Showing results by narrator "Rudy" in All Categories

David and his girlfriend, Stephanie, move to a small town in the Napa Valley with plans to start a winery with the windfall from David's skateboarding success. Shortly after upending their life to chase this dream, Stephanie dies. David, grief-stricken and rudderless, must navigate new, small town dynamics while uncovering the sordid truth of his relationship. He also must come to terms with the guilt of his own seemingly unearned financial success.

Anyone who has ever crammed for a test, capitulated to a grade-grubbing student, or fretted over a child's report card knows that the way we assess student learning in American schools is freighted with unintended consequences. As experts agree, our primary assessment technologies—grading, rating, and ranking—don't actually provide an accurate picture of how students are doing in school. In Off the Mark, Jack Schneider and Ethan Hutt explain how we got into this predicament, why we remain beholden to outmoded forms of assessment, and what we can do to change course.

In this first installment of the Miami Crime Trilogy, Don Donovan spins a sprawling noir tale of three hardened individuals whose lives are woven together in a web of money, betrayal, and murder.

With these captivating initial glimpses into her storytelling psyche, Jo Walton shines through subtle myths and reinvented realities. Through eclectic stories, subtle vignettes, inspired poetry, and more, Walton soars with humans, machines, and magic-rising from the every day into the universe itself.

Crime reporter Will Finch never saw it coming. On Telegraph Hill, a woman mistakes him for someone named Joel Griffin. "The game is getting dangerous," she whispers. Before she can say more, a drive-by assassin silences her—collapsing at Finch's feet in a pool of blood. By morning, two FBI agents are at his door. Finch is the prime suspect in a deep-web conspiracy. The evidence is airtight. The threat is real. And a merciless foreign organization is watching his every move.

Crime reporter Will Finch and private investigator Eve Noon escape to a remote media retreat deep in the redwoods of Northern California—until a midnight knock shatters the silence. A wildfire rages toward them, but the real danger isn't the flames. As the evacuation order comes down, Will and Eve find themselves trapped in a deadly game where the enemy isn't just nature—it's the people hidden among them.

When the outgoing governor of Kentucky pardons 428 felons, the criminal justice system is rocked. Among them—Lennart Skoll, convicted of a brutal double homicide. He swears he was framed. But can he be trusted? Across the country, crime reporter Will Finch joins an Extinction Rebellion protest outside San Francisco's City Hall. Chaos erupts, a gunshot rings out, and Finch tackles the shooter. When the dust settles, a Nobel Prize-winning climate scientist lies dead beside him.

Ari recently began her rookie year in the Windrider Corps, an elite airborne police force that protects the desert city of Gaobeyna. At 17, Ari is the youngest rookie on record, and has one goal: to carry forward her legendary status from the Academy and become the best protector Gaobeyna has ever known. That dream shatters when a cadet dies on her watch, sending her into self-exile in the wilderness. Meanwhile, an ancient deity lies dormant beneath Gaobeyna’s foundations. A ruthless faction has emerged in the city’s underground, and they will do anything to resurrect this malevolent force.

When a professional skateboarder disappears under mysterious circumstances, a podcaster seems to be the only person interested in finding him. She has her own motivations, of course, and so begins an exploration into the little-known and unpredictable world of international skateboarding. Walker Ryan’s second novel is a tale of complicated friendships, hesitant romance and unexpected adventure.

The lanterns burn low, the lions walk free, and the Cirque des Ténèbres has risen again from ruin. The Swan, Mei Yee, has lost her great love, Douglas O’Kemp Jr., the man the world called a monster but who was born of violence, shaped by cruelty, and never given a choice to be gentle. In the hush after his death, she wakes with a secret beneath her heart, a child born not of sin, but of mercy.

Severance braces for a catastrophic impact as a colossal storm churns menacingly in the Atlantic. Eden, a seasoned storm investigator with a global reputation, feels a gnawing uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach. Her extensive experience with unprecedented weather events tells her this could be a monstrous hurricane poised to strike. She comes together with friends, past and present, to determine the significance of the cyclone's track. They watch and pray, knowing the conditions are ripe for disaster.

Born with visions pressed against his chest like a second heart, Song walks along a road no other can see. Omens follow him, the scream of the panther from the ridge, the pale Indian Pipe rising in the dark soil, the red-banded Cecropia moth beating its wings against firelight. These are not accidents. These are messages. Song has been chosen to carry them. But every song casts a shadow. That shadow has a name: Cypian, the River Wolf.

Eric Carter has a lot on his plate. He's hunting the Oracle of Las Vegas, a literal talking head that manipulates the future to make its prophecies come true. But it has a new trick. It can change the past, too. Now Jazz Age Los Angeles is invading the present. Long gone buildings suddenly restored, decommissioned Red Car trains appearing on paved over tracks, miles of the city changing back to orange groves.

The eighth book of this dark urban fantasy series follows necromancer Eric Carter through a world of vengeful gods and goddesses, mysterious murders, and restless ghosts.

Jake McGraw, independent space trucker, has been shanghaied. He and his crew, fresh off their adventures in Starrigger and Red Limit Freeway, are plucked off the Skyway by a creature of unknown power. Now on an alien planet where most of the rules of the regular universe do not seem to apply, Jake confronts the builders of the Skyway once and for all. Will he and his crew make it out alive?

The Rainbow, the Midwife & The Birds audiobook contains 7 Dene First Nation stories, as experienced by Raymond Yakeleya.

A brilliant idea to get you started on your own business venture with minimal investment is to begin a vending machine operation. Vending machines are everywhere, and the demand for them is increasing every year.

Are contemporary soldiers exploited by the state and society that they defend? More specifically, have America's professional service members disproportionately carried the moral weight of America's war-fighting decisions since the inception of an all-volunteer force? In this volume, Michael J. Robillard and Bradley J. Strawser examine the question of whether and how American soldiers have been exploited in this way. Robillard and Strawser offer an original theory of "moral exploitation".

Janzen Robinson is no longer a man torn between two worlds, having decided to come off the bench and dive head first into Cleveland's magical underworld. With his new partner and perpetually exhausted friend Grove, he's just starting to get a handle on all the supernatural happenings when disaster shows up at their doorstep.

The best 5e fantasy roleplaying games are often the most unpredictable. When the plans of the Gamemaster meet the actions of the characters, the incredible creative energy that results can spin encounters off in different directions, creating a largely spontaneous campaign story that keeps the GM and the players alike on the edge of their seats. But when it comes to the climactic boss battle encounters that cap off single adventures or entire campaigns, it's often much harder for GMs to work things out on the fly. That's where this audiobook comes in.