Showing results by narrator "Mikael Naramore" in All Categories

When Soviet agent Viktor Tronko defected to the US in 1964, he made two intriguing claims: he insisted that Russia had not placed a mole inside the CIA, and that Lee Harvey Oswald had not been recruited to assassinate the president. Convinced that Tronko was working as a disinformation agent, the CIA furiously did everything they could to break him. But Tronko had one more surprise for them: he refused to break.

Jim (aka Kid Sensation) counts himself fortunate in that his friends have always been there for him, and he - in turn - tries to be there for them. That’s why it is with a great deal of enthusiasm that he looks forward to attending an event honoring his friend, the teen warlock Kane. However, his plans are immediately complicated by two factors. First, an emissary from the nigh-omnipotent group of beings known as Incarnates unexpectedly appears on his doorstep. It is an arrival that, while not unwelcome, introduces a certain amount of unpredictability and chaos in his life.

Picture rippling muscles, clad in magical armor, perhaps, artfully splattered with the viscera of foes smote in twain. Or...ooh...alternatively, a severely tasteful robe, dusted - equally artfully - with the ashes of enemies immolated with eldritch fyre. Now picture these paragons of heroism sitting astride their muscled warhorses, surrounded by the cheering, garland-throwing peasants of a hamlet they have saved from the blight. Now, throw that image out, because this isn’t that story.

Taking on supervillains has never been a problem for Jim (a.k.a. Kid Sensation). It’s what he’s been trained to do, and he does it well. Completely intrepid in the face of danger, he’s never shied away from a crisis, no matter how difficult the assignment or how great the menace. But now he faces a task that even he dreads: hunting down his friend and mentor, Mouse.

Everyone needs help occasionally - even supers with amazing powers - and Jim (aka Kid Sensation) is no exception. Having previously received aid from a young psychic named Rudi, Jim feels obligated to return to the favor and rescue her from the federal facility where she's being held. But breaking into a top-secret, heavily-fortified government installation is never a walk in the park, especially when said installation has top-of-the-line security systems, trigger-happy guards, and its own team of formidable supers. It will take a bold and audacious plan to get Jim inside.

Alexandra Yorke was a top police clairvoyant, but years of living inside the heads of serial killers has taken its toll. Unable to control her gifts, she retreats from the world, but a few months of peace is all she has before a friend calls in need of help.

Ninety years ago, the dwarves of the Dragonhammer Clan were driven from their ancestral home. Now, a small band from a new generation, raised in exile among humans, are mounting a venture to retake it. These young dwarves aren't fools. They don't have an army. They don't even know the old ways. Led by the young heir to the clan, Genrik Dragonhammer, they seek to carve out a foothold within a nearby mountain, rebuild the clan's strength, and eventually drive out the goblins that have settled in the city their ancestors built.

Part lawman, part tracker and part magician, the Wardens are monster-hunters—tasked with protecting people from the nightmarish creatures that have invaded the world of men. However, despite being descended from a long line of Wardens, Errol Magnus believes it to be the absolute worst job on the planet: How could a single occupation simultaneously be the most boring, abominably stupid and extraordinarily dangerous profession imaginable?

Sam has finally accepted a position with Ron Thomas, Harry Winslow's former DHS Computer Wiz. He's now the Chief Investigator for Windlass Security Services, and his very first case is one of the most incredible of his entire career. He's got to solve the mystery behind the theft of one of the most innovative new technological advances in the world: a Brain-Computer Interface chip that can literally perform miracles. But this isn't science fiction; this case is coming straight out of the headlines of today.

Danger grows in Myriatos, from without and within. Arche stumbles through his new trade while Lyssa tries to live for both herself and the village. Dissident whispers arise, casting doubts and spreading fears. Monsters are more familiar than expected and the gods are taking direct interest. Mistakes are weighed in blood.

