Category: Contemporary

Lost Bits

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Lost Bits
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The last thing K-404 remembers is a happy home with the human child Ele, whose care is his primary purpose. So, when he wakes up in a landfill of tossed-away technology, his only thought is to reunite with his family.

This world is not his own, though. It’s a wasteland of desolate buildings, flying metal disks, and monstrosities that keep themselves active by stealing another bot’s power.

How did the world get this way?

And why was he discarded?

Hampered by imperfect memory, an obsolete body, and limited battery life, 404 sets out to find his home. Joined by other castaways, he faces off against scavengers and monsters, only to encounter greater threats.

Mask: Author’s Preferred Text

Mask: Author's Preferred Text
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I am the mask. The mask is me.

America has fallen. Remnants of states cling together. The Pacific Northwest is now PacNorth.

Democracy has gone off the rails. Citizens still vote, but only to vote away anything–or anyone–they don’t like. Long-term wisdom loses to short-term pleasure.

And the Collectors come in the night.

Radial is a Collector. The instrument of the will of the people. You get voted away…Radial makes you disappear. The system works, and he is its servant. The rule of the people is the highest form of human government. He is a believer.

Until he is asked to collect someone who should never, ever be voted away.

Assault on Saint Agnes

Assault on Saint Agnes
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When terrorists assault Saint Agnes Church in Saint Paul, Minnesota, they expect to find a congregation of lambs: they get Bobby Kurtz instead.

An unrepentant Cold Warrior, Kurtz destroys the terror cell with violent finality. Against his will, Kurtz is pulled back into the life he left behind decades before. He reluctantly picks up the burden of hunting the terrorists in our midst.

He risks his life, and his marriage, in a single-minded pursuit of victory over evil. Working with a shadowy government agency, Kurtz uses all of his skills and experience to foil a plan that would plunge the Twin Cities back into the Stone Age. The final battle rages across the plains during a Christmas Eve blizzard in a story that will leave the reader pleading for more of Kurtz and his team of experts.

Dark Transit (Anthony “Patch” Pacino Series Book 1)

Dark Transit (Anthony "Patch" Pacino Series Book 1)
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Lieutenant Anthony Pacino reports aboard the “project boat” USS Vermont two years after having survived the catastrophic sinking of the Piranha. Pacino quickly learns that Vermont’s missions are all ultra-secret with the boat reporting only to the Sub Force commander, the National Security Advisor and the President: Vermont does the dirty deeds that need doing in deadly silence and obscurity.

After Vermont misses the mark on an easy mission, there are questions asked about her ability to conduct the next mission, one that is vital to the security of the United States and the future of the submarine force. Vermont is tasked with stealing a revolutionary submarine that the Russians are testing with an Iranian crew because it’s too risky to use Russian sailors. It’s a high-stakes gamble for all involved, with the losers vanishing if things go wrong, the winners validating a world-changing technology.

Pacino is part of the mission to steal the submarine, but the toughest obstacle is a wolf-pack of Russians coming to the defense of the Iranian submarine. Getting it back to the United States for evaluation becomes secondary to surviving an exchange of missiles and torpedoes in an underwater battle that threatens to let the final genie out of the bottle.

***

“DiMercurio has used the last decade to refine his writing and produce the best naval thriller in decades. I couldn’t put it down.” Joseph Courtemanche, author of Assault on Saint Agnes.

Voyage of the Devilfish (The Michael Pacino Series Book 1)

Voyage of the Devilfish (The Michael Pacino Series Book 1)
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The Kaliningrad stands as the last great triumph of Soviet submarine technology. Now it has put out to sea, lurking beneath the polar ice cap. In command is the most brilliant officer the Soviet fleet has ever produced—Admiral Alexi Novskoyy. And in his fanatical hands is the power to turn back the clock to the Cold War…and begin the countdown to doomsday.

Opposing him is the killer chase sub USS Devilfish, captained by Commander Michael Pacino—a dogged veteran of the American fleet. His orders are to hunt down and destroy the Russian vessel. But his personal mission is to settle an old score with Novskoyy—the man who killed his father.

The ultimate undersea duel is about to begin…

Blackthorne

Blackthorne
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Framed for a crime he didn’t commit. Haunted by the ghosts of his past. Incarcerated in the most notorious prison in the Freeholds. Fate has mauled Mattias Temple, a failed cadre necromancer, leaving him with little hope.

Until a rogue military squad kidnaps the governor and threatens the city with a magical plague, giving him a shot to redeem a lifetime of mistakes and be the one thing he never thought possible: A hero.

As the body count rises Mattias finds himself neck-deep in trouble and drowning in ghosts. Outnumbered and outgunned, he has one choice left: Cut a bloody swathe through his enemies or die trying.

