Since the flames died three hundred years ago, human civilization has evolved into a dual society: Women’s Country, where walled towns enclose what’s left of past civilization, nurtured by women and a few nonviolent men; and the adjacent garrisons where warrior men live—the lost brothers, sons, and lovers of those in Women’s Country.
Two societies. Two competing dreams. Two ways of life, kept apart by walls stronger than stone. And yet there is a gate between them. . . .
Once upon a time, a girl was born. A hundred years later, she grew up. Aurianna must rewrite the past in order to save the future. When a mysterious stranger sweeps her back in time, she discovers there is more to her life than she ever imagined. Aurianna must race against time to uncover the truth about a catastrophe that will leave the world broken, divided, and at war.
Targeted Age Group:: Teen and Adult
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
I grew up reading and watching many versions of fairy tales, both old and new. I have always loved unique spins on traditional stories, so I decided to incorporate this into my writing. I write "stories of myth and magic" that cross over into multiple genres, but they are mostly fantasy at their core.
The angels of Yeluthia abandoned their alliance. Demons are merely legends of the past. If those are the truths Coura grew up learning, why is she thrown between both during her first venture outside of the Magic Arts Academy? Both creatures are real, but which is friend and which is foe?
With her life teetering on the edge of uncertainty after completing her dark magic training, she thought traveling to the palace with her mentor, Byron, would allow her time to figure out what she values most. Instead, they discover whispers of political manipulation surrounding a new law that could impact the future for all mages. If that wasn’t difficult enough for her to keep up with, Coura also falls into something much more frightening: a secret locked away within herself. A pair of black wings opposite to those belonging to the angelic race and seething with demonic power attach themselves to her, labeling her as an enemy to some and a threat to all.
Decades have passed since anyone has seen either and questions are raised as the world of magic is evolving. Armed with sword work, dark magic, and newfound demonic abilities, Coura is thrown into the part she was fated to play in the battle between the angels and long-forgotten demons.
Targeted Age Group:: 13-24
What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
The Dark Angel series has been an idea of mine for nearly a decade and is inspired both by the fantasy books I read and the anime I enjoyed. Once I had a full series in my mind, I began writing as a hobby and never intended to publish anything until my husband and friends encouraged me to try. Now, I have most of the series written with Book Two releasing later this year.
A physicist from isolated Anarres travels to the mother planet, Urras, in hopes of dissolving the hatred that exists between them
Buy The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia by Ursula K. Le Guin Here
Winner of the 1961 Hugo Award for Best Novel and widely considered one of the most accomplished, powerful, and enduring classics of modern speculative fiction, Walter M. Miller, Jr.’s A Canticle for Leibowitz is a true landmark of twentieth-century literature — a chilling and still-provocative look at a post-apocalyptic future.
In a nightmarish ruined world slowly awakening to the light after sleeping in darkness, the infant rediscoveries of science are secretly nourished by cloistered monks dedicated to the study and preservation of the relics and writings of the blessed Saint Isaac Leibowitz. From here the story spans centuries of ignorance, violence, and barbarism, viewing through a sharp, satirical eye the relentless progression of a human race damned by its inherent humanness to recelebrate its grand foibles and repeat its grievous mistakes. Seriously funny, stunning, and tragic, eternally fresh, imaginative, and altogether remarkable, A Canticle for Leibowitz retains its ability to enthrall and amaze. It is now, as it always has been, a masterpiece.
We Don’t Die by Cedrick Wilson
A cocky police detective, Dallas Scott and his best friend and partner, Ray Davis chase after a notorious hit-man, McNeil, and a bad decision by Scott lead to Davis’ death.Scott is haunted by his choice and it leads him to become a bad cop and a horrible husband.Now partnered with a new young detective, John Crawford, they finally get a lead on the killer only to come up short.Days later, they find McNeil dead on the street and this still leaves Scott unhappy because he didn’t kill the man responsible for his partner’s death himself. McNeil’s wife asks Scott for help but he refuses and this is a huge mistake which leads to her and her child’s death. This incident brings McNeil’s ghost to come back and haunt Scott and causes him to have a car accident.Now in the afterlife, the chase is on again with Scott having to go after McNeil for bringing chaos to the people who murdered him and his family.The Stakes are higher than ever in purgatory with Scott having to stop McNeil and having to prevent his soul from getting in the hands of the devil due to his own sins.
