Showing results by narrator "Aiello" in All Categories

Beneath the glitter of Mardi Gras lies the sleaze of Bourbon Street; under the celestial sounds of JazzFest, the nightmare screams of a city once at war within its neighborhoods, but after Hurricane Katrina, seemingly at war with nature and the rest of the country as well. New Orleans is a third world country in itself, a Latin, African, European (and often amoral) culture trapped in a Puritan nation.

These fourteen science fiction stories reveal Lem’s fascination with artificial intelligence and demonstrate just how surprisingly human sentient machines can be.

In Northworld, a world of eight warring planes where weaponry is supreme, gods and men battle for control of the Matrix, a high-tech bridge through space and time, and participant Nils Hansen faces a difficult challenge.

Hiram Taine is a handyman who can fix anything. When he isn't fiddling with his tools, he is roaming through the woods with his dog, Towser, as he has done for as long as he can remember. He likes things that he can understand. But when a new ceiling appears in his basement - a ceiling that appears to have the ability to repair television sets so they're better than before - he knows he has come up against a mystery that no man can solve.

What if the life you wanted, and the woman you fell in love with, belonged to someone else? Chris and Claire Canton's marriage is on life support. Downsized during the recession and out of work for a year, Chris copes by retreating to a dark place where no one can reach him, not even Claire. When he's offered a position that will keep him away from home four nights a week, he dismisses Claire's concern that time apart could be the one thing their fragile union can't weather. Their suburban life may look idyllic on the outside, but Claire has never felt so disconnected from Chris, or so lonely.

Death stalks Corvis by night, and only an unlikely group of heroes known as the Black River Irregulars can put an end to the terror. The labyrinth of tunnels beneath Corvis is home to some of the city's worst criminals, but now even these hardened thugs have reason to watch their step in the dark, shadowy undercity. Death moves in that darkness, leaving behind a trail of horribly mangled bodies.

In this Italian children's classic, a lonely toymaker named Gepetto creates a small wooden puppet who magically comes to life. In a series of mischievous adventures, Pinocchio thinks he can get by on a variety of clever lies and tricks. There is one problem: his nose grows every time he tells a lie. One way or another, the truth always comes out, and Pinocchio finds out that lying does not pay.

I thought the hard part of helping the Helta defeat the rampaging Tevynians would be the fighting. How wrong I was. To the Helta, we Earthers look just like the Tevynians, their mortal enemies. And convincing their government to ally with humans may be even beyond the crew of the starship James Bowie. But the clock is ticking, because the Tevynian fleet is bearing down on the Helta homeworld. If we can’t talk the Helta into accepting our help to fight them off, then Helta Prime will fall.... And Earth will be next.

When 10-year-old Megan helps her uncle invent the Thumbtop, the world's smallest computer, mice are overjoyed, and they want one for every mouse hole. The Big Cheese, leader of the Mouse Nation, has orders: Follow that girl - even if it means high-tailing it to Megan's new home on the other side of the country. While Megan struggles as the new girl, the mice wait for their chance.

Stranded on the moon after a global economic crash, Nick Morrison and his friends must take decisive action to secure their supply chain before they starve to death. The capture of a space station wins them some breathing room. But the powers that be on Earth cannot tolerate an independent, thriving lunar colony. Amidst a high-stakes arms race, Nick and his friends struggle to hold off the entire might of Earth. At the same time, Nick must also fight his old nemesis, Joe Massad, for control of the lunar base.

Created in a lab to serve as a host to the parasitic chok’tal, Dak Korasa is a Purifier, an elite warrior genetically altered to possess superhuman strength and endurance. Compelled by the symbiote inside him, Dak engages in combat as an unwilling participant in the Glorious Game, earning points for every kill. If he fails to keep up his body count, the chok’tal will end his life. Guilt-ridden at being forced to perpetrate one massacre after another just to survive, Dak wants the alien out of his body at any cost.

Recalling the great muckrakers of the past, an outraged team of America's best-selling writers unite to confront the disasters of wrongful convictions. Wrongful convictions, long regarded as statistical anomalies in an otherwise sound justice system, now appear with frightening regularity. But few people understand just how or why they happen and, more important, the immeasurable consequences that often haunt the lucky few who are acquitted years after they are proven innocent.

Sometimes to save a recruit, he’s got to break them. A pragmatic, battle-tested Knight recalls the savage fallout of the Chaos War. Sergeant Claymore leads his recruits through a brutal boot camp training and to an unexpected, bloody battle. They will admire him. They will fear him. And when it’s all over, they will remember him for the rest of their lives.

A small ship like the Veho quickly becomes a makeshift family. Especially in the far reaches of space. Samantha had been working mining and salvage operations with Jack and Benji for years. While prospecting a new claim, they come across an abandoned ship and what comes next will change the course of human history.

Outside any city still standing, the Mechanical Circus Tresaulti sets up its tents. Crowds pack the benches to gawk at the brass-and-copper troupe and their impossible feats: Ayar the Strong Man, the acrobatic Grimaldi Brothers, fearless Elena and her aerialists who perform on living trapezes. War is everywhere, but while the Circus is performing, the world is magic. That magic is no accident: Boss builds her circus from the bones out, molding a mechanical company that will survive the unforgiving landscape.

Contains books one, two and three of the Star Lawyers series, an action-packed deep space adventure filled with humour, romance, and adventure.

From filmmaker and New Yorker contributor Susanna Fogel comes a comedic novel about a fractured family of New England Jews and their discontents. Told entirely in letters to a heroine we never meet, we get to know the Fellers through their check-ins with Julie over the course of three decades: their thank-you notes, letters of condolence, family gossip, and good old-fashioned familial passive-aggression.

Professor Viktor Pendrake is a legend in his own time and is the foremost expert in extraordinary zoology. His research demands he place himself in peril to directly observe and interact with his subjects, a peril his assistants must endure as well. Bookish Lynus Wesselbaum is the picture of a scholar-in-training whose days are often spent sifting through the vast stacks of tomes within Corvis University. Yet Lynus has earned his place as Professor Pendrake’s senior assistant professor, having accompanied his mentor in the field and survived countless encounters with the most dangerous flora and fauna of western Immoren.

In keeping with the Akashic Noir series tradition, each story in Boston Noir is set in a different neighborhood of the city - the impressively diverse collection extends from Roxbury to Cambridge, from Southie to the Boston Harbor, and all stops in between. Lehane's own contribution - the longest story in the volume - is set in his beloved home neighborhood of Dorchester and showcases his phenomenal ability to grip the heart, soul, and throat of the reader.

Four years after his father died a hero's death fighting a fire, Tim Ginocchetti was behind bars for killing his mother. How one tragedy led to another is a true story that puts a horrifying twist on the familiar one of bullied gay teens. In this case, the bully was the teen's own mother, and instead of harming himself he killed her in a momentary but irreversible explosion of rage.