Sirens and Other Daemon Lovers [Mass Market Paperback]

Ellen Datlow (Author), Terri Windling (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 5, 2002

Prepare to be seduced by powerful magic -- the sorcery of lust, need, and sensuality. Multiple award-winners Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling have gathered together twenty-two tales of unearthly temptations wickedly concocted by some of today's most potent literary conjurers -- including Neil Gaiman, Jan Yolen, Michael Swanwick, and Joyce Carol Oates. Here are stories of incubi and succubi, of forbidden fruits harvested in erotic gardens, of pleasures that persist beyond death. So heed the sirens' song. Lie back, relax, and submit to the darkest delights you have ever experienced.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Obsessions, lust, passion, and ecstacy are the subjects of this excellent anthology edited by the talented, award-winning, and prolific team of Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling. With uninhibited stories from heavy-hitters such as Joyce Carol Oates, Neil Gaiman, Pat Murphy, Jane Yolen, and Michael Swanwick, Sirens and Other Daemon Lovers won't fail to capture your attention and hold it. These authors and many more take readers on a journey to the boundaries of love and sex, jumping freely into the abyss of magical fascination and strange desire. Highlights include Oates's Oedipal story of a teenage sex object, Kelley Eskridge's tale of a wanderer who only finds release and love in the heart of violence, and Tanith Lee's look inside Little Red Riding Hood's secret fantasies. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Ellen Datlow is fiction editor for the SCIFI.COM website. She has edited numerous successful anthologies, including Blood Is Not Enough, Little Deaths, Off Limits, Twists of the Tale, and Vanishing Acts. With Terri Windling she has edited the popular anthology series The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror for sixteenyears. A multiple World Fantasy Award-winner, she lives in New York City.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 432 pages
• Publisher: Harper Voyager (November 5, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061057827
• ISBN-13: 978-0061057823
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #935,139 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great collection of erotic stories, January 7, 2000

By 

David F. (Lynn, MA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sirens and Other Daemon Lovers (Paperback)

Definitely a worthwhile book to read if you enjoy both SF/fantasy and erotica. I thought the stories were well written and posed some interesting scenarios. I think the editors did an excellent job putting together this collection of sexy stories. My favorite story was "The Eye of the Storm" by Kelley Eskridge and I look forward to reading more of her work in the future. In many ways I felt that this was the most original story in the book and I find myself going back to reread it often.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS I'VE EVER READ, March 5, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Sirens and Other Daemon Lovers (Paperback)

I stumbled across this book by chance, and I'm SO glady I did. It's extraordinary, sensual, and a completely wonderful read from start to finish. There's not a bad story in the book, and all of them are of the highest literary quality -- so much so that it's a shame this was published as "fantasy" and may not reach a wider mainstream audience. Whether you love fine literary fantasy or fine mainstream literature of an Angela Carter or Joyce Carol Oates calibre (Oates actually has a great new tale in the book), I can't recommend this one highly enough.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Magical and sexy!, October 1, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Sirens and Other Daemon Lovers (Paperback)

This is a gorgeous--magical--erotic--highly literary collection -- as one would expect from Ms. Datlow and Ms. Windling. I've never read anything like it before -- and I ended the book wanting more (I hope there's a sequel). The fascinating introduction by Terri Windling about eroticism and mythology is worth the price of the book alone -- but add stories by Ellen Kushner, Joyce Carol Oates and other luminaries and this becomes a book to treasure. I was almost put off by the cover --for some strange reason there are dead-looking women on the cover and I thought this was yet another sex-and-blood horror collection-- but when I saw the names of the editors I knew I was in good hands. Some of the stories are dark, but not so dark as Horror fiction, more like Angela Carter's dark fantasy. And other stories are as bright as day -- like Delia Sherman's scrumptiously bawdy Elizabethan fairy tale for instance. So ignore the cover -- or paste a romantically sexy picture of your own over it -- and enjoy this wonderful WONDERFUL book! Datlow and Windling have done it again.