I was ready for the uplink. There was just one thing I had to do first. I had to die. Ripcord was a revolutionary new product that launched people into a virtual reality world just moments before death, sparing them their painful end-of-life memories and allowing them to live in a video game utopia for all time. At least, that’s how it was advertised. No one ever came back to say whether Ripcord lived up to its promise. It was a one-way ticket for those lucky enough to get in. Well, maybe “lucky” isn’t the right word for it. My wife had been in Ripcord for two years. I was finally ready to go find her. When I got there though, it was nothing like I had expected and she was nowhere to be found. Oh, and did I mention something is killing everyone off? “Griefing” players that were already grieving. If I ever wanted to see my wife again, I’d have to get a lot stronger, learn how to level up in this strange new world, and hope she found a way to survive this long…

    NASA scientists warn of the possible effects of heightened solar activity, but the threat is downplayed until it's far too late.After #1: The Shock- Rachel Wheeler flees the dangers of Charlotte to seek her grandfather's remote compound in the Blue Ridge Mountains. She is joined by several other survivors as they fight back against a hostile world.After #2: The Echo- The survivors discover the mutant Zapheads are evolving by imitating human speech and behavior, but the threat of savage violence remains.After #3: Milepost 291- As Rachel and the others near her grandfather's compound, new dangers emerge, including a military unit that has established its own harsh laws.

    The seas have risen, the skies have darkened and the American Midwest has become a desert. A handful of corporations own and operate the country and food is used as a means of oppression. The year is 2074. America is now a third-world nation and China, with its prosperous and burgeoning middle class, is the leader of the Free World. Against this backdrop, a devastating raid by the wealthy ruling class on a stronghold of rebels fighting against the system inadvertently unites two enemies in a forbidden love that threatens to tear their worlds apart. Carlin Pheney, a decorated military pilot and member of the upper class, is captured by Aelena Hall, a veteran leader of the food wars. Together, they become fugitives on the run from a military industrial complex headed by Carlin’s father. Aided by strangers and betrayed by friends, they are swept up in an unstoppable global catastrophe. When Aelena is captured and thrown into the Federal Torture Chamber on Guantanamo Island, Carlin devises a desperate plan for her impossible escape from the water-bound prison. Mystery and suspense pursue the two lovers across the oceans and around the world to a wild and newborn land. Here, if they hope to survive, they must face a terrible battle to colonize a new America and give birth to a nation. In the tradition of literature with science fiction and political overtones that includes Nineteen Eighty-Four, Brave New World and Fahrenheit 451 comes one of the best new books of the year, the dystopian thriller 2076: A Revolutionary Tale—a book about a tomorrow ruled by the plutocrats of today.

     Valerie Diaz has a power that she can't contain, and it's killing her. Bounced between foster homes and the streets, she only has time to concentrate on staying alive. But a visit from the imaginary friend of her childhood opens a world of possibilities, including a new life half a universe away on a planet that is bursting with magic. The first three books of The Conjurors Series follow Valerie on a journey that straddles two worlds. In order to survive, she must travel many light years away to a realm where anything is possible. But choosing to embrace her potential will set Valerie on a treacherous course - one filled with true love, adventure and perilous danger. This collection includes the first three novels in this young adult fantasy series: The Society of Imaginary Friends, Knights of Light, and Guardians of the Boundary. Purchased individually, the ebooks would cost $10. The fourth and final book in the series, Edge of Pathos, is available on Amazon but not included in this collection.

    He is increasingly adrift in a modern world into which, more and more, he doesn't seem to fit. The sorrows and losses that have scarred his life and crushed his soul are close to taking what's left of the ranch and home his Grandfathers built. His self respect and his life are circling the drain when fate drops him into the path of Amanda Blake, a desperate young woman, and her son. The girl is struggling to escape a life of brutal slavery and give her son the chance at a decent life. Acting out of the habits of a long and un-gentle life, Ben finds he is unable to walk away from that life and death struggle of a helpless woman and her son. For him, there are no options. The Honor and Values of his ancestors, and everything he is demand, he must help. Along the way he discovers that there is indeed life and Love left in his heart, and a reason for fresh hope. As they struggle to survive, the idea begins to form that though they might be an unlikely pair; his need for her is as great as her need for him. Together, they find the courage to create for each other, A Pair of Second Chances.

    Complications arise when a US Marine veteran's account of the war challenges Levine's beliefs, forcing the historian to decipher between propaganda and history.

