Award Winner: 2018 Best Book Awards Fiction: Cross-Genre
Medicine has no cure for evil.
Ben Oris, a pragmatic med student from Philadelphia, gets cut by an old bone while touring the Paris catacombs. His companion Laurette, a public health student from Haiti, senses danger and worries an evil curse now runs through him.
Ben scoffs at the idea--he simply has a wound that won't heal--and back home he returns to his stressful clerkship at the hospital. But when people close to him succumb to a grisly illness and a dark priest pursues him, his skepticism wavers. Could a bone from an 18th century skeleton with a frightening history really cause modern-day disease?
With the help of Laurette, he scrambles to find a cure through Vodou before more of his loved ones die. But first, he must battle the mysterious priest who's bent on vengeance and determined to have Ben's blood as his own.
The Bone Curse, though a standalone, is the first in a series about a man of science who gets caught up in otherworldly situations.
Award Finalist: 2018 Best Book Awards Fiction: Cross-Genre
Lama Rinzen awakens from meditation to find himself reincarnated as a detective on Denver's Colfax Avenue. Immediately he realizes that once again he has been reborn into the Hell Realm--this time charged with finding insurance man Sonny Heller's killer. Rinzen believes finding Heller's killer will lead to the Sacred Dorje, which has eluded the lama for many lifetimes. By finding the Dorje, he will become a bodhisattva, allowing him to lead all sentient beings to Nirvana. But should the Dorje escape his grasp, Rinzen will be forced to suffer yet another lifetime in Hell, haunted by past demons and his failure to achieve enlightenment.
Award Finalist: 2018 Best Book Awards Fiction: Cross-Genre
This third book in the Henrietta and Inspector Howard series provides a delightful romp through the English countryside and back.
Anxious to be married, Henrietta and Clive push forward with their wedding plans despite their family differences, made worse now by Oldrich Exley’s attempts to control the Von Harmons. When the long-awaited wedding day arrives, there is more unfolding than just Clive and Henrietta’s vows of love. Stanley and Elsie’s relationship is sorely tested by the presence of the dashing Lieutenant Harrison Barnes-Smith and by Henrietta’s friend Rose—a situation that grows increasingly dark and confused as time goes on.
As Clive and Henrietta begin their honeymoon at Castle Linley, the Howards’ ancestral estate in England, they encounter a whole new host of characters, including the eccentric Lord and Lady Linley and Clive’s mysterious cousin, Wallace. When a man is murdered in the village on the night of a house party at the Castle, Wallace comes under suspicion—and Clive and Henrietta are reluctantly drawn into the case, despite Clive’s anxiety at involving his new bride and Henrietta’s distracting news from home.
Delicately attempting to work together for the first time, Clive and Henrietta set out to prove Wallace’s innocence, uncovering as they do so some rather shocking truths that will shake the Linley name and estate forever.
Award Finalist: 2018 Best Book Awards Fiction: Cross-Genre
Miraculum Monstrum is an epic hybrid narrative about Tristia Vogel, a female artist who experiences a radical physical transformation, beginning with the excrescence of apparent wings. Though she is possibly an anomalous mutation resulting from worldwide ecological upheaval, the bird/woman is co-opted by a religious cult that claims to have prophesied her experience; she is thus written as the central figure of their scriptural text. The fragmentary poem that is Miraculum Monstrum, which bears the same name as the fictitious codex quoted throughout, is presented within a catalog for an exhibit of visual artifacts and writings that chronicle this speculative history. The exhibition curator persona performs a duel function as narrative voice within the poem and critical commentator on the exhibit.
Award Finalist: 2018 Best Book Awards Fiction: Cross-Genre
Esteemed California music professor David Whealy is drawn to the other side of the country to investigate the circumstances behind his unexpected inheritance. As David probes deeper into the secrets of his benefactor, James Burton West, he finds more than just a wealth of unpublished music on the order of the great composers.
David's benefactor knew precious little about his own estate that had been in continuous family hands since 1724. He knew nothing about his colonial ancestor, a Thomas of historic import, nor the origins of that ancient iron key which held a secret even West knew nothing about.
A secret which may well have redrawn the map of the United States.
Award Finalist: 2018 Best Book Awards Fiction: Cross-Genre
The earth is threatened with a catastrophic political event which could result in international warfare and destroy all life on the planet. In heaven, a divine council decides that extraordinary measures are essential. They call for an intervention that involves two souls returning to earth. The chosen two sign a contract that they will work to avert the disaster.
