Showing results by narrator "Paul Dateh" in All Categories

Bloomsbury presents If Something Happens to Me by Alex Finlay, read by John Pirhalla, Paul Dateh and Helen Laser. From the critically acclaimed author of Every Last Fear and The Night Shift, a gripping thriller about one young man's search for the truth after an inexplicable crime leaves his...

Yoshio is thirty years old, and his life is a mess. A shut-in living with his parents, he has no job, no relationship, and no prospects. When he receives a new sim computer game that boasts characters created with a new kind of A.I., he doesn't think much of it--until he gets drawn into a fantasy world so vibrant and lifelike that its residents can't just be game characters. Suddenly finding himself the benevolent god of a scrappy fantasy village is a lot for Yoshio to handle, but it might be the key to the change he is desperate for.

It all started with a livestream on a bottom-tier YouTube prophecy channel. The message was simple—the world is ending. Was it true or a hoax? No one knew. But then people began to see strange things that no one else could, and as belief in the prophecy spread, so too did a creeping madness. Convinced the end was near, people began to act.

A high school boy finds the diary of his classmate--only to discover that she's dying. Yamauchi Sakura has been silently suffering from a pancreatic disease, and now exactly one person outside her family knows. He swears to her that he won't tell anyone what he learned, and the shared secret brings them closer together in this deeply moving, first-person story that traces their developing relationship in Sakura's final months of life.

THE FATED REUNION It is now year 22 of the Heisei era (2010 AD). As foretold long ago by the demon of Farsight, Magatsume has come to be revered as a savior by the demons who've lost their place in the modernized world. To everyone's surprise, Jinya enrolls as a student at Modori River High...

Five high school classmates hold secrets close to their hearts--hidden talents, unspoken feelings, and buried pain. As they collide with each other on the path to growing up, they might jostle some of those secrets free. From Yoru Sumino, acclaimed author of I Want to Eat Your Pancreas and I Had That Same Dream Again comes a gentle, intriguing tale about love, life, and the things we leave unsaid.

For generations, a shrine has stood in the mountain village of Kadono, and for each generation the shrine has had an Itsukihime--its shrine maiden--and the maiden has had her guardian. During the Edo period, a young man named Jinta protects the town and the Itsukihime. When he confronts a strange demon in the nearby forest, it tells him that in the distant future a Demon God will threaten all people, everywhere, and it claims that the Demon God's rise to power springs from this very time and place, in the village of Kadono.

Yoshio was a thirty-year-old unemployed shut-in when a mysterious village-building sim, The Village of Fate, showed up at his door. Through watching and caring for the game's intensely realistic NPCs, Yoshio has started getting his life back on track--getting a job to pay for microtransactions, and using the villagers' care for each other as inspiration to reconnect with his family. But despite overcoming the first challenges thrown at him, more complicated issues, both in and out of the game, are closing in. And are the game's monstrous enemies controlled by real humans, too?

OLD FACES IN FAMILIAR PLACES Less than a year remains until the advent of the Demon God, and Jinya is enjoying high school life with Miyaka and his other new friends. Like his classmates, his days are filled with school bells, outings with friends, and study woes, but unlike them, he is...

Edo, the winter of 1856. The city is abuzz over a liquor known as Snow's Memory. The craze sparks an incident, and demon hunter Jinya finds himself embroiled in intoxicating affairs. Amid the intrigue and rumor, he uncovers signs that point to his long-lost younger sister. But does Jinya want to find her, when their future looms and their past is inescapable?

The game is over for Yoshio. His villagers are gone, all dead as far as he can tell. But just as he is overcome with despair, one final gift arrives from the Village of Fate--a package containing the NPC Carol, and she's clearly a real, live girl. With Carol in tow, Yoshio leaves the safety of his home to travel to Hokkaido, where the developers are located. He will uncover the truth of this mysterious game once and for all!

Ryousuke Nanasaki married his husband in 2016 in the first religiously recognized same-sex wedding in Japanese history. This collection of essays follows Ryousuke's search for love on the journey to his extraordinary marriage. From unrequited junior high crushes to awkward dating sites to finally finding a community, Ryousuke's heartfelt reflections on his coming-of-age as a young gay man in Hokkaido will touch listeners all over the world.

Jinta's path is set: in one hundred and seventy years, he will face the Demon God and attempt to prevent a catastrophe. He has changed his name to Jinya and left his adopted home behind. It is the Bakumatsu period, and the city of Edo is bristling with unease. As a demon hunter in the city, Jinya encounters a warrior in search of his missing brother and finds demons hiding among the people. Among these meetings and partings, he seeks a reason to wield his blade.

The year is Showa 34 (1959 AD). Rising from the ashes of the great war, Tokyo is rebuilding and changing rapidly all around Jinya. As the demon hunter searches for his place in this new world, a rumor reaches his ear--a prostitute with a flower name reminiscent of Magatsume's daughters is working in the Dove District, a flourishing red-light district of downtown Tokyo. But when Jinya goes to investigate, he gets caught up in a strange case that is more than he bargained for.

In year 21 of the Heisei era (2009 AD), Jinya returns to his hometown Kadono. Only a year remains until the foretold arrival of the Demon God—his sister, Suzune. To prepare for their fated confrontation, Jinya enrolls in the high school located on the former grounds of the Itsukihime shrine, and among his classmates is the Itsukihime of the Heisei era, Himekawa Miyaka. And if finding his place in this old-yet-new environment isn't enough to keep him busy, Jinya finds himself discovering not only what new dangers the night holds, but the final secret of the Yatonomori Kaneomi blades as well.

With his allies by his side, Jinya manages to bring an end to Nagumo Eizen's schemes. But while the lives of those dear to him are safe, the demonic sword he sought, Demon Wail, is taken by Yonabari amid the chaos. Yonabari is secretly after a power hidden in the blade—a power with deep ties to Jinya's memory of Kadono... Is the sword lost to Jinya forever? And as the sun sets on the Taisho era, can Jinya hold those dear to him close despite the march of time?

A mysterious videotape warns that the viewer will die in one week unless a certain, unspecified act is performed. Exactly one week after watching the tape, four teenagers die one after another of heart failure. Asakawa, a hardworking journalist, is intrigued by his niece's inexplicable death. His investigation leads him from a metropolitan Tokyo teeming with modern society's fears to a rural Japan—a mountain resort, a volcanic island, and a countryside clinic—haunted by the past.

It's been 39 years since Jinya's defeat at the hands of Magatsume. Time marches on, the world continues to change, and friends and enemies alike continue to slip in and out of Jinya's life, but his determination to gain strength and fight evil continues to grow. As tensions between Jinya and the Nagumo family come to a head, Jinya and Somegorou make their way to rescue Kimiko and Ryuuna. 

AN UNLIKELY PACT It is year two of the Bunkyu era. Six years have passed since the alcohol craze that stole yet more loved ones from Jinya's life, but as time marches forward, so must he. The new era keeps Edo on edge as the anti-shogunate movement gains momentum with each passing day. Meanwhile...

It's 1872, year five of the Meiji era, and the world is rapidly changing, long leaving the samurai behind--but some things aren't content to remain a memory of the past. Now in Kyoto with his daughter Nomari, Jinya runs a soba restaurant by day and patrols the streets at night hunting demons, which have strangely been increasing in number.