Fantasy Adventure

Chaol Westfall has always defined himself by his unwavering loyalty, his strength, and his position as the captain of the Guard. But all of that has changed since the glass castle shattered, since his men were slaughtered, since the king of Adarlan spared him from a killing blow, but left his body broken. His only shot at recovery lies with the legendary healers of the Torre Cesme in Antica - the stronghold of the southern continent's mighty empire.

Benjamin Carter Mason died last night. Maybe he threw himself off a bridge into Los Angeles Harbor, or maybe he burned to death in a house fire in San Pedro; it doesn't really matter. Today, Mason's starting a new life. He's back in boot camp, training for the only war left that matters a damn.

Nina Idi - a third child in a society where families are allowed only two children - has been betrayed by the boy she loved and arrested by the Population Police for exposing other alleged third children. Angry and confused, Nina knows only one thing for sure: She is innocent of the charges. But now she is faced with the most difficult choice of her life: Get three other prisoners to admit they are shadow children and be spared herself, or refuse to cooperate and be killed. The options are clear. The choice, Nina discovers, is not.

An unholy attack upon his brother-in-law, General Arisaydia, pitches sorcerer Learned Penric and his Temple demon, Desdemona, headlong into the snake pit of Cedonian imperial politics. But they will not travel alone. The mission from his god brings Penric some of his strangest new allies yet and the return of some of his most valued old ones.

Ben and his friends have defeated a deadly threat to mankind and gained powerful allies along the way, but sometimes, the biggest danger is ourselves. In the final audiobook in the Benjamin Ashwood series, Ben will have to take the mantle of leadership to prevent a war that will devastate Alcott.

At the end of Worldbinder, Fallion Orden, son of Gaborn, was imprisoned on a strange and fantastic world that he created by combining two alternate realities. It’s a world brimming with dark magic and ruled by a creature of unrelenting evil, one who is gathering monstrous armies from a dozen planets in a bid to conquer the universe.

Women rule in Women's Country. Women live apart from men, sheltering the remains of civilization. They have cut themselves off with walls and by ordinance from marauding males. Waging war is all men are good for. Men are allowed to fight their barbaric battles among themselves, garrison against garrison. For the sake of his pride, each boy child ritualistically rejects his mother when he comes of age to be a warrior. But all the secrets of civilization are strictly the possession of women.

Hugo Award-winning author Charles Stross is renowned for his cutting-edge science fiction. This third entry in his “edgy … spoof of Cold War spy thrillers” ( Booklist) finds covert agent Bob Howard learning about a top-secret dossier that vanishes with his boss. Determined to discover the contents of this memorandum, Howard runs afoul of Russian spies, ancient demons, and apostles of a hideous cult planning to raise the Eater of Souls from the undead.

When war comes, the Earth is not ready. An immortals war arrives, the only warning a flash of light and energy 660 million kilometers away. A curiosity, passed off to NASA and tucked away in a note to be ignored. Only the flash of light is not the end, it is the beginning. Admiral Zachary Quinn is about to have a very bad day, and he is not alone. The war is here. Our response must be fast, it must be sure, and it must be victorious. Who wants to live forever?

Though many perished in the dark times past, a precious few survivors escaped, fleeing certain doom to find a dazzling, dangerous land of wonder. Here wizards and witches inhabited forests spun from enchantment and towers of celestial beauty. But in this place of promised safety, the Black Warlock was rising from the ashes of defeat - with an insatiable lust to dominate the world.

Bilbo Baggins is a hobbit who enjoys a comfortable, unambitious life, rarely travelling further than the pantry of his hobbit-hole in Bag End. But his contentment is disturbed when the wizard, Gandalf, and a company of 13 dwarves arrive on his doorstep one day, to whisk him away on a journey "there and back again". They have a plot to raid the treasure hoard of Smaug the Magnificent, a large and very dangerous dragon.

This exciting anthology includes a new novella featuring Mercedes Lackey's most popular heroines, Tarma (one of the sword-sworn and most feared of all warriors) and Kethry (who wields magic and weapons for the greater good), whose fates are suddenly bound together in blood by the powers that control their destinies.

Ever since Soren was kidnapped and taken to the St. Aegolius School for Orphaned Owls, he has longed to see his sister, Eglantine, again. Now Eglantine is back is Soren's life, but she's been through an ordeal too terrible for words. Deep within Soren's gizzard, something more powerful than knowledge tells him there's a connection between these mysterious events.

Dragon hatchling Ember Hill was never prepared to find love at all - dragons do not suffer human emotions - let alone with a human, and a former dragonslayer at that. With Garret, an ex-soldier of St. George, dying at her feet after sacrificing his freedom and his life to expose the deepest of betrayals, Ember knows only that nothing she was taught by the dragon organization Talon is true. About humans, about rogue dragons, about herself and what she's capable of doing and feeling.

Kiram Kir-Zaki may be considered a mechanist prodigy among his own people, but when he becomes the first Haldiim ever admitted to the prestigious Sagrada Academy, he is thrown into a world where power, superstition and swordplay outweigh even the most scholarly of achievements. But when the intimidation from his Cadeleonian classmates turns bloody, Kiram unexpectedly finds himself befriended by Javier Tornesal, the leader of a group of cardsharps, duelists and lotharios who call themselves Hellions.

The Krakau came to Earth to invite humanity into a growing alliance of sentient species. However, they happened to arrive after a mutated plague wiped out half the planet, turned the rest into shambling, near-unstoppable animals, and basically destroyed human civilization. You know - your standard apocalypse. The Krakau's first impulse was to turn around and go home. Their second impulse was to try to fix us. Now, a century later, human beings might not be what they once were, but at least they're no longer trying to eat everyone. Mostly.

Keeping up-to-date with the most buzzworthy and cutting-edge science fiction requires sifting through countless magazines, e-zines, websites, blogs, original anthologies, single-author collections, and more - a task accomplishable by only the most determined and voracious readers. For everyone else, Night Shade Books is proud to introduce the latest volume of The Best Science Fiction of the Year, collecting the finest that the genre has to offer, from the biggest names in the field to the most exciting new writers.

From the New York Times, USA Today, and international best-selling author of the Iron Fey and the Blood of Eden series comes the fiery, hugely anticipated finale of the Talon Saga. What if dragons walked among us in human form? Enter a modern fantasy of heroes, sacrifice, forbidden love, and enemies turned allies who have no choice but to fight side by side. Don't miss the epic conclusion as Ember, Riley, and Garrett face off against Dante and the Talon dragon clones.

Newt has been to hell and back with his friends. The Glade. The Maze. The Scorch. The inner halls of WICKED. But now he has a burden that can't be shared with Thomas and the others - the Flare. And Newt can't bear the thought of his friends watching him descend into madness as he succumbs to the virus.

When Dumbledore arrives at Privet Drive one summer night to collect Harry Potter, his wand hand is blackened and shrivelled, but he does not reveal why. Secrets and suspicion are spreading through the wizarding world, and Hogwarts itself is not safe. Harry is convinced that Malfoy bears the Dark Mark: there is a Death Eater amongst them. Harry will need powerful magic and true friends as he explores Voldemort's darkest secrets, and Dumbledore prepares him to face his destiny...