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Books Tagged With when - period - near future

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Word Count: 15600

Summary: Following his successful base jump from Fred Noonan Skyport, Tiger Bailey undertakes the next step in the development process of the Gryphon hardshell wingsuit, a drop from Low Earth Orbit. Using the Gryphon-10 with enhanced navigation and computer control, and with a greater wingspan, he uses the Slingshot Space Launch Loop to gain Low Earth Orbit (LEO), but experiences equipment problems that nearly destroy him and doom the project. Ultimately, Tiger perseveres and drops into the Earth's atmosphere. He skips out in in several times before eventually making a harrowing but safe landing.

Daedalus Leo - Robert G. Williscroft
DAEDALUS LEO—SWIC drop from Low Earth Orbit
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Word Count: 12300

Summary: After his successful proof-of-concept drop from Low Earth Orbit (LEO), Tiger Bailey's squad undertakes the next step in the development process of the Gryphon hardshell wingsuit, a coordinated drop from LEO by six team members. They tried to plan for every conceivable contingency, however, Mother Nature intervened with disastrous results.

Daedalus Squad - Robert G. Williscroft
DAEDALUS SQUAD—SWIC Squad drop from Low Earth Orbit
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Word Count: 13500

Summary: Using a new Gryphon-7 hard-shell wingsuit, Tiger Baily, irreverent member of the Navy SEALS Winged Insertion Command, makes a harrowing first experimental base jump from the edge of Space, the Fred Noonan Skyport 80,000 meters above Jarvis Island in the Equatorial Pacific. Tiger’s target, which he must reach to survive, is Kiritimati Island, a tiny isolated atoll 379 km northeast of Jarvis over ever-threatening and oh-so-deep ocean waters.

Daedalus - Robert G. Williscroft
DAEDALUS: SWIC Basejump from Fred Noonan Skyport
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Word Count: 4000

Summary: Who expects a haunted doll to be such a nuisance? When Dare’s dog discovers an abandoned doll on their doorstep, Dare assumes it’s nothing more than a lost toy… until it begins to talk. After the doll offers up a string of bad suggestions and unhelpful advice, Dare is left wondering if the isolation of lockdown has finally proved too much. Struggling to get rid of the bad-tempered toy, Dare has no idea that this not-quite-scary fiend will accidentally change everything. With a dash of humour, this queer cosy-horror short story is a fun, quirky tale – perfect for readers who like the idea of being scared more than the reality of it.

Dare vs. the Doll - SI Clarke
Dare vs the Doll
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Word Count: 110100

Summary: Nate’s no supernatural expert, but even he knows a murdered man coming back to life to kill him can only mean one thing—the necromancer is back and out for revenge. Recruited by Department Seven in a desperate attempt to stop Peter before he claims new victims, Nate quickly realizes he’s in way over his head. His powers are failing him, he’s haunted by Peter’s ghost, and he can’t even remember how he stopped Peter the first time—or why he feels that someone very important is missing from his life. Ben is fighting for his afterlife. Trapped in the supernatural version of solitary confinement, he knows freeing himself will destroy New Camden’s fragile peace—but what choice does he have? The longer he spends in his magical prison, the harder it becomes to resist his inner vampire. But if Ben wants to help Nate prevent Peter taking over the city, he has to prove himself to his sire—Saltaire, a thousand-year-old vampire with no qualms about using his immense power to suppress Ben’s free will. As the casualties mount and the city descends into chaos, Ben and Nate must overcome their worst fears and impossible odds—or be written out of existence entirely.

