Showing results by narrator "Stephen Davies" in All Categories

The year is 1989 in Los Angeles, and Miles Jameson is about to graduate from high school. The last big party of high school is approaching, along with the end of a turbulent decade, and Miles has only a vague desire to “work with his hands” (his girlfriend points out that this is a bit trite). Marked with the disaffection and apathy that filled a particular era, and that has always marked adolescence, author John Duncan Talbird gives us a rollicking and bacchanalian look at the challenge of making something of yourself, even when it seems there is little to work with.

Stories of Color marks Lawrence Biscontini's first book of fiction. Written during a 12-country, 12-month sabbatical in 2015, these various short stories offer something for (almost) everyone. The common thread of the human condition among all sentient beings weaves throughout the tales.

Nestled in upstate New York, Stratburgh University has a problem. Three sorority sisters have disappeared, and the police say they simply ran away. The students are outraged. Even openly gay junior Jamie Bradford is concerned, only he has other worries. He doesn’t have a boyfriend and is willing to disregard the troublesome news on campus to find one. With hopes of finding a lover, Jamie attends the party of the year and becomes involved with two men at the same time. One is the man of his dreams; the other is a man of his nightmares and a police officer. And Jamie’s hell begins. The cop has another goal and will stop at nothing to achieve it. He’s even willing to track Jamie through the Catskill Mountains and New York City to get what he wants. Jamie’s life.

Written by multiple Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy Award nominee Jay Lake, "The Leopard's Paw" was first published in the April 2007 issue of Subterranean Magazine.

Over his long career, Jay Lake has published 10 novels and more than 300 stories. He was honored with the 2004 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer.

Written by multiple Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Award nominee Jay Lake, "Green Grass Blues" was first published in the 2007 anthology The River Knows Its Own. Over his long career, Jay Lake has published 10 novels and more than 300 stories. He was honored with the 2004 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer.

What Luck, This Life begins in the aftermath of the space shuttle's break-up, as the people of Piney Woods watch their pastures swarm with searchers and reporters bluster at their doors. A shop owner defends herself against a sexual predator who is pushed to new boldness after he is disinvited to his family reunion. A closeted father facing a divorce that will leave his gifted boy adrift retrieves an astronaut's remains. An engineer who dreams of orbiting Earth joins a search for debris and instead uncovers an old neighbor's buried longing.

The issues and arguments surrounding school choice are sometimes hijacked to make political points about government control, democratic ideals, the public good, and privatization. In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, David Garcia avoids partisan arguments to offer an accessible, objective, and comprehensive guide to school choice.

Plain-English guidance for strategic business analytics and big-data implementation. Win with Advanced Analytics focuses on integrating multiple types of intelligence, such as web analytics, customer feedback, competitive intelligence, customer behavior, and industry intelligence into your business practice.

The twentieth century's so-called golden age of science fiction produced many great writers, yet none is greater than Clifford D. Simak, named Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America. His bold visions of and ingenious speculations about humankind's future, always enriched with empathy and a deep understanding of human strengths, foibles, and failings, have stood the test of time, remaining powerful, affecting, and relevant.

Beginning with the unforgettable title story—a wry and chilling horror tale about cloning and alien invasion that inspired the classic teleplay "The Duplicate Man" from the television series The Outer Limits—Simak propels the listener on a breathtaking journey across the galaxies and into the future. He then enthralls us with the strange chronicle of twin siblings, one tied to the Earth, the other drawn to the stars; imaginings of a volatile reunion of two former enemies who must join forces on Jupiter's moon or face extinction; and the story of a house in the middle of nowhere.

In The Intentional Leader, Tim Hebert explores the various actions that define and shape leadership. From those decisive moments in which a difficult decision must be made, to the unguarded moments when our emotional, authentic selves manifest themselves for better or worse.

No science fiction author was more highly regarded than Grand Master Clifford D. Simak, winner of numerous honors. One of the genre's premier literary artists, Simak explores time travel and time engines; examines the rituals and superstitions of galactic travelers who have long forgotten their ultimate purpose; and even takes fascinating detours through World War II and the wild American West in a wondrous anthology that no science fiction fan should be without.

Twelve classic tales of the unknown from the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author of Way Station.

In the collection's title story, Frederick Gray is closing in on seventy and has outlived his usefulness as a professor of law. He has no family; his best friend, fellow faculty member Ben Lovell, has recently died. Before Gray moves into a retirement home, he takes a final canoe trip to a favorite fishing spot he and Lovell had visited many times, only to find that someone has built a house on the remote riverside. When an accident leaves Gray stranded and in pain, he returns to the shelter seeking aid and instead finds a new reason for living.

Sex. It’s something that’s on everyone’s mind. But the minds that thought of the weird, strange, and stupid sex acts that are reported in Fifty Shades of Dumb: True Stories of Strange and Screwy Sex are a breed of their own - and unfortunately some of them try to breed on their own.

Evoking such classics as Elmer Gantry and The Day of the Locust, William Giraldi's About Face boldly transfers the perennial literary themes of celebrity, ambition, and obsession to twenty-first-century Boston. There we meet Val Face, a charismatic self-help guru who captivates multitudes with his uncanny ability to heal adherents using only the power of his words, the mysterious touch of his hands, and the transcendent beauty of his face.

This volume contains ten stellar short stories by Clifford D. Simak. In "Grotto of the Dancing Deer," a man carrying an ancient secret finally speaks up, unable to bear any longer the loneliness he has experienced for millennia. In "Over the River," which Simak wrote in memory of his beloved grandmother Ellen, children from an embattled future are sent back for safekeeping to their ancestors in the peaceful past. And in "Day of Truce," the inhabitants of a suburban subdivision must barricade themselves against bands of roving attackers.

In Understanding the Metaverse: A Business and Ethical Guide, expert product and customer experience strategist Nick Rosa delivers a timely exploration of what is bound to be one of the most important technologies of our time. The author explains the technology that underpins the metaverse as it exists today and that will form the basis for its rapid evolution in the future.

The story of Luigi Ronsisvalle is an intimate look at the life of a professional killer. It is, in some ways, the story of all workingmen and women with ambition who never achieve their ultimate goal. But what makes Luigi unique is that, for him to achieve his goal, people had to die. His ambition, from when he was twelve years old, was to be a made man in the Mafia. He once told a presidential commission, "American child falls in love with baseball, I fall in love with Mafia."

Boston real estate agent William Collins knows that his habits are slipping out of control. Due to obsessive-compulsive daily cleaning binges and a penchant for nightly online cruising for hookups, he finds his sales figures slipping despite a booming market. There’s also his ongoing struggle to collect the rent from his passive-aggressive tenant and his worries about his best friend, Edward, whom he’s certainly not in love with. Just as he decides to do something about his life, he meets Charlotte and Samuel, wealthy suburbanites looking for the perfect city apartment.