    Preferably by rescuing as many other ReAssignees as possible. And if doing so shakes the EuroBloc to its foundations, so much the better.Meanwhile – a madman awaits his fate.The world waits for Margo to take up her pen again.And in their secret base, Margo and Bane prepare to marry at last.But the safety of their new home is deceptive.When they are discovered, the EuroGov’s vengeance will be swift.And merciless.

    And she begins to question everything she’s ever known.She has to play along if she has any hope of escaping.But the Institution is hiding some dark secrets. And they won’t let her leave.Can Sage keep up the ruse she’s begun?

    Before they can go home, they will visit Foreverland, an alternate reality that will heal their minds.Reed dreams of a girl that tells him to resist Foreverland. He doesn’t remember her name, but knows he once loved her. He’ll have to endure great suffering and trust his dream. And trust he’s not insane.Danny Boy, the new arrival, meets Reed’s dream girl inside Foreverland. She’s stuck in the fantasy land that no kid can resist. Where every heart’s desire is satisfied. Why should anyone care how Foreverland works?

    Get fourteen books for the price of one! This boxed set features one new cozy mystery (Chocolate With A Side Of Murder) and thirteen backlist favorites (Killer Amnesia, College Can Be Murder, Fishing For Murder, Murder Of A Yoga Instructor, Drowning In Deceit, A Not So Merry Christmas Murder, Killer Injustice, Murder Of A Restaurant Critic, Murder Of A Movie Producer, The Killer Holiday Office Party, Deadpan Murder, Murder In Happy Creek, and The Last Frontier Of Murder).

    But the worms aren’t the only thing that he finds. Staring at him through the darkness, with wide, innocent eyes, is something that makes Seckry’s heart almost stop.A girl.She’s shaking, petrified, and has no recollection of who she is or what she’s doing there.Floodlights bleach the area and Seckry has no choice but to grab a hold of the girl and escape with her.Suddenly the question of what Endrin were doing with a few worms becomes the last thing on Seckry’s mind. What were Endrin doing with a human?

     Way out in the sea, impossible to reach. It rises gray and bare, up and up, and then out of sight. As if the sea gave birth to something meant to connect it to the sky. I’ve never seen the top. Maze says she’s not convinced it has one. And I’ve always taken its impossible presence for what the Fathers say it is: a relic from before the Wipe. The hubris of pre-Wipe man, and a reminder for us all as to why it is God’s Will that we never return to technology. But Maze suddenly has it in her head that the tower means something else, something different than the history the Fathers have given us. I think she’s a conspiracy theorist. Until she shows me the map. Just the word mirror scribbled in red ink, next to a marking, and she expects me to go into the Deadlands with her. As long as I’ve known of her recklessness, and as much of a bad influence as she is on me, I can’t say no. Because while she doesn’t know they exist, I can’t stop my feelings for her. And I start to realize, when we first pass over the rotting gates, into the ruin that was a city, that it will take something much more than either of us ever knew we had in order to survive the truth.

    But when deadly strife breaks out among their ranks, the teenage son of one prominent family finds himself fleeing in the dead of night only to wind up shipwrecked on the forbidden continent of America. Armed with only his wit and the most unexpected of allies, the teenager struggles to survive in a wasteland filled with unspeakable horrors and in the end must uncover the one secret that can save his own people or spell doom for mankind forever.

     After my first escape, I realized that everything I'd believed, everything the Elders told us, and everything I thought I knew were all calculated lies. Now I know the truth will set me free.

    After a perilous escape from the nuclear wreckage of their Washington, DC suburb in Ashes, Ashes, the surviving kids reach their destination, a mountain safe house, only to find their troubles have just begun. There are no adults and the kids are still all alone. Fifteen-year-old Nester Bartlett's biggest worries had been growing up black in America... but the nuclear apocalypse has changed all of the rules. Now, instead of getting good grades and struggling against the negative stereotypes against African American men, he's fighting just to stay alive. With no skills for his new life of tending animals, maintaining fires and defending their mountain cabin against intruders, he's unprepared for the threats that bombard him and his friends from the weather, from escaped prisoners from a nearby correctional facility and from their own grief over their losses. Then, as nuclear winter sweeps over their mountain home killing crops and animals, a medical emergency threatens one of their number. Nester must make a desperate choice that shatters their little community and irrevocably alters their chances for survival.