The Planetary Anthology is Complete! Wasteland And Sky

Complete Series Available Here!

After many years in development, and going through two separate publishers, as well as many different editors and creative hands, the Planetary Anthology series has finally wrapped up! Today is the official release of the final volume, Saturn, and for the first time every volume is now out in the wild.

Starting as an ambitious project with the now-defunct Superversive Press, the Planetary Anthology series was meant to host 12 volumes based on the classical planet system (including the sun and two for the moon due to the amount of stories received) each headed by a different editor. The various volumes would each contain stories based on the different legends and themes centered around each planet. They could be any genre, as long as they were superversive in some way.

Unfortunately, Superversive Press ended up taking on more than they could carry, and only ended up releasing five of the volumes before they closed up shop. It was around this time that author Richard Paolinelli and his publisher, Tuscany Bay Books, stepped in to take over. He mentions it on his blog here back in April of 2020.

"Then disaster struck. After publishing only five books, Superversive Press shut down. For the six editors left hanging it was, to say the least, a huge disappointment as it was for the authors who had been accepted into many of them. But there was a ray of sunshine to be found among the dark clouds. Jason Rennie, the publisher at Superversive Press, announced he would be willing to turn over all rights to the series to another publisher should one be found with an interest in doing so.

"As you know, I just happen to have a small publishing house, well at least one-half of one, in my back pocket. And we’ve already established my interest in this entire series. So I put in a call with the other half of Tuscany Bay Books, Jim Christina, and we decided to pick up the series.

"We also decided to re-release the original five – Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars and Jupiter – under our own imprint. This meant waiting for Superversive’s first editions to come off of Amazon after a three-month wait. Instead of sitting and waiting, we decided to release the three new books that were ready to go.

"Pluto was first, followed by Luna and Uranus. Then we reached the point where we could start re-releasing the originals and Mercury came out earlier this month. Venus will be released in late May and every six weeks after that a new release will become available until all 11 books are out.

[. . .]

"It has been an incredible journey with this series, an epic in its way, these three years. When it began I never for a second imagined it would turn out the way it has. I’d like to thank Jason for creating this series and, when circumstances forced him to shutter Superversive, that he was willing to allow another publisher to pick up this series’ banner and carry it on to completion."

Tuscany Bay kept this schedule. Starting their run in November of 2019 with the completed but never released Pluto, they pushed the rest of the series out, including the five reprints, up to today with the final release of Saturn in February 2021.

And it was no half-thought out project. Tuscany Bay created both print and audio versions (still in production!) of each volume, and have been very active promoting on both social media with posts and trailers for every release. The only change from the original project was keeping Luna at one volume instead of cutting it in two due to how much longer it would make the production process. Otherwise, this is the series as it was originally intended to be.

I should also mention that I have stories in two volumes, Cold Heart of Ouranos and Judgement Sun, both of which are sword and planet stories in the same cycle. There are two more to come in the future, though I cannot tell you when right now since they are not yet completed. Nonetheless, it was nice to have this series to push me to get started on them sooner than later. I am quite proud of both tales.

However, I know there are other writers who also used this series as a planning board to create new series and craft new ideas, so you can look forward to a lot of fresh material in these 11 volumes. There isn't any other project like it.

So now we should get to just what is the final count for the series. The number of contributing authors tally up to 90, and the amount of stories included reaches 193. There are all sorts of names from all over the field in different genres, as well as a few pseudonyms, contributing to make this project quite the read.

The final trailer can be viewed here.

Contributors include (apologies for misspellings):

