The Colonial Defense Forces usually protect humanity from alien attack, but now the stability of the Colonial Union has been threatened, and Lieutenant Heather Lee and her squad are called to squash a rebellion on a colony world. It seems simple enoughbut theres a second act to the rebellion that finds Lee captive, alone, and armed with only her brains to survive.

In a world in which the police have telepathic powers, how do you get away with murder? Ben Reichs heads a huge 24th century business empire, spanning the solar system. He is also an obsessed, driven man determined to murder a rival. To avoid capture, in a society where murderers can be detected even before they commit their crime, is the greatest challenge of his life.

A young man who escaped from drug addiction and a cyber cult must go tempt fate by entering that world again as an undercover confidential informant. His quarry: a clone created by the cyber cult that is murdering people in his name.It's time to climb back down the hole again. George has found his way into and out of addictions. His first love was Spectrum, the memory theiving drug that killed is mother. To escape Spectrum he found himself some religion. He drilled a hole in his skull and threaded a wire into his brain that wove his sensations together with the collective illusion known as the Abderan Cipher. George had thought he'd escaped from under the heel of the world's most powerful narcotic, only to find himself wrapped in a cult so pervasive that he lost all sense of whether he was old or young, criminal or saint. He'd lost himself down the hole. Then at last, he pulled himself up. There was no more Spectrum and no more Abdera, only mud and rain the early morning hours in which he lived. George was poor and alone, surviving from one brutal day until the next, but happy because he was free. But the past never lets you go. Around town there's a man dismembering people and leaving George's DNA behind. The police know that George, the mentally crippled ex druggie, is no killer. Not that they aren't above pinning the crimes on him. They've got to catch someone, haven't they? The police offer George a deal. The man killing others in George's name is somehow connected to the Abdera Cipher and the drug Spectrum as well. George has got to climb back down the hole again. He's got to take up his old addictions again to find the one living in his name, yet another thing out to steal away his identity. And George will do it - because he's poor, because he's powerless. And yet he is the only one who can stop the specter of horrific death, if only he is strong enough to withstand the forces that have brought him within a hair of oblivion. It is up to him to unhaunt the hours.

This is the tale is the end. It is the story of the death of a person in After World.A mouse named Rennet has been starving for days. Things do not turn out well for him. This is a telling of his final hours.Seek not pleasure or fancy beyond this point. These stories are not for everyone and I would warn against those that are faint of heart from continuing. The deaths contained in these stories are no pretty, glamorized, or funny. They are detailed and raw.A Death in Afterworld is a short story series that focuses on the death of a person in the After World universe. Pitfalls, deaths, and murder are commonplace and are a means of survival for others.Death is final. Death is abrupt. Death is the end of one’s story. Now these people get their last story told before the book is closed on them.

Martin is not married and has no children…or so he thought. However, Martins life changes forever – and continues to change in all manner of inexplicable ways. As the weeks go by, Martin comes to realise that he can no longer be sure of anything, anybody, or even his past life. Is he really losing his mind and going mad? Or are others now controlling his life and possibly manipulating his destiny?This is a story told through the eyes of Martin a recently retired banker. Within weeks of returning to his home village he meets up with Alistair – an old school friend. Unsure how he will make use of his free time, Martin agrees to take up the intriguing offer from Alistair and get involved in his secret project.Martin has never married, nor has he had any children. These are all facts and part of his life memories. At least, that’s what he thinks he remembers. However, since his involvement with Alistair’s project, Martins life changes forever – and continues to change in all manner of inexplicable ways. As the weeks go by, Martin comes to realise that he can no longer be sure of anything, anybody, or even his past life. Is he really losing his mind and going mad? Or are others now controlling his life and possibly manipulating his destiny?

A lighthearted short story of a god-like alien who shows up in one man's back yard with a message."The Summer Dress" is a short story that was runner up in the 2015 Hot Air "Too Write" Literary Festival held in Stoke on Trent, Staffordshire. It first appeared in a book of short stories entitled "The Little Book of Dark Tales", which is available from Amazon Book Store, signed copies of which can be purchased direct from the author's website at www.wrarmstrong.comReviews of this story would be most welcome.

Paloma Delacroix has suffered greatly for a mistake in her youth. She dreams of a future she wonders if she can ever have. But for all her imagination, Paloma can’t predict what is about to happen. Thomas, Clay, Keith and Quinn McQueen are men with secrets and a past that keeps them on the run. But when life explodes around Paloma, the McQueens will be all that stands between Paloma and death. Her sweet nature and strength make them believe the universe might not be as awful as they’ve come to believe it. But is it too late for all of them? Or can love win the day? Content warning: Reverse Harem. Intense.

