No Choice: McKenna Largo loves police work and hates being in the spotlight. But when the California cop transforms into a cougar in the middle of a bank raid, she knows there’s no dodging the publicity. Now a viral video sensation, she’s the reluctant public face of a newly created race of shifters. Scared by her strange new impulses, Largo worries she's a monster. But when criminals capture innocent young shifters, the cougar and the cop combined must leap into action. Commander: Discovering an Artificial Intelligence lives in your head, strike one. Having the Artificial Intelligence explain aliens are the origin of shifters on Earth, strike two. Having it announce you are the commanding officer of the earth shifters, strike three. Finding herself in a situation she never imagined, McKenna must step up and be the leader they need, a true commander. Now if she could just devise a plan that won’t get them all killed. Incoming: Getting back home with the knowledge that aliens are coming for your planet is one thing.  Figuring out how to get anyone in a position of power to listen to you is something else.  With the knowledge that the Elentrin are weeks away from Earth, McKenna must persuade the government that she isn’t crazy and that aliens are coming.  When the aliens land and her fears come true. How many chances will she take, lives will she risk, to give Earth a chance against the incoming aliens?  When everyone’s life is on the line, how much is hers worth?  And what can one person, on a planet of billions, do to stop an invasion? Allies: When a member of the Drakyn race, the ones the Elentrin want to destroy, shows up to offer aid in Earth's fight for survival, McKenna has hope. Their visitor unlocks information buried in her friends' heads and gives them a chance against this enemy. Calling in the government seems like the best idea, after all it's a worldwide battle. Because not only are more Elentrin coming, but when they are done, they'll destroy the Earth with asteroids. The window is running out to save the captured shifters on the ships above and convince the Elentrin to leave before Earth is reduced to rubble. Family: Being in the middle of creating history isn't a comfortable place. Toni Diaz has dealt with a lot in her life, but turning into an animal, meeting aliens, and trying to save the world wasn't anything she'd ever seen in her future. Trying to do the best thing for everyone she'll need to balance the good of her family with what is best for Earth. Toni will need to decide exactly what family means, and why sometimes the craziest option is the best one. Even as she prepares to do the impossible, she'll try to keep her loved ones safe, and pray the choices they have made are the right ones. Not just for her, but for all Kaylid left on Earth. Elen's Eviction: The story of the Drakyn and Elentrin and how the war started, at least from the Drakyn's point of view.

    It was said that anyone bold enough to find this runaway planet might be rewarded with technology beyond imagination. But, this ghost planet was traveling at nearly the speed of light and only known to pass through a single set of coordinates once every thousand years. It would take a dangerous rendezvous in warped time and space just to confirm the legend, and trying to set foot on a deserted future world promised even greater peril. Join Adrian Tarn and R.J. Smith as they dare to tempt fate on a mission filled with mysteries from the future and dangers from the present. (standalone, Adrian Tarn series #5)

     Felix used to be a traveling salesman, drifting through the galaxy and hawking his wares. Used to be, that is, until a freak accident in an out of the way system. One rough landing later and Felix finds himself stranded on a wild, alien planet-- front and center in a deadly role he never auditioned for to entertain a secret audience. The upside? A fellow passenger made it to the escape pod with Felix. With this reptilian stranger at his side, he’s not totally alone. The downside? They don’t share a language. Worse, there’s not one scrap of survival know-how between them, and an ominous clawing is coming from outside the escape pod. As if the struggle to avoid becoming lunch and finding some of their own wasn’t enough, an autonomous implant from an unknown source seeks to integrate them into the system.

    The planet is further paralyzed by a wicked winter storm blanketing everything under several feet of snow and ice. For those who survive it is only the beginning of their nightmare as bodies of the missing begin falling from the sky. Captain Austin Reynolds, lone survivor of his military unit, sets out on a cross country trek in search of his pregnant wife. Upon vague instructions from General Roth he heads for Cheyenne Mountain where he hopes to find answers and his wife. Along the way he meets up with other survivors who join in his quest.As the survivors make their way to the mountain, it becomes apparent humans are no longer the fittest on the planet and the fight for survival may be their last.

