Ghosts, Robots and Things In-between

Abstract

Ghosts, Robots and Things In-between: A Florilegium, is a collection of six original short stories in the realm of Speculative Fiction, with an accompanying introductory essay reviewing the history of Speculative Fiction in literature. The variety of story types, from ghost stories, to fantasy/horror tales, to “hard” science-fiction, provides an illustration of the wide spectrum of settings and narrative elements found in literature of the fantastic, which allows the author to explore and showcase a range of writing voices, narrative types, and the use / subversion of genre conventions. The introductory essay, comprising a historical and critical review of works of literature of the fantastic (e.g. Fantasy, Horror, and Science Fiction), provides the reader with an understanding of how literature of the fantastic (the term Speculative Fiction is used in the project) has been viewed and received through the centuries, and explores the relatively recent compartmentalization and stratification of stories into “genre fiction” types.