Science Thriller

Most humans have no idea that a dark and deadly underworld, filled with magic and monsters, exists. They wander through life blissfully ignorant of the supernatural world around them. Nora Jacobs is different. Nora knows exactly what kinds of hellish creatures haunt the streets of Detroit. Thanks to a unique set of psychic abilities, Nora has managed to steer clear of the underworld most of her life. But all that changes the night the most powerful vampire in the city discovers her gifts and decides to use her as a tool to find one of his missing clan members.

Earth has fallen under the influence of the Fermion Party, whose members believe humanity’s future lies in the metaverse, a simulated environment to which people can upload their consciousness to become immortal. As a simulant, one cannot get sick, grow old, or die. Human beings have no business risking their lives in the betaverse, where injury and illness can kill them. And those who wish to explore beyond the solar system blaspheme what the Fermions believe is the natural order.

In God Don't Play, trouble comes a woman's way just when she thinks she's finally got it all figured out. Annette Goode couldn't be happier with where she is in life. She has a good job, a comfortable home, and a wonderful husband and daughter. But tough times lie ahead. Out of the blue, Annette begins receiving anonymous hate mail and threatening phone calls. It seems her life isn't as settled as she thought, and demons from her past surface in unexpected ways.

Navigating life was already no picnic for Riley, a young widowed surgeon with a teenage daughter. Now, it will take near superhuman courage to find safe harbor in a world gone mad. With the help of a brilliant but quirky cardiologist named Coop, she must conquer her fears, traverse hundreds of miles of frozen terrain, and survive hostile confrontations to get her daughter, Julia, to safety. Will she have the strength and determination to ensure they survive?

Hugo Award-winning author Charles Stross is renowned for his cutting-edge science fiction. This third entry in his “edgy … spoof of Cold War spy thrillers” ( Booklist) finds covert agent Bob Howard learning about a top-secret dossier that vanishes with his boss. Determined to discover the contents of this memorandum, Howard runs afoul of Russian spies, ancient demons, and apostles of a hideous cult planning to raise the Eater of Souls from the undead.

After the assassination of FDR in the 1930s, the US collapses and is picked off by the UK, Canada, Mexico, and Russia. Gunnie Lizbeth Rose tries to piece out a life, running security on runs from Texoma across the border to Mexico, where work and prospects are stronger. When two Russian magicians come looking for a man named Alex Karkarov, they hire Lizbeth, but there are problems: The man they're looking for is dead, but he has a daughter they now need to find, as an ever-growing set of sorcerers and gunnies do not want them to succeed.

Lily Ivory hopes for a normal life when she opens Aunt Cora's Closet. With her magical knack for vintage fashion - she can sense vibrations of the past from clothing and jewelry - her store becomes a big hit. But when a client is murdered and children start disappearing from the Bay Area, Lily may be the only one who can unravel the crime.

The beast came at night. Murdered the cop in his home. Tore his Rottweilers to pieces. And it's only the latest in a series of gruesome attacks. Overwhelmed, Houston PD is at a loss. But shape-shifter Michael Biörn isn't. Michael discerns the secret nature of the killer; a werewolf's handiwork is unmistakable. Werewolves move in packs, however. And the local pack is 40 members strong. But a young woman's life is at stake. And so, after centuries spent avoiding the wolves, Michael abandons his retreat to confront his ancestral enemies.

The Facility is a research centre that specialises in cryptozoology, the search for legendary creatures. Once these ‘cryptids’ are found, they are caged, abused and experimented on to graft their physical prowess onto ordinary soldiers. Even as the Facility’s troops hunt down Shaw, and the cunning Cryptid Nine plans her escape, something far more horrifying is emerging from hibernation to feed. And both human and cryptid will discover that nothing can stop the Wendigo....

Dr. Nia Wallace has built her career on untangling the secrets hidden in DNA, but nothing has prepared her for the mystery her own genes are about to reveal. When a new ancestry app connects her to a sibling she never knew existed, Nia is drawn to the remote Louisiana town of Darbonne, a place steeped in history—and secrets. The town is almost too perfect: the people are welcoming, the streets are idyllic, and the community seems to thrive in isolation. But beneath the surface, Nia senses something is off. Faces look too familiar, questions are met with vague answers, and the deeper she ...

Likable antiques dealer Joseph Bridgeman is back in the present and dreaming of a quiet life. But when a mysterious and enigmatic time traveler arrives in his shop, Joe learns that his first trip was just the beginning and this time, the rules of the game have changed. Blackmailed into accepting a new mission, Joe is flung back to 1960s London where he comes face-to-face with a ruthless gangster and witnesses the brutal murder of an innocent woman. Joe knows better than most that death can be reversed and the final chapter is sometimes where the story actually begins.

When an EMP devastated the nation's power supplies and left the country in ruins, Jack, Wayne, Susan, Emma and Logan all fought to seek shelter in a treacherous first day. But surviving the first day was just the beginning. Jack has found his way home. But when tragedy strikes, he is forced on a personal journey across the country to seek new shelter - and face up to the harrowing demons of his past. Wayne's search for Candice is going nowhere. But when a stunning discovery breathes new life into his journey, he is determined to make one final push through.

Alone since her father's murder, Aurora has spent years hunting his killers. Battle-weary she's ready to start over where no one knows who or what she is, she just has one last mission to complete. Everything is going to plan until she discovers the beautiful winged girl caged underground. Her decision to rescue Evie and to help her get home safely, despite avians being infamous for selling out shapeshifters like Aurora to cutters and black-market flesh dealers, will put her on a perilous path.

Waking up in a tacky coffin and wearing off-brand shoes, Betsy Taylor can't believe the horrible turn her life has taken; then she discovers she's a vampire. Soon, Betsy becomes a participant in a power struggle between the forces of darkness. With only her friend Jessica and the hunky vampire Sinclair to help her, this new "Queen of Vampires" will have a tough time getting her afterlife straight.

Life as Aileen knew it ended when she woke up in a morgue sporting a new set of fangs after a wild night out. Now, as a courier for the supernatural world, she balances figuring out this whole vampire thing with making enough to support her ice cream habit. When a job goes disastrously awry and ends with a body on the ground, Aileen finds herself in over her head as she draws the attention of a powerful creature intent on her death.

Grave Sight draws listeners into the intriguing world of Harper Connelly, a woman with a unique gift: she can "see" the deceased and how they died. A teenage girl from a small Ozarks town is missing and feared dead. Hired by local police, Harper locates the girl's body in a nearby forest. But there's more than one corpse in those woods, and the second one raises questions no one wants to ask.

The witnesses are legion, scattered across the world and dotted through history, people who looked up and saw something impossible lighting up the night sky. What those objects were, where they came from, and who - or what - might be inside them is the subject of fierce debate and equally fierce mockery, so that most who glimpsed them came to wish they hadn't. Most, but not everyone.

It starts with the dogs. They won’t stop barking. And then the earth shrugs - 8.9 on the Richter scale. It’s the world’s biggest earthquake since Lisbon in 1755, and it doesn’t hit California or Japan or Mexico, but New Madrid, Missouri, a sleepy town on the Mississippi River. Seismologists had predicted the scope of the disaster - but no one listened. For hundreds of miles around, dams burst, engulfing entire counties in tidal waves of mud and debris. Within minutes, there is nothing but chaos and ruin from St. Louis to Vicksburg, from Kansas City to Louisville.

Ishmael Jones is someone who can't afford to be noticed, someone who lives under the radar, who drives on the dark side of the road. He's employed to search out secrets, investigate mysteries and shine a light in dark places. Invited by his employer, the enigmatic Colonel, to join him and his family for Christmas, Ishmael arrives at the grand but isolated Belcourt Manor in the midst of a blizzard to find that the Colonel has mysteriously disappeared. As he questions his fellow guests, Ishmael concludes that at least one of them - not least Ishmael himself - is harboring a dangerous secret.

Not satisfied with the thrills of being one of Greater Los Angeles' toughest cops, Jake Cardigan turns to Tek, a computerized brain stimulant that transports the user to any reality he can imagine. He's soon addicted to this fantasy enabler—and it isn't long before Cardigan is accused of dealing. When he fails to convince the mechanized jury of his innocence, the state strips his badge and sentences him to fifteen years in suspended animation. Four years later, he's awakened. His sentence has been changed, but no one will tell him why.