Brad Channing, a Navy SEAL, and Sarah O'Brien, a teacher, become heaven's representatives on earth. The story follows them as they individually and then together face overwhelming obstacles and eventually end up on a strategic Air Force base in California. It is there that they discover a conspiracy to assassinate the President of the United States. The terrorists have a plan for global dominance and they are determined to complete their mission. Although military leadership appears to have the President's best interests at heart, it is not clear who can be trusted and who should be feared. The action is rough and tumble as Brad and Sarah try to figure out the culprits for the plot that will turn into a worldwide conflagration unless stopped.
If you enjoy thrillers, this is one with enough twists and adventure to keep you riveted and guessing. If you like your thriller along with a good romance, Brad and Sarah's initial attraction and eventual love will sustain you as they live out their heavenly and earthly desires. A Great summer read.
Award Finalist: 2018 Best Book Awards Fiction: Cross-Genre
The very last thing 17-year-old Emmott Syddall wants is to turn out like her dad. She’s descended from ten generations who never left their dull English village, and there’s no way she’s going to waste a perfectly good life that way. She’s moving to London and she swears she is never coming back. But when the unexplained deaths of her neighbors force the government to quarantine the village, Em learns what it truly means to be trapped. Now, she must choose. Will she pursue her desire for freedom, at all costs, or do what’s best for the people she loves: her dad, her best friend Deb, and, to her surprise, the mysterious man in the HAZMAT suit? Inspired by the historical story of the plague village of Eyam, this contemporary tale of friendship, community, and impossible love weaves the horrors of recent news headlines with the intimate details of how it feels to become an adult—and fall in love—in the midst of tragedy.
Welcome to Primrose Street, where neighbours share close interactions but know very little of each other. Only the maple trees that have lined the road for decades know their decisions, indiscretions, secrets, joys, and pains. From fifty-year residents Charlie and Cora and their grandson Ronald, to newcomer Sofia and her son Nicolas, to best friends Tabitha and Dayna, the residents of Primrose Street go about their daily lives--shopping, attending school, meeting at cafés, smiling as they pass on the sidewalk--all the while remaining invisible to one another.
Only when an invitation arrives in their mailboxes must the residents of Primrose Street decide whether to allow authenticity into their lives and neighbourhood or remain limited in their relationships and thereby to themselves.Drawing comparisons to Maeve Binchy and Elizabeth Strout for its clear-eyed characterizations of everyday people, Marina L. Reed's writing sheds light on questions that haunt us and exposes the poison of secrets. Primrose Street is everyone's street, where the ebb and flow of daily experiences can bring people together and miracles are still possible.
A remarkable tale of vengeance, time travel, and dark magic. What would you do if you woke up one morning and your world was inexplicably changed in the worst way imaginable? Banished by his enemy into a hellish alternate dimension, Luke Decker fights to understand why his world has suddenly changed, and why is he on trial for the murder of his beloved Nina? What he doesn't know is she's not dead. Nina watches him vanish into thin air and is completely bereft, struggling to find out how and why he disappeared. Using all of her psychic talents and traversing the astral realm, she frantically searches for him to no avail. She owns a secret item which holds the key to his salvation, but will she figure it out before he's condemned to live the rest of his life in a realm of darkness?
CODE DECO is an epic dream, an odyssey that unfolds in an era vaguely resembling our 1920s, 30s, in a glimmering Metropolis called the GovernMeccno Beuro.
The Metropolis GMB entombs its society for the sole purpose of perpetuating itself. It is engineered to function with mechanical precision and has done so for as long as ancestry can remember.
Two citizens, a young peasant, Ollee BoGair, and a wealthy, charismatic gambler, Dick Deco, by a sudden turn of events, find themselves on the run, pursued by both common thugs and Agents of LawEnforcement.
The further they journey, the more elusive their safety becomes.
It is with no intention of their own that they stumble upon a foreign realm, a realm of hidden activity, forbidden knowledge, and empowering visions.
It is an odyssey that transforms two individuals... and forever affects the future of the Metropolis GMB.
Veronica "Ronni" Johnson, licensed practical nurse and aspiring writer, meets the captivating Violet in the assisted living facility where Violet requires no assistance, just lots of male attention. When she dies, she leaves Ronni a very generous bequest—only if Ronni completes a book about her life within one year. As she's drawn into the world of young Violet, Ronni is mesmerized by life in a simpler time. It's an irresistible journey filled with revelations, some of them about men Ronni knew as octogenarians at Fairfield Springs.
Struggling, insecure, flailing at the keyboard, Ronni juggles her patients, a new boyfriend, and a Samsonite factory of emotional baggage as she tries to craft a manuscript before her deadline.
