Welcome to Arra, a harsh yet strangely beautiful world. From a frozen northern outpost to a tropical rainforest, from marshy hinterlands to volcanic islands, from great cities to architectural ruins, Voices of Arra depicts people, ordinary and extraordinary, who tell their stories in their own words: A girl forced into a life of poverty and degradation finds hope in the unlikeliest of places; a teenager on the cusp of a terrible disease races to complete one final task; another must choose between his culture and his own individuality; a beautiful courtesan who sides with the enemy learns the price of treachery; a spiritual man must give up his heart's desire to discover his soul's inspiration; while investigating an apparent suicide, a woman finds herself at the center of a government conspiracy; a dying man makes a deal with a fabled healer who is wrestling with his own demons ... and more. The tales examine emotions, intrigue, and the consequences of choice. Stripped of most of the usual trappings of the fantasy genre, they are by turns graphic, lyrical, vulgar, and philosophical, but always realistic and intensely human.