For a thousand years the ash fell and no flowers bloomed. For a thousand years the Skaa slaved in misery and lived in fear. For a thousand years the Lord Ruler, the "Sliver of Infinity," reigned with absolute power and ultimate terror, divinely invincible. Then, when hope was so long lost that not even its memory remained, a terribly scarred, heart-broken half-Skaa rediscovered it in the depths of the Lord Ruler's most hellish prison.

We were fighting on the wrong side of a war we couldn't win. And that was the good news. The Ruhar hit us on Columbus Day. There we were, innocently drifting along the cosmos on our little blue marble, like the native Americans in 1492. Over the horizon come ships of a technologically advanced, aggressive culture, and BAM! There go the good old days, when humans only got killed by each other. So, Columbus Day. It fits. When the morning sky twinkled again, this time with Kristang starships jumping in to hammer the Ruhar, we thought we were saved.

Hadrian Blackwater, a warrior with nothing to fight for, is paired with Royce Melborn, a thieving assassin with nothing to lose. Hired by an old wizard, they must steal a treasure that no one can reach. The Crown Tower is the impregnable remains of the grandest fortress ever built and home to the realm’s most prized possessions. But it isn’t gold or jewels that the wizard is after, and if he can just keep them from killing each other, they just might succeed.

Zachary Quinto - best known for his role as the Nimoy-approved Spock in the recent Star Trek reboot and the menacing, power-stealing serial killer, Sylar, in Heroes - brings his well-earned sci-fi credentials and simmering intensity to this audio-exclusive novella from master storyteller John Scalzi. One day, not long from now, it becomes almost impossible to murder anyone - 999 times out of a thousand, anyone who is intentionally killed comes back. How? We don't know.

Enter a cruel palindrome world: a symmetric place where disturbing situations displace the common; where good acts transmute to evil ones; where windows and mirrors are interchangeable. Within, characters influence each other through macabre arrangements of involuntary happenstance, and learn the inevitabilities of coincidence. A segmented story of a mother and daughter intertwines the others.

Reclusive college student Jonathan Tibbs wakes in a pool of blood, not a scratch on him. His life is about to undergo a massive shift. A violent and merciless otherworldly enemy unleashes slaughter in the streets, calling out in a language only he understands. And it is seeking its challenger. In order to defeat the threat, Jonathan must become a temporal weapon...while remaining completely anonymous. Unfortunately, harnessing off-world powers has its own special challenges...

It's not every afternoon that an enigmatic, comely blonde named Stilton (like the cheese) walks into the scruffy gin joint where Sammy "Two Toes" Tiffin tends bar. It's love at first sight, but before Sammy can make his move, an air force general named Remy arrives with some urgent business. 'Cause when you need something done, Sammy is the guy to go to; he's got the connections on the street.

Still stinging from his unceremonious ouster from the Garda Siochana, and staring at the world through the smoky bottom of his beer mug, Jack Taylor is stuck in Galway with nothing to look forward to. He is teetering on the brink of his life's sharpest edges, his memories of the past cutting deep into his soul and his prospects for the future non-existent.

My favorite line in my favorite song about Dallas goes like this: Dallas is a rich man with a death wish in his eyes / A steel and concrete soul in a warm heart and love disguise... The narrator of Jimmie Dale Gilmore's perfect tune Dallas" is coming to town as a broke dreamer with the bright lights of the big city on his mind. He's just seen the Dallas cityscape through the window of his seat on a DC-9 at night. Is he just beginning his quest?

Barrington Jedidiah Walker is 74 and leads a double life. Born and bred in Antigua, he's lived in Hackney, London, for years. A flamboyant character with a fondness for William Shakespeare, Barrington is a husband, father, grandfather - and also secretly gay.

The third opus in the illustrious life of St. James St. James Romance Novels for Dudes collection sees him fighting prohibition in the 1920s all the way through his flyboy days in WWII. If you don't have an erection, he'll give you one. I mean, you'll have to pay for this sh*t... but you'll get one. That's a Men's Wearhouse type of guarantee too, homeboy. Did that guy die btw? (#thoughtsandprayers if he did)

Key West, 1991. Don Roy Doyle is back in town. Tough and quick-witted, he's fresh out of prison, where he served three years for a diamond swindle. Now he's back to collect his share of the proceeds, about $200,000, but the money has vanished. A local family dynasty which has controlled the island's politics for generations, a cop with a grudge, the FBI, and the Russian mob all have a stake in the action.

Picking up right where he left off, Paul Carter pulls out more tall tales of a mad, bad and dangerous life in the international oil trade. Starting with action and mayhem galore This Is Not A Drill sets an unrelenting pace that just doesn't let up, as Paul almost drowns when the Russian rig he's working on begins to capsize; is reunited with his Dad - another adrenaline junkie; gets married; hangs out with his rig pig buddies in exotic locations; and spends a couple of interesting weeks in Afghanistan.

The mid-'70s: at an all-boys Catholic school in Melbourne, Timothy Conigrave falls wildly and sweetly in love with the captain of the football team. So begins a relationship that weathers disapproval, separation and ultimately death. With honesty and insight, Holding the Man explores the highs and lows of any partnership and the strength of heart both men have to find when they test positive for HIV. This is a book as refreshing and uplifting as it is moving - a funny and sad and celebratory account of growing up gay.

Jack Tate is hopeless.... Everything he touches turns into a disaster, but he means well. His business is even less successful than his love life. His once-thriving coffee shop was on the brink of bankruptcy, but salvation could be right under his nose. At the insistence of his loyal and underappreciated assistant, Emma, he sees that the last hope of saving his business could be the only customers who’ve not deserted him for the faceless coffee chains - the old folk.

Still stinging from his unceremonious ouster from the Garda Siochana, and staring at the world through the smoky bottom of his beer mug, Jack Taylor is stuck in Galway with nothing to look forward to. He is teetering on the brink of his life's sharpest edges, his memories of the past cutting deep into his soul and his prospects for the future non-existent.

Picking up right where he left off, Paul Carter pulls out more tall tales of a mad, bad and dangerous life in the international oil trade. Starting with action and mayhem galore This Is Not A Drill sets an unrelenting pace that just doesn't let up, as Paul almost drowns when the Russian rig he's working on begins to capsize; is reunited with his Dad - another adrenaline junkie; gets married; hangs out with his rig pig buddies in exotic locations; and spends a couple of interesting weeks in Afghanistan.

Born and raised in a poor, working-class family in Toronto, Jack Spayd is the son of an unhappy marriage. After being taken under the wing of "Miss Frostbite", the owner of a local jazz club, Jack becomes a gifted musician, playing piano and harmonica. Fame and the allure of gambling takes him to Vegas, and prospects of fortune take him to the Belgian Congo, where he's heard it's possible to earn big money working in the most dangerous parts of the local copper mines.

Dan Starkey is a young journalist in Belfast, who shares with his wife, Patricia, a prodigious appetite for drinking and dancing. Then Dan meets a beautiful and apparently impoverished student. And then, terrifyingly, she is murdered. Is it because she was not exactly who she claimed to be? Is it the IRA? A Protestant extremist group? A jealous lover? Before long, Dan is a target himself.…

One May evening in London, Adam Kindred, a young climatologist in town for a job interview, is feeling good about the future as he sits down for a meal at a little Italian bistro. He strikes up a conversation with a solitary diner at the next table, who leaves soon afterward. With horrifying speed, this chance encounter leads to a series of malign accidents, through which Adam loses everything—home, family, friends, job, reputation, passport, credit cards, cell phone—never to get them back.