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Stalemate by Thomas Webb


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Ella


Samantha Evans - 2019
    King Breen, Liam's father, and Cullen, Liam's brother, believe that true honor is achieved once they slay a dragon. Liam believes that dragons are majestic and do not deserve to die. King Breen, Liam’s father, brings Liam along on an expedition to slay a dragon. On one of the nights of the expedition, Liam rescued a dragon’s egg. Liam decides to care for it, and it hatches on Liam’s birthday. Tragedy strikes, which leads to Liam having to leave Derzeli, and Liam goes on the run with the help of Ella the dragon. Ella helps him escape, and runs to a barren wasteland where he saw himself to becoming a hermit for the rest of his life. But due to an event happening with the help of a new friend, and a childhood friend he has no choice but to return home. Having to make the decision to run away from his destiny, or embrace it, the destiny of a king.

Ice and Monsters (The Lost Book 1)


Peter Nealen - 2022
    Silent. Deadly… Hunted.Recon Marine Conor McCall didn’t expect action during his training op in the icy waters off Norway. But when a bizarre summer fog engulfed his boat, he and his team found themselves in a pitched fight against strange, cruel monsters emerging from the coastal depths of the North Sea.That was just the beginning.Stranded in a barren land of mountains, glaciers, and black pines, far from home and unable to contact the world they came from, the Marines must prepare for war against murderous barbarians, wicked sorcerers, and foul creatures summoned from the oldest, deepest, and darkest pits of hell.When even their allies are enemies, the Recon Marines must do what they have always done: adapt or die. But with a world of ice and monsters seeking to destroy them, every second is mission-critical.

Scavenger Girl: Season of Atchem


Jennifer Arntson - 2017
    There is no question that her family's bond is strong, but the law of the Authority is stronger...and soon it will come to collect her. After all, the family is on borrowed time already.When a night of torment and truth reveals well kept secrets, Una takes new freedoms - free from the Authority, her family, and possibly her fate. Pulled between the life she's always known and a world where status and rituals are everything, Una struggles to understand a culture that has rejected all she holds dear. As Atchem comes to an end and she learns who she really is, will Una find the courage to do what it takes to ensure her family's survival, or will she find the faith to follow her heart?

Nightmare City


Jack Conner - 2014
     Lavorgna is a city of fog and shadows, undead servants soaring zeppelins, where mad scientists prowl the alleys, mob bosses strive for power and the dreaded Guild of Alchemists holds the land in an iron grip, while below the city lies a network of black caverns embedded with the ruins of an ancient race known as the Elders that worshipped Lovecraftian horrors. To survive and save the world from an unimaginable fate, Katya must navigate all these dangers and more. Running from the loan shark, she seeks out the local mob boss Ravic, only to learn that he’s embroiled in a vicious gang war with his rival Loqrin, a conflict that has supernatural overtones. A new horror has gripped the city, with mysterious creatures called haunts killing people by the dozen, and Ravic believes Loqrin is behind it. If Katya wants Ravic’s help, she must find out what Loqrin is up to – and stop him! To do this, Katya must use all her thieving skills and cunning, because if she doesn’t and Loqrin accomplishes his endgame, the whole world will suffer an awful fate. No pressure, Kat.

The Storm Beyond The Tides


Jonathan Cullen - 2019
    War is on the horizon but on Monk Island, Maine life goes on as usual. As the daughter of a lobsterman, Ellie Ames’ future seems limited until a mysterious German couple comes off the ferry with their nineteen-year-old son. From the moment she meets Karl Brink, the two become inseparable and not everyone approves because locals are suspicious of outsiders. Ellie ignores their scorn, however, and the secret she learns about Karl’s family makes her even more determined to be with him. The magical summer ends when the Brinks suddenly have to go home. And although Karl promises to return in the fall, by then Europe is at war. Two years pass and Ellie has all but given up hope when she gets a letter in the mail that will change her life forever.The Storm Beyond The Tides is the story of the unlikely romance between a small-town girl and a German on the eve of the Second World War and explores a frightening time in America’s past—when U-Boats prowled the East Coast and put small, coastal communities on the frontline of a global conflict.