But then the secrets start to emerge, some of them in person. And they don't stop.
In a divided, politically polarized world, sometimes we need to take a closer look at the other side. What at first seems a monochrome rural town, may have more variety and color than you would suspect. Come on a trip, a trip to a small southern town on the edge of the Okefenokee Swamp, a town filled with eccentric and delightful characters, some good and some bad, but most a delicious swirl of both, all a part of the kaleidoscope that is Crowley Stories: Swamp's Edge.
Story after story, separate and shining, lighting up corner after corner of Crowley. Story after story, slowly interweaving together, revealing a progressive undercurrent in this very conservative town. Characters dance through each other's lives. A young teenager decides how to handle an unanticipated pregnancy. Another young man can't choose how and when to come out to his wealthy but bigoted father. A grizzled veteran Sheriff struggles to represent all the people in the town, not just the elite. There are people in the grips of new romance, of unraveling relationships, and some who've comfortably meshed together for decades.
Inside the swamp, there is a plant that could change the world, but whether it will be found or plowed under by developers, only our stories will tell. And there is a growing murder mystery, one that only the odd combination of the very Southern Sheriff and a Crowley newcomer, a very Connecticut Yankee CPA, can resolve.
The book is set in the fall and winter of 2013/14, very much a part of its time and place, including dealing with the extremism of the Christian right and the emerging domination of Tea Party values and prejudices.
Take a trip to Crowley and stay a spell. Enjoy the dance. You'll be glad you did.
In one, unexpected moment Simpson's happy life is forever shattered. Driving home from celebrating the renewal of his wedding vows, an accident places his wife's life in jeopardy. As she succumbs to her injuries, Simpson's spirit breaks and he walks away in search of his faith. Isolated at his father's cabin in Northern Minnesota, Simpson first encounters the spectral form of his wife. The connection between them opens a doorway allowing hostile creatures to come through. Soon Simpson is fighting for his own life as winter is bearing down on the cabin and the entity in the bedroom wants him dead. In one last fight for survival, Simpson braves the elements to return home. His wife is still alive and only he can save her. Isolation blends the paranormal with immeasurable love between husband and wife. It adds in coming to terms with grief and finding faith when the odds are against you. The ending will leave you emotionally drained and pull at your heartstrings.
The lust for adventure leads Rennin O'Rourke to read the memoirs of his ancestor and namesake as he shares parallel exploits. His quest brings him to his wife, the California gold fields, close encounters with death, a murder charge, the War Between the States, and ultimately back to a mythical land where only exceptional people may go. Rennin meets Rebekah Sinclair, and the two of them embark on a lifetime of love and adventure as both are constantly compelled to return to a mythical place they have only read about. Draconis calls them home.
Death is only temporary and then you’re reborn, sending out a call to other souls linked through past friendship, love—and betrayal.
When WWII nurse Cora Tate discovers she can remember past lives, she is thrust into a world she never knew existed but lived through more times than she could count. Although the memories of her many pasts have not yet returned, she finds herself at the center of a centuries-old conflict with a clear line dividing those who seek power and those who seek to give it. With her superior fighting skills and instincts for battle resurfacing, Cora agrees to fight, joining ancient warriors who could never blend in and a petite female sniper you could never see coming.
With battle after battle, Cora's memories begin to flood back--though some not soon enough. Their leader, British Captain Alastair Scott, doesn’t hide his feelings for her, barely reigning in his passions in his attempt to give her space to remember. But as Cora’s mind begins to open further revealing her love for Alastair and the never ending war in which they fight, memories of another soul emerge from a far away past where lovers turned into enemies and enemies became lovers.
With her destiny held in the balance, Cora must reconcile who she once was with who she was always meant to be to finally end the war.
Obsessed with following an ancient trail that borders more on fairytale than fact, Archaeologist Ethan Jameson prepares to leave the Amazon with artifacts which seem to prove his theory. As the spirits of the jungle surge forward to protect its secrets, he’s drawn into a web of vivid dreams, prophetic visions, and horrifying nightmares. Ethan soon finds himself thrust into a world of mystery and magic, where love and desire are wielded as weapons, and forbidden knowledge is protected by shape shifting warriors. It’s the first step on an epic adventure that will lead him towards impending battle, human sacrifice, and eternal balance.
Bella and Jimmy, long lost soul-mates, re-discover each other in a chance encounter that forever changes their lives. Jimmy, however, is already engaged to marry Bella’s sister, Veronica.
