But when a terrified woman falls through his bathroom ceiling, he's forced back into a life of gunfights, double agents and paranormal research. The secret he's been keeping for nearly four decades might reunite him with his lost love, or kill millions.This new short story by John August falls into the genre of paranoid "spy-fi" popularized by writers like Jorge Luis Borges and shows like The Prisoner and The Man from U.N.C.L.E.== What Others Say =="I really dug the story. Gave it a glance just to see, got totally hooked, and blazed on through to the end."-- Michael Chabon (The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, The Yiddish Policemen's Union) "The Variant" is both a good, fun, smart story and an interesting experiment in indie self-publishing for fiction."-- John Gruber, daringfireball.net== About the Author ==An excerpt of The Variant is available at johnaugust.com/variant About the AuthorJohn August is the screenwriter of eight feature films, including Go, Big Fish, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Corpse Bride. He wrote and directed the 2007 movie The Nines.He can be found on Twitter, @johnaugust

    In this espionage action thriller, Steele's encounters with blackmail, suicide bombers, double agents, unwelcome romance, rogue military forces, and a full-on tank assault will excite fans of British and American spy thrillers as he incurs the wrath of British, US, and North Korean authorities and a Russian organized-crime boss, all of whom want him dead.As if that wasn't enough, Steele alone holds the key to defeating the twisted and ruthless external reality of international politics, diplomacy, and unexpected evil in the Tumen triangle of Russia, North Korea, and China.From London to Moscow to Vladivostok and into the secret world of Pyong Yang, Steele must continually choose: fight, flight, report … or die?

    Thousands of autonomous computer programs, or daemons, make our networked world possible, running constantly in the background of our lives, trafficking e-mail, transferring money, and monitoring power grids. For the most part, daemons are benign, but the same can't always be said for the people who design them. Matthew Sobol was a legendary computer game designer—the architect behind half-a-dozen popular online games. His premature death depressed both gamers and his company's stock price. But Sobol's fans aren't the only ones to note his passing. When his obituary is posted online, a previously dormant daemon activates, initiating a chain of events intended to unravel the fabric of our hyper-efficient, interconnected world. With Sobol's secrets buried along with him, and as new layers of his daemon are unleashed at every turn, it's up to an unlikely alliance to decipher his intricate plans and wrest the world from the grasp of a nameless, faceless enemy—or learn to live in a society in which we are no longer in control. . . . Computer technology expert Daniel Suarez blends haunting high-tech realism with gripping suspense in an authentic, complex thriller in the tradition of Michael Crichton, Neal Stephenson, and William Gibson.

    Being beautiful with a figure to die for made it easy for her to juggle men and get her needs met. She had never met a man who wasn't impressed by her outer appearance until she met Montez, a married tattoo artist. Montez has more on his plate than he bargained for. He is desperate to start a family with Destiny, his wife of 3 years, but the secrets that she's withholding make that seem almost impossible. A chance meeting from a mutual acquaintance puts Cashmere and Montez in each other's presence briefly. It's love at first sight for one of them, but not so much the other. Cashmere is used to men falling at her feet, but the lack of attention from Montez has her questioning herself as well as the beauty that she's always been known to possess. Take a ride with an insecure young woman and a very outspoken young man to see just how their lives intertwine when they cross paths with one another. Will Montez be able to resist the sexy vixen known as Cashmere or will he dishonor his vows for a taste of her forbidden fruit? Will Cashmere be able accept Montez's rejection or will she continue to pursue something that she can never have? Is Montez really off limits or will he be the man to show her love like she's never known before?

