I’m delighted to announce the new weird historical fiction anthology, Under Twin Suns: Alternate Histories of the Yellow Sign, from Hippocampus Press, edited by James Chambers. It explores the madness of those under the sway of the Yellow Sign in the classic work of weird fiction, The King in Yellow, written by Robert W. Chambers in 1895 (note, no relation to the anthology editor!).

Chambers wrote four stories that outlined the strange world of Carcosa, parallel to our own, that was ruled by the King in Yellow, who was in decline. The stories refer to the play of the same name; if you read the full second act, you go mad. Also, there is a mysterious symbol called the Yellow Sign, which calls people to the play and their subsequent madness.

One of these stories, “The Repairer of Reputations,” shows the megalo-maniacal ravings of Hildritch, who tried to get his cousin Louis and his love, Constance, out of the way from inheriting an alleged empire. It’s set in an alternate history in 1920’s New York City where subway stations were seen as suicide chambers.

The primary characters in the story are all men; it was, after all, written in 1895. I take a look at it from the women’s point of view in my story, “The Yellow Crown.”

tinyurl.com/UnderTwinSuns

A fabulous Table of Contents!