Showing results by narrator "Eric James" in All Categories

Sam'l Flintlock has been hired to protect an innocent man who narrowly escaped the noose but everyone still seems to want dead. The murder of a school teacher sets in motion a battle to the death that pits Flintlock against the hidden man who pulls the strings in the town of Open Sky. But first Flintlock must find out who that man is, what he wants and why. As people start dying, the pieces start to fall together and Flintlock knows that for every evil deed there must be a reckoning....and Flintlock is that reckoning.

Once, Orion and I were lovers. Then, the gorgeous demon king broke my heart. He kicked me out of the City of Thorns, exiling me to the mortal world. Now, I have plans to get back at him—and save the world while I'm at it. Orion wants revenge on all the mortals. If I steal his crown, I can stop the bloodshed. All I have to do is beat him in a series of trials, proving that the gods chose me as queen.

Bizarre murders are taking place in a fertile farming community, and the locals are quick to point fingers at Ryan and his companions. But they know another culprit is responsible. A colony of mutants has been driven from its underground home, forced to find sustenance in the light of day. And only human flesh will satisfy their hunger. Caught between a rock and a horde of hungry cannibals, Ryan and the companions face an ultimatum — help the cannies reclaim their territory, or risk becoming the next meal.

It’s high-stakes, win-or-die football action in the far future, as aliens and humans fill positions based on physiology and leave their blood, sweat, and tears on gridirons across the galaxy. Last season, 19-year-old rookie quarterback Quentin Barnes overcame his racism and unified his team. He led the Ionath Krakens to a lower-tier championship, a championship that earns them promotion into the meat grinder known as “Tier One”. Now, he and the Krakens have to compete against the greatest football teams ever assembled and do far more than just survive each game.

It was there for the taking: $75,000 in gold bullion, the combined payrolls of the three productive gold mines, just waiting to be stolen from under the noses of a bickering sheriff and city marshal. Billy Ray Gilmore and his band of kill-crazy outlaws have a plan to do it, too.... That is, until Sixkiller comes to town. Hiding his badge to conceal his identity as a US Marshal, Sixkiller goes undercover to smoke out the culprits before they strike.

Notes from the author: The following is a short story I wrote in the Elantris world back in January of 2006. There were always a few holes in Elantris where I decided not to include viewpoints or sections of explanation in the name of streamlining, particularly at the end. In the back of my mind, I knew what happened. This story talks about one of those holes; it is meant to be heard after you’ve finished the novel and takes place during the events of the climax.

They're hanging Bobby Lee Cabot in Cloverdale, Nevada on Friday. Or so they think. Thursday brings Smoke Jensen to town. In another life, Bobby Lee was almost kin to Smoke, and guilty or not, Smoke will blast Cloverdale sky high if that's what it takes to set his old friend free. By midnight, Smoke and Billy Ray are riding hell-for-leather out of Cloverdale, and into a war between cunning railroad robbers and the organization sworn to stop them. Bobby Lee was working for the railroads until he was betrayed. Now, both men are pursued by deadly enemies on either side of the law.

After a lifetime of robbing banks and holding up trains, Jimmy “Slash” Braddock, and Melvin “Pecos Kid” Baker are ready to call it quits — though not completely by choice. Sold out by their old gang, Slash and Pecos have to bust out of jail and pull one last job to finance their early retirement....

The Birthday Children fought for survival against the elements, jungle wildlife, the “Grownups” who created them...and, as evil corrupted their numbers, even against themselves. With these opponents finally defeated, Em and her people realized that more threats were coming, traveling from across the universe to lay claim to their planet. The Birthday Children have prepared as best they can against this alien armada. Now, as the first ships reach orbit around Omeyocan, the final battle for the planet begins.

After decoding an ancient scroll — one that purports to pinpoint the treasure of the Jewish Temple, lost for 2,000 years — archaeologist Annja Creed agrees to lead the party to recover the find in Judea. It’s a perilous desert journey through sandstorms and bandits, and complicated by mysterious sabotage within the group, to arrive at a long-forgotten fortress deep beneath a mountain.

Amid top-level peace talks between the Low Kingdoms and Outremer, the streets of Haven are ravaged by a new drug, which brings out the vicious animal instincts of its victims. The distributors always seem to be one step ahead of the City Guard force. Someone may be revealing the Guards' plans. Could Isobel Fisher be the informant? Hawk and Fisher are pulled apart by circumstance as a political truce is threatened and the death toll climbs.

Esmay Suiza wasn't a member of a great Navy family like the Serranos. She'd had to make her way on grit alone, which meant it wasn't likely she'd ever make admiral and "hoist her own flag." Well, that was fine with her: all Esmay wanted was a secure berth where she could be part of something greater than herself, and otherwise just live her life in peace.

On the coast of what used to be Maine, the group's armorer, J.B. Dix, lies dying from a gunshot wound. Having no other choice, Ryan makes a deal with a local baron and his strangely beautiful wife. J.B. will get the surgery he needs when Ryan and crew rescue the couple's daughter, abducted by slavers. But the cold, deep Atlantic waters harbor predark secrets, including the terrifying specter of a USSR nuclear submarine...and its descendants.

John Rourke knows that there are six people left on Earth - his loved ones. After five centuries of sleep, they wake to discover a world unlike the one they knew...and they are not alone. New and old enemies live to kill and kill to live. It could be the ultimate test of Rourke's skills as The Survivalist.

World War III and its aftermath of all-consuming fire left civilization on the brink of extinction. But John Thomas Rourke, the ex-CIA Covert Operations Officer, weapons specialist, and survival expert — still lives, fighting the elements and the odds. And those odds have never been more heavily stacked against Rourke than when he finds his son mortally wounded and Natalia and all of his family kidnapped by a Russian foe, long thought dead.

Colter Farrow was just a skinny cow-puncher when the men came to Sapinero Valley and murdered his best friend, whose past as a gunfighter had caught up with him. Now, Cole must strap on his Remington revolver, deliver some justice, and make a reputation of his own.

Heading west to San Diego some honest pilgrims paid 10 men good money to keep their wagon train safe. Soon word comes to Tombstone, where Matt Bodine and Sam Two Wolves are wearing out their welcome gambling with Wyatt Earp. The wagon train’s guards turned against their charges and headed off to Mexico with six young pioneer girls captive. Everyone knows the tortures of the damned that await the girls in the hellholes south of the border. But only Matt and Sam will do something about it.

While most folks are busy preparing for Christmas, the tightknit Jensen clan can only hope they’ll make it home. Luke Jensen is in San Antonio tracking down a dangerous outlaw. But when he finds the man leading a wholesome life — as a charity-working Hill Country pastor — Luke agrees to wait until after Christmas to bring him to justice.

For Smoke and his daughter Denny, life on the Sugarloaf Ranch is more valuable than all the gold in the world. Which works out fine, since all the gold mines in Big Rock were squeezed dry years ago. Even so, that won’t stop a pair of businessmen from the East from trying to squeeze out a little more. One of them has developed a newfangled method for extracting gold—something called “hydraulics”—and they’ve bought up all the old mines to do it. Smoke isn’t sure what to think of. Especially when they hire a small army of gunfighters to protect their mines from sabotage.

All it took was one phone call and TV show host and archaeologist Annja Creed is in mortal danger. Her producer Doug Morrell has been abducted by a greedy treasure hunter who's seeking the lost raubgold, or looted gold of Nazi Germany. The terms are simple: retrieve the bounty and Doug lives. Fail, and he dies....Now Annja and her friends must find a missing German fighter plane that was shot down over the Alps in 1945.