Showing results by narrator "Marc Vietor" in All Categories

From James Leo Herlihy (author of Midnight Cowboy) comes a series of grim yet insightful short stories in his first collection, The Sleep of Baby Filbertson. Both an examination of the darker themes of alienation and isolation and an elevation of the oddities and quirks that make up human nature, Herlihy’s seven tales tackle the anxieties of fragile people and get to the heart of a world inhabited by perennial outsiders.

Can a person be tried more than once for the same crime in the United States? Under usual circumstances, no. But in Mississippi, one man was tried six times for the same brutal crime - and his ordeal still hasn’t ended.

In his second collection of short stories, James Leo Herlihy explores a landscape of people living on the fringes of normal society as the pleasures of daily life fade. Men and women search for the missing fragment of meaning from their existence with Herlihy’s signature humor and deft dialogue. In the titular story, Mary Ellen McClure is trapped in a dull, unfulfilled life in a trailer park, suspecting her husband of having an affair. Together with her neighbor Ivy, she dabbles with a Ouija board which spells out the name Ezra and implies that Mary Ellen will have an affair.

Rinda Sue McCarthy, born at the precise moment the atomic bomb burst over Hiroshima, sits in a Mexican jail awaiting execution by firing squad. As the Mexican soldiers practice their marksmanship outside her cell, she writes her confession: a tale of the crimes committed against her by the leaders of a Conspiracy She Is Not At Liberty To Name, and her murderous, but utterly apt revenge. Who are They? Old boyfriends, professors, doctors, her former husband.

Caribbean born novelist Tobias Buckell established himself as a gifted new voice in science fiction with his stunning first novel Crystal Rain. Now, in his first collection, Buckell demonstrates his strengths in the short form, offering readers a collection of stories that are compelling, smart, wonderfully imagined, and entertaining. Tides from the New Worlds contains 19 stories that range from multicultural science fiction to magical realism, some in print for the first time.

The typical military history presents a chronicle of battles and wars and the commanders and troops who fought them. This book takes a different approach. It presents battles and wars and people aplenty, but they are not its ultimate subjects. This book is about the turning points that not only make military history dynamic but crucial to the story of humanity and civilization.

The Solar Federation has been stable for decades - until a few days ago when leader of the abbots (artificial, biological robot) has mysteriously disappeared. His fate threatens the unsteady peace between human and machine. Detective Harlan Rubik has but a few chances left to save his career after a string of failed cases. When he’s tasked with finding the abbot leader, he uncovers a deadly conspiracy perpetrated by a shadowy group called Vanguard, whose tendrils reach to the highest echelons of government.

Detective Doyle Carrick is awakened in the middle of the night by frantic banging on his front door, followed by gunfire. Ron Hartwell, a complete stranger, is dying on his doorstep. A halfhearted investigation labels the murder a domestic dispute, with Miriam, Ron's widow, the sole suspect. Doyle discovers the Hartwells both worked for a big biotech company and suspects something else is going on, but it's not his case. Then Miriam tracks him down and tells him her story.

A trip to an island off the New England coast - and away from the demands of police work - might be just what is needed to jumpstart Detective Doyle Carrick and Nola Watkins' stalled relationship. But a mysterious plague is killing the island’s bees. Nola takes a job at an organic farm hit hard by the disease, working for the rich, handsome, and annoying Teddy, with whom she quickly becomes a little too friendly for Doyle's liking.

When the H1N1 "Swine Flu" virus mutates it begins to not only kill those who have received the vaccination, but also bring on the unthinkable: the dead reanimate. Cole Helman and his friends are not only survival experts, they've spent hours discussing and preparing for just this event and quickly head to the hills before the cities become clogged with looting and riots.

Protect your retirement from the next big crash with a new twist on the old investment strategy. For years advisors have recommended that investors take a "buy and hold" approach to the market. But people over 50 can't afford to rely on this strategy. Buy, Hold, and Sell! uncovers the myth of the "buy and hold" investment philosophy and explains why it's dangerously incomplete.

When two chrononauts from the 24th century travel back in time, they inadvertently disrupt the ill-fated voyage of the Hindenburg, causing it to land successfully. Now, lost in a parallel universe, their mistake will be felt by every single human being.

Meet Clay, a Brooklyn performance artist who is sick of being broke. Sporting a row of stitches from his last show, and severely in debt to both family and girlfriend, he decides to do the unthinkable: get a straight job. Clay shaves off his green hair, teaches himself to type, and gets a secretarial gig on Wall Street. But is this just another form of theater? Will his girlfriend still love him in a necktie? What about his artist friends - will they forgive him for consorting with the enemy?

A photographer descends into New York City’s chaotic and brutal underground in this sweeping story of the Big Apple at its seediest. It’s 1982, and Clarence Dmitri Larkin is working as a photographer at Bellevue hospital in Manhattan. The job offers a painfully clear perspective on a city sick with madness, fraught with crime, and coming apart at the seams. Larkin’s curiosity soon leads to a subterranean world of all the city’s secret dangers, including domestic terrorists with a nuclear device, a serial killer inspired by an occult past, and a disfigured arsonist who just might be the one to burn the whole city down.

Chris Taggart is a ruthless, driven, real estate entrepreneur whose buildings have changed the skyline of New York. Young, handsome, irresistible to women, Taggart has won it all with his bare hands and fierce ambition. But his dazzling success can never erase the bitter memory of his father's death at the hands of the mob - and now Taggart sets out to use his wealth and power to destroy the men whom he holds responsible. It is a secret vendetta - a war, in fact - that Taggart launches single-handedly against the Five Families of New York.

"Io, Robot" is a short story from the collection Tides from the New Worlds. Caribbean-born novelist Tobias Buckell established himself as a gifted new voice in science fiction with his stunning first novel, Crystal Rain. Now, in his first collection, Buckell demonstrates his strengths in the short form, offering readers a collection of stories that are compelling, smart, wonderfully imagined, and entertaining.

In a distant future in which the empire of humanity has spread throughout the stars, the Xenic Bureau of the Grand Ekumenical Security Directorate investigates any hint of aliens, strange disappearances, or other anomalous events. When rumors spread of the mysterious reappearance of a long-lost battleship, a priest, an alien-killer, and a cashiered starship engineer find themselves caught up in a chase across the empire and into secrets better left forgotten.

The Wilding is the long-awaited sequel to C.S. Friedman's epic, In Conquest Born. The Braxaná were created to become the ultimate warriors. The Azeans were raised to master the power of the mind. The two civilizations are fighting an endless war over a long-forgotten cause. Now, after a century and a half, the legacy of their greatest military leaders threatens to tear apart both empires.