Showing results by narrator "Chelsea Stephens" in All Categories

She fled her violent world in Italy and made a life for herself in L.A. under a new name. But then...They found her. And took away everything she loved. Now she has only one thing left to live for...Making them pay....

When Citaria falls under the shadow of a demonic incursion, only a legendary hero can stop them. For Karian Vanador, though, being resurrected comes with a price. Not only is she in a different time and place, but the world has changed in her absence, and she must face the dark demons of her past once again.

Callypso Lillis is a siren with a very big problem, one that stretches up her arm and far into her past. For the last seven years she’s been collecting a bracelet of black beads up her wrist, magical IOUs for favors she’s received. Only death or repayment will fulfill the obligations. Only then will the beads disappear. Everyone knows that if you need a favor, you go to the Bargainer. He’s a man who can get you anything you want … at a price. And everyone knows that sooner or later he always collects. But for one client, he’s never asked for repayment. Not until now.

Nineteen years ago, I was plucked from the heart of a bloody massacre that spared nobody else. Small. Fragile. An enigma. Now ward to a powerful High Master who knows too much and says too little, I lead a simple life, never straying from the confines of an imaginary line I've drawn around the castle grounds.

The conflict between Citaria and Mehr’Durillia has begun. Gone are the days of subtlety and subterfuge, giving way to the rising tide of war. As the Silver Blades and their allies lay plans to fight the war on enemy soil rather than at home, new allies and enemies rise to the surface. An ancient evil stirs from its ages-old slumber. A once-peaceful empire threatens from the West as an undead uprising begins.

When magic returns to Gloamington, the town holds a Spring Awakening Festival. It should be an opportunity to celebrate. Instead, it becomes the perfect stage for murder. When the mayor is found dead at the festival, Malcolm Fawkes and Ella Bloom find themselves hunting a killer among the celebrating crowd. The sheriff calls it an accident but the great detective knows better.

When free-spirited artist Sienna Fisher is mistaken for an intern at a New York luxury goods empire, the last thing she expects is for the CEO to be aloof English art curator Jasmine Gemayel. Years ago in London, Jasmine shredded Sienna's art and mocked her for knowing nothing of life, setting her on a path to wander the world. Now Sienna has a second chance to impress Jasmine, and she's not about to waste it. Even if it means becoming an intern at age thirty-four and trying to win an in-house design competition, all to dazzle the woman who changed her life . . . and doesn't even remember her.

Hot on the heels of her 2018 This Is Horror Award–winning short story collection Spectral Evidence, critically horror author Gemma Files compiles fifteen more of her most startling recent nightmares—a creepily seductive downward spiral of dark poetry and existential dread, entirely suitable to the slow apocalypse going on all around us. So take your mind off your troubles and send it somewhere the rules still operate, if only to punish those who violate them.

Astoria Tempest has lived countless lives, but none that truly belonged to her. Cursed with immortality and the ability to return the dead, she's spent over a century fleeing grief, guilt, and the trail of second chances she never had the right to give. But when she bargains her husband's soul to save their daughter, the scales tip too far and Death comes to collect all she's stolen. Except Death isn't a shadow or a scythe. He's a man with cold eyes, a sharper tongue, and a ledger of names with hers at the top.

Despite her success setting a self-supported Fastest Known Time record on the Pacific Crest Trail in 2013, Heather “Anish” Anderson still had such deep-seated insecurities that she became convinced her feat had been a fluke. So two years later she set out again, this time hiking through mud, rocks, and mountain blazes to crush her constant self-doubt and seek the true source of her strength and purpose. The 2,189 miles of the Appalachian Trail, from Maine to Georgia, did not make it easy.

When Ella accepts a mysterious job in the picturesque town of Gloamington, all she wants is six weeks of peace and a place to call home. Instead, she finds herself assistant to Malcolm Fawkes, a renowned paranormal detective with no memory of hiring her—or much of anything else.

