In-Depth Market Research Interviews with Dead People: Volvo


Alison Espach - 2020
    If you knew you were going to die in two years, would you still have gone with the Volvo? So begins the first question of this interview between the recently deceased Linda and her Volvo’s Market Research representative. Over the course of the rest of the interview, listen in and roll down your window into not only a woman’s marriage but a psyche. This brilliantly woven tale shines a light on our collective idiosyncrasies, neuroses, and desires. In the tradition of Sally Rooney and Maria Semple, Alison Espach threads the needle between humor and devastation and emerges a master of observational satire and millennial voice.

Interview with the Robot


Lee Bacon - 2020
    Criminal. Robot.Eve looks like an ordinary 12-year-old girl, but there’s nothing ordinary about her. She has no last name. No parents or guardian. She’s on the run from a dangerous and secretive organization that will stop at nothing to track her down. And most astonishing of all: She’s a robot, a product of Eden Labratories. When she discovers the truth, she realizes everything she thought she knew about herself is a lie. Eve manages to escape, fleeing the lab, the only home she’s ever known. After being arrested for shoplifting, Eve is interviewed by Petra Amis from Child Welfare Services. Her incredible story unfolds during the interrogation, with flashbacks to her life inside Eden Laboratories, which has a dark secret. Exploring a range of topics that drive our society and our lives - topics such as artificial intelligence and human nature - Interview with the Robot is a story told by a startlingly original protagonist, a story that explores the vast potential of technology and the deep complexities of humanity.

The Never Hero


T. Ellery Hodges - 2014
    His life is about to undergo a massive shift. A violent and merciless otherworldly enemy unleashes slaughter in the streets, calling out in a language only he understands.And it is seeking its challenger.In order to defeat the threat, Jonathan must become a temporal weapon... while remaining completely anonymous. Unfortunately, harnessing off-world powers has its own special challenges...The Never Hero is the first installment in The Chronicles of Jonathan Tibbs -- a mind-bending, genre crossing, action-adventure trilogy.

Ticker


Lisa Mantchev - 2014
    But soon it’s discovered that Warwick killed dozens of people as he strove to perfect another improved Ticker for Penny, and he’s put on trial for mass murder. On the last day of Warwick’s trial, the Farthings’ factory is bombed, Penny’s parents disappear, and Penny and her brother, Nic, receive a ransom note demanding all of their Augmentation research if they want to see their parents again. Is someone trying to destroy the Farthings...or is the motive more sinister?Desperate to reunite their family and rescue their research, Penny and her brother recruit fiery baker Violet Nesselrode, gentleman-about-town Sebastian Stirling, and Marcus Kingsley, a young army general who has his own reasons for wanting to lift the veil between this world and the next. Wagers are placed, friends are lost, romance stages an ambush, and time is running out for the girl with the clockwork heart.

Henrietta & Eleanor: A Retelling of Jekyll and Hyde


Libby SpurrierKatarina Olsson - 2018
    For many years she manages to live under the radar, keeping her dark secret unknown to those around her. However, gradually her evil side gains strength until Dr Jekyll is overwhelmed by Eleanor Hyde, to disastrous consequences. An exploration of human duality and forces of good and evil, this modern retelling is compelling and eerie and retains the disturbing nature of the original text.Starring Holliday Grainger (Cinderella, My Cousin Rachel, Strike) and Carla Mendonça (My Parents Are Aliens, So Awkward).Also starring Tim Bentinck, Bill Fellows, Hugh Fraser, Holliday Grainger, Clive Mantle, Carla Mendonca, Katarina Olsson, Miranda Raison and Hugh Ross.

The Stress of Her Regard


Tim Powers - 1989
    Joining forces with Byron, Keats, and Shelley in a desperate journey that crisscrosses Europe, Crawford desperately seeks his freedom from this vengeful lover who haunts his dreams and will not rest until she destroys all that he cherishes. Told in the guise of a secret history, this long-awaited tale of passion and terror is finally back in print after more than 20 years.

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell


Susanna Clarke - 2004
    She has created a world so thoroughly enchanting that eight hundred pages leave readers longing for more.English magicians were once the wonder of the known world, with fairy servants at their beck and call; they could command winds, mountains, and woods. But by the early 1800s they have long since lost the ability to perform magic. They can only write long, dull papers about it, while fairy servants are nothing but a fading memory.But at Hurtfew Abbey in Yorkshire, the rich, reclusive Mr Norrell has assembled a wonderful library of lost and forgotten books from England's magical past and regained some of the powers of England's magicians. He goes to London and raises a beautiful young woman from the dead. Soon he is lending his help to the government in the war against Napoleon Bonaparte, creating ghostly fleets of rain-ships to confuse and alarm the French.All goes well until a rival magician appears. Jonathan Strange is handsome, charming, and talkative-the very opposite of Mr Norrell. Strange thinks nothing of enduring the rigors of campaigning with Wellington's army and doing magic on battlefields. Astonished to find another practicing magician, Mr Norrell accepts Strange as a pupil. But it soon becomes clear that their ideas of what English magic ought to be are very different. For Mr Norrell, their power is something to be cautiously controlled, while Jonathan Strange will always be attracted to the wildest, most perilous forms of magic. He becomes fascinated by the ancient, shadowy figure of the Raven King, a child taken by fairies who became king of both England and Faerie, and the most legendary magician of all. Eventually Strange's heedless pursuit of long-forgotten magic threatens to destroy not only his partnership with Norrell, but everything that he holds dear.