In a glorious new trade paperback complete with an original Introduction written by author Kim Stanley Robinson
First published in 1949 and a winner of the inaugural International Fantasy Award in 1951, Earth Abides went on to become one of the most influential science-fiction novels of the twentieth century. It remains a fresh, provocative story of apocalyptic pandemic, societal collapse, and rebirth.
The cabin had always been a special retreat for Isherwood Williams, a haven from the demands of society. But one day while hiking, Ish was bitten by a rattlesnake, and the solitude he had so desired took on dire new significance. He was sick for days—and often delirious—waking up to find two strangers peering in at him from the cabin door. Yet oddly, instead of offering help, the two ran off as if terrified. Not long after, the coughing began. Ish suffered chills and fever, and a measles-like rash on his skin. He was one of the few people in the world to live through that peculiar malady, but he didn’t know it then.
Ish headed home when he finally felt himself again—and noticed the strangeness almost immediately. No cars passed him on the road; the gas station not far from his cabin looked abandoned; and he was shocked to see the body of a man on the roadside near a small town. Without a radio or phone, Ish had no idea of humanity’s abrupt demise. He had escaped death, yet could not escape the catastrophe—and with an eerie detachment he found himself curious as to how long it would be before all traces of civilization faded from Earth.
White Hat Black Heart by D. B. Goodin
Playing a virtual game is fun…unless the game wants you dead.
Nigel Watson is a clever teenage hacker who uses his skills to make extra spending money. But, after someone plunders his mother’s bank account and drains the funds,Nigel realizes his hacking could save the family.
Soon, Nigel’s online expertise is noticed by the billionaire founder of the Colossal Machine, a virtual game played by millions of people around the planet. When Nigel is given a chance to show his prowess, his skills outshine the work of the current developers. He even discovers new ways to cheat the game that no one else knows. But, Nigel doesn’t realize that his sudden success has made enemies who want him dead.
Nigel is thrust into the shadows of the Dark Web – a hidden part of the Internet where evil can find its way to your door. Little does he know, but the object of the game has become Nigel’s life.
In this cyber thriller, you never know who to trust when the virtual world makes it impossible to decrypt friend from foe.
In this bestselling novel by the authors of THE MOTE IN GOD’S EYE, a massive comet breaks apart and bombards the Earth, with catastrophic results: worldwide earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, thousand-foot tidal waves and seemingly endless rain… With civilization in ruins, individuals band together to survive and to build a new society.
This bewitching play, Shakespeare’s final work, articulates a wealth of the playwright’s mature reflections on life and contains some of his most familiar and oft-quoted lines. The story concerns Miranda, a lovely young maiden, and Prospero, her philosophical old magician father, who dwell on an enchanted island, alone except for their servants — Ariel, an invisible sprite, and Caliban, a monstrous witch’s son.
Into their idyllic but isolated lives comes a shipwrecked party that includes the enemies who usurped Prospero’s dukedom years before, and set him and his daughter adrift on the ocean. Also among the castaways is a handsome prince, the first young man Miranda has ever seen. Comedy, romance, and reconciliation ensue, in a masterly drama that begins with a storm at sea and concludes in joyous harmony.
Students, poetry lovers, and drama enthusiasts will treasure this convenient, modestly priced edition of one of Shakespeare’s greatest plays and one of literature’s finest comedies.
Buy The Tempest (Dover Thrift Editions) by William Shakespeare Here
The bestselling phenomenon and inspiration for the award-winning film.
