Showing results by narrator "Luke Daniels" in All Categories

Spain is on the brink of economic collapse, and European banks demand that any bailout be linked to harsh domestic changes. An alliance of Islamic bankers counters with a rescue package containing no conditions at all. The underlying goal: to break the unity of Europe and put Madrid on the path back to Islamic rule. When the United States stridently opposes that deal, terrorists storm the American consulate in Barcelona and slaughter an entire six-man US Marine security guard.

One morning, traveling salesman Gregor Samsa wakes from an anxious dream to discover that he has inexplicably changed into a monstrous insect. Nonetheless, life goes on, and poor Gregor is left to deal not only with the existential questions of who or what he now is but also with more mundane concerns: his job (which he fears he’ll lose), his loved ones (whom he fears he disgusts), and the daily indignities of everyday life (which continue apace). Soon, even those who sympathize with his bizarre predicament begin to lose their patience....

The Central Intelligence Agency is under attack, and so is its top field operative, Kyle Swanson. The highly decorated former marine corps gunnery sergeant is attending the funeral of a friend when a terrorist blows up the grave. A week later he narrowly survives a grenade attack in Berlin. In Washington, Congress is being told that Swanson has been turned, his private employer is corrupt, and the agency itself cannot be trusted.

In its 2001 report on global climate, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change of the United Nations prominently featured the "Hockey Stick", a chart showing global temperature data over the past 1,000 years. The Hockey Stick demonstrated that temperature had risen with the increase in industrialization and use of fossil fuels. The inescapable conclusion was that worldwide human activity since the industrial age had raised CO2 levels, trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and warming the planet.

David Slaton has a good life. He has a new wife and a house in the Virginia suburbs. But he also has a dark past. Slaton is a former kidon, the most lethal Israeli assassin ever created. After decades of work, a brilliant scientist has taken Iran to the threshold of its dream - a nuclear-tipped ballistic missile. Mossad must eliminate the man, but with a spy lurking high in its ranks there is only one option: bring back Slaton.

When all new threats are dealt with, old enemies emerge from the shadows. Dean Parker has brought his wife home, and he’s looking forward to relaxing and having a future with his family on New Spero. The Iskios vortex is gone, vanquished by the Hero of Earth, but unforeseen enemies linger in the universe. The Bhlat send a warning to the humans, one that suggests the Kraski may not all be dead. All signs point to Lom of Pleva, a wealthy and very dangerous enemy to have.

As a teenager, Vickie Preston survived an attack by a serial killer. That was the first time she saw a ghost. Now the city of Boston is being terrorized - someone is kidnapping women and burying them alive, but cruelly leaving a glimmer of hope for the authorities by sending a clue about their location. Vickie is pulled into the investigation when her name is mentioned in one of the notes.

This CliffsNotes study guide on William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice supplements the original literary work, giving you background information about the author, an introduction to the work, and critical commentaries, all for you to use as an educational tool that will allow you to better understand the work.

Charlene "Charlie" Moreau is back in St. Francisville, Louisiana, to work on a movie. One night she stumbles across the body of a Civil War reenactor, the second murdered in two days. Charlie is shocked to learn that her father - a guide on the Journey, a historic paddle wheeler that's sponsoring the reenactment - is a suspect.

The Celestial War has arrived. Captain Hughes and his team of rebels have created a shaky alliance with the same government that sought to end them, but even that might not be enough. In order to combat the Celestial threat, Jace will need to convince the Sarkonian Emperor to not only join his cause but lend him the resources he needs to overpower the enemy.

A 39-year-old with Asperger’s syndrome and obsessive-compulsive disorder, Edward Stanton lives alone on a rigid schedule in the Montana town where he grew up. His carefully constructed routine includes tracking his most common waking time (7:38 a.m.), refusing to start his therapy sessions even a minute before the appointed hour (10:00 a.m.), and watching one episode of the 1960s cop show Dragnet each night (10:00 p.m.). But when a single mother and her nine-year-old son move in across the street, Edward’s timetable comes undone....

Twelve months ago, Max was living what one would consider a normal life. That is, until he learned he was a little more than your average 30-year-old. Together with a team of eclectic mages working out of an estate known as the Atheneum, they destroyed the Fountain of Youth and stopped a plot to disrupt the upcoming talks about the magical and Ethereal communities coming out to the normal world, known as "The Balance", but only for the time being.

The Synchronicity War is over, and the insectoid beachheads in our spiral arm have been destroyed, but the aftermath of the war holds some nasty surprises for humanity and its loyal AI allies. Somebody is messing with the human time line. Is it the friendlies, the sogas, the insectoids, or a new race?

The rich are very different from you and me. Blessed by great wealth, they can get what they want, even what they shouldn’t have. Cursed by great wealth, they become the targets of others who will risk everything to become affluent. Nelson DeMille introduces twenty original tales by today’s most elite mystery writers who explore the life (and death) styles of the rich and infamous.

The brilliants changed everything.

Since 1980, 1% of the world has been born with gifts we'd only dreamed of. The ability to sense a person's most intimate secrets, or predict the stock market, or move virtually unseen. For thirty years the world has struggled with a growing divide between the exceptional...and the rest of us.

The gods are dying. But for one man, death is only the beginning. Murdered as a ritual sacrifice, amateur thief and professional charmer Dustin Graves mysteriously survives, finding himself gifted with strange, dark magic. Then more dead bodies turn up. Some are human, but one is a god of the old world, slain at his own doorstep.

After a brief yet exalted career that resulted in the acclaimed films Badlands and Days of Heaven, director Terrence Malick shunned the public eye and, seemingly, his talents. In The Absence of Malick, David Handelman renders the scope and mystery of Malick's disappearance and, against all odds, finds him on the other end of a phone call.

Being popular in the college music scene doesn’t solve all your problems; at least that’s what the hot musicians of indie band Luminescent Juliet discover. In this compelling novel, trouble begins when 18-year-old Riley, trying to regain her rhythm after throwing away her percussion scholarship to a top school, wins an audition to become the band’s new drummer. This sets her on a collision course with Romeo, the band’s sexy dark-haired guitarist, whose ambitions do not include performing with a girl.

For thirty years humanity struggled to cope with the brilliants, the 1 percent of people born with remarkable gifts. For thirty years we tried to avoid a devastating civil war. We failed. The White House is a smoking ruin. Madison Square Garden is an internment camp. In Wyoming, an armed militia of thousands marches toward a final, apocalyptic battle.

Cairn has finally gained access to the Sanctum…the birthplace of the infernal’s mystic abilities and proving ground for their adolescents, a place filled to the brim with magic and mystery. The power he needs to solidify a major alliance is close at hand. All he needs to do is settle in and prove himself with the help of old friends and new. Simple enough. Or it would be, if Cairn was the only outsider to breach the Sanctum. When he arrives, he discovers an old enemy has sealed the Sanctum from the inside, holding it ransom. Her demands: “Bring me the head of the usurper.”