A Kindle best seller. A body plucked from the sea, a call for help, a friend in danger. Three linked events. It can only mean one thing to Matt Durham. He must return to the past, to the duplicity and machinations of others, for they are not done with him. And now he isn't done with them. This is where it will end. For him or his enemies.The Red Dragon stirs. Is it a threat to global stability, or just to the West? The world holds its breath, watches, and waits.Such grand matters of State don’t concern Matt Durham. He has moved into a new house by the coast on Vancouver Island with his partner Grace. Life is comfortable. Life is good. It doesn’t get any better than this.That is until he plucked a woman’s body from the sea. Now it would begin. The discovery prompts a desperate call for help. Not just any call but one from an old foe, now wishing to befriend him for mutually beneficial reasons. Grace told him to ignore the caller. The same person had not so long ago tried to have Matt killed; except there is a life at stake, the life of someone important to him. Compelled to accept the invitation and believing the task at hand to be relatively uncomplicated he all too soon grasps the gravity of the situation and realises he should have known better. Nothing about this past adversary is ever straightforward.Matt is unwittingly plunged into a dark world he doesn’t understand, one of political intrigue and manipulation, bringing him into contact with the widow of a man he killed, a woman he must now deceive. The further he delves, the muddier the waters become and he begins to understand his adversary has involved him in a plot far bigger than he could have imagined, a conspiracy which leads to the heart of the US Administration.Now he must find a way out. But to succeed he must compromise both himself and his ideals by making alliances with people he cannot trust, by deceiving the innocent, and by testing the loyalties of those closest. Matt must call upon all his reserves of strength and courage relying on nothing other than his wit and cunning.He must risk everything to get to the truth; to reach the end game.

One day, not long from now, it becomes almost impossible to murder anyone - 999 times out of a thousand, anyone who is intentionally killed comes back. How? We don't know. But it changes everything: war, crime, daily life. Tony Valdez is a Dispatcher - a licensed, bonded professional whose job is to humanely dispatch those whose circumstances put them in death's crosshairs, so they can have a second chance to avoid the reaper. But when a fellow Dispatcher and former friend is apparently kidnapped, Tony learns that there are some things that are worse than death and that some people are ready to do almost anything to avenge a supposed wrong. It's a race against time for Valdez to find his friend before it's too late...before not even a Dispatcher can save him.

It's 2022 and a left wing authoritarian Progressive Party seizes control of the government. The country spirals into chaos. The money is worthless and the cities are charred ruins after the food riots and epidemics. States are seceding and printing their own money. Mexican armies recapture large areas of the southwest. The nation is paralyzed until, finally, the people take action.The Constitutional Convention of 2022The Whig Party was once the majority party in this country but disintegrated in 1854. That year, in its place, the Republican party was founded. It quickly grew and took the White House in 1860.In 2016, after eight years of health care and immigration debacles, epidemics and lawlessness, the Democrat Party imploded. But from its ruins, a new, authoritarian Progressive Party rapidly rose on a sea of billionaire funding.The Progressive political philosophy was simple: representative democracy is an obsolete and outdated concept from another era. In the modern world, governments should be run by experts and charismatic leaders, not 18th century debating societies. Through clever changes to the voting laws, a few well chosen dossiers supplied by the NSA, and a general amnesty, the Progressives seize control in the election of 2020. They quickly consolidate their power by means of the endless alphabet soup of Federal agencies to which lazy Congresses, over many years, have delegated vast regulatory and rule making authority. Congress, shirking its duty, made itself irrelevant. The new Progressive executive knows this. Overnight, the nation slips into dictatorship.But things do not go well. Laws and policies once hammered out by political compromise are replaced by an endless stream of ill-thought-out central government executive decrees. The economy, now micro-managed from Washington, spirals into depression. The government, struggling to pay its debts and its hordes of EBT clients, prints ever more money to survive.The economy is so weakened that the Chinese decide the time is right to strike. Realizing they will never be repaid, they dump their trillions in Treasury bonds onto the world markets. The dollar collapses. Overnight, the Renminbi becomes the new global reserve currency. America is bankrupt.By 2022, all is chaos. The money is debased. The supply chain for food and fuel shipments grinds to a halt and the riots erupt. The large cities are soon charred ruins. Midwestern states begin seceding and printing their own money, backed by gold. Emboldened Mexican armies recapture large areas of the southwest. Russian and Chinese armies are also on the move. A desperate, enfeebled Federal government begins confiscating gold, silver, anything of value, and scrambles to sell overseas assets to buy foreign exchange. The nation is paralyzed.But when all seems lost, a brave governor in the Midwest organizes the opposition and calls for a Constitutional Convention to smash the Washington leviathan. But the federal beast, though wounded, fights back. Read it while it's still fiction!

