Modern Science Fiction

The Alliance is losing. Their most critical weapon, seventeen-year-old witch Nathan Brynn, has killed fifty-two people, and yet he's no closer to ending the tyrannical, abusive rule of the Council of Witches in England. Nor is Nathan any closer to his personal goal: getting revenge on Annalise, the girl he once loved, before she committed an unthinkable crime. There is an amulet, protected by the extremely powerful witch Ledger, which could be the tool Nathan needs to save himself and the Alliance. But the amulet is not so easily acquired.

How to Win an Election is an ancient Roman guide for campaigning that is as up-to-date as tomorrow's headlines. In 64 BC when idealist Marcus Cicero, Rome's greatest orator, ran for consul (the highest office in the Republic), his practical brother Quintus decided he needed some no-nonsense advice on running a successful campaign.

Ares, god of war, is leading the other dying gods into battle. Which is just fine with Athena. She's ready to wage a war of her own, and she's never liked him anyway. If Athena is lucky, the winning gods will have their immortality restored. If not, at least she'll have killed the bloody lot of them, and she and Hermes can die in peace. Cassandra Weaver is a weapon of fate. The girl who kills gods. But all she wants is for the god she loved and lost to return to life. If she can't have that, then the other gods will burn, starting with his murderer, Aphrodite.

In New Orleans in 1937, a man and woman embark on a headlong flight into the wilderness of illicit passion. In Mississippi ten years earlier, a convict risks his one chance at freedom to rescue a pregnant woman. From these separate stories Faulkner composes a symphony of deliverance and damnation.

More than 1,500 years after his disappearance into the mists of Avalon, King Arthur has returned. This time, he's prepared to rule the Camelot of a new millennium: New York City. Handsome, charismatic Arthur Penn is running for mayor on a platform of common sense, humor, and knightly virtues. His advisors include a gifted 10-year-old named Merlin; Percival, an immortal accountant; and Gwen, a lovely young woman with no end of problems.

Hidden away in the Record Department of the sprawling Ministry of Truth, Winston Smith skilfully rewrites the past to suit the needs of the Party. Yet he inwardly rebels against the totalitarian world he lives in, which demands absolute obedience and controls him through the all-seeing telescreens and the watchful eye of Big Brother, symbolic head of the Party. In his longing for truth and liberty, Smith begins a secret love affair with a fellow worker, Julia, but soon discovers the true price of freedom is betrayal.

Colin McCool here, everyone’s favorite smart-aleck druid and all-around trouble magnet. Something supernaturally weird is going on in my town. I leave for six months to another timeline, and the place is on fire when I get back. As in, literally…on…fire. Now my girlfriend is missing, the vampire and werewolf factions are at war, the local fae queen has become a lock-in, and a strange cult has popped up that’s somehow connected to this whole mess.

The Antichrist is a book by the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, originally published in 1895. Although it was written in 1888, its controversial content caused its publication to be delayed. The German title can be translated into English as either The Anti-Christ or The Anti-Christian, depending on how the German word Christ is translated. Nietzsche claimed in the foreword to have written the book for a very limited readership. In order to understand the book, he asserted that the reader "...must be honest in intellectual matters to the point of hardness to so much as endure my seriousness, my passion."

Dr. Victor Frankenstein, an ambitious young scientist, is consumed by a fanatic desire to create a living being. He fashions an eight-foot-tall creature and succeeds in animating him, but, horrified by his visage, perceives his creation to be a monster and frightens him away. The monster, wandering in search of human companionship, is spurned and repulsed by all he approaches and learns to hate and to kill.

A dark epic fantasy inspired by The Prince and the Pauper, from best-selling author C. J. Redwine. Javan Najafai, crown prince of Akram, has spent the last 10 years at an elite boarding school, far away from his kingdom. But his eagerly awaited return home is cut short when a mysterious impostor takes his place - and no one believes Javan is the true prince. After barely escaping the impostor's assassins, Javan is thrown into Maqbara, the kingdom's most dangerous prison.

