Showing results by narrator "Kevin T Collins" in All Categories

It has been three years since their devastating battle, and peace has settled across their land. But to the south an empire lies ready to crumble. When the dowager empress dies along with her successor, a great war breaks out, threatening to overwhelm the known world.

Hadjar has seen everything that the Mortal Realm of the Nameless World has to offer. Beloved son, disgraced prince, brother, loyal friend, brave warrior, illustrious commander, murderer, traitor, devoted husband, monster . . . All these roles converge in Hadjar Darkhan, the Mad General. He has left behind songs and tales of courage and honor that have become the lament of the thousands who've met their end at his blade, their blood drenching the fields and valleys of the mortal regions. And he did it all so he could keep going, so his journey wouldn't end before its time.

When Basch encountered an injured creature outside his town, he hadn't expected it to be a dragon. Nor had he expected its hunter to be a fire-wielding mage. But the very last thing he expected was to bond with this injured dragon and defeat the fire mage with his very own magic.

When Tom is invited to the reading of a will of a great-uncle he’s never heard of, there’s no way to know what to expect. But on the long list of possible things to inherit, a travelling carnival ghost train is the very last on the list. To get his full $10 million inheritance, all Tom has to do is run the antique ride until his 18th birthday. Easy. Except for a strange caped-creep he’s never met, who’s trying to con him out of the money...and the actual ghosts and ghouls who call the ride home.

Inspirational and magical, here is the story of a boy who grows up determined to save the world from its most savage ecological predator: Man himself. "What the hell do you want?" snarled Frogman at Raff Cody, as the boy stepped innocently onto the reputed murderer's property. Fifteen years old, Raff, along with his older cousin, Junior, had only wanted to catch a glimpse of Frogman's 1,000-pound alligator. Thus, begins the saga of Anthill....

In Kindle County, a woman is killed in an apparent random drive-by shooting. The woman turns out to be the ex-wife of a prominent state senator and an old acquaintance of Judge Sonia Klonsky, on whose desk the case lands. As the pursuit of justice takes bizarre and unusual turns, Judge Klonsky is brought face-to-face with a host of extraordinary personalities and formidable enemies bent on her destruction.

Donovan was shot by a cop. Four of the nine shots were lethal or would have been, if their target had been anybody else. The Foundation picked him up, brought him back, and trained him further. “Lethal” turns out to be a relative term when magic is involved. When Marci was 15, she levitated a paperweight and threw it at a guy she didn't like. The Foundation scooped her up for training too. “Hippie chick” Susan got well into her Foundation training before they told her about the magic, but she's as powerful as Donovan and Marci now.

Brand-new stories by: Daniel Woodrell, Matthew Eck, Catherine Browder, Nancy Pickard, John Lutz, J. Malcolm Garcia, Kevin Prufer, Linda Rodriguez, Nadia Pflaum, Phong Nguyen, Andres Rodriguez, and others. Kansas City: where East and West collide, where naked ambition meets broken dreams, where blues and the night go together like rye whiskey, vermouth, and bitters. Yes, Kansas City is a surprising place of grit, gore, and betrayal, at least in the imaginations of our diverse lineup of contributors.

Lena Duchannes is unlike anyone the small Southern town of Gatlin has ever seen, and she's struggling to conceal her power and a curse that has haunted her family for generations. Ethan Wate, who has been counting the months until he can escape from Gatlin, is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When Lena moves into the town's oldest and most infamous plantation, Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.

In the future, love is complicated and death is not necessarily the end. Love Minus Eighty follows several interconnected people in a disquieting vision of romantic life. There's Rob, who accidentally kills a jogger, then sacrifices all to visit her in a cryogenic dating facility, seeking forgiveness but instead falling in love. Veronika, a shy dating coach, finds herself coaching the very woman who is stealing the man she loves. And Mira, a gay woman accidentally placed in a heterosexual dating center, desperately seeks a way to reunite with her frozen partner as the years pass.

