Books Tagged With format - paperback

Word Count: Click here to reveal45000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Tangents & Tachyons is Scott's second anthology - six sci fi and sci-fantasy shorts that run the gamut from time travel to hopepunk and retro spec fic: Eventide: Tanner Black awakes to find himself in his own study, staring out the window at the end of the Universe. But who brought him there, and why? Chinatown: Deryn lives in an old San Francisco department store with his girlfriend Gracie, and scrapes by with his talent as a dreamcaster for the Chinese overlords. But what if a dream could change the world? Across the Transom: What if someone or something took over your body on an urgent mission to save your world? Pareidolia: Simon's not like other college kids. His mind can rearrange random patterns to reveal the images lurking inside. But where did his strange gift come from? And what if there are others like him out there too? Lamplighter: Fen has a crush on his friend Lewin, who's in a competing guild. But when the world goes dark, only a little illumination can save it. And only Fen, Lewin and their friend Alissa can light the spark. A Liminal Sky short. Prolepsis: Sean is the closeted twenty-five-year-old editor of an 80's sci-fi 'zine called Prolepsis. When an unabashedly queer story arrives from a mysterious writer, it blows open Sean's closet door, and offers him the chance to change the world - and the future. Plus two flash fiction stories – The System and The Frog Prince, never before published. This is the first time all of these stories have all been collected in one place.

Word Count: Click here to reveal65 000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: "Set amid an imaginative blend of sci-fi and fantasy, the novel’s fictional universe is vividly realized and will grab curious readers. The book works in thought-provoking themes that will further draw readers in." BookLife Prize The Alchemist meets fantasy with a splash of space opera. Viola Alerion, a renowned storyteller in the Haldrian Empire, wants to be left in peace. For years, she’s been hounded by her past, never to find a moment’s rest. Then she meets a boy who wants to become her apprentice. He refuses to take no for an answer, and she reluctantly yields, even though she knows taking him with her could endanger his life. As their journey progresses, Viola begins to understand she’s not the only teacher in the equation. The nameless boy also has something to teach, but Viola makes for a reluctant student. Can she give way to possibility and embrace a future in alignment with what she’s always wanted? Can she find the courage to embrace the principles that will transform her life? Can she overcome her circumstances and face her past? Or will she keep on running with nowhere to hide? And what of the boy who guards untold secrets and exhibits mysterious powers that defy belief?

Word Count: Click here to reveal84000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Kyri was raised a fletcher but after finding a new home and family with the Telequire Amazons, she discovers a desire to take on more responsibility within the tribe. She has skills they desperately need and she is called to action to protect those around her. But Kyri's path is ever-changing even as she finds herself altered by love, loyalty, and grief. Far away from home, the new Amazon is forced to decide what to sacrifice and who to become in order to get back to all that she has left behind. And she wonders what is worse, losing everyone she's ever loved or having those people lose her?

Word Count: Click here to reveal108,720 (Click here to hide)

Summary: As the first-born son of a royal duke and cousin to the prince, Cathal has always put his duty to family and country first, even when it conflicts with his own wishes. When Cathal’s father arranges a marriage between him and Velia, cousin to the emperor of Ardunn, without consulting him, he sees no alternative but to go along with his plans for the good of Tournai. But it’s Velia’s companion, Flavia, who fascinates Cathal from the moment he first sets eyes on her. Cathal doesn’t know Flavia is really Flavian, an artist masquerading as a woman to escape Ardunn, a restrictive and repressive place where Flavian’s preference for men is forbidden. Even when Cathal discovers Flavian’s identity, even as he struggles with his obligations and duty, he cannot fight his attraction to the sharp-tongued artist. Flavian is intrigued by him as well, but Cathal is still betrothed to Velia, and Flavian worries he is more taken with the feminine illusion Flavian presents than the man beneath it. He came to Tournai to start a new life—a safe one—as an artist, and an inconvenient attraction to his friend’s betrothed, a man who happens to be a member of the royal family, is not a part of his plans. While both men battle their longings for each other, spies from Ardunn infiltrate the capital, attempting to uncover Tournai’s weaknesses and secrets. They are also searching for Flavian, who possesses a magical Talent giving him the ability to see the truth of a person just by painting their portrait—something that would be invaluable to Ardunn’s emperor.

