Showing results by narrator "Scott Smith" in All Categories

The gathering was supposed to have been a perfunctory media exercise on retiring Senator Jackson Ridge's last day in office. When a grieving mother slips in and poses that simple question, though, everything from Ridge's own legacy to American interests in Afghanistan all get called into question. Racing against a ticking clock and powerful figures that would prefer to keep things happening across the globe a secret, Ridge must call on every last favor he has accumulated over the course of his time in office in search of answers.

Back in the old days, when a witch deserted his coven, the coven sought revenge. Jacob Mallory knew the stories, but he left Shadow Marbas anyway. After a disagreement between Cult of Lucifuge and Temple Apophis leaves Jacob defenseless and he discovers Marbas' remnants of a curse, he seeks protection from Lucifer's Haven. Shadow Marbas, however, won't be denied. Either Jacob is theirs, or he dies. There is no in-between.

The Lucifer's Haven elders took in newcomer Connie Hudson the day she arrived. But the mentor assigned her, Jason, senses something off about the demur 20-something blond from Boston. As if her bizarre behavior and strange questions aren't enough, none of The Haven's younger members can find any trace of the mysterious newcomer's former life. When one of them is found face down in a river, and Jason thinks he has Connie figured out, the coven is approached by Lucifer to take on a perilous task.

Temple Apophis: a coven full of obnoxious trouble-makers hell bent on provoking the ire of witches across three counties. Among Apophis' membership is the quiet, sweet Belinda Applegate, a stark contrast to the company she keeps. When the head of Apophis asks Belinda to channel an ancient Daemon, and the Daemon decides he needs Belinda to complete a task for him, she finds herself in over her head.

As the city that produces the most selium - that precious gas that elevates airships and powers strange magic - Hond Steading is a jewel worth stealing. To shore up the city's defenses, Detan promises his aunt that he'll recover Nouli, the infamous engineer who built the century gates that protect the imperial capital of Valathea. But Nouli is imprisoned on the Remnant Isles, an impervious island prison run by the empire, and it's Detan's fault.

Forged in the fires of conflict, the Iron Kingdoms is a fantastic realm where the combined power of magic and technology thunders across a landscape shaped by war. Dominating the field of battle are rare individuals who have mastered both arcane and martial combat and who boldly lead mighty armies in the ongoing struggle to claim victory over these ancient lands. In the Undercity of Corvis, where mercenaries and criminals blur the lines between them, a ruthless crime lord has made a bold move to establish a stranglehold on Corvis’ underworld and make it his own.

Exiled from the Smoky Mountains for gunning down a man in self-defense, Breck Wallace tries to make a new home in St. Louis, even tries his hand at romance, but some men are too wild to settle down. Breck is soon back on the trail, where a vicious gang of trappers, after his goods, picks up his scent and begins to dog his every step, until Breck’s only choice is to bed down for the winter with a tribe of friendly Indians. In the frigid, brutal cold of a Rocky Mountain winter, he hopes to find peace...but death is not done with Breck Wallace.

Several baronies have disappeared, as if swallowed by the Earth. Strange disturbances lead Kane and the others to a giant sinkhole in a remote and wild area of Mexico, where reality merges with an ancient culture of sorcery. Here, a beautiful, mysterious guerilla leader wages war against a terrifying army of demons spiriting humans into the subterranean netherworld. Joining the fight, the Cerberus rebels invade the cavernous chambers of a hidden world, and confront a self-styled warlord using predark nuclear tech to rule the depths of the planet.

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.

Eighteen months ago, Detective Reed Mattox didn’t just lose his partner, the woman he met on his first day at the police academy and worked with for the entirety of his career thereafter. He lost his confidante. His sounding board. His support system. His best friend. Victim to a senseless shooting during a routine traffic stop, the details of that night are still as elusive to Reed as they were more than a year before.

A new anthology celebrating the witches and sorcerers of epic fantasy—featuring stories by George R. R. Martin, Scott Lynch, Megan Lindholm, and many others! Hot on the heels of Gardner Dozois’s acclaimed anthology The Book of Swords comes this companion volume devoted to magic. How could it...

Catherine Clarke defied her family's expectations when she married Gabriel, a handsome Lebanese businessman. After moving to Gabriel's homeland and welcoming a baby daughter, Catherine knew she had to acclimate herself to the strange new world. Yet both her husband and her surroundings became more volatile and threatening than she could have ever imagined. When Gabriel forbids her to return to the States, Catherine devises a plan to deceive him, but she vastly underestimates how far he will go to punish her.

Entrepreneurs must learn to be the masters of their tools and practices, instead of religious followers of them. They need to learn how to build, explore, and preserve empathic connections to the people they intend to serve with their solutions. The Lean Startup brings up interesting perspectives to optimize the development process. Those productivity-driven assets will be incredibly helpful, as long as entrepreneurs are building something relevant to the people they are aiming to serve. Service design, with its human-centrism, opens crucial empathetic windows.

21st Century Paradigm Shift: What It Is and How to Thrive In It is about economics, philosophy and so much more. In her new book, Carol E. Leutner traces the history of how 300+ years of Newtonian-based science has framed our perception of reality. She then proposes that the new field of quantum physics contains the building blocks for a revised method of perceiving reality suitable to the his¬torical challenges we face. Carol drills down to challenge listeners on how a revised worldview might impact economic thought and behavior.

When Broker Assistant Kathy Jenkins overhears a suspicious conversation between her boss and an unknown person, she's thrust into a dangerous situation, leading to her wrongful termination. Hiring Scott Winslow, Kathy aims to expose the wrongdoing, while Lee Henry's unconventional investigation uncovers a network of seasoned brokers dealing in non-public information without a paper trail.

Opposites attract, and Chad and Sierra are that. Chad is destroyed on the outside by a suicide bomber, while Sierra is damaged on the inside by human trafficking. They are each other’s reflection of who they are. Beautiful yet damaged by life.

Hope This Finds You is a collection of letters from a friend, journeying your wild and precious life beside you. Here are the memories, the celebrations, and the joy and ache of living, threaded through glimpses of extraordinary-ordinary daily life. It’s a small gift of gratitude to a life filled with light and mystery, possible and promise.

An IED blew up more than Marc North's career as a Cobra pilot: it shattered his plans for marriage. After being dumped by his girlfriend and spending more than a year in rehab, all he wants is to fly again. He jumps at the chance to partner with a combat buddy in a helicopter sightseeing business.

When Reed Mattox and his K-9 partner, Billie, received a direct summons to the personal residence of Governor Thomas Cowan, he assumed it was another escalation over the particulars of their new position as liaisons between the Columbus Police Department and the state Bureau of Criminal Investigations.

In a chaotic blast of gunfire, the James Gang fled a posse's attack—and the infamous Jesse threw his cousin Jeston Nash a hoard of stolen cash. But dodging the law with thirty thousand dollars in a dusty carpetbag is a risky proposition. Hoping to lie low in the mountains of the Northwest, Jeston and his partner, Quiet Jack, find themselves on a journey into the dark heart of human nature—and deadly animal instinct....