Showing results by narrator "Kevin T. Collins" in All Categories

Why does everything have to be so complicated? How's a guy supposed to run a spacetime shelter, save everybody, and still loot everything that isn't nailed down? And, most importantly, will Sergey ever make it to Berlin? There's only one way to find out!

Maximillian has been given the chance to avenge his family's death: the Duke of Odoevsky has conspired in a plot against the emperor, and if Max plays his cards right, he'll be able to destroy the man who read out his family's execution order with such ecstasy. But one small mistake topples his plans, and now thousands of people caught in the clutches of terrible monsters are counting on him to save them. What choice must he make? Revenge or salvation?

A tournament to name the best mage in the empire. What could go wrong when everything is carefully planned down to the last detail, and only the best of the best are invited to participate? The answer is obvious: everything! Once again, Maximilian Valevsky will have to save everyone to preserve the integrity of the empire. This time, however, forces far more powerful than anything he has encountered before have taken an interest in his affairs.

Liam and Phoebe, having barely escaped our exploding sun with their lives, are in stasis for the decade-long journey to the rogue planet Delphi, where they hope to meet up with the rest of the human refugees, find help for their injured parents, and pass along the devastating things they discovered on Mars: that someone destroyed their world intentionally, and that that someone might still be after them, trying to finish the job. Phoebe is carrying her own dark secret. One that finds her waking up secretly at various points in their journey, changing their path through space.

The Chahwyn created the Spiders to keep their intra-galactic transportation system, the Quadrail, safe and running smoothly, and contracted ex-security agent Frank Compton to protect its integrity. So far, Compton and his half-human, half-Chahwyn partner, Bayta, have had their hands full keeping this essential link between occupied worlds open and preventing the evil collective intelligence called the Modhri from using it to spread their mind-controlling infection. But now a new threat has boarded, one that troubles even the Modhri.

What do you do when home is a conspiracy that's been discovered and destroyed? When home is a planet in a star system that's gone missing? When home means working for the destroyers of galaxies? When home is a spaceship that's calling out to the enemy? Cantra 'yos Phelium isn't a quitter, but she has more than a little problem: the Enemy has accelerated its attacks and how do you fight an Enemy whose major form of attack is the de-crystallization of everything around itself?

A complicated war is about to get a lot more complicated. And Bud's brought it on himself. There's no end in sight to either the Rawtenuga or Trixone wars. And the search for the dinosaur home world is proving just how big the galaxy is, especially where it's not properly mapped. The enemy keep popping up in too many places, and as fast as the sensor network expands, they seem to have expanded faster.

Never underestimate the capacity of a plant to learn something new from a dinosaur. Bud is getting a crash course in how to fight a war all on his own. At the same time, the needs of his homeworld and the Imperium distract him from the goal of finding where the Rawtenuga entered the core galaxy from. Being Thorn's heir has both positive and negative aspects to it, and as the war with the Rawtenuga keeps getting bigger, so do the demands from the civilian side of his life.

The dark "doomed soldier" Max, formerly Baron Maximilian Valevsky, has committed an act of heroism. The emperor wants to personally reward him, and a meeting with the leader of the empire means only one thing: Max will regain his former name. But the mysterious forces circling the throne of the Zarask Empire have their own opinions about how best to utilize Max and his abilities. Their task is simple: bend our hero to their will and force him to do their bidding. But will Max agree to dance like a marionette with someone else pulling the strings?

Max, formerly Maximilian Valevsky, begins to understand what it means to exist in a dark world dominated by light. People hate him, exploit him, fear him, and try to kill him the first chance they get. But our hero is willing to endure all trials and tribulations in pursuit of his goal: killing Duke Odoevsky and avenging his family. And he'll let nothing stand in his way.

The offworlders are defeated. The Lithoids have been destroyed. It seems like a long-awaited peace is about to befall Hearth, but the servants of Chaos have their own designs. They're eager to destroy the trouble-maker and control him like some kind of puppet. Once a doomed soldier, always a doomed soldier.

E. A. Smithe is a borrowed person. He is a clone who lives on a third-tier shelf in a public library, and his personality is an uploaded recording of a deceased mystery writer. Smithe is a piece of property, not a legal human. A wealthy patron, Colette Coldbrook, takes him from the library because he is the surviving personality of the author of Murder on Mars. A physical copy of that book was in the possession of her murdered father, and it contains an important secret, the key to immense family wealth.

There has never been a mage this powerful before. And yet, what use is power when bad things happen while you sleep? For most people, the question is: "How do I go on?" For Bud, the question is: "How do I fix this?" The problem is determining why it broke, so it won't happen again. But fixing things is easy. It's the consequences of your choices which are difficult. And what of the other things which need fixing? Once you start fixing things, where does it end? He's worked for Kali, Ganesha, and Shiva, across two galaxies. Now, he's Destiny's Spacemage.

Diplomacy is the bane of Bud's life these days.

As riots rage across the Human Federation space, what he'd been told on Sanctuary accelerates. Everyone wants his help.

The consequences of losing your temper for a moment grow with your power.

But is this a good thing or bad? Only time will tell, but suddenly everything seems to be happening at once.

The moment Spencer meets Hope the summer before seventh grade, it's...something at first sight. He knows she's special, possibly even magical. The pair become fast friends, climbing trees and planning world travels. After years of being outshone by his older brother and teased because of his Tourette syndrome, Spencer finally feels like he belongs. But as Hope and Spencer get older and life gets messier, the clear label of "friend" gets messier, too.

Winner of the 1979 National Book Award, Going After Cacciato, a classic novel of Vietnam, captures the peculiar mixture of horror and hallucination that marked that strangest of wars. In a blend of reality and fantasy, this novel tells the story of a young soldier who one day lays down his rifle and sets off on a quixotic journey from the jungles of Indochina to the streets of Paris.

Theo has been bested. On the hunt for missing children, he encounters a man who has more magical weapons than Theo could ever believe existed. Their confrontation may have ended with Theo managing to wound the abductor, but it leaves him spelled in the shape of a goat.

A pioneering neuroscientist argues that we are more than our brains To many, the brain is the seat of personal identity and autonomy. But the way we talk about the brain is often rooted more in mystical conceptions of the soul than in scientific fact. This blinds us to the physical realities of...

Death is not the end. Maximilian Valevsky was slain, but rune magic has returned him to this reality. There are still enemies to destroy and evil forces to expel from this world. The only question is: what will he do with the person who finally did him in? Will he forgive and forget, or take action to ensure his killer can never pull of such a trick again?

It was a crime that shocked the nation: the brutal murder in Chicago in 1924 of a child by two wealthy college students who killed solely for the thrill of the experience. Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb were intellectuals - too smart, they believed, for the police to catch them. When they were apprehended, state's attorney Robert Crowe was certain that no defense could save the ruthless killers from the gallows.