“A manic blend of insectile cyberpunk, necromancy, and vicious humor, Blackthorne crushes.” -Michael R Fletcher, author of The Obsidian Path

“A grim and gutsy mash-up of military SF and gore spattered noir fantasy. Highly recommended and fingers crossed for a sequel.”
-Anthony Ryan, author of The Martyr

“Truly a mesmerizing read that I recommend to anyone who loves sf and fantasy with guts, heart, and feeling.”
-Nick Borrelli, Out of this World SFF

Mushroom Blues (The Hofmann Report Book 1)

Mushroom Blues (The Hofmann Report Book 1)
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ENTER THE FUNGALVERSE. BEAT THE WINTER BLUES.

Blade Runner, True Detective and District 9 meld with the weird worlds of Jeff VanderMeer, Philip K. Dick and China Miéville in Adrian M. Gibson’s dark, hallucinatory, fungalpunk noir debut.

Two years after a devastating defeat in the decade-long Spore War, the island nation of Hōppon and its capital city of Neo Kinoko are occupied by invading Coprinian forces. Its fungal citizens are in dire straits, wracked by food shortages, poverty and an influx of war refugees. Even worse, the corrupt occupiers exploit their power, hounding the native population.

As a winter storm looms over the metropolis, NKPD homicide detective Henrietta Hofmann begrudgingly partners up with mushroom-headed patrol officer Koji Nameko to investigate the mysterious murders of fungal and half-breed children. Their investigation drags them deep into the seedy underbelly of a war-torn city, one brimming with colonizers, criminal gangs, racial division and moral decay.

In order to solve the case and unravel the truth, Hofmann must challenge her past and embrace fungal ways. What she and Nameko uncover in the midst of this frigid wasteland will chill them to the core, but will they make it through the storm alive?

Lovecraft’s Iraq

Lovecraft's Iraq
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The year is 2005. Blood from the Second Battle of Fallujah still dries on the farmlands of the Zaidon. But for Stygian 2-3, a young team of Recon Marines, the war is anything but over.

Plaguing their battlespace is an ancient evil. Those who volunteered to ensure “Iraqi Freedom” must fight not only anti-Coalition forces, but powers older than the United States, democracy… the world itself.

———————————————————————————————————————————————————-

“Military hell from a veteran who’s lived it, Rose’s Lovecraft’s Iraq is slick, cinematic, and surreal. An action adventure of the heroes who give their all, even when there is no winning.”

– Lee Murray, two-time Bram Stoker Award®-winner, and author of Into the Mist

“Rose effortlessly captures the nuance of an Iraq deployment while conjuring something far more sinister.”

– Leo Jenkins, author of Lest We Forget

“Brought me back to the gritty details of the very real and intense moment-to-moment experiences of combat, woven together with the altogether unreal.”

– Brock Hileman, former Recon Marine and David Rose’s team leader in Iraq

Monsters in the Bush: Lovecraftian Military Tales

Monsters in the Bush: Lovecraftian Military Tales
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Seven tales—including ‘Lovecraft in Lockup,’ the sequel to Lovecraft’s Iraq—are here to pay homage to military life and lunatic cosmic dread.

Malaki Marsh, corporal in the Marine Corps, has brought a bit of Ipswich to Onslow Beach. Armed with arcane know-how, he’s on the verge of summoning a swimmer from the deep—but whose ill fate it may bring not even he can tell.

Recon Marine, daring leader, lunatic extraordinaire, Cornelius Van Cleave seems to live for only two things: the beloved Corps and climbing with his hands and teeth up its bloody ranks. But there are fallen stars, abductions, and dark magic during Desert Storm all standing in his way.

Ronald Ragsdale, veteran turned congressman, would like nothing better than to unsee his past. But none could forget the horror he encountered while in the jungles of Vietnam. His one and only trip to the VA leaves him spilling his guts to a skeptical shrink, though she may not remain doubtful for long.

There is the Iraqi, Al-Sufi. Along with his moronic brother, he’s high-tailing it out of Iraq, off to a new land, to the United States of America, where, if they get there, a greater banquet awaits than seen in their centuries-spanning lives.

Esoteric rituals. Strange powers harnessed. A disarmed military policeman, out to solve the case of a lifetime, and more.

Creepy, well-crafted, rife with dark humor, and teeming with determined characters, Monsters in the Bush is a collection of military horror like no other.

SNAFU: An Anthology of Military Horror

SNAFU: An Anthology of Military Horror
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War is Hell… Soldiers fight to survive. They fight each other, and they fight the demons inside. Sometimes, they fight real monsters.

SNAFU collects stories of ancient myths, time travellers, horrors in the old west… and the soldiers who fight them. Featuring some of the best writers working in the field today.

Jonathan Maberry, Greig Beck and James A Moore lead the way, with a contingent of emerging authors to back them up. Fight or die.