What If? Science Fiction/ Fantasy Writers

"With the fast-paced first Conradverse urban fantasy, Shvartsman (Eridani’s Crown) delivers a laugh-out-loud, snarky adventure, throwing out pop culture references and wry observations with dizzying frequency....His supernatural New York City is vibrant and authentic, and Conrad fits right in with wisecracking fan favorite heroes like Harry Dresden and Simon Canderous. The result is a thoroughly satisfying romp."—Publishers WeeklyWhat would you do if you lost everything that mattered to you, as well as all means to protect yourself and others, but still had to save the day? Conrad Brent is about to find out.Conrad Brent protects the people of Brooklyn from monsters and magical threats. The snarky, wisecracking guardian also has a dangerous secret: he’s one in a million – literally.Magical ability comes to about one in every 30,000 and can manifest at any age. Conrad is rarer than this, however. He’s a middling, one of the half-gifted and totally despised. Most of the gifted community feels that middlings should be instantly killed. The few who don’t flat out hate them still aren’t excited to be around middlings. Meaning Conrad can’t tell anyone, not even his best friends, what he really is.Conrad hides in plain sight by being a part of the volunteer Watch, those magically gifted who protect their cities from dangerous, arcane threats. And, to pay the bills, Conrad moonlights as a private detective and monster hunter for the gifted community. Which helps him keep up his personal fiction – that he’s a magical version of Batman. Conrad does both jobs thanks to charms, artifacts, and his wits, along with copious amounts of coffee. But little does he know that events are about to change his life…forever.When Conrad discovers the Traveling Fair auction house has another middling who’s just manifested her so-called powers on the auction block, he’s determined to save her, regardless of risk. But what he finds out while doing so is even worse – the winning bidder works for a company that’s just created the most dangerous chemical weapon to ever hit the magical community.Before Conrad can convince anyone at the Watch of the danger, he’s exposed for what he really is. Now, stripped of rank, magical objects, friends and allies, Conrad has to try to save the world with only his wits. Thankfully though, no one’s taken away his coffee. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Betrayal brings grave ending to a noble bloodline. Forced to flee, its sole surviving heir is spared this fate by the timely intervention of a haunter of the wilds. In his charge, the maiden embraces the lore of the dark arts and rises to become the watch-keep of the woods. As decades pass, with her legend growing, the ‘witch of root and earth’ weaves subtle deceits in a tangled web of vengeance.But will there be a fairy tale ending, or will poisoned legacies and pacts with dark forces see ambition unravel in her relentless pursuit of power?Bloody, and brilliantly realised, Baird’s dark fantasy nightmare spins a lavish tale of dread, desire, and fantastical fury. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

