hc = hardcover, tp = trade (oversized) paperback, [UK ed] = British publication, [CDN ed] = Canadian publication. Default is US publication.
Please note that this listing is not exhaustive; we have many more (several hundred more) titles coming during this period.
Hired by a family of eccentric street preachers to recover a lost saint's finger, Gilda is tempted by their promise of "electric resurrection," when the Westside's countless dead will return to life. She is fighting the urge to believe in miracles when her long dead mother, Mary Fall, walks through the parlor door. Stricken with amnesia, Mary remembers nothing of her daughter or her death, but that doesn't stop her from being as infuriatingly pushy as Gilda herself. As her mother threatens to drive her insane, Gilda keeps their relationship a secret so that they can work together to investigate what brought Mary back to life.
Tina has always known her destiny is outside the norm - after all, she is the human clone of the most brilliant alien commander in all the galaxies (even if the rest of the world is still deciding whether aliens exist). But she is tired of waiting for her life to begin. And then it does - and maybe Tina should have been more prepared. At least she has a crew around her that she can trust - and her best friend at her side. Now, they just have to save the world.
Queen Aqreen of Aquila leaves her husband Jarsun and flees across the Red Desert. Aqreen and Krushita's caravan of ten thousand wagons will take several years to reach the only safe harbour, the queendom of Reygar. Jarsun's pursuit is relentless and his vengeance terrible, but the growing powers of little Krushita gives hope, along with the four-armed twin-bodied Vanjhani wagon train leader and their band of desert militia.
As Fjerda's massive army prepares to invade, Nikolai Lantsov will summon every bit of his ingenuity and charm - and even the monster within - to win this fight. And duty demands that Zoya Nazyalensky embrace her powers to become the weapon her country needs. And Nina Zenik risks discovery and death as she wages war on Fjerda from inside its capital.
The Hive Mind has done the impossible - left its island prison. It's a matter of time before Amicae falls, and Laura Kramer has very few resources left to prevent it.The council has tied her hands, and the gangs want her dead. Her only real choice is to walk away and leave the city to its fate.
When her old tormentor Prince Karim invades her new home and forces her into a marriage alliance, Razia finds herself trapped in the women's quarters of a foreign palace, with her beloved Prince Arjun exiled from her side. Now, in order to free herself, and her province, from Karim's clutches, she must call upon all of her training as a royal princess, a cunning courtesan, and a daring thief to summon new allies and old friends for a battle that will decide her fate, and the fate of an empire.
The Apkallu rule the world from the shadows, using mind control and deadly monsters to eliminate any threat to their power. If they know your name, or have a trace of your blood, you can never defy them. After Sam Arquero lost his family to a demon, an old man named Lucas offers him the chance to find out who is responsible, and bring down the Apkallu forever.
Now that Koli and his companions have found the source of the signal they've been following - the mysterious "Sword of Albion" - there is hope that their perilous journey will finally be worth something. They're searching for a way to help humanity fight back against nature. But what they'll find is an ancient war that never ended...
176 pages. Derek is LitenVarld's most loyal employee - from the moment he wakes up in a converted shipping container at the edge of the parking lot to the second he clocks out of work 18 hours later. But just try and take a sick day. So he is assigned to a special inventory shift, hunting through the store to find defective products. Toy chests with pincers and eye stalks, ambulatory sleeper sofas, killer mutant toilets, that kind of thing. Helping him are four strangers who look and sound almost exactly like him.
Touraine is a soldier. Stolen as a child and raised to kill and die for the empire, her only loyalty is to her fellow conscripts. But now, her company has been sent back to her homeland to stop a rebellion, and the ties of blood may be stronger than she thought. Luca needs a turncoat. Someone desperate enough to tiptoe the bayonet's edge between treason and orders. Someone who can sway the rebels toward peace, while Luca focuses on what really matters: getting her uncle off her throne.
Esen must find a way to rescue a hapless group of chimeras, beings who are a new and unique blend of species, when she can't become one herself. As she races to save them from persecution by the "still pure," she unwittingly discovers that Evan Gooseberry isn't what he believes himself to be, shattering his self image. Before he can help Esen, he must not only confront her true self, but his own.
Something malevolent lurks in deep space, something able to pluck starships from their course and cause their crews to vanish. It has an interest: Botharis, the planet where Esen and Paul have established the All Species' Library of Linguistics and Culture. Esen and Paul will need every resource, every friend and even foes, if they're to discover who - or what is behind this before more are lost.
It's the edge of the universe. Now it's collapsing - and taking everyone and everything with it. The only ones who can stop it are the Sentinels - the recruits, exiles, and court-martialed dregs of the military. At the Divide, Adequin Rake, commanding the Argus, has no resources, no comms - nothing, except for the soldiers that no one wanted. They're humanity's last chance.
Earth is getting ready for the war to end all wars: it's angels vs demons and Luce is the only one who seems worried about humanity, hapless pawns who are stuck in the middle of the battlefield. Between building an army and running for her life, she's got a lot on her plate - and that's not to mention her beloved Cole. As angels drop dead and violent forces begin to gather in the city, the final pieces of an ancient war fall into place, and it's time for Luce and her loyal coterie to face an enemy like no other.
The Kimei family and the second group of castaways, led by Sergeant Campbell, had finally joined forces after both had been forced to land on the bizarre planet Lincoln, whose "continents" were huge floating coral colonies, inhabited by even stranger lifeforms. They had survived crash-landings and venom-filled bites and disease, their own despair, and even the destruction - and consumption! - of one of their floating islands, and had learned to live, even prosper, in their strange new home. But Lincoln has far worse in store.
Domingos Fernandes Calabar started out as a military advisor for the Portuguese in Brazil. But to his superiors, he was still nothing more than a mameluco, a man of mixed blood. Until, that is, the Dutch arrived and he switched sides. Then the Portuguese had a new label for him: "traitorous dog." Now Calabar has to help engineer a swift Dutch exodus to a safer place before word of Tromp's defeat reaches Spanish ears.
16 year old Hal Stevens is a budding historical scholar from a small town in Colorado. He has only two friends: Roberto the Biker Witch and Cleo Mallawi. Cleo claims to be the reincarnation of Queen Cleopatra. She also believes she's being stalked by an ancient Egyptian demon, Ammut, the Devourer of the Dead. When Hal and Roberto find Cleo murdered in the forest near her home, it appears she may have been telling the truth.
Norah and Arthur are learning how to co-exist in their new little world. Though they hardly know each other, everything seems to be going perfectly - from the home they're building together to the ring on Norah's finger. But survival in this world is a tricky thing, the air is thicker every day and illness creeps fast through the body. And the earth is becoming increasingly hostile to live in. Fortunately, Easton Grove is here for that in the form of a perfect little bundle to take home and harvest. You can live for as long as you keep it - or her - close.
Mattie can't remember a time before she and William lived alone on a mountain together. She must never make him upset. But when Mattie discovers the mutilated body of a fox in the woods, she realizes that they're not alone after all. When three strangers appear on the mountaintop looking for the creature in the woods, Mattie knows their presence will anger William. Terrible things happen when William is angry.
Kit and Thomas go through Induction and have a baby girl, Mimi. At first everything goes well but then the small mistakes, ISPs (Insufficient Standard of Parenting), build up and suddenly Kit is face to face with the idea of losing Mimi, and she is forced to ask herself how far she will go to keep her family together.
With the Silvertown's chief of police on leave, officer Mary Whittaker is left alone to confront a series of abnormal incidents. A teenager dies tragically after eating obviously poisonous mushrooms from his lawn. A hiker is found dead on a trail, smiling serenely after being mauled by a bear. A normally doting mother leaving her toddler twins behind without noticing. The town has apparently lost all instinct for self-preservation.
Four stories of speculative fiction from the South Korean author.
Yaz has lost her friends and found her enemies. She has a mountain to climb, and even if she can break the Hidden God's power, her dream of a green world lies impossibly far to the south, across a vast emptiness of ice. Before the journey can even start, she has to find out what happened to the ones she loves and save those that can be saved.
The residents of Sycamore River emerge from the Change and the nuclear war to try to build a life from the shattered remains of their town. But for some, the very air has become toxic. The people of Sycamore River have to survived the unthinkable. Can they build something new from the ashes?
