Cat Rambo's 250+ fiction publications include stories in Asimov's, Clarkesworld Magazine, and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. In 2020 they won the Nebula Award for fantasy novelette Carpe Glitter. They are a former two-term President of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA). Their most recent works are space opera You Sexy Thing (Tor Macmillan) and anthology, The Reinvented Heart (Arc Manor, March, 2022), co-edited with Jennifer Brozek.

For more about Cat, as well as links to fiction and popular online school, The Rambo Academy for Wayward Writers, see their website. They are represented by Seth Fishman of the Gernert Agency.

Cat's recent space opera, You Sexy Thing, was nominated for Dragon and Locus Awards, as well as an Amazon Editor's Pick for Best SF of 2022.

Altered America: Steampunk Stories by Cat Rambo

Altered America: Steampunk Stories showcases an alternative America where Abraham Lincoln wins the Civil War through the use of zombies, mechanical Pinkerton agents pursue fugitives, and zeppelin-flying bandit gangs haunt the skies while across the seas fairy-plagued England fights a losing battle against the vampires on the Continent.

Rambo's foreword provides the historical framework on which these stories can be placed, creating a complex and rich chronology full of the marvel and wonder that readers have come to expect from this master of the short story.

Stories include pieces that have appeared in traditional markets, such as "Clockwork Fairies" and "Rappacini's Crow," while others were independently published through Amazon or the author's Patreon campaign, such as "Her Windowed Eyes, Her Chambered Heart," "Snakes on a Train," and "Laurel Finch, Laurel Finch, Where Do You Wander?"

CURATOR'S NOTE

This is a set of steampunk stories, loosely tied together by an alternate history in which vampires have conquered Europe and Lincoln won the Civil War with necromatic spells. Stories include "Clockwork Fairies," "Snakes on a Train," and "Her Windowed Eyes, Her Chambered Heart". – Cat Rambo

 

REVIEWS

  • "Cat Rambo is endlessly innovative, ingenious, and just plain entertaining. Read her stories."

    – NY Times bestselling author Kevin J. Anderson
  • "one of the brightest talents in the field"

    – Ursula Vernon
  • "Rambo has a gift for immersing her reader into a vivid universe full of adventure, sensuality, wit, and poignant observation."

    – Jodi Lynn Nye
  • "This short story is a great introduction to Steampunk. ...on point and the descriptions just beautifully written." – Romance Novels in Color ("Clockwork Fairies")
  • "...does those things that Nisi Shawl and Catherynne Valente were hoping steampunk would do more of." – Tansy Rayner Roberts
 

BOOK PREVIEW

Excerpt

Section from "Her Windowed Eyes, Her Chambered Heart"

Frenzies of gingerbread adorned the house's facade, but it was splintery, paint peeling in long shaggy spirals that fuzzed the fretwork's outlines. The left side of the house drooped like the face of a stroke victim, windows staring blindly out, cataracted with the dusty remnants of curtains.

Agent Artemus West thought that it would have given a human man the chills. He glanced back at Elspeth to see how she was taking it, but her face was chiseled and resolute as a fireman's axe.

"You all right?"

She swabbed at her forehead with a bare forearm, leaving streaks of dark wet dirt. "Thank your lucky stars you're mechanical and don't feel the heat," she rasped.

Hot indeed if enough to irritate her into mentioning that. He chose to ignore it.

The house sagged amid slumping cottonwoods, clusters of low-lying trees, their leaves ovals of green and pale brown. Three stories, and above that, two cupolas thrust upward into the sky, imploring, the left one tilted at an angle. The wind whistled through the fretwork, a shifting, hollow sound, like a jug's mouth being blown across. There had once been a flower garden towards the back. Weeds had claimed most of it, but the papery red heads of poppies blazed among the tangle. The sky stretched high and blue and hollow overhead.