Book picks similar to
Side Quests by James A. Hunter


litrpg
viridian-gate-online-series
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The Legacy Builder


Ember Lane - 2018
    Barakdor, a world sliding helplessly to war. Lincoln wanted to be a warrior, a rogue or a mage, but he'd made a promise to himself, so he chose builder. He wasn’t supposed to play the game on his own, but now he wanted to build a legacy for Joan, a sanctuary in a virtual world. It was supposed to be a place where folk could come to get away from the terrors that the land held, a utopia he would create with his bare hands. It was supposed to be Joan’s legacy. But as the growling thunderheads of war gather, he begins to think it might be a last refuge. He begins to think it might be the land’s only hope. Fantasy collides with LitRPG in this first novel from The Land of Barakdor. Scroll up and get your copy.

Caesar's Shadow


Anthony Wright - 2020
    Now he can. The newest VRMMORPG Gods & Kings is the closest thing to a time machine he’ll ever get.With the powers of his Warrior Priest class Matt must build his army, level his followers, and discover new battle formations that will help him defeat his enemies and become a true Roman general. More victories means more glory and more men – so Matt must use all his knowledge of history to give his fighters the edge in battle, as well as buffing his troops with ancient magic and even summoning mythic beasts to fight alongside his men. It’s awesome!But his carefree attitude soon earns the scorn of a serious competitor who has made it his mission to rewrite history and see Matt and his allies destroyed. To see the version of Rome he loves come to life, Matt must use all his skill to defeat his nemesis and save the empire.

World-Tree Online


E.A. Hooper - 2018
     In 2056, the world’s most powerful AI System, ARKUS, comes online. Created to extend human lifespans, it quickly designs new kinds of nanomachine therapies, in addition to making world-changing discoveries in health science. It also develops an advanced VR headset that uses consumable nanomachines to allow users to experience time faster in virtual worlds. Two years later, ARKUS releases World-Tree Online. The game’s time-dilation makes it so that one hour of playtime feels like one month to those in-game, allowing humans to live extended, virtual lives that feel real. However, shortly after an old gamer named Vincent joins World-Tree Online, an update begins that stretches the time-dilation to one year for every five seconds. Players are unable to exit the game during the update—with an estimated wait time of three hundred sixty years. While trapped in the game, Vincent discovers an exploit in the physics that might take him higher up the World-Tree than he ever expected. Unfortunately, he crosses paths with the last moderator in the game, a young man named Lucas that uses his mod abilities to torture and subjugate other players. Lucas is willing to abuse his power to conquer the World-Tree, but Vincent’s exploit might just be the key to stopping him.

Blood and Magic


Ann Gimpel - 2014
    It chased him down, bludgeoned him, and has been dogging him ever since. Some lessons are harder than others, but Luke embraces danger, upping the ante to give it one better. An enforcer for the Coven, a large, established group of witches, his latest assignment is playing bodyguard to the daughter of Coven leaders. Abigail Ruskin is chaperoning a spoiled twelve-year-old from New York to her parents' home in Utah Territory when Luke gets on their stagecoach in Colorado. A powerful witch herself, Abigail senses Luke's magic, but has no idea what he's doing on her stagecoach. Stuck between the petulant child and Luke's raw sexual energy, Abigail can't wait for the trip to end. Unpleasant truths surface about the child. While Abigail's struggling with those, wraiths, wolves, and dark mages launch an attack. Luke's so attracted to Abigail, she's almost all he can think about, but he's leery too. The child is just plain evil. Is Abigail in league with her? It might explain the odd attack that took out their driver and one of their horses. In over his head, he summons enforcer backup. Will they help him save the woman he's falling in love with, or demand her immediate execution?

Grayhold


Troy Osgood - 2019
    Forced back to level 1. What's next, permadeath? Sky Realms Online is the largest and most popular Virtual Reality MMORPG ever made. Set amongst the mystical, floating islands of Hankarth, it's played and enjoyed by millions every hour. Until something goes wrong. Unable to log out, players find themselves reduced to level one, and in the starting zones. They receive a cryptic message from the developers stating that for unknown reasons, they are trapped in the game and may have to live out their lives within the virtual world. Hall is one of the those trapped in the game. He’s been playing Sky Realms Online as a spear-wielding Skirmisher ever since the beta. And instead of panicking as many do, he decides to make the most of it; to play the game and live his new life, all while quietly hoping the developers will find a fix. It doesn’t take Hall long to find out that, while some aspects of the game are the same, the difficulty level is beyond anything he's ever experienced. Together, with a new party of trapped players and NPCs with canned answers, Hall will find out just how different Sky Realms Online has become, and how playing a game is different from living the game... Experience the start of this unforgettable Fantasy LitRPG Adventure today! It's perfect for fans of J.A. Hunter, Dakota Krout and Edward Brody. Also available on Audible, performed by Pavi Proczko, narrator of Eden's Gate and Continue Online.

