Fantasy Realism

The tales in Mark Haddon's lyrical and uncompromising new collection take many forms - Victorian adventure story, science fiction, morality tale, contemporary realism - but they all showcase his virtuoso gifts as a stylist and the deep well of empathy that made his three best-selling novels so compelling. The characters here are often isolated physically or estranged from their families, yet they yearn for connection.

The downtown core of Toronto is being consumed by Elysium, a drug that allows its users to slip through the permeable edges of this world into the next, before consuming them utterly. Peddled by the icy Srebrenka, few have managed to escape the drug and its dealer. But Maggie has. Years after beating her addiction, Maggie is dismayed by the reappearance of Srebrenka in her life. Although she resists temptation, she quickly learns her brother, Kyle, has been ensnared by Srebrenka's beguiling.

Saint Petersburg, 1812. Russian forces have defeated Napoleon at great cost, and the tsar's empire is once again at peace. Sasha, a captain in the imperial army, returns home to Grand Duke Felix, the disgraced second son of the tsar and his irrepressibly charming lover, but their reunion is quickly interrupted by the arrival of Sofia, a mysteriously persuasive figure whose disruptive presence Sasha suspects to be something more than human. Felix, insisting that Sasha's old-fashioned superstitions are misplaced, takes Sofia into his confidence.

Treasure and her mother lost everything when Treasure’s father died. Haggling for scraps in the market, Treasure meets a man who promises to change their fortunes, but his feet are hovering just a few inches above the ground. He’s a spirit, and he says he can bring Treasure’s beloved father back to life if she’ll do one terrible thing for him first.

The action ramps up with Dean struggling to defeat the Minotaur's Maze. Team Core will push him to a new level, and that blasted Thero plots in the shadows. Join Dean and Team Ola as they strive to save Planet Oakley.

A woman meets her next-door neighbor and loans her a spatula, then starts suffering horrific gaps in her memory. A man, feeling jilted by an unrequited love, becomes obsessed with sorting through his neighbors' garbage in the belief that it will teach him how to better relate to people. A landlord decides to raise the rent, and his tenants hatch a plan to kill him at a team-building retreat. In 10 captivating, unnerving stories, Flowers of Mold presents a range of ordinary individuals who have found themselves left behind by an increasingly urbanized and fragmented world.

By working together, Henry Sato and Jason Booth have managed to survive their unwanted trip to Ludus, an experiment planet. However, Delvers LLC has made some enemies...if monsters, bandits, mages, criminals, bounty hunters, and even dark cults can be called, "some enemies." After their latest battle, the two have been separated and must adapt or die. Henry in particular faces a trial by fire - perhaps literally - that may be impossible for him to overcome. The two American men will face their greatest challenges yet while working as conscripted Berber Intelligence agents. But even while outnumbered, and most likely outgunned, the former veteran EMT and resilient IT programmer will be armed with modern Earth know-how.

Welcome to the Midwest, America's Heartland, home to a hidden community of witches and wizards. When Maria Apple receives a strange music box for her 19th birthday, everything changes. She begins to showcase odd magical abilities, glowing blue, seeing ghosts, and talking to creatures that shouldn't be able to talk, all while trying to juggle the task of being a typical teenage girl. Now, not only does Maria learn she is a witch, but her grandfather, Ignatius, reveals he was once a famous warrior from a planet named Oriceran.

High school is hard enough for most teens but for Noble, Harlan, Argus and Tora, some days can be a real howl. Born wolves, the shape-shifting siblings have spent most of their lives in human form, taking to the woods to enjoy their animal strength in secret. But all that could change at any moment… For it’s only a matter of time before Harlan pounces on his high school nemesis, revealing his feral nature to all. Before Tora shares the pack’s secret with the classmate she’s got a major crush on.

The student witches are growing increasingly reckless, preying on the mundanes below the mountains as their tutors plot and scheme to take advantage of the chaos. And no one seems to know why. Emily is in no condition to intervene. But she cannot refuse. Heading to Laughter, Emily finds herself dragged into a world of schoolgirl games, staffroom politics, and a deadly plot aimed at the heart of the Allied Lands themselves.

