Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister
by Gregory Maguire | 
Warbreaker
by Brandon Sanderson | 
Battle Mage
by Peter A. Flannery | 
Life Reset: EvP
by Shemer Kuznits | 
Little, Big
by John Crowley | 
Tailchaser's Song
by Tad Williams | 
The Stolen Child
by Keith Donohue | 
The Goblin Emperor
by Katherine Addison | 
Kingdoms and Chaos
by Kel Kade | 
The Emperor's Blades
by Brian Staveley | 
The Wreck and Rise of Whitson Mariner
by S. D. Smith | 
The Shadow of What Was Lost
by James Islington | 
Valor
by Sever Bronny | 
The Magic Thief
by Sarah Prineas | 
The Inner World Adventure
by Wayne Reinagel | 
Where Desert Spirits Crowd the Night
by Charles de Lint | 
Feathers
by Debora Geary | 
Fortress of Shadows
by Carrie Summers | 
Archibald Finch and the Lost Witches
by Michel Guyon | 
The Misanthrope
by S. M. Boyce |
Secret Life is the definitive collection by a young writer widely regarded as one of the best fantasists in the world. Jeff VanderMeer has handpicked these 23 stories (three written exclusively for this collection), which reflect a diversity of approaches to key questions about the human condition: mortality, love, obsession and creativity - all shot through with dark humor and irony. Secret Life represents the author's continuing effort to stretch the narrative boundaries of fiction while still entertaining the reader. Yet all of these stories are related thematically: transformation and what it means to be human - and the reader too will be transformed, into one of the faithful, a confirmed believer in the short fiction of Jeff VanderMeer.