Urban Contemporary

Adam Binder has the Sight. It’s a power that runs in his bloodline: the ability to see beyond this world and into another, a realm of magic populated by elves, gnomes, and spirits of every kind. Years after his brother Bobby had him committed to a psych ward, Adam is ready to come to grips with who he is, to live his life on his terms, to find love, and maybe even use his magic to do some good. Hoping to track down his missing father, Adam follows a trail of cursed artifacts to Denver, only to discover that an ancient and horrifying spirit has taken possession of Bobby’s wife.

“One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in bed he had been changed into a monstrous verminous bug.” With this startlingly bizarre sentence, Kafka begins his masterpiece, The Metamorphosis. It is the story of a young traveling salesman who, transformed overnight into a giant, beetle-like insect, becomes an object of disgrace to his family, an outsider in his own home, a quintessentially alienated man. Rather than being surprised at the transformation, the members of his family despise it as an impending burden upon themselves.

"I very much need to be dead." These are the chilling words left behind by a man who had everything to live for - but took his own life. In the void that remains stands his widow, Jane, surrounded by questions destined to go unanswered...unless she does what all the grief, fear, confusion, and fury inside of her demand: find the truth, no matter what. There is no one else to speak for Jane's husband - or the others who have followed him into death at their own hands.

In this entry from Anthony Award winner Charlaine Harris' New York Times best-selling series, the gorgeous and feisty telepath hits the road to find her missing boyfriend, who may have run off with his former lover - a notorious vamp.

After an unfortunate incident, Sookie finds herself beholden to a group of Louisiana vampires. So she agrees to travel to Dallas with her undead boyfriend Bill and track down a missing vamp, but only if the vampires promise to let local humans go unharmed.

Two-time Aurora Award-winning author Guy Gavriel Kay has been nominated for the World Fantasy Award three times. In the first book of his Fionavar Tapestry series, five college students meet a wizard who takes them to the heart of the first of all worlds - a place called Fionavar. The students soon discover that they have been pre-ordained as part of the pattern called the Fionavar Tapestry - and if they don't fulfill their destinies, the world will suffer devastating consequences.

Clay Bennett is a powerful DarkRiver sentinel, but he grew up in the slums with his human mother, never knowing his changeling father. As a young boy without the bonds of Pack, he tried to stifle his animal nature. He failed... and committed the most extreme act of violence, killing a man and losing his best friend, Talin, in the bloody aftermath. Everything good in him died the day he was told that she, too, was dead.

Knowledge is power. That would be the motto of Lander University, had it not been snatched up and used to death by others long before the school was founded. For while Lander offers a full range of courses to nearly all students, it also offers a small number of specialty classes to a very select few. Lander is home to the Hero Certification Program, a curriculum designed to develop students with superhuman capabilities, commonly known as Supers, into official Heroes.

Adam Binder has lost what matters most to him. Having finally learned the true identity of the warlock preying on his family, what was supposed to be a final confrontation with the fiend instead became a trap that sent Adam’s beloved Vicente into the realm of the dead, where none living are meant to be. Bound by debt, oath, and love, Adam blazes his own trail into the underworld to get Vicente back, and to end the threat of the warlock once and for all. But the road to hell is paved with far more than good intentions.

Since the moment I was ripped from my mother's womb, I've been an outcast among my own kind. The Sidhe might possess magical Gifts, unbelievable wealth, and unfathomable power, but I don't want a thing to do with them. I ran away from their lands in the Highlands of Scotland when I was 11 years old, and I've never looked back. I don't need a clan. I've got my own family of highly skilled thieves who mean more to me than any Sidhe ever could.

Integrity Taylor has regained possession of her ancestral lands - and inherited a whole host of new problems. The specter of what really happened to her parents is casting a shadow over everything, while Fomori demons are being sighted up and down the Highlands. It doesn't help that Aifric Moncrieffe still seems determined to see her dead, and emerald-eyed Byron remains stubbornly blind to his father's true nature. Integrity is determined to stay in control of her own destiny, however, even if it means confronting the darkness across the Veil yet again.