Terry Brooks Landover CD Collection


Terry Brooks - 2009
    But after he purchased it, Ben Holiday learned that there were a few details the ad had failed to mention. The kingdom was in ruin. The task of proving his right to be King seemed hopeless. But Ben Holiday was stubborn...The Black Unicorn:A year had passed since Ben Holiday bought the Magic Kingdom from the wizard Meeks, who had set a series of pitfalls against him. But Ben had been troubled by dreams of disaster to his former partner, Miles Bennett. Unknown to Ben, the dreams had been a trap by Meeks.Wizard at Large:It all began when the half-able wizard Questor Thews announced that finally he could restore the Court Scribe Abernathy to human form. All went well - until the wizard breathed the magic dust of his spell and suddenly sneezed. Then, where Abernathy had stood, there was only a bottle containing a particularly evil imp.The Tangle Box:Horris Kew, conjurer, confidence-man, and trickster, had returned to Landover from Ben's own world. Alas, he had been sent by the Gorse, a sorcerer of great evil, whom Horris had unwittingly freed from the magic Tangle Box. Now it had returned to enslave those who had once dared to condemn it.Witches’ Brew:The Magic Kingdom of Landover was finally at peace, and Ben and his wife, the sylph Willow, could watch their daughter Mistaya grow. But his idyll was interrupted when Rydall, a king of lands beyond the fairy mist, assembled armies on Landover's border and threatened to invade.Read by Dick Hill.28 audio discs (approximately 31 hr.) : digital ; 4 3/4 in.

The Apex Book of World SF 2 (Apex Book of World SF #2)


Lavie TidharHannu Rajaniemi - 2012
    In The Apex Book of World SF 2, World Fantasy Award nominated editor Lavie Tidhar brings together a unique collection of stories from around the world. Quiet horror from Cuba and Australia; surrealist fantasy from Russia and epic fantasy from Poland; near-future tales from Mexico and Finland, as well as cyberpunk from South Africa. In this anthology one gets a glimpse of the complex and fascinating world of genre fiction – from all over our world. Pre-order edition also includes Nir Yaniv‘s never-before-published-in-English novelette “Undercity” (8800 words) as well as Charles Tan‘s essay, “World SF: Our Possible Future”!Table of Contents:“Alternate Girl’s Expatriate Life” by Rochita Loenen-Ruiz“Mr Goop” by Ivor W. Hartmann“Trees of Bone” by Daliso Chaponda“The First Peruvian in Space” by Daniel Salvo (translated by Jose B. Adolph)“Eyes in the Vastness of Forever” by Gustavo Bondoni“The Tomb” by Chen Qiufan (translated by the author)“The Sound of Breaking Glass” by Joyce Chng“A Single Year” by Csilla Kleinheincz (translated by the author)“The Secret Origin of Spin-Man” by Andrew Drilon“Borrowed Time” by Anabel Enríquez Piñeiro (translated by Daniel W. Koon)“Branded” by Lauren Beukes“December 8th” by Raúl Flores (translated by Daniel W. Koon)“Hungry Man” by Will Elliott“Nira and I” by Shweta Narayan“Nothing Happened in 1999” by Fábio Fernandes“Shadow” by Tade Thompson“Shibuya no Love” by Hannu Rajaniemi“Maquech” by Silvia Moreno-Garcia“The Glory of the World” by Sergey Gerasimov“The New Neighbours” by Tim Jones“From the Lost Diary of TreeFrog7” by Nnedi Okorafor"The Slows” by Gail Hareven (translated by Yaacov Jeffrey Green)“Zombie Lenin” by Ekaterina Sedia“Electric Sonalika” by Samit Basu“The Malady” by Andrzej Sapkowski (translated by Wiesiek Powaga)“A Life Made Possible Behind The Barricades” by Jacques Barcia“Undercity” by Nir Yaniv“World SF: Our Possible Future” by Charles Tan

Dark Wizard's Case


Kirill Klevanski - 2019
    At first, everyone thought it was just a new game, however... Alexander Dumsky, or Alex Doom, was a dark wizard. At the age of seventeen, he was convicted of a litany of crimes so long that even the seasoned investigators, judges, and prosecutors involved in the case could only shudder. Not a single attorney could be found to defend him in court. But four years later, Alex was released from prison to become the Professor of Dark Magic. They'd thrown him into the deepest hole they could find, one built for the sole purpose of holding wizards, and then they let him back out again... Why him? Why then?

