Showing results by narrator "Tom Taverna" in All Categories

When food writer David Domine; buys a three-story Victorian house, little does he know it is located in an enchanted neighborhood, one full of gargoyles and gas lamps, hidden courtyards, towers, turrets, and gingerbread trim. The 1890s structure he will call home becomes known as La Casa Fabulosa--or the fabulous house in Spanish--because of its elaborate facade. His is just one of hundreds of striking dwellings in an area famous for its fanciful architecture and 19th-century charm, however. The neighborhood is also replete with colorful characters--an assortment of vagrants, cross-dressers, gypsies, and random misfits that make life interesting, to say the least.

Imagine how different your life would be if you knew a way to hack your daily habits to become a highly self-disciplined and productive person. You will never quite know how many opportunities you have missed by lacking the self-discipline to truly follow through on your convictions. Whether it's attaining a new body, better job, or simply being more productive in life. All too often people fall short as they aren't equipped with the right mental make-up and mind tricks to actually achieve it.

Something doesn't want the inhabitants of an isolated mountain town to leave. When local hermit Maul Thorndean disappears, Sheriff Joe Moorefield finds his cabin in a bewildering state. All of the surrounding trees have turned white and brittle and are leaning towards the cabin. There is blood on the floor but no sign of Maul. The dying of the trees spreads and soon the townspeople are encircled by ash grey trees with limbs that wont allow them to leave. That's when the people begin to disappear.

Dr. CC Peladora never expected to ask a stranger to father her child, but neither did she think she’d be diagnosed with a chronic disease. With a failed marriage and a busy career, love is the last thing on her priority list, but she wants more than anything to experience motherhood before it’s too late. When she hears through the grapevine that Adam Colt, the sexy, mysterious son of Buzz Colt, must marry to meet the stipulations of his father’s will, she sees an opportunity that won’t come along again.

Michael is CEO of a $64 billion global corporation, driving a strategy founded on productivity and growth. Despite having "best practices" spearheaded by finance in place, he's convinced that many of the company's investments in change are still not delivering the most value they can - or even the value they promised. Late one night, while reading a hard-to-believe business case for an IT transformation, he makes it his business to find out why.

Axemen. Norsemen. Vikings. Whoever they are, Jedidiah Huckleberry Smith doesn't care. But with the possibility of a pardon on the table, he knows that he'd better do everything he can to prove his worth. Which means leading a civilian expedition, this time along the coast of Prehistoria, towards a mysterious warrior tribe whom the apes fear.

Some say the Goat Man is just an old folk tale, meant to scare people from wandering too far into the woods. For a group of Satanists, crossing the infamous Goat Man's Bridge is the first step to appeasing their Dark Lord. When their sacrifice goes wrong, hell is birthed on Earth. What rises from the ashes under a lightning-slashed sky will crave only two things: to bring about chaos, and bathe in the blood of the dead.

In Ilia Epifanov’s sci-fi mystery, Crescent Earth, the first intentional murder committed by a sentient android creates shock waves that threaten to change how androids are perceived. Rene Robertson is sentenced to labor on a moon base for the rest of time. Most of the human race is satisfied that justice has been properly dealt. Everyone except James Mason, Frankie’s only son. And now Tom, James’ companion, is left with a dilemma. The trauma of witnessing the murder firsthand has left a permanent scar on them both. James has no way to move on from the terrifying memory.

Planetary geologist Dr. Micah Clarke, his nine-year-old daughter Faye, and his assistant Catalina Abril are abducted at gunpoint and forced to join a megalomaniac’s paramilitary expedition down an Amazon tributary ruled by murderous pirates and cannibal tribes. The goal—recover a meteorite capable of providing clean energy for the world. But prehistoric terrors lurk around every bend in the river. Swarms of six-inch titan ants, mega piranha, and a 70-foot Titanoboa tear a bloody swath through the flotilla.

Dustina “Dusty” Cavanaugh has been around rough and tough cowboys all her life. She has two unwavering rules. One, don’t mix business with pleasure. Two, never, ever, believe anything that a cowboy says right after an eight second ride. Then she blows it over a charming, handsome cowboy. He gives her a night to remember…and a positive pregnancy test.

