Book picks similar to
Absent Friends by Max Gladstone


serial
urban-fantasy
espionage
fantasy

A Long, Cold Winter


Lindsay Smith - 2016
    When Andula, a young Czech student, is stalked by an inhuman hunter, KGB agent and Ice operative Tanya Morozova must risk all to protect her, while CIA agent Gabe Pritchard learns that some horrors, once seen, can never be forgotten. This episode is brought to you by lead creatives Max Gladstone and Lindsay Smith, who advise readers to fasten their seatbelts and get ready for one hell of a ride.“A Long, Cold Winter” begins the 13-part serial,The Witch Who Came In From The Cold, presented by Serial Box. This espionage fantasy is brought to you by Lindsay Smith, Max Gladstone, Cassandra Rose Clarke, Ian Tregillis, and Michael Swanwick.

The Market Arcanum


Margaret Dunlap - 2015
     When a mysterious invite arrives in the mail and Father Menchu responds by whisking Sal off to Lichtenstein, the former cop is left on very new ground as she gets more than a glimpse at the broader world of magic users. Unfortunately, they are immediately confronted by a wealthy business man who is less upset about them blowing up his boat two episodes ago, as he is about them stealing his (sludge-demon releasing) book. When the three remaining Team members back in Rome suddenly find themselves under attack, Sal and Menchu are left scrambling for how to help and have to turn to the peculiar techno-cultists whose computers run on seahorses and have a pointed interest in the cop sister of their acquaintance Perry. Welcome to the Market Arcanum. This episode is brought to you by team-writer Margaret Dunlap who shows us that the Society is far from the only fish in the magic-hunting sea—and certainly isn’t the biggest. "Bookburners is sheer enormous fun! Energetic, intense, vivid prose. More soon please." --Naomi Novik, author of Uprooted and the New York Times bestselling Temeraire series "Bookburners is the breathless, hallucinogenic love child of Torchwood, the Librarians, and the Laundry Files. More soon, please." --Ian Tregillis, author of The Mechanical and Bitter Seeds "Bookburners is an exciting new take on urban fantasy. Love the premise, love the characters, love the unique (and sometimes wonderfully disturbing) spin on the dangers of magic!" --Cassandra Rose Clarke, author of The Assassins Curse "Bookburners has everything I want from episodic storytelling - strong writing, a rich premise, and memorable characters that will keep me coming back week after week." --Mike Underwood, author of the Ree Reyes Geekomancy series "Bookburners satisfies my craving for pulpy, demonic chaos with sharp writing, deliciously sinister magic, stellar black humor, and a kick-ass cast. The serialized story perfectly suits a sorcerer’s codex of baddies while the plucky Sal digs for deeper truths in her work with the Black Archives squad." --Lindsay Smith, author of the Sekret Series

A Sorcerer's Apprentice


Mur Lafferty - 2015
    Something is amiss in the Dear Green Place, however, as the pair land to discover the entire city has become obsessed with a restaurant (which just happens to be owned by the deceased mentor’s only living relative). They beat the crowds to get a table, only to find the fight has just begun and they left their muscle at home. This episode is brought to you by team-writer Mur Lafferty and explores how magic, like food, is rarely cut and dry. A Sorcerer's Apprentice continues the 16-part Serial, Bookburners, presented by Serial Box. From a team of writers, this collaborative effort unfolds an epic urban fantasy narrative across an entire season in weekly installments. Follow along as Sal learns the life changing lesson: some books have teeth.

Jade Calhoun Series bundle, books 1 and 2


Deanna Chase - 2012
    When empath Jade Calhoun moves into an apartment above a strip bar on Bourbon Street, she expects life to get interesting. What she doesn't count on is making friends with an exotic dancer, attracting a powerful spirit, and developing feelings for Kane, her sexy landlord. Being an empath has never been easy on Jade's relationships. It's no wonder she keeps her gift a secret. But when the ghost moves from spooking Jade to terrorizing Pyper, the dancer, it's up to Jade to use her unique ability to save her. Except she'll need Kane's help--and he's betrayed her with a secret of his own--to do it. Can she find a way to trust him and herself before Pyper is lost?Witches of Bourbon StreetJade Calhoun was never fond of her empath abilities. Now she's discovered she has another gift she'd rather not unwrap--magic. But when her mentor, Bea, becomes gravely ill and insists Jade's the only one who can help, she's forced to embrace her witchy side.It's too bad she spent a decade shunning the magical community and never learned to harness her powers. Because time's run out. A trapped spirit has revealed a clue to Jade's long-lost mother. The resident angel has gone rogue and disappeared with Jade's boyfriend, Kane. And if that wasn't enough, her ex appears to be possessed.To save any of them, Jade will need to find a way to control her inner white witch--without succumbing to black magic. Otherwise, she'll lose everything...including her soul.

