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Hex Publishers is an independent publishing house proudly specializing in genre fiction: horror, science fiction, crime, dark fantasy, comics, and any other form that explores the imagination. Founded by writers, Hex values both the author and the reader, with an emphasis on quality, diversity, and voices often overlooked by the mainstream.

Mechanical Animals: Tales at the Crux of Creatures and Tech


A speculative fiction safari that riffs on the traditional ideals of automata to explore our strange and competitive relationship with the natural world. Biomimicry is no stranger to literature, with canonical authors like Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hans Christian Anderson, and Jules Verne setting the tone for a trope that has expounded and expanded upon what exactly separates humans from the animal kingdom as well as the boundary between machines and living beings. Featuring 15 original stories by today’s top science fiction and fantasy authors and contextual mecha-fauna essays by artist and Insect Lab Studio maker, Mike Libby, and SF encyclopedist and author Jess Nevins, Mechanical Animals presents a biomimicry menagerie of animalistic machines that will blur the lines between what is and isn’t nature’s design.

Colorado Book Award Finalist.

Table of Contents [+]

INTRODUCTION: MAKING TOTEMIC SENSE
Mike Libby

MECHANICAL ANIMALS
Jess Nevins

TWO BEES DANCING
Tessa Kum

BRASS MONKEY
Delia Sherman

THE REBEL
Maurice Broaddus and Sarah Hans

EXHIBITIONIST
Lauren Beukes

STRAY FROG
Jesse Bullington

THE HARD SPOT IN THE GLACIER
An Owomoyela

EVERY SINGLE WONDERFUL DETAIL
Stephen Graham Jones

THE NIGHTINGALE
Hans Christian Andersen

LE CYGNE BAISEUR
Molly Tanzer

AMONG THE WATER BUFFALOES, A TIGER’S STEPS
Aliette de Bodard

THE TWIN DRAGONS OF SENTIMENTALITY AND DIDACTICISM
Nick Mamatas

THE ARTIST OF THE BEAUTIFUL
Nathaniel Hawthorne

GLASS WINGS
Kat Howard

BET THE FARM
Michael Cisco

LONG PIG
Adrian Van Young

Excerpt from ELECTRIC BOB’S BIG BLACK OSTRICH; OR, LOST ON THE DESERT
Robert T. Toombs

LOOKIN’ OUT MY BACKDOOR
Joseph S. Pulver, Jr.

THE ISLAND BRUSHED BY GHOSTS
Alistair Rennie

Excerpt from THE STEAM HOUSE: CHAPTER V: THE IRON GIANT
Jules Verne

THE CLOCKWORK PENGUIN DREAMED OF STARS
Caroline Yoachim

CLOSER TO THE SKY
Carrie Vaughn

“Mind-stretching tales of synthetic fauna..."

Kirkus Reviews

Edited by Selena Chambers and Jason Heller
Cover illustrations by Aaron Lovett

418 Pages

Paperback ISBN-13: 978-0-9997736-0-4
Ebook ISBN-13: 978-0-9997736-5-9




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