Fiction Literature Dramatized

Gavin Guile is the Prism, the most powerful man in the world. He is high priest and emperor, a man whose power, wit, and charm are all that preserves a tenuous peace. But Prisms never last and Guile knows exactly how long he has left to live: Five years to achieve five impossible goals.

Buckskin, Nevada, was once a boomtown, then died a peaceful death. But when a fresh vein of silver is struck, Frank Morgan lets himself get pinned with a tin badge at the worst possible time. It's not the petty swindlers, or the stray murderer or two that will give Morgan problems. Instead, Buckskin is heating up from a miners strike, industrial sabotage, a hostile state militia, and an outlaw gang that decides the time is ripe for an all-out assault on the town.

It's hard country, but the pioneers of Fury (Population 112) are banding together to make it a home. With barren lands, blinding dust storms, drought, hostile Indians and violent bands of cutthroat outlaws against them, death is never far away. It's enough to make Jason Fury, whose father the town was named after, ride out for San Francisco. But a fiery young redhead named Megan McDonald keeps him Arizona bound - and just in time.

Frank Morgan survived his first trip to Alaska. Barely. Now, in Western Canada, Morgan and a band of survivors encounter an arch enemy with a fortune in ill-gotten gains - money he'll use to supply murderous Metis rebels with stolen U.S. Army Gatling guns to use for a bloodbath - and the Last Gunfighter is now in their way. But before the rebels can kill him, a daring U.S. secret agent joins his side. In a harsh and untamed land, Frank Morgan will soon face the ultimate battle for survival - before an all-out civil war explodes.

When a wealthy cattle baroness, Pamela Danvers, hires gunslinger Joe Buckhorn to track down her son, it sounds like easy money. But when he learns that the boy has run off with a girl — whose father is the leader of the cattle-rustling Riley gang — Buckhorn’s only hope is to infiltrate the gang.

Since time immemorial, humans have worshipped the gods they call Fhrey, truly a race apart: invincible in battle, masters of magic, and seemingly immortal. But when a god falls to a human blade, the balance of power between humans and those they thought were gods changes forever. Now only a few stand between humankind and annihilation: Raithe, reluctant to embrace his destiny as the God Killer; Suri, a young seer burdened by signs of impending doom; and Persephone, who must overcome personal tragedy to lead her people. The Age of Myth is over. The time of rebellion has begun.

Aging cowboy and bronco-buster Wes Hendricks just wants to be left alone on his poor ranch, even when town developers offer him big money to sell it. Wes's grandson reluctantly tries to convince him to give up his home, but that was before he, too, succumbs to the ranch's - and a young cowgirl's - wild beauty.

Smoke Jensen has journeyed up to the Colorado Rockies to a sell a prized bull to a local rancher. Instead, the rancher and his wife have been mercilessly slaughtered by outlaws only moments before Smoke’s arrival. In a hail of bullets, Smoke pulverizes two of the murderers and drags two others to the town of Brown Spur for justice. Come hanging day, the two killers are on the way to the gallows when a thundering gang of raiders crashes into town and rescues them from the jaws of death.

Hank Fallon knows what it’s like to rot behind bars. To wallow in the filth of a rat-infested cell. To smell the pent-up rage of cutthroat killers and thieves. Fallon earned his freedom the hard way. He saved the lives of four guards, got released early, and became a detective. Then he went undercover, infiltrated a prison gang plotting to bust out — and barely made it out alive. Now they’re sending him back. Behind the iron. Straight to hell.

Joey Wells has a score to settle in Pueblo: Find Jacob Murdock and the band of vaqueros who attacked his wife and drown them in their own stinking blood. Smoke Jensen, the trigger-ready legend of the "High Lonesome," is more than willing to strap on a brace of 45's to help out Wells - especially if it involves nailing some dirty renegades to the wall. But things are tougher than Jensen imagined. Murdock and his men aren't just hiding out in Pueblo - they've taken it over.

In "Pecos Crossing", two young cowboys, Johnny Fristo and Speck Quitman, have been cheated of six months’ hard-earned pay by their rancher boss, Larramore and intend to get what is due to them. In "Shotgun", Two Forks, Texas, rancher Blair Bishop must contend with a mean customer named Macy Modock, who Bishop sent to prison 10 years past. Modock is out of the hoosegow and has returned to Two Forks determined to get even with the man who sent him up the river.