In a daring and deadly heist, thieves have made away with an artifact of terrible power - the death mask of Louis Charbon. Made by a master craftsman, it is imbued with the spirit of a monster from history, a serial murderer who terrorized the city with a series of gruesome murders. Now Charbon is loose once more, killing from beyond the grave. It is up to Krona Hirvath and her fellow Regulators to enter the mind of madness to stop this insatiable killer while facing the terrible truths left in his wake.
To buy time for humanity, Kihrin must convince the king of the Manol vane to perform an ancient ritual that will strip the vane of their immortality - a ritual that certain vane will do anything to prevent. Including assassinating the messengers. Worse, Kihrin must come to terms with the horrifying possibility that his connection to Vol Karoth is steadily growing in strength.
Michael Kingman thought he was going to die by the executioner's axe, forever labeled as a traitor. Still alive, and under the protection of the Orbis mercenary company, Michael and his family and friends are deeply involved in the seemingly rival conspiracies that are tearing the Hollows apart. With the death of the King, both the corrupt prince and his sister Serena are vying for the throne, while the rebel Emperor is spreading lies amongst the people, and all of them want Michael dead.
When their hopes for ending Moquoia's brutal system of bondage are crushed, unlikely allies Lark and Veran are forced to flee into the harsh desert. With no weapons or horses, they must make their way to safety across the 50-mile expanse of waterless plains known as the water scrape. It is an odyssey filled with unexpected dangers that challenge even a skilled outlaw like Lark - though the farther they travel, the more she wonders if she even fits the fearsome title of the Sunshield Bandit anymore.
Space: a tycoon's playground. A handful of trillionaires dictate the future of humanity. Outside the reach of Earthly law and with the vast resources of the inner solar system at their disposal, the "Four Horsemen" do exactly as they please. The governments of Earth are not amused; an international team of elite military women, masquerading as space colonists, are set to infiltrate and neutralize the largest and most dangerous project in human history.
Arden Beacon arrives in the salt-swept port of Vigil tasked with using the magic in her blood to keep the lighthouse burning. But the coastline Arden must keep alight - battered by a sea teeming with colossal, ancient beasts - is far from the cultured, urban world she knows. Her neighbour, Jonah Riven, the hunter of leviathans, is rumoured to have murdered his wife, that he is as much a monster as his prey.
It's been a mostly quiet life since Robin Hood put aside his pregnant wife Marian, turned his back on his Merry Men and his former life and retreated to a monastery to repent his sins - although no one knows what was so heinous he would leave behind Sherwood Forest and those he loved most. But when friends from their outlaw days start dying, Father Tuck, now the Abbott of St Mary's, suspects a curse and begs Marian to use her magic to break it.
Former New York City Mayor Tom Cafferty enters a nest underneath the Nevada desert and is horrified to find it completely empty - the battle for survival is not over. Across the planet, creatures are emerging from their subterranean homes. Now, the all-out war against humanity has begun - a war in which only one apex species will survive.
The predators known as grendels were under control and Avalon's new mainland hydroelectric power station was nearly complete, and when on-line would compensate for the nuclear power systems lost in the Grendel Wars. But unbeknownst to the planet-bound humans, something was moving out there in the stars, decelerating at a rate impossible for a natural object. And its destination was Avalon. The most probable origin was earth's solar system.
Will Connor returns to his hometown, a village north of Boston, to care for his injured mother and finds himself reexamining a horrific incident that took place during one of his mother's "spirit circles." As Will looks deeper into his family's history, he discovers that her practices weren't so much a passing fad but the latest link in a long tradition of New England witchcraft, which still seems to hold a strange power over the town.
Since decoding the language of the universe 8 millenia ago, humanity has built itself a near utopia across thousands of worlds. A holy order of monastics is tasked with monitoring the use of that language. Elyth is one such mendicant, capable of infiltrating and destroying corrupted worlds with nothing more than her words. She is sent to the world Qel in response to the appearance of a forbidden strain of the Deep Language that was supposed to have died out with its founder seven centuries ago.
Deep in the Hungarian woods, the sacred magic of King Solomon lives on in his descendants. Gathering under the midnight stars, they perform small miracles and none are more gifted than the great Rabbi Isaac and his three daughters. But a darkness is creeping across Europe, threatening the lives of every Jewish person in every village. Each sister will have to make an impossible choice in an effort to survive - and change the fate of their family forever.
Virginia, 2004: Lara Barnes is on top of the world until her fiance disappears on their wedding day. Her search for answers unexpectedly leads to her great-grandmother's journals from Paris of the 1920s. Swept into a story of a dark circus and ill-fated love, secrets about Lara's family history come to light and reveal a curse that has been claiming payment from the women in her family for generations.
Emperox Grayland II has finally wrested control of her empire from those who oppose her and who deny the reality of this collapse. Yet the forces opposing her rule will make a final, desperate push to topple her from her throne and power, by any means necessary. Grayland and her thinning list of allies must use every tool at their disposal to save themselves, and all of humanity.
Sonya and her allies - the foreign Uaine and their armies of the undead - have beaten the imperial soldiers and ousted them from Izmoroz. Now they have the rest of the empire to free. Meanwhile, betrayed by his sister, his homeland, and his fiance, Sonya's brother, the famed wizard Sebastian, has retreated with the imperial forces. But another traitor is waiting in the capital, and enemies of the throne may hide in plain sight...
Years ago, a vast and mysterious object known as the Anomaly was discovered in deep space. All missions to explore and explain it have failed. Now, as it draws close to Earth, threatening to swallow up the planet, a team of scientists desperately seek a way to destroy it or arrest its progress.
New York 1905. Thalia Cutler is a stage magician, until one night when a trick goes horribly awry. In surviving, she discovers that she can shapeshift, and has the potential to take her place among the rich and powerful, such as the Vanderbilts and the Astors. But first, she'll have to learn to control that power...before the real monsters descend to feast.
When her father refuses to recognise her as heir to the throne, Lin vows to prove her worth by mastering the forbidden art of bone shard magic.Yet such power carries a great cost, and when the revolution reaches the gates of the palace, Lin must decide how far she is willing to go to claim her birthright - and save her people.
In a Titanshade alley the mutilated body of a young woman is discovered. She is a recent immigrant so little-regarded that not even her lovers bothered to learn her name. But in death, she's found a champion. Detective Carter single-mindedly pursues the killer as he navigates political pressures and resists becoming a pawn in the struggles tipping the city toward anarchy.
With the return of spring, new life floods into Titanshade. Even pop culture has taken notice, with a high-profile concert only days away. When a band member's murder threatens to delay the show, the diva star performer demands that the famous Detective Carter work the case. But Carter has secrets of his own, and his investigation unearths more victims and dark secrets, triggering a spiral of deceit, paranoia, and nightmarish magical transformations.
The Fellowship raised Lark to kill monsters. His partner betrayed them to the Feds. But Lark knows his magic is real, and he'll do anything to complete his quest.
Software manager Jane Smith receives an envelope containing a key to a storage unit that holds a taxidermied hummingbird and salamander. Alongside the key is a list of five other animals. The list is signed, "Love, Silvina." Jane does not know a Silvina, and she wants nothing to do with the taxidermied animals. But by removing the hummingbird and the salamander from the storage unit, Jane has set into motion a series of events over which she has no control.
The Savages are the greatest weapon they ever developed. Culled from the streets of their cities, they take the ones no one will miss and throw them, by the thousands, at the empire's enemies. Evie is a warrior with a mission: to find the man she once loved, the man who holds the key to exposing the secret of the Savage Legion and ending the mass conscription of the empire's poor and wretched. But to find him, she must become one of them.
A princess isn't supposed to fall for an evil sorceress, especially a princess whose line has been cursed by a wicked fairy, a curse that could only be broken by true love's kiss.
When Murderbot's human associates (not friends, never friends) are captured and another not-friend from its past requires urgent assistance, Murderbot must choose between inertia and drastic action. Drastic action it is, then.