Kennedy Bennett comes from a long line of curse weavers. For centuries, her family has plied their trade in Unstable, Massachusetts, an unconventional small town that's welcomed paranormal practitioners since the dawn of spiritualism. Kennedy has recently struck out on her own, opening an antiques shop in Boston, where her specialty is uncursing and reselling hexed objects. Then Aiden Connolly walks into her life with an offer she really should refuse. The scion of a wealthy family of luck workers, Aiden has a scheme to get his hands on the most famous cursed object of all.

Integrity Taylor should have been a Clan princess. Instead she's lived a life on the very periphery of society. However, now that she's learned more about her heritage and the magic that she's capable of wielding, she's not going to hide in the shadows any longer. The once-in-a-generation Sidhe Games are going to provide the perfect opportunity for her to win back her birthright, and the fact that she'll be going head-to-head, toe-to-toe, and mouth-to-mouth with golden-haired Byron Moncrieffe might just be the icing on the cake.

Waking up in a tacky coffin and wearing off-brand shoes, Betsy Taylor can't believe the horrible turn her life has taken; then she discovers she's a vampire. Soon, Betsy becomes a participant in a power struggle between the forces of darkness. With only her friend Jessica and the hunky vampire Sinclair to help her, this new "Queen of Vampires" will have a tough time getting her afterlife straight.

As a half-demon master of the dark arts, Eve Levine isn't what anyone would call "angelic." That's exactly why the Fates chose her for the job. She's their secret weapon against the forces of evil. However, after five years, Eve is tired of being the designated rebel of the angel corps, expected to break the rules, then being penalized for it. When the leaderless djinn stage an uprising, Eve sees the perfect chance to get herself fired.

With magic declassified in the UK, the fake psychics and fraudulent healers are running amok, and it's up to the Department of Extradimensional Affairs' newly appointed Skepticism Officers to crack down. But when they set their sights on Modern Miracle, a highly suspicious and fast-growing faith healing cult with remarkably good social media presence, even their skepticism is put to the test.

Let's get one thing straight - Ivy Wilde is not a heroine. In fact she's probably the last witch in the world you'd call if you needed a magical helping hand, regardless of her actual abilities. If it were down to Ivy, she'd spend all day every day on her sofa, where she could watch TV, munch junk food, and talk to her feline familiar to her heart's content. However, when a bureaucratic disaster ends up with Ivy as the victim of a case of mistaken identity, she's yanked very unwillingly into Arcane Branch.

Private eye Eddie Valiant doesn't like Toons - those cartoon characters who live side-by-side with humans. But Eddie will work for a Toon if his cash supply is low enough. So he reluctantly agrees when Roger Rabbit, a Toon who plays straight man (or should that be straight rabbit) in the Baby Herman cartoon series, asks him to find out who's been trying - unsuccessfully - to buy his contract from the DeGreasy Brothers syndicate. Then Rocco DeGreasy is murdered - and Roger is the prime suspect!

It's not easy pretending to be dead - especially when it feels as if you have the weight of the world on your shoulders. Between an unfulfilled prophecy, the demon-occupied Lowlands, the continuing power of murderous Aifric Moncrieffe - not to mention her constant yearnings for Byron - Integrity Adair has a lot to worry about. Still, how hard can it really be to save Scotland, maintain her morals, get the guy, and keep her sense of humor?

Ivy Wilde, the laziest witch in the West, is still entangled with the Hallowed Order of Magical Enlightenment. That's not a bad thing, however, because it gives her plenty of excuses to spend more time with sapphire-eyed Raphael Winter, her supposed nemesis. And when he comes knocking because he needs her to spy on the latest series of Enchantment, she jumps at the chance. Hanging around a film set can't be hard - or dangerous - right?