System Fiction

It's festival time! All would be perfect, fun, competitive. Well, try telling the vampires not to crash the damn party. January's volume arrives, a fourth book containing Clyde and his amazing party, humor and ass-kicking, happy and sad moments. While Clyde continues to strengthen himself so he wouldn't die to the Viper, figures and organizations move in the background.

The Anime Trope System is back in a third action-packed, humor-packed adventure in Satovia. Clyde's next threat comes in the form of a classmate. While her descent occurs, the young man must deal with hornets (the monster girl kind); prepare to meet up with vampires; and even depose Alice's father, the demon lord, once and for all. One hell of a week, right?

In Robert Louis Stevenson’s haunting and introspective short story “Markheim,” a chance encounter on Christmas Day leads to a chilling exploration of morality, free will, and the struggle between good and evil. With gothic atmosphere and philosophical depth, Stevenson crafts a psychological tale that lingers long after the final tick. A masterwork of Victorian horror and spiritual suspense, "Markheim" invites listeners into the dark recesses of the human soul.

Brought to you by Penguin. Life can exist anywhere. And anywhere there is life, there is home. In the swirling clouds of Venus, the families of la colonie live on floating plant-like trawlers, salvaging what they can in the fierce acid rain and crackling storms. Outside is dangerous, but...

Kieran Hart has just gone through a divorce and is starting over with a new job at a DNA discovery site. After finding out she’s adopted years earlier, she sends in her sample, hoping to find her birth parents. Instead, she finds herself in a police station being accused of a crime she didn’t commit because her DNA was a match to a homicide.

Ominous Obelisks land on Earth with a single message: Join the Games to give humanity a fighting chance to survive...or roll over and die. Too bad for them, Warren isn't the rolling-over type. Now, the battles begin. The five alien races have been trained. All the resources and bonuses have been issued. Welcome to Battle World!

Elderly military veteran Volper had no idea what to expect when he entered the virtual world of Alpha Rome. But he now realizes that it’s not a game, after all. The number of times you can respawn by replicating in special capsules is limited and might one day run out. Volper has also had to take on a group of teenagers and has managed to turn them into a lethal combat squad. However, their success has not gone unnoticed, and the team has caught the attention of some powerful corporations.

Born over a century after "The Rise", Jeff scavenges with his tyrannical mother for survival. Banned from cultivating freely, Jeff wants none of this life; his one objective is to join the immortal rankers as they attempt to climb the Northern Tower. On the day of his escape, a powerful guild attacks Leah’s group, and Jeff is thrown through a unique dungeon portal—a portal that hasn’t been used in nearly a hundred years. In the pursuit of Jeff’s ultimate goal, he must choose whether to follow the Church, join a guild, or try it all on his own.

When space travelers Click Hathaway and Irish Marnagan are stranded on a barren asteroid after a catastrophic crash, they find themselves surrounded by horrifying alien creatures seemingly conjured by a ruthless pirate named Gunther. As oxygen dwindles and terror mounts, the men begin to realize a chilling truth: the monsters may not be physical beings at all, but manifestations of their own fears made real through belief and suggestion.

To gain his Master Class, John Lee made a deal with the Erethran Empire. Now, the empire has come to collect on the debt, forcing him to appear in their capital after his last fight. Thrown into Galactic politics of a militarized, system-based society, John will have to weigh consequences of the decisions he's been asked to make and confront the warped reality of a system-created empire. When politics, self-interest, and a human's stubbornness collide, the very stars are threatened.

Commander Jay Luckrun is a bit more than a dorky weirdo these days. He's a dungeon crawler of the multiverse and a relentless killer of thousands of men and monsters. People think he's to blame for the spread of the apocalypse, too! Some of that might be true, but Jay still thinks of himself as a hero of comedy. But when a secretive group of villains gets empowered by the System and attacks the people close to Jay, he might have to lean into his infamy more. He might have to go all out to seek vengeance.

In an instant, life as it was known is gone, replaced by a System called The Connection. It doesn't come quietly as earthquakes rock the planet, the chosen survivors falling unconscious as the Connection takes their bodies and Adapts them. Lochlan Brady and his family were on their way home from a camping weekend when the Connection appears. He awakens with a new Adapted body, finding his wife missing. Now Loch must survive and thrive in this new world with his two teenage daughters, Harper and Piper. All Loch wants to do is protect his daughters and find his wife.

A twist-filled psychological and domestic thriller packed with family secrets, shocking twists, and suspense, following a woman who protects her stepson from a murder accusation only to discover deadly secrets in her home, perfect for fans of Freida McFadden and Kiersten Modglin. She turned her...

As a software developer from Texas, Tom thought he understood broken code. But when mysterious obelisks transform Earth into a glitch-riddled dungeon crawler, he discovers that debugging the apocalypse won't be as easy as turning it off and back on again. Their lifeline? Vending machines turned into miniature storefronts. These mechanical saviors dispensed everything from swords to shampoo—until they started dispensing death.

Eloquent. Philosophical. Introspective. These are not the words usually associated with an autistic child. But in a remarkable display of courage and creativity, a boy named Tito has shattered stereotypes, and in The Mind Tree makes us question all of our previous assumptions about autism. For Tito is severely autistic and nearly nonverbal, and this is his story.

With more than 10 stories from exciting new voices and a few veterans of the universe, the second anthology highlights the lives and struggles of humanity's best and worst years after system advent.

Leveling systems create overpowered main characters. Cooking systems create master chefs capable of conquering any stomach. Founder systems create monstrous sects from nothing. However, who creates the systems?

The System took over the whole world in an instant, and people lost any ability to communicate with each other. But the deadies weren't the only ones who could get better. Over time all the peoples of the earth found ways to contact each other, with the System allowing them to trade, communicate, and come to each other's aid.

How much will you sacrifice to survive in a world turned game? When friends and family fall to monsters and aliens everyday, will you choose safety over freedom? These are the questions the survivors in the Yukon must ask themselves. New alien masters arrive, offering safety from ever stronger monsters in return for their freedom and future potential. Thrust into a position of power and influence by dint of his Levels, John must choose—not just for himself but Whitehorse itself. The price, however, might be more than he is willing to pay.

The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge by Arthur Conan Doyle is one of Sherlock Holmes’s most atmospheric and chilling mysteries. When a wealthy Englishman receives a cryptic note inviting him to a secluded country estate, he soon finds himself entangled in a bizarre web of murder, deception, and superstition.