The city of Neo Songdo has augmented and virtual spaces anchored in the weight of the real. The smart city is designed to be read by machine vision while people see only the augmented facade of the corporate ideal. At night the stars are obscured by an intergalactic virtual war being waged by millions of players, while on the streets below people are forced to beg, steal, and hustle to survive. Enter Julius Dax, online repoman and real-life thief. He's been hired for a special job: stealing an unknown object from a reclusive tech billionaire. But when he finds out he's stolen the first sentient AI, his payday gets a lot more complicated.
From the author of THE GOBLIN EMPEROR. In an alternate 1880s London where angels inhabit every public building, vampires and werewolves walk the streets with human beings in a well-regulated truce. Jack the Ripper stalks the streets of this London too. But this London has an Angel. The Angel of the Crows.
Now retired from the military, Major Bhaajan is a private investigator who solves cases for the House of Majda, a powerful royal family centered in the City of Cries. The powerful elite of the City of Cries are disappearing, and only Bhaajan, who grew up in the Undercity, can find them - if she isn't murdered first.
Seven years after first contact, an enormous and deadly warship, built to protect humanity from its greatest ever threat, is launched. On board is a crew of just four - tasked with monitoring the ship and reporting the war's progress to a mesmerized global audience by way of social media. But while pursuing the enemy across space, the crew confront the unthinkable: their communications are cut, their ship becoming decreasingly trustworthy and effective.
Audacious astronauts encounter bizarre, sometimes deadly life forms, and strange, exotic, cosmic phenomena, including miniature black holes, dense fields of interstellar plasma, powerful gravity-emitters, and spectacularly massive space-based, alien-built labyrinths. Tasked with exploring this brave, new, highly dangerous world, they must also deal with their own personal triumphs and conflicts.
Eric Carter has been killed and his soul sent to take its place as a stand-in for the Aztec god of death Mictlantecuhtli. But somebody on Earth isn't done with him, yet. Somebody with the power to bring him back from the dead. He doesn't know who, and worse he doesn't know why. Between an angry death goddess, family secrets steeped in blood, a Djinn who is biding his time, and a killer mage who can create copy after copy of himself, Eric's new life looks to be just as violent as his last one.
Cassandra Tipp is dead...or is she? The notorious recluse and eccentric bestselling novelist has left behind no body - just her massive fortune, and one final manuscript. Then again, there are enough bodies in her past - her husband Tommy Tipp, whose mysterious disembowlment has never been solved, and a few years later, the shocking murder-suicide of her father and brother.
Three more Penric novellas - PENRIC'S MISSION, MIRA'S LAST DANCE and THE PRISONER OF LIMNOS. Sorcerer Penric is sent on a covert diplomatic mission to Cedonia to bring General Arisaydia and his widowed sister Nikys back. This, it turns out, is not as simple as it sounds.
In a US facing growing food shortages, stark inequality, and a growing fascist government, three perfectly normal young women are about to find out that they share a great deal in common. Their creator, the gifted geneticist Peng, made them that way - before such things were outlawed. Rumors of a virus make their way through an unprotected population on the verge of rebellion, only to have it turn deadly. As the women fight to stay alive and help, Peng races to find a cure - and the cover up behind the virus.
When the Supernatural nations of the world meet up to negotiate an end to ongoing hostilities, Harry Dresden, Chicago's only professional wizard, joins the White Council's security team to make sure the talks stay civil. But can he succeed, when dark political manipulations threaten the very existence of Chicago - and all he holds dear?
Daslakh is an AI with a problem. Its favorite human, a young man named Zee, is in love with a woman who never existed - and he will scour the Solar System to find her. Daslakh's nicely settled life gets more complicated when Zee helps a woman named Adya escape a gang of crooks. This gets the pair caught up in the hunt for the Godel Trigger, a legendary weapon left over from an ancient war between humans and machines - which could spell the end of civilization. In their search, they face a criminal cat and her henchmen, a paranoid supermind with a giant laser, the greatest thief in history, and a woman who might actually be Zee's lost love.
Pounce, a young bot caring for his first human charge, Ezra, has just found a box in the attic. His box. The box he arrived in, and the box he'll be discarded in when Ezra outgrows the need for a nanny. As Pounce is propelled down a road of existential dread, the pieces are falling into place for a robot revolution that will spell the end of humanity. Pounce must make an impossible choice: join the revolution and fight for his own freedom - or escort Ezra to safety across the battle-scarred post-apocalyptic hellscape that the suburbs have become.
The Five-Hop One-Stop on the planet Gora is a place where long-haul spacers can stretch their legs (if they have legs, that is), and pick up fuel, transit permits, and assorted supplies. When a freak technological failure halts traffic to and from Gora, three strangers are thrown together at the Five-Hop. Grounded, and with nothing to do but wait, the trio - an exiled artist with an appointment to keep, a cargo runner at a personal crossroads, and a mysterious individual doing her best to help those on the fringes - are compelled to confront where they've been, where they might go, and what they might be to each other.
Closeted, broke and jobless, Jessamyn Teoh is moving back to Malaysia with her parents - a country she last saw when she was a toddler. But now she's hearing in her head the voice of the ghost of her estranged grandmother. In life, Ah Ma was a spirit medium, avatar of a mysterious deity called the Black Water Sister. Now she's determined to settle a score against a business magnate who has offended the god - and she's decided Jess is going to help her do it, whether Jess wants to or not.
Cairo, 1912: Fatma el-Sha'arawi, the youngest woman working for the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities, investigates after someone murders a secret brotherhood dedicated to al-Jahiz, the man who transformed the world 40 years ago when he opened up the veil between the magical and mundane realms, before vanishing into the unknown. This murderer claims to be al-Jahiz, returned to condemn the modern age for its social oppressions.
After 15 years of lies and sacrifice, Baru Cormorant has the power to destroy the Imperial Republic of Falcrest that she pretends to serve. The secret society called the Cancrioth is real, and Baru is among them. But the Cancrioth's weapon cannot distinguish the guilty from the innocent. If it escapes quarantine, the ancient hemorrhagic plague called the Kettling will kill hundreds of millions...not just in Falcrest, but all across the world.
As the last war begins, Luce and her mate Cole face danger on every front, from the angels and their all-powerful leader, from the demon inside Luce who will take any chance to break free from her pesky humanity, to the secrets her so-called allies seem to be keeping. Worst of all, they've got to keep finding new babysitters for one small, extremely loyal, far-too-fearless and very determined baby dragon.
Hatushaly and his young wife Hava have arrived in the prosperous trading town of Beran's Hill to restore and reopen the fire-damaged Inn of the Three Stars. But Hatu and Hava are actually assassins from the mysterious island of Coaltachin, home to the powerful and lethal Nocusara. And Hatu conceals an even more dangerous secret. He is the last remaining member of the legendary Firemanes, the ruling family of Ithrace.
The assassinated Shah Jahan lies entombed beside his beloved wife in the Taj Mahal, while their progeny drag the Mughal Empire into a three-sided struggle over the succession to the Peacock Throne. The diplomatic and trade mission from the United States of Europe is providing Princess Jahanara and her brother with technical assistance as the siblings prepare to fight their rivals for the throne.
Teagan Frost might be getting better at moving sh*t with her mind - but her job working as a telekinetic government operative only ever seems to get harder. No sooner has Teagan chased off one psychotic kid hell-bent on trashing the whole West Coast, but now she has to contend with another supernatural being who can harness devastating electrical power. And if Teagan can't stop him, the whole of Los Angeles will be facing the sh*tstorm of the century.
The messianic cult of practicing cannibals called the Unreconciled have been settled at remote Tyson Station, but a wasting disease has broken out among them. Kalico leads a party to deal with the epidemic but disappears. Talina Perez has brokered an uneasy truce with the quetzal molecules that float in her blood. Now, she, young Kylee Simonov, a quetzal named Flute, and a clueless nobleman named Taglioni rush to save Kalico's vanished party. But lurking in the forest outside Tyson Base is an old and previously unknown terror that even quetzals fear. And it has already begun to hunt.
It's 2001, and the WyldBoyZ are the world's hottest boy band, and definitely the world's only genetically engineered human-animal hybrid vocal group. When their producer, Dr. M, is found murdered in his hotel room, the "boyz" become the prime suspects. Las Vegas Detective Luce Delgado has only 24 hours to solve a case that goes all the way back to the secret science barge where the WyldBoyZ' journey first began - a place they used to call home.
