SHORT STORY / 5800 WordsLea knew what the land folk were good for - very little. They stumbled around awkwardly on spindly legs and smelled of sweat and dung. She preferred the open freedom of the ocean. To be able to plunge hundreds of feet into its shadowy depths or to ride in exhilaration along a cascading wave.But today's waves were different.A torrential storm pounded the coastline ...SHORT STORY / 5800 WordsLea knew what the land folk were good for - very little. They stumbled around awkwardly on spindly legs and smelled of sweat and dung. She preferred the open freedom of the ocean. To be able to plunge hundreds of feet into its shadowy depths or to ride in exhilaration along a cascading wave.But today's waves were different.A torrential storm pounded the coastline as she desperately pushed north to reach her sisters. On her hip was an urgent message. And nothing could stop her from reaching her destination.Until she realized a young boy clung desperately to his currach, and a towering wave was about to shatter him into tiny pieces ...* * *Half of all proceeds of the Selkie Tales short stories benefit battered women's shelters.While this first book is non-explicit, due to the strong sexual content and adult situations in future books, this romantic suspense series is recommended for readers aged 17+. The series is structured for readers to read along as I write them to offer feedback and suggestions on the complex storyline. If you're the style of reader who would prefer to wait until the entire series is finished before you tackle it, that is fine! Simply wait until the series is complete and I'll offer the boxed set. I do that with all of my books.The reason I publish as I write is that I don't write full time and it can sometimes take months for me to finish up a storyline. There are readers who don't want to wait - who would rather read along as I go and stay engaged in the process. That way they can provide feedback and suggestions on the storyline. Whichever way works well for you, I provide an option.I'd love to hear from you at my website at OpheliaSikes.com.

Infectious, the first novel in The Infectious Series, is a post-apocalyptic love story with a zombie twist. Young Ivy has a killer sense of humor and a personal relationship with the Curse Giver. Ivy longs for freedom from her overbearing, spinster aunt and from Toccoa's protective fences. A trip outside the compound brings confusion, danger, romance and death into Ivy's already troubled life."Before I can even hope that we're safe, I smell him. His nauseating odor reaches my nostrils just a second before he has his arm around my neck. It's the smell of rotting flesh and body odor. The two smells, though equally gross, are in opposition to each other—the smell of death mixed with the smell of activity and life. That's what a zombie is, polar-opposites coexisting. Physically alive, but spiritually dead. And cursed. He's behind my seat and his grip is an iron band across my neck."Six years ago, when millions of people disappeared from the face of the earth in a silent instant, all hell broke loose. People did what you'd expect; they panicked. We've been programmed with the will to survive--to care for our loved ones at any cost. Husbands became murderers. Children became thieves. The world turned upside-down and survival was all that anyone could think about. That was before we knew about the disease. Infectious, the first novel in The Infectious Series, is a post-apocalyptic love story with a zombie twist. Young Ivy has a killer sense of humor and a personal relationship with the Curse Giver. Ivy longs for freedom from her overbearing, spinster aunt and from Toccoa's protective fences. A trip outside the compound brings confusion, danger, romance and death into Ivy's already troubled life. Two different guys--polar opposites--are vying for her heart, and Ivy is desperate to hold onto The Cure in the midst of the chaos and heartache. Infectious is a love story that will ravage your heart and leave you hungry for more.

Conrad really just wanted a hotdog. But a run-in with Loki, and somehow he ends up with a very important piece of dead god locked up in his head, and half the Edda after it. Running for his life, Conrad meets a cast of crazies—myths and gods and everything in between. Now if only he can keep his head long enough to stave off the apocalypse…Conrad really just wanted a hotdog. But a run-in with Loki, and somehow he ends up with a very important piece of dead god locked up in his head, and half the Edda after it. Running for his life, Conrad meets a cast of crazies—myths and gods and everything in between. Now if only he can keep his head long enough to stave off the apocalypse…

When Nicholas sets out to confront his destiny danger is not just at the end of his journey; death and hardship lurk all along the way.This book is a collection of highly inspirational poems. It stylishly unveils success principles of life and living even as it entertains the reader. The highly illuminating lines of each topic stir up the reader’s imagination so as to transport them into a realm of poetic inspiration. The equally wonderful illustration further interprets the words and phrases in diverse perspectives, entertaining the reader thereby. Every lover of poetry will benefit tremendously from the book. It is a book that always attracts the reader back to it over and over again because of the author’s unique style of writing poetry. Let every reader who desires to benefit from the book take time to go over the lines of each poem for therein may lie the word that will ignite in them the inspiration they need to go ahead at every point in their life’s journey.