If a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it, does it make a sound? When Napoleon crowned himself Emperor, the magnitude of the spectacle was evident to every witness. But did it matter to, let us say, the Siberian farmer who died shortly thereafter, never hearing of the day? This story of Napoleon’s coronation blends philosophy and history to answer the most profound of existential questions.If a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it, does it make a sound? This ancient philosophical question is not typically associated with Napoleon’s Coronation Day. But perhaps it should be. With the twenty-first century now firmly underway, the meaning, purpose, and raison d’être for life has been repeatedly, violently, relentlessly undermined from all sides. It is said today, quite routinely, that our universe has been around for 13 billion years and that, indeed, the sun is just one of billions of stars in our galaxy, and that our galaxy is just one of billions in the universe. Still more, it is said that each one of these innumerable stars has its own set of planets, leaving our Earth as, to put it gently, just one of many. Indeed, as Freud posited, mankind has suffered three cruel blows upon its “naïve self-love” in modern times. The first came from Copernicus, who showed that the Earth was not the center of the universe, but rather “only a tiny speck in a world-system of a magnitude hardly conceivable.” The second came from Darwin, who theorized that the human species did not have the “peculiar privilege” of having been specially created, but had instead descended from “the animal world.” And the third insufferable blow, Freud proudly stated, had come from himself and his theory that man is not even “master of his own house,” and must live in ignorance of the powerful unconscious forces that motivate his everyday actions. With this backdrop in mind, the Coronation of Napoleon I, the grandest day Europe has ever known, begins to seem trivial and insignificant. It is naturally presumed that a day of such fanfare, jubilation, pomp, and historical importance is, in fact, an inherently special day. But, if Coronation Day were to be put under a microscope, we might find the moment robbed of its preciousness, aimless rather than select. The Eiffel Tower, the Musée du Louvre, and the epithet “City of Love,” all seem forever inseparable from Paris itself. But perhaps this “Paris” is a veneer, behind which is nothing more than a landmass with unimpressive hills, traversed by a meandering river, all resting rather stably atop a vast tectonic plate. In the same manner, it appears God-given that Napoleon Bonaparte was intrinsically greater than other men, and that his title of Emperor of France is as unchallengeable as Newton’s Third Law. But on the other hand, to reference Darwin above, Napoleon is perhaps less a preordained Übermensch than just another “descendant” from the animal kingdom. Immanuel Kant, the greatest philosopher of the German Enlightenment, developed an epistemological theory which speaks to this question. Kant held that the human mind, as it experiences the world, is working actively, tirelessly, to construct meaning from sensory input which is otherwise adrift, purposeless, and nonsensical. The implication here is, of course, that the world does not contain categorical meaning, but that significance only arises when our minds experience this free-floating stimuli and instinctively construct purpose to it. In short, if a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it, it does not make a sound. “The Coronation of Napoleon I,” however, offers an alternative. As it takes its reader through the magnificent day of Napoleon’s Coronation, the short story examines this legendary crowning from a multitude of perspectives. By the end of the tale, one might become persuaded (or perhaps not), that the joyous cries and triumphant music coming from Notre-Dame Cathedral, Paris, on the Second of December, 1804, did, in fact, echo to all corners of the cosmos, even if the mere sounds themselves never extended beyond the city’s borders.

