Arrival Of Missives, The

Description: From the award-winning author of The Beauty, Aliya Whiteley, comes a genre-defying story of fate, free-will and the choices we make in life. "One of the most original and haunting stories I have read in recent years." Nina Allan, author of The Rift In the aftermath of the Great War, Shirley Fearn dreams of challenging the conventions of rural England, where life is as predictable as the changing of the seasons. The scarred veteran Mr. Tiller, left disfigured by an impossible accident on the battlefields of France, brings with him a message: part prophecy, part warning. Will it prevent her mastering her own destiny? As the village prepares for the annual May Day celebrations, where a new queen will be crowned and the future will be reborn again, Shirley must choose: change or renewal?

Review: 'This is a tremendous story - the kind that wins Pulitzers, like Jane Smiley's A Thousand Acres - with haunting and heart-rending women's issues that are sure to draw comparisons to Margaret Atwood.' - Carol Kean, Perihelion Science Fiction 'Thanks to the poetic simplicity of Whiteley's prose, it is more intimate and more thematically textured than many novels four times that length... an intriguing "what if?" of a tale, one that keeps us transfixed and wondering right up to the final pages and with an ending that won't easily be forgotten.'- Starburst 'An incredible talent, Aliya Whiteley continues to astound and delight, and The Arrival of Missives confirms what anyone who read The Beauty already knew: these books, and this writer, are not to be missed, under any circumstances.'- Reader Dad 'Because this isn't just about the plot, it's about science fiction as a genre too: if old white men think they can make the future without a place in it for everyone but themselves, then . . . no. There are other, better futures.'- Strange Horizons 'If you've ever any read stories by such authors as Nina Allan, Douglas Thompson, David Rix and Allen Ashley, you'll love The Arrival of Missives, because it equals everything that these authors have ever written. I think that we can expect great things from Aliya Whiteley. '- Rising Shadow

Author Biography: Aliya Whiteley writes novels, short stories and non-fiction and has been published in The Guardian, Interzone, Black Static, Strange Horizons, and anthologies such as Fox Spirit's European Monsters. She has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize twice, and won the Drabblecast People's Choice Award in 2007. Her writing is often violent, tender, terrifying and funny. It has garnered much critical praise and provoked discussion.