Cover Art by Joy Brienza
Releases April 1, 2024
ISBNs: Print: 978-1-953736-34-5 EBook: 978-1-953736-35-2 Download the Press Kit Request a print review copy Available on NetGalley |
The Heartbeat of the Universe: Poems from Asimov’s Science Fiction and Analog Science Fiction and Fact 2012–2022
Edited by Emily Hockaday The Heartbeat of the Universe collects poems from the top writers in the science fiction and literary genres, including voices such as Jane Yolen, Bruce Boston, Robert Frazier, Jessy Randall, and many others. These poems, selected by editor Emily Hockaday from the pages of Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine and Analog Science Fiction and Fact over the past decade, examine the Universe’s smallest particles and largest astral phenomena. These poems travel through time, speak to and from the dead, explore the body and quantum physics, all depicting the human condition and allowing readers to learn more about their universe and themselves. Emily Hockaday is the senior managing editor for Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine and Analog Science Fiction and Fact. With Jackie Sherbow, she coedited the horror anthology Terror at the Crossroads. She is the author of the poetry collections In a Body (Harbor Editions, 2023) and Naming the Ghost (Cornerstone Press, 2022), along with six chapbooks. She can be found online at www.emilyhockaday.com. About the Cover Designer: Joy Brienza lives in a small shoreline town in Connecticut with her family. The cover designer of the anthology, Terror of the Crossroads: Tales of Horror, Delusion and the Unknown, Joy has been at her current job for 11 years as Manager of Design, Websites, and Digital Publishing for Penny Publications, publisher of Dell Magazines and Penny Press books and magazines. Her other creative work also includes designing print, digital, and social media ads, and websites for Asimov’s Science Fiction and Analog Science Fiction and Fact magazines, among many other sites. As an artist, Joy has worked in all types of mediums, but especially loves oil painting. In her free time she enjoys spending time at the beach with family and friends.
Praise for THE HEARTBEAT OF THE UNIVERSE
"There are wry observations about the road not taken. A woman named Nancy turns into a giantess. Poets explore our desires for connection with loved ones who have passed, and our yearning to know just enough of the future to make our lives easier. Offering a variety of moods and topics, The Heartbeat of the Universe is a wide-ranging collection which, at the same time, hangs together thematically. Entertaining, multi-layered, and, quite simply, an enjoyable read." —Lisa Timpf, SFWA Reviews
“The Heartbeat of the Universe gathers poems into a story of the world, past, present, and future, as seen through sound and rhythm, wonder and science. It is a collection that spins and weaves—using both experimental and formal structure—a core connectivity: that we are all, each of us, in every moment, speculative and liminal, and the poetry that recognizes this is truly special. My heartfelt congratulations to the authors and editors of this magnificent book.” —Fran Wilde, Nebula-winning author and occasional battle-poet "This collection constitutes an important step in keeping our appreciation of speculative poetry alive and well, with a remarkable sampling of the diverse voices and approaches poets featured in Analog and Asimov's over the past decade. In an age when so many challenge the role of poetry in science fiction and fantasy, the editors have taken great care to remind us of how much has been achieved, and how more is yet possible. A commendable achievement, and I look forward to returning to this collection in the years ahead." —Bryan Thao Worra, former SFPA President (2016-2022) "When I first started reading science fiction as a teenager, I always loved discovering the occasional poem tucked in among the short stories and novelettes in the Year's Best collections, and I was so happy when Analog and Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine carried on the tradition of including poetry in their definition of what science fiction could be. And now this! It's a true delight to see so many wonderful poems in one place! And such an infinite variety! There are poems here exploring virtually everything you can think of: —aliens, ants, quantum entanglement, grocery stores, 1950s sci-fi movies, math, music, Marie Curie, the National History Museum, messages from (and to) the dead, and poetry itself—and ranging from the elegiac to the soaring, the nostalgic to the futuristic, the harsh to the contemplative. A truly galactic collection of science fiction's best poems and poets!" —Connie Willis Contents: Introduction by Emily Hockaday The Sum of Broken Parts Mostly Hydrogen by Jack Martin Somebody I Used to Love Asks Me Who Marie Curie Is by Carly Rubin Postulate 2 by Timons Esaias Sparking the Matter by Tod McCoy Fay Ajzenberg-Selove (1926–2010) by Jessy Randall Soft Collision by Scott E. Green & Herb Kauderer Hypothesis/Assertion by Daniel Dexter Villani atomic numbers by D.A. Xiaolin Spires Maryam Mirzakhani (1977–2017) by Jessy Randall Mathematics by John Ciminello Almost Certainly a Time Traveler by Jarod K. Anderson After National Geographic by Jason Kahler recipe for time travel in case we lose each other by Kristian Macaron Archaeologists Uncover Bones, Bifocals by a Tricycle by Steven Withrow The Appeal of Time Travel by Kimberly Jones billets-doux by Brittany Hause What a Time Traveler Needs Most by Jane Yolen At the Natural History Museum by Bruce Boston Time Traveler at the Grocery Store circa 1992 by Kristian Macaron Apocatastasis by Jennifer Crow Abyss inside our young hearts by Yuliia Vereta Quantum Entanglement by Ken Poyner In Theory by Rebecca Siegel Field Notes by Lola Haskins Three-body by Josh Pearce Neurologic by Robert Frazier Yes, Antimatter Is Real by Holly Lyn Walrath All the Weight by Holly L. Day The Astronaut’s Heart by Robert Borski Collisions by Kathryn Fritz Leaving by Bruce McAllister Quantum Entanglement by Fred D. White Ansibles by Ursula Whitcher Taxi Ride by Ian Goh Service Interrupted by Levi M. Rubeck Packing for the Afterlife by Mary Soon Lee Messaging the Dead by Betsy Aoki All Saints Day by Lisa Bellamy The Tsuchinoko Always Lies by Megan Branning Final Dispatch by Robert Frazier Small Certainties by Sara Polsky When Words Take Flight by Bruce Boston Miles To Go Before We Rest by G.O. Clark Attack of the Fifty-Foot Woman by Ron Koertge Music Remembers by Ashok K. Banker First Contact by Stuart Greenhouse The impending apocalypse helps me maintain perspective by Steven Dondlinger Past Pluto by Eric Pinder Wobble by Richard Schiffman Terra Incognita by Fred D. White The Dogs of the Soviet Space Program by Christopher Cokinos Continuum by G.O. Clark Galileo Falling by Stuart Greenhouse Flight by Donald M. Hassler How to Go Twelfth by Mary Soon Lee Ecopoiesis by Joe Haldeman Inside Voice by Jackie Sherbow I Get a Call from My Estranged Father and Let It Go to Voicemail by Aaron Sandberg Your Homeworld Is Gone by Leslie J. Anderson The Three Laws of Poetics by Stewart C. Baker |