In poetry, four sets of parents of a players on a high school girls team lament their daughters obsession with the sport; they end up with the conclusion that human beings are at their best when working in a group of five! If you have children in athletics, or have had, you need this book big time!Pro Se Productions, the home of the Pro Se Single Shot Signature line of digital singles, announces the first tale in a new author focused digital single imprint. From the Pen of J. Walt Layne features stories by the Author of Pro Se Productions’ Champion City series of books (A Week in Hell, Breathless). Within this imprint, Layne will explore both familiar fields and new grounds of storytelling.In Hard Up! A Tale of Champion City, the first story in J. Walt Layne’s From the Pen of…, a man with no name and a monkey on his back roll into Champion City in the wee hours. There's no rest for a man in trouble with the mob. Personal demons and dead bodies revisit a man hard up and down on his luck.From the Pen of J. Walt Layne. A Pro Se Single Shot Signature writer’s imprint from Pro Se Productions.

Rosy, the elephant bequeathed to young Adrian Rookwhistle by a reprobate relative, turned out to be a handful: not alone because of her size but also because of her fondness for strong drink. To Adrian she represented the chance to get away froma City shop and a suburban lodging by exploiting her theatrical talent and experience. To Rosy their progress towards the gayer South Coast resorts offered undreamed-of opportunities for drink and destruction. So the Monkspepper Hunt is driven to delirium and Lady Fenneltree's stately home reduced to a shambles. In due course the always efficient local constabulary caught up with the pair, whose ensuing trial was a like a triumph of the law and of the author's comic genius. The verdict was--but the story has to be read to be believed, if then. Even though the author does maintain that it is entirely credible, indeed that this, his first novel, is 'an almost true story'.

Special contribution by Nikola Danaylov **** Transhumanist stories about the next future **** We are living exponential times, dominated by disrupting technologies that in a few years will project our world into a revolution with extreme consequences. Have a nice journey into the next future.Special contribution by Nikola Danaylov **** Transhumanist stories about the next future **** According to future studies, the world will be dominated soon by disruptive technologies, able to plunge the world into an era of accelerated progress. Main outcomes will be the achievement of immortality, the creation of smarter than human Artificial Intelligence and the spread of the new species through the universe. The passionate scenarios described in these stories make the reader share the soul of a civilization. Social issues as well as dreams and projects of the digital people are key drivers of the stories. Have a nice journey into the next future.

Whether describing the most beautiful poem ever composed or an invention gone horribly wrong, this title features eight stories that open up a rich, fantastical world of wonder, adventure and cruel twists of fate, where nothing is as it seems. It includes: 'The Magic Paint', 'The Death of Marinese', 'Censorship in Bitinia', and 'Knall'.

A dwarf blacksmith is given the task of creating an amazing weapon meant for a future warrior. In the process, he discovers what life has hidden from him when he was part of the world. These revelations are as melancholy as they are enlightening.A dwarf blacksmith is given the task of creating an amazing weapon meant for a future warrior. In the process, he discovers what life has hidden from him when he was part of the world. These revelations are as melancholy as they are enlightening.This short story is the first of the Songs of Derisma series. Look for more coming soon!

A collection of early Asimov short stories, showcasing the development of the author's oeuvre. The title comes from Asimov's breakthrough short story. CONTENTS: Nightfall - Astounding, Sept 1941 Green Patches - Galaxy, Nov 1950 Hostess - Galaxy, May 1951 Breeds There a Man . . . ? - Astounding, June 1951 C-Chute - Galaxy, Oct 1951 In a Good Cause - "New Tales of Space & Time", 1951 What If--- - Fantastic, Summer 1952 Sally - Fantastic, June 1953 Flies - F&SF, June 1953 Nobody Here But--- - Star SF #1, 1953 It's Such a Beautiful Day - Star SF #3, 1954 Strikebreaker - Original SF Stories, Jan 1957 Insert Knob A in Hole B - F&SF, Dec 1957 The Up-to-Date Sorcerer - F&SF, July 1958 Unto the Fourth Generation - F&SF, April 1959 What is this Thing Called Love? - Amazing, March 1961 The Machine That Won the War - F&SF, Oct 1961 My Son, the Physicist - Scientific American, Feb 1962 Eyes Do More Than See - F&SF, April 1965 Segregationist - Abbottempo, Book 4, 1967