    The First Galactic Empire has fallen. The Keeper of the Unknowable, Guardian of the Gates, the Eternal Emperor, is dead. Entire star systems have been ravaged by war, planets cracked by powerful weapons, and suns sent into supernova. The infrastructure of an advanced civilization that spanned thousands of stars is ruined. Trillions have died. Instead of liberation and a return to democracy, freedom, and a new golden age, humanity has been plunged into darkness.Eighteen years after the Great Fall of civilization, stranded on the wrecked world Asherho, Keira Kane struggles to make her way. Shattered by war, the climate of the planet has become inhospitable to life and is getting worse with each passing year. The government is a brutal regime, focused on maintaining its own grip on power instead of feeding the few million ragged survivors living upon its surface. What little law and order there is has begun to erode and break down.Adopted, protected, and raised by former Imperial Marines, Keira has been trained as a mechanic and technician. Her skillset is indispensable to maintaining the decaying infrastructure of her dying planet.Sent out on a routine repair job to Hakagi Tower, a seedy apartment block, Keira rapidly finds herself a fugitive, hunted not only by the government she has faithfully served, but by the planetary militia who wants her for their own nefarious reasons. A mysterious battle-damaged warship has also arrived in-system and they want something too.Unbeknownst to Keira, her Imperial Marine companions have been guarding an incredibly valuable secret, one that has the potential to save humanity or see its light extinguished from the galaxy forever.Caught up in a planetary revolt and hunted, Keira is thrust into a life-or-death struggle she never imagined possible. Though she has yet to suspect it, the road ahead is not only dangerous, but a path destined for her and her alone.Does she have the courage to walk it? Does she have the willpower to pick up a fallen standard? Or will she falter and allow humanity to continue its fall into darkness? Only time will tell…Find out why thousands of readers have fallen for Amazon bestselling author Marc Alan Edelheit’s captivating books! The battle to save the galaxy begins here!

    If only he had known then what that choice would mean. Thirteen years later, Keegan, no longer a boy, learns that his younger sister survived the massacre and sets off to be reunited with her. When Keegan accidentally interrupts a plot against a princess, his simple trip turns into a complicated struggle for survival. A mysterious elder appears, full of wit and riddle. Mythical monsters shed their fictional skin and hungrily pursue Keegan and his dragon. Haunting nightmares begin to tear at his mind. As he continues on his quest to be reunited with his sister, Keegan is only just beginning to understand what it means to be... The Dragon’s Son

    An expedition is mounted to the deepest parts of the Amazon in search of the unknown. A team of researchers travels down remote tributaries and treks through dense jungle terrain in search of creatures long thought to be extinct. It isn’t long before they realize that certain remnants of the primeval past have managed to survive into current times.

     But when Wilson takes an intense interest in Oliver's writing and his genre stories of dragons, aliens, and spies, things get weird. Oliver’s stories don’t just need to be finished: they insist on it. With the help of Minerva, Wilson’s girlfriend, Oliver has to find the connection between reality, fiction, the mythical Cydonian Kingdom, and the non-mythical nightclub called M Pallas. That is, if he can survive the alien invasion, the ghosts, and the fact that he thinks he might be in love with Minerva. Unfiction is a wild ride through the collision of science fiction, fantasy, thriller, horror and romance. It's what happens when one writer's fiction interferes with everyone's reality. Unfiction is the latest novel from Gene Doucette, the bestselling author of The Spaceship Next Door.

    A mage cop on his first assignment learns the world isn't as black and white as hopedA jump mage and a starship with matching needs turn out to be a magnet for troubleDigging in 1940s New York City awakens a monster--and brings in the elite of the FaeThe protected heir of an interstellar dictatorship is called to a battle no one expected him to fightAn explosive collection of four novellas from science fiction and fantasy author Glynn Stewart, spanning his ONSET, Starship's Mage, Changeling Blood and Exile universes, including two brand new urban fantasy novellas.  Includes:ONSET: Murder by MagicStarship's Mage: Episode 1Fae, Flames and FedorasAshen Stars

    There will be more world information, tips on how to use the time-line and World Books, rewrites on O.C.C.s, and in some cases, expansions of and more details on O.C.C.s such as the Headhunter, Mercenaries, the Techno-Wizard and Shifter, as well as a few new O.C.C.s. Our goal is to make Rifts® more exciting and compelling than ever, while at the same time making the rules better organized, clearer and easier to use. The wonder and infinite possibilities of Rifts® all brought to pulse-pounding life like never before. Of course, there will be a few fun changes and additions, but nothing so dramatic as to make the 40+ available sourcebooks obsolete. Approximately 30 unique Occupational and Racial Character Classes, including Cyber-Knights, cyborgs, Glitter Boys, Psi-Stalkers, Dog Boys (mutant humanoid dogs), Juicers, Crazies, Techno-Wizards, Ley Line Walkers, Mystics, Shifters, Elemental Fusionists, Mind Melters, and many others. Supernatural and magical creatures, like dragons, available as player characters, others are horrifying menaces from the Rifts. Bionics and cybernetics offer a vast range of mechanical augmentation, meanwhile chemical enhancement (Juicers) and brain implants (Crazies) can turn a human into a superman, though with tragic results. Psychic powers are the source of the Burster, Mind Melter and Mystics abilities. Strange forms of magic are at the command of characters like the Ley Line Walker, Shifter, Elemental Fusionist, Rifter and Techno-Wizard (who combine magic and technology). Super-technology with Mega-DamageTM body armor, energy weapons, rail guns, power armor, and human augmentation. The Coalition States. Humankind's salvation, or its own worst nightmare? Character sheets. Color end sheets by John Zeleznik. New artwork and color pages throughout. Written and created by Kevin Siembieda.