Heart-broken, they continue along their destined paths in life, journeys that flow from the shores of historic Galveston Island on the Gulf of Mexico to the icy depths of Lake Superior in Duluth, Minnesota. Along the way, life confronts them with devastating losses – and experiences that defy explanation.
Bella seeks solace through her spirit guide and visits to the other side of life.
The sisters, torn apart by their love for the same man, spend many years locked in a cycle that fluctuates between feuding and estrangement. It is only after Jimmy’s death that they begin to discover secrets buried within a past life they once shared. Secrets that may help them to unravel this bizarre love triangle.
Can they find a way to heal, to forgive, and to break free from the karma that has haunted them for an eternity? Or, is it too late to penetrate the veil separating the world of the living from the land of the dead?
When Dode Schneider, rattle-brained Indiana farmer, insists an abandoned mansion is haunted by ghosts with big butts who dance in the apple orchard, Pawpaw County Sheriff Boots Gibson happily off-loads the crazy complaint to Ruby Jane Waskom and Veenie Goens, senior sleuths in training with the Shady Hoosier Detective Agency. Ruby Jane and Veenie, lifelong gal pals, aren’t afraid of the haunted mansion, built by a con artist banker who rowed out of town on the flood waters of 1919, taking the town’s assets with him. The senior crime-cracking duo set out in their smoke-belching 1960 Impala to uncover the truth behind the century-old haunting legend only to find surprise evidence of long ago murder and mayhem. Along the way, Veenie and Ruby Jane chase down a missing drunk wiener dog, earn a lifetime supply of mystery meat sandwiches from Pokey’s Tavern, recover a stolen Harley, and uncover the startling truth about a long-cursed buried treasure. The investigation, which involves con artists, bank robbers, and hillbilly hoodlums, doesn’t go smoothly, but Ruby Jane and Veenie, fueled by senior grit, engage in crime-cracking hijinks that will leave the reader rolling in laughter in this classic comic crime novel.
The War Between the States presents Brendan Bonneau with a choice between his loyalties to his family, owners of one of the largest and most profitable plantations in South Carolina, or his oath as an officer in the United States Navy. For maritime artifacts conservator Lillian Cherrington, life changes from the predictably mundane when her father reveals a long-held secret and makes a dying request. Using skills developed from years of revealing secrets buried beneath layers of history, she searches for the truth about their ancestor, a man who has been alternately honored or vilified by generations of their family since the last days of the Civil War. Lillian’s quest takes her from dusty archives in Maryland, to the ruins of her family’s plantation in South Carolina, to eighteenth-century rumrunner’s dens on the island of Bermuda, where Lillian’s search is complicated by love, threatened by smugglers, and thwarted by secrets kept and lies bequeathed for generations.
This musically and graphically enriched chamber novel is an over-the-top black and blue comic extravaganza about the conspiratorial undoing of a teenage entitlement princess. The story throbs throughout with an undercurrent of apocalyptic motifs related to the extinction of art, fall of empire, and coming of the Antichrist. It is an epic farce that reads like an erotically supercharged psychological suspense thriller. The narrative takes the reader/audient on a veritable boomerang roller-coaster ride (with multiple inversions) through a reputational strip-and-whiptease of the novel's malignantly artful (albeit ingenuously doe-eyed) protagonist: a wealthy young heiress and socialite who boasts an exclusive claim to her progenitors' munificent estate. Her inheritance comprises an immense fortune amassed through shareholder investments in the world's largest employment recruiter: the multi-national temp agency behemoth known as the Pleasant Peasant Corporation.
Greed and corruption is fueling the quest for ivory. Herds of elephants are mysteriously dropping dead at water holes in Zimbabwe's Hwange National Park. It is up to Hector Kaminjolo, the newly hired ZimParks superintendent to discover the cause. A gang of Poachers, led by a local chief, is using cyanide to poison elephants and Hector and his rangers must stop them. Environmentalists Piet and Jessica van Rooyen step in to aid Hector and his men in their battle with the gang. It sets off a terrifying series of events in which lives hang in the balance, and Piet's ultimate survival depends on a small herd of elephants that he and Jessica had earlier rescued.
This novel contains two stories intertwined: As a freshman, Abby is the star quarterback of her small town's high school football team. When she finds out that her family is moving to the big city and leaving behind everything she knows, Abby's latent anxiety becomes a problem that she can no longer ignore. In order to be successful both on and off the field, she must face stigma and her own fears before her nervous symptoms become crippling. Twenty years later, Abby has become a successful professor of psychology. Although her nervous symptoms are well under control, when she is thrown into the lime-light, Abby experiences a new wave of anxiety. With the insight she has gained over the years, she works through her symptoms, reflects back on her path since high school, and finds that she still has a lot to learn.