Earthy, magical, and utterly charming, this tale of family life in turn-of-the-century Mexico blends poignant romance and bittersweet wit.
This classic love story takes place on the De la Garza ranch, as the tyrannical owner, Mama Elena, chops onions at the kitchen table in her final days of pregnancy. While still in her mother’s womb, her daughter to be weeps so violently she causes an early labor, and little Tita slips out amid the spices and fixings for noodle soup. This early encounter with food soon becomes a way of life, and Tita grows up to be a master chef, using cooking to express herself and sharing recipes with readers along the way.
Now a major motion picture A bestseller that takes readers on a journey to New York of the Belle Epoque, where Peter Lake attempts to rob a Manhattan mansion only to find the daughter of the house at home. Thus begins the love between the middle-aged Irishman and Beverly Penn, a young girl who is dying. “This novel…is a gifted writer’s love affair with the language” (Newsday).
Breathtakingly suspenseful and beautifully written, The Historian is the story of a young woman plunged into a labyrinth where the secrets of her family’s past connect to an inconceivable evil: the dark fifteenth-century reign of Vlad the Impaler and a time-defying pact that may have kept his awful work alive through the ages. The search for the truth becomes an adventure of monumental proportions, taking us from monasteries and dusty libraries to the capitals of Eastern Europe—in a feat of storytelling so rich, so hypnotic, so exciting that it has enthralled readers around the world.
Antonio Marez is six years old when Ultima comes to stay with his family in New Mexico. She is a curandera, one who cures with herbs and magic. Under her wise wing, Tony will probe the family ties that bind and rend him, and he will discover himself in the magical secrets of the pagan past–a mythic legacy as palpable as the Catholicism of Latin America. And at each life turn there is Ultima, who delivered Tony into the world… and will nurture the birth of his soul.
“One Hundred Years of Solitude is the first piece of literature since the Book of Genesis that should be required reading for the entire human race. . . . Mr. Garcia Marquez has done nothing less than to create in the reader a sense of all that is profound, meaningful, and meaningless in life.” —William Kennedy, New York Times Book Review
One of the most influential literary works of our time, One Hundred Years of Solitude remains a dazzling and original achievement by the masterful Gabriel Garcia Marquez, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature.
One Hundred Years of Solitude tells the story of the rise and fall, birth and death of the mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendiá family. Inventive, amusing, magnetic, sad and alive with unforgettable men and women—brimming with truth, compassion, and a lyrical magic that strikes the soul—this novel is a masterpiece in the art of fiction.
Buy One Hundred Years of Solitude (Modern Classics) by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Here
Titus is expected to rule this extraordinary kingdom and his eccentric and wayward subjects. But with the arrival of an ambitious kitchen boy, Steerpike, the established order is thrown into disarray. Over the course of these three novels—Titus Groan, Gormenghast, and Titus Alone— Titus must contend with a kingdom about to implode beneath the weight of centuries of intrigue, treachery, manipulation, and murder.Intoxicating, rich, and unique, The Gormenghast Trilogy is a tour de force that ranks as one of the twentieth century’s most remarkable feats of imaginative writing. This special edition, published for the centenary of Mervyn Peake’s birth, is accompanied by over one hundred of Peake’s dazzling drawings.
Buy The Gormenghast Trilogy by Mervyn Peake, Michael Moorcock Here
This critical history of Iain M. Banks’ Culture novels covers the series from its inception in the 1970s to the The Hydrogen Sonata (2012), published less than a year before Banks’ death. It considers Banks’ origins as a writer, the development of his politics and ethics, his struggles to become a published author, his eventual success with The Wasp Factory (1984) and the publication of the first Culture novel, Consider Phlebas (1987). His 1994 essay “A Few Notes on the Culture” is included, along with a range of critical responses to the 10 Culture books he published in his lifetime and a discussion of the series’ status as utopian literature.
Banks was a complex man, both in his everyday life and on the page. This work aims at understanding the Culture series not only as a fundamental contribution to science fiction but also as a product of its creator’s responses to the turbulent times he lived in.
