Sandkings

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Sandkings is a collection of science fiction short stories by George R. R. Martin, published in 1981. The multiple-award-winning title story concerns a race of insectoid, militaristic alien 'pets' who worship their master until he badly mistreats them. It was adapted into "The Sandkings," an episode of the new The Outer Limits, as well as a 1987 graphic novel, published by DC Comics as the seventh and last book of the DC Science Fiction Graphic Novel line, adapted by Doug Moench, Pat Broderick, and Neal McPheeters.

In the original story, a millionaire named Simon Kress buys four colonies of 'sandkings'- highly intelligent antlike creatures - as an addition to his collection of exotic pets. Problems occur when he forces the sandkings to make war on one another for his amusement, only to find they are a more sophisticated species than he bargained for.

Also included is "The Way of Cross and Dragon," about an inquisitor in a distant-future interstellar Catholic Church who must suppress a heresy concerning new, evidently fanciful Bible which names Judas Iscariot a saint.

[edit] Collection Contents

  • The Way of Cross and Dragon
  • Bitterblooms
  • In the House of the Worm
  • Fast-Friend
  • The Stone City
  • Starlady
  • Sandkings
v • d • e
George R. R. Martin's bibliography
Novels
Novellas

Night of the Vampyres · The Skin Trade · The Hedge Knight · The Sworn Sword
Collections

A Song for Lya · Songs of Stars and Shadows · Sandkings · Songs the Dead Men Sing · Nightflyers · Tuf Voyaging · Portraits of His Children · Quartet · Dreamsongs: A RRetrospective
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