Bernadette has almost everything a twenty- six year old model could desire. She has a great home, beautiful clothing, and a wonderful family. Yet, all she really desires is a decent man to share her life with. Against her sister’s wishes, Bernadette, joins the world of online dating. She can hardly believe her luck upon finding the profile of Martin Day, a handsome, successful businessman, who is moving to her hometown. The couple clicks instantly and their relationship is on the fast track to marital bliss, when suddenly a stranger brings unsettling news about Martin’s past. Despite the warnings, Bernadette continues seeing him, and quickly finds out that some relationship mistakes cannot be easily fixed. As her situation grows increasingly out of control, she realizes that it has come down to life or death and that she must put a stop to Martin’s reign of terror, at any cost.
Detective Cadence Riley never believed in ghosts, until she became one. Killed in the line of duty, she finds herself recruited into a group that monitors haunted sites, making sure that the spirits don't give too much away to the living. All seems to be going well until a group of cultists unleash a chaos demon in a haunted asylum. Now Cadence and her new partner find themselves in a race against time. They have to find a way to stop the demon before it devours both the spirits and the living, and they may just have to break a few rules to do it.
On a rainy September night, Ivy Greenaway answers a phone call that will change the course of her life. The caller is Romney Sharpe, her older sister's on-again off-again boyfriend, who happens to be a dark arts warlock. Ivy is a white witch and druidess. Before she knows it, she's been marked by Romney as his property and drawn into a war against his evil black witch sister, Rayna, who's already murdered their father. Romney is now the King of the dark arts practitioners. Ivy is his chosen Queen. A black King has never taken a white Queen before- and lived. Will they be able to unite black and white practitioners in this war to protect the great magical treasure trove that Romney has become the guardian of? With little time to organize and train family, friends, acquaintances, and recruited black and white practitioners, Romney and Ivy face an uncertain future. With Rayna determined to kill him, Romney has to rely upon his Queen to cast the death spell upon him to prevent Rayna from getting her hands on the treasure. Will Ivy find the strength within herself to kill him when he asks her to? Or will Rayna destroy them both, and ultimately destroy the world by doing so?
Kaden Valens' world is kill or be killed. Such is the life of a Challenger, the property of a Citizen. Fight or die. When Kaden is ordered to face his sole family member, his sister Nix, he chooses a different battle—one against the Federacy that owns him. Rebel Cassidy Havok is the Federacy's worst nightmare. Her only goal is to bring down the government, doing whatever it takes to eradicate the slave-based society. When Kaden defies the Federacy publicly, she hopes to make an ally out of him, turning the tide in the resistance’s favor. Cassidy helps Kaden escape the clutches of the Citizenry, and they flee to the Wilds, the world outside the Federacy’s reach. There they plan for the fight of a lifetime. Can they take on a nation, or is their cause a lost one?
Anna Christiansen's small-town life is about to go haywire. A young reporter stuck in a dead-end job, Anna falls head over heels for an interview subject, the bass player in an up-and-coming alt band. In short order, she pulls up stakes, moves to Las Vegas, gets married and pregnant, and moves into a big fixer-upper haunted by the ghost of a Sin City racketeer. That's when she gets notice from a corrupt casino owner that he's buying up all the properties on her street to make way for a parking lot. But Anna has poured her heart and soul into the house, and digs in hard to fight the system, not the easiest of tasks in a city where bribery, mayhem, and murder are standard operating procedures.
Can Anna's tough-guy ghost provide the help she needs to prevail in this dangerous cat-and-mouse game? Will Anna's life be left in ruins? Or worse?
Part road trip, part coming-of-age saga, part mystery, part ghost story, The House Always Wins is all Vegas.
James Wong built a billion-dollar software company with his childhood friend, Maria Cortez. He had everything until an ultra-rich investor stole control of his company with a shady contract. How do you fight the rich and powerful? In a video game, he would use a power-up to defeat the villain. Maria tells him there aren't power-ups in real life, but James finds the ultimate power-up: become president.
They must uncover secrets about their company, themselves, and the dark forces aligned against them. As the world falls apart around them, it will take every ounce of Maria's strength and every crazy idea James can muster to get their company back.
Imitating Elvis isn't enough for Doyle Brisendine. He wants to be Elvis. Then a young woman offers him cash and a ride in an antique pink Cadillac to a replica of Elvis's Graceland. Captured by a cult ruled by a ruthless matriarch called Mama escape seems impossible . . .