When Kelvin was a child, his mother read to him from the Book of Prophecy and he asked what the poem meant. Now he was about to learn. The Kingdom of Rud languishes under the heel of a usurper; an evil sorcerer has taken the throne in the name of his wicked daughter. Even deep in the forest, away from all power, the people tremble and await the day of prophecy's fulfillment. It cannot come too soon: Charlain and her children are soon to lose their home to the tax collector. But Kelvin and Jon have other plans.

Cotton Pickens is feeling about as low as a man can get. Held up, robbed, and fired from his job as sheriff, things get even worse when someone murders Cotton's horse Critter. And it's all happening just as a flashy, fleshy stage company comes to town. Some folks demand the show be shut down for immorality. Some folks - Cotton included - sure enjoy the proceedings. But when a man gets stabbed to death, a bank safe gets blown up, and another county's sheriff starts imposing his will, Cotton realizes that a dastardly plot is taking over Doubtful.

Heris Serrano - formerly a commander in the Regular Space Service - must take whatever job she can get after her resignation under a cloud. What she can get is the captaincy of a rich old lady's space yacht...a rich old horsewoman, who has little liking for the military, and whose spoiled nephew Ronnie (and his equally spoiled friends) have been foisted on her after his folly embarrassed the family. Lady Cecelia's only apparent interest is horses - she intends to go fox hunting on the private pleasure planet of a friend of hers, Lord Thornbuckle.

Underpowered and overwhelmed, Kenton tries to hold the Sand Masters together as forces political and personal conspire against them. Now, in one final push, Kenton must tap the most dangerous depths of his own abilities to combat the enemies within his own guild and discover the truth behind the ambush that killed his father and almost destroyed the Sand Masters for good.

Using an old cannon that once belonged to Napoleon's army, an outlaw gang has been bringing trains to a halt and then robbing them. Now Edward Sheffield - one of the owners of the railroad - wants to hire Conrad Morgan, known as The Loner, to wipe the gang off the map. The Loner isn't interested, especially when Sheffield's hot-blooded wife tries to seduce him into going after the gang's leader, Gideon Black - a renegade ex-colonel-turned-outlaw.

Ignatius O’Reilly is famous for his beautifully crafted counterfeit money. John Henry Sixkiller is famous for hunting criminals into the most violent and dangerous worlds most lawman dare not go. Now, the Deputy U.S. Marshal is zeroing on O’Reilly in San Francisco, when the case blows up in his face. Instead of O’Reilly, Sixkiller finds a beautiful woman and a meddling Federal agent from the Secret Service. O’Reilly gets away and the hunt leads Sixkiller after the woman, the counterfeiter, and the Fed into the rugged Sierra Nevada Mountains.

Lawmen don't last long in the town of Doubtful, Wyoming Territory. The last one quit, another ended up in a hangman's noose, and one more was backshot by the hired guns at the Circle L Ranch. But the town of Doubtful has never seen the likes of the man who's known only as Cotton, who aims to take the badge for $125 a month, save himself a nice chunk of money over the next year, and be on his way. At least, that's his plan.

The sun is setting on humanity. The night now belongs to voracious demons that prey upon a dwindling population forced to cower behind half-forgotten symbols of power. Legends tell of a Deliverer: a general who once bound all mankind into a single force that defeated the demons. But is the return of the Deliverer just another myth? Perhaps not. Out of the desert rides Ahmann Jardir, who has forged the desert tribes into a demon-killing army. He has proclaimed himself Shar’Dama Ka, the Deliverer and he carries ancient weapons - a spear and a crown - that give credence to his claim.

The train grinds to a halt somewhere in the Indian Nations, and the bandits get onboard. They take everything on the train worth stealing and gun down a guard to make their escape — just another notch on the belt for Ben Trout and Zack Larsen, two of the most savage killers in the west. US Deputy Marshal Ed Pine follows them to Muskogee. There the trail runs cold, and Ed Pine disappears.