The troubling message from Serena Charters' late grandmother appears in a package containing four pages of a centuries-old illuminated manuscript - a strange inheritance that hides many secrets...and has already cost many lives. Seeking answers, Serena turns to Erik North of Rarities Unlimited, a reclusive manuscript appraiser with a passion for the past. Without warning they are thrust together into the center of a lethal firestorm that rages between two worlds - one long dead yet living on in an ancient text, the other chillingly alive and fraught with peril.

In the scorching heat of the Southwestern desert, a frightened old man knows his time is quickly running out, as the bad karma of his own good fortune is finally closing in on him after 50 years.

Donovan International is a power to be reckoned with in the dazzling and cutthroat worldwide gem trade -- and is therefore a target for the murderous greed of unscrupulous competitors. Though a shrewd businesswoman, Honor Donovan has been effectively shut out of the dangerous family enterprise by the Donovan males -- until her favorite brother, Kyle, mysteriously vanishes along with a fortune in stolen amber.

Orphaned at 13, Grace Silva clawed her way out of poverty and violence to become one of the most respected judges on the federal bench. Grace believes in the rule of law, lives it, breathes it. She has always been buttoned up and buttoned down. Except once.

A hero of the crusades, Dominic le Sabre has returned in glory and in triumph to claim his reward: the beautiful Saxon bride awarded to him by the conqueror king. But Lady Margaret of the Blackthorne cannot yield to the bold Norman invader.

When an exquisitely crafted, authentic imperial Faberge egg mysteriously shows up at Laurel Swann's home studio, she knows it can only be from one person - her father, who has drifted in and out of her life for as long as she can remember. But this time Jamie Swann leaves her something too many people will kill for. Out of her league and desperate, Laurel is forced to accept help from the very man who is trying to ensnare her father in his own web of double crosses. Cruz Rowan can help her stay alive, but will he do the same for her father?

An art dealer and owner of her own design studio, Perfect Touch, Sarah "Sam" Maddox travels the world to find the ideal artwork for her clients. Her sophisticated, comfortable life in San Francisco is light years away from the poverty of her family's dairy farm, and Sam will do whatever it takes to keep her business strong. A dedicated urban career woman focused on her work, she doesn't have time or energy for a family or distracting romantic entanglements.

Beautiful, sweet Shay and dark, dangerous Tanner don′t have a lot in common. He′s a suspicious big city cop come home to his family′s ranch and she′s a bleeding heart who works for a group that seeks out ranches to conserve after the owners have passed away. But the suspicious death of Tanner′s uncle at his ranch throws the two opposites together and sparks fly.

Carlin Reed lives in fear, off the grid, moving from place to place. So Battle Ridge, Wyoming, a small town in the middle of nowhere, seems like a good place to lie low for a while. But after becoming cook and housekeeper to cattle rancher Zeke Decker, Carlin suspects that she’s made her first mistake. Rugged, sexy, and too distracting for his own good, Zeke is pure temptation mixed with something deep and primal that makes Carlin feel almost safe. Soon things are getting way too hot in the kitchen.

This is the first in the popular series featuring California investigator Kinsey Millhone. She's 32, twice divorced, no kids, an ex-cop who likes her work...and who works strictly alone!

When a casino robbery in Atlantic City goes horribly awry, the man who orchestrated it is obliged to call in a favor from someone who's occasionally called Jack. While it's doubtful that anyone knows his actual name or anything at all about his true identity, or even if he's still alive, he's in his mid-30s and lives completely off the grid, a criminal's criminal who does entirely as he pleases and is almost impossible to get in touch with.

DS Whitney Walker wants a promotion, but it’s hard when she’s trying to balance motherhood with a career. When a newborn baby is kidnapped from the local hospital, she draws on her skills as a mother to help. Despite being ordered not to, and when the leads are going nowhere, Walker enlists the help of a local journalist who’s convinced it’s the work of an international baby smuggling ring. Walker’s plan backfires and she fears they’re running out of time.

Lurking in the dark corners of J. P. Beaumont's bizarre case was not just a demented mind obsessed with murder, but secrets so deadly that even a street-tough cop could die guessing.

Venetia Milton's memories of a romantic night with Gabriel Jones—an alchemist's descendant—are shattered soon thereafter by news of his death. Adopting the guise of his respectable widow, she embarks on a new career as a fashionable photographer in London, where her unique ability to "see" beyond her subjects makes her photographs highly prized. But Venetia's romantic whim causes unexpected trouble.

When former prosecutor Penn Cage returns to his hometown of Natchez, Mississippi, he doesn't find the peace he desperately craves. He finds that his own father is being blackmailed by a corrupt ex-cop. And when Penn investigates, he uncovers a murderous secret - and the small town's violent past.

Donovan International is a power to be reckoned with in the dazzling and cutthroat worldwide gem trade -- and is therefore a target for the murderous greed of unscrupulous competitors. Though a shrewd businesswoman, Honor Donovan has been effectively shut out of the dangerous family enterprise by the Donovan males -- until her favorite brother, Kyle, mysteriously vanishes along with a fortune in stolen amber.

