Showing results by author "Matthew S. Cox" in All Categories

Nothing has complicated Sarah Wright’s life as much as losing it. Discovering vampires and other supernatural creatures are real took the sting out of being murdered by her ex-boyfriend. She’s enjoying her new reality, even if taking a knife to the heart was the sanest thing to happen to her since. Not quite a year into being an immortal, Sarah’s embraced the supernatural world hidden beneath the veneer of modern society.

Sarah Wright has gone through a lifetime of mess in a mere five months, but her most difficult challenge yet is making it through Thanksgiving without spilling blood. It isn’t only her extended family tempting her to sprout claws. A vampire hunter has arrived in Seattle, his sights set on Professor Heath.

Sarah Wright faces many challenges typical to any college student: tons of work, second-guessing her major, and trying to find time between classes to drink blood. She’s adjusted to her new vampiric self. It’s fun being immortal, despite a mostly nocturnal schedule cutting into her time for friends and family.

Samantha Moon hadn't always been a vampire. Once, she had been a wife and mother, happily married to her soul mate and raising two adorable kids. Once, she had been a federal agent investigating a world teeming with sophisticated scams, drugs, human trafficking, and violence. That is, until she caught the eye of something evil....

Kerys Loring hopes an expedition to a distant alien ruin will make her career - assuming she lives long enough to still have one. When Avasar Biotechnology appeals to her unique combination of experience and desperation, she jumps at the chance. At least she’ll be thousands of light-years away from her abusive ex. Within minutes of arrival, her excitement shatters at the sight of her ex already there. Then, on her first day in the ruins, she makes a profound discovery...but something goes terribly wrong.

Sarah Wright has a job to die for. She never asked for it, never even filled out an application. To be fair, she didn’t ask to die either. Ever since she woke up as a vampire, she only wanted to unlive in as ordinary a way as possible. Alas, the realities of undeath and awakening to the greater existence of the supernatural made certain demands of the family. Now Sarah runs errands for the vampire boss of Seattle. It isn’t such a bad gig when she’s not being shot at, chased, clawed up, thrown around, or scrambling to keep her family safe.

Agent Kirsten Wren, a gifted psionic with a troubled past, possesses a rare combination of abilities that makes her a powerful weapon against paranormal threats. Adrift in a society that fears people like her, she feels alone in a city of millions. In 2418, rampant violence and corporate warfare have left no shortage of angry wraiths. Most are little more than fleeting shadows or eerie whispers in the darkness, but every so often, one gathers enough strength to threaten the living. A series of attacks by androids known as dolls leave the normal police baffled.

Natalie Rausch said she'd die for a chance to meet DJ Crazy Todd, but she didn't mean to be literal. A bitter divorce shattered her family and turned her into a 13-year-old weapon in the hands of two people who want nothing more than to destroy each other. Once an accelerated student looking at early college, Natalie let anger at her parents lead her down a desperate path of self-destruction. No amount of rebellion gets her mom or dad's attention - or stitches up the hole inside her where love used to be.

Life in suburban New Jersey with her mother is comfortable, not to mention boring, to an introverted 14-year-old. As if her friend’s surprise trip didn’t suck enough, her best summer ever falls to pieces when she’s sent across the country to stay with a father she hasn’t seen in six years.

At 22, she's still slinging coffee at an Amazon Cafe despite having a degree in programming. It's not because she's unlucky, unmotivated, or even that she fancies herself an underground activist crusading against evil corporations. Hunting for a real job would take time away from her game. Axillon99 is the world's most popular multiplayer online experience, with a universe containing billions of planets to explore. Ever since video games broke the screen barrier, plunging players fully into their characters, reality just can't compete.

Most brides have some anxiety over their wedding, but not too many have to worry a dead person might spoil it. Detective Maddy Wimsey is looking forward to her handfasting to Caius. Mostly. She’s simultaneously on edge and can’t wait. About the only thing capable of going wrong is her catching a homicide investigation complicated enough to push back the date.