As whispers of war echo over the plains and across the fjords, fate follows the footsteps of three people: a huntress searching for her missing son, a jarl's daughter who has rejected privilege in pursuit of battle fame, and a thrall who has cast off his chains and now fights alongside the famed mercenaries known as the Bloodsworn.
Spar Idgeson, once heir to the brotherhood of thieves has been transformed into the living stone of the new city. But his powers are failing and the criminal dragons of the Ghierdana are circling. Meanwhile, far across the sea, Carillon Thay - once a thief, a saint, a god killer; now alone and powerless - seeks the mysterious land of Khebesh, desperate to find a cure for Spar. But what hope does she have when even the gods seek vengeance against her?
A heartbroken mother sets out to save her lost daughter, through the realms of the real, of dream, and even into the underworld itself. But determination alone is not enough. For to save something precious, she must give up something precious, be it a song, a memory, or her freedom itself.
Rachel Mariana Morgan, witch-born demon, discovers that the very same acts she and her friends took to forge new powers may have released something bound by the old. With a rash of zombies, some strange new murders, and an exceedingly mysterious new demon in town, it will take everything Rachel has to counter this new threat to the world - and it may demand the sacrifice of what she holds most dear.
A dark fairy tale against a Victorian backdrop. Ella is forced to work hard as a lowly maid under the unforgiving, lecherous gaze of the man she once called stepfather, her only refuge in the books she reads by candlelight, secreted away in the library she isn't permitted to enter. Then a fairy godmother offer her seven wishes, hers to make as she pleases. But each wish comes at a price and Ella must decide whether it's one she's willing to pay...
Dr. Luke Findley is on the midnight shift at a hospital in rural Maine when Lanore McIlvrae enters his ER. He is inexplicably drawn to her...despite the fact that she is a murder suspect with a police escort. She tells him her story, beginning at the turn of the 19th century when the town was a Puritan settlement. She was consumed as a child by her love for the founder's son, Jonathan, and would do anything to be with him. But the price she pays is steep - an immortal bond that chains her to a terrible fate for all eternity.
New Liberty City, 2134. Here, Mallory streams Stellaxis's wargame SecOps on BestLife, spending more time jacked in than in the world just to eke out a hardscrabble living from tips. When a chance encounter with one of the game's rare super-soldiers leads to a side job for Mal - looking to link an actual missing girl to one of the SecOps characters, it puts her in the kind of danger she's only experienced through her avatar.
The great Stormhawk - Bourshkanya's paranoid, fascist leader - is seemingly unkillable, but for the rebellion to succeed, he must die. Celka Prochazka uses magic in ways no one believed possible. She could be the perfect resistance assassin - if she can avoid being discovered as a traitor. Gerrit Kladivo, the Stormhawk's son, is determined to end his father's tyrannical rule. But to get Celka close enough to his father, he must first prove unflinching loyalty to the regime.
The Eight Immortals have catastrophically failed to stop Kihrin's enemies, who are moving forward with their plans to free Vol Karoth, the King of Demons. Kihrin has his own ideas about how to fight back, but even if he's willing to sacrifice everything for victory, the cost may prove too high for his allies. Now they face a choice: can they save the world while saving Kihrin, too? Or will they be forced to watch as he becomes the very evil they have all sworn to destroy?
A collection of six novellas in which each story reveals a sinister secret about the mysterious small town of Goblin.
12 years after Malorie and her children rowed up the river to safety, a blindfold is still the only thing that stands between sanity and madness. One glimpse of the creatures that stalk the world will drive a person to unspeakable violence. Then she learns that someone very dear to her, someone she believed dead, may be alive. But getting her life back means returning to a world full of unknowable horrors--and risking the lives of her children again.
The Stranger Times is a weekly newspaper dedicated to the weird and the wonderful (but mostly the weird). But when tragedy strikes the paper is forced to do some serious investigating. What they discover leads to a shocking realization: some of the stories they'd previously dismissed as nonsense are in fact terrifyingly real. Soon they come face-to-face with darker forces than they could ever have imagined.
Rose Marshall died when she was sixteen years old and on her way to her high school prom. She hasn't been resting easy since then. Bobby Cross, the man who killed her, got away clean after running her off the road, and she's not the kind of girl who can let something like that slide. But now the crossroads have been destroyed, and Bobby's protections are gone. For the first time, it might be possible for Rose to defeat him.
The British band Utopia Avenue emerged from London's psychedelic scene in 1967 and embarked on a meteoric journey from the seedy clubs of Soho, a TV debut on Top of the Pops, the cusp of chart success, glory in Amsterdam, prison in Rome and a fateful American sojourn in the Chelsea Hotel, Laurel Canyon, and San Francisco during the autumn of '68. Along the way the lead guitarist must confront the demon that possesses him.
[Local author]. Antonina Beaulieu is in the glittering city of Loisail for her first Grand Season when she falls under the spell of the telekinetic performer Hector Auvray. As their romance blossoms, and he teaches her how to control her telekinetic gift, she believes a marriage proposal is imminent. Little does Antonina know that Hector and those closest to her are hiding a devastating secret that will crush her world and force her to confront who she really is and what she's willing to sacrifice.
In the year 1960, private eye John Nyquist arrives in Delirium, a city of a million borders, to pursue his strangest case yet: tracking down the stolen sentient image of faded rock'n'roll star Vince Craven. As Nyquist tracks Vince's image through Delirium, crossing a series of ever-stranger and more surreal border zones, he hears tantalizing stories of a First Border, Omata, hidden within the depths of the city.
In the thriving city of Bassa, Danso is a clever but disillusioned scholar who longs for a life beyond the rigid family and political obligations expected of the city's elite. A way out presents itself when Lilong, a skin-changing warrior, shows up wounded in his barn. She comes from the Nameless Islands - which, according to Bassa lore, don't exist - and neither should the mythical magic of ibor she wields.
As Fergus discovers that his storage unit is now filled with priceless, stolen art, the Shipyard is attacked. His friends are missing, presumably kidnapped. Accompanied by the sole friend who escaped the attack and an untrustworthy detective who suspects Fergus is the art thief, Fergus must follow the tenuous clues to locate and save his friends. The trail leads them to Enceladus, where Fergus plans to go undercover to the research stations that lie beneath the moon's thick ice sheet deep in a dark, oppressive ocean.
Val and Julie reluctantly agree when their teenage son David comes home one day asking for a Pilot, a new brain implant to help with school. Soon, Julie feels mounting pressure at work to get a Pilot to keep pace with her colleagues, leaving Val and their daughter Sophie part of the shrinking minority of people without the device. Soon Sophie and her anti-Pilot movement are pitted not only against the Pilot's powerful manufacturer but also against the people they love most.
Rick Galloway has survived mutinies, civil wars, battles against Byzantine "Romans," medieval knights, and Mongol raiders on a world where catastrophic climate change races unchecked through a 600-year cycle. Now, 13 years later, New Starmen have arrived on Tran, with dangerous gifts and star weapons of their own. Everything Rick Galloway thought he knew about his mission on Tran is about to be turned on its head. And everyone expects him to fix it.
A collection of three novellas set in the world of Pratt's Axiom space opera trilogy. These three novellas followup on some of the characters from the original series: Ashok the cyborg engineer, the machine intelligence Shall, and the alien Lantern.
Today's most popular writers produce new stories set in their most famous universes, alongside essential and seminal short fiction from past masters. With a new introduction and a short story by David Weber, the authors include Becky Chambers (Wayfarers), Curtis C. Chen (Kangaroo), Orson Scott Card (Ender), Susan R. Matthews, Larry Niven and Steven Barnes (Dream Park), Tanya Huff (Confederation), Jack Campbell (Lost Fleet) and many more.
So you thought you know the story of King Arthur and his knights? Think again. Arthur? An over-promoted gangster. Merlin? An eldritch parasite. Excalibur? A shady deal with a watery arms dealer. Britain? A clogged sewer that Rome abandoned just as soon as it could.
[Local author]. Queen Talyien's son has been stolen from her, her warlords despise her, and across the sea, a cursed prince threatens her nation with invasion in order to win her hand. Dark magic tears rifts in the sky, preparing to rain down madness, chaos, and the possibility of setting her nation aflame.
Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission - and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish. Except that right now, he doesn't know that. He can't even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it. All he knows is that he's been asleep for a very, very long time. And he's just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company.
When Murderbot discovers a dead body on Preservation Station, it knows it is going to have to assist station security to determine who the body is (was), how they were killed (that should be relatively straightforward, at least), and why (because apparently that matters to a lot of people - who knew?) Yes, the unthinkable is about to happen: Murderbot must voluntarily speak to humans! Again!
Stories set in the Freehold world. Contributors include Kevin J. Anderson and Michael Z. Williamson himself.
When the young half-goblin emperor Maia sought to learn who had killed his father and half-brothers, he turned to an obscure resident of his Court, a Prelate of Ulis and a Witness for the Dead. Thara Celehar found the truth, though it did him no good to discover it.Now Celehar lives in the city of Amalo, far from the Court though not exactly in exile. He has not escaped from politics, but his position gives him the ability to serve the common people of the city, which is his preference. He lives modestly, but his decency and fundamental honesty will not permit him to live quietly.
The story of Julie D'Aubigny is well known. Her tumultuous childhood, her powerful lovers, her celebrated voice. Connected to most of the nobility of 17th century Paris, feted for her performance, unwilling to live by the rules of her society, she took female lovers, fought duels with noblemen and fled from city to country and back again. But now the real truth can be told. She also made a deal with the devil. He gave her no powers or help, but he kept her alive for only one reason. To take revenge.
Kell Kressia is a legend, a celebrity, a hero. Aged just 17 he set out on an epic quest with a band of wizened fighters to slay the Ice Lich and save the world, but only he returned victorious. The Lich was dead, the ice receded and the Five Kingdoms were safe. But now a new terror has arisen in the north, and clearly Kell is the one to deal with it. But Kell's terrible secret is that he is no hero -- just lucky. In fact, he's a coward who has no intention of risking his life for anyone...
In the mid-21st century, the Kernel, a strange object on a five-hundred-year-orbit, is detected coming from high above the plane of the solar system. Could it be an alien artefact? An elderly ex-shuttle pilot goes to take a look and disappears. When the Kernel reappears, Earth has been transformed. A descendant of the pilot goes out to take a look at the object.
Ceda, now leader of the Shieldwives, a band of skilled desert swordswomen, works feverishly to break the curse on Sehid-Alaz, the ancient, undying king of her people. But when the combined might of Sharakhai and the desert gods corner the survivors of the Thirteenth Tribe in a mountain fastness, the very place that nearly saw their annihilation centuries ago, Ceda knows the time has come for her to lead.
Ceda, knowing Nalamae would have been reborn on her death, sets out on a quest to find her.The trail leads her to Sharakhai where, unbeknownst to her, others are searching for Nalamae as well. Ceda's quest to find her forces her into a terrible decision: work with the kings or risk Sharakhai's destruction..
End to the series begun in 1977. Even as one group remains to defend the Four Lands from the Skaar invasion, another is undertaking a perilous journey across the sea to the Skaar homeland, carrying with them a new piece of technology that could change the face of the world forever. And yet a third is trapped in a deadly realm from which there may be no escape.
Kinch Na Shannack's debt to the Takers Guild has driven him to lie in wait by the old forest road, planning to rob the next traveler that crosses his path. But next is Galva - a knight, a survivor of the brutal goblin wars, and handmaiden of the goddess of death. She is searching for her queen, missing since a distant northern city fell to giants. Unsuccessful in his robbery and lucky to escape with his life, Kinch now finds his fate entangled with Galva's.
Geary's warships must escort a diplomatic and scientific mission across the dangerous, disintegrating remnants of the Syndicate Worlds empire. But even if he can make it to Midway Star System, the gateway to alien-controlled space, Geary will face former Syndicate officials who have rebelled and regard the Alliance with deep suspicion. And that will be the easy part...
After her young daughter is killed in a tragic accident, CIA intelligence analyst Quinn Mitchell hopes to find a new start in her latest assignment: investigating a series of bizarre international assassinations whose victims have been found with numeric codes tattooed, burned, or carved into their flesh. As Quinn follows the killer's trail across the globe, always one body behind, she begins uncovering disturbing connections between the murders - and herself.
Sheltering beneath Das Kagel, the cloud-scraping structure rumoured to be the Tower of Babel, the sacred Monastery of the Eastern Gate descends into bedlam. Their ancient oracle, Quite Testiyont - whose prophesies helped protect the church - has died, leaving the monks vulnerable to the war raging between the living and the dead. Tasked by the High Church to deliver a new oracle, Barry Follett and his group of hired mercenaries are forced to confront wicked giants and dangerous sirens on their mission, keeping the divine creature alive by feeding it marrow and confessing their darkest sins.
Assigned to the cislunar cruiser U.S.S. Borman as a search-and-rescue officer, Ensign Hunter is resigned to a life of rescuing wayward spacefarers and derelict satellites. But his fortunes appear to change when a billionaire couple goes missing on their way to survey a near-Earth asteroid and the Borman is dispatched to bring them home. But as they approach the asteroid, the Borman itself becomes hopelessly disabled.
After two years and seven months biding her time on Anima, her home ark, it is finally time for Ophelia to act, to put what she has discovered in the Book of Farouk to use. Under an assumed identity she travels to Babel, a cosmopolitan and thoroughly modern ark that is the jewel of the universe. Will her talent as a reader suffice to avoid being lured into a deadly trap by her ever more fearful adversaries? Will she ever see Thorn, her betrothed, again?
Evie Cross signs on as a temp for a small consultancy whose principal, Misha Meserov, specializes in breaking up relationships. Misha is tall, infuriatingly handsome, and effortlessly charismatic - he can make almost anyone, man or woman, fall into bed with him. And he often does. But the more Evie is exposed to Misha's scandalous world, the more she becomes convinced that he's hiding something...
Iseult has found her heartsister Safi at last, but their reunion is brief. For Iseult to stay alive, she must flee Cartorra while Safi remains. And though Iseult has plans to save her friend, they will require her to summon magic more dangerous than anything she has ever faced before. Meanwhile, the Bloodwitch Aeduan is beset by forces he cannot understand. And Vivia - rightful queen of Nubrevna - finds herself without a crown or home.
Two bloodlines - the Corvivios clan and the Soldavere clan - are in full possession of the lush and benign world of Verano. The youngest members of each family - Johrun Corvivios and Minka Soldavere - are slated to wed. All looks rosy for the joint family enterprises. But then the happy future is dramatically and tragically overturned! Now Johrun must undertake a desperate quest across the stars to reclaim his birthright.
Toure, a twenty-something Cambridge coder wakes up one morning to find himself seemingly the only person left in the city - until he finds Robbie and Carol, two equally disoriented Harvard freshmen. But where did everyone go -- and how did the city become overgrown with vegetation overnight, and how wild animals with no fear of humans came to roam the streets?
Princess Sun has grown up in the shadow of her mother, Queen-Marshal Eirene, who expelled the invaders and build Chaonia into a magnificent republic. But the cutthroat ambassador corps and conniving noble houses have never ceased to scheme - and they have plans that need Sun to be removed as heir, or better yet, killed.
Mercia, 788 AD. King Offa's youngest daughter Eadburh is destined for an arranged marriage, but she loves a Welsh prince she can never be matched with and who is quickly and cruelly taken from her. Offa's Dyke, 2021. In a cottage hidden amongst the misty Welsh hills of Offa's Dyke, Bea Dalloway is called to help Simon Armstrong, who is searching for peace. Instead he finds himself disturbed by unsettling noises and visions. It isn't long before Bea is also swept up by haunting dreams.
An expedition is sent to the New World to see just what might be happening there and what might be done. They are armed with their technology, including a radio and an airship. More importantly, they are armed with the knowledge of future history and their determination not to repeat the errors of their past. What could possibly go wrong?
Recovering from a disorienting course of Memory Pacification Treatment, Astra struggles to focus on her overriding goals - to find her Code father and avenge the death of her Shelter mother, Hokma. But can the CONC compound director, the ambiguous Major Thames, protect her from the hawk-eyed attentions of her old enemies? And who in this world of competing agendas can she trust?