Danielle Ackley-McPhail [Venus]
Edward Ahern [Neptune]
Kevin J. Anderson [Mars]
Arlan Andrews [Earth, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto]
J.M. Anjewierden [Saturn]
Lou Antonelli [Mercury, Venus, Earth, Luna, Mars, Jupiter]
J.D. Arguelles [Pluto]
Jay Barnson [Mars]
J.D. Beckwith [Mercury, Venus, Earth, Jupiter]
L.A. Behm [Luna, Jupiter, Pluto]
Dana Bell [Venus, Mars, Saturn]
Bret A. Booher [Jupiter, Neptune]
David Breitenbeck [Jupiter, Neptune]
Bokerah Brumley [Sol, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Luna, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, Editor for Saturn]
Misha Burnett [Mercury, Venus, Neptune]
Sarah Byrne [Uranus]
K.M. Carroll [Mars]
Amy Sterling Casil [Venus]
Christine Chase [Pluto]
Kai Wai Cheah [Mars]
Jim Christina [Publisher]
J.D. Cowan [Sol, Uranus]
Vonnie Winslow Crist [Saturn, Neptune]
Emily Crook [Neptune]
Nathan Dabney [Earth]
Lucca DeJardins [Mars, Editor for Mars]
Chuck Dixon [Mars]
Susan Dorman [Sol]
Colleen Drippe [Jupiter]
Karina L. Fabian [Luna, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto]
Rob Fabian [Saturn]
Gail Deibler Finke [Neptune]
Declan Finn [Mercury, Venus, Luna, Mars, Pluto, Editor for Luna]
Marina Fontaine [Uranus]
A.M. Freeman [Sol, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Luna, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Pluto, Co-Editor for Venus]
Jake Freivald [Jupiter, Pluto, Editor for Neptune]
Julie Frost [Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus]
Caroline Furlong [Sol, Luna, Uranus]
Dan Gallagher [Earth]
Karl Gallagher [Luna, Saturn]
Alfred Genesson [Earth]
Marie Genesson [Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars]
Paul Go [Luna]
Allen Goodner [Pluto]
Josh Griffing [Sol, Earth, Luna]
Clinton Hale [Uranus]
David Hallquist [Sol, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Editor for Mercury]
W.J. Hayes [Venus, Earth, Neptune, Pluto]
Sean Patrick Hazlett [Mars]
Carlton Herzog [Saturn]
Frederic Himebaugh [Venus]
G. Scott Huggins [Saturn]
Lori Janeski [Luna]
Avily Jerome [Mars]
C.S. Johnson [Saturn]
Steve Johnson [Luna]
Jeb Kinnison [Jupiter]
L. Jagi Lamplighter [Mercury, Venus, Luna, Co-Editor for Venus]
Jane Lebak [Venus, Jupiter]
William Lehman [Luna]
Ann M. Lewis [Luna]
Frank Luke [Sol, Pluto]
Corey McCleery [Mercury, Pluto]
Jon Mollison [Mars]
Constantine Nakos [Uranus]
Jody Lynn Nye [Earth, Luna]
John M. Olsen [Earth, Pluto]
Richard Paolinelli [Sol, Earth, Luna, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, Co-Editor for Pluto, Publisher]
Julie Pascal [Editor for Jupiter]
C.E. Perez [Neptune]
C.T. Phipps [Mars]
R.A. Piatt [Saturn, Pluto]
Andy Pluto [Pluto]
J.F. Posthumus [Saturn]
James Pyles [Sol, Mars, Saturn]
Jim Ryals [Pluto]
Denton Salle [Sol, Saturn]
Hans Schantz [Earth]
David Skinner [Pluto]
Margot St. Aubin [Venus, Luna]
B. Michael Stevens [Pluto]
Justin Tarquin [Luna]
Europa Thomas [Luna]
Mark Wandrey [Luna]
Richard Ware [Earth, Jupiter, Neptune]
J. Manfred Weichsel [Earth, Pluto]
Robert Wenson [Jupiter, Neptune]
Ben Wheeler [Sol, Mercury, Earth, Mars, Saturn, Uranus, Editor for Sol]
Edward Willett [Venus]
Chris Wilson [Uranus, Editor for Uranus]
Dawn Witzke [Editor for Earth]
John C. Wright [Mercury, Luna]
Josh Young [Mercury, Venus, Saturn]
Jason Rennie & previous editors for Superversive Press

All of these names contributed to make this series happen.

So if you have not yet jumped on the train of this incredible 11 volume series, now is the time! Get yourself just under 200 stories of wonder, excitement, and plenty of action.

It's been near half a decade since the Planetary Anthology blossomed from a single interesting idea, and yet here it is in its completed form.

Check it out today!