The Otherworld Witches Series 3-Book Bundle: Dime Store Magic, Industrial Magic, Haunted


Kelley Armstrong - 2014
    Sure to mesmerize fans of Deborah Harkness, Laurell K. Hamilton, and Karen Marie Moning, these novels introduce a trio of kickass heroines who perfectly showcase Armstrong’s thrilling imagination.  DIME STORE MAGIC   Paige Winterbourne was always either too young or too rebellious to succeed her mother as leader of the elite American Coven of Witches. Now that she’s twenty-three, the Elders can no longer deny her. But even Paige’s wildest antics can’t hold a candle to those of her new charge, Savannah, who is all too willing to use her budding powers for evil, and evil is all too willing to claim her. For this girl is being pursued by a dark faction of the supernatural underworld. It’s an initiation into adulthood, womanhood, and the brutal side of magic—and Paige will have to do everything within her power to make sure they both survive.  INDUSTRIAL MAGIC  Someone is murdering the teenage offspring of the underworld’s most influential Cabals—a circle of families that makes the mob look like amateurs. And none is more powerful than the Cortez Cabal, a faction with which Paige is intimately acquainted. Her boyfriend is none other than Lucas Cortez, the rebel son and unwilling heir. But love isn’t blind, and Paige has her eyes wide open as she is drawn into a hunt for an unnatural-born killer. Pitted against shamans, demons, and goons, it’s a battle chilling enough to make a wild young woman grow up in a hurry. If Paige gets the chance.  HAUNTED   Eve Levine—half-demon, black witch, and devoted mother—has been dead for three years. She has a great house and an interesting love life, and she can’t be killed again, which comes in handy when you’ve made as many enemies as Eve has. All she needs to do is find a way to communicate with her daughter, Savannah, and she’ll be happy. But the Fates have other plans. They want Eve to hunt down an evil spirit called the Nix, who has escaped from hell, before she does any more damage. But the Nix is a dangerous enemy: The only way to stop her is with an angel’s sword—and Eve is no angel.  Praise for Kelley Armstrong and the Otherworld series  “Gripping . . . [a] sexy supernatural romance [whose] special strength lies in its seamless incorporation of the supernatural into the real world.”—Publishers Weekly, on Dime Store Magic   “One of my favorite writers.”—New York Times bestselling author Karin Slaughter   “Up there with the big girls of the genre like Laurell K. Hamilton.”—The Kansas City Star   “Armstrong writes page-turning prose.”—Booklist   “One of the masters of urban fantasy.”—Fresh Fiction

Doorways


Robert Enright - 2017
    Shielded from humanity, the Otherside is watched over by the BTCO, a highly secret government agency, whose members all possess 'The Knack', a genetic anomaly that allows them to see this other world. Franklyn 'Bermuda' Jones is the BTCO's finest agent, the only human to have passed to the Otherside and returned. Gifted with the ability to physically interact with both worlds, Bermuda reluctantly stands between both worlds, pining for the life he had to leave behind and the daughter he can no longer see. Teamed with Argyle, an enigmatic Otherside warrior, Bermuda is assigned the case of a missing woman who has vanished under mysterious circumstances.As Bermuda delves further into the disappearance, he uncovers a threat that could destroy the truce between two worlds...and finds himself in a race against time to safeguard humanity's very existence. Discover a new world in this fast-paced urban fantasy packed with thrills, action and the odd one liner.

The Society


Lilith Saintcrow - 2005
    Then he escaped and joined the Society, an underground resistance movement of psions determined to use their talents to bring Sigma down. Competent, cold, and cruelly efficient, he s the best operative the Society has, a legend among the psions who fight a shadow war against an enemy that owns the courts, the press, and the police. Feared even by his own teammates, hunted by the government, and too damaged to feel anything but clinical rage, he is utterly alone until he meets Rowan. When Rowan Price stumbles across Delgado s team in an abandoned house, he is assigned to make contact with her, bring her in, and keep her alive because Rowan is one of the most powerful psychics the resistance has ever encountered. If the government gets its hands on her, she could very well mean the downfall of the resistance, because nobody, not even Rowan, is quite sure how far her talents extend. The Society will welcome Rowan, if she can stay alive long enough to join them. Unfortunately, there s a traitor buried in the ranks. If the Society goes down, Rowan is at risk. God alone knows what Delgado will do to keep her safe, because Rowan is fast becoming the only thing in the world he cares about . . .