Outside Astra's fortified Gaian homeland, an infertility crisis is threatening the survival of the human race, while the world's reliance on rare earth metals is infuriating the ancient spirits of the planet. Astra may have found her voice as a messenger of cosmic harmony - but is anyone listening?
16 summers old Lynx and his best friend Quiller are members of the Sealion People - archaic humans known as Denisovans. They live in a world growing colder, a world filled with monstrous predators that hunt them for food. When they flee to a new land, they meet a strange old man who impossibly seems to be the last of the Jemen. He tells Lynx the only way he can save his world is by sacrificing himself to the last true god, a quantum computer named Quancee.
July 1942. The Nazis unleash an occult war in an attempt to tip the scales: whoever reunites the four sacred Swastikas will win. Double agent Tristan Marcas sets out in search of the Romanov treasure, which is said to harbour the final relic. He's got no time to lose, as the battle is about to come to a head...
America has devolved into a full-on dragon apocalypse. Smoke eaters are banned and have gone into hiding to avoid being held prisoner by the soldiers. Guiellermo Contreras is a private in the NUSA, and when he's accused of potentially being a smoke eater upon pain of death, he escapes and sets out to find the heroes who disappeared years before. But what he discovers is that the NUSA has been working on something unthinkable, and it's going to take more than a few smoke eaters to stop them.
This anthology features LGBTQ+ science fiction and fantasy short fiction from the last decade and includes characters, perspectives, and stories that span the rainbow. Kiernan, Muir, Cipri, Tidhar, Hopkinson, Anders, McGuire, Kushner, and Valente are among the many contributors.
Lyra, Queen of Rondelmar, has fought enemies without and within, dealt with grief and loss, embraced forbidden magic, found her father and borne a child - and still it isn't enough. Her enemies are on the march and the Rondian Empire is collapsing. Ervyn Naxius is now laughing as the world of Urte tears itself apart. Kings and priests dance to his tune and his daemonic followers are spreading through the lands, but still he isn't satisfied.
Dashryn Cowl, erstwhile sorcerer of the Imperial College is now a fugitive from the Bolgravian Empire. So when he gets his hands on a map showing a place outside the known lands rich in istariol, the mineral that fuels sorcery, he sees a way back to power. There's only one problem: it means masquerading as an Imperial Cartomancer (an instant death sentence) and finding some dupes to help him mine the istariol in secret, no questions asked.
Richards and Klein are a 22nd century Holmes and Watson...except Richards is a highly advanced AI and Klein is a German ex-military cyborg. Together, they must journey through the Great Firewall of China into the renegade digital realm of Reality 36, in search of a missing AI rights activist. But what they find will threaten their entire world.
The reality of preserving the Sisterhood of Aytrium's magical bloodline horrifies Elfreda Raughn. She wants out, whatever the cost. So when a shadowy cabal approaches Elfreda with an offer of escape, she leaps at the opportunity. As their spy, she gains access to the highest reaches of the Sisterhood, and enters a glittering world of opulent parties, subtle deceptions, and unexpected bloodshed.
Magic has a price, and Tessa is learning that it is both steep and deadly. The phoenix wizard who could train her has deserted Tessa. She has friends among the Iron dwarves and harpies, even a lesser demon, and the mysterious Malender with his sinister whip of thorns and fire. But she is still faced with a delicate balancing act.Then her mother incurs the wrath of the magical world when she writes a dissertation exposing its reality.
A collection of her dark fairy tales.
1468. A young priest, Christopher Fairfax, arrives in a remote English village to conduct the funeral of his predecessor. The land around is strewn with ancient artefacts - coins, fragments of glass, human bones - which the old parson used to collect. Did his obsession with the past lead to his death? As Fairfax is drawn more deeply into the isolated community, everything he believes - about himself, his faith and the history of his world - is tested to destruction.
The new master vampire of Cincinnati has arrived - and she wants Rachel Morgan out. No matter where Rachel goes, Constance is there - threatening Rachel's allies, causing city-wide chaos, and, to add insult to injury, even forcing Rachel out of her current quarters. A witch-born demon can't stand against the old undead - at least, not alone.
In the lands of Bethel, where the Prophet's word is law, Immanuelle Moore's very existence is blasphemy, due to her mother's union with an outsider of a different race, so Immanuelle does her best to lead a life of submission, devotion, and absolute conformity. Then a mishap lures her into the forbidden Darkwood, where the spirits of powerful witches killed by the first prophet reveal to Immanuelle the journal of her dead mother..
Born into a post-war circus family, our nameless star was unwanted and forgotten, abandoned in the shadows of the big top. Until the bright light of Serendipity Wilson threw her into focus.Now an adult, haunted by an incident in which a child was lost from the circus, our narrator, a tightrope artiste, weaves together her spellbinding tales of circus legends, earthy magic and folklore, all in the hope of finding the child...
Ten Low is an ex-army medic, one of many convicts eking out a living at the universe's edge. One night, attempting to atone for her sins, she pulls a teenage girl - the sole survivor - from the wreck of a spaceship. But Gabriella Ortiz is no ordinary girl. The result of a military genetics programme, she is a decorated Army General, from the opposing side of the war to Ten.
When a child goes missing in Edinburgh's darkest streets, young Ropa investigates. She'll need to call on Zimbabwean magic as well as her Scottish pragmatism to hunt down clues. But as shadows lengthen, will the hunter become the hunted? When ghosts talk, she will listen...
In the aftermath of a deadly outbreak, a city at the tip of Africa is losing its mind, with residents experiencing hallucinations and paranoia. During these strange days, Faith works as a fulltime corpse collector and a freelance "truthologist," putting together desperate pieces of information to solve problems. But after Faith agrees to help an orphaned girl find her abducted baby brother, she begins to wonder whether the boy is even real.
Multiverse travel is now possible, but no one can visit a world where their counterpart is still alive. 372 of Cara's counterparts have perished. But on this Earth Cara has survived and, identified as an outlier, is chosen to collect off-world data for the Eldridge Institute. But trouble finds Cara when one of her eight remaining doppelgangers dies under mysterious circumstances, plunging her into a new world with an old secret.
L.A.'s Little Cairo neighborhood has suddenly been overrun by violent spirits, the reason reaching back to an unsolved murder of the 1970s. To prevent the Little Cairo haunting from consuming the city, Stark must piece together the connections between the Zero Lodge - a club of adrenaline junkies - and a missing angel last seen in a Hollywood porn palace.
Conri, former Crown Prince of Oriel, claimed the hand that wears the Abiding Ring, but the prophecy remains unfulfilled. Queen Euthalia of Calanthe returned to her island kingdom, but broken in mind and body. With the blood of war unleashing ancient terrors, Calanthe isn't the haven it once was. Lia must use her magical bond with Calanthe to save their people while Con fights to hold off the vengeful Emperor Anure and his wizards. Con and Lia will have to trust in each other - and in love - to fend off ultimate disaster.
Four novellas: Mr. Harrigan's Phone, The Life of Chuck, Rat, and If It Bleeds.
In the swirling clouds of Venus, the families of la colonie live on floating plant-like trawlers, salvaging what they can in the fierce acid rain and crackling storms. Outside is dangerous, but humankind's hold on the planet is fragile and they spend most of their days simply surviving. But Venus carries its own secrets, too. In the depths, there is a wind that shouldn't exist. And the House of Styx wants to harness it.
The story of the original founding of the nation itself by the legendary Baron Valdemar.
13 year old Prince Kyril and Mags and Amily's 14 year old son Tory "share" the Gift of Farsight - although neither of them are Chosen. Their Gifts become crucial when Mags gets a desperate message from his cousin Bey, the head of the enigmatic assassin-tribe, the Sleepgivers. Bey's eldest daughter has been kidnapped, but he doesn't know why or by whom. Tory is certain that if anyone can find her, he can. But that will mean traveling out of Valdemar into an unknown, dangerous country.And it will mean taking a Royal Prince with him.
England, the year 2900 CE. Sentenced to decades of imprisonment, Isobel believes that life as she knows it is entirely over. Or is it? When she's offered a time-travelling mission back in the time of the Crusades, she has the chance to change the course of history - and free herself in the process. But the perils of medieval France are like nothing she's encountered before, and Isobel realises too late that the stakes are far higher than she ever imagined.