R-Group – The most connected cyber heroes in the world! Founded after decrypting the German Enigma Machine code for military strategy the three founders of the R-Group decided to help others from the moral high ground. Currently governments and private customers often seek support from the Zurich based team. The Enigma Series stories target relevant technology issues with each story as the R-Group outwits the cyber thugs from the Darknet. A foundation of real technology, a dab of history, world travel, intrigue, mystery, thrills and a splash of humor make these stories a cut above. ICABOD, their leading-edge supercomputer, supports the efforts of the team using bleeding edge programming and machine learning. Individually or in order, these award-winning stories will make you take a second and third look at your security. Available in eBook, paperback, and audible formats! Breakfield and Burkey name-Two of the Top Ten TechnoThriller Writers You Need To Be Reading-Caleb and Linda Pirtle declared in 2020! (https://calebandlindapirtle.com/breakfield-burkey-two-top-ten-techno-thriller-writers-need-reading/) Are your devices holding you captive with Tech·nol·o·gy (tekˈnäləjē) - Today’s weapon of choice… Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Millions of years in the future, humanity has been driven out of the Milky Way and now calls the Andromeda Galaxy home. Lost in their murky past are the tales of great knights that held the line against the invasion of a dark force until the rest of humanity could escape their doom. The last and greatest of these knights was Galen Underwood.Long after that heroic stand, a mercenary by the name of Galen Dwyn has been hired to rescue a kidnapped princess. Enticed by a healthy down payment and a chance to settle an old score, Galen accepts the job, only to find out it's a lot more than he bargained for.Soon Galen finds himself weaving and dodging through a web of political intrigue as the very forces that chase him have set in motion plans that will throw the galactic alliance into civil war.To his surprise, he also finds that the rescued princess might not be quite the spoiled brat he rescued from the clutches of her keeper.Accompanied by the princess, his former mentor, and a snarky AI, Galen sets out to find a way to outsmart entire kingdoms, keep the princess alive, and avert the deaths of millions.Of course, he'll also learn the reasons behind his namesake's chosen path, as he realizes that the only way to win is Galen's way. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Lancaster James is scouring ancient ruins of long lost civilizations on distant planets in search of powerful relics that may unlock the greatest secrets of the galaxy.His ex-wife Mika is also on the search, but she's trying to find her second husband, who has disappeared trying to find one of these artifacts. Lancaster joins her to try to locate this man, and the priceless relic for which he was hunting.But danger awaits them around every corner as corporate spies, criminals, and mercenaries hunt for the same treasures, and sometimes for them. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Barely surviving her first expedition to the primordial island, Dr. Tracey Moran joins a mission to rescue those left behind. Better armed and prepared, the new expedition finds the lost world in chaos. Dr. Peter Albanese, having accidentally awoken an extinct reptilian race, must now protect the friendly indigenous tribe from their relentless attacks. A sympathetic reptilian figure reveals some of the island’s history and sets Peter on a quest to awaken an extinct simian race and restore balance. All the while, an evil entity bent on escaping the island stalks Peter and the other survivors. Reunited, Tracey and Peter must contend with hungry dinosaurs, mythical forces, and corporate greed to restore balance and escape with their lives. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From an Aurora Award-winning author comes a thrilling young-adult outer-space adventure.When the old woman who raised him in a remote village is murdered, Kriss Lemarc finds himself alone on a planet where he’ll always be an outsider.His only link to his long-dead, unknown parents is the touchlyre they bequeathed him, a strange instrument that not only plays music but pours his innermost feelings into the minds of his listeners.When Tevera, a girl of the space-going, nomadic Family, hears Kriss perform, she is drawn to him against her better judgment and the rules of her people. With her help, though mistrusted and even hated by some of her comrades, Kriss seeks to discover the origin of the touchlyre, the fate of his parents, and a place where he truly belongs.But the touchlyre proves to be more than just a musical oddity. Powerful, ruthless people will stop at nothing to get it—and Kriss and Tevera are all that stand in their way Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On the Moon’s far side, shielded from Earth’s radio cacophony, Americans are building a radio-astronomy observatory. Russians sift the dust of a lunar “sea” for helium-3 to run future fusion reactors. Commercial robots, remotely operated from Earth, roam the Moon’s near side in a hunt for mineral wealth. Why chase distant asteroids for precious metals? Onetime asteroids must lie close beneath the much-bombarded lunar surface.Then a prospecting robot encounters a desiccated, spacesuited figure. An alien figure ….Americans from the lunar observatory investigate. Near the original find, underground, they discover an alien installation. Lunar Russians, realizing that the Americans are up to something clandestine, send their own small team. Each group distrusts the other … even before the fatal “accidents” begin. By the time anyone suspects what ancient evil they have awakened, it may be too late—For everyone on Earth, too. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

 When superhumans begin to show up, the US government steps in to...well...govern them. Billy B is one of the most powerful super folk around, leader of a team of similarly endowed characters headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina and handled by Uncle Sam. Life is what you might expect for any group of workers put together for a common task, except that these people can pulverize concrete blocks with their bare hands, or fly through steel plate, or melt rock with a glance, or read your mind, or any of dozens of other abilities far beyond those of mortal man. Still, though, things seem to go according to Federal plan until a dozen Roman gods come back to Earth to pick up where they left off a couple of thousand years ago. At that point it's up to Billy B and his super folk to keep the peace. Read it now, for the first time, from the pen of the baddest of the bad: Billy B in the first volume of his fully authorized autobiography.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Out in the darkness of space, something is targeting the Greatships.With their vast cargo holds and a crew that could fill a city, the Greatships are the lifeblood of human occupied space, transporting an unimaginable volume - and value - of goods from City, the greatest human orbital, all the way to Tradepoint at the other, to trade for xenoglas with an unknowable alien species.It has always been Marca Nbaro's dream to achieve the near-impossible: escape her upbringing and venture into space.All it took, to make her way onto the crew of the Greatship Athens was thousands of hours in simulators, dedication, and pawning or selling every scrap of her old life in order to forge a new one. But though she's made her way onboard with faked papers, leaving her old life - and scandals - behind isn't so easy.She may have just combined all the dangers of her former life, with all the perils of the new . .  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

By 2047, no crime in America goes unsolved. No wrongdoing goes unseen.When Dray Quintero learns his nineteen-year-old daughