Science fiction award-winner, flesh-eating bacteria-survivor, and somewhat questionably convicted felon Peter Watts returns with this long-awaited short fiction collection. Including an unpublished work, Watts posits unlimited brain-computer interfaces, the possibility of life existing inside stars, the hacking of human behavior, and ecological collapse. (Also, the healing power of revenge.)
ISBN: Print: 978-1-61696-467-2; Digital formats: 978-1-61696-468-9
Published: 22 September 2026
Available Format(s): trade paperback, digital
Science fiction award-winner, flesh-eating-bacteria survivor, and somewhat questionably convicted felon Peter Watts returns with this long-awaited short fiction collection. Including an unpublished work, Watts posits unlimited brain-computer interfaces, the possibility of life existing inside stars, the hacking of human behavior, and ecological collapse. (Also, the healing power of revenge.)
What if a weaponized water supply reprograms pattern recognition in the brain, provoking violent rage at the sight of the Google logo. Or an accidental hive-mind creates a global agenda to resurrect itself in the scant seconds between its emergence and dissolution? A steroidal jump gate-building ship attempts to survive passage through a red-giant sun by hiding inside an ice-giant planet. When something is trying to colonize the sun, humans try to stop it. Spoiler alert: Nobody comes off very well.
In his newest short fiction, alongside an introduction by Richard K. Morgan, Watts (The Freeze-Frame Revolution) reserves whatever hope he has for whatever comes after humans. In light of his stories and recent events, it is difficult to fault that assessment.
Praise for Peter Watts
“If science fiction can really be claimed as a literature of ideas, then Watts is without doubt its premier practitioner.”
—Richard K. Morgan, author of Altered Carbon
“A new book from crazy genius Watts is always cause for celebration . . . Watts is one of those writers who gets into your brain and remains lodged there like an angry, sentient tumor.”
—io9
“Watts displays a gleefully macabre inventiveness combined with scientific rigour.”
—Nalo Hopkinson, author of Brown Girl in the Ring
“[Watts] asks the questions that the best science fiction writers ask, but that the rest of us may be afraid to answer.”
—Chicago Tribune
“Watts continues to challenge readers with his imaginative plots and superb storytelling.”
—Library Journal
“A hard science fiction writer through and through—and one of the very best alive, a peer of writers such as Neil Stephenson, Allen Steele, and the Three Gregs, Benford, Bear and Egan.”
—The Globe and Mail
“Even when Watts is wrong he is brilliant.”
—Armed and Dangerous
“Watts’s novels blow the mind pretty much on every page.”
—Tor.com
Peter Watts (www.rifters.com) is a former marine biologist who clings to some shred of scientific rigor by appending technical bibliographies onto his novels. His debut novel, Starfish, was a New York Times Notable Book, while his fourth, Blindsight—a rumination on the utility of consciousness that has become a required text in undergraduate courses ranging from philosophy to neuroscience—was a finalist for numerous North American genre awards, winning exactly none of them. (It did, however, win a shitload of awards overseas, which suggests that his translators may be better writers than he is.) His latest novella, The Freeze-Frame Revolution, won the Nowa Fantastyka Prize for Best Foreign Book in Poland.
Watts’s shorter work has also picked up trophies in a variety of jurisdictions, notably a Shirley Jackson Award (possibly due to fan sympathy over his nearly dying of flesh-eating disease in 2011) and a Hugo Award (possibly due to fan outrage over an altercation with U.S. border guards in 2009). The latter incident resulted in Watts being barred from entering the U.S.—not getting on the ground fast enough after being punched in the face by border guards is a “felony” under Michigan statutes—but he can’t honestly say he misses the place all that much.
Watts’s work is available in twenty languages—he seems to be especially popular in countries with a history of Soviet occupation—and has been cited as inspirational to several popular video games. He and his cat, Banana (since deceased), have both appeared in the prestigious scientific journal Nature. A few years ago he briefly returned to science with a postdoc in molecular genetics, but he really sucked at it.
It’s not generally known, but Peter Watts and I started out as professional antagonists.
Back in 2009, I was pitching a storyline to a very high profile video-game company for their world-class First Person Shooter series.
So, as it turned out, was Peter.
We’d both been headhunted for the job. At the same time. Apparently, different departmental heads got their wires crossed, but the end result was that we were being steered blind to compete for the gig. At the time, I had no idea anyone else was in the frame. So it was a revelation when Peter got in touch out of the blue to let me know. “Probably isn’t in my best interests to warn you about this,” he wrote amiably. “But hey, I was raised by Baptists.”
A revelation—in more ways than one.
It didn’t hurt that I’d already read Peter’s First Contact masterwork Blindsight and nearly fallen off my chair with sheer envy at the pitch-perfect balance of rigorous hard SF, poignant human heartache and stylistic literary verve it contained. I already knew the man to be a massive talent in both literary and genre terms.
Now I also knew him to be what the American Jewish community likes to refer to as a mensch—a person of integrity and honour. A person you can trust to do the right thing.
Peter Watts has been doing the right thing in science fiction his whole writing career. He knows, as the saying goes, what time it is, and he reminds us of the fateful hour, over and over again. His stories eschew facile hero narratives, crowd-pleaser happy endings, cheery hope-punk vistas of a future where human ingenuity and bright shiny tech will save us all or, failing that, at least send us to live happily ever after on the Moon and Elon Musk’s Mars.
Fold Catastrophes
Peter Watts
Science fiction award-winner, flesh-eating bacteria-survivor, and somewhat questionably convicted felon Peter Watts returns with this long-awaited short fiction collection. Including an unpublished work, Watts posits unlimited brain-computer interfaces, the possibility of life existing inside stars, the hacking of human behavior, and ecological collapse. (Also, the healing power of revenge.)
Fold Catastrophes
by Peter Watts
ISBN: Print: 978-1-61696-467-2; Digital formats: 978-1-61696-468-9
Published: 22 September 2026
Available Format(s): trade paperback, digital
Science fiction award-winner, flesh-eating-bacteria survivor, and somewhat questionably convicted felon Peter Watts returns with this long-awaited short fiction collection. Including an unpublished work, Watts posits unlimited brain-computer interfaces, the possibility of life existing inside stars, the hacking of human behavior, and ecological collapse. (Also, the healing power of revenge.)
What if a weaponized water supply reprograms pattern recognition in the brain, provoking violent rage at the sight of the Google logo. Or an accidental hive-mind creates a global agenda to resurrect itself in the scant seconds between its emergence and dissolution? A steroidal jump gate-building ship attempts to survive passage through a red-giant sun by hiding inside an ice-giant planet. When something is trying to colonize the sun, humans try to stop it. Spoiler alert: Nobody comes off very well.
In his newest short fiction, alongside an introduction by Richard K. Morgan, Watts (The Freeze-Frame Revolution) reserves whatever hope he has for whatever comes after humans. In light of his stories and recent events, it is difficult to fault that assessment.
Praise for Peter Watts
“If science fiction can really be claimed as a literature of ideas, then Watts is without doubt its premier practitioner.”
—Richard K. Morgan, author of Altered Carbon
“A new book from crazy genius Watts is always cause for celebration . . . Watts is one of those writers who gets into your brain and remains lodged there like an angry, sentient tumor.”
—io9
“Watts displays a gleefully macabre inventiveness combined with scientific rigour.”
—Nalo Hopkinson, author of Brown Girl in the Ring
“[Watts] asks the questions that the best science fiction writers ask, but that the rest of us may be afraid to answer.”
—Chicago Tribune
“Watts continues to challenge readers with his imaginative plots and superb storytelling.”
—Library Journal
“A hard science fiction writer through and through—and one of the very best alive, a peer of writers such as Neil Stephenson, Allen Steele, and the Three Gregs, Benford, Bear and Egan.”
—The Globe and Mail
“Even when Watts is wrong he is brilliant.”
—Armed and Dangerous
“Watts’s novels blow the mind pretty much on every page.”
—Tor.com
Peter Watts (www.rifters.com) is a former marine biologist who clings to some shred of scientific rigor by appending technical bibliographies onto his novels. His debut novel, Starfish, was a New York Times Notable Book, while his fourth, Blindsight—a rumination on the utility of consciousness that has become a required text in undergraduate courses ranging from philosophy to neuroscience—was a finalist for numerous North American genre awards, winning exactly none of them. (It did, however, win a shitload of awards overseas, which suggests that his translators may be better writers than he is.) His latest novella, The Freeze-Frame Revolution, won the Nowa Fantastyka Prize for Best Foreign Book in Poland.
Watts’s shorter work has also picked up trophies in a variety of jurisdictions, notably a Shirley Jackson Award (possibly due to fan sympathy over his nearly dying of flesh-eating disease in 2011) and a Hugo Award (possibly due to fan outrage over an altercation with U.S. border guards in 2009). The latter incident resulted in Watts being barred from entering the U.S.—not getting on the ground fast enough after being punched in the face by border guards is a “felony” under Michigan statutes—but he can’t honestly say he misses the place all that much.
Watts’s work is available in twenty languages—he seems to be especially popular in countries with a history of Soviet occupation—and has been cited as inspirational to several popular video games. He and his cat, Banana (since deceased), have both appeared in the prestigious scientific journal Nature. A few years ago he briefly returned to science with a postdoc in molecular genetics, but he really sucked at it.
Watts lives in British Columbia, Canada.
www.rifters.com
Excerpt from the Introduction by Richard Morgan
It’s not generally known, but Peter Watts and I started out as professional antagonists.
Back in 2009, I was pitching a storyline to a very high profile video-game company for their world-class First Person Shooter series.
So, as it turned out, was Peter.
We’d both been headhunted for the job. At the same time. Apparently, different departmental heads got their wires crossed, but the end result was that we were being steered blind to compete for the gig. At the time, I had no idea anyone else was in the frame. So it was a revelation when Peter got in touch out of the blue to let me know. “Probably isn’t in my best interests to warn you about this,” he wrote amiably. “But hey, I was raised by Baptists.”
A revelation—in more ways than one.
It didn’t hurt that I’d already read Peter’s First Contact masterwork Blindsight and nearly fallen off my chair with sheer envy at the pitch-perfect balance of rigorous hard SF, poignant human heartache and stylistic literary verve it contained. I already knew the man to be a massive talent in both literary and genre terms.
Now I also knew him to be what the American Jewish community likes to refer to as a mensch—a person of integrity and honour. A person you can trust to do the right thing.
Peter Watts has been doing the right thing in science fiction his whole writing career. He knows, as the saying goes, what time it is, and he reminds us of the fateful hour, over and over again. His stories eschew facile hero narratives, crowd-pleaser happy endings, cheery hope-punk vistas of a future where human ingenuity and bright shiny tech will save us all or, failing that, at least send us to live happily ever after on the Moon and Elon Musk’s Mars.
Peter Watts is not here for that shit.
And who can blame him.