- Unconditional? is now available in the US Kindle store
- The Branding is now available in the US Kindle store
- There are still free copies of Icarus Rising available and I've added a 40% off coupon for those that would rather purchase a copy. This converts easily using Calibre and should appeal to any Tolkien fans out there.
- All 3 parts of When Darkness Falls are now available on Kindle and in other stores. On the Kindle, the third part is now free in more regions (including Canada) than when it was a pre-order.
The Pursuit of Happiness ($0.99 Kindle, B&N, KoboBook Description
Manhattan, Thanksgiving eve, 1945. The war is over, and Eric Smythe’s party was in full swing. All his clever Greenwich Village friends were there. So too was his sister Sara, an independent, outspoken young woman, starting to make her way in the big city. And then in walked Jack Malone, a U.S. Army journalist just back from a defeated Germany, a man whose world view was vastly different than that of Eric and his friends. This chance meeting between Sara and Jack and the choices they both made in the wake of it would eventually have profound consequences, both for themselves and for those closest to them for decades afterwards. Set amidst the dynamic optimism of postwar New York and the subsequent nightmare of the McCarthy era, The Pursuit of Happiness is a great, tragic love story; a tale of divided loyalties, decisive moral choices and the random workings of destiny.
The Janissary Tree ($9.99Kindle; $2.99 B&N, KoboBook Description
It is 1836. Europe is modernizing and the Ottoman Empire must follow suit. But just before the sultan announces sweeping changes, a wave of murders threatens the fragile balance of power in his court. Who is behind them? Only one intelligence agent can be trusted to find out: Yashim, a man both brilliant and near-invisible in this world, an investigator who can walk with ease in the great halls of the empire, in its streets, and even within its harems--because, of course, Yashim is a eunuch. His investigation points to the Janissaries, who, for four hundred years were the empire's elite soldiers. Crushed by the sultan, could they now be staging a brutal comeback? And can they be stopped without throwing Istanbul into political chaos?
Book Description
happen...
Nicola Holland has fought hard to get where she is. She does not take no for an answer and refuses to back down from any challenge. Frustrated that her attempts to meet with her client were being thwarted, she goes to see him personally. The meeting does not go as she planned. The man she meets is like nothing she expected. His mixture of arrogance, confidence, and charisma is intoxicating to her senses. Yet, as she gets to know him, it is his gentleness that makes her most afraid. She knows that getting involved with him would be foolish, but can she resist? Does she even want to? Nicola decides to do as she has always done--do things her way and let no one stand in her path.
Bradford “Brawich” Chadwick likes his solitude, and people generally leave him be. Yet, from time, the raven-haired beauty comes into his house, and he wants to get up close and personal. Although Nicola is trespassing, she acts like she owns the place and thus seals her fate. No way can he let this self-assured, arrogant, and sexy woman walk away. He is usually underestimated because of the image of lazy self-confidence he portrays, but Nicola sees through all that and challenges him. She might think she has the upper hand and that things are going to be her way. However, Nicola is about to learn that it is always Brawich’s Way.
Tempest Rising ($2.99 $2.99 B&N, KoboBook Description
Living in small town Rockabill, Maine, Jane True always knew she didn't quite fit in with so-called normal society. During her nightly, clandestine swim in the freezing winter ocean, a grisly find leads Jane to startling revelations about her heritage: she is only half-human.
Now, Jane must enter a world filled with supernatural creatures alternatively terrifying, beautiful, and deadly- all of which perfectly describe her new "friend," Ryu, a gorgeous and powerful vampire.
It is a world where nothing can be taken for granted: a dog can heal with a lick; spirits bag your groceries; and whatever you do, never-ever-rub the genie's lamp.
If you love Sookie Stackhouse, then you'll want to dive into Nicole Peeler's enchanting debut novel.
The Wolf's Sun and A Devil Singing Small, by Karen Charbonneau, are both currently on marked down to 99 cents (for a limited time).The Wolf's Sun
In this sweeping historical novel of 17th century France, the wrath and power of Louis XIV are felt all the way to Keltic Brittany near the Bay of the Dead.
Born into the peasant culture, a mixture of ancient pagan beliefs mixed with Catholicism, is the girl Anna, a bastard looking like no one in her parish – her mother would not tell who her father was. Taught the use of herbs by the women of her family, she also has the gift of healing – a power also attributed to French and English kings who were said to heal scrofula with their touch. This ability will cause one man, a physician, to attempt to use her for his own glorification, and another, a Jesuit, to work to send her to a fiery death.