Webley and The World Machine


Zachary Paul Chopchinski - 2019
    Let the war begin.Deep in the belly of a cave lies a door to a mechanical world that will change two lives forever.Webley and the steam-powered creations of the World Machine keep the Earth turning. But, when Adal and Arija unknowingly set the gears in motion on a fierce civil war, they could destroy billions of lies. Including their own.Adal and Arija have already lost so much, they can't lose each other too. But, when they're forced to fight a creature that couldn't possibly exist, they must adapt or they'll lose the only people they have left.

Renegade Redhead


F.E. Arliss - 2017
    Her off-the-charts military testing gets her placed on an experimental ship bound for the outer reaches of known space. Once in the void, her willingness to question authority, uninhibited behavior, love of ancient ‘rock and roll’ music, and absolute sense of right and wrong, put her in disfavor with the ship’s crew. After rescuing an enormous alien war-dog, then blowing an alien slaver camp sky-high with her own brand of energy magic, Sasha is considered a freak of nature and disavowed. Set adrift in space, she collects a family of like-wise disenfranchised, yet talented, aliens and sets out to command her own future, ship, company, and planet. Nothing will stop this renegade redhead once she’s on a roll. For lovers of science fiction, science fiction and fantasy, chick lit, romance science fiction, romance action and adventure, space opera, womens fiction and anyone who admires a good woman doing what she wants.

Ack-Ack Macaque: The Complete Trilogy


Gareth L. Powell - 2017
    Every day the cynical, cigar-chomping, hard-drinking monkey climbs into his Spitfire to do battle with the waves of German ninjas parachuting over the gentle fields of Kent. But life is not all the joyous rattle of machine guns and the roar of the engine, as Ack-Ack is about to find out… Because it is not 1944. It is the 21st century, in a world where France and Germany merged in the late 1950s, where nuclear-powered Zeppelins circle the globe, where technology is rapidly changing humanity, and Ack-Ack has lived his whole life in a videogame. Ex-journalist Victoria Valois finds herself drawn into a deadly game of cat and mouse with the man who butchered her husband and stole his electronic soul. The heir to the British throne is on the run after an illegal break-in at a research laboratory, and Ack-Ack has been rudely awakened from his game world to find the doomsday clock ticking towards Armageddon… Two unlikely heroes and one mightily pissed-off monkey come together in a sci-fi trilogy full of action, adventure, bananas and bottles of rum. Includes the original Ack-Ack Macaque short story and a brand new epilogue, The Last Macaque.

Shadows of the Gods


S.M. Schmitz - 2016
    When they trap Selena in an alleyway in New Orleans, she is ready to admit defeat. But an unfamiliar demigod rescues her, and the more she learns about Cameron, the more she discovers their common bonds may be the key to unraveling her own mysterious history. In the first book of The Unbreakable Sword series, Selena and Cameron must not only evade the New Pantheon, which is ruthlessly hunting the remaining gods and their descendants, but an angry Aztec god that wants Selena’s power to himself. And they will discover in the impending final battle of the gods, no one can be trusted.

Bronze Gods


A.A. Aguirre - 2013
    The native fae who refused to treat with the invaders faded; their bodies withered and died, stranding them as hungry, angry spirits that haunt the countryside.That means there’s always trouble brewing in Dorstaad.Janus Mikani and Celeste Ritsuko work for the Criminal Investigation Department, keeping citizens safe from things that go bump in the night. He’s a hardboiled cynic with an uncanny sixth sense; she’s determined to justify her promotion as the first female detective in her division. Together, they’re trying to keep a black tide from drowning the city.But when the second body surfaces, murdered with the same type of infernal device, the entire CID must face the truth. There’s a madman on the loose, twining magic and blood… and only Mikani and Ritsuko can unravel the intricate, lethal conspiracy before the Royale killer completes his macabre plan, unleashing old, forbidden magic on an unsuspecting populace. If the maniac succeeds, it could mean the end of everything…

Imhotep


Jerry Dubs - 2010
     Stumbling in the dark of an unfinished tomb beneath the sands of Saqqara, American tourist Tim Hope unknowingly passes through a time portal that leads to ancient Egypt — a time before the Sphinx, before the great pyramids of Giza, and long before the loss of his beloved Addy. When he discovers that two other Americans preceded him through the time portal, Tim immerses himself in the ancient world to search for them. As he becomes more comfortable with the simpler, more immediate land, he finds himself irresistibly attracted to the delicate Meryt, a wbt-priestess for the god Re. Learning that a seven-year famine has led to a plot to overthrow King Djoser, Tim discovers that his fate, the lives of the two Americans and the future of Egypt rest in the hands of the legendary Imhotep, master architect of the Step Pyramid, renowned physician and intimate adviser to King Djoser. Downloaded by more than 100,000 readers, “Imhotep" is the first book in an acclaimed four-book series about the ancient Egyptian architect Imhotep. The second book in the series is "The Buried Pyramid." The third book is "The Forest of Myrrh." The fourth book is "The Field of Reeds."