Dead Wrong - Gillian St. Kevern
Dead Wrong
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Word Count: 80000

Summary: Other stories will take you to Mars. This one will take you inside the boardroom, the pub, and the bedroom with the people planning the mission. Gurdeep is an engineer and a soldier. Georgie’s a food scientist. One is pragmatic with a tough outer shell; the other’s an optimist, a person of ideas and compassion. In the span of a single afternoon, the couple find themselves in charge of planning a self-sustaining colony on Mars. Together, they’re humanity’s last hope for survival. They have 160 slots to fill with experts from all over the world as they set about designing an all-new society with its own government, economy, and culture – and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Among those chosen for the mission is Devon, an autistic scientist with a unique skill set who finds life on Earth strange and alienating. Maybe a whole new planet is exactly what’s needed. With 1,114 days until the launch, excitement and tensions run high. Earth’s second chance hangs in the balance. Between strict genetic requirements and the dangers of the dystopian almost-present, will everyone make it to the final countdown? This is a work of neurodiverse, culturally diverse, gender-bendy, socio-politico-economic, drunken-arguments-in-the-pub science fiction – not bang-bang-pew-pew science fiction.

Devon's Island - SI Clarke
Devon's Island
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Word Count: Information not available

Summary: My kid, Romy, says I'm old and she's worried about me. What's to worry about... aside from Jordan, my ex? Really, she didn't have to come all the way home to check on me. It's all good—especially Nova, the girl at the drive-up coffee shop. I keep to my work and surfing the local breaks to keep her out of my head... But it doesn't work. Her perfect skin and brilliant hair crash through my mind and draw me to her—like a super-moon tide. There's something about her... Bodie Catalan knows second chances don't just happen after a hard life, wracked by mistakes. Every now and again, however, the universe throws down a wildcard. Drive-Up is a fabulist, sentimental, 21st century tale. It rides the beach breaks along the shores of several genres and connects the wildcard thrown to entangled, beach-bound lives and the inexorable tidal change that moves all that cross it. Dive into this tale and see what's been served at the Drive-Up.

Drive-Up - CK Page
Drive-Up
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Word Count: 71,661

Summary: A dead-end job, a slob for a boyfriend, and neglectful friends: this is Kat Wallace's life. Ever since her best friend got married, Kat has been struggling to find happiness. All that changes when she meets Melody Adebayo, a field agent with the mysterious transdimensional company Clockwork & Associates. Melody's job is to send the consciousness of others to a scarier dimension in order to make them kinder and more grateful for their lives, which, in theory, will influence them to do good. But when Kat is sent to B-215, she awakes in a world beyond her wildest dreams. She's wealthy, well-liked, and has a successful career. Kat realizes she doesn't need to find happiness in her own world ... she can just steal it from her other self. Because of a certain (ahem) incident, Melody owes a lot of money to her evil ex-girlfriend, and Kat works out a deal with her in order to keep visiting B-215. With each visit, a sinister plot unfolds. Kat discovers her life is at risk, and she isn't alone in this dimension. To eliminate the threat, she must team up with Melody, but can the two uncover the truth before Kat loses her life? More important, will they be able to move on from the mistakes they made in the past and find love with each other?

Duality - Chloe Spencer
Duality
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Word Count: 30000

Summary: Flee. Scatter. Take your mates and your offspring and run. The escape pods fall to Earth one by one over the course of weeks, a mysterious and diverse alien diaspora, each pod containing a different alien race and leaving the world's governments scrambling to deal with this unexpected immigration. Serge Kosygin, still grieving and isolated after his husband's death, watches events with gray disinterest until one day he witnesses a pod crash for himself while driving home. Two of the alien visitors have died, but one survives, badly injured, and Serge is determined that if this alien is also going to die, it won't be under the harsh lights of a government facility. Devastated by the loss of his life mates in their desperate effort to reach safety, the knowledge that Een is the last Aalana in this sector of the galaxy only compounds his sorrow. He wakes in an alien dwelling under the care of one of the native dominant builder species, a being who appears to share nothing with Een besides a bipedal structure. Slowly, with the help of his patient and kind host, he discovers they are more similar than he imagined as they share harmonies and his host assists him with language acquisition. Their tentative first contact soon evolves into a deepening friendship, a balm for two grief-weary souls. They'll need each other and their growing bond for the troubles lurking just ahead. Publisher's Note: Eating Stars was previously published as part of Meteor Strike: Serge & Een as a novelette. It has undergone extensive rewrites and edits with over 10,000 words of new content added.

