Showing results by publisher "Recorded Books" in Epic

1868. The Boshin War is about to break out. A 16-year-old Japanese girl, Atsuko grew up in the neighborhoods of Aizu City, in the shadow of her brother Ibuka. Promised to an arranged marriage, the young girl hides a secret: she wields weapons just as well as her brother, whose talent with the sword actually masks an insurmountable fear of combat. When war is declared, Ibuka must leave to fight alongside their father for the honor of the family. Defying the tradition forbidding women to take part in battles and wanting to protect her brother, Atsuko enlists in secret as a simple soldier.

With San Francisco doomed to fall off the continent, the bard must summon the Nightflyers, the soul-devouring shadow creatures from the dreaming world.

An amazing array of the most popular and exciting names in Fantasy are set to appear in the first in a brand new series of Fantasy anthologies featuring original fiction, from the master editor Jonathan Strahan. The authors appearing in the launch volume include Trudi Canavan, Elizabeth Bear, Daniel Abraham, Kate Elliott, Saladin Ahmed, Glen Cook, Scott Lynch, Ellen Klages, Ellen Kushner & Ysabeau Wilce, Jeffrey Ford, Robert Redick, and KJ Parker.

Banding together with the remnants of the Ghoul’s Tooth gang, Garrett finds himself thrust into a power struggle he wants nothing to do with. The city is filled with warring factions, each bent on using every means possible to come out on top, and they all seem to think Garrett is the perfect tool to achieve that.

It was just another sunny day at the coast when a life was changed forever. What started as a prank for a young girl resulted in the elevation of a crab's existence. Now, wrenched from its happy life at the beach, the crab...HAS AWAKENED. Sir Crabby finds himself thrust into sapience. Into a world filled with creatures both mundane and magical, a world where evil lurks beneath the waves. Join Sir Crabby as he travels beneath the ocean, discovering power, adventuring forth and searching for his young friend as he's thrust into the Eternal Conflict of Arthos.

Matt’s journey to survive in a world filled with heroes and demons continues! Matt now has to guide his growing nation through competing nations and kingdoms and demonic incursions, while trying to amass more power, train his forces, make more equipment, amass allies and friends, and navigate sensitive relationships with heroes and former heroes!

The last wizard king seeks a return to Tralodren after nearly eight centuries of exile. But doing so requires the manipulation of a band of mercenaries oblivious to his goals. The gladiator sold his soul for revenge. The knight's a bigot. The dwarf only cares about regaining his honor. Even the wizardess seems too bookish for anyone’s good. But they’ve all been hired by a blind seer and his assistant to retrieve some forgotten knowledge long hidden away in a jungle-strangled ruin.

Ten years ago, the renegade demigod known as the Kinslayer returned. His armies of monsters issued from the pits of the earth, spearheaded by his brutal Yorughan soldiers. Thrones toppled and cities fell as he drove all before him. And then he died. A handful of lucky heroes and some traitors amongst his own, and the great Kinslayer was no more. Celestaine was one such hero and now she has tasked herself to correct the worst excesses of the Kinslayer and bring light back to her torn-up world. With two Yorughan companions she faces fanatics, war criminals, and the monsters and minions the Kinslayer left behind....

Upon the death of Swayvill, King of Chaos, Merlin unexpectedly finds himself under Black Watch with only two heirs between him and the throne. In his absence a deadly game of thrones has greatly reduced the number of heirs. Merlin has his suspicions about this, but before he can do more than raise voice to his questions he is once again caught up in the struggle between the Pattern in Amber and the Logrus in Chaos. A struggle that could destroy the entire multiverse. Even armed with a Spikard, Ghostwheel, and his whits it will take a miracle for Merlin to survive.

Wielding a Red Sword depicts a mere mortal who is called to serve as a god-like incarnation. It is the thrilling story of Mym, an Indian prince who takes up the Red Sword to become Mars, the Incarnation of War. To avoid breaking his betrothal to the princess Rapture and the war that would surely result, Mym accepts the fearsome office. As Mars, he plans to keep Rapture by his side as he stops the suffering caused by Earth's incessant wars.

