I got a big surprise when I opened the copy of Steampunk'd
I got in the mail!I opened the front cover and there on the title page is the excerpt - from my story! How cool is that???
Excerpt from front title page of STEAMPUNK'D:
Alva Edison knew her life would never be the same again.
"It can be done, sister, I know it can," he told her again.
"Thomas, I keep telling you, remember Mr. Franklin? The founding father never signed the Declaration because he foolishly stood out in a rainstorm, with a kite of all things. And stringing a key on the end? How foolhardy. Anyone with common sense knows that you do not want to be near any metal in a storm. No surprise that he was electrocuted. It was such a tragedy that could have been averted."
"But his idea was right," Thomas insisted. "The power of those thunderbolts can be harnessed as a new energy source."
She snorted at that. "Thomas, dear, next you'll be saying that thunderbolts can do all kinds of things, like that kooky Dr. Frankenstein and his outlandish, sacrilegious ideas about life and death. They took him off to the sanitarium and not soon enough, I say. Please stop such talk. I do not want to lose my only brother to some ridiculous notion."
–From "Edison Kinetic Light and Steam Power" - C. A. Verstraete
(This is from the beginning of the story.)
More details:
The 320-page collection of 14 stories, edited by Jean Rabe and Martin H. Greenberg, includes my short story, "Edison Kinetic Light and Steam Power" by C.A. Verstraete, in which an ailing, but resourceful Alva Edison helps her soon-to-be-famous brother, Thomas, overcome a tragedy and find the answers he'd been seeking. As they say, behind every man is a powerful woman, right?
(Their story continues in a new romance steampunk anthology, also coming from DAW and I am working on a novella about them. I fell in love with the story and don't want to let go yet! )
About the book:
Steampunk can be defined as a subgenre of science fiction that is typically set in an anachronistic Victorian or quasi-Victorian setting, where steam power is prevalent. Consider the slogan: "What the past would look like if the future had come along earlier." The stories in this all-original anthology explore alternate timelines and have been set all over the world, running the gamut from science fiction to mystery to horror to a melding of these genres.
BUY:
* For Barnes & Noble's Nook