Eating Stars - Angel Martinez
Eating Stars
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Word Count: 98400

Summary: Sarah Colby is a musician, teacher, lover, sister, and so much more. In the past year, she learned that sometimes life takes you places you never even knew existed. For Sarah and her sister Annie, they found out that not only were the monsters real but sometimes you loved them. Now the Colby sisters and their friends are being targeted by someone with a grudge. They must discover who is attacking the people of Columbus or risk losing all that they hold dear. Nobel Keller is with them every step of the way but will she bring salvation or merely the end of their lives in Columbus?

Embracing Forever - K. Aten - Blood Resonance
Embracing Forever
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Word Count: 97000

Summary: The seas spell freedom. Pirates and kraken, boats and submarines, deadly sirens, mermaids, and the women who face them all. These are our heroes. High seas adventure, fantasy, and magic weave together in this sapphic anthology focusing on the joy of the unbounded oceans. If you like diverse stories with lesbian and sapphic heroines exploring oceans, battling sea monsters, and seducing pirates, buy Farther Reefs today! With stories by: Sarah Day and Tim Pratt, Kim Pritekel, Kyoko M. Sara Codair, William C. Tracy, N.L. Bates, Robin C.M. Duncan, Vanessa Ricci-Thode, Margaret Adelle, and J.S. Fields Genres: Science Fiction / Fantasy / Adventure / Lesbian / LGBT and Non Binary Market: Adult

Farther Reefs Anthology
Farther Reefs
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Word Count: 36,700

Summary: Let the good times roll! That’s Ava Martin’s retirement plan at least, until gray aliens abduct her from the middle of the Nevada desert. In her hair rollers no less! Talk about a rude awakening for this UFO skeptic. And her sexy, winged rescuer is no help either; he’s more concerned about obeying orders. Seems there’s only one way for this gal to get home—hijack his ship. All in the line of duty. The grays have been a burr in Captain Sovah Raptorclaw’s wing throughout his law-enforcement career, and now they have absconded with half his crew. If only the crazy stopped there. The stunning female he rescued is from a planet he has never heard of, yet she has him breaking every rule to keep her in his life. Can this high-flying duo make a daring rescue, conquer fears, return a cow—and other Earthlings—home, and discover that true love does not have an expiration date? Welcome to the Silverstar Mates series, featuring intergalactic love matches for those over fifty.

Fly With Me - Lea Kirk - Silverstar Mates
Fly with Me
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Word Count: 45000

Summary: A mordant, smirking collection; rife with life in a grim future Florida, notions of Christianity and its cousin Satanism—spies, mercenaries, magic, asteroid-belt drillers, and above all else, a universe bent forever by the powers of pleasure and pain.

Forsaken, Fantastic - David Rose
Forsaken, Fantastic!
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Word Count: 79700

Summary:

First settlers on Mars may be the last.

Emma Winters wants to explore with her robotic walkabouts.

When the tiny colony's psychologist walks out an airlock, she takes the one-way journey to Mars despite misgivings. As more deaths and illness plague humanity's tiny foothold, Emma must discover the truth before the Red Planet kills them all.

Glory on Mars - Kate Rauner - On Mars
Glory on Mars
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Word Count: 20000

Summary: An Artificial Superintelligence bent on destroying humanity. A mech warrior determined to stop it. No one is safe. Not before, not now, not ever. Jedidiah Martin survived the AI apocalypse that almost destroyed America. He was there when they took down Isaac, the superintelligence responsible for nearly ending humanity. But is Isaac dead for good? From the ashes, a new threat has emerged. The people from a neighboring town are missing, as is Jedidiah’s nephew, Blake. All hell is about to break loose. With his band of mechanized warriors, Jedidiah sets out to find answers. But the questions keep coming: Is Isaac back from the grave? What does he want with Blake? Will he try to finish humanity for good this time?

