Karl El-Koura

The Winter 2019 Issue of MYTHIC: A Quarterly Science Fiction & Fantasy Magazine includes a collection of engaging sci-fi and fantasy tales by authors Topher Froehlich, Barry Charman, Karl El-Koura, Tom Jolly, Caitlin E. Jones, Sean Patrick Hazlett, Timothy Mudie, Katie Gray, John Waterfall, and Shaun Kilgore.

"The One they've been seeking is the One they've been hiding from..." This is the Biblical narrative in a way you've never encountered it before-the story of Enoch, an angel who is swept up in the war against God. He fights for Lucifer, and falls with him when the rebels are overthrown. Although Enoch finds renewed purpose in Lucifer's mission-to uncover and thwart God's plan for the strange new creatures of flesh and blood-he is haunted by the memory of Heaven, tormented by jealousy of these creatures of matter, and terrified by the thought that God's plan for their redemption will end with his own annihilation. From Adam to Jesus, A Devil's Gospel spans thousands of years, as Enoch and the other dark angels suspect one person after another of being the promised Messiah, and attempt to corrupt or kill these people they're afraid have been sent to destroy them. In the spirit of C. S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters, this is the sweeping drama of Christianity from the perspective of a fallen angel. It all starts with a man and a woman, many millennia ago...

They've barely survived a worldwide plague - will they survive what comes next? Beset by violent nightmares and feeling abandoned by the God Whose presence he'd felt so keenly only a short while ago, Father John Salibi is distracted, irritable, and completely devoid of spiritual power. But then he meets an enigmatic old man who tells him that all will be well. In contrast to John, the old man commands staggering power: he travels great distances in moments; like Christ, he multiplies food in his hands; and he performs wonderful miracles of healing in a world desperately in need of healing. The old man even claims to have defeated the antichrist, the mysterious figure haunting John's dreams and whose activity in the world allowed the plague John had once thought of, in his ignorance, as the "zombie apocalypse." Is the old man real, or a figment of John's troubled imagination? If real, where does his power come from-from God or from somewhere else? A story of good and evil, of faith, of love, of defeat, of death and resurrection, and of the one thing necessary. In this epic sequel to Father John vs the Zombies, the story of the end of the world continues...

Civilization has collapsed. The world is dying. It happened very fast. Within weeks, isolated news reports of people acting in strange and often violent ways became frequent and widespread. Terrifying videos were uploaded to the internet in shocking numbers from across the globe. Chaotic images of societies in rapid decline. Then-everything went dark. No electricity, no internet, no broadcasts on the emergency radio station. Now-howling, angry, bloodied creatures claw to get into Johnny Salibi's house, where he lives with his wife and infant daughter. But Johnny and his family are safe. He's boarded up the windows. The door is locked and secure. They will ride things out until the government can get things under control again. They're safe. . . . . . except that they're not. Johnny must try to protect his wife and daughter in a world suddenly turned apocalyptic. But things will not go according to plan. Johnny will learn that the zombie plague is not what he or anyone else thought it was. He will learn that the government is not in any position to rescue them. And he will also learn that an unlikely group of survivors might hold the key not only to survival, but to salvation. Combining elements of zombie fiction, apocalyptic literature, and spiritual thrillers, this is the gripping tale of a man whose faith in God is put to the test with life-and-death-and even greater-consequences.

These are the adventures of James Kollins: greedy, petty, selfish captain of the galactic warship DeVille; a man obsessed with the holodrama Captain Courageous and the Women Who Love Him; a man completely unforgiving of his much-maligned first officer. A man who has just met the Creator of the universe, though he doesn't quite realize it yet, and whose life is about to change in ways he never dreamed possible, though he doesn't quite know it yet. Find out what happens when an overgrown child in charge of a large military ship, and sadly lacking a conscience and possessed of a strange sense of humor, comes into contact with God Himself, who isn't above playing a few tricks of His own. You'll be plunged into interstellar war and ultramodern espionage, witness textbook-poor diplomacy and longstanding family feuds, and even encounter a seemingly evil empire of cute babies. It's a safe bet you'll laugh while reading this book; a virtual lock you'll crack a smile or twenty; and inconceivable that you won't groan and shake your head on a regular basis. In the tradition of Isaac Asimov's pun-in-cheek "feghoots," each of these twelve short-shorts ends in a play on words and phrases that will leave you wondering what's wrong with the author. Part loving Star Trek parody homage, part spiritual journey, The Lost Stories is a series of cosmic and comic adventures that is silly, fun, and also demonstrates the power of God working in the life of even the most self-obsessed warship captain you've ever met.