin unlocking the subtle code of the arrows inscribed on the ground.


Any help tracking this book down would be greatly appreciated!



Answer



The Year's Best Fantasy Stories 13 (1987).


The first story you described is Something in the Blood by Richard Purtill.



The second one is A Place to Stay for a Little While by Jim Aikin.


Excerpt:



It was a very unusual household among whose members were a man who patched holes in the world, a shapechanger, and even a talking radio. It was also a very peaceful domicile until a man who had the ability to control minds became a resident.


“I can't cope,” Cynthia Lutz said to the radio. “I simply cannot cope.” “Oh, come on,” the radio said. It was a wooden table model that dated from about 1933. "Things aren't that bad. Things have been this bad before.”



The third story could be Long, Long Ago by R. Chetwynd-Hayes.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.
Post a Comment
Read more

harry potter - How could Expelliarmus beat Avada Kedavra?

I want to be very careful about how I ask this question – I am not asking How did Voldemort die? [CLOSED] Below the text is the relevant passages from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows if anyone wants to review them (I'm sorry for the amount of text). How did Expelliarmus beat Avada Kedavra and kill Voldemort? I feel the reason Harry's Expelliarmus overpowered Voldemort's Avada Kedavra curse has to do with who was master of the Elder Wand and how the Elder Wand works. I've always had trouble understanding fully how the Elder Wand works, though. How much did the fact that Voldemort never truly won or mastered the Elder Wand factor into how Expelliarmus reacted to Avada Kedavra and caused Avada Kedavra to rebound and kill Voldemort? An answer based in book canon would be especially welcome, but any canon source really is fine. Harry heard the high voice shriek as he, too, yelled his best hope to the heavens, pointing Draco’s wand: ‘ Avada Kedavra !’ ‘ Expelliarmus !...
Post a Comment
Read more

Is there good canon evidence for the "Nightmare Matrix"?

On the Matrix wiki, there's an article about the Nightmare Matrix which says: The Nightmare Matrix was the second prototype Matrix, designed by The Architect after the massive failure of the Paradise Matrix in the hope that human minds would more readily accept an imperfect world with suffering. Unlike the first version, this Matrix instituted a basic cause-and-effect programming and forcibly made those connected to it accept the program. Vamp Prime, a possible remnant of the Nightmare Matrix. It also featured programs that resembled mythical evil creatures in various human mythologies such as vampires, werewolves, zombies, aliens, etc. It also failed, but many of the programs who were designed for it survived deletion in exile. The Merovingian and his wife, Persephone may have had their roots in this version of the Matrix. Upon its failure, the Merovingian started a smuggling ring of programs and information to provide a haven for exiles that would last for 6 cycles in the final ...
Post a Comment
Read more

story identification - Anime with a boy hiring a creature from a stone, meets a man named Dante and starts a journey to collect crystals

I am from India, this anime or animated series (I can't remember this was made by the Japan or other countries) was aired between 2009 and 2012 probably in Jetix/Disney XD (but I'm not sure). This anime starts with a boy (the main character, I forgot his name) who find a stone (or crystal like thing) in his dad's property, his dad was missing that time. Some day he accidentally hire a creature/monster from that stone. Other day some creature attack him and he was saved by his creature and the story begins. In his journey to solve the mystery he meets a middle aged man 'Dante' (probably that was the name; this is the only character name I can remember). He had also some stone. After that they meet with one girl and a women (one of the girls is same age with the main boy character and probably will become his partner as the story goes on). Another women probably Dante's partner. Four of them started their journey to collect all the stone/crystal. They are collecti...
Post a Comment
Read more