Delorean Harper has a gym bag full of cash, a new identity, a cabin on the Oregon coast, and a beautiful girlfriend. He also has a small army of assassins on his trail. What his hunters don’t know is that Delorean had his first encounter with a killer when he was twelve years old, and he hasn't forgotten how to take care of himself in a fight to the death.The second in the Delorean Harper series. Delorean Harper has a gym bag full of cash, a new identity, a cabin on the Oregon coast, and a beautiful girlfriend. He also has a small army of assassins on his trail. What his hunters don’t know is that Delorean had his first encounter with a killer when he was twelve years old, and he hasn't forgotten how to take care of himself in a fight to the death.Rejected by the government witness security program for being dangerous and unstable, Delorean is on his own against an El Paso drug cartel who wants to punish him for testifying against one of their top lieutenants. Delorean gets assistance from a sympathetic federal marshal, Eric Fullmeyer, who offers Delorean a new identity and place to live if he'll agree to leave town without starting a shooting war with the cartel. After a heated confrontation in an El Paso bar with a pair of cartel killers, Delorean agrees to Eric Fullmeyer's offer, and Delorean escapes to a remote Oregon beach town to shake the cartel from his trail. He isn't there long before he's asked by Eric Fullmeyer to protect Bonnie, a beautiful woman who has her own problems with the cartel. Keeping her safe isn't easy - the cartel's relentless hunters know Delorean's moves so well that he suspects that the federal marshals are leaking information about his location. As professional killers track Delorean and Bonnie through snowy forests, in small towns, and on isolated beaches, Delorean is forced to become as ruthless as the cartel assassins just to stay alive. This isn't the first time he's had to defend himself against hired killers, though, and he knows how to fight dirty to keep himself and his girlfriend alive.Eventually Delorean's luck runs out when he's ambushed on a secluded beach and Bonnie is kidnapped by the cartel. She's taken back to El Paso and held for ransom. The price of her freedom: Delorean's life. If he wants her back, Delorean's going to have to go to war with the cartel on their home turf of El Paso. Delorean likes his odds. He knows that the most dangerous creation of society is the man who has nothing left to lose.

In a fantasy world, a journal is found describing events either real or myth about a nation known only as the Illistarta and how they came to be forgotten. A man once known as Quillis Olgatin is haunted by his guilty secret.Several millennia ago a war raged between the factions of dragonkind. With their world ravaged, the Kaldean Alliance forged the Amulet of Draconic Control and the Tethering Stone, and banished their foes other realms, saving Kalda from utter destruction. Fearing the power of the Amulet, the survivors secreted it away. But now knowledge of the Amulet has resurfaced—and in the wrong hands, war could erupt anew. Over the last thousand years, the humans of Kalda have regressed to a medieval realm; magical objects are scarce and outlawed in certain Kingdoms. Though mages are abundant magical items are precious and often tip the balance of power. Thirsty for power, the necromancers of Soroth often send expeditions to the far reaches of Kalda. On one such search to a remote island ancient texts are discovered detailing the ancient dragon war and the Amulet of Draconic Control. Wary of the find, a warrior must decide whether to deliver them to the necromancers or ally with an old friend–the fate of Kalda rests in his hands. An epic tale in a far off mystical land, The Dragons’ Legacy will send you on a riveting ride fraught with adventure, intrigue and wonder.

The second volume in an extraordinary collection published shortly after the author's death. There are 23 science fiction stories, ranging from the very surprising heart-tugger "The Ugly Little Boy" to the overwhelming vision of "Nightfall". In these stories, Asimov's vivid awareness of the potential of technology is translated into human dilemmas. The definitive collection of short fiction by Isaac Asimov, supreme master of the science fiction genre continues with Volume Two of the Complete Stories. The Good Doctor was always ahead of his time and his work stands today as the clearest expression of our collective hopes and fears for the future. But the ever-expanding popularity of his stories with young and old readers alike is explained by their wit, zest and human interest. Within this volume are stories often voted among the best science fiction stories of all time. In these stories Asimov's vivid awareness of the potential of technology is translated into human dilemmas that...