Books Tagged With author - american

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Summary: A tragic secret. A trial of pain. Gust holds a secret close to his heart, and it festers like an infected wound. While part of him wants to tell Lance so they can deal with it together, he fears what it will do to his friend. The last thing he wants to do is hurt the man he is falling in love with. And it never seems the right time as they pursue Ulfr’s warriors and elude hunting parties of royal soldiers. Lance wants nothing more than to confess his love and undying loyalty to Gust. But he fears rejection. He has Gust’s friendship and dares not ask for more. He’s not yet a man worthy to ask for more. And as he continues on his self-imposed mission to cut down Ulfr’s warriors, he begins to wonder if he will ever find the redemption he so fiercely seeks. When word of a new Scourge reaches them, their journey brings them to the war-ravaged kingdom of Grekenus. It is there that Lance is forced to face the actions of his past, and once again his life hangs in the balance. Now it is only Gust who can defend him against those thirsty for blood… and to Lance himself.

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Summary: It's a time of change, between magic and alchemy. Born the heir of a master woodcutter in a queendom defined by guilds and matrilineal inheritance, nonbinary Sorin can’t quite seem to find their place. At seventeen, an opportunity to attend an alchemical guild fair and secure an apprenticeship with the queen’s alchemist is just within reach. But on the day of the fair, Sorin’s mother goes missing, along with the Queen and hundreds of guild masters, forcing Sorin into a woodcutting inheritance they never wanted. With guild legacy at stake, Sorin puts apprentice dreams on hold to embark on a journey with the royal daughter to find their mothers and stop the hemorrhaging of guild masters. Princess Magda, an estranged childhood friend, tests Sorin’s patience—and boundaries. But it’s not just a princess that stands between Sorin and their goals. To save the country of Sorpsi, Sorin must define their place between magic and alchemy or risk losing Sorpsi to rising industrialization and a dark magic that will destroy Sorin’s chance to choose their own future.

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Summary: Imagine that every sixteen years, you died and started over, with no memory of the past. Could true love ever find you? Only if it were immortal. In 1915, a coven of vampires attacked the town of Fairville, MA, the disappearances making headlines. Sixteen-year-old Lundy Guillory and the boy who loved her, Harlan Wallace, discovered the culprits, so the vampires devised a cruel punishment: Lundy was cursed to die and be reborn every sixteen years, each time retaining no memory of her past lives. Harlan was turned into a vampire, so that, immortal, he would be tortured with the task of finding her again in every new life, and telling her their story. Over ninety years later, Lundy Lawson and her parents move into Fairville, one month before her sixteenth birthday, with desperate hopes that the doctors there will be able to help Lundy, whose health has been diminishing steadily. But Lundy begins to have strange dreams. First there seems to be a ghost in the library, trying to reach her; then a stranger shows up at her window at night - Harlan, unearthly, impossibly pale and sharp-teethed, and madly in love with her. It's Lundy's first lifetime back in the town where it all began, and this time she and Harlan have their chance to break the vampire's curse.

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Summary: Taste the magic of the gods! Sisters Kisare and Belili uproot an ancient box in their owner’s orchard and find a miracle inside: a fifth godfruit in a society that knows only four. It is punishable by death for non-nobles to eat godfruit, so the sisters hide the discovery and plot to escape servitude for good. With the power represented in the box, they could live as nobles themselves. But Kisare finds her new freedom more difficult than she imagined, and Belili has many secrets she strives to keep hidden. With the help of a people slowly losing their culture and technology to the powerful nobles, the sisters lead an infiltration of the highest levels of noble society. While Kisare finds she cares for the captured leader of the people helping them, Belili comes to love her noble suitor’s guard—a fierce woman with a similar past to her own. In the end, the fifth godfruit may bring harmony to the world, but the sisters’ only hope of succeeding lies in deciphering ancient mythologies surrounding the gods’ original plan for their people.

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Summary: A collection of the "Brassbright Kids" stories PLUS a brand-new novelette! The Steamkettle Kids Save the Day - Can Paisley Pockets and Christopher Cogan stop a crime in progress? They may be just a couple of kids, but where there’s a will and some smarts, there just might be a way. The Legend of The Engineer - In a country called Industralia, children listen to a New Year's story about Frostica, the Engineer, and a magical train. A Life Invented - Gerard Liddle tinkers with his very first inventions - which sometimes work, and sometimes do unexpected things. The Steamkettle Kids and the Lucky Tentacles - After a hurricane shakes up Steamkettle Bay, Paisley Pockets, Christopher Cogan and Jimmy Cupper have an adventure as big as the sea. ~ NEW ~ The Secret of Tarragon Alley - Robin dreams of having a garden filled with flowers, just like Gramma did. When he brings home a little clay pot filled with gnarly, weird plants, he has no idea that it will take him on an amazing adventure.

