Showing results by narrator "Ray Porter" in All Categories

A rural working-class New England town elects as its mayor a New York hedge fund millionaire in this inspired novel for our times - fiction in the tradition of Jonathan Franzen and Jennifer Egan. Here are the dramas of 21st-century America - rising inequality, working class decline, a new authoritarianism - played out in the classic setting of some of our greatest novels: the small town. The Locals is that rare work of fiction capable of capturing a fraught American moment in real time.

Taryn di la Rovissi and Rutger Shaw: Two hard-luck mercenaries looking to make a clean break from the flagging war in occupied Llael... With the forces of Khador massing for another surge south into Cygnar and the Thornwood Forest, Taryn and Rutger are forced to take a dangerous escape route before borders close for good. Amid the last refugees fleeing the advance, the duo is caught up in an assignment that will prove to be either their salvation or their undoing.

The dire legend of Thagrosh Hellborne began in cold and darkness... Thagrosh has known nothing but bondage and grueling labor for all his adult life. Prisoners of Khadoran slavers, he and the other ogrun of his village have spent their lives toiling in the lightless depths of a mine. Yet Thagrosh and his brother Vargal have a plan to escape their misery and flee to the nearby nation of Rhul. When their bid for freedom is discovered, Thagrosh is forced to escape alone into the wilderness once again.

"Superiority" was first published in the August 1951 issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. Sir Arthur C. Clarke (1917-2008) is regarded as one of the most-influential science fiction writers of all time. He was named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, and was inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame.

Rutger and Taryn are scraping by in the infamous Port of Deceit, a place where two skilled mercenaries should have no trouble finding work. But an ominous shadow has fallen across the city of Five Fingers, and an ancient evil has come to gorge itself on the agony and suffering that have long been the city’s stock and trade. Rutger and Taryn are dragged into a tangled plot of danger and intrigue as they face a terrifying Cryxian invasion and a vengeful specter from their past.

In this new collection of five short stories from New York Times best-selling author Jonathan Maberry, listeners get an eclectic sampling of the writer's work - from SF parody to murder mystery and beyond.

This full-cast audiobook, featuring 11 different voice actors, and narrated by Hillary Huber, take on the roles of the Tandem Players, a group of community theater actors that love their community theater almost as much as they love the sweet old landlady who gave them a home to perform their plays in over the years. But when she passes away, and the will that was to leave the Broadtown Theater to the acting troupe disappears, they don’t even have time to mourn their loss. Her son comes in like a wrecking ball....

In Blue Marble, you are a feisty and fetching woman in the richest decade of American history. Every man in Marble, Colorado exhales vocally at your provocative 1910 fashions. And it doesn’t hurt that there are 50 strapping men for every female in this booming quarry camp in the rarified mountains of Colorado.

In March 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson sent troops into Vietnam. 57,939 American soldiers would be killed and 17 years would pass before this controversial chapter of American history concluded with the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in 1982. The history of this era is complex; the cultural impact extraordinary. But it's the personal stories of eight people - six American soldiers, one American nurse, and one Vietnamese refugee - that form the heartbeat of Boots on the Ground. Each individual's story reveals a different facet of the war and moves us forward in time.

The Incrementalists are a secret society of 200 people - an unbroken lineage reaching back 40 thousand years. They cheat death, share lives and memories, and communicate with one another across nations and time. They have an epic history, an almost magical memory, and a very modest mission: to make the world better, a little bit at a time. But now Phil, the Incrementalist whose personality has stayed stable through more incarnations than anyone else's, has been shot dead.

The enemy’s plotting against them - while they’re tearing at each other’s throats! Malaria could lay them on their backs. Jungle fever threatens to strip their sanity. An army of death marches through bloody war zones looking to tear their guts out. But over the roar of grenades and the swish of Samurai swords you can always hear the spine-curdling battle cry of the guys who kill their way to victory.

The whole world has a stake in the war against poverty and leaders across the globe are looking for a permanent solution. That's why economist Barry Asmus and theologian Wayne Grudem have teamed up to outline a robust proposal for fighting poverty on a national level. These two experts believe the solution lies in a comprehensive development plan that integrates the principles of a free market system with the Bible's teachings on social ethics.

Joey Anderson attended his great-grandmother's funeral because he expected to receive a little inheritance money. What he didn't expect was to inherit her bed-and-breakfast, provided he lives there and follows her final instructions. With a little help from his friends, Joey grows up and discovers a world beyond me, my, and I.

They’re bad news wherever they go. Slogging their way through steaming jungles choked with blood. Digging out from the stone-cold tunnels of an underground tomb. To them, death is just a sick joke - a joke played on anyone dumb enough to stand in their way. The Rat Bastards. Nothing is more important to them than winning.

Clifford Hickey is scheduled to perform at the festival in what might be his last guitar gig before heading off to law school to please his father. He arrives at the peaceful woodland campsite of his brother Alvaro, but within moments six armed men in badges crash the camp, and Alvaro runs. Clifford is arrested and roughly handcuffed. One of the sheriffs’ nephews has been murdered, and Alvaro is the posse’s quarry. When Clifford’s father and mother arrive on the scene, it’s the beginning of a confrontation between the Hickey family and the locals, including the Cossacks, who seemingly have their own agenda for Alvaro.

Sam Hunter is a bit of an animal. He's a former Twin Cities cop who lost his badge because of excessive force. Abusive husbands, child molesters, and other lowlifes wound up looking like they'd been mauled by a dog...or a wolf. In this short story taken from Beneath the Skin, Sam is hired by a mysterious woman to stop a group of killers who are skinning young women alive.

The twisted trail of blood! Slicing and stabbing hand-to-hand for the bloody booty of war. Ramming a hijacked truck through the hell of enemy lines. Escaping over water made choppy by hot Japanese bullets. Defending a cave full of frightened American nurses from a brutal onslaught of killers. The Rat Bastards fight on, turning New Guinea into an island of savage slaughter. They’ll take on their own top brass, then roll flat the whole Jap army. For them, war isn’t everything. It’s the only thing.

In "The Death Song of Dwar Guntha", two old warriors prepare to ride into battle for the last time to save the future of Barsoom. Set in the world of Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter of Mars, this story first appeared in the anthology Under the Moons of Mars.

"History Lesson" was first published in the May 1949 issue of Startling Stories. Sir Arthur C. Clarke (1917-2008) is regarded as one of the most-influential science fiction writers of all time. He was named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, and was inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame.

From the introduction by Les Standiford: "The truth is that Miami, though naturally lovely, is a frontier town, perched on the border between the known and the rarely before experienced. The poet Richard Hugo once said that the natural place for the writer was on the edge, and 'edge' might well be the definitive word when it comes to this city... We are not only on the edge of the continent, we are to this country what New York was in Ellis Island's heyday, what the West Coast was in the middle of the 20th century.