Gods of War - Steve Pantazis
Gods of War
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Word Count: 17000

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.  

Gutshot the Catastrophe - Patricia Loofbourrow
Gutshot: The Catastrophe
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Word Count: 78600

Summary: What can you do when a computer virus starts infecting people? For years, a virus that targets cybernetics has plagued people with any sort of computerized implant in their bodies. It is untraceable, unpredictable, 100% fatal and infecting more people every day. Politics tore apart Project Requiem, a highly-funded military endeavor meant to create an antivirus to save humanity. A ragtag group of programmers and visionaries is trying to pick up where Requiem left off, but their resources are limited, they're hounded by the army and corporate mercenaries and a key engineer with the only remaining copy of the antivirus is missing. As the virus grows more powerful by the day, all they can do is hope that they can finish before it becomes powerful enough to attack the entire city at once.

Halcyon - Catherine Fitzsimmons
Halcyon
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Word Count: 48,300

Summary: The final book in The Cassie Tam Files is here! With Angel Tanner, the android that runs California’s criminal underworld, pulling the strings, PI Cassie Tam finds herself thrust into a conflict with New Hopeland’s biggest and baddest. But working with the murderous AI may be the only way that Cassie can get to the bottom of her home’s greatest mystery: What is New Hopeland City? As she struggles to balance her dealings with allies and enemies alike, Cassie is left with a difficult choice. She has always straddled the line between light and dark. Now, the time to decide which side she’s on is drawing close…if she can figure out which is which.

Half-Light - Matt Doyle - Cassie Tam Files
Half-Light
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Word Count: 131000

Summary:

In the aftermath of World War Three, the most famous face in the world belongs to a nine year old girl.

Maya Oman is the daughter of the woman who controls what’s left of civilization, the CEO of Ascendant Pharmaceuticals Corporation. Her smile is as ubiquitous as air, selling everything from vital medicine to vanity drugs with risky side effects. Lifelike android clones reside in over a dozen homes, shielding her from the violent resentment of a population straining under her mother’s boot heel. Ascendant’s power comes from Xenodril, a drug capable of reversing the effects of Fade, a disease some claim came from aliens or from the governments that predate the war. Only Ascendant sells it, and at a price only Citizens can afford. The rest are left to die. Maya’s earliest memories are of living alone in a penthouse apartment, desperate for the attention of a mother who never visits. Forbidden to go out except to record advertising video, her only friend has been the ‘net. When she is taken for ransom by a group of mercenaries with nothing left to lose, she discovers her life may not be what she thought it was—or wants.

Heir Ascendant - Matthew S. Cox - Faded Skies
Heir Ascendant
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Word Count: Information not available

Summary: Thirty years ago, an asteroid struck the Earth. Now killer plants hunt the last surviving humans. Ori Scott is a young junkie running from his mother’s prophecy that he’d one day save the world from the killer plants. Her preaching made him a laughingstock and now he hides in his drugs. But he can’t hide the change in his veins. They are turning green, and the prophecy is dragging him into a dark struggle between invisible forces. Set up on bogus drug charges, Ori is taken to a secret facility where he becomes a test subject in experiments to discover an antidote to the alien plant’s sting. Jack Doll is a cop with a vendetta against the plants that killed his best friend. All he has in the world now is his old friend’s lover, Rive. Together they form an unbreakable bond—or so he thought. Jack has never liked Rive’s friend, Ori, but he believes in Ori’s innocence and doesn’t understand Rive’s strange indifference to Ori’s conviction.  Struggling with his suspicions, Jack can’t help digging into a mystery that draws him closer to Ori than ever before—and closer to somebody who has secrets to hide. Alone and scared, Ori is grateful for Jack Doll’s friendship, and his longtime crush soon blossoms into love. But Ori has no plans to accept his fate. He wants to escape, and he doesn’t care if he takes the cure with him.

Jesus Kid - Kayleigh Sky
Jesus Kid
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