The Curse


Phoenix Grey - 2018
     Will refused to admit to the HR lady at Radical Interactive that he’d never played their debut virtual reality MMORPG The Realm. From what he’d seen in videos and heard from reviewers, the game sucked. With the company’s failed attempt at entering the gaming industry, they switched their sights to focus on smaller scale educational programs. Being a beta tester for Radical Interactive was not the dream job that Will had envisioned, but he had hoped it would get his foot in the door to one day becoming a graphic designer for the company. As he filled out his new hire paperwork, he never realized that he was literally signing his life away. Now a phenomenally successful company, Radical Interactive was secretly working on something behind closed doors that would change both the medical and gaming industries forever. The Realm was reborn. The only problem was that it wasn’t a game—at least not to those trapped inside. Dumped into a fantasy world filled with nightmarish monsters, awe-inspiring magic, and way more walking than Will thought he was physically capable of as a nerdy desk jockey, he has to navigate the perils of The Realm and unravel the mystery of how he came to be here and how to get out. Fantasy meets real-life consequences in a game that could mean the difference between life and death. But first, Will must get over being a noob…

Ghosts of Gods


Sydney Allen - 2019
     After my time in the army and then finding myself in the mountains of Tibet, I was ready to lay low, to relax. It was time to go home. Or so I thought. No sooner had I set about returning to the normal life then I found myself swept up in a mission to kill the gods in order to save the life of someone very dear to me. The only problem with killing gods aside from, well, having to kill gods? First I had to be able to reach them through a ritual of intimacy and death. Yeah, you can see where that might be problematic. What follows is a tale of godly proportions with harem elements and downright dirty deeds.

Under My Skin


Shawntelle Madison - 2014
    Little does the populace know that the Guild hides sinister secrets...For Tate Sullivan, life in her small, coastal town is far from glamorous. The affluent lives of the Guild members and their servants isn't something she has ever wanted. But all sixteen year-olds must take a simple test, and Tate's result thrusts her into the Guild's world, one where they hide horrible plans for those they select. Tate must fight the relentless General Dagon for control of her mind, body, and soul to keep the one precious thing she has always taken for granted: herself.Her only ally is the same handsome boy she is pitted against in General Dagon’s deadly game. Quinn desires nothing more than to end the life of General Dagon who has taken over Tate's mind. While romance blooms between Tate and Quinn, General Dagon plots to eventually take over Tate's body, and love might end before it even begins.

The Hero of the Valley: Volume 1


Gary Spechko - 2021
    Chosen by the Gods, he is thrust into a world he knows little about and must grow stronger to face powerful invaders from other worlds.

Undermountain


Eric Kent Edstrom - 2011
    . .Danny Michaelson, sixteen, just wants a little time away from his troubled home in Nashville. So when he joins a group of teens in the Canadian Rocky Mountains for a ten day hiking excursion, he's primed for adventure.Breyona Lewis, sixteen, is a beautiful rich girl from Chicago. Outwardly cheerful, she conceals a dark secret. One she denies even to herself.. . . the encounter of a lifetime . . .Danny and Breyona come face to face with a creature of legend--an eight foot tall beast they tag as "bigfoot." But it's no missing link, no mere animal. And it does not want humans knowing its secrets. Because there are thousands of them here on Earth, living in a hidden city deep beneath the mountains, waiting for the day humans are "ready.". . . friendship, love, and loyalty . . .Separated from each other and told they may never return home, Danny, Breyona, and the others race to escape. To survive.One is made more than human, one is made less.One must fight, one must surrender.Both must face the truth of who they are.

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Part 3.


Mark Twain - 2012
    

Moonlands


Steven Savile - 2013
    There’s no doubt her overachieving parents love her, but they are wrapped up in their own worlds for so much of the time it leaves her feeling like she’s alone.Like a lot of teenagers, Ashley dreams of other worlds, but unlike a lot of teenagers her world is about to collapse as rifts to an ancient Fae Kingdom begin to open all around her. With the arrival of of a supernatural hit-squad intent on killing her, and an unexpected inheritance, Ashley’s London is about to become a magical and mysterious warzone where the prize is Ashley herself.Ashley has to find out the secrets of her own life before she is killed. Balancing ancient prophecies, schoolwork and the love of her life is difficult to say the least! Take part of the wonderful world of Moonlands.