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Summary: "No hero would ride over the hill. Except for us." It's been fifty years since magery returned to the north. The citizens of the Sharren Accord have enjoyed decades of peace and prosperity. Giadella Marteen didn't mean to ruin that. Now her country's enemies are back. Gia and her friends are determined to set things right. But a greater threat, long brewing, is about to rise above them all. Fury's Gift is the final standalone sequel to the Woodspell Series and one of the Tales of Ardonna.

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Summary: Free bird? Don't make me laugh. Mom tossed me out of the nest with five dollars and the clothes on my back. Why? I visited my snitch brother in Danvers Sanitarium. Pariah or not, I refuse to abandon my favorite sibling. Did I forget to mention mom made me homeless on the night before my first day of high school? The principal took pity, but she stuck me in the boarding house with a nosy roommate. I refuse to flunk out of high school like the rest of my family. Breaking the cycle is a tall order. Three of my classmates decide to grief me because of my shady family. The others are part of an exclusive and mysterious clique. My only friend is Ed, a scrawny medium I rescued from a gang of psychic bullies. At least he doesn’t mind my obsession with ghosts. How will I get through the first month at this rowdy school, let alone three whole years?

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Summary: The mighty storm wrecking havoc on the city and the ensuing fire engulfs Dr. Kite's warehouse, destroying his experiments and the ugly truths hidden in the depth of its high walls. In the aftermath, Kite escapes from the city to the safety of a small coastal town, where nobody knows him ... or do they? The three women, their lives previously altered by his novel mind-control chips, forge another life. Will Gigi hold on to true love? Ellen has lost weight but gained a bundle of joy. Does she tell the baby's father? Will Lilly's new business succeed? They're changing their lives to find happiness again. This time, taking a journey of self-discovery and risks of their own choosing. Please note: This book does end on a cliff-hanger. Primal Will wraps it up. "Primal Will delivers just as many twists and turns as the first two books, plus a stunning conclusion!" - Amazon reviewer

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Summary: Two thousand years ago, a machine was forged by brilliant minds whose wisdom was outstripped by their thirst for power. Rather than being a mere mechanical calendar, the Antikythera Mechanism in reality harnessed a formidable and frightening power — one that could make or break the world. Men rose up and fought the Mechanism's owners, stopping them from using its psychic force for destruction. They destroyed the device, burying it — and themselves — in the depths of the Aegean sea. But the knowledge to rebuild it remained, and attracted power-hungry individuals who would stop at nothing to control it. When two archaeologists studying the Mechanism are killed, an unlikely team of heroes come to the horrifying realization that it's all starting again — an elderly minister, a student with prophetic dreams, an unassuming secretary and her best friend, a young and idealistic news reporter, and a skeptical university professor are drawn into a web of intrigue and danger. If the Mechanism is rebuilt, it will unleash an unimaginable cataclysm. Only they have the ability to stop it.

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Summary: Coasters, carousels, an old cemetery, and a sprawling hotel on a stormy lakeside. Visit this haunted tour of scrapbook memories where legendary summers intersect with history and rumor. Told in vignettes that weave stories, newspaper clippings, postcards, and images, Ghastly Tales follows four families through the decades at a lakeside resort and amusement park where everyone eventually returns.

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Summary: This horror collection graphic novel contains the following stories: “And They Lived Long Enough to Bury Their Dead” is a dark fantasy comic zine about a group of Gen X goth/punk folks growing older and processing the deaths of loved ones. A paranormal urban fantasy, it centers around Billie, a nonbinary African-American alternative rocker from Oakland who develops the psychic ability to see and communicate with ghosts. Their nesting partner, Davis, a formerly homeless African-American transgender man, their twin brother Sean, a ghostcat, and the ghost of their mother are other central characters. In the story Billie, Davis, and their Gen X circle of friends are coming to terms with aging, the declining health (and loss) of their parents, and adjusting to a new post-pandemic world. It is an urban fantasy taking place in Oakland and the San Francisco Bay Area “Agrippa” is a dystopic near-future tale that takes place in an unnamed industrialized nation very much like the United States. When foreign creditors demand that the nation repay its considerable international debt or face war it enacts the Dulcetta Reforms, ultra-restrictive laws establishing debtor’s prison, and causing a large number of people – many of them seniors – to go to jail or even face execution if not continuously working to pay off their personal debts to the government. Dr. Tine, an expert in geriatric medicine, is desperately searching for employment at the beginning of our tale, having lost her useful functioning in society as the elders she once treated were rounded up and hauled off to the prison camps. Things were so bad she didn't think they could possibly get any worse. How very wrong she was. Dreamworlds: Beyond Somnalia - the author is plagued by a series of increasing demands from their fictional characters who come to take over the writer's life.