But first, she is caught up in the Breton peasant rebellion of 1675, when a people rose up against the punishing taxes of the French king and local nobles after years of hunger and failed crops. It is the consequence of the violence and retribution by the French that set the wheels of her destiny in motion.
After learning first-hand about her healing touch, a young physician, Luc de St. Connec, purchases Anna her from her family and carries her to the chateau of a relative on the French border. To conceal his motive, he creates a new identity for her -- she is his cousin Anne de St. Nolf, stolen away by her peasant nurse as an infant and in need of being taught French and the graces that accompany her birthright. At the chateau she becomes the companion of Marie Angélique de Scoraille, the demoiselle Fontanges, destined to become Louis XIV's last and tragically short-lived mistress. But Anne has a secret Luc has yet to discover, which will change him from her exploiter to her protector.
Paris and the court of Monsieur, brother to the King, beckon. To gain an appointment at court, St. Connec abjures his Huguenot religion and embraces Catholicism, an act of conscience he will later regret as the King, edict by edict, suppresses the freedom to practice Protestantism in France. In Paris, St. Connec renews his friendship with the English diplomat and spy John Keyes, who he’d met in Brittany and knows of Anne’s origin. Their friendship is challenged by their growing love for Anne, a love they deny to each other and to themselves.
In 1680, the Affair of Poisons takes Paris by storm, and during a three-year period many are tried as blasphemers and poisoners (with the implicit understanding that they are also witches). Many are burned at the stake. The poison investigations implicate the King's longtime mistress, Madame de Montespan, mother of five of his children. Assisted in conspiracy by the lieutenant-general of the Paris police, Louis XIV begins one of the great cover-ups of French history, determined that no word of La Montespan's possible involvement will leak out to make him an object of ridicule or to endanger her. Anne is implicated in the affair of poisons, endangering herself and the men who love her.
The author researched and wrote this historically accurate and entertaining novel during an eight-year period.... This is a long story, so if you are a reader who likes to submerge yourself for days into a different time and place, observe historical figures in their proper milieu like a ghost at a banquet, and follow the destinies of charming, romantic, ambitious, but flawed characters during a time of French splendor and court intrigue, religious persecution, conspicuous consumption, assassination, torture and fiery executions, brandings and life sentences as galley slaves, you will enjoy this novel.
A Devil Singing Small
What would you do if, after a dozen years of trying to be the perfect wife to an unpredictable combat veteran with a hair-trigger temper, your husband is diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic?
This family saga, spanning the years from World War II through the Vietnam War and after, recounts the unseen wounds war inflicts on two generations of an American family. With a raw authenticity stripped of self-pity and with a poet's eye for lyrical detail, Betty recounts her wartime romance with Army Air Corps Sergeant Mitch Lanier, raised in a Catholic orphanage; their rocky marriage; the births of a son and daughter; and Mitch's gradual downward spiral from a man who built his own home and could fix anything into a schizophrenic, obsessed with the Virgin Mary and extra-terrestrial flight.
They raise their family in rural Idaho, where Betty relies on her inner life - her love of the land - to give her the fortitude to fulfill her marriage vows and the courage to protect her family and seek whatever help is available for Mitch. Betty grows from a subservient homemaker of the 1940s and '50s to a breadwinner in the 1960s. Love and temptation, fear and loss give a razor's edge to a sometime funny, often difficult, life.
It is also the story of the conflicting relationship between Betty and daughter Torie, who seeks her future in Washington, D. C., during the anti-war movement; and Betty's pride and apprehensions for son Michael, a combat infantry lieutenant in Vietnam.
The lives of this post-war American family are etched with vivid detail. The author drew on her observations of her father's schizophrenia to give this novel a sometimes tender, sometimes brutal, realism.
Silence Fell ($1.42), by Josephine Dickinson, is a short (96 pages) tome of poetry, which you can also get for $1.50 in Hardcover, if you want to give it as a gift.Book Description
Silence Fell marks the American debut of an extraordinary poet from the remote north of England. The poems are set on a sheep farm in the northern mountains and tell the story -- in the form of a modern shepherd’s calendar -- of Josephine Dickinson’s marriage to a Cumbrian sheep farmer, a man more than twice her age, and their life together, until his death in 2004.
During a reading tour in England, Galway Kinnell was introduced to Josephine Dickinson’s work. Her poems made such an impression on him that he passed the books on to his publisher and wrote a foreword for her American debut.
