A great collection of short speculative fiction.Twenty-three authors selected by co-editors Rhonda Parrish and Greg BechtelNevertheless (Tesseracts Twenty-one) is a collection of optimistic speculative fiction stories, each optimistic in a slightly different way. These stories explore the optimism that drives us to seek out new worlds, that inspires us to sacrifice for others or fuels us to just keep going when everything seems lost and in so doing turn the idea upside down and inside out.One of the best reasons for doing an anthology of optimistic future this year was because no matter which side of the political or social spectrum you land on, it's been a tough year. Nevertheless we try to remain optimistic. Nevertheless, we don't give up. Nevertheless, yes, we persist. The stories in this anthology of optimistic SF are some of the darkest optimistic stories you'll ever read but, nevertheless, they are optimistic. And powerful.Featuring stories and poems by: James Bambury, Meghan Bell, Gavin Bradley, Ryan Henson Creighton, Darrel Duckworth, Dorianne Emmerton, Pat Flewwelling, Stephen Geigen-Miller, Jason M. Harley, Kate Heartfield, R. W. Hodgson, Jerri Jerreat, Jason Lane, Buzz Lanthier-Rogers, Alison McBain, Michael Milne, Fiona Moore, Ursula Pflug, Michael Reid, S. L. Saboviec, Lisa Timpf, Leslie Van Zwol, Natalia YanchakEdited by Rhonda Parrish and Greg BechtelRhonda Parrish is driven by a desire to do All The Things. She founded and ran Niteblade Magazine, is an Assistant Editor at World Weaver Press and is the editor of several anthologies including, most recently, Mrs. Claus and Equus. In addition, Rhonda is a writer whose work has been in publications such as Tesseracts 17: Speculating Canada from Coast to Coast and Imaginarium: The Best Canadian Speculative Writing (2012 & 2015). Her most recent book is Haunted Hospitals, which she co-wrote with Mark Leslie.Greg Bechtel's occasionally prize-winning stories and essays have appeared in a variety of magazines and anthologies, including Avenue Edmonton, The Fiddlehead, Prairie Fire, two previous Tesseracts anthologies, and Imaginarium 4: The Best Canadian Speculative Writing. His first story collection, Boundary Problems, won the Alberta Book of the Year Award for trade fiction and was a finalist for the ReLit Award, the William L. Crawford Fantasy Award, and the City of Edmonton Robert Kroetsch Book Prize.Greg currently lives in Edmonton, Alberta where, as of this writing, he is serving for his second year as Writer in Residence for the Alberta Branch of the Canadian Authors Association. He also teaches English Literature, Writing Studies, and Creative Writing at the University of Alberta, where he completed his PhD on Canadian syncretic fantasy.Add this anthology to your Tesseracts collection now.