Showing results by narrator "John Pirhalla" in All Categories

American History lecturer Paul Mahan was looking for a little peace and quiet. A place to recover from his personal demons and pursue his academic career. But when he moves into the newly refurbished Rookwood Apartments, he soon finds himself trapped in a living nightmare. Deep beneath the old apartment building, the stones of its foundation have been infused with decades of pain and bloodshed. A dark legacy hangs over Rookwood...a curse Paul cannot escape, no matter how hard he tries.

Huon is weak. A surgecaller who escaped into the wilds, his only goal was to survive. Now he is Oathbound, forced to fight in an arena, forced to become stronger than he’d thought possible. As he realizes he can become strong, the need for revenge fills his heart, and a new goal forms in his mind. But his goal is impossible: Kill the dragon rider, the Immortal of Fire. To succeed, he’ll have to do more than just survive - he’ll have to advance beyond anything the realm has ever seen.

Leo Surinar is a wanderer, traveling with his mother in the Wayward caravan in the only life he's ever known, finding their own peace while parts of the world descend into war. When a traveling minstrel joins the caravan, everything begins to change. As Leo learns the power of song and begins to dream of a world beyond the caravan—one only the Academy can show him—he starts to think there might be more to the world than what he sees from the top of a wagon. Until his mother's illness forces him to make a difficult choice.

Awakening from cryo sleep after barely surviving the Tarrant System Battle, Captain Hazard King begins working on restoring the wrecked Imperial Fleet. The Swarm forces smell blood and press their victory, sending a strike fleet to attack the Fleet base at Icarus. In the past, the Empire had ten years between attacks. This time, they'll only have two. Even worse, the Empire doesn't have the forces or the technology needed to stop the massive Swarm fleet, and Hazard is stymied at every turn by an entrenched bureaucracy that is unable to give Hazard the resources required to win the war.

No longer traveling with the Wayward, Leo learns that finding his own way is its own adventure and one he could never have experienced as one of the Wayward. He joins a new caravan and befriends a young girl fascinated by the Twilight Gates, travels with one of the fae and learns of a danger to their realm, and makes an enemy of the Alley King. Surviving the journey is only the first step. The Academy is the goal. Even then, he must still gain entry to the Academy—which proves more difficult than Benjamin led him to believe.

A new crime lord has risen, claiming control of Marquithe's underbelly. Ruthless and powerful, this man demands Jerrell join his ranks. Jerrell refuses, preferring his independence, but soon realizes he cannot face the entire thieves guild on his own. With a gorgeous and conniving partner at his side, he acquires a new client willing to pay an outrageous sum if he can execute the impossible: steal a ton of silver from a mine controlled by a powerful wizard and guarded by an army of soldiers. Action, intrigue, and betrayal await in this outlandish conclusion to Jerrell's solo adventures.

Plunged into an ancient portal, Hunter finds himself in a world where mankind has been all but destroyed by the dark magic of the forest surrounding Tykus, the last remaining human settlement. Magic that threatens to transform mankind into horrifying monsters. But when Hunter discovers that he possesses the power to absorb the skills and traits of the people around him - and to transfer his skills and traits to others - Hunter becomes the hunted. For the immortal King Tykus will stop at nothing to destroy him...or to brainwash him into becoming the kingdom’s ultimate weapon.

A battle-scarred Vietnam vet has been living alone deep in the woods, but when a group of weekend campers enter the area, his fragile grasp on reality breaks, and he believes he’s back in the jungle...surrounded by an enemy he needs to kill.

The empire defeated the Swarm at the Battle of Iris, but it came at a great cost. To win, Hazard King needed to reveal he was Crown Prince Henry and take command of the Imperial Fleet as War Leader. Now their enemy is suing for peace, something many in the empire don't want to give. There are even officers in his own fleet that wish to restart the war and eradicate the Swarm. Hazard and his mother, Empress Elizabeth, face not only issues in the Isis System but across the empire.