He landed his dream job pursuing the guilty, but two decades of horrific violence and a steady stream of death left him scarred...From the streets of South Los Angeles to the elite homicide bureau, former sheriff’s detective Danny R. Smith saw some of LA’s darkest hours: A crack cocaine epidemic, unprecedented gang warfare, a spike in homicides that stunned the nation, the Rodney King riots. In this no-holds-barred memoir, Smith offers a rare, unfiltered view of a career in law enforcement.

An ancient ship lost at sea. In 1852, a whaling vessel killed a bizarre creature the length of a whale...but it was no whale. Soon after, the ship went missing, along with any evidence of their find. Was the encounter true, or merely a legend? The public could only wonder as newspapers of the day spread the story across Europe. A mystery that would go on to haunt and taunt cryptozoologist through the ages...until now. Archeologist John Paxton has always been eluded by the great find. But his luck is about to change on a mysterious island near South Africa.

Forget the conspiracy theories about Denver International Airport...this just got real. When a massive snowstorm shuts down the airport and forces a plane carrying exotic and deadly cargo to land, those trapped inside the terminal have no idea what's in store for them. Can a group of passengers and airport workers band together to face the onslaught, or will they be ripped apart?

Refusing to heed an evacuation warning, Wade Freeman and his family stay to protect their home in the destructive path of a hurricane. But after the storm the devastation is too much for the Freemans to bear. Hoping to secure a better future, Wade moves his family deep in the Canadian wilderness to a remote riverside community called New Haven on the advice of his brother.

A collection of short stories; some are true, some are fiction, but all are captivating. To say that the deep south is different is stating the absurdly obvious. In many ways it has not changed in the last 100 years or so. This is especially true of South Louisiana where I grew up, just a stones' throw from the Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, and practically on the banks of the same river that Huck Finn rafted down. Sound interesting? The author thinks so too! Listen to Hershey Bars and Werewolves.

When Sloan Booker’s father dies tragically, he has no other option but to give up his job as an FBI agent and take over his family’s vehicle restoration business in Oahu, Hawaii. Giving up his badge is difficult but having Homeland Security and his old boss request the use of his house in a stakeout, spying on his Muslim neighbors who they suspect are terrorists, is just too damn much for a man already frazzled. It makes no difference that they’ve offered him a partner to be in charge of the surveillance...until he meets the gorgeous divorcee.

When high-powered corporate lawyer Dupree arrives in White Owl, Washington, he should know better than to get between a corrupt deputy and the focus of his lust. Little did he know that his actions set in motion a reign of terror on the whole town. Will the town continue to allow a corrupt man to destroy their gentle life and make law the enemy? Sometimes the battle between good and evil seems unwinnable, until just one man steps out of the shadows and dares to make a difference.

Forced into a marriage arranged by the orphanage where she lived, Sadie escapes the clutches of an abusive older man: her betrothed. She needs to stay hidden, where no one knows her or cares that she has broken the law. Dr. Elliott Larkin is still reeling over the loss of his young family. His brother in Big Rock has convinced him to come back home to visit, and he decides a change would do him good. Who would have thought a mine collapse on the outskirts of town would be just what the doctor ordered?

Seconds chances come in their own time. For Mindy and Creed the flame remains. Newly divorced and empty nester, Mindy Sage, decided that her hometown might be the perfect place to reinvent herself, or at least find the wild and carefree girl she used to be before she moved away. She’s craving small town comfort, but the problem is, in Cooper’s Hawk, everyone knows everyone. Secrets can feel as tall and wide as the Montana mountains that backdrop the friendly, picturesque town where she’d left her heart in the hands of a handsome cowboy 19 years ago.

Humanity has come face to face with its own mortality. The Earth, its environment overwhelmed by the products of an increasing human civilization, no longer offers its inhabitants quality of life. Survival, for all of the Earth's species, has become the only goal. Then they came. Not many, just a few. Their behavior and instincts were more like the bear and the deer than human but they possessed powers beyond humanity's comprehension. They came to restore paradise on Earth.