"Rosenbaum's _The Ant King and Other Stories_ contains invisible cities and playful deconstructions of the form. In "Biographical Notes to 'A Discourse on the Nature of Causality, With Air-Planes,' by Benjamin Rosenbaum"—yes, his name is part of the title—the author imagines a world whose technologies and philosophies differ wildly from ours. The result is a commentary on the state of the art that is itself the state of the art." —_Los Angeles Times_ Favorite Books of 2008 * "Give him some prizes, like, perhaps, "best first collection" for this book." —_Booklist_ (Starred review, Top 10 SF Books of the Year) "Featuring outlandish and striking imagery throughout—a woman in love with an elephant, an orange that ruled the world—this collection is a surrealistic wonderland." —_Publishers Weekly_ "Rosenbaum proves he’s capable of sustained fantasy with "Biographical Notes," a steampunkish alternate history of aerial piracy, and "A Siege of Cranes," a fantasy about a battle between a human insurgent and the White Witch that carries decidedly modern undercurrents.... Perhaps none of the tales is odder than "Orphans," in which girl-meets-elephant, girl-loses-elephant." —_Kirkus Reviews_ "Urbane without being arch, sweet without being maudlin, mysterious without being cryptic."—Cory Doctorow, _Boing Boing_ "Lively, bizarre, and funny as well as dark, sinister, and sensual." —_Boston Phoenix _ A dazzling, postmodern debut collection of pulp and surreal fictions: a writer of alternate histories defends his patron’s zeppelin against assassins and pirates; a woman transforms into hundreds of gumballs; an emancipated children’s collective goes house hunting. BENJAMIN ROSENBAUM’s stories have appeared in _Asimov’s Science Fiction_ and _McSweeney’s_, been translated into fourteen languages, and listed in _The Best American Short Stories 2006_. Shortlisted for the Hugo and Nebula awards, Rosenbaum’s work has been reprinted in _Harper’s_ and _The Year’s Best Science Fiction_. He lives in Switzerland with his family.