Brian K Vaughan. Ed Brubaker. Darwyn Cook. Greg Rucka. Mark Waid. All decent people, all made uplifting comics and incorparated great female characters. None of them ever felt obligated to make any of their characters asshole and bastards to prove how "edgy" they are. None of them felt the need to make joke about…

Pell found the wildflower station in the hydroponics bay and began picking. He'd made fun of Shirin for planting them; they were glorified weeds taking up space that could be better put to use for food or medicinal plants. But Shirin thought they were cheerful. When several different species were in bloom at the same…

Actually, there are a few drugs that work against plague. Streptomycin comes to mind.

Agreed; these prompts are great... makes me more and more eager to try one myself! Also, AG, I though yours was the BEST, IMO, BECAUSE it was so dark. Great job!!!

Later, after escaping from the cellar dungeon, Commander James fled the city and ended up on the seashore. He walked for a time before he came upon a statue sticking up from the coast. It was then that he realized what happened and he collapsed to the ground, his eyes lifted to the Statue of Liberty yelling "you blew…

Mikhail watched his toxin meter as he crossed into the exclusion zone—a two day's hike from the wall—and let out a breath as the light continues to glow blue. He was tempted to take off his helmet, but protocol forbade it. Anyway, if he encountered any survivors, he'd need to avoid an exchange of microbes.

Although,…

It is by far the stupidest thing I have ever heard of, "lockstep". Who in their right minds would subject their citizens to such a thing just so the people traveling don't come out hopelessly outmoded?

Dust trickled from the long-undisturbed stones overhead, shaken by the faint thrum of boots and tires on the floor far below. Insects, roused from their slumber at the noise, blinked compound eyes at the scene below: the 453rd legion had succeeded in blasting away the rubble blocking the door after three days of…

Crina hated traveling with the military; it was hard enough to avoid disrupting a site without two dozen untrained boots stomping around, but she understood the need. After what happened on Gloraminus…well, not everything at an archaeological site was dead. The Hayward System Exploration Board had quickly decreed that…

He got some great covers. That's not even the copy of Time Machine Hoax I read. This is:

God, I love that cover.

I've been hooked on Keith Laumer since I picked up my first of his books, but when I try to talk about him, even to other science fiction fans, I tend to get blank looks and "Keith who?" He wrote a lot of light weight but very entertaining science fiction back during an age when that was a significant market to write…

I *love* that Doris Piserchia made your list! Although I would have picked "A Billion Days of Earth" over "Star Child" for an honorable mention. But frankly, all her work is pretty brilliant. It amazes me how few Sci Fi fans have even heard of her and that most of her work has been out of print for decades.

This is my problem with a lot of fantasy and the current post apocalyptic/dystopian trend. You have writers writing about things like survival and it makes no god damn sense. It'll fool somebody who has spent their whole life in a city working at a desk or coffee shop but anyone with a cursory experience camping,…

Disclaimer: I don't write. I hate to write. I like to draw and paint, so I can get the mental images out of my head.