The illustrious life of a wealthy couple is shattered.THE THINGS THAT GO BUMP IN THE NIGHT ARE REAL.Kamlyn Paige is a young woman who has suffered great loss in her life. At nineteen, when she was seven months pregnant, her parents were in a fatal car accident. And at twenty-four, when her son was only five years old, he was murdered before her eyes by a cloaked figure in the middle of the night. It takes everything she has to hold on after the devastation.But when a mysterious neighbor sees her weeping on the sidewalk, he picks her up and introduces her to a new world. She goes with him to the Chamber of Darkness, an underground society, where she learns to fight evil beings and creatures as a Huntsman. The sole motivation to complete her training is getting revenge on the demon that killed her little boy. But while she's there, she realizes there are other beings that threaten the way of life on Earth. Prophetic dreams reveal there is a mysterious traitor in the Chamber's headquarters and he's trying to get his hands on a goblet that will open the portal to the demon world, unleashing them all on the humans.Will she be able to figure out who the traitor is in time to stop them from destroying the human race? With the help of her new friends and fellow Huntsmen, they may stand a chance at saving the world from a massive possession of epic proportions.

Fallible gods regress into myopic squabbles as a catastrophic evil emerges to conquer all. Only one Earthling prophesied possesses the fortitude to thwart it.At any ordinary time Thomas Reed and Elziwarry Figg would have never known of the existence of the other. Tom is a remarkable Senior at Sudbury High but mysterious circumstances threaten his existence. Elziwarry is a holy man whose fate is easily disregarded by the gods he serves known as Titans. Yet a series of events will shape their lives to culminate in a destiny neither thought was possible. At every turn they persevere in an attempt to survive and learn who are the shadowy forces that want them killed.

Virgin Verses is a collection of poems written under heavy doses of inspiration with lines so vast it deals with a variety of subjects every person can relate with.I'm an odd dude. But I write some decent stuff, and here's my way of sharing my odd dude thoughts.I'm the author of three 'major' series; Adrian's Undead Diary, Elmoryn's The Kinless Trilogy, and the Reemergence Novels, the first of which is Tesser: A Dragon Among Us.To help folks get a taste of my writing, I've put At Least He's Not On Fire together. Inside this wonderful electronic tome of my words, you'll find a healthy sized sampler of each of my major works, as well as several short stories that are mixed in for your entertainment. All in, Hell Hole, and The Vampire of Menlo Park are all great fun, and I hope you enjoy them.Dark Recollections: Book One of Adrian's Undead DiaryBeheading a zombie isn't easy in a world where you're more afraid of the living than the dead.Adrian Ring's simple life is thrown into chaos when the world is ripped apart by a plague of undead and legions of desperate survivors. Retreating to Auburn Lake Preparatory Academy, Adrian attempts to rescue friends and family on the way while dancing around his impending insanity over who and what he left behind, and evading maniac survivors. He saves his cat Otis, but shoots his mom. Pretty successful, all things considered.Dark Recollections is the first part of Adrian's own story of how he survived after "That Day." Told through his eyes as he talks to his laptop, affectionately named 'Mr. Journal," and through short stories that entwine with his tales that bring forth dark visions of a world being eaten alive by an unimaginable evil. Adrian's Undead Diary is an eight part epic about a solitary, guilt stricken man that didn't think he deserved to live, but realizes very soon that he survived, and suffered for a reason.The Wrath of the Orphans: Book One of The Kinless TrilogyMalwynn and his twin sister Umaryn live in a small town in northern Varrland. In idyllic New Picknell nearly nothing happens, and when their day to day routine is interrupted by a skirmish between an invading patrol of the dead from The Amaranth Empire and a defending force from Varrland, their world begins to come undone.With international war looming on the horizon New Picknell becomes the center of quite unwanted attention, and the twins have their world shattered. With nothing left to lose, they set out on a mission of vengeance that will take them to places they'd never dreamed of visiting, discovering mystical powers in The Way that will change their lives forever, and revealing dark knowledges best left undiscovered.Tesser: A Dragon Among Us A Novel of the ReemergenceImagine for a moment that you are a Dragon. A creature of unimaginable power, unending intelligence and strength, and you've just woken from ten thousand years of slumber. Worse yet, you've awoken underneath a city; Boston, an alien and strange place that defies everything you've ever known.Your last memories were of primordial forests, erupting volcanoes sculpting a developing world, faeries, witches, vampires, krakens, and monsters that feared where you turned your eyes.But all that is gone. Humans, only barely coming into their own in the world from your memory, have taken over. They have erected cities made of stone and steel erupting from the earth like stalagmites reaching for the high blue sky, and developed sciences that have overshadowed even the glory of old magic.This was not the way it was supposed to be.Meet Tesser, the Dragon. He who walks in any form, and flies the skies free of fear.A Dragon Among Us is Tesser's story. Walk with him as he learns the human way, and discovers the dark truth about why magic has really faded from the world he calls home.And just maybe, humanity will remember why dragons were most noble, and most savage creatures again.Welcome to The Reemergence.

