Showing results by narrator "Nicole Poole" in All Categories

The conclave continually pressures the Imperium Empire by ousting peacekeepers and Radag mercenaries from imperial territories. This interdicts resources bound for Krackus worlds from the suborned races and exacerbates Imperium distribution protocols. On Jegstrat, a populous Krackus world, declining grain shipments lead to favoring distribution to large companies. Saboteurs plan to slow production at Imperial Grains, the largest processing plant. The goal is to rebalance grain distribution, but the attack goes terribly awry, causing death and great damage.

When a mission in New York City goes terribly wrong, Sienna Nealon finds herself replaced as head of the government agency in charge of policing people with powers beyond those of a normal human. Marginalized, humiliated, she ponders her place in the world now that her war is over. But it isn't long before another threat rears its ugly head, and Sienna finds herself outmatched and outgunned - against former prisoners bent on executing a scheme which will push Sienna past limits of ruthlessness even she could not imagine.

As any fan of Jo Walton's Among Others might guess, Walton is both an inveterate reader of SF and fantasy, and a chronic rereader of books. In 2008, then-new science fiction mega-site Tor.com asked Walton to blog regularly about her rereading—about all kinds of older fantasy and SF, ranging from acknowledged classics, to guilty pleasures, to forgotten oddities and gems. These posts have consistently been among the most popular features of Tor. Now this volume presents a selection of the best of them, ranging from short essays to long reassessments of some of the field's most ambitious series.

Opportunity is presented to Admiral Cordelia. Imperium’s Presiding Executor Gaketork sends emissaries to establish communications with her, and she responds by installing a comm system aboard the executor’s transport. The Imperium governor, who has become sentient, uses the new comm system to send her critical data. Cordelia shares the governor’s information with newly assembled Trident squadron commanders. She directs the commanders to scour another executor’s territory and free suborned worlds of mercenary Radags and Krackus overseers.

Admiral Cordelia prosecutes multiple Krackus territories simultaneously with Trident squadrons. However, the success of the Liberation and its Trident escorts to clear territories comes to an end with the loss of multiple warships in a furious engagement against a capable Krackus fleet imperator. Forced to return to Helgart, Captain Mila Pappas offers a harsh solution to enable the Liberation to return residents to their home worlds. She suggests they no longer engage in ship-to-ship battles against Krackus fleets. Instead, Juno and her companions should fight with the deadly Elvian drones. The idea is readily accepted.

Iari is good at killing monsters. As a templar in the Aedis, a multi-species religious organization committed to protecting the Confederation, eliminating extra-dimensional horrors is her job. But after she helped stop separatists from sabotaging the entire Confederation, she discovered a new sort of monster: the rogue-arithmancer, political kind.

The Emperor's daughter Mercedes is the first woman ever admitted to The High Ground, the elite training academy of the Solar League's Star Command, and she must graduate if she is to have any hope of taking the throne. Her classmate Thracius has more modest goals - to defy his humble beginnings and rise to the rank of captain. But in a system rocked by political division, where women are governed by their husbands and fathers, the poor are kept in their place by a rigid class system, and the alien races have been conquered and subjugated, there are many who want them to fail.

The Citadel of Wizards was under siege. Deep in the Vaults beneath the walled city, gates into inhuman realities were opening and closing without warning. Monsters emerged from other dimensions; and ancient, malign magics came to life under the influence of cosmic chaos. Someone was tampering with the Void. The Council of Wizards blamed Antryg Windrose, the rebel mage who had fled their justice to find haven in the City of Angels.

"Tanjiri is not for you. You are not ready to encounter what exists there." So Lezuri spoke in warning, long ago. Urban still possesses the strange gift—the impossible puzzle—Lezuri gave him that day. A needle, ultra-thin and twelve centimeters long, with a silvery surface that slices light into rainbow glints. All Lezuri's knowledge lies locked within that needle. Urban has only to discover the trick of opening it, to gain that knowledge for himself—but the needle remains an enigma.

When Lieutenant Iari hears screams in the night, she expects to interrupt a robbery or break up a fight. Instead she discovers a murder with an impossible suspect: a riev, one of the battle-mecha decommissioned after the end of the last conflict, repurposed for manual labor. Riev don't kill people. And yet, clearly, one has. Iari sets out to find it.