Young Lord of Khadora ($5.59 Kindle), by Richard S. Tuttle, the first book of the Forgotten Legacy series, is free on Smashwords. This is the same Frank Tuttle whose Origin Scroll was free not to long ago and who has such a wicked sense of humor in his postings on the Amazon forums.Book Description
A skilled warrior gets entangled in a corrupt political world, his cunning strategies pitted against thousands who seek his death. Marak challenges the clans of Khadora and the Chula, the dreaded cat people of ancient times, in a struggle that will change the fate of the world. Young Lord of Khadora is a tale of magic, military cunning, and political intrigue set in a land where honor is everything yet deceit is everywhere.
Son of Heaven ($1.59), by David Wingrove, originally titled Chung Kuo, was 480 pages (Corvus) is now out of print, but is available on Kindle for a very good price. I snapped it up after reading thru just part of the sample of this first in a post-apocalyptic series (I hope all of them migrate to Kindle, as I can't see paying $65 - $100 for what appears to be the very scarce paper editions).Book Description
The year is 2085, two decades after the great economic collapse that destroyed Western civilization. With its power broken and its cities ruined, life in the West continues in scattered communities. In rural Dorset Jake Reed lives with his 14-year-old son and memories of the great collapse. Back in ’43, Jake was a rich, young futures broker, immersed in the datascape of the world’s financial markets. He saw what was coming – and who was behind it. Forewarned, he was one of the few to escape the fall. For 22 years he has lived in fear of the future, and finally it is coming – quite literally – across the plain towards him. Chinese airships are in the skies and a strange, glacial structure has begun to dominate the horizon. Jake finds himself forcibly incorporated into the ever-expanding ‘World of Levels’ a global city of some 34 billion souls, where social status is reflected by how far above the ground you live.
Skin ($3.32), by Ted Dekker Book Description
A freak storm has spawned three tornadoes that are bearing down on the town of Summerville.
Yet under the cover of the storm looms a much more ominous threat: A vindictive killer known as Red who's left a string of victims in his wake and is now bent on exacting his final revenge on the unsuspecting town.
But there is an enigma surrounding Red that the FBI is unwilling to admit-closely guarded secrets of something gone terribly wrong beneath the skin of Summerville. Secrets that will destroy far more than one small town.
Wendy Davidson is caught in the middle. She's a recovering cult survivor who takes refuge in Summerville on her way to visit her estranged mother. And with her, four strangers, any of whom could be the next victim . . . or the killer.
Busted: Life Inside the Great Mortgage Meltdown ($4.71), by Edmund L. AndrewsBook Description
A veteran New York Times economics reporter, Ed Andrews was intimately aware of the dangers posed by easy mortgages from fast-buck lenders. Yet, at the promise of a second chance at love, he succumbed to the temptation of subprime lending and became part of the economic catastrophe he was covering. In surprisingly short order, he amassed a staggering amount of debt and reached the edge of bankruptcy.
In Busted, Andrew bluntly recounts his misadventures in mortgages and goes one step further to describe the brokers, lenders, Wall Street players, and Washington policymakers who helped bring that money to his door. The result is a penetrating and often acerbic look at the binge and bust that nearly bankrupted the United States.
Enabled by know-nothing complacency in Washington, Wall Street wizards used "collateralized debt obligations," "conduits," and other inscrutable financial "innovations" to put American home financing into hyperdrive. Millions of Americans abandoned the safety of thirty-year, fixed-rate mortgages and loaded up on debt. While regulators insisted that the markets knew best, Wall Street firms fragmented and repackaged unsound loans into securities that the rating agencies stamped with triple-A seals of approval.
Andrews describes a remarkably democratic debacle that made fools out of people up and down the financial food chain. From a confessional meeting with Alan Greenspan to a trek through the McMansion bubble of the OC, he maps the arc of the Frankenstein loans that brought the American economy to the brink.
With on-the-ground reporting from the frothiest quarters of the crisis, Andrews locates what is likely to be the high-water mark in America's long-term embrace of higher borrowing, higher risk-taking, and the fervent belief in the possibility of easy profits.