Norman Babbit is the smartest kid in Petaluma. He is also the youngest kid in junior high and his teachers, his little sister and the school bully are driving him crazy. If only his science project qualifies for the Nationals in Washington DC...The smartest kid in Petaluma never thought seventh grade would be like this! When Norman Babbit skipped a grade and entered junior high a year early he thought his life would be great. But the school bully forces Norman to do his homework, his younger sister is a brat, his English teacher hates him, his older brother is trying to fill in for their deceased father, and his mother thinks all Norman's problems are dietary. If it weren't for his best friend Chris and his pet owl Luigi, Norman would go crazy. With the deadline for his science project approaching as fast as a showdown with the bully, Norman simply has too many problems and no solutions.

How much would a little extra space mean to you? Cupboards overflowing? Do you long for a man cave? How about a spare room conjured out of nowhere. The very latest in interdimensional car and furniture storage.What could possibly go wrong?How much would some extra space mean to you? The scientists dreamt of infinite multiple universes but in the end there were only two. Ours, fertile and rich, the other dead and grey, a poisonous wasteland. A complete dead loss according to the press and the media, but one bright new start-up discovers a way to attach doorways to the front of houses to add much needed parking space to their inner city homes.It seems a good idea when, but as he stares out onto the dead world he has the sense the planet is observing him. It’s mad. The planet is so clearly dead. Barren.But sometimes he thinks he sees the solid earth bubble and shift. But it can’t be true. Can it?

Black magic, giantess, drama, fiction, raunchyThis is a short story about a witch (priestess) known as Kate Williams. They don't really come with the combination of being beautiful and at the same time merciless. But this is only the beginning of Kate's wrath as she shrinks, manipulates, and even alters the state of anyone she see's fit. This is only the first of many....the beginning of a witches scorn!

Ellie Washington lost her husband in a tragedy five years ago at Christmas. She wouldn’t have made it through her grief if not for her husband’s brother, Nick, who helped her pick up the pieces of her shattered life. And with every year, her feelings for Nick have grown. Now she realizes she might be in love with him, but that’s not fair, because Nick deserves a life that isn’t about his brother’s widow and son. Sharing his life with Ellie and her son has been the balm that soothed Nick’s soul after losing his brother. Now that friendship has turned into something deeper. Nick doesn’t want to upset the status quo, but someone has to make the first move, and it’s time they figure out if their feelings are real. Nick believes in what they have. He also believes in Christmas miracles, and he thinks they’re both long overdue for one.

From one of the greatest writers of our time: the most spellbinding, entertaining, wildly imaginative novel of his great career, which blends history and myth with tremendous philosophical depth. A masterful, mesmerizing modern tale about worlds dangerously colliding, the monsters that are unleashed when reason recedes, and a beautiful testament to the power of love and humanity in chaotic times. Inspired by 2,000 years of storytelling yet rooted in the concerns of our present moment, this is a spectacular achievement--enchanting, both very funny and terrifying. It is narrated by our descendants 1000 years hence, looking back on "The War of the Worlds" that began with "the time of the strangenesses": a simple gardener begins to levitate; a baby is born with the unnerving ability to detect corruption in people; the ghosts of two long-dead philosophers begin arguing once more; and storms pummel New York so hard that a crack appears in the universe, letting in the destructive djinns of myth (as well as some graphic superheroes). Nothing less than the survival of our world is at stake. Only one, a djinn princess who centuries before had learned to love humankind, resolves to help us: in the face of dynastic intrigue, she raises an army composed of her semi-magical great-great--etc.--grandchildren--a motley crew of endearing characters who come together to save the world in a battle waged for 1,001 nights--or, to be precise, two years, eight months and twenty-eight nights.

Ms. Kane writes like no other, says Romantic Times of Andrea Kane's breath-catching, dramatic mixture of romance and danger. Now, in this dazzling sequel to The Gold Coin, she continues her suspenseful tale of two beautiful cousins, so alike even their own family mistakes them, so enmeshed in a web of deceit that their very lives are at risk.... All her life, Breanna Colby has lived on the precipice of fear, her only joy the recent reunion with her beloved cousin Anastasia. With her violent father now locked away in jail, the repressed young woman can emerge from her cocoon and pursue all the joys she's been denied. But she finds -- to her terror -- that not all the shadows have lifted, and an evil from the past stalks both her and Anastasia. When authorities are unable to help with this assassin lurking in the darkness, the Colbys turn to the brilliant, unconventional Royce Chadwick, England's foremost expert on finding people who don't want to be found. Hard, detached Royce has always been a loner who operates by his own set of rules. He has little patience for weakness. Delicate Breanna Colby is an eye-opener to him, for beneath her fragile exterior ties a core of steel. As the two face overwhelming danger side by side, Royce discovers a woman he never dreamed existed -- one who, despite his cynicism, he is losing his heart to. But their future together can never be -- not unless Royce kills the assassin before the assassin kills them.