Val is expanding her horizons as she settles into her new abode. Her jewelry business is taking off, and she's also found a pub or two for relaxing. Plus, she's got the bodyguard business, and the occasional bouncing gig. Busy dwarf! She's also learning the art and science of having friends. One of them, Stella, will be moving, which forces Val to make a choice. Has she finally found a world that will accept her? Does she want to make it her home? Then Anne, her first client who is now a friend as well, calls her about another protection job, and she can't say no.

Old Gods never die…or so Athena thought. But then the feathers started sprouting beneath her skin, invading her lungs like a strange cancer, and Hermes showed up with a fever eating away his flesh. So much for living a quiet eternity in perpetual health.

Magic is real, fairies are assholes, and everyone knew about it but me...Sera Allen needs a change. The family house she inherits is the perfect place for a fresh start, except for the sexy neighbor she’d ditched years before and the surprise fairies living across the street. Before long, she’s neck-deep in magic, Fae, and zombie bunnies, and her tenuous connection to her powers relies on the one man she wants to avoid. With a dark force threatening the town, they’ll have to face their pasts and overcome their distrust to have any chance at a future.

At a safe distance from the intrigues of courtly life at Louis XIV’s Versailles, an intellectual crowd of mostly women have been gathering in a Parisian home to share what hostess Marie D’Aulnoy herself has christened contes de fées: fairy tales. Recently ousted from court and still raw from the death of his beloved wife, Charles Perrault finds companionship and creative camaraderie at the salon, where he eagerly joins the storytellers. Their hostess is impressive, fiercely intelligent, but somehow unreadable. She is harboring secrets of her own.

These are just a few of the people who tell their stories in Modern Love, Revised and Updated, featuring dozens of the most memorable essays to run in The New York Times “Modern Love” column since its debut in 2004. Some of the stories are unconventional, while others hit close to home. Some reveal the way technology has changed dating forever; others explore the timeless struggles experienced by anyone who has ever searched for love.

EMP: Equipping Modern Patriots is a harrowing story of survival after the destruction of the electric grid and nearly every electronic device in the country. Jonathan Hollerman paints a vivid and disturbing picture of society falling apart after an Electromagnetic Pulse attack against our nation.

When things go bump in the night, there's only one federal agency that stands between the supernatural and humankind...CERBERUS. C.E.R.B.E.R.U.S. stands for “Clandestine Enforcement and Reconnaissance Bureau, Extranormal Rampart Division of the United States”—the American law enforcement unit that was created to deal with all things magical and unexplained. Follow along as Deputy Marshal Tony Mendoza is inducted into the supernatural underworld by the shadowy agency and its enigmatic leader, Director Strickland.

Lucian is a Dragon Prince of the House of Smoke...and he's dying. He has to spawn a dragonling to uphold the treaty that keeps the mortal world safe from the immortal Dark Fae, but a dragon's mate rarely survives the birth of a young dragon, and he can't face the horror of another woman's death on his hands. When he rescues a beautiful woman from a demon roaming the streets of Seattle, he has to seduce her without losing his heart...and before he turns into a feral dragon and breaks the treaty forever.

The Reveries of the Solitary Walker was one of the last works written by the French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) and was, in fact, not quite complete. It was published four years after his death and came quickly to be regarded as one of his most poetic works. It consists of 10 Walks (only the final ‘Walk’ was unfinished) during which he muses on a variety of topics including thoughts on issues which featured strongly in his notable life as a philosopher and commentator, including education and political philosophy.

Kept in a cage for two years by the Council of Fairborn Witches, Nathan was trained to kill his father, the most violent and feared of the Blood Witches. Now Nathan has escaped, and he dreams of a quiet life of freedom with Annalise, the girl he loves—but Annalise is a prisoner, wasting away in a deathlike sleep. Nathan’s friend, Gabriel, is missing, likely dead, and although Nathan has found his unique magical Gift, he can’t control it. The Council's Hunters are on his trail, so he is always on the run.