Urban Alchemy

Best-selling author Pedram Shojai, “The Urban Monk”, presents a comprehensive guide on how Taoist alchemical practices can help you release stress, harness life force energy, and awaken your true self.

Mattie, an intelligent automaton skilled in the use of alchemy, finds herself caught in the middle of a conflict between gargoyles, the Mechanics, and the Alchemists. With the old order quickly giving way to the new, Mattie discovers powerful and dangerous secrets - secrets that can completely alter the balance of power in the city of Ayona. This doesn't sit well with Loharri, the Mechanic who created Mattie and still has the key to her heart - literally.

All Ben Vecchio wanted was a quiet summer before his last semester of university. All Tenzin wanted was a cache of priceless medieval coins that had been missing for several hundred years. And some company. Phrases like "never again" don't mean much when you've been a vampire for several thousand years, and promises made in the heat of anger don't always outweigh the lure of gold.

What do you do when you follow a strange girl through a wall into a world where alchemy is real? You move in with her cousin, become a magic barista, and try your hand at higher education one more time. Only instead of biochemistry and physics, you're taking elixirs and searching the school grounds for secret chambers and long-lost spells. How do you go from someone who was never supposed to wind up here in the first place to becoming the greatest alchemist that ever lived?

But when your enemies try to reveal your big secret, that you were a mundane man from the mundane world, do you think you could not only stop them, but win the day and come out of it all stronger and smarter? You could...if you were the King of Alchemy.

Devon Sanders, a private investigator and deputy headmaster of a paranormal school, has proven himself to be a formidable wizard. When magic becomes unbalanced, however, chaos ensues. A new enemy threatens to tear the paranormal world apart, so Devon will have to turn to the past for answers. The school is in danger again, and things are not as they appear. Secrets, betrayal, and danger are par for the course for Devon and his friends, but this time, magic cannot be trusted.

I was starting to think I knew what I was dealing with here at the university best known as Villain Academy. Not so much. But can I really trust a shocking revelation from someone who's proven to be my enemy? There's no way to answer that without diving in. If my mother is still out there alive, I have to uncover the truth. Even if it means putting myself back in the hands of the mages who've betrayed me before.

Veranix Calbert is the Thorn - the street vigilante who became a legend to the people of Maradaine, especially the gangs that run the neighborhood of Aventil. The Thorn continues to harass Willem Fenmere, the drug kingpin of the Dentonhill neighborhood. Veranix is still determined to stop Fenmere and the effitte drug trade, especially when he discovers that Fenmere is planning on using the Red Rabbits gang to bring the drug into Aventil. But it’s also Exam Week at the University of Maradaine, where Veranix is a magic student.

After winning the Civil War against the Confederate Wielders, the Union Machinists have outlawed magic to usher in a new age of steam-powered technology. Diah, an alchemist and the only non-wielder in his family, owes his brother for saving his life in the war; so when Cager is blackmailed into procuring the magical hide of the White Buffalo, Diah accompanies him to the Dakota territory.

Alchemist Amelia Rimos has just discovered the cure for the undead. Being naive and vulnerable, she does not realize the undead have their targets set on her. Happening upon a tall, dark, exotic man named Michel Gauthier, he saves her from becoming a victim, thrusting her into a game of cat and mouse. Amelia realizes being an alchemist is not in her best interest when she befriends him. Is Michel as sincere as he seems, or does he have an ulterior motive?

Vesta has just become confident of her newfound abilities within the tarot when a strange new world of alchemy confronts her. Peter has been kidnapped from Chartres Cathedral and her InSight failed to alert her. He is willing to die rather than reveal the formula for immortality. Now she must race to find him before he's murdered setting cataclysmic events into motion. Is the Red King her friend or foe? And what is the secret night chant of the violin's forest? Answers to both will steer her destiny and the fate of humanity.

It's been a year since Hazel's older sister was murdered by the killer the newspapers dubbed Jack the Ripper. And she's tired. Tired of watching her brilliant father lose his inspiration for tinkering. Tired of her family withdrawing from hunting, even as she takes on the family legacy. And she's tired of being the Harker, a legendary vampire hunter. Worse, not only is she battling vampires nightly, she's also fighting against societal norms that label her an old maid and improper, and very nearly led her to be hospitalized for mania.

Eighteen-year-old Brynn Taylor eagerly heads for college, ready to escape the aunt and uncle, who resented being saddled with their orphaned niece. Her excitement to be on her own quickly turns to dismay. With nowhere else to turn, Brynn reluctantly accepts her newfound Aunt Nora’s offer for temporary room and board in Wisconsin. Rumors abound, and Brynn fears her aunt might be a witch—and that Brynn herself might share this unexpected family legacy. Are the goods made from Nora’s garden—the ones she sells in her gift shop—more than herbal remedies and homemade bath products?

The Nazis have unleashed occult forces throughout Europe and the Allies are forced to recruit and employ wizards to counter their attacks. Among them is the battle weary spy, Isabella George, a Gray Tower dropout trained in Alchemy.