The Clown Service


Guy Adams - 2013
    The Department: Section 37 Station Office, Wood Green.The Boss: August Shining, an ex-Cambridge, Cold War-era spy.The Mission: Charged with protecting Great Britain and its interests from paranormal terrorism.The Threat: An old enemy has returned, and with him Operation Black Earth, a Soviet plan to create the ultimate insurgents by re-animating the dead.

Daniel Silva's Gabriel Allon Collection, Books 11 - 13: Portrait of a Spy / The Fallen Angel / The English Girl


Daniel Silva - 2014
    From #1 New York Times bestselling author Daniel Silva come books 11-13 in his beloved Gabriel Allon series: Portrait of a Spy, The Fallen Angel, and The English Girl.

Her Dark Path


Ken Ogilvie - 2017
    Rebecca was only eight years old. The killer has never been caught. Growing up, Rebecca vowed that one day she would track him down and make him pay. Now Rebecca is a young police woman in Ontario. She wants to become a homicide detective. Her first investigation is the cold case of a woman who vanished for 16 days and then was found dead in her own home. The brutal crime shocks the remote Canadian town of Conroy. The puzzling case has uncanny similarities to the murder of Rebecca’s mother. Both victims were found strangled in their own kitchens. Can Rebecca keep her emotions together as she closes in on a killer with connections to her family and tragic past? And will she finally get justice for her mother?

Earthbound Bones


ReGina Welling - 2016
    Not quite human, yet not fully an angel, the best thing the PTBs can think to do with her is bounce her around so she can solve supernatural problems. Ghosts that need to find their way home or that purposefully take the wrong path are her bread and butter. To add insult to injury, she is assigned a fledgling pair of guardian angels to train. Julius and Estelle are ready and willing to learn, but they also have a secondary agenda. One that Galmadriel is never supposed find out about. Helping the ghost of young Ben Allen find his way home reconnects Galmadriel with Kat, Amethyst, Gustavia, and Julie in the first of many adventures to come.

The Vampire Files, Volume Four


P.N. Elrod - 2011
    novels. In the latest Vampire Files omnibus, Jack Fleming now runs his own nightclub while remaining a reluctant player in the politics of gangland Chicago in the 1930s. And wherever vampires and mobsters mix, there will be blood...

Jim Butcher's Dresden Files: Down Town #1


Mark Powers - 2015
    But vampires are far from the only supernatural threat Chicago's only wizard for hire must stand against. Someone has unleashed an entity unlike any Harry has yet encountered - and it has begun targeting the innocent, seemingly indiscriminately. Along with his apprentice, Molly Carpenter, Harry must uncover the truth behind this new predator... no matter how far into darkness he must descend.

The Nine Lives of Catseye Gomez


Simon Hawke - 1992
    When the young television journalist is killed by a car bomb, Gomez the feline detective pursues all the clues, as well as the victim's sexy calico.Catseye, P.I. Name’s Gomez. I’m a cat. And yeah, I talk. Because in an age of magic, nothing’s quite what it seems. When you combine magic with genetic engineering, predators and crooks take on a thousand different forms. So do the good guys. Denver was a new town, new turf for an old stray tom like me. I came in search of a fresh start, but what I found was criminal. It all began when Susan Jacobs, an ambitious and beautiful young broadcaster, met up with a car bomb that blew a lot more than her ratings sky high. After what happened in New Mexico, I needed a case like this like I needed a big hairball. But Susan Jacobs had a sexy little calico whose lambent golden eyes had a look in them that made it really hard to just say no….So together with a Zippo-snapping, studded leather rebel cop named Leventhal, I’m prowling the streets and alleys of the Mile High City among political whack-jobs, religious nuts, media weasels, talking snakes, gutter sorcerers and wizard wannabes, on a cat-and-mouse hunt for a killer. And when I find out who it is, the fur is really gonna fly…

Anywhere But Here


Brian Francis Slattery - 2015
    In this episode we meet the rest of the team and get a tour of the Black Archives (pro tip: don’t touch anything), before being whisked off on Sal’s first mission: investigate a magical disturbance in the heart of Madrid, Spain. There they find a breathing apartment door, little girls being held hostage, and some furniture that is far too alive for good taste. First days on the job are never easy…This episode is brought to you by team-writer Brian Francis Slattery and trips down a rabbit hole (or rather, through an apartment door) into some thoroughly New Weird territory. Fans of Vandermeer’s Southern Reach trilogy will find much to enjoy.Anywhere but Here continues the 16-part Serial, Bookburners, presented by Serial Box. From a team of writers, this collaborative effort unfolds an epic urban fantasy narrative across an entire season in weekly installments. Follow along as Sal learns the life changing lesson: some books have teeth. To learn more about Bookburners and find out how you can read the whole serial, check out SerialBox.com.