The power unleashed during the Ascendance, lingers. After defeating the Revenant, Monty realizes Simon’s blood has been poisoned—tainted. Simon is slowly transforming. His body is harnessing dark magic in ways thought unimaginable. Now, Monty is faced with the hardest choice. Let the poison run its course, transforming Simon into a dark immortal, increasing his power, but drawing the attention of those who would want him dead, or allow Simon to take the blood lessons, risking his friend’s life? Can Monty help Simon before he’s too far gone or will Simon become an unstoppable threat?

James Casper is one of the good guys. A DEA agent. A loyal husband. With his sights set on the man at the top of the city’s opioid crisis, James is about to make the biggest bust of his career. Then his beloved wife Rosie does something terrible, and James must choose: Report it - or help her. He knows how this works, and he tells himself he’s smart enough to get away with murder. But James’ worst enemy knows what they have done - and he won’t hesitate to use it to manipulate him.

After his brother, Damon Salvatore, betrays him in New Orleans, Stefan starts over in Manhattan. Vowing never to harm another human, he roams the streets, trying to disappear into the city’s chaos. But just when he thinks he’s left his past behind, Stefan discovers that he can never escape his brother. Damon has grand plans for the vampire Salvatore brothers - whether Stefan likes it or not. Together, they take New York by storm. When their exploits end up on the society pages, an old enemy resurfaces - one hell-bent on revenge.

It's been eighty years since Thorn split his people into six societies spread across the galaxy. He's known all that time a timeline shift was coming, and the role he needed to play when it did. The mages of his world are ready, including his great-great nephew, Bud. For Bud, living in the shadow of his legend relative hasn't really been an issue, and his role in the timeline shift is supposed to be minor. But Kali has an agenda, magic has its own agenda, and since Thorn is old, and tired of his people's reliance on him, he too has an agenda.

While in London, Peaches, Simon’s faithful hellhound manages to grow to the size of a small bus, shocking Monty & Simon with his new transformation. Realizing the danger of a Peaches XL, the Montague & Strong Detective Agency take steps to control these growth spurts. They acquire a special collar to regulate the size shifts, but it’s not working. The situation is growing out of control…literally.

We know you are here, our brothers and sisters...Pressia barely remembers the Detonations or much about life during the Before. In her sleeping cabinet behind the rubble of an old barbershop where she lives with her grandfather, she thinks about what is lost - how the world went from amusement parks, movie theaters, birthday parties, fathers and mothers...to ash and dust, scars, permanent burns, and fused, damaged bodies. And now, at an age when everyone is required to turn themselves over to the militia, Pressia can no longer pretend to be small.

Since the apocalypse began, Bain Lee has survived with a class that should never have been intended for combat. Using his ability to see into the true nature of the System, he has turned the ocularist class into a powerhouse on the battlefield. His time on this new Earth has changed him, transformed him into what he was always meant to be: A leader among humanity, a general among all sentient species.

T. R. Westwood, distinguished professor of biology and the galaxy's greatest hunter, is in for the biggest challenge of his career. When an unknown animal starts killing off settlers on a backwater planet run on coal and steam power, he's the only person who can help stop the slaughter. Rocks and spears or shotguns and cannons, he'll use whatever is allowed to get the job done.

Ethan Wate used to think of Gatlin as a place where nothing ever changed. Then he met mysterious newcomer Lena Duchannes, who revealed a secret world that had been hidden in plain sight all along. A Gatlin that harbored ancient secrets. A Gatlin where a curse has marked Lena's family of powerful Supernaturals for generations. A Gatlin where impossible, magical, life-altering events happen. Sometimes life-ending. Together they can face anything Gatlin throws at them, but after suffering a tragic loss, Lena starts to pull away, keeping secrets that test their relationship.

When aliens abduct New York City, carrying it into space inside a huge dome, the citizens trapped inside must find out why, what they can do to save themselves and to save the dozens of other cities which the aliens have stolen from other planets.