LF Reader

It took me over 35 years to admit to myself that I’m gay, another seven to find the courage to say it out loud to anyone else, and exactly 30 seconds to develop a massive crush on my daughter’s music teacher. It’s really not my fault. Have you even seen those cute bowties he wears? After everything it’s taken to get here, am I going to work up the nerve to come out to my ex-wife and my best friends?

I have the best luck ever, it’s terrible. You want it? It’s yours. But ask yourself: Do you like being bored all the time because there are no challenges ever? Do you like being surrounded by people because no one will ever leave you alone? (Even in the bathroom, you’ll need to invest in some really good locks.)

Twenty years ago, monsters rose on earth and began a new age of civilization. One where humans live in military-controlled, cramped and dirty cities along the coasts, and the majority of the United States is known as the Wastes. A lawless, desolate and dangerous place, teeming with monsters that have claimed the land for their own. Including Wyn the Soul Eater. He appears every three years, making his way across the country and slaughtering humans randomly, sucking them dry until they’re nothing but husks.

At 43, Holden Barnett is getting along just fine. His job as a pilot keeps him from getting restless, and he’s got a man who doesn’t want promises for the future. One phone call from his estranged sister changes everything. She needs his help, so Holden drops everything and heads to Harmony, a small town in Briar County, which represents everything he’s tried to avoid in life.

After years of abuse for being different, Isa finally escaped his family by going to college. Or at least he thought he had, until he realized even moving to another state wasn’t enough to leave them behind. Ultraconservative, harsh, and extremely controlling, they were determined to force him to conform to their ideals. Even in public, he couldn’t escape their fundamentalist views, and they sought to end his private life. So who was the silent giant who swept in and rescued Isa from being attacked by his sister? And why did he like to carry Isa around like his own stuffed toy?

Branded by the trauma of his past, Eli is struggling in his freshman year of college. He might be afraid of just about everything, but in his heart of hearts, he's nobody's bitch. Yet it's at his lowest point that he first hears it. Him. The voice. Afraid it's a sign of his fragile psyche's demise, Eli is torn between hunting down the source to prove it's real and ignoring it in case it isn't. His eventual quest will see him grappling with geese, battling burritos, and dodging deities - all in the search for his sanity. And maybe, just maybe, finding love.

Is it really wrong to want to murder your boss? Dylan has worked for Gabe for two years. Two long years of sarcastic comments. Two long years of insults, and having to redo the coffee pot four times in the mornings to meet his exacting standards. Not surprisingly he has devoted a lot of time to increasingly inventive ways to murder Gabe. From stabbing him with a cake fork, to garrotting him with his expensive tie, Dylan has thought of everything. However, a chance encounter opens his eyes to the attraction that has always lain between them, concealed by the layers of antipathy.

Atticus Mulvaney is the eldest son of eccentric billionaire, Thomas Mulvaney - a role he takes very seriously. Atticus takes everything seriously. Like his brothers, Atticus is a psychopath, raised to right the wrongs of a broken justice system. Unlike his brothers, he’s not very good at it. Jericho Navarro is no psychopath, but he is a vicious killer. Like Atticus, he also has a secret life. To most, he’s just a mechanic. But to a ragtag group of social misfits, he’s Peter Pan, teaching them to eliminate those who prey on the weak with extreme prejudice.

Daniel Mulligan is tough, snarky, and tattooed, hiding his self-consciousness behind sarcasm. Daniel has never fit in - not at home in Philadelphia with his auto mechanic father and brothers, and not at school where his Ivy League classmates looked down on him. Now, Daniel's relieved to have a job at a small college in Holiday, Northern Michigan, but he's a city boy through and through, and it's clear that this small town is one more place he won't fit in.