Showing results by author "Andy Marino" in All Categories

A man arrives home from an international flight to find that the airline has delivered his lost luggage. Wonderful, except he never lost his luggage in the first place. The story is told through his increasingly maddening call to customer service as he tries to figure out how, and why, the airline created a perfect replica of his suitcase and possessions.

Berlin, November 1943. With bombing raids commencing, the city is blanketed by explosions. Siblings Gerta and Max Hoffmann live a surprisingly carefree childhood amid the raids. Berlin is a city going about its business, even as it's attacked almost nightly. But one night, the air raid sirens wail, and the Hoffmanns' neighborhood is hit. A mortally wounded man comes to their door, begging to be let in. He asks for Karl Hoffmann, their father. Gerta and Max watch as Karl tries in vain to save the man's life.

Max, Gerta, and their parents have abandoned their home and relocated to a safehouse in a different Berlin neighborhood. The Hoffmanns share the tight quarters with the daughter of a captured Becker Circle conspirator - Kat Vogel, who is Gerta's age. Though they have strict orders to stay inside unless absolutely necessary, the three kids sneak out regularly, all while concocting a plan to keep the spirit of their resistance alive. They're going to burn down the headquarters of the Hitler Youth.

Possession is an addiction. Sydney's spent years burying her past and building a better life for herself and her young son. A respectable marketing job, a house with reclaimed and sustainable furniture, and a boyfriend who loves her son and accepts her, flaws and all. But when she opens her front door, and a masked intruder knocks her briefly unconscious, everything begins to unravel. She wakes in the hospital and tells a harrowing story of escape. Of dashing out a broken window. Of running into her neighbors' yard and calling the police.

The plot has been enacted, but there's been a problem. Now dire consequences await the would-be assassins.

When Lark goes to deliver one of his latest pieces to a fabulously rich buyer, it seems like a regular transaction. Even being met at the gate of the sprawling, secluded estate by an intimidating security guard seems normal. Until the guard plays him a live feed: Betsy being abducted in real time. Lark is informed that she's safe for now, but her well-being is entirely in his hands. He's given a book. Do what the book says, and Betsy will go free.

As the world desperately works to unravel the mysteries of the swarm, and humanity rests on the knife’s edge of extinction, Vicky and a group of strangers will fight to uncover the shocking origins of the attack—and the terrible purpose behind it. This panoramic novel of insect apocalypse reaches back into the darkest recesses of the twentieth century and unleashes its horrors on our modern, interconnected world.

[Contains explicit content] Hop on the "L" and take a fast-moving, nostalgic tour through Chicago on this episode of Sounds Like America. You'll be guided along the way by some of the Third Coast's funniest comedians - with stops for deep dish, blues, improv, and much more. The comedy in this episode was recorded at live venues all around the country.

The story of a girl whose strange life in a mysterious lighthouse is turned upside down when her mother's murder leads her to a hidden door - and a mission into an alternate world. Hannah Silver has a secret. She can sense things that other people can't, like the cotton-candy smell of a bad sign, or the weightless touch of an approaching storm. Or the warm, smooth voices of people who aren't really there. In the Cliff House, secrets of all kinds float through the air and bounce off the walls.