Buy The Culture Series of Iain M. Banks: A Critical Introduction by Simone Caroti Here
A Texas teen comes face-to-face with a cousin’s ghost and vows to unmask the murderer.
Elatsoe—Ellie for short—lives in an alternate contemporary America shaped by the ancestral magics and knowledge of its Indigenous and immigrant groups. She can raise the spirits of dead animals—most importantly, her ghost dog Kirby. When her beloved cousin dies, all signs point to a car crash, but his ghost tells her otherwise: He was murdered.
Who killed him and how did he die? With the help of her family, her best friend Jay, and the memory great, great, great, great, great, great grandmother, Elatsoe, must track down the killer and unravel the mystery of this creepy town and its dark past. But will the nefarious townsfolk and a mysterious Doctor stop her before she gets started?
A breathtaking debut novel featuring an asexual, Apache teen protagonist, Elatsoe combines mystery, horror, noir, ancestral knowledge, haunting illustrations, fantasy elements, and is one of the most-talked about debuts of the year.
This is the story of a place that never was: the kingdom of Prester John, the utopia described by an anonymous, twelfth-century document which captured the imagination of the medieval world and drove hundreds of lost souls to seek out its secrets, inspiring explorers, missionaries, and kings for centuries. But what if it were all true? What if there was such a place, and a poor, broken priest once stumbled past its borders, discovering, not a Christian paradise, but a country where everything is possible, immortality is easily had, and the Western world is nothing but a dim and distant dream?
Brother Hiob of Luzerne, on missionary work in the Himalayan wilderness on the eve of the eighteenth century, discovers a village guarding a miraculous tree whose branches sprout books instead of fruit. These strange books chronicle the history of the kingdom of Prester John, and Hiob becomes obsessed with the tales they tell. The Habitation of the Blessed recounts the fragmented narratives found within these living volumes, revealing the life of a priest named John, and his rise to power in this country of impossible richness. John’s tale weaves together with the confessions of his wife Hagia, a blemmye–a headless creature who carried her face on her chest–as well as the tender, jeweled nursery stories of Imtithal, nanny to the royal family. Hugo and World Fantasy award nominee Catherynne M. Valente reimagines the legends of Prester John in this stunning tour de force.
Buy The Habitation of the Blessed (A Dirge for Prester John Book 1) by Catherynne M. Valente Here
2019 HUGO AWARD FINALIST, BEST NOVEL
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy meets the joy and glamour of Eurovision in bestselling author Catherynne M. Valente’s science fiction spectacle, where sentient races compete for glory in a galactic musical contest…and the stakes are as high as the fate of planet Earth.
A century ago, the Sentience Wars tore the galaxy apart and nearly ended the entire concept of intelligent space-faring life. In the aftermath, a curious tradition was invented—something to cheer up everyone who was left and bring the shattered worlds together in the spirit of peace, unity, and understanding.
Once every cycle, the great galactic civilizations gather for the Metagalactic Grand Prix—part gladiatorial contest, part beauty pageant, part concert extravaganza, and part continuation of the wars of the past. Species far and wide compete in feats of song, dance and/or whatever facsimile of these can be performed by various creatures who may or may not possess, in the traditional sense, feet, mouths, larynxes, or faces. And if a new species should wish to be counted among the high and the mighty, if a new planet has produced some savage group of animals, machines, or algae that claim to be, against all odds, sentient? Well, then they will have to compete. And if they fail? Sudden extermination for their entire species.
This year, though, humankind has discovered the enormous universe. And while they expected to discover a grand drama of diplomacy, gunships, wormholes, and stoic councils of aliens, they have instead found glitter, lipstick, and electric guitars. Mankind will not get to fight for its destiny—they must sing.
Decibel Jones and the Absolute Zeroes have been chosen to represent their planet on the greatest stage in the galaxy. And the fate of Earth lies in their ability to rock.