Boneshaker


Cherie Priest - 2009
    Anxious to compete, Russian prospectors commissioned inventor Leviticus Blue to create a great machine that could mine through Alaska’s ice. Thus was Dr. Blue’s Incredible Bone-Shaking Drill Engine born.But on its first test run the Boneshaker went terribly awry, destroying several blocks of downtown Seattle and unearthing a subterranean vein of blight gas that turned anyone who breathed it into the living dead.Now it is sixteen years later, and a wall has been built to enclose the devastated and toxic city. Just beyond it lives Blue’s widow, Briar Wilkes. Life is hard with a ruined reputation and a teenaged boy to support, but she and Ezekiel are managing. Until Ezekiel undertakes a secret crusade to rewrite history.His quest will take him under the wall and into a city teeming with ravenous undead, air pirates, criminal overlords, and heavily armed refugees. And only Briar can bring him out alive.

Even Tree Nymphs Get the Blues


Molly Harper - 2019
    The solitary tree nymph just wants to live a quiet life running her ice-cream shop in peace. Unfortunately, she can’t seem to shake her new neighbor, Rob Aspern, head of the League’s data science department and so good looking it just isn’t fair.If there’s one thing Ingrid doesn’t need, it’s someone poking around in her business. But the more she gets to know the hunky mathematician, the more she finds herself letting her guard down. Can she trust him with her secrets, or will her past destroy everything?

Professional Integrity


Michael J. Sullivan - 2015
    Things have gone well enough for the team as they do "jobs" for various nobles throughout Elan. Usually that means stealing something, but when a young heiress asks them to steal her…well, that's a first for the pair. All is not as it seems, but Royce is determined to get the bottom of what's actually going on. After all, he has his professional integrity at stake.Originally released in the Blackguards anthology published by Ragnarok Publications, this is a standalone short story of 10,800 words. No prior knowledge of The Riyria Revelations or The Riyria Chronicles is required to enjoy it to its fullest, making this a perfect introduction for new readers or a chance for existing fans to spend a little more time with old friends.

The Devil You Know


Mike Carey - 2006
    It may seem like a good ghost buster can charge what he likes and enjoy a hell of a lifestyle--but there's a risk: Sooner or later he's going to take on a spirit that's too strong for him. While trying to back out of this ill-conceived career, Castor accepts a seemingly simple ghost-hunting case at a museum in the shadowy heart of London - just to pay the bills, you understand. But what should have been a perfectly straightforward exorcism is rapidly turning into the Who Can Kill Castor First Show, with demons and ghosts all keen to claim the big prize. That's OK: Castor knows how to deal with the dead. It's the living who piss him off...

Zero Tolerance


Jonathan Maberry - 2011
    Dropping back into the world of former Baltimore cop Joe Ledger, the Department of Military Sciences, and flesh-eating zombies, fans of the series will finally see the tying up of a few loose ends.

Dead Man's Hand: An Anthology of the Weird West


John Joseph AdamsSeanan McGuire - 2014
    Here are twenty-three original tales—stories of the Old West infused with elements of the fantastic—produced specifically for this volume by many of today’s finest writers. Included are Orson Scott Card’s first “Alvin Maker” story in a decade, and an original adventure by Fred Van Lente, writer of Cowboys & Aliens. Other contributors include Tobias S. Buckell, David Farland, Alan Dean Foster, Jeffrey Ford, Laura Anne Gilman, Rajan Khanna, Mike Resnick, Beth Revis, Fred Van Lente, Walter Jon Williams, Ben H. Winters, Christie Yant, and Charles Yu, with an introduction by editor John Joseph Adams.CONTENTS:01 - Joe R. Lansdale, The Red-Headed Dead02 - Ben H. Winters, The Old Slow Man and his Gold Gun from Space03 - David Farland, Hellfire on the High Frontier04 - Mike Resnick, The Hell-Bound Stagecoach05 - Seanan McGuire, Stingers and Strangers06 - Charles Yu, Bookkeeper, Narrator, Gunslinger07 - Alan Dean Foster, Holy Jingle08 - Beth Revis, The Man With No Heart09 - Alastair Reynolds, Wrecking Party10 - Hugh Howey, Hell from the East11 - Rajan Khanna, Second Hand12 - Orson Scott Card, Alvin and the Apple Tree13 - Elizabeth Bear, Madam Damnable's Sewing Circle14 - Tad Williams, Strong Medicine15 - Jonathan Maberry, Red Dreams16 - Kelley Armstrong, Bamboozled17 - Tobias S. Buckell, Sundown18 - Jeffrey Ford, La Madre del Oro19 - Ken Liu, What I Assume You Shall Assume20 - Laura Anne Gilman, The Devil's Jack21 - Walter Jon Williams, The Golden Age22 - Fred Van Lente, Neversleeps23 - Christie Yant, Dead Man's Hand

Baron Steele


Rhett C. Bruno - 2020
    As a matter of fact, he doesn’t even wear a mask. And he doesn’t even fight crime anymore. That’s for the guys with too much brawn and not enough brain.No, Steele works in consulting. After having his license revoked by the Guild of Masked Crimefighters, he decided he would scout talent instead. Match up heroes with their villainous counterparts, help the young bucks and buckettes discover their talents and abilities. That sort of thing.It’s all going fine and well until Steele gets a bad cup of coffee. No. Seriously. Day after day, the same little twerp gets his order wrong. From there, it’s a downhill spiral into chaos, and Steele finds himself fighting for his freedom in a court of law. Did he really kill a barista over a cup of joe?Don't miss this hilarious spin on the superhero genre from the number one Audible best-selling duo of Rhett C. Bruno and Jaime Castle.

The Improbable Adventures of Sherlock Holmes


John Joseph AdamsTanith Lee - 2009
    This reprint anthology showcases the best Holmes short fiction from the last 25 years, featuring stories by such visionaries as Stephen King, Neil Gaimen, Laura King, and many others.