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Summary: "This was a good time for silent reflection, to ask myself how—in all the rumored worlds—I’d arrived here." All she wanted was a secure home, but Maddie’s problems just got bigger. GIANTS’ GATE is a standalone MAGE ERA prequel to the WOODSPELL SERIES and one of the TALES OF ARDONNA. Content Advisory: Contains adult themes and situations and spoilers for River’s Roar

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Summary: Alex Philothea, the newly appointed director of the Keepers of the Holy and Noble Maat, is fighting to save the agency her ancestors have led for over two millennia. Operating in deep cover, KHNM shields the mortal realm against the lethal chaos of the Immortals. As Alex battles the Gods over the agency’s existence, she is in a race against time to contain dangerous magical artifacts. If the Gods succeed in shuttering the agency and these ancient objects fall into unworthy hands, humanity will pay a deadly price. Deep in the Netherworld, adventurer Jorge Trinculo unearths a primordial book of magic. It exposes one of KHNM’s darkest secrets. For years, the agency has been erasing the memories of his encounters with the Immortals. As his old life floods back, he realizes all that he has lost. In Jorge’s pursuit of revenge, his future becomes entwined with that of a power-hungry magician. A magician who has waited patiently, for centuries, to possess the forbidden book and wield its lethal magic against the mortal realm.

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Summary: A prophecy to a 16-year-old blacksmith’s son sends Trygare kan Ingan from his home in the Cymenean glyns, armed only with his father’s sword. Being GodChosen isn’t easy. The woman he wants doesn’t want him ; the man who should be his best friend thinks him laughable, and everyone ridicules his youth, to say nothing of his glyndweller accent. Slaying a dragon and defending the country from invaders changes their minds, and things are going nicely, but then the gods interfere… Tragedy strikes, sending Trygare to a foreign land where his true destiny lies… …to become the ancestor of a dynasty that will rule his planet for three thousand years.

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Summary: After their daughter was bullied at school, Kyle and Alejandro decided to make a fresh start and move into a beautiful new cul-de-sac development. As they take up residence, the family enjoys seeing the community come to life. But when lights flicker, shadows lurk, and small objects disappear, they begin to doubt their sanity. When Alejandro and many of their neighbors are struck down by a strange sickness that defies explanation, the family starts to question their recent life change. Feeling trapped they speak with their new neighbors, learning they aren’t alone in the haunted neighborhood. Who do you turn to when the authorities can’t offer any assistance or protection? How do you fight against a sinister force that is older than time? Can Kyle, Alejandro and the rest of the occupants of Golden Hills Court survive or will this nightmarish ordeal destroy them?

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Summary: Elderly, unarmed, and extremely dangerous. Ajay Andersen was the best hacker the NSA had ever hired. He sank corporations, toppled governments, and broke cryptography. All of it. Retirement hasn't slowed him down one bit, thank you very much. When his estranged daughter shows up on his doorstep with his two granddaughters, Ajay will do anything to keep them safe. He’ll hack biotech corporations and criminal enterprises alike. He'll brave the woods of Minnesota. Nobody after his girls will be safe, but the more he digs, the more he dredges up the shadows of his own dangerous past. He only needs to know one thing: What makes his granddaughters so darn dangerous?

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Summary: Retired, reclusive, and too smart to die. Hacker Ajay Andersen knows his retirement isn't always going to be sunshine and roses. He's committed to protecting those he loves, and sometimes that's not going to be easy. But things get complicated fast when he finds Silas Cardoso's body in his living room. An environmentalist entrepreneur threatens the very wilderness he once protected. Mercenaries hold information that could endanger Ajay's granddaughter Kylie. If he's going to make things right, Ajay will need to venture somewhere he never wants to go during the harsh Minnesota winter: Outside. Too old to race a snowmobile through a dense forest? Maybe. Too old to be a pain in the butt? Not this Grandfather.

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Summary: Seasoned, strange, and dangerously clever Some invitations are impossible to refuse. When Ajay and Kylie are invited to a dinner party hosted by one of the wealthiest women around, Ajay sees it as an opportunity to dig into her past. He needs to find what shady business she’s been up to and how dangerous she really is. Never mind that she’s Kylie’s grandmother. What starts out as a dinner party turns quickly to trouble when a guest is murdered. Was the killer the billionaire socialite, the odd chef, or one of the other guests? Ajay needs to cut through the complex connections between the reluctant guests, because one of them is a killer–but they aren’t the only one. Too old to learn decent manners? Maybe. Too old to solve a murder? Not this grandfather.

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Summary: "...an apocalyptic survival story that moves with the speed of a raging river..." This is how the world ends. For one man, this is how it begins. Donald Kerston's life up to now could only be described as a nightmare. But what he wakes up to suddenly becomes much worse. Struggling for his very survival, for the first time he finds friends and a future - only to be confronted with the one thing he didn't ever want to face.