Countdown in Cairo ($1.99), by Noel Hynd, is the third book of a trilogy that has seen both the earlier volumes free in the Kindle store, courtesy of Christian publisher Zondervan. If you plan on reading it, grab this one now, before it goes back up in price.Book Description
Why won't the dead stay dead? Federal agent Alexandra LaDuca travels to Egypt to investigate the possible sighting of a former mentor, a CIA agent who everyone thought was dead. She is thrown into the deadliest game of double cross of her career as the events that began in Kiev and continued in Madrid find their culmination in the volatile Middle East. Her assignment is to locate a man she once knew. But to find the answers, Alex needs to move quickly into the underworld of the Egyptian capital, a nether society of crooks, killers, spies, and Islamic fundamentalists. And she must work alone, surviving on her wits, her training, and a compact new Beretta. Her search immerses Alex deeply into the explosive international politics of the day, touching on Arab-American relations and the new balance of terror between Russia and the United States. And it doesn't help that she's forced into a partnership with a quirky double agent known only as Voltaire, one of the most shadowy and powerful members of the Cairo underworld. If you've been waiting for Alex LaDuca's next adventure, this fast-paced thriller is it. If you've never met Alex, Countdown in Cairo offers a first-rate introduction. You will be holding your breath from its explosive beginning to the very last twist.
I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell (Movie Tie-in) ($5.00), by Tucker MaxBook Description
The Book That Inspired The Movie
My name is Tucker Max, and I am an asshole. I get excessively drunk at inappropriate times, disregard social norms, indulge every whim, ignore the consequences of my actions, mock idiots and posers, sleep with more women than is safe or reasonable, and just generally act like a raging dickhead. But, I do contribute to humanity in one very important way: I share my adventures with the world. --from the Introduction
Actual reader feedback:
"I find it truly appalling that there are people in the world like you. You are a disgusting, vile, repulsive, repugnant, foul creature. Because of you, I don't believe in God anymore. No just God would allow someone like you to exist."
"I'll stay with God as my lord, but you are my savior. I just finished reading your brilliant stories, and I laughed so hard I almost vomited. I want to bring that kind of joy to people. You're an artist of the highest order and a true humanitarian to boot. I'm in both shock and awe at how much I want to be you."
The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory ($2.11), by Brian Greene, is another book that tries to explain physics to the common man (and apparently does it quite well).Book Description
Now with a new preface (not in any other edition) that will review the enormous public reception of the relatively obscure string theory—made possible by this book and an increased number of adherents amongst physicists—The Elegant Universe "sets a standard that will be hard to beat" (New York Times Book Review). Brian Greene, one of the world's leading string theorists, peels away the layers of mystery surrounding string theory to reveal a universe that consists of eleven dimensions, where the fabric of space tears and repairs itself, and all matter—from the smallest quarks to the most gargantuan supernovas—is generated by the vibrations of microscopically tiny loops of energy.
Today physicists and mathematicians throughout the world are feverishly working on one of the most ambitious theories ever proposed: superstring theory. String theory, as it is often called, is the key to the Unified Field Theory that eluded Einstein for more than thirty years. Finally, the century-old antagonism between the large and the small-General Relativity and Quantum Theory-is resolved. String theory proclaims that all of the wondrous happenings in the universe, from the frantic dancing of subatomic quarks to the majestic swirling of heavenly galaxies, are reflections of one grand physical principle and manifestations of one single entity: microscopically tiny vibrating loops of energy, a billionth of a billionth the size of an atom. In this brilliantly articulated and refreshingly clear book, Greene relates the scientific story and the human struggle behind twentieth-century physics' search for a theory of everything.
Through the masterful use of metaphor and analogy, The Elegant Universe makes some of the most sophisticated concepts ever contemplated viscerally accessible and thoroughly entertaining, bringing us closer than ever to understanding how the universe works.
Far Bright Star ($4.50), by Robert OlmsteadBook Description
Set in 1916, Far Bright Star follows Napoleon Childs, an aging cavalryman, as he leads an expedition of inexperienced soldiers into the mountains of Mexico to hunt down Pancho Villa and bring him to justice. Though he is seasoned at such missions, things go terribly wrong and the patrol is brutally attacked. After witnessing the demise of his troops, Napoleon is left by his captors to die in the desert.
Through him we enter the conflicted mind of a warrior as he tries to survive against all odds, as he seeks to make sense of a lifetime of senseless wars and to reckon with the reasons a man would choose a life on the battlefield. Olmstead, an award-winning writer, uses his precise, descriptive prose to explore the endurance and fate of the last horse soldiers. The result is a tightly wound novel that is as moving as it is terrifying.
