Showing results by narrator "Ryan Burke" in All Categories

A cyborg on the edge of eternity, a lonely 10-year old girl, a curmudgeon seeking his one great novel; there are many lost souls desperate for a way out. These 20 tales show us the side of humanity we'd often like to ignore.

Harry George Alexander Bircham: Not necessarily an infamous name in the annals of gay fictional characters - yet. But listeners of Erastes' newest historical novel should prepare themselves for many pages of suspenseful intrigue as the miscreant Bircham, a cultured man of Wildean excesses and humours, will do anything it takes to bend Fate to his will. And that sinister will is to keep the affections and attentions of another English young man.

An alien pyramid has appeared on Earth, squatting in the middle of Chicago. It is growing, destroying the city as it does, and nothing seems able to stop it, not even the might of the US military. Somehow, the alien device is snatching people and for unknown reasons transporting them into worlds of mythology. Dr. Lukacs is one of the victims. Granted, he's an expert on mythology. But myths are not something he'd thought to encounter personally. Or wanted to!

Teenage burn survivor Wilder Tate begins high school ashamed of his disfigurement. He finds an outlet tapping into his one-dimensional basketball talent as a shutdown defender and courts his cheerleader dream girl, only to endure heartbreak and setbacks that drive him to have a tissue-expander operation to rid himself of his scar tissue for good, but at what price?

The Cipher ran the universe with its game-like rules, and it has chosen Cullen, an exiled bounty hunter, to be the method of its return. He's given a quest to free a telepathic mother and son from wrongful imprisonment. If he can break his targets out of prison, they'll have to level up, learn new skills, and hunt down the prophecy's clues. All while facing down berserkers and EMP-hurling tigers in a jungle that offers no succor.

In a world where everyone wears masks and superstitions abound, the color of your chrome determines who you are and where you will live. And if you will live. Asheva, a 14-year-old Chrome of the Black Nation, will see his world crumble underneath him as events too big for his age will force him to run away from his native city of Axyum. A new journey will take him to lands with different colors and different ways from the Black.

Chromes of different colors need to unite and overcome their differences. In the meantime, the love between Asheva and Cestia is put to the test, and the outcome is anything but certain. Life, death, friendship, freedom...they all merge into a new breathtaking journey into the territories, where a new dawn has just begun.

Violence sweeps the Territories as the Black Nation continues to bite at the heels of Asheva and Cestia, the fallen Red Princess. Cestia has to rise above her own personal tragedy to uncover the truth about the Chromes, the Harlequins, and Asheva. Asheva, in the meantime, caught between the wrath of revenge and the desire for love, needs to fight his own demons. Together, Cestia and Asheva vow to rise and fight the darkness that has taken hold of their world.

Asheva must learn to survive on his own and put aside his age-old Black Nation hatred for enemy Red Chromes. As he makes his way to the Red city of Samaris, his convictions about the Red clash with the reality of a land divided into castes. There, the Janis, members of the lowest caste, are left to live in abominable conditions. But turmoil is building, both inside the walls of Samaris and outside where a violent attack takes the Reds by surprise...and nothing in all of the Territories will ever be the same again.

A new anthology of science-fiction stories, Overruled! explores what the future of jurisprudence might well be like, with thrilling, hilarious, and downright entertaining results.

Modern-day markets do not arise spontaneously or evolve naturally. Rather they are crafted by individuals, firms, and most of all, by governments. Author Steven Vogel builds his argument upon the recognition that all markets are crafted then systematically explores the implications for analysis and policy. In modern societies, there is no such thing as a free market. Markets are institutions, and contemporary markets are all heavily regulated. The "free market revolution" that began in the 1980s did not see a deregulation of markets, but rather a re-regulation.

A mysterious pyramid appears in Chicago, oozing fantastic creatures and sucking humans into our own mythological past. It's an alien invasion from within! When a special forces team sent to capture an AWOL official gets into deep trouble with a certain one-eyed Norse god, redoubtable comparative mythologist Jerry Lukacs must rescue them, strike a deal with the droll and dangerous Loki, and risk bringing on Ragnarok itself to once again save human myth from alien domination.

Valdar, heir to the throne of Dhulon, was in the fabled city-state of Schaerisa to pay his kingdom's respects to the recently deceased co-emperor. But then he ran into his old mentor, the sorcerer Nyrthim - who was supposed to be dead. The sorcerer's death had been faked so that he could be free to investigate tales that demons, once banished, were returning to the world. And unfortunately, the tales understated the danger.

The availability of big data, low-cost commodity hardware, and new information management and analytics software has produced a unique moment in the history of business. The convergence of these trends means that we have the capabilities required to analyze astonishing data sets quickly and cost-effectively for the first time in history. These capabilities are neither theoretical nor trivial. They represent a genuine leap forward and a clear opportunity to realize enormous gains in terms of efficiency, productivity, revenue and profitability.

The race for Resurrection City begins with an earthquake, a rare class, and a portal to the Spirit Realm. In the aftermath of waking the game system known as the Cipher, the newly-minted council of 11 must learn to wage war with new skills in a world that’s been cut in half. It's a race against time...and new enemies to fulfill prophecy and activate the first Rune they need to survive. The alien Osuna are coming, and scripture says that only the Runelords will stand a chance when they arrive.

In the last leg of Asheva's journey, new stories and secrets will be revealed. Secrets that will shake the very foundation of the Territories. Secrets that have to do with a young prince, a monarch, and a Seer....

Forced to flee from the Confederation, Captain Viar of the Bastian Navy is on the run. Fearing that he is marked a traitor to his people, and facing the same fate which befell his father, he seeks a way to redeem himself to Supreme Commander Freist when a prime target approaches. War is inevitable, and he is in position to execute. On a mission to find Steven Chancey, the prime from which his clone, Garret Cushing derived, Ambassador Spar deploys on a new ship with a member of the Litar Guard.

Danielle is the prime suspect in her billionaire husband's murder, and now defense attorney Andrew Morrison must face his dark past with her as the trial nears a verdict.

Historians Cameron Thorne and Amanda Spencer-Gunn uncover a stolen painting which the Nazis believed was a secret map to the Holy Grail and the lost treasure of the Knights Templar. Hitler planned to weaponize the Holy Grail and monetize the treasure as part of his campaign of world dominance. Cam and Amanda just want to find the legendary artifacts. The Nazis failed because they were unable to decipher the secret Templar clues left in the painting. Cam and Amanda may fail—perhaps fatally—because a group of modern-day Nazis remain obsessed with finishing Hitler's work.

A dying millionaire hires historian Cameron Thorne to help raise what he claims is a Roman-era ship wrecked off the coast of Massachusetts' Plum Island. Roman coins and artifacts scattered around New England and the Ohio River Valley appear to confirm legends of early Romans crossing the Atlantic. It seems like a harmless assignment until a sultry Mossad agent threatens Cam's life. Why would the Mossad care about ancient Roman artifacts? The answer, it turns out, could destabilize the Middle East for generations to come.