Branches: A Novel


Adam Peter Johnson - 2020
    The election of an authoritarian president. The sudden loss of his mother. A series of debilitating seizures. Now, as America descends into a nightmare, he’s shocked to discover the explanation for his seizures: He’s in the wrong universe.A drug trial promises to return him to the timeline where he belongs. With his family life strained, his job gone and tanks in the streets, he jumps at the opportunity. But what will he find on the other side?Take a reality-bending trip filled with surprises and second chances. Visit alternate timelines where life played out differently. Explore the roads not taken. Question the nature of fate. And find an answer to the biggest question of all: in a world that feels like it’s spinning out of control, what would it take for one person to make a difference?Now an international bestseller, Branches is at once a twisty cerebral drama and a deeply personal journey through fear, grief and redemption.First in a series.REVIEWS“Part dystopian, part all-too-familiar reality … walks an imaginative line between what we think we know and what actually is.” –Stories on Stage Davis“Lovers of alternate histories will find much that fascinates [in] this bold experiment in timelines and trauma.” –BookLife“I did not want to put it down, and I did not stop thinking about it after.” –Amazon review“A story of emotional discovery and depth that left me breathless by the last fateful word. … This is sci-fi with both brains and a heart. … Brilliantly insightful.” –BookBub review“The vivid imagery … and heart-pounding drama caused me to read this novel in one sitting.” –Amazon review“If you were a fan of Blake Crouch’s Dark Matter, this is for you.” –GoodReads review

Mark of Fire


Richard Phillips - 2017
    A young woman’s destiny. Lorness Carol, coming of age in the kingdom of her warlord father, Lord Rafel, aspires to wield magic. But she’s also unknowingly become the obsession of Kragan, an avenging wielder as old as evil itself. He’s waited centuries to find and kill the female prophesied as the only human empowered to destroy him. However, dispatching the king’s assassin, Blade, to Rafel’s Keep, ends in treason. For Blade arrives not with a weapon but rather a warning for the woman he’s known and loved since he was a child. With a price on his head, Blade flees—as Carol and her family are urged away on their own desperate route of escape.Now, traversing the lawless western borderlands, Carol struggles to understand the uncanny magic she possesses and must learn to master. Though separated, Carol and Blade are still united—not only by the darkness pursuing them both but by a quest toward destiny, revenge, and the revelations of an ancient prophecy that signal the ultimate war between good and evil.

Shifters


DP - 2013
    The Ordinaries of the lost colony—Earth—are about to encounter something that will change their world forever.

Swann


Ryan Schow - 2016
    You’re not your hair, your eyes or your nose. You’re not your diseases, your anxieties, or your psychosis. Welcome to Astor Academy where, with the right genetic coding and a stomach for the impossible, you can change not only your body but the very course of your life…Thrust into the sexy, ultra-elite social scene, sixteen year old Savannah Van Duyn starts Astor Academy armed with only her sarcasm, a survivalist’s wit and her father’s promise that the school’s geneticist can fix her many problems at the DNA level. The foremost expert in genetic engineering, however, is teeming with so much dark secrecy it has Savannah’s skin crawling. What begins as a bold promise of genetic therapy becomes a life-threatening search for morality in an immoral cure, and an obsession to right the wrongs heaped upon her and those students who have died before her. Swann is the first in this groundbreaking debut series of young adult novels. Prepare yourself for an unabashed, unapologetic look into today’s YA world, namely: coping with a body fit for shame, crazy mothers on meds, the notion that there’s a pill for every problem, bullying and cyberbullying, the ebb and flow of first love and all things humorous, sick and twisted. In the spirit of balance, however, Swann explores the allure of friendship, the resolve of the desperate soul to find light inside the darkness, and one girl’s path to redemption in the face of insurmountable odds. And so begins the story of the ugly duckling becoming the swan…

The Mad Hatter's Son


Helen Starbuck - 2017
    Annie Collins is an OR nurse who is used to caring for others--both inside the operating room, and in her own personal life. So it isn't a surprise when she is drawn--albeit unwillingly--into the chaos that is her long-time friend Libby Crowder's life. The friendship between Annie and Libby began deteriorating after Libby met the cold and wealthy Edward Matheisen, and quickly ended after she married him. It's been four years since Annie and Libby parted ways. But now she's back and seeking Annie's help. With puzzling symptoms and a plea for help, Annie can't help but wonder: Is Libby really ill or is there more to the story than what Libby is saying? Annie's suspicions heighten when Libby's close friend is severely beaten and dies. Faced with Libby's own apparent suicide, Annie is beside herself with guilt and unable to stop asking questions to uncover the truth. But the answers to these questions don't come without a price. Annie finds herself drawn into a life that has derailed, and pursuing the mystery of Libby's illness threatens to derail her own life as well. Friends change, love betrays, and the end results are never what you anticipate.

Nightmare of the Clans


Pamela E. Cash - 2012
    Each clan possesses supernatural powers. On her 16th birthday Chassie inherits powerful abilities and discovers she's a descendant of the Sakombi clan. She’s also in extreme danger.John is ready to teach her how to fight but there isn’t much time. She must deal with her harsh new reality fast if she wants to stay alive…because her mother’s killer is looking for her.

