Showing results by narrator "P.J. Ochlan" in All Categories

Instantly reminiscent of the work of Osamu Dazai and Patricia Highsmith, Fuminori Nakamura's latest novel is a dark and twisting house of mirrors that philosophically explores the violence of aesthetics and the horrors of identity. A young writer arrives at a prison to interview a convict. The writer has been commissioned to write a full account of the case, from its bizarre and grisly details to the nature of the man behind the crime.

Story One: Bumbling Caper on the Swiss Alps. "Watson! Watson!" I shouted in dismay, thinking I was close to the surface. Alas, I could not find my way out of the snow, packed thick and heavy all around me. My legs were pinned in place, and I could scarcely breathe with each passing moment.

When Dr. Stephen Wallace, a fertility specialist from Sydney Australia, is approached by his brother and sister-in-law for help conceiving a child there is no way he can refuse. Since they have already exhausted all the possibilities modern medicine can provide, Stephen turns to his skills as a shaman for alternative solutions. His search leads him to Las Vegas, Nevada on a slim lead to capture a succubus who he hopes has the power to help.

Eight years after the war with the Alotans, Jake, Teddy, Gris, and Dru are the only survivors of Tom Callahan's squad.

They're gathering for their annual reunion - but this year a new face wants to join in: an Alotan going by the name of...Tom Callahan.

In 1899 Jeremy, a young engineer, leaves a small town in Maine to oversee the construction of a railroad across East Africa. In charge of hundreds of Indian laborers, he soon finds himself the reluctant hunter of two lions that are killing his men in almost nightly attacks on their camp. Plagued by fear, wracked with malaria and alienated by a secret he can tell no one, he takes increasing solace in the company of the African who helps him hunt.

Just after World War II, a young orphan living in Naples comes under the protection of Don Gaetano, the superintendent of an apartment building. He is a generous man and is very attached to the boy, telling him about the war and the liberation of the city by the Neapolitans. He teaches him to play cards, shows him how to do odd jobs for the tenants, and even initiates him into the world of sex by sending him one evening to a widow who lives in the building. But Don Gaetano possesses another gift as well: he knows how to read people’s thoughts.

The lush and beautiful forest planet of Bellerophon is home to a cacophony of noises, but its resident psychics are known as the Silent. Previously they could travel to the Dream, a telepathic plane of existence where they could twist the laws of reality. But that time is over... One madman's lust for power tore the Dream asunder. Now only a handful of the Silent can enter it. Kendi Weaver is one of them.

The telepathic communications net, known as "The Dream," has been shattered. And the majority of the Silent who used it are unable to reenter. But Kendi Weaver has more pressing concerns: finding the family that slavers tore from him more than a decade before....

Before Kendi learned to use his talent of navigating the plane of mental existence known as the Dream, he had to escape his physical existence as a slave.

Award-winning author James Alan Gardner evokes a sense of wonder that is synonymous with great speculative fiction. Now, in his first short-story collection, he brings together the numerous tales that have made his reputation, ranging from the everyday experience to the cosmic, from peanut butter sandwiches to space drives. There are stories of wonder, imagination, humanity, and the unknown and tales that remind us of the importance of possibility.

Jack Knight-Snow has had a bad year for losing things. So far he has lost a ship full of ancient treasure, his family, his friends, his title, his lands and money, his fiancé, the century into which he was born...oh, and his physical body. Worse, feisty Chiara D’Angelo might just make him lose his mind. For her part, Chiara simply wants to help Jack get his body back and move on with his life. She doesn’t want to like his snarky humor or his gorgeous eyes. She’s a hot mess when it comes to romantic relationships. Case in point...she’s developing feelings for a ghost.

Virtually everyone would agree that Leonardo da Vinci was the most important artist of the High Renaissance. It was Leonardo who singlehandedly created the defining features of Western art: a realism based on subtle shading; depth using atmospheric effects; and dramatic contrasts between light and dark.

After the Berlin Wall fell, a group of Christian colleges in the US seized the opportunity to begin strategic faculty and student exchanges with universities inside the Soviet Union. They could not have foreseen the doors that would open next. During a 1990 visit to Russia, John Bernbaum and his colleagues received a surprising invitation from a Russian government official: come help build a faith-based university in Moscow. Thus, after 70 years of fierce religious persecution under communism, the Russian-American Christian University (RACU) was born.

The twins' train is held up by not one, but two vicious outlaw gangs. The Jessup gang has been using the Spalding gang's hideout to plan the robbery. The Jessups just lost two of their brothers in a bank job gone wrong - courtesy of Duff MacCallister - and they're gunning for revenge. Together, these two bloodthirsty bands of killers and thieves are teaming up to make this one Christmas the MacCallisters will never forget.

Corcoran takes some time off as Eureka County Deputy Sheriff to visit an old family friend and stumbles into a land fraud scheme. It gets mighty dangerous as a conspiracy develops, one layer at a time, and bodies begin to pile up. A rancher leaves his foreman in charge in order to get medical help for his daughter and the foreman claims the man abandoned his homestead claim. Corcoran being Corcoran, he meets a charming young lady whose father is an Oregon County Sheriff. He seriously contemplates giving up his badge and settling down.

Terrence Corcoran, recovering from injuries he received breaking up a cattle-rustling gang, stumbles onto a grisly scene high in the Monitor Range of central Nevada. That discovery nets him a charming teenage girl from a ranch in the valley, an old army scout who has never lost his abilities, and some wild rides through the Nevada desert in pursuit of Humboldt Charley and a gang of murderers, bank robbers, and kidnappers. Town marshals protect criminal elements, three county sheriffs become involved, and Corcoran discovers at least one more person from his past.

Southern Afghanistan, 2005. NATO forces are battling the Taliban across Kandahar Province. In a terrifying twist, the rebels unearth a tactical nuclear bomb lost in the final days of the Soviet occupation. The years buried in the sand have damaged it, so the Taliban seeks the help of al Qaeda to secure replacement parts through its contacts in Saudi Arabia, the Opium Cartel, and the Russian Mafia. Doing so, however, inadvertently alerts the Americans, the Russians, and the Israelis.

Although it's a smelly task for those who have to constantly bathe him, Roy's happiness centers on his very favorite thing - dirt - and from sunrise to sunset, he burrows in it, rolls in it, and digs up buried treasures. There's terror in every terrier, and when Roy runs into the house after being sprayed by a skunk, he faces the dreaded bathtub.

Growing up under his punk rocker dad’s spotlight, 18-year-old Luke Greenly knows fame and wants nothing to do with it. His real love isn’t in front of a crowd, it’s on the page. Hiding his gift and secretly hoarding songs in his bedroom at night, he prefers the anonymous comfort of the locally popular podcast he co-hosts with his outgoing and meddling, far-too-jealousy-inspiringly-happy-with-his-long-term-boyfriend twin brother, Cullen. But that’s not Luke’s only secret. He also has a major unrequited crush on music blogger Vada Carsewell.

Rouge is a sexy, glamorous journey into the rivalry of the pioneers of powder, mascara, and rouge. This fast-paced audiobook examines the lives, loves, and sacrifices of the visionaries who invented the modern cosmetics industry: Josiah Herzenstein, born in a Polish Jewish shtlel, the entrepreneur who transforms herself into a global style icon and the richest woman in the world, Josephine Herz; Constance Gardiner, her rival, the ultimate society woman, whose deepest secret threatens everything; and more.