Life is difficult for the world’s tiniest superhero. Her genius plan to save her parents from supervillainy in one easy step proved impossible - at least not without destroying the Earth. Superpowers, good or bad, aren’t going away any time soon. Mom’s as likely to hug her as trick her into a ridiculous trap, but at least, her dad’s mellowed out a bit. Lately, he seems focused more on being weird than evil.

Cops sometimes rely on hunches to guide them, but Detective Maddy Wimsey takes it a step further: Magic. August opens with the bad omen of a suicide that she suspects is more than it appears. However, before she can even start to find evidence that won't get her a date with a shrink, an even worse case walks in the door. A local nurse claims she suspects one of her co-workers of murdering patients. Unfortunately, the woman has even less evidence than Maddy's belief that a spirit is throwing people off tall buildings. However, something about the story rings too true to brush aside.

In August of 2021, they tried to disprove the adage that violence doesn’t solve anything — by killing everyone. No people, no problems. Fifty years later, humanity has emerged from the ashes. As if nuclear war didn’t do enough, a cruel virus followed on its heels, reducing many survivors to mindless killers. Drivers are the only link between scattered towns. Anyone with the skill to maintain a vehicle (and the balls to hit the road) can seek fortune and glory running jobs for the Roadhouse.

It’s been a few weeks since the Nolmek scattered giant crystals around the world that unintentionally gave some people superpowers. They also nearly eliminated war and shared technology to solve famine, drought, and pollution, so pretty much everyone loves them. Alas, the aliens didn’t visit Earth purely out of kindness. They needed a primitive species to enslave.

For most 12-year-olds, being kidnapped is terrifying. For Althea, it’s only Tuesday. Her powers of healing make her a precious commodity in the Badlands, a place where the strong write the law in blood. For as long as she can remember, she has lived either as a possession or a goddess. Althea contents herself with captivity as long as she can help others, even those who killed to own her. After three whole months in the same village, the friendship of a young warrior makes her feel almost like a member of the tribe rather than a prisoner.

Magical forces don't always play nice. In fact, they can be downright evil. Life is going fairly well for Detective Maddy Wimsey. At 35, she's an accomplished detective, practicing Wiccan, has a wonderful relationship with her long-time boyfriend, and even a much-needed vacation after dealing with a cursed gem. Alas, her break doesn't last long. A creeping darkness interrupts the solace of the woods with a supernatural vendetta against her coven. Maddy had opened a particular can of worms looking into the past, and the entity has decided to make her a target.

Eleven-year-old Kiera Quinn is sure she’s having a nightmare. She doesn’t believe a nap that started in her suburban bedroom ends in an empty wasteland. She doesn’t believe everyone she’s ever known may have never existed - and she definitely doesn’t believe an old man who tells her she will resurrect the world. The odd shaman clad in junk and old computer parts claims she is "the child born of the earth", humanity’s only chance to survive. Desperate and scared, Kiera humors him, hoping her bad dream ends soon.

Saving the world isn’t easy. It’s even harder when you’re only nine. Kelly Donovan used to be a nobody. Well, a smart nobody. Skipping ahead a year in school made her the smallest kid in fifth grade and a target for bullies in search of an easy mark. She tried to follow her father’s advice and ignore them, but it didn’t do any good. Escaping into her favorite comic books at least helped her through the day. Who needs friends anyway? Sometimes, dreams find a way to come true, even if nobody asked them to.

A move to the small town of Spring Falls, New York, is the perfect cure for Mia Gartner’s horrid commute. However, her new home isn’t quite empty. She adored working in fine art restoration, but a two-hour ride each way got old fast. When her husband found a house for sale at a suspiciously low price, they jumped at it. Mia expected chemical contamination, a fixer-upper, or termites, so when the problem turned out to be persistent rumors of haunting, she set aside her worries.