The Spacetime Pool

A collection that includes the Nebula Awardwinning titular novella and Light and Shadow, the story that begins the Saga of the Skolian Empire series. In The Spacetime Pool, recent MIT grad Janelle Aulair is hiking through the Great Smoky Mountains when a man appears out of nowhere to request her help. Shaken by his impossible appearance, she steps awayand falls through a portal onto a beach in another universe. Thats when Dominick, the man who waylaid Janelle, reveals she is part of a prophecy. It foretells a bizarre future: if Dominick marries Janelle, hell depose his twin brother and become Emperor of the land. If Dominick doesnt marry her, his brothera brutal tyrant who will do anything to keep his thronewill murder him. Janelle finds herself caught in a conflict that could destroy the realm. If thats not mind-blowing enough, she discovers books that prove this civilization achieved interstellar travel five centuries ago. Yet now theyre living in a culture that doesnt have electricity, riding two-horned creatures that definitely arent horses, and sword-fighting. To find her way home, Janelle must figure out what happened between then and now . . . The Spacetime Pool also includes Catherine Asaros first-ever published story, Light and Shadow, featuring Kelric, a popular character from the Saga of the Skolian Empire series, and an illustrated essay on the math in her fiction titled A Poetry of Angles and Dreams. Praise for Catherine Asaro Readers seeking the harmonious meld of hard SFs rigor and human chemistrys heat should read Catherine Asaros fiction. SciFi Weekly