    But Tom's demons return with a vengeance as he discovers the baby is possessed by the spirit of another girl, who went missing 10 years ago - the night Tom had his last drug-fuelled blackout.

    Joined now by a team of Special Forces operators from an alternate and skewed timeline with their own agendas and motivations, Hunter now finds himself without direction. Since escaping Ancient Rome four years earlier, his only goal was to survive long enough to enact his scheme to remove Agrippina from power and place Vespasian, a once and future emperor of Rome, on the throne in her place. But all his well laid plans came to a fruitless end when he and his friends narrowly escaped a grisly fate at the hands of Agrippina. However, there was one thing that survived Hunter’s encounter with the empress to focus his mind. The orb. He has often thought on it, but has never really understood it, yet now comes the moment when he must come to grips with the fact that only by understanding its nature will he be able to harness its power and send everyone home. The orb should have been his sole source of focus from the very beginning, but it was only after his recent failure to apprehend Agrippina that this fact was fully realized. Found in the rubble of Agrippina’s villa was a note left for him by his deceased friend Marcus Varus, tasking him with a mission to track down ancient Druids who may be able to help him. Now, after years trapped in Antiquity, Hunter must finally seek answers to the central mystery that has plagued him since becoming history's first recorded time traveler. Armed with fresh clues and a final destination, Hunter and his company embark on a new quest, one that will take them beyond the boundaries of the Roman Empire in search of centuries old information about a relic few even know exists. But a darkness accompanies them. While the orb is a powerful tool, it is also a deadly device in the hands of those who underestimate or do not understand its dark potential. With its ability to grant certain users the ability to manipulate time, also comes a degenerative property that can reduce an individual into a simpering, doddering fool, or warp him into a tyrannical despot. The orb’s ability to do this is well documented in both Caligula and Claudius, and perhaps Agrippina too, but it is Hunter who should be most concerned by its influence. He has interacted with it far more than anyone else, and as he and his friends begin their odyssey, his challenge will be greater than simply discovering the truth about the orb’s origins, but overcoming and surviving its ill effects as he struggles to maintain control of his mind.

    Four mini-subs are sunk or captured. The fate of the fifth sub, I-16, is unknown.Late at night, nearly three quarters of a century later: Marine biologist Jack Ferrell sails into a mysterious fog off of Kauai’s Na Pali coast.Dense fog banks don’t form in Hawaii . . . or so he thought. They certainly don’t glow in the dark.Concealed within the mist is the sloop Julie Ann floundering in a rogue remnant of drift net. A young woman’s scream pierces the damp air, and he rushes to her rescue.The next morning, Jack dives to check the damage done to the reef by the net and discovers a sunken WWII Japanese mini-sub and the answer to a Pearl Harbor enigma: the fate of I-16. But in a depression in the coral, lies a greater mystery: a human skull the size of a grapefruit.Through a colleague, he learns the skull is from an extinct species of child-sized human being that lived 12,000 years ago on the remote Indonesian island of Flores. But this skull is no 12,000-year-old fossil.In search of answers, Jack, the woman from the Julie Ann, two close friends, and a select team of scientists plunge into a subterranean world deep within the rugged mountains of the mystical Na Pali coast. And what should have been a routine scientific excursion becomes a deadly encounter with the unknown and a race against time when the expedition battles the elements, personal fears, and even one of their own to unearth the key to the origin of the skull and the surprising truth behind one of Hawaii’s famous legends: The Menehune. This is a new release of a previously published edition.

    This science fiction adventure blends magic and technology with the adventures of Ruth, a normal human, pushed into extraordinary situations. Ruth’s transformation takes her from Earth to worlds and situations of which she never dreamed.