Roleplaying games have come a long way since the 1970s. Possessed of this second edition of XDM: X-Treme Dungeon Mastery, you can become and x-treme dungeon master, and as an XDM you'll stand ready for the next 50 years of RPGs.

War has been simmering for generations, but the Legend is about to make the violence boil over. Forces gather from across the continent and even across the world as complex conflicts are forced into narrow categories. For the first time, Tani and her allies have a chance to make a difference, but that will pit them against one of the most dangerous warriors in the world. The Zeitai wants war as much as the Hero, and the result may really be the end of everything. Time is running out, sending everyone scattering in different directions before the final battle.

After a glorious run as the world’s first full-immersion VR mega-game, Armored Souls is on its last legs. Competitors are on the rise, and the company’s own projects are surpassing it. In a last-ditch effort to inject new life into the game, Valhalla West announces a tournament with such an awesome prize that no player can resist. Reggie has led Wounded Legion to the top ranks of the factions on the Armored Souls servers, but the game has gotten easy for him. Too easy.

A war is raging in the galaxy, a diversion, a means of keeping beings from several planets from realizing the deceit in which their leaders are cooperatively engaged. Genocide is taking place, threatening to wipe out an entire species, and the only hope for these gentle beings requires that one of them have the courage to make a dangerous and lonely journey through space and merge with a creature from another world. Quizan Azah braves the journey, merging with a human, Cole, creating a powerful new species, the Trekachaw, setting in motion the events that may ultimately restore peace.

Chuck and Mort team up to finish a job Mort had to leave undone. A dark wizard is on the loose with a head start and the entire galaxy in which to hide. Their only lead? A mystical connection that Mort doesn't want to talk about. To make matters worse, their target has an accomplice, and it's someone Mort isn't inclined to get rough with.

A book can open an entire world of experience or provide a recipe for meatloaf. Either is wonderful to Lewis Buzbee, who has spent much of his life in bookstores as a bookseller, a sales representative, and a customer. In The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop, Buzbee celebrates the unique experience of the bookstore - the smell and touch of books, getting lost in the deep canyons of shelves, and the silent community of readers.

As Norway’s newly appointed minister of justice, child-rights advocate Clara Lofthus has a chance to accomplish something meaningful on behalf of the most vulnerable members of society. It couldn’t be more personal. After her husband’s death, she is the sole caretaker of her twin sons, Andreas and Nikolai. She’s also still haunted by her own traumatic childhood—and the lengths to which she was willing to go to pursue her own brand of vigilante justice. How far? No one ever needs to know. And this is just one of Clara’s secrets.

With humanity out in the open, Eve and her sisters are now the subject of worldwide adoration—and constant surveillance. With Eve as humanity’s spokeswoman, it’s up to her to bargain for the freedom she craves. But Eve’s pleas fall on deaf ears. Hers is only one voice, lost in a committee of robots hundreds of years her senior. No amount of earnestness can overcome the crushing inertia of the Human Committee. With no prospect of gaining room to breathe within the rules, Eve hatches a plot to escape and finds out exactly why the robots have tried so hard to keep the humans safe.

Charlie7 has his secrets. Every robot knows that history has a dark period where he was the only one alive, with no one to corroborate his story. That was before an old adversary, long believed dead, emerges from hiding to expose Charlie7 as a fraud. With a newfound internship mixing new robotic personalities, Rachel Eighteen stumbles across an old file in the archive that no robot can access. The data it contains could upset the underpinnings of the thousand-year-old robotic civilization.

Charlie7 is the progenitor of a mechanical race he built from the ashes of a dead world—Earth. He is a robot of leisure and idle political meddling—a retirement well-earned. Or he was, until a human girl named Eve was dropped in his lap. Geneticists have restored Earth’s biome and begun repopulation. But primate cloning is in its infancy; human cloning is banned. Far from a failed genetics experiment, Eve is brilliant, curious, and heartbreakingly naïve about her species’ history. But Eve’s creator wants her back and has a gruesome fate planned for her.