Apprentice Magician Kyron is assigned to the late Emperor's honour guard escorting his body on the long road back to the capital. Mistrusted and feared by his own people, even a magician's power may fail when enemies emerge from the forests, for whoever is in control of the Emperor's body, controls the succession. Seven lives and seven deaths to seal the fate of the Empire.
On a giant artificial world surrounding an artificial sun, one man - a lucidor, a keeper of the peace, a policeman - is on the hunt. Separated by massive seas, the various maps dotted on the surface of this world rarely contact each other. But something has begun to infiltrate the edges of the lucidor's map, something that genetically alters animals and plants and turns them into killers. Only the lucidor knows the depths to which his quarry will sink in order to survive, only the lucidor can capture him.
The 23rd century is a time of optimism, expansion and diversity in the lunar colonies - but an age of repression on Earth. The clash of ideologies explodes into the Quiet War. The colonies and their bid for independence is defeated -- but the struggle continues -- and now there's talk of another war.
Kendra Donovan's path to professional success hits a speed bump during a disastrous raid where half her team is murdered, a mole in the FBI is uncovered, and she herself is severely wounded. She travels to Aldrich Castle in England to hunt down the man responsible for the deaths of her teammates. She runs into a stairwell that promises an escape from her pursuer, but when she stumbles out again, she emerges into the year 1815.
Former FBI agent Kendra Donovan's attempts to return to the 21st century have failed, leaving her stuck at Aldridge Castle in 1815. And in London, the Duke of Aldridge's nephew Alec - Kendra's confidante and lover - has come under suspicion for murdering his former mistress, Lady Dover, who was found viciously stabbed with a stiletto, her face carved up in a bizarre and brutal way.
Pocket of Dog Snogging washes up on the sun-bleached shores of Greece, where he hopes to dazzle the Duke with his comedic brilliance and become his trusted fool. Instead he finds himself on the run from the Duke -- and soon stumbles into the wooded realm of the fairy king Oberon, who, as luck would have it, IS short a fool. Puck has been murdered. Pocket can have the job -- and his life -- if he can solve the case.
A virus has wiped out 95 per cent of the world's population in just a few weeks, leaving the remaining 5 per cent to stay alive in a world devoid of the most basic amenities - electricity, transport and medicine. Abby Grant, widowed by the plague, moves through this new dark age with determination, sustained by hope that her son, who fled his boarding school at the onset, has survived.
The internet has been replaced with an evolved, augmented-reality version called The Grid. Harrigan, a hard-drinking private detective living as off-Grid as possible, is about to be evicted from his apartment when a stranger shows up and involves him in the struggle to find and control a program/entity called Mirror, Mirror, which has the capacity to merge The Grid and reality.
The code has been cracked. The secrets of the Casimir gates have been revealed. But the alien intelligence known as Rainier and her clones are still out there, hell-bent on humanity's destruction. And only Sanda can stop them. With the universe's most powerful ship under her command and some of the most skilled hackers, fighters, and spies on her team, it will still take everything she has to find the key to taking down an immortal enemy with seemingly limitless bodies, resources, and power.
Novella. An anonymous representative of the Devil, once a high-ranking Duke of Hell and now a committed underachiever, has spent the last forever of an eternity leading a perfectly tedious existence distracting monks from their liturgical devotions. It's interminable, but he prefers it that way, now that he's been officially designated by Downstairs as "fragile." No, he won't elaborate. All that changes when he finds himself ensnared, along with a sadistic exorcist, in a labyrinthine plot to subvert the very nature of Good and Evil.
After Earth spun through the comet's debris field and the sky rained fire, the town of Northfall, Minnesota will never be the same. Meteors cratered hardwood forests and annihilated homes, and among the wreckage a new metal was discovered. This "omnimetal" has properties that make it world-changing as an energy source...and a weapon.
AD 573. As one of the bloodiest battles of early medieval Scottish history abandons its survivors to the wilds of Scotland, Lailoken and his men must flee to exile in the mountains of the Lowlands, while nine-year-old Angharad must summon all Lailoken has taught her to follow her own destiny through the mysterious, mystical land of the Picts.
Joe Tournier has a bad case of amnesia. His first memory is of stepping off a train in the 19th-century French colony of England. The only clue Joe has about his identity is a century-old postcard of a Scottish lighthouse that arrives in London the same month he does. Written in illegal English-instead of French-the postcard is signed only with the letter "M," but Joe is certain whoever wrote it knows him far better than he currently knows himself, and he's determined to find the writer.
1888. Thaniel Steepleton, an unassuming translator, and Keita Mori, the watchmaker who remembers the future, travel to Japan. Thaniel must find out why the staff of the British legation have been seeing ghosts. Then Mori vanishes. Meanwhile Mori's old friend Takiko Pepperharrow is investigating strange happenings in a frozen labour camp in Northern Japan.
In her forest-veiled pagan village, Evike is the only woman without power, making her an outcast clearly abandoned by the gods. Thus, when soldiers arrive from the Holy Order of Woodsmen to claim a pagan girl for the king's blood sacrifice, the village chooses her. But when monsters attack the Woodsmen and their captive en route, slaughtering everyone but Evike and the cold, one-eyed captain, they have no choice but to rely on each other.
All-new short stories set in the aftermath of the zombie apocalypse series BLACK TIDE RISING. Includes stories by Kevin J. Anderson, Brendan DuBois, Jody Lynn Nye, Michael Z. Williamson, Kacey Ezell, Mike Massa, and many more.
After the Dark One fell, the world went back to normal - for everyone but the Five. After all, what do you do when you're the most famous people on Earth, your only education was in magical destruction, and your purpose in life is now fulfilled? Then, on the tenth anniversary of the Dark One's defeat, something unthinkable happens: one of the Chosen Ones dies. When the others gather for the funeral, they discover the Dark One's ultimate goal was much bigger than they, the government, or even prophecy could have foretold - bigger than the world itself.
Exiled by her despotic brother when he claimed their father's kingdom, Malini spends her days trapped in the Hirana: an ancient, cliffside temple that was once the source of the magical deathless waters, but is now little more than a decaying ruin. A servant in the regent's household, Priya makes the treacherous climb to the Hirana every night to clean Malini's chambers. She is happy to play the role of a drudge so long as it keeps anyone from discovering her ties to the temple and the dark secret of her past.
The Lunar colonists made a great discovery and perceive it as their own. Finders keepers and possession being nine tenths of the law is how things are seen on the Moon. But the governments of the Earth don't quite see eye-to-eye with the Lunarian philosophy. As far as the Earth is concerned, they paid for everything on the Moon, so it belongs to them. There is only one solution: Battle Luna!
You never forget your first time with a vampire. Witness the bewildering array of complex vampire codes of conduct, dark ritual and dating practices as they chat up the locals and engage in the most erotic encounters you will sink your teeth into this side of un-Death. Because vampires never really die, do they?
Goldie has grown distant and inconsolable. Driven by grief, she devises a diabolical plan using a human sacrifice to resurrect what she has lost. When Liyana unexpectedly discovers what Goldie intends to do, she agrees to help if Goldie will try another way, without sacrificing a life. Returning to Everwhere, they combine their powerful magic to bring back what Goldie has lost. But something goes terribly wrong, and Scarlet is showing signs of being possessed by an evil spirit.
Literature professor Dr. Addie Cox is puzzled why a famously eccentric billionaire tech genius wants her to guide a mercenary strike team sent to infiltrate his island retreat off the US northwest coast. Until she understands what Lang has built: Insula Mirabilis, an isolated resort where tourists will one day pay big bucks for a convincing, high-tech-powered fantasy-world experience, complete with dragons, unicorns, and, yes, magic.
Jordan Baker grows up in the most rarefied circles of 1920s American society - she has money, education, a killer golf handicap, and invitations to some of the most exclusive parties of the Jazz Age. She's also queer and Asian, a Vietnamese adoptee treated as an exotic attraction by her peers, while the most important doors remain closed to her. But the world is full of wonders: infernal pacts and dazzling illusions, lost ghosts and elemental mysteries. In all paper is fire, and Jordan can burn the cut paper heart out of a man. She just has to learn how.