In the American Southwest, Nevada, Arizona, and California skirmish for dwindling shares of the Colorado River. Into the fray steps Angel Velasquez, leg-breaker, assassin, and spy. A Las Vegas water knife, Angel "cuts" water for his boss, Catherine Case, ensuring that her luxurious developments can bloom in the desert, so the rich can stay wet while the poor get dust. When rumors of a game-changing water source surface in drought-ravaged Phoenix, it seems California is making a play to monopolize the life-giving flow of the river, and Angel is sent to investigate. There, he encounters Lucy Monroe, a drought-hardened journalist, and Maria Villarosa, a young refugee who survives by her wits in a city that despises everything she represents. For Angel, Lucy, and Maria, time is running out and their only hope for survival rests in each other’s hands. But when water is more valuable than gold, alliances shift like sand, and the only thing for certain is that someone will have to bleed if anyone hopes to drink. 

Gathering darkly fantastic short fiction previously available only in limited editions, this collection explores the mysteries of souls—whether they are sacrificed on the pinnacle of Mount Parnassus or lodged in a television cable box. In a Kabbalistic tale of transformation, the executor of an old friend’s will is almost duped into housing his soul. In a tale of time travel between 2015 and 1975, a tragedy sparked by an angel falling onto a pizza shop is reenacted—and the event is barely, but fatally, altered. The cornerstone of the collection is a postscript to the harrowing novel of the haunting of the Romantic poets, The Stress of Her Regard. Once Byron and Shelley break free of the succubus that claimed them, their associate, Trelawny, forges an alliance with Greek rebels to reestablish the deadly connection between man and the nephilim. Fans of Powers’s renowned secret histories will delight as he deftly weaves an array of fantastical creatures into richly layered narratives of the past.

Enter the magical worlds of Sheri S. Tepper, with this eBook collection, containing the Marianne trilogy and the Mavin Manyshaped trilogy: Marianne, the Magus and the Manticore Marianne, the Madame and the Momentary Gods Marianne, the Matchbox and the Malachite Mouse The Song of Mavin Manyshaped The Flight of Mavin Manyshaped The Search of Mavin Manyshaped

It all starts with a school essay. When twelve-year-old Gratuity (“Tip”) Tucci is assigned to write five pages on “The True Meaning of Smekday” for the National Time Capsule contest, she’s not sure where to begin. When her mom started telling everyone about the messages aliens were sending through a mole on the back of her neck? Maybe on Christmas Eve, when huge, bizarre spaceships descended on the Earth and the aliens – called Boov – abducted her mother? Or when the Boov declared Earth a colony, renamed it “Smekland” (in honor of glorious Captain Smek), and forced all Americans to relocate to Florida via rocketpod? In any case, Gratuity’s story is much, much bigger than the assignment. It involves her unlikely friendship with a renegade Boov mechanic named J.Lo.; a futile journey south to find Gratuity’s mother at the Happy Mouse Kingdom; a cross-country road trip in a hovercar called Slushious; and an outrageous plan to save the Earth from yet another alien invasion. Fully illustrated with “photos,” drawings, newspaper clippings, and comics sequences, this is a hilarious, perceptive, genre-bending novel by a remarkable new talent. the planet from a really big catastrophe.

An uneasy peace reigns in France, but behind the scenes Catholics, Protestants and the agents of foreign powers are still locked in secretive, bloody combat. As his country's future hangs in the balance, Pierre de Siorac's apparent employment as a doctor masks a more deadly occupation - as a spy working for King Henry IV and his ally Elizabeth I of England, using fair means and foul to protect the peace of two realms. As the plots against his king thicken and the Spanish Armada prepares to sail, Pierre finds himself struggling to save not only his country but the lives of his entire family. With his back to the wall, he will need a keen wit and a steady sword arm to fight his way to safety

Two enthralling novels by Robert Silverberg about a future in which the minds of the living can be changed for a price—often with dire consequences In To Live Again, thanks to the Scheffing Institute, death is not the end. For a hefty fee, the soul bank stores the personas of those who have died and inserts them into the brains of willing, living hosts. It’s a process that integrates the two minds, imbuing the host with a menu of highly valuable abilities, memories, and traits. The more personas one absorbs, the greater his social status. When banking mogul Paul Kaufmann dies, many people apply to receive his persona. The leading applicants—his bitter business rivals—are locked in a battle to claim his soul. The Institute follows strict rules to ensure that the host always remains in control, but of course accidents do happen . . . In The Second Trip, Paul Macy wears the Rehab badge, the sign of healing that advertises his status as a reconstruct job. When society derides capital punishment and opts, instead, for personality rehabilitation, criminals undergo mindpick operations in which their identities are stripped and extinguished. Given a new bank of memories and a fresh identity, they are offered a second chance at life. For Paul, though, this gift comes with a price. His former self still lingers inside him, waiting for the opportunity to emerge and battle Paul’s new self for ultimate control. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Robert Silverberg including rare images and never-before-seen documents from the author’s personal collection.

Two reporters looking for a story in the outer reaches of the Solar System come upon a derelict spaceship. Inside, they find the only inhabitant, a beautiful young woman who has been imprisoned for a thousand years in suspended animation, suspended but aware for the whole time. Together they set off on a grand adventure across the vastness of space and time in a search for a race known as the Cosmic Engineers on a mission to save the universe. Originally published as a short novel in Astounding Stories in 1939 and later expanded in this 1950 version, Cosmic Engineers shows the scope and imagination of one of science fictions true masters, Clifford Simak.