    Brand New

    The cause of their failure was a complete mystery.Five months later, a seemingly unrelated event occurred. A computer security firm in Belarus was called in to troubleshoot some computers in Iran that were caught in a reboot loop—crashing and rebooting repeatedly. At first, technicians with the firm believed the malicious code they found on the machines was a simple, routine piece of malware. But as they and other experts around the world investigated, they discovered a virus of unparalleled complexity and mysterious provenance and intent. They had, they soon learned, stumbled upon the world’s first digital weapon.Stuxnet, as it came to be known, was unlike any other virus or worm built before: It was the first attack that reached beyond the computers it targeted to physically destroy the equipment those computers controlled. It was an ingenious attack, jointly engineered by the United States and Israel, that worked exactly as planned, until the rebooting machines gave it all away. And the discovery of Stuxnet was just the beginning: Once the digital weapon was uncovered and deciphered, it provided clues to other tools lurking in the wild. Soon, security experts found and exposed not one but three highly sophisticated digital spy tools that came from the same labs that created Stuxnet. The discoveries gave the world its first look at the scope and sophistication of nation-state surveillance and warfare in the digital age.Kim Zetter, a senior reporter at Wired, has covered hackers and computer security since 1999 and is one of the top journalists in the world on this beat. She was among the first reporters to cover Stuxnet after its discovery and has authored many of the most comprehensive articles about it. In COUNTDOWN TO ZERO DAY: Stuxnet and the Launch of the World’s First Digital Weapon, Zetter expands on this work to show how the code was designed and unleashed and how its use opened a Pandora’s Box, ushering in an age of digital warfare in which any country’s infrastructure—power grids, nuclear plants, oil pipelines, dams—is vulnerable to the same kind of attack with potentially devastating results. A sophisticated digital strike on portions of the power grid, for example, could plunge half the U.S. into darkness for weeks or longer, having a domino effect on all other critical infrastructures dependent on electricity.

    To touch anyone under his protection was to invite destruction. A savagely effective methodology, until Skinner's CIA handlers began to fear him as much as his enemies did and banished him to the hinterlands of the intelligence community. Now, an ornate and evolving cyber-terrorist attack is about to end that long exile. His asset is Jae, a roboticist with a gift for seeing the underlying systems violently shaping a new era of global guerrilla warfare. At the root of it all is a young boy, the innocent seed of a plot grown in the slums of Mumbai. Brought to flower, that plot will tip the balance of world power in a perilous new direction. A combination of Le Carre spycraft with Stephenson techno-philosophy from the novelist hailed by the Washington Post as "the voice of twenty-first century crime fiction," Skinner is Charlie Huston's masterpiece -- a new kind of thriller for a new kind of world.

    The hunt is on in this edge-of-your-seat original prequel thriller based on Showtime’s hit series, HOMELAND.Beirut, 2006. CIA operations officer Carrie Mathison barely escapes an ambush while attempting a clandestine meeting with a new contact code-named Nightingale. Suspicious that security has been compromised, she challenges the station chief in a heated confrontation that gets her booted back to Langley.Expert in recognizing and anticipating behavioral patterns—a skill enhanced by the bipolar disorder she keeps secret to protect her career—Carrie is increasingly certain that a terrorist plot has been set in motion. Carrie risks a shocking act of insubordination that helps her uncover secret evidence connecting Nightingale with Abu Nazir, the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq. Determined to stop the terrorist mastermind, she embarks on an obsessive quest that will nearly destroy her.Filled with the suspense and plot twists that have made Homeland a must-watch series, this riveting tale reveals the compelling untold backstories of the series’ main characters and takes fans deeper into the life and mind of one brilliant woman spy.

     “The story blends heartwarming moments and action beautifully in a way that will make children of any age enjoy the book.” Readers’ Favorite 5★ review "Sweetly written and packed full of adventure. Children will love it, particularly if they love dogs!" The Wishing Shelf 11-year-old Jonas Ridley loves dogs. Unfortunately, his mother won’t let him have one of his own. But one Christmas, Jonas gets the chance to RENT a dog, and not just any dog but Rascal, the famous four-legged star of Jonas’s favorite movie, Canine Commando! Jonas and Rascal have a blast and really bond together, even performing in the school talent show. But when the movie studio has to take Rascal back, Jonas hatches a movie-like plan and becomes a real-life secret agent to rescue Rascal! If A Dog’s Purpose touched your heart, you'll love A Dog of My Own. This middle grade book is a sweet yet exciting adventure full of action and heartwarming moments for any reader – children, tweens, teens or readers of any age. This fun ‘boy and his dog’ story is the first in a series, so if you like it, there's more to come! (Don't forget to look for the surprise after Chapter 1!)

