Showing results by narrator "Gabrielle de Cuir" in All Categories

An ongoing, episodic "prose comic" from which the pictures are summoned by the magic of words, Goon Squad is set in a version of modern-day Manchester. Its biggest divergence from the real city is that it - along with most other large urban centers - has a team of superheroes to protect it against unusual threats with which the conventional forces of law and order would have problems.

Twenty years ago, five master criminals known as the Demon Princes raided Mount Pleasant to enslave thousands of inhabitants in the lawless Beyond. Now Morwen Sabine, a daughter of captives, has escaped her cruel master and returns to Mount Pleasant to recover the hidden treasure she hopes will buy her parents’ freedom.

Fall 1942. When her Hollywood private detective daddy is called back to uniform, Fancy Anders is issued orders of her own - answer the phone, make referrals, and keep the place dusted. But the 24-year-old Barnard grad - whose hobbies include shooting, flying, and jujitsu - isn’t having any. At Amalgamated Aircraft, a young female worker chosen to pose for patriotic photos and posters has met with a suspicious “accidental death”. Fancy takes the victim’s place on the swing shift, fitting in well with coworkers very much not from high society circles.

Struggling to forget a crumbling marriage, 40-year-old Anna Lucia Lottol comes to Venice to visit an old friend - but instead of finding solace, she is dragged into the police station and accused of murdering a money-laundering count with whom she had a brief affair. A US Treasury officer with brains and athleticism, Anna fights to clear her name in a seductive city full of watery illusions. As she works to pry information from a cast of recalcitrant characters sometimes denying what she sees and hears, she succeeds in unleashing a powerful foe bent on destroying her.

First published serially in Gilman's magazine The Forerunner from 1909-1910, What Diantha Did is the story of Diantha Bell, a young woman who leaves her home and her fiancé to start a housecleaning business. A resourceful heroine, Diantha quickly expands her business into an enterprise that includes a maid service, cooked food delivery service, a restaurant, and a hotel.

The world didn't end with a bang, it didn't go out in a ball of fire and fury, nor did it end in ice. But in some strange way, ice was the end - or maybe it was the beginning of something more. When Bethany finds herself suddenly alone in a world that was alive only moments before, she flees into the streets of her town in search of her family. Panicked by the immobile people surrounding her, she is almost captured by the monsters hunting her until Cade steps in.

These 16 stories represent a unique perspective on Orson Scott Card's short fiction, from science fiction to social commentary to pure fairy tale. Included are three new stories not yet published in book form. None have ever been released in audio before.

Sixteen-year-old Delaney Archer always waits until the last moment to do everything. Nevertheless, she is the top student in her class. She's even about to graduate as valedictorian - until one morning when she wakes up in a strange place. Suddenly, she finds herself in graduate school. Seven years of her life have disappeared without a trace since she went to bed last night, but how? But it's not all bad, right? After all, she can drink alcohol now, and she has almost finished school. Then she wakes up the next day and another seven years have passed.

A major biography—the first in three decades—of one of the most important artistic forces of the twentieth century, the legendary American dancer and choreographer who upended dance, propelling the art form into the modern age, and whose profound and pioneering influence is still being felt...

A gothic, literary adventure set in New England, Janice Clark's haunting debut chronicles one hundred years of a once prosperous and now crumbling whaling family, told by its last surviving member. Mercy Rathbone, fifteen years old, is the diminutive scion of the Rathbone clan. Her father, the...

On Macy’s list of things to do, taking on a new crime syndicate wasn’t at the top. Patrolling the city as Stellar, balancing crime-fighting with romance as she fans a budding relationship, and finding Luminesa, her elusive co-superhero, are her priorities. But when she stumbles upon a new enemy and the Alderwoman’s plans to retake the city, she must become more than just the muscle and venture into a world beneath Port Saint Dominic. With the help of old friends and some peculiar new ones, she sets out to unravel the mysteries of the city’s hidden past.

In the Kingdom of Estala, sorcerers called the Menti are outlawed, and religious fervour spreads throughout the realm. When Reva Avalon's parents are murdered during the Menti uprising, King Davead of Estala takes her into his care. But instead of marrying Prince Luca, as the King promised, she is sold to the severe General Unna of the King's army. When she is abruptly released from his clutches, Reva embarks on a journey through Estala, with more adventure, danger, and heartbreak than she could ever have imagined. Prince Luca, the king's second son, has always lived in the shadow of his beloved older brother. Sickly and weak, Luca fears he may be on his deathbed, but in a shocking turn of events, Luca finds himself at the centre of a power so great it may consume him. Luca must learn to control his powers in order to hide them, but can he hide his new gifts of sorcery from his father?

Portland has a witch problem. Claire expects Christmas vacation to deliver an earned respite from thinking, doing, and obeying. She gets to sleep in and play with dragons. Right? Of course not. Ghosts don't care about vacation. Drew wishes magic could finish high school for him. Who cares about calculus or dangling participles when he can crush mutant bugs with his mind? It can't do much more, though, until he gets off his butt and learns how to use it properly.

Kayla Nighthawk, born crippled and orphaned in the theocratic realm of Potemia, defies her society's ban against reading the ancient books on sciencecraft. Her search for a cure for her deformities and for the meaning of existence itself becomes a matter of life or death for Kayla - as well as for all of humanity. This is the history of the next millennium of humankind. An epic tale of technology and the backlash against it.

Carny Sullivan grew up in the zany world of a traveling carnival. Quaint and peaceful Serenity, Texas, has given her a home, a life, and a child. Logan Brisco is the smoothest, slickest, handsomest man Serenity, Texas has ever seen. But Carny Sullivan knows a con artist when she sees one—and...

All words fell away. I pushed myself off the path, noticing for the first time the signs of earlier passage—the matted earth, broken twigs. And I knew. My mouth turned cottony. I licked my lips, took three halting steps. My maddening, visual brain churned out pictures of colorless faces on a...

She was washing dishes when her world began to blur.Chelsea Adams hitched in a breath, her skin pebbling. She knew the dreaded sign all too well. God was pushing a vision into her consciousness.Black dots crowded her sight. She dropped a plate, heard it crack against the porcelain sink. Her...

Sixteen-year-old Pelly has a master plan: After years of therapy, medication, and even a stint in a mental hospital, she’s finally ready to re-enter the world of the living. Pelly has been suffering from severe panic attacks ever since her best friend, Tara, disappeared from a mall six years ago. And her plan seems to be working, until an unkempt girl accompanied by an older man walks into the coffee shop where she works. Pelly thinks she’s seen a ghost, until the girl mouths “help me” on the way out, and Pelly knows she’s just seen Tara.

Rita Van Arsdale, a member of the high society in New York, is invited to an elegant party where she falls in love with a gentleman called Mr. Durand, who returns her feelings and proposes to her. But their plans are derailed after Mrs. Fairbrother, who has arrived at the party wearing a spectacular diamond, is discovered murdered in an alcove. The prime suspect is none other than Mr. Durand, so Miss Van Arsdale gets down to work to reconstruct the true course of events and prove that her love is indeed innocent.

Red Pottage follows the lives of close friends Rachel West, the wealthy heiress, and Hester Gresley, the novelist. Rachel has fallen in love with Hugh Scarlett, a spineless and weak-willed man who has just ended an affair with a married woman. Hester, on the other hand, is stuck living with her brother, a pompous and critical vicar. She must contend with her brother’s disapproval of her writing, a battle which manifests itself as a nervous illness in her.