The Complete Adventures of Curious George, Anniversary Edition ($5.59), by H. A. Rey, is a huge book (24MB) and is priced significantly under the latest Anniversary Edition ($16.50), which is even larger (39MB).Book Description
Created by Margret Rey and her husband H.A. Rey, the mischievous monkey Curious George has delighted millions of readers for more than 50 years with his hilarious hijinks. After the birth of Curious George in 1941, six titles completed the series, which have since been translated into 12 languages. This wonderful 416-page collector's edition (with all seven of the original Curious George titles in one colorfully illustrated volume) features Curious George, Curious George Takes a Job, Curious George Rides a Bike, Curious George Gets a Medal, Curious George Flies a Kite, Curious George Learns the Alphabet, and Curious George Goes to the Hospital. The intrepid monkey--who represents the insatiably curious (and invariably accident-prone) soul in all of us-- captures the heart of everyone he meets. (Picture book)
How to Be a Movie Star: Elizabeth Taylor in Hollywood ($2.16), by William J. MannBook Description
In the 60s, Elizabeth Taylor's affair with the married Richard Burton knocked John Glenn's orbit of the moon off front pages nationwide. Yet, despite all the gossip, the larger-than-life personality and influence of this very human woman has never been captured. William Mann, praised by Gore Vidal, Patricia Bosworth, and Gerald Clarke for Kate, uses untapped sources and conversations to show how she ignited the sexual revolution with her on-and off-screen passions, helped kick down the studio system by taking control of her own career, and practically invented the big business of celebrity star-making. With unputdownable storytelling he tells the full truth without losing Taylor's magic, daring, or wit.
Readers will feel they are sitting next to Taylor as she rises at MGM, survives a marriage engineered for publicity, feuds with Hedda Hopper and Mr. Mayer, wins Oscars, endures tragedy, juggles Eddie Fisher, Richard Burton and her country's conservative values. But it is the private Elizabeth that will surprise--a woman of heart and loyalty, who defends underdogs, a savvy professional whose anger at the studio's treatment of her led to a lifelong battle against that very system. All the Elizabeth's are here, finally reconciled and seen against the exciting years of her greatest spirit, beauty, and influence. Swathed in mink, staring us down with her lavender eyes, disposing of husbands but keeping the diamonds, here is Elizabeth Taylor as she was meant to be, leading her epic life on her own terms, playing the game of supreme stardom at which she remains, to this day, unmatched.
Corrag: A Novel ($3.64), by Susan Fletcher Book Description
February 13, 1692. Thirty-eight members of the MacDonald clan are killed by soldiers who had previously enjoyed the clan's hospitality. Many more die from exposure. Forty miles south, the captivating Corrag is imprisoned for her involvement in the massacre. Accused of witchcraft and murder, she awaits her death. Lonesome, she tells her story to Charles Leslie, an Irish propagandist who seeks information to condemn the Protestant King William, rumored to be involved in the massacre. Hers is a story of passion, courage, love, and the magic of the natural world. By telling it, she transforms both their lives.
As in her award-winning debut novel, Eve Green, Susan Fletcher shows that she is "a novelist with the soul of a poet" (Booklist). This deeply philosophical and dramatic book is about an epic historic event and the difference a single heart can make—how deep and lasting relationships can come from the most unlikely places.
Impeding Justice ($0.99 Kindle), by Mel Comley, the first in the Lorne Simpkins series, is currently free on Smashwords (EPUB/PDF DRM-free) and the sequel, Final Justice, is 99 cents in both stores.Impeding Justice
Detective Inspector Lorne Simpkins comes up against her long-time nemesis, The Unicorn. After leading Simpkins and her partner into a trap, in which Pete is killed, Lorne comes to the conclusion the criminal is obtaining insider information, enabling him to stay one step ahead of them. With the informant out of the way, The Unicorn needs to find another way to keep Lorne on her toes, so he kidnaps the D I’s teenage daughter. But, Lorne’s troubles don’t end there. She is forced off the case by a Superintendent with a ten-year vendetta against her father. Fortunately, the Chief Inspector insists Lorne’s vast expertise is needed to solve the case. The investigation takes a surprising turn when one of the region’s most precious landmarks is held to ransom by The Unicorn, but this merely turns out to be yet another one of his frivolous decoys, as his true audacious plan unfolds… A fast-paced thriller of 83,000 words.
Final Justice
This is the sequel to Impeding Justice but is also a standalone thriller/adventure.
After suffering a breakdown and quitting the force, former Detective Inspector Lorne Simpkins is contacted by a friend at MI6 to help in a covert operation. Against her will, Lorne is convinced to help track down an old enemy, a sadistic and calculating criminal whose ambition is to become the world's richest man.
It’s up to Lorne and the agent to prevent him, which results in a chase through France.