    From that day forward, the Bush administration turned to the Department of Justice to give its imprimatur to activities that had previously been unthinkable—from the NSA's spying on US citizens to indefinite detention to torture. Many of these activities were secretly authorized, others done in the light of day. When President Obama took office, many observers expected a reversal of these encroachments upon civil liberties and justice, but the new administration found the rogue policies to be deeply entrenched, and, at times, worth preserving. Obama ramped up targeted killings, held fast to aggressive surveillance policies, and fell short on bringing reform to detention and interrogation. How did America veer so far from its founding principles of justice? Rogue Justice connects the dots for the first time—from the Patriot Act to today’s military commissions, from terrorism prosecutions to intelligence priorities, from the ACLU’s activism to Edward Snowden’s revelations. And it poses a stark question: will the American justice system ever recover from the compromises it made for the war on terror?Riveting and deeply reported, Rogue Justice could only have been written by Karen Greenberg, one of this country’s top experts on Guantánamo, torture, and terrorism, with a deep knowledge of both the Bush and Obama administrations. Now she brings to life the full story of law and policy after 9/11, introducing us to the key players and events, showing that time and again, when liberty and security have clashed, justice has been the victim.

    That source turned out to be the twenty-nine-year-old NSA contractor Edward Snowden, and his revelations about the agency's widespread, systemic overreach proved to be some of the most explosive and consequential news in recent history, triggering a fierce debate over national security and information privacy.Now Greenwald fits all the pieces together, recounting his high-intensity eleven-day trip to Hong Kong, examining the broader implications of the surveillance detailed in his reporting for The Guardian, and revealing fresh information on the NSA's unprecedented abuse of power with documents from the Snowden archive. Fearless and incisive, No Place to Hide has already sparked outrage around the globe and been hailed by voices across the political spectrum as an essential contribution to our understanding of the U.S. surveillance state.

    An oil tanker runs aground in Japan when its navigational system suddenly stops dead. Hospitals everywhere have to abandon their computer databases when patients die after being administered incorrect dosages of their medicine. In the Midwest, a nuclear power plant nearly becomes the next Chernobyl when its cooling systems malfunction.At first, these random computer failures seem like unrelated events. But Jeff Aiken, a former government analyst who quit in disgust after witnessing the gross errors that led to 9/11, thinks otherwise. Jeff fears a more serious attack targeting the U.S. computer infrastructure is already under way. And as other menacing computer malfunctions pop up around the world, some with deadly results, he realizes that there isn't much time if he hopes to prevent an international catastrophe.Written by a global authority on cyber security, Zero Day presents a chilling "what if" scenario that, in a world completely reliant on technology, is more than possible today -- it's a cataclysmic disaster just waiting to happen.

    Maloney delivers a heartpounding tale as fast, cold, and sleek as a 9mm bullet . . .FOR DUTY AND HONORThe unthinkable has happened to operative Dan Morgan. Captured by the Russians. Imprisoned in the Gulag. Tortured by his cruelest, most sadistic enemy. But Morgan knows that every prisoner has a past—and every rival can be used. With the most unlikely of allies, Morgan hatches a plan. To save what’s important, he must risk everything. And that’s when the stakes go sky-high. Dan Morgan’s got to keep fighting. For duty. And honor. And even certain death . . .

    The fan, twenty-five year old Lori Dalton, eventually, after chatting with the well-known author for six months, decides to leave her hometown in Seattle, to drive to Virginia Beach to be with her favorite writer. Lori shows up at Scott Howard's doorstep, unannounced, excited to finally meet him in person.At first, author and fan hit it off, but soon when Scott Howard starts having feelings for his ex girlfriend Trixie, jealousy arises and the deadly stalking begins.

    From the birth of the Pinkertons to Howard Hughes, from presidents to Cold War spies, Broker, Trader, Lawyer, Spy is, like Legacy of Ashes and Blackwater, a first rate political thriller that also just happens to be true.