Parry's promising life as a musician and apprentice in the arts of White Magic got thrown off track by the violent death of his beloved. Led down a path of depravity by a harlot demoness, Parry has lived a long, corrupt life that may finally be coming to an end - unless he can defeat Lucifer himself at the gates of Hell and become the new Incarnation of Evil.

Two generations after the Change, Crown Princess Orlaith struggles to preserve the hard-won peace her father brought to Montival - the former Western US. But the Change opened many doors, and through them, powers strong, strange, and terrible walk once more among humankind. With her fire-forged friend and ally Japanese Empress Reiko, Orlaith must take up her sword to stop the spread of the mad malignancy behind the Yellow Raja that has imprisoned her brother, Prince John.

Orb is four years old when she first hears the wonderful music of the morning. Gifted with a magic that makes her songs irresistible anytime she sings, she spends her life seeking the source of the mystical music. Orb finally feels she's getting somewhere when she hooks up with the Livin' Sludge, a rock band that could use all the magic they can find. Unfortunately, there's still the pesky little matter of a prophecy to deal with - the prediction that Orb will someday marry Evil, the devil himself.

Ysabel is a contemporary fantasy that centers on the Saint-Sauveur Cathedral of Aix-en-Provence, where a 15-year-old boy accompanies his father on a photo shoot. Befriending a whip-smart American girl and confronting a knife-wielding maniac, the boy finds that the ancient site shimmers with mysteries of fantastical design.

In the future there is no want, no war, no disease nor ill-timed death. The world is a paradise - and then, in a moment, it ends. The council that controls the Net falls out and goes to war. Everywhere people who have never known a moment of want or pain are left wondering how to survive. But scattered across the face of the earth are communities which have returned to the natural life of soil and small farm. In the village of Raven’s Mill, Edmund Talbot, master smith and unassuming historian, finds that all the problems of the world are falling in his lap.

In The Wandering Fire, college students Dave, Paul, Kim, Kevin, and Jennifer return to the magical land of Fionavar to battle the minions of Rakoth Maugrim. But this time, Jennifer is pregnant with a god's baby - one destined to "take the longest road" of any child ever born.

War is heck! Guido and Nunzio may not be the brightest bodyguards in the world - but they certainly are faithful. When Skeeve "the Great" asks them to join the army of Possiltum, the two thugs volunteer without question.... Except: Whose side are they on? Queen Hemlock's? The Mob's Fairy Godfather's? Skeeve's? The two baffled bodyguards barely have time to figure it all out - they've been handed government-issue crossbows, armored with leather skirts, and given combat orders by the dreaded drill sergeant Smiley! With war heroes like these...who needs enemies?

Being a teenager is hard enough, but being ripped through a portal from your home to a magical realm is something else. Yet that is exactly what Mira, Jackson, and Sara have experienced. Their parents got sucked in too, and surprisingly life and death situations proved that they actually did know something about life. But now, these kids find themselves wielding powers they could have only imagined before or in Mira's case that she would have called a nerd dream before. More than that they are the rising stars at the center of more than one political conflict.

Simon Malmain, the Earl of Falconer and chief enforcer of the Guardians, is transformed into a unicorn by the evil magic of Lord Drayton. Now only a virgin can save him! New York Times best-selling author M. J. Putney has won two RITAs and a Romantic Times Career Achievement Award.

High above a jungle-planet float the last refuges of humanity—plant-made civilizations held together by tradition, technology, and arcane science. In these living cities, architects are revered above anyone else. If not for their ability to psychically manipulate the architecture, the cities would plunge into the devastating earthrage storms below. Charismatic, powerful, mystical, Iravan is one such architect. In his city, his word is nearly law. His abilities are his identity, but to Ahilya, his wife, they are a way for survival to be reliant on the privileged few.