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Summary: The embers of War still glow as memories of strange skies over an alien landscape, light-years from home, bring back the sensations of battle; a time when personal sacrifice meant the difference between salvation for all, or total destruction. Gathered here is a cross-section of stories from the first decade of the award-winning Defending The Future series. Written by the known and up-and-coming in the military science fiction genre, these stories represent the fan-requested highlights from the series.

Word Count: Click here to reveal54418 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Mercy must unlearn her past if she hopes to find her future. After eluding hunters who wanted her dead, Mercy finds herself in a strange new place to call home. With the help of the bizarre Thomas Farrell and the mysterious Leyda, she discovers how different the world is from what her father taught. The violence of her past still haunts her, but the truth she uncovers rattles her core. Mercy must put her past and fears behind her, unlearn what she once believed to be doctrine, and uncover her true capabilities as a burgeoning scientist if she hopes to make a difference in Kanta. Drawn to the laboratory and to caring for the werewolves she once worked so hard to capture, Mercy discovers her own true passions instead of those demanded of her. When Andrei, a young, handsome werewolf, enters her life, Mercy sees firsthand the harsh realities of the werewolves she once demonized. She wants to help, but does Mercy have the courage and the wits to do the impossible?   Book 2 of The Wolves of Kanta series

Word Count: Click here to reveal117000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: A bond she didn’t choose. A love she can’t escape. A creature so powerful it bends the limits of time… Smart, sassy, and sanguine, Des Mildue is a traveling sellsword in Rescalin, a dry and dusty kingdom full of rogues, opportunists, and thieves. She keeps her nose clean, brazens it out with a blade when she can’t, and keeps others at arm’s length where they can’t mess up her plans. That is, until a sword fight gone wrong leaves her tied by blood to the first dragon hatched in centuries. Suddenly, Des has to contend with a new voice in her head: haughty, willful Esquidamelion. Des wants to leave Squid by the roadside, but the blood bond has other ideas. With half the world on their tail - including Liv, her beautiful, faithless ex who Des is definitely over - Des must search for answers for why so many are willing to kill, maim and torture to get their hands on Squid. But she’s beginning to suspect her blood bond has tied her not only to a dragon, but to a fight for Rescalin’s future… …and no one else even knows it’s at risk. If you like the kind of story that grabs you by the shirtfront and hauls you through mystery, magic, adventure and betrayal, with a side of sapphic romance, pick up The Blood-Born Dragon, first in a new trilogy from debut author J.C. Rycroft.

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Summary: Reclaiming Earth from the Zhen was only the first battle. Now Tajen Hunt and his fellow colonists must fight for their fledgling colony’s survival. Tajen’s mission to seek aid from the Kelvaki Assembly is cut short when the Zhen invade Earth. Now he, Liam, and Kiri must return to Earth and liberate the colony from brutal occupation.  When Tajen learns the Zhen plan to destroy a human fleet amassing in preparation to help Earth, he and his crew must escape the planet once more and warn them.

Word Count: Click here to reveal84000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Pirate captain, inventor, and entrepreneur Onofre Cisneros sweeps his friends Fatemeh and Ramon Morales off to Hawaii for their honeymoon. Once there, a British agent makes Cisneros an offer he can't refuse and the captain must travel to Japan. Wanting to see more of the world, Ramon and Fatemeh ask to accompany the captain only to find themselves embroiled in a plot by samurai who steal a Russian airship, hoping to overthrow the Japanese emperor.

Word Count: Click here to reveal108000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Being a nobody isn’t Duncan Alexander’s life goal, but it’s worked for him. He has a nondescript job, a few good friends, and overall he’s content. That’s until one fateful trip to San Jose, California, where he is “Called” to meet the mysterious Juliet de Exter. Juliet is a beautiful, wealthy, powerful Immortal who is undertaking The Calling—a search for a human to join her world of Immortals. Inexplicably, Duncan’s calling is more dangerous than any of the Immortals, even Juliet, ever thought it would be. There is more to this nobody, this only child of long-deceased parents, than anyone thought. When Duncan experiences uncontrollable dreams of people he doesn’t know and places he hasn’t been, Juliet and the other Immortals worry. Soon, his visions point to a coven of long-dead witches. The dreams also lead Duncan to his one true love. How will Duncan navigate a forbidden romance with an outcast Immortal? How will he and the others keep the balance between the Light and Dark, survive vicious attacks, and keep the humans from learning who they truly are? More importantly, who is this implacable foe Duncan keeps seeing in his dreams?