Once you've felt love, it's hard to let it go. The curse has been unleashed at the stroke of midnight and everything has changed. Everyone who once cared for me is now indifferent. And the one person who loved me unconditionally now hates my guts. I've never felt more alone before in my life. Hiding out with the seelies has been my only option, but when truths unfold, even the seelie aren't safe anymore. With nowhere to turn to and no one to trust, I find an unlikely ally who amidst it all, doesn't hate me.

My name is Leah, and I am a Cazador. Trained to hunt and kill vampires over 300 years ago, my training became essential once I became one of those monsters. The underbelly of the supernatural world has begun to bleed into the human world, and journalist Rachel Sambrook is asking too many dangerous questions. Unwittingly, she's revealed a conspiracy I had hoped would never become a reality: using vampire blood for human experiments. As I attempt to contain her, she's by my side, and the truth of just how deep the darkness goes is exposed.

Magic can be a blessing or a curse. Emma Ayers is about to discover the biggest secret of her life - she's a witch. When tragedy upends Emma's idyllic life, she is taken in by a mysterious woman - the matriarch to Hell's Belles, a secret society of debutante witches in the historic city of Charleston. With Emma's help, they'll try to defeat an enemy that wants all the powers the Belles are gifted with - and who will stop at nothing to get them. Even if it means destroying everyone in the path, including the city they protect.

An unnamed woman checks into a guesthouse in a mysterious district known only as the Subdivision. The guesthouse's owners, Clara and the Judge, are welcoming and helpful, if oddly preoccupied by the perpetually baffling jigsaw puzzle in the living room. With little more than a hand-drawn map and vague memories of her troubled past, the narrator ventures out in search of a job, an apartment, and a fresh start in life.

The Solar League, humanity's empire, has existed since mankind reached for the stars. While the humans considered it the pinnacle of human achievement, for the subjugated alien races it seemed only to endorse humanity's worst impulses. But the worst of humanity pales in comparison to an alien onslaught that is on the verge of bringing mankind down into death and subjugation.

Fourteen years have passed since he was framed for theft to cover up an imperial atrocity, and disgraced military officer Thracius "Tracy" Belmanor has built a new life for himself. Living under an assumed name as the captain of a small trading vessel crewed primarily by aliens, he and his crew engage in both legal and illegal deals just under the radar of the Solar League authorities.

Ever since Callie - the Vatican's rookie monster hunter - killed a demon a few weeks ago, Kansas City's been eerily quiet. But she soon learns it's just the calm before the storm. Because werewolves begin abducting young women in Kansas City, and a new church opens its doors, pronouncing death to all idols, including these "make-believe" monsters and wizards. But when one of their congregation is disemboweled by a monster on the steps of the church with the phrase God is dead painted in blood, someone in the church decides to take a lesson from the Salem Witch Trials.... And the police seem to be helping.

Rory Thorne is a princess with 13 fairy blessings, the most important of which is to see through flattery and platitudes. As the eldest daughter, she always imagined she'd inherit her father's throne and govern the interplanetary Thorne Consortium. Then, her father is assassinated, her mother gives birth to a son, and Rory is betrothed to the prince of a distant world. When Rory arrives in her new home, she uncovers a treacherous plot to unseat her newly betrothed and usurp his throne.

If you want to get to heaven, you’ve got to raise a little hell.... Callie Penrose is struggling to find her special purpose in life. Rather than allying with any of the powerful supernatural groups begging to sign her up - the Vatican, the vampires, the shifters, or the Armies of both Heaven and Hell - Callie has been picking fights with all of them. But when she’s abducted by a host of angels, and a greater demon begins hunting her through the daytime streets of Kansas City, Callie learns that her past has come back to haunt her.

One of the Vatican’s most infamous Shepherds has been murdered, and Callie’s friends are the prime suspects. To prove them innocent, Roland and Callie must risk their very souls.... Because Callie can’t reveal that she’s hearing strange whispers when she uses her magic, or that she’s harboring an Angel’s Grace. And if the Shepherds discover the hellish bargain Roland made, the streets of Rome will flow with blood as brother turns against brother.