Showing results by publisher "Brilliance Audio" in Literature & Fiction

Courting Death finds Melanie Wilkerson (from Cotton, book two of the Clarkeston Chronicles) and Arthur Hughes working uncomfortably together in the chambers of a famous federal judge. While Melanie neglects her duties as a law clerk to investigate the mysterious death of a young woman in the courthouse five years earlier, Arthur wades through the horrific habeas corpus appeals of two prisoners: an infamous serial killer and a pathetic child murderer.

Created by Don Quinn, the co-creator of Fibber McGee & Molly, The Halls of Ivy was a situation comedy series that ran on NBC radio from 1950 through 1952. Originally slated to star Gale Gordan and Edna Best, the lead roles went to British husband-and-wife actors Ronald and Benita Colman. The Colman’s were well versed at comedy and already a hit with radio fans having played Jack Benny’s next-door-neighbor on The Jack Benny Program for years. Ronald Colman played William Todhunter Hall, the urbane president of small, rural Ivy College.

Kate and Michael, twenty-something housemates working at the same Trader Joe’s supermarket, are thoroughly screwed when people start turning into zombies at their house party in the Oakland hills. The zombie plague is a sexually transmitted disease, turning its victims into shambling, horny, voracious killers.

To Pom Trager, humanity’s entire history is one big joke - and he delivers the punchlines, broadcasting hilarious exploits back to his home planet to boost the ratings of his reality show, The Prankster. But when a system malfunction strands Trager in modern-day Santa Fe, his only hope rests in a nebbish assistant he recently fired, a headstrong human woman, and his ability to outrun a relentless sheriff hot on his trail. Now Trager must hightail it to the pickup point in San Francisco, all the while dealing with car thieves, time loops, all-American truck stop food - and a rapidly closing rescue window.

When the world gets more frightening, what do you do? Do you hide in your basement, watching 24-hour rolling news about the latest crimes? And what happens when it comes knocking on your door? Do you double-check those locks? Or do what Hamlet did, taking arms against a sea of troubles and, by opposing, end them? Pub-doorman-turned-recluse Royston Blake has never heard of Hamlet, but when headless corpses start turning up all over Mangel, he decides to do just that. And what better way to fight evil than by becoming a cop? Who cares if they all say you’re the worst kind of copper a town needs? What matters is results, right?

Estranged from her bohemian Brooklyn family and fired for an impropriety at work, Claudia Silver is officially in over her head. When her younger sister lands on her doorstep urgently in need of help, twenty-something Claudia desperately wants to offer the rescue that she herself has longed for. But Claudia missteps dramatically, straight into a disastrous love affair that disrupts three very different New York households.

What happens when a thirty-something, newly divorced man discovers courage and adventure, thanks to a karaoke contest? In Adventures of the Karaoke King, Harold Taw introduces us to Guy Watanabe, a man marginally aware of his Asian background and decidedly unaware of how poorly he has planned for his future. In this riotous, often thoughtful, and always entertaining novel, readers are taken on a memorable journey that crosses America, Asia, and back, with the last leg spent in a shipping container.

With his star on the rise since solving the murder of Ajoy Chaterjee, yoga detective Matt Bolster is invited to teach at The Gathering, a prestigious yoga retreat run by the renowned Tom Hart. Bolster is a little dubious about the cultish atmosphere that surrounds Hart, but, as they say in L.A., it’s an honor just to be nominated. But when what starts off as a decadent retreat quickly spirals into deadly chaos, Bolster must use all his yoga-detective powers, and also his fists.

Nothing is what it used to be for our salesman narrator: not his family, not his commissions, not even the commuter jets that carry him from client to client. Having lost his top-of-the-heap status in his profession, he reflects on his new reality with a darkly comic perspective that resonates deeply with each of us who has desperately needed a new direction in life.

For seven months, anthropologist Blackwell James has lived among the Wantayo people of the Amazon, immersing himself in their culture in order to collect data for his dissertation. Trouble is, he hasn’t done much research. Instead, he’s just hung out with the tribe, resulting in some fair skills with a bow and arrow but little else. When Blackwell returns to Columbia University with a trunk full of hallucinogenic vines but no research notes, his frustrated advisor packs him off to Los Angeles to assist a colleague with a primate experiment.

Incendiary Girls explores our baser instincts with vivid imagination and humor. In these stories, our bodies become strange and unfamiliar terrain, a medium for transformation. In "Fundamental Laws of Nature", a doctor considers her legacy, both good and bad, when she discovers that her mother has been reincarnated as a thoroughbred mare. In the title story, a mischievous angel chronicles the remarkable life of a girl just beyond death’s reach.

Sasha King dreams of being a serious novelist and living the good life with her surfer boyfriend, Brock. But her day job as assistant producer of Project Icon, a once-mighty ratings juggernaut that’s recently taken a hit in viewership, keeps her working nonstop. She’s got her hands full with Icon’s two new celebrity judges, entrepreneur-actress-singer Bibi Vasquez ("Crew to be forbidden to make eye contact with Artist AT ALL TIMES," reads her contract) and Joey Lovecraft, a horny but spiritual rock legend who doesn’t even own a TV (it goes against the teachings of his guru, Tibetan high lama Yutog Gonpo).

Russell Wiley is in deep trouble. A media executive for the failing Daily Business Chronicle, his career is teetering on the brink of collapse, and his sexless marriage is fast approaching its expiration date. With his professional and personal lives floundering, it’s no wonder Russell is distracted, unhappy, and losing faith in himself. Making matters worse are his scheming boss, a hotshot new consultant, and the beguiling colleague whose mere presence has a disconcerting effect on Russell’s starved libido.

A Jewish teenager on the hunt for black-market tight pants and rock records, Svyatoslav somehow fails to develop his undying love for Lyuba into a happy ending. He finds work in a mental institution, runs off to Kiev with one of the patients, marries a few times, has a son, becomes a professor, and halfheartedly runs interference for the KGB.

The Weekly World News team uncovers the definitive and faux-tastic story of Bat Boy, from his hardscrabble origins in the caves of West Virginia to his global influence in the 21st century. Going Mutant reveals how Bat Boy has heeded a call to service that has embarrassed less forthcoming mutants.

After years of exploitation, neglect, and despair, the animals of Manor Farm revolt. They drive owner Mr. Jones off the land and rechristen the property Animal Farm, a utopia of equality and mutual support. But Napoleon, a young boar who assumes command after the rebellion, is hungry for power. And as the pigs consolidate control, all the good intentions of Animal Farm are crushed by a new and inevitable tyranny.

The catcher is a statistical savant, the first baseman speaks in Buddhist koans, and the twin star pitchers may or may not derive mystical powers from scars betraying their Siamese birth. In fact, everything about the Birmingham Barons baseball team is remarkable - except for their performance on the field. For decades, the Barons have been woefully mediocre and Pudge Morrison - former better-than-average left fielder now long past his prime - has become the symbol for the team's disappointment.

The United States prides itself on being the world’s melting pot, but during a long, hot summer in coastal North Carolina, three young people will put that theory to the test. A German named Tillmann is vacationing in the States with his girlfriend and corresponding with an African American colleague about the evolution of blues music.