Word Count: Click here to reveal117000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: You can choose your friends, but you can’t choose your family… Quirk and Moth have avoided killing each other long enough to solve another case. They decide on a local job next, and take up the search for a missing scientist. How could Quirk know this new mystery put them on a headlong collision course with his troubled past, a plethora of personal issues, and a hoard of genetic hybrid creatures with an appetite for anything that moves? When their client dies in mysterious circumstances, law enforcement pursues the dysfunctional duo all the way to a research lab in frozen Yellowknife. Can Quirk and Moth find the scientist before they are banged up for murder, or has she already been eaten? Is it coincidence Quirk’s father-in-law bought the company? Can they expose the shadow from Quirk’s past and clear their names? Quirk and Moth need time, but it’s fast running out, and the bodies are piling up. Find out what happens in The Carborundum Conundrum!

Word Count: Click here to reveal97,600 (Click here to hide)

Summary: **First Place Winner 2017 Rainbow Awards: Best Gay Sci-fi//Futuristic. ** **Third Place Winner 2017 Rainbow Awards: Best Gay Book.** Shield Captain Bennet arrives on the Gyrfalcon to take up his final year’s posting before returning to the Shield Regiment after his rotation out. On Gyrfalcon he faces up to the fallout from Makepeace—ethical, political and above all, personal. Will he be able to accept necessity: that knowing what the Maess are up to outweighs the humanitarian issues surrounding the prisoners he rescued from Makepeace? Can he ride out the political furore that follows the loss of the dreadnought Caliban? How will he cope with an entire year of serving under his father, Caeden? And worst of all, how in the name of every god in the Pantheon can he stand to see Flynn every single day, with the Fraternisation Regs standing between them and keeping them apart? It will be an interesting year. Bennet can hardly wait for it to be over. Of course, things never really do go to plan…

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Summary: Since the beginning, Doc Silence has warned the Indestructibles, his team of super-powered protégés, that magical threats would be the most dangerous. The team has faced down alien invasions, time traveled to post-apocalyptic futures, and more since they first banded together, but now, for the first time, they are confronted with not one but two sources of dark and dangerous magic. Together, Jane, Billy, Kate, Titus, and Entropy Emily will go up against an evil necromancer, warping his victims into weapons in a reckless pursuit of wealth; and an even stranger threat, a young girl with inherent mystical abilities who has become a pawn in an interdimensional power struggle. When an entire town disappears, the Indestructibles – a solar-powered girl, a boy with an alien in his mind, a ballerina vigilante, a werewolf with confidence issues, and a Whovian with a black hole where her heart should be – must band together with new allies to stop dark forces far beyond their comprehension. This is their greatest challenge and most personal mission yet. Has all their training been enough to prepare them?

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Summary: Pulled into a magical world,  two twelve-year-olds must learn to work together in order to defeat a trio of evil witches and unravel a curse that has enslaved an entire land.

Word Count: Click here to reveal13000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Poems written by Cyborgs in the future, melding sci-fi and poetry, human and machine. The Cyborg Anthology takes place in a future where there was a thriving world of Robots and Cyborgs living peacefully beside Humans, but a disaster destroyed all Robot and most Cyborg life. The book is organized like a typical anthology of literature, split into sections that include a biography of each poet and a sample of their poetry. It covers early Cyborg poetry, political, celebrity, and pop culture poets, and ends with the next generation of Cyborg poets. The narrative takes place in the time after a cataclysmic event, and the collection wrestles with this loss. Through the lives of the poets, the book chronicles the history of personhood for technological beings, their struggle for liberation, and demonstrates different ways a person can be Cyborg. The poems and biographies together tell the story of a complex and enthralling world-to-come, exploring topics that are important in the future, and also urgent right now. “With mordant wit and a playful satiric touch, these Cyborg poems showcase a dazzling range of poetic forms and ideas: imaginative and charmingly subversive. Move over Norton Anthology of Poetry, there’s a new force in town, and they are a delight.” —Renée Sarojini Saklikar, author of Listening to the Bees and Children of Air India “The premise of this collection alone is fabulous. The poems are potent and powerful. With echoes of Le Guin, Brunner and Monáe, Lindsay B-e’s debut is layered and smart, provocative, and deeply satisfying. I was moved and fascinated. Speculative poetry at its best.” —Hiromi Goto, author of Chorus of Mushrooms and Darkest Light