Tess Gregory's brilliant career as a research scientist hides her longings for husband and child. Though deaf, she is a free spirit--a woman full of life and love. She is struck down all too soon But for Tess, a new life begins at her death, in post-Civil War America. She is now Amarylis Rafferty, wife and mother of three--and she can hear. Shocked and disoriented by her new surroundings, she is drawn into the savage heartache burdening the family, especially her husband, Jack, a man who fears himself capable of anything.

Stepping Up is back!This season is going to be hotter—and more scandalous—than ever! After the roaring success of the first season, the pressure is on America's most popular reality dance show. And no one is feeling it as much as guest judge and TV presenter Darla James. This opportunity could make her career soar…or sink. But when her nemesis, the very hot and infuriating Blake Nelson, is asked to join the show, too, Darla wonders exactly what she's signed up for! But the sparks—on camera and off—between Darla and Blake are brighter than a Georgia firecracker, and all the tension between them has turned into wicked, mind-blowing, melt-your-brain sex. If anyone finds out, it will be the end of both their reputations—and the scandal of the television season. Then again, with chemistry like theirs, it might be worth it!

"It was sometimes called the echo cave, and if you shouted your question loud enough in the right direction, you got an answer instead of an echo..." Clare and David--divided as children by a rigid social code that branded her as shanty Irish and him as gentry...brought together as adults by a desire that knew no class, no barriers, only the urgent hunger of two people destined to love--and ready to defy a world determined to keep them apart. Even at fifteen, David Power knew the echo would answer eleven-year-old Clare O'Brien's dearest wish, to win a school prize. But it was years before Dr. Power's cherished only son saw in the huckster's daughter the answer to his own heart's desire. Here in Castlebay, perched precariously on the seaside cliffs, the lines between them were clearly drawn. Clare's only hope is to leave the town where time stopped, propelled by scholarships to Dublin, fueled by her own drive and brilliance, far from the insular, gossipy world of Castlebay and those in its thrall... Angela O'Hara, beautiful, isolated, a teacher trapped in the convent school, who risks everything to help Clare escape... Gerry Doyle, the town charmer who finds in Clare the woman he vows to have at any price... Caroline Nolan, the beautiful, rich outsider who comes to plunder... For Clare, that was before the wild freedom of Dublin, and love. And David.  Before fate drove them back to Castlebay, and the past...

John Crowley's masterful Little, Big is the epic story of Smoky Barnable, an anonymous young man who travels by foot from the City to a place called Edgewood—not found on any map—to marry Daily Alice Drinkawater, as was prophesied. It is the story of four generations of a singular family, living in a house that is many houses on the magical border of an otherworld. It is a story of fantastic love and heartrending loss; of impossible things and unshakable destinies; and of the great Tale that envelops us all. It is a wonder.

Four years ago, I lied. I stood in front of the police, my friends and family, and made up a story, my best one yet. And all of them believed me. I wasn't surprised. Telling stories is what made me famous. Fifteen bestsellers. Millions of fans. Fame and fortune. Now, I have one last story to write. It'll be my best one yet, with a jaw-dropping twist that will leave them stunned and gasping for breath. They say that sticks and stones will break your bones, but this story? It will be the one that kills me. This book is not a romance. It is contemporary fiction, but very suspenseful in nature. It is about a famous romance author and a dark secret she keeps. *

By the writer Milan Kundera called Czechoslovakia's greatest contemporary writer comes a novel (now in English for the first time) peopled with eccentric, unforgettable inhabitants of a home for the elderly who reminisce about their lives and their changing country. Written with a keen eye for the absurd and sprinkled with dialogue that captures the poignancy of the everyday, this novel allows us into the mind of an elderly woman coming to terms with the passing of time. Praise for Too Loud a Solitude: "Short, sharp and eccentric. Sophisticated, thought-provoking and pithy." --Spectator "Unmissable, combines extremes of comedy and seriousness, plus pathos, slapstick, sex and violence all stirred into one delicious brew." --The Guardian "In imaginative riches and sheer exhilaration it offers more than most books twice its size. At once tender and scatological, playful and sombre, moving and irresistibly funny." --The Independent on Sunday Praise for I Served the King of England: "A joyful, picaresque story, which begins with Baron Munchausen-like adventures and ends in tears and solitude." -- James Wood, The London Review of Books "A comic novel of great inventiveness ... charming, wise, and sad--and an unexpectedly good laugh." --The Philadelphia Inquirer "An extraordinary and subtly tragicomic novel." --The New York Times "Dancing Lessons unfurls as a single, sometimes maddening sentence. The gambit works. Something about that slab of wordage carries the eye forward, promising an intensity simply unattainable by your regularly punctuated novel." --Ed Park, The New York Times Book Review