Having pulled off an impossible heist, Jonathan wants nothing more than to relax and take a few simple jobs as a distraction. But nothing is ever simple for the Dragon. When friends go missing, an old enemy returns, demanding Jonathan take a job even more dangerous than the last. If he refuses, new friends will suffer, but if he takes the job, Heziah may gain a power to overthrow the Society itself.

Fresh out of prison, Jonathan Aguelon wants one big score before he leaves the city for good. The job will be more complicated than any that he's ever attempted, but this time he can steal more than money: He can get revenge—but only if he follows a mysterious benefactor’s plan. With the right team, Jonathan can succeed, but much in the city has changed during his time away, and the Dragon doesn't have the draw he once did. The team of outcasts he assembles needs time to prepare, but time is the one luxury they don’t have.

Bentley Little was born in Arizona a month after his mother attended the world premiere of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. He is the author of 10 previous novels, including The Revelation, The Mailman, The Summoning, Death Instinct (published under the name Phillip Emmons), University, Dominion, The Ignored, The Store, The House, and The Town. An acknowledged master of horror, he is currently at work on his next novel.

Aldo Cassidy, formerly a low-born freelancer, finds himself at the heart of a desperate operation to save humanity. With the threat of a seemingly mindless alien force looming at the borders of the human empire, a brave group of military personnel works to form an alliance that may give them a chance against an invasion. Heading to a beleaguered outpost, Aldo and his team must rescue an alien delegation. Success gives a union a chance, while failure could lead to war. Meanwhile, a conspiracy threatens to upend the inner workings of human civilization.

Who am I? What am I? These questions have plagued Joshua since childhood. Mysterious amplified senses and boosted reflexes have helped him survive and thrive in a brutal, lawless megacity, and he leads the notorious Epitaph gang with keen street instincts. When Joshua’s unexplained abilities draw the attention of a covert government entity, he finds himself on the run. Only his skills, street smarts, and a rogue hacker named Shelby keep him one step ahead of his relentless hunters. They know what he is. They know who he is, and they will tear apart a megacity to bring him in.

Torian Ranth is no longer the struggling student he once was. Now a skilled sahir to be reckoned with, Torian arrives at the devastated university. It still stands amid the remnants of the Rusav onslaught.

Hazard King finally managed to win peace with the Swarm, and he stabilized the Marxist Federation and helped create a more democratic new government on Lenin. The Black Dragon virus, though, continues to kill thousands there, and Imperial Scientists have finally admitted that antidotes are beyond their ability. Worse, it is only a matter of time before the virus makes it off planet, an event that is sure to kill billions and bring down the empire. But there is hope. If they can find the original virus, the creation of a vaccine may be possible.

After the President declared the Maduro Sector off-limits, a peace craze swept the United Nations of Terra, and the government enacted the Budget Realignment Act to reap the dividends of the peace by shifting funds from the defense budget to public services. Thousands of Space Marines and Fleet personnel were summarily dismissed from the service, and their ships and weapons were mothballed.

A year ago, Captain Abner Fortis led a dangerous mission to kill the leader of the Maltaani insurgency, a mission that almost cost the life of his best friend, Gunnery Sergeant Petr Ystremski. Since then, he’s been assigned to a research and development project while Ystremski recovered from his wounds.

Death is the one, true constant in the Shift. This is something Troias has learned in his journey to become Baron of Wisconsin, and most of that death has come from his hands. He's battled monsters spawned from legends and nightmares and slaughtered powerful guardians of energy-rich Vortices. Now, though, he faces a new sort of enemy: his fellow man.

However did it come to this? Cobb wanted a simple life. He wanted excellent steaks, great coffee, friends, and a quiet place to restore his favorite ship. Working for a recovery operation turned out to be the best place to find parts cheap. She had other plans for him. He wanted the staff of the deep space salvage ship, OXCART, to treat him just like another member of the crew. Not the man he really was. Light-years from Earth, he thought his secrets, his past, wouldn't matter.