Word Count: Click here to reveal96500 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Aik will never be the same … and neither will his world. War is coming. Aik has become the Progenitor, and the Seed Mother has released him to transform the world for her alien brood. Silya and Raven, Aik's former friends, are the only ones who can save him and the world. But what if the cure is worse than the invasion? As Silya rushes to prepare Gullton for the battle to come, she's determined to save as many people as she can. But new crises emerge that demand her attention. Raven has his own hands full, keeping the dragon-like verent in line, while helping Silya to save the world. But what if the only way to do so is to sacrifice Aik, the man that he loves? It's the end of the world … or could it be the start of something new?

Word Count: Click here to reveal126000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: YOUR NEXT READ IS NOW BOARDING She can speak all languages. He can smell evil intent. They're enemies. They crave each other. With international settings, a conspiracy plot, star-crossed lovers, and sharp writing, The Demon in Business Class is a stunning debut novel spanning continents and genres. Zarabeth travels the world for a shady executive, laying the groundwork for global war. Gabriel offers a second chance to the criminals that a visionary leader sees in dreams. One rainy night in Scotland, they meet... Now, it's complicated. There's also the investigator, the witch, the playboy, the gangster, the cultist, the pre-school teacher, the two angels… And, the demon. Fans of Jeff VanderMeer, Michel Faber, and David Mitchell will love this stylish hybrid-genre novel. The Demon in Business Class is an international story of fantasy, intrigue, and love, on the uneasy ground where the human meets the divine.   "If William Gibson wrote paranormal .... weaves the dark worlds of the occult and big business into an intoxicating tale." – D. J. Butler, author of Witchy Eye "Creative spark? Anthony Dobranski ignites a creative bonfire ...A masterwork of invention." – Mary Kay Zuravleff, author of Man Alive! "... a swank cocktail of international intrigue, steeped in the supernatural, mixed with literary flair .... so sleek it flies off the page...." - Zach Powers, author of First Cosmic Velocity  

Word Count: Click here to reveal93000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: To resuscitate his fading celebrity, tech CEO Stephen Lucas would sell his soul for one more hit. When the subspace network for his holographic gaming empire crashes, his hardware guru makes a discovery proving that Einstein was right once again—information can be sent into the past. They accidently created a simple time machine. In a culture built on instant gratification, Lucas is sure he's stumbled upon the next big thing,  the game-changer that will make Wall Street give him the accolades he craves—a device that makes instant delivery possible. Want a pizza now? Send your order back in time 30 minutes. Forgot to make reservations at that chichi french restaurant two weeks ago? No worries now you can make purchases of anything in the past and have it appear when you want it—now. So, buy last weeks PowerBall ticket. Invest in that stock you wish you bought last year. Share a FaceTime call with a loved one that passed away last month. Finally time really is on your side. A time machine for the rest of us. But when he rushes into beta testing, he learns that the stuff dreams are made of can quickly become the stuff of nightmares. It turns out Move Fast and Break Things is terrible policy when developing a time machine.

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Summary: ---From the Archives--- Stories by Mike McPhail and Danielle Ackley-McPhail based on the 1986-96 military science fiction role-playing game The Alliance Archives. By the late 21st century, humanity has final reached for the stars and established an off-world colony in the system of Tau Ceti, only to discover that man's greatest enemy is still man. On the colony world of Demeter, ADF power-armored troopers and their Parr scouts fight a desperate, covert war against invading corporate mercenaries. Even in the vastness of space, there is no room for lasting peace.  

Word Count: Click here to reveal24000 (Click here to hide)

Summary: Every time something goes missing from the village, Sir Violet, the local knight, makes his way to the dragon's cave and negotiates the item's return. It's annoying, but at least the dragon is polite. But when the dragon hoards a person, that's a step too far. Sir Violet storms off to the mountainside to escort the baker home, only to find a more complex mystery—a quest that leads him far beyond the cave. Accompanied by the missing baker's wife and the dragon himself, the dutiful village knight embarks on his greatest adventure yet. The Dragon of Ynys is an inclusive fairy tale for all ages.