Our Price: AUD$24.95 (USD$)* ISBN: 978-1-921456-32-9 Subject: Fiction/Fantasy/Short Stories Publication Date: June 2010

Synopsis
The One World presents three original works of short fantasy fiction from new author, Belinda Cowell.

Alcatraz
Forced to fight for things she barely believes in for a cause she doesn't understand, Alcatraz's destiny is about to change. Sent away on a long voyage as a slave, she refuses to eat and is left for dead, before finding herself in a strange world where cats can talk and men sing deadly songs...

Siren Call
A woman on the run abandons her child, a man seeks peace, and a lonely young boy must find his path as the only male siren alive. But as the past becomes an unbearable unknown, his long lost sister appears with a message: their mother is dying, forcing him to choose between reconciling his past or letting the mother he never knew die alone.

Bill and Mary
A young girl nearing womanhood and a tall dark stranger are inexplicably drawn together when worlds collide, and chaos reins. Now, her only hope of seeing her family lies within his hidden temptation.

About The Author
Belinda Cowell resides in Perth, Western Australia where she is busy working on her next book.

Her interests are many and varied and include martial arts and the outdoors, although her greatest passion is art.

From The Book
The woman bundled up her newborn daughter in the remains of her coat, hoping they wouldn't find her tucked away in the corner of the empty building.

There were footsteps and urgent voices outside, so the exhausted woman quickly hid the baby behind her back, unable to stand up let alone defend herself.

The men crashed into the building, their torches sending bright light into her sensitive pink eyes.

"So you thought you could get away?" sneered their leader, the one who had attacked her.

She looked up at him defiantly, hoping he wouldn't notice that she had already given birth. Instead, he slapped her hard across her face, the sound of it echoing through the building. Her vision blurred; she knew he would kill her, but she needed to protect her daughter. They couldn't know.