In the world of IN FURY BORN. Rear Admiral Terrence Murphy is a Heart Worlder, his family part of the Five Hundred. There is no end to how high he can rise in the Republic's power structure. All he has to do is successfully complete a risk-free military "governorship" in the backwater Fringe System of New Dublin without rocking the boat. But the people sending him to New Dublin have miscalculated, because Terrence Murphy is a man who believes in honour.
Golem Chava and jinni Ahmad pretend to be human - just two more immigrants in the bustling world of 1900s Manhattan. Each has unwittingly affected the humans around them. Park Avenue heiress Sophia Winston, whose brief encounter with Ahmad left her with a strange illness that makes her shiver with cold, travels to the Middle East to seek a cure. Back in New York, in a tenement on the Lower East Side, a little girl named Kreindel helps her rabbi father build a golem they name Yossele.
Kas is a junior researcher on a fact-finding mission to old Earth. But when a con-artist tricks her into wagering a large sum of money belonging to her university on the outcome of a manned robot arena battle she becomes drawn into the seedy underworld of old Earth politics and state-sponsored battle-droid prizefights.
As the only Second Daughter born in centuries, Red has one purpose - to be sacrificed to the Wolf in the Wood in the hope he'll return the world's captured gods. She is almost relieved to go, plagued by a dangerous power she can't control. But the legends lie. The Wolf is a man, not a monster. Her magic is a calling, not a curse. And if she doesn't learn how to use it, the monsters the gods have become will swallow the Wilderwood - and her world - whole.
Will Peter Holman rescue his sister Kait, or will she be the one to rescue him? Will Chloe Cary revive her acting career with the help of the princeling Treble, or will the insurgents take both their lives? Will Whistle or Twoclicks wind up in charge of Earth, and how will the Mother, who runs all of S'hudon, choose between them? And the most important question of all: who are the Old Ones that left all that technology behind for the S'hudonni - and what if they come back?
Esa and fellow Justified agent Jane Kamali have been traveling across the known universe, searching for children who share Esa's supernatural gifts. Then they find themselves on the tail of a mysterious being with impossible powers who will stop at nothing to get his hands on the very children that Esa and Jane are trying to save.
Simon and Miriamele's allies in Hernystir have made a pact with the dreadful Queen of the Norns to allow her armies to cross into mortal lands. The ancient, powerful nation of Nabban is on the verge of bloody civil war, and the fierce nomads of the Thrithings grasslands have begun to mobilize, united by superstitious fervor and their age-old hatred of the city-dwellers. And over it all looms the mystery of the Witchwood Crown, the deadly puzzle that Simon, Miriamele, and their allies must solve if they wish to survive.
Tau and his Queen, desperate to delay the impending attack on the capital by the indigenous people of Xidda, craft a dangerous plan. If Tau succeeds, the Queen will have the time she needs to assemble her forces and launch an all out assault on her own capital city, where her sister is being propped up as the 'true' Queen of the Omehi. If the city can be taken, if Tsiora can reclaim her throne, and if she can reunite her people then the Omehi have a chance to survive the onslaught.
Wendy Darling grew up. She has a husband and a young daughter called Jane, a life in London. But one night, after all these years, Peter Pan returns. Wendy finds him outside her daughter's window, looking to claim a new mother for his Lost Boys. But instead of Wendy, he takes Jane. Now a grown woman, a mother, a patient and a survivor, Wendy must follow Peter back to Neverland to rescue her daughter and finally face the darkness at the heart of the island...
Humanity fights for its future as Godzilla and Kong embark on a path of destruction that will see the two most powerful forces of nature on the planet collide in an all-out war!
Dr. Chelli Lona Aphra, rogue archaeologist, is in trouble again. A pioneer in the field of criminal xenoarchaeology, Aphra recognizes no law, has no fear, and possesses no impulse control. To her, the true worth of the galactic relics she discovers isn't found in a museum but in an arsenal. This viewpoint has led to a lot of misunderstandings.
Dr. Timothy Hoenikker arrives on Pala Station, a Weyland-Yutani facility. Lured there by the promise of alien artifacts, instead he finds a warped bureaucracy and staff of misfits testing the effects of Xenomorph bio-materials on living creatures. Unbeknownst to the personnel, however, there is an infiltrator among them whose actions could spell disaster.
The Dark Lady and her forces now work in the shadows as both the Horde and Alliance, including her own sister, Alleria, race to uncover her next move. Struggling to shoulder the crushing weight of leadership, King Anduin entrusts the void elf and High Exarch Turalyon to uncover Sylvanas's whereabouts..
The original script to the audio production. As Dooku courts a new apprentice, the hidden truth of the Sith Lord's past begins to come to light. Caught between the world of the Jedi, the ancient responsibilities of his lost home, and the alluring power of the Sith relics, Dooku struggles to stay in the light - even as the darkness begins to fall.
Three classic Spider-Man novels in one volume: THE DARKEST HOURS by Jim Butcher, DOWN THESE MEAN STREETS by Keith R.A. DeCandido, and DROWNED IN THUNDER by Christopher L. Bennett.
Three novellas in the role-playing world, one each from Genevieve Gornichec, Cassandra Khaw, and Caitlin Starling.
Star Wars Insider, the official magazine of the Star Wars saga, presents a collection of exclusive short stories. Includes fiction written by Star Wars authors such as Jason Fry, Matthew Stover, John Ostrander, and Paul S. Kemp, and also includes art from such Star Wars interpreters as Joe Corroney, Brian Rood, Jan Duursema, and Magali Villeneuve.
On the thirteenth day of Secundus, the bombardment of Terra began... With the solar defences overcome through the devastating strength of the Traitor armada and the power of the warp, Horus launches his assault on the Throneworld in earnest. Between the plague weapons of Mortarion and the fury of Angron, the defenders face a losing battle.
Mal and the crew take receipt of a sealed crate which they are being paid to transport to Badger, no questions asked. Yet once their cargo is safely stowed aboard, River insists Mal should "space" it out of the airlock, for it contains, she insists, ghosts. With supplies running low, the crew desperately need another pay day, but soon find themselves paralysed by hallucinations of their deepest hopes and desires, so vivid they cannot be distinguished from reality.
In a desperate attempt to prevent the artificial intelligence known as Control from seizing crucial information that could destroy all sentient life, Commander Michael Burnham donned the "Red Angel" time-travel suit and guided the USS Discovery into the future and out of harm's way. But something has gone terribly wrong...
The Ascendancy is home to the enigmatic Chiss and the Nine Ruling Families that lead them. After a baffling attack it dispatches one of its brightest young military officers to root out the unseen assailants - a recruit born of no title, but adopted into the powerful family of the Mitth and given the name Thrawn. As Thrawn's first command probes deeper into the vast stretch of space his people call the Chaos, he realizes that the mission he has been given is not what it seems.
Thrawn has led the Chiss to victory and brought glory to the House of Mitth, but the true threat to the Ascendancy has not yet been extinguished. Their foes do not send threats or ultimatums, do not mass ships on the edge of the Chaos. Their weapons come cloaked in smiles and generosity: Gifts offered freely. Services granted unconditionally. Across the Ascendancy, seemingly inconsequential events could herald the doom of the Chiss.
While attempting to settle in as commandant of Starfleet Academy, Admiral James T. Kirk must suddenly contend with the controversial, turbulent integration of an alien warrior caste into the student body - and quickly becomes embroiled in conflict when the Academy controversy escalates to murder.
The 13 year behind the scenes struggle to make the show: the uncensored story of Game of Thrones, from the creators' first meetings with George R. R. Martin and HBO through the series finale, including all the on-camera battles, off-camera efforts, and the many controversies in between. The book also features more than fifty candid new interviews, rare and stunning photos, and unprecedented access to the producers, cast, and crew.
Based on the podcast. Rabbits is a mysterious alternate reality game so vast it uses the entire world as its canvas. Since the game started in 1959, ten iterations have appeared and nine winners have been declared. The identities of these winners are unknown. So is their reward. K, a Rabbits obsessive, is approached by billionaire Alan Scarpio, who says that something has gone wrong with the game and that K needs to fix it before the 11th iteration starts, or the whole world will pay the price.