In a world where vampires and witches live in secrecy, 16-year-old Larissa Norton's life is turned upside down when her vampire parents are murdered and a dark presence begins pursuing her. Forced to flee into hiding, Larissa discovers she is not who she thought she was. She learns her real name is Larissa Dubois, a powerful witch born in 1920s New Orleans.

In 1986, humanity experienced the Reaping - a nationwide slaughter of six-year-old children by their parents - one of the country's most horrific tragedies. From that day forward, the world would never trust another cryptid. Now, Delilah Marlow and a rogue group of cryptids are on the run. One morning, Delilah wakes up with dried blood all over her hands. Though she has no memory of it, she obviously went somewhere - and possibly killed someone - in her sleep. More killings follow, and there is something connecting her victims - perhaps something as dangerous as another Reaping.

When her parents died in a tragic accident and her life in Australia fell apart, Carlie was sent across the ocean to live with a stranger. After a harrowing journey through the mists, she finally found peace with her grandmother, magic with her new friend, and first love with her druidic soul mate. But then she was plunged back into the darkness. Now, haunted by loss and betrayal, and worried that her shattered heart is beyond repair, she must decide whether she has it in her to find her way back into the light.

Cat hasn’t been to Montgomery Falls, the town her family founded, since she was 12 years old. Since the summer she discovered she could do things that no normal 12-year-old could do. Since she had her first kiss with Riley Fraser. Since she destroyed their friendship. Now, five years later, she’s back and Riley has disappeared. When Noah, Riley's brother, asks for help in discovering what happened, Cat is torn between wanting to learn the truth and protecting the secret that she’s been guarding ever since that summer she and Riley stopped speaking.

The search for the Holy Grail has been going on for countless centuries. Science and religion have both sought to answer humanity's thirst for the ultimate knowledge, the power over life and death and the key to immortality. Sometimes, however, great discoveries occur by complete accident.

Penniless and stranded in France after a bid to escape her cruel uncle goes awry, Cornelia Shaw is far from the Parisian life of leisure she imagined. Desperate and out of options, she allows herself to be recruited to Napoleon’s Grande Armée. As a naturalist, her mysterious ability to heal any wound with herbal mixtures invites awe amongst the soldiers…and suspicion.

Never whistle at the Northern Lights, the legend goes, or they'll sweep down from the sky and carry you away. Sixteen-year-old Eline Davis knows it's true. She was there 10 years ago, on a frozen fjord in Svalbard, Norway, the night her mother whistled at the lights and then vanished. Now, Eli lives an ordinary life with her dad on Cape Cod. But when the Northern Lights are visible over the Cape for just one night, she can't resist the possibility of seeing her mother again. So she whistles--and it works. Her mother appears, with a hazy story of where she's been all these years.

Every night, as Faye puts her daughters to bed, she thinks of her own mother, Jeanie, who died when Faye was eight. The pain of that loss has never left her, and that’s why she wants her own girls to know how very much they are loved by her — and always will be, whatever happens. Then one day, Faye gets her heart’s desire when she’s whisked back into the past and is reunited not just with her mother but with her own younger self.

Marvin Deitz has some serious problems. His mob-connected landlord is strong-arming him out of his storefront. His therapist has concerns about his stability. He's compelled to volunteer at the local Children's Hospital even though it breaks his heart every week. Oh, and he's also the guilt-ridden reincarnation of Geoffroy Thérage, the French executioner who lit Joan of Arc's pyre in 1431. He's just seen a woman on a Los Angeles talk show claiming to be Joan, and absolution seems closer than it's ever been . . . but how will he find her?

Willkommen an der Blue Reef High: Die Gestaltwandler-Schule für Meerestiere öffnet ihre Pforten! Für Tiago ist es ein Schock, als er herausfindet, dass er ein Gestaltwandler ist. Und was für einer: In seiner zweiten Gestalt als Tigerhai wird er sogar von seinen Mitschülern gefürchtet. Einzig das fröhliche Delfinmädchen Shari hat keine Angst vor ihm. Doch ihre Freundschaft wird bereits beim ersten großen Abenteuer, das die an der Blue Reef High erwartet, auf die Probe gestellt.