Soft Apocalypse

Acknowledgments

First and foremost, thank you to my wife, Alison Scott, for her encouragement and love, and for reading and commenting on this novel, which is nothing like the Jane Austen novels she usually reads. I’m deeply grateful to Laura Valeri, Sara King, Joy Marchand, Tom Doyle, and David W. Goldman, my friends and fellow writers, for providing truly indispensable feedback. Also Walter John Williams, Kelly Link, and my fellow students at Taos Toolbox 2007.

Special thanks to my father, Brigadier General William F. McIntosh, for advice and information regarding how the military might react to a soft apocalypse.

Thanks to Andy Cox and the people at Interzone, who published the short story on which this novel is based. To the Clarion Science Fiction Writer’s Workshop, and my teachers Jim Kelly, Maureen McHugh, Scott Edelman, Nalo Hopkinson, Richard Paul Russo, Howard Waldrop, and Kelly Link. Thanks to my friends Colin Crothers, Doris Bazzini, and Angela Ogburn for inspiration.

Finally, many thanks to my agent, Seth Fishman, for believing in this book.

Although I created a nightmarish version of the city of Savannah, I hope a glimpse of its real beauty and charm has shone through. If you haven’t been to Savannah, come visit and wander the squares.

About the Author

Will McIntosh is a Hugo Award winner and Nebula finalist whose short stories have appeared in Asimov’s (where he won the 2010 Readers’ Award for short story “Bridesicle”), Strange Horizons, and Science Fiction and Fantasy: Best of the Year, and many other venues. In 2005 his short story “Soft Apocalypse” was nominated for both the British Science Fiction Association and the British Fantasy Society awards. His story “Followed,” which was published in the anthology The Living Dead, is currently being produced as a short film. A New Yorker transplanted to the rural south, Will is a psychology professor at Georgia Southern University, where he studies Internet dating, and how people’s TV, music, and movie choices are affected by recession and terrorist threat. In 2008 he became the father of twins.

Copyright

Soft Apocalypse © 2011 by Will McIntosh

This edition of Soft Apocalypse © 2011 by Night Shade Books

Cover art by Nonie Nelson

Cover design by Rebecca Silvers

Interior layout and design by Ross E. Lockhart

All rights reserved

First Edition

Trade Paperback ISBN: 978-1-59780-276-5

E-ISBN: 978-1-59780-307-6

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