Alignment


H.G. Suren - 2015
    A sunless and moonless sky is covered with an enormous barrier that prevents any view of the heavens.And silence, pervasive and absolute, reigns. Nothing stirs. The air is oppressive and there is no wind, not even the softest breeze.As far as the five friends can tell, there isn’t another living thing on earth other than them, neither animal nor plant. What happened to life on Earth while they slept? Are they all that's left, these five closest of friends? Is humanity really gone? Are they really still on Earth or have they been transported elsewhere -- another planet, heaven, hell, pawns in a sophisticated computer game? Is it all just their imagination?Aram believes they aren't dead. He believes if there is a way into the Silent World, then there must be a way out. He must convince his friends to stay focused and put up a worthy fight to find their way back to the reality they once knew. He can't give up, because somewhere out there, beyond their frightening new world, is a new-born son waiting for his Daddy's return.The debut novel from H.G. Suren, Alignment: The Silent City, is a novel comparable to The Mist by Stephan King and Pines by Blake Crouch.

Fireseed One


Catherine Stine - 2010
    Varik Teitur inherits a vast sea farm after the mysterious drowning of his marine biologist father. When Marisa Baron, a beautiful and shrewd terrorist, who knows way too much about Varik's father's work, tries to steal seed disks from the world's food bank, Varik is forced to put his dreams of becoming a doctor on hold and venture with her, into a hot zone teeming with treacherous nomads and a Fireseed cult who worships his dead father, in order to search for Fireseed, a seemingly magical hybrid plant that may not even exist. Fans of Divergent will likely enjoy this as well as those who like romance with their page-turners. ***Indie Reader notable, YA finalist in sci-fi & YA in USA News International Book Awards and Amazon bestseller. Includes discussion questions for book club or classroom.

Valhalla Online


Kevin O. McLaughlin - 2017
    McLaughlin! More than just a game, Valhalla Online was designed as a permanent repository for the uploaded minds of mortals afraid of death. An artificial afterlife.Samantha’s world is turned upside-down when she arrives in Valhalla - because as far as she knows, she isn’t like the other people uploaded there.She isn’t dead. At least...she hopes she isn’t.Now Sam must solve the mystery of her own abduction - or murder! - while trapped inside a virtual world, cut off from communication with the outside. To do this she must do more than simply survive Valhalla - she needs to win the game! ˃˃˃ Excerpt from the book: The battle raged only a dozen feet ahead. Men with green bandanas tied to their arms, or with green paint on their shields, were holding a position on the wall facing off against a squad of blue-bearing troops.The bad news was that the green troops - whom Sam assumed were the enemy - had ladders up against the outside of the wall. More troops were climbing into the fort every moment. The good news was that most of them were facing the blue troops on the other side of the rampart. Their backs were to Harald and Sam.Harald didn’t pause for more than a moment to let his eyes adjust before rushing in. He gave a terrific scream, bashing the one green warrior with his shield as he was trying to climb onto the wall. The man lost his balance and fell backwards outside the fort. There was a long cry as he fell, which cut off suddenly. It sounded like the drop on the other side of the wall was at least as far as the one on this side.An arrow flashed upward from somewhere outside the fort. Acting entirely on instinct, Sam raised her shield just in time to ward the shot. It stuck into the wood with a resounding thunk. The impact stung her fingers and left them buzzing. How the hell had she found herself in this crazy situation? Scroll up and grab a copy today.

The Only Harmless Great Thing


Brooke Bolander - 2018
    Around the same time, an Indian elephant was deliberately put to death by electricity in Coney Island.These are the facts.Now these two tragedies are intertwined in a dark alternate history of rage, radioactivity, and injustice crying out to be righted. Prepare yourself for a wrenching journey that crosses eras, chronicling histories of cruelty both grand and petty in search of meaning and justice.