I was five when the dragons first appeared...and the lights went out for good. Now, 18 years after the cataclysmic appearance of the four great dragons over Mount Fuji, humanity shares a shattered Earth with the Fey - fairies, elves, and other supernatural creatures. Trust is short, magic is common, and each day is a struggle for survival in the Awakened World of 2053. I'm Angie Ritter, a former army mage who can't cast spells anymore. I have some issues. I'm working on them.

The arrival of the Malor spacecraft proved, once and for all, that humanity is not alone in the universe...the path of destruction it left behind showed that aliens are not always friendly. Remaining on Earth, Sydney and Brian must now face the aftermath of the Malor invasion. When a mysterious stranger shows up on Sydney's doorstep in the middle of the night, she's drawn into an urgent mystery: There has been a massive increase in alien abductions around the globe, despite the breakdown of Malor technology - and someone powerful is trying to keep it quiet.

It’s not in my nature to beg, but I’ll stay on my knees until I feel that flame sputter out. And then … I’ll rip the world to shreds. I’ve tumbled into a darkness so deep it’s hard to see the light, my petals curling inward as I tip my face from the sun. Hide from my monstrous actions. Traitor. Murderer. High Mistress. My mistakes hunt me down, and I’m pulled into a political tug-of-war, balancing Ocruth’s welfare on the edge of a bloody blade. The moon is swelling, the weight on my shoulders is compacting, and my unfailing curiosity keeps weaving its roots in the wrong direction.

Problems just keep piling up for Nicolette ‘Nic’ Saracini. The biggest? Her best friend Will is getting married, which is fine except it means the end of an era. Since childhood the two have been inseparable, sharing the same tastes in music, movies, and, most importantly, women. The two have been wingmanning each other for the better part of a decade. From highschool prom, to frat parties in college, to smoky dive bars in adulthood, the two have been helping each other score for as long either of them can remember. But weddings have always been their favorite hunting ground.

In the beginning, there was darkness. Before he met Callie, before he became the Bargainer, there was Desmond Flynn, the bastard son of a scribe. A boy born to a weak mother, cursed with little magic, and destined to marry a slave. But fate had something else in mind. From the barren caves of Arestys to the palace of Somnia to the streets of earth, this is how Desmond Flynn, a fairy who began with nothing, became the Emperor of Evening Stars.

The war for Mehr’Durillia has begun. With the Council of Anthraxis shattered, only four kings remain to counter the collective armies of Mehr’Durillia’s six sister worlds. But three of these are by far the worst of the lot: the eldest, most destructive kings, the very architects of the destruction of a deity and the enslavement of multiple worlds. There is little doubt that they will fight to the bitter end and cast every life they can into the maw of war before they admit defeat.

For Callypso Lillis, the fae magic that now runs through her veins is equal parts curse and good fortune. While it bonds her to Desmond Flynn, her soul mate and the King of Night, it also leaves her newly vulnerable to the Thief of Souls, who wants to break the Otherworld … and Callie along with it. But it’s not just the Thief whose shadow looms over the fae realms. Des’s father, the previous King of Night, has returned from the dead, and he wants revenge on the son who sent him to the grave in the first place.

Siren Callypso Lillis still wears the physical reminders of her time as Karnon’s captive, even after reuniting with soulmate Desmond Flynn, the King of Night. Not only that, but mounting evidence suggests the Thief of Souls, the being responsible for the disappearance of countless fae warriors, is still out there. Invited to an annual Solstice celebration, Callie and Des journey to the Kingdom of Flora to continue their investigation. But under the bright lights and striking blooms of the realm, new complications arise, ones that no amount of bargaining can undo.

In his Locus review of Two Worlds and in Between - the first volume of The Best of Caitlín R. Kiernan - Gary K. Wolfe wrote, “...it makes you wish the second volume were here now.” Well, the long wait is over. This second volume completes this ambitious undertaking, collecting the finest of Kiernan’s stories from 2004 to 2012, selected by the author herself. The book includes 25 short stories and one poem, plus the short novel Black Helicopters - more than 200,000 words of fiction, including the World Fantasy Award-winning “The Prayer of 90 Cats”.