Showing results by narrator "Charlie Thurston" in All Categories

Summer vacation isn’t all fun and hanging out when you’re a wizard-in-training. For partly reformed warlock Chance Fortunato, it’s even worse. In addition to the constant study and training, he has to prove he’s ready to be a full-fledged apprentice before he starts at the Franklin Academy. Plus, he’s beginning to think someone has it out for him. If things weren’t bad enough with a snooty proctor monitoring his every move and demons trying to capture him, his father finally makes his first attempt to get his wayward son back under his control by trying to frame his mom.

Knowledge is power. So when an unassuming Manhattan bassist named Will Dando awakens from a dream one morning with 108 predictions about the future in his head, he rapidly finds himself the most powerful man in the world. Protecting his anonymity by calling himself the Oracle, he sets up a heavily guarded website with the help of his friend Hamza to selectively announce his revelations. In no time global corporations are offering him millions for exclusive access, eager to profit from his prophecies.

The Franklin Academy is the most prestigious magick school in the US, with the highest admission standards, and tuition to match. Any student would be honored to go at all, much less get a scholarship. Not Chance Fortunato. He’d much rather stay at home and study under his mentor, Dr. Corwin. But when a student is attacked and his soul is ripped from his body, Chance knows he has to stay.

Dills and his mom have returned to Hamilton, her hometown, hoping to leave the horrors of Windsor behind. But it's impossible to escape the echoes of tragedy, and trouble always follows trouble. When Dills hurts a new classmate, it comes out in court that he was in the Windsor High library when the shooter came in. But he won't talk about what he saw, what he still sees whenever he closes his eyes.

Apprentice mage Chance Fortunato has faced off with a lot of nasty things. Power hungry vampires, abusive alpha werewolves, and deranged cultists. But none of his training under his mentor Dr. Corwin has prepared him for the trial he is about to face: Junior Prom.

A religious miracle: The Cahokians believed that the divine hero Morning Star had been resurrected in the flesh. But not all is fine and stable in glorious Cahokia. To the astonishment of the ruling clan, an attempt is made on the living god's life. Now it is up to Morning Star's aunt Matron Blue Heron to keep it quiet until she can uncover the plot and bring the culprits to justice. If she fails, Cahokia will be torn asunder in warfare, rage, and blood as civil war consumes them all.

A thousand years ago, the mighty Cahokian civilization dominated the North American continent. At the heart of the empire stood a vast city, teeming with tens of thousands of residents, traders, and travelers. The city of Cahokia sent settlers and priests throughout the continent, from Wisconsin to the Gulf of Mexico, carrying word of the power of their gods. People who wouldn't bow to that power were conquered or slaughtered. Power rested in one being, Morning Star, a god resurrected in the body of a living man.

A seasoned war correspondent, Jeffrey Gettleman has covered every major conflict over the past 20 years, from Afghanistan to Iraq to the Congo. For the past decade, he has served as the East Africa bureau chief for the New York Times, fulfilling his teenage dream of living in Africa. Love, Africa is the story of how he got there - and of his difficult, winding path toward becoming a good reporter and a better man.

I Hunt Killers introduced the world to Jasper (Jazz) Dent, the son of the world's most infamous serial killer. When a desperate New York City detective comes knocking on Jazz's door asking for help with a new case, Jazz can't say no. The Hat-Dog Killer has the Big Apple - and its police force running scared with no leads. So Jazz and his girlfriend, Connie, hop on a plane to the big city and get swept up in a killer's murderous game. Meanwhile, Jazz's dad, Billy, is watching... and waiting.

Apprentice mage Chance Fortunato just can’t catch a break. His training has gotten even harder, and his mentor, Dr. Corwin, is pushing him to take his mage trials early. Still, it beats his old gig working for a demon. But life takes a turn for the worse when a member of his girlfriend Shade’s werewolf pack is killed by a member of a rogue pack. Adding insult to grief, the pack is forced to let the Conclave send an observer to monitor their investigation.

At 18, Brian, like so many other promising young gay men, arrived in New York City without much more than a love for the freedom and release from his past that it promised. But within six short years, AIDS would claim his lover, his friends, and his future. With nothing left in New York but memories of death, Brian decides to write his mother a letter asking to come back to the place, and family, he was once so desperate to escape.

Nuclear brinksmanship, psychological warfare, spies, double agents, femmes fatales, and dead drops… The Cold War - a terrifying time when nuclear war between the world's two superpowers was an ever-present threat, an all-too-real possibility that could be set off at the touch of a button - provides a chilling backdrop to this collection of all-new short stories from today's most celebrated mystery writers.

A body burns in the high desert hills. A boy walks into a fire station, pale with the shock of a grisly discovery. A middle school teacher worries when her colleague is late for work. By day's end, when the body is identified as local math teacher Adam Merkel, a small Nevada town will be rocked to its core by a brutal and calculated murder. Adam Merkel left a university professorship in Reno to teach middle school in Lovelock seven months before he died.

Nick Merrick is stretched to the breaking point. Keep his grades sky-high, or he'll never escape his hometown. Keep his brother's business going, or the Merricks will be out on the street. Keep the secret of where he's going in the evenings from his own twin, or he'll lose his family. Keep his mind off the hot, self-assured dancer who's supposed to be his "girlfriend's" partner.

Germany, 1945. Ever since Anton Kohler first heard the vibrant sound of the violin, he's dreamed of mastering the instrument. But when his father dies, the 15-year-old must give up his passion to support his seven younger siblings. As the Russian army marches closer to his hometown, Anton and his best friend Gerhard are pulled from their families and forced to help defend their home in a last desperate stand. When Anton witnesses the slaughter of concentration camp prisoners, he vows to escape the war and find a way home....

Late one night, investigative journalist Jack Logan receives a surprise visit from US Senator Malcolm Phillips at his New York apartment. Disheveled and in a panic, the senator swears that he’s about to be murdered and pleads with Jack to protect his wife Taylor, who happens to be the only woman Jack has ever truly loved.

After publishing his debut novel, The Shattered Man, to disappointing sales and reviews, Campbell P. Marion is struggling to find inspiration for a follow-up. When Edenville College invites him to join as a writer-in-residence, he’s convinced that his bad luck has finally taken a turn. His girlfriend Quinn isn’t so sure—she grew up near Edenville and has good reasons for not wanting to move back. Cam disregards her skepticism and accepts the job, with Quinn reluctantly following along.

Before Joe Hart can stop the murder of John Lennon, he must die himself. When Joe Hart dies after leading a wasted life, he chooses to use his second chance to make the world better. Even when he thinks he knows what is coming, changing the past is difficult. What would you do, if you could do it all again?

Chance Fortunato may be away at boarding school, but the bad guys haven’t gone anywhere, and they certainly haven’t changed their ways. It falls to Chance’s friends to pick up the slack.

It’s been almost two years since investigative reporter Jack Logan and television producer Taylor Parks brought down the Institute. But soon, a series of bizarre, seemingly random murder/suicides captures Jack’s attention as a disturbing pattern emerges. Could someone be intentionally causing people to become homicidal? At the same time, Taylor is producing a story about a class action suit against a national insurance company that has reached the Supreme Court.