American Z


J.G. Fletcher - 2017
    [zom - bie] program. A powerful group of elitists, known as The Society, has been secretly controlling governments for years, and are now on the brink of being able to control humanity itself. One man believes he is destined to stop them and is willing to do whatever it takes, including betraying those closest to him. American Z is sure to slowly eat away at your conscious, long after putting it down. American Z is not your typical "flesh-eating" Zombie book. It is based on a more disturbing, a more sinister concept of Zombies, that will haunt your thoughts and leave you second-guessing the world as you know it. You will never look at people the same way again after reading American Z.

Glow


Amy Kathleen Ryan - 2011
    Part of the first generation to be successfully conceived in deep space, she and her boyfriend Kieran will be pioneers of New Earth. Waverly knows she must marry young in order to have children who can carry on the mission, and Kieran, the handsome captain-to-be, has everything Waverly could want in a husband. Everyone is sure he’s the best choice. Still, there’s a part of Waverly that wants more from life than marriage, and she is secretly intrigued by the shy, darkly brilliant Seth.Suddenly, Waverly’s dreams are interrupted by the inconceivable – a violent betrayal by the Empyrean's sister ship, the New Horizon. The New Horizon’s leaders are desperate to populate the new planet first, and will do anything to get what they need: young girls. In one pivotal moment, Waverly and Kieran are separated, and find themselves at the helm of dangerous missions, where every move has potentially devastating consequences, and decisions of the heart may lead to disaster.Pulse-pounding and addictive, Glow begins Amy Kathleen Ryan's Sky Chasers--the most riveting series since The Hunger Games.

The Living Dead Boy


Rhiannon Frater - 2010
    As the head of the Zombie Hunters Club, he's obsessed with preparing for the zombocalypse. Though no one around him really believes that zombies will one day rise to devour the living, Josh is convinced it just might happen. When zombies do shamble into his schoolyard, Josh finds himself the leader of the dwindling band of zombie hunters, and he is charged with protecting them all. Josh's baby brother, his closest friends, and the love of his young life try to survive as the undead take over their town. Trapped in his treehouse and surrounded by the dead, will Josh be able to save them all?A gripping horror tale for zombie fans of all ages!

One of Us


Craig DiLouie - 2018
    He loves his friends, even if the teachers are terrified of them. They're members of the rising plague generation. Each bearing their own extreme genetic mutation.The people in the nearby town hate Enoch, but he doesn't know why. He's never harmed anyone. Works hard and doesn't make trouble. He believes one day he'll be a respected man.But hatred dies hard. The tension between Enoch's world and those of the "normal" townspeople is ready to burst. And when a body is found, it may be the spark that ignites a horrifying revolution.

Karina


E.B. Mann - 2018
    Her life seems hopeless, until she stumbles upon a mysterious cave near her home. What she learns from the cave's extraordinary inhabitants will change her perspective–and her life–forever.

Inevitable


Tamara Hart Heiner - 2013
    But when she witnesses a murder, Jayne finds herself caught up in a dangerous world of intrigue and suspense.As it turns out, she is not the only one doing the stalking. The killer is on to her, and all of her visions of the dying don't reveal how her life will end. Somehow, she must stop the murderer before he arranges Jayne's own inevitable death.

Seeker’s World


K.A. Riley - 2019
    Prove yourself worthy, and you may just save the world.”
 On her seventeenth birthday, Vega Sloane receives a strange and puzzling gift: a key in the shape of a dragon’s head, along with a note that claims she’s destined for greatness. When the handsome and mysterious Callum Drake enters her life, she finds herself inextricably drawn to him, and more questions begin to arise. Who is the boy beyond the exquisite façade and charming smile? Is he an ally, or the very enemy she needs to fight off? Vega soon discovers that she’s being recruited to attend a magical Academy in a world beyond her own—a school where those known as the Blood-Born train and compete to see who comes out on top. The only problem? Everyone seems to want her dead.

Escape


Inna Hardison - 2016
     What if everything you knew about the world around you was a lie, and the very people you were taught to fear were your salvation, your escape? Meet Amelia, raised in the safety of a Replenisher compound, a protectorate for the few Alliance females who can bear children. In two months, she will have to choose a mate and begin her duties, except it doesn't happen like that. When she witnesses a Zoriner boy fall over the wall of the compound, the very wall designed to keep those like her safe from those like him, the injured boy becomes her burden and maybe, if she lets him, her escape from the life she is meant to have, and the key to unraveling of the many secrets and lies on both sides of this conflict and each other. This is the very beginning of her journey.

The Blueprint


Wesley Cross - 2016
    Some might say it has been doing it already for decades by whatever means necessary. But they are no longer content to hide in the shadows. They want to become the true masters.Jason Hunt knows nothing about that world. In a decaying society plagued by poverty and a lost sense of purpose, he's one of the lucky ones. He's got money. He's happily married. He could just go on living.But when his wife becomes ill, Jason finds himself pitted against the cabal that might hold the key to her survival. To save her, he needs to embrace technology he doesn't understand, take over a billion-dollar company without a billion dollars, outsmart professional assassins, and land a contract with the DOD. But even that might not be enough.Pick up THE BLUEPRINT--the first book in THE UPGRADE series set in a dark, near-future world that will appeal to fans of Altered Carbon, Daniel Silva, and Tim Tigner.