Brooding and sexy Rafe Di Luca has returned to his family's luxurious vineyard resort and discovers that a long-ago quarrel has ignited once more, forcing him to work with Brooke Petersson, the woman he seduced...and betrayed.

Anna Strong is trained for anything-until she's attacked one night, only to awaken in a dark world that exists between the living and the dead. Here, Anna struggles with her love for the two men who inhabit the realms of each: Max, a human DEA agent, and Avery, a Night Watcher who joins Anna in pursuit of the vampire who changed her life. Now, as her two worlds collide, fate plunges Anna into the ultimate battle between good and evil - where survival is not just for the living.

In number-one New York Times best-selling author Charlaine Harris’s "Dahlia Underground,” venerable vampire Dahlia Lynley-Chivers survives an attack by an anti-vampire terrorist group, only to show them they tried to blow up the wrong bloodsucker. Bailey Ruth Raeburn, a ghost assigned to assist humans in trouble, steps into the middle of a marital dispute with surprising twists in Carolyn Hart’s “Riding High”....

Here come the (Barefoot Bay) brides! They’re experts at planning dreamy “I do’s” but haven’t found their own happily ever after...yet. Destination wedding consultant Willow Ambrose has fought a battle with the scale for much of her life, but she has finally won the war. She hasn’t just cut calories - she’s cut all ties to her past, too, and successfully carved out a new body and a new life. But when she comes face to face with someone who left an indelible mark on her heart years before, all that threatens to crumble.

The Gale family can change the world with the charms they cast, and they like to keep this in the family. Alysha Gale is tired of having all her aunts try to run her life, both personally and magically. So when the letter from her Gran arrives willing her a "junk" shop in Calgary, Alysha jumps at the chance. It isn't until she gets there that she realizes her customers are fey. And no one told her there's trouble brewing in Calgary - trouble so big that even calling in the family may not save the day.

In Renaissance Italy, intrigue is as intricate as carved cathedral doors, but none is so captivating as that surrounding the prized Wind Dancer, the lost treasure of a family—and of the man who will stop at nothing to reclaim it. Lionello Andreas is bound by his vow to guard the exquisite statue. But to recover what is rightfully his, he will need the help of a thief—one he can control body and soul.

Vicki Nelson, formerly of Toronto’s homicide unit and now a private detective, witnesses the first of many vicious attacks that begin plaguing the city of Toronto. As death follows unspeakable death, Vicki, in an attempt to stop these forces of dark magic, is forced to renew her relationship with her former partner, Mike Celluci - along with another, unexpected ally…. Henry Fitzroy, the illegitimate son of King Henry VIII, has learned over the course of his life how to blend with humans; how to deny the call for blood in his veins.

Years ago, the Gypsy Kumpania where Janeal Mikkado lived was attacked by outsiders. With her best friend about to be consumed by a fire, Janeal had two options: try to save her friend—at serious risk to her own life—or disappear with the million dollars that she had just discovered. But the past is quickly coming back to haunt her. Both the best friend and the boyfriend that she was sure were dead have reappeared in her life, as has someone who knows about the money. There's a debt to be paid for the money she found, but there's an even greater debt she must face.

When the Lusitania sank, more than one 1,000 people died. One passenger, however, survived to become a changed man, giving up his life as a petty thief but keeping a small silver statue that would become a family heirloom to future generations. Now, nearly a century later, that heirloom, one of a priceless, long-separated set of three, has been snatched away from the Sullivans.

In 1985, with much fanfare, a time capsule was buried under the front lawn of a small-town county courthouse, to be reopened in 2085. But just 20 years later, in the dead of night, the capsule is dug up, its contents stolen.

MacKayla Lane's life is good. She has great friends, a decent job, and a car that breaks down only every other week or so. In other words, she's your perfectly ordinary 21st-century woman. Or so she thinks...until something extraordinary happens.

Martha Macnamara knows that her daughter, Elizabeth, is in trouble; she just doesn't know what kind. Mysterious phone calls from San Francisco at odd hours of the night are the only contact she has had with Elizabeth for years. Now, Elizabeth has sent her a plane ticket and reserved a room for her at San Francisco's most luxurious hotel. Yet she has not tried to contact Martha since she arrived, leaving her lonely, confused, and a little bit worried. Into the story steps Mayland Long, a distinguished-looking and wealthy Chinese man who lives at the hotel and is drawn to Martha's good nature and ability to pinpoint the truth of a matter.

Mad scientists have never had it so tough. In super-hero comics, graphic novels, films, TV series, video games, and even works of what may be fiction, they are besieged by those who stand against them, devoid of sympathy for their irrational, megalomaniacal impulses to rule, destroy, or otherwise dominate the world as we know it. It’s just not fair. So those of us who are so twisted and sick that we love mad scientists have created this guide.

Short novels are movie-length narratives that may well be the perfect length for science fiction stories. This audio collection presents the best-of-the-best short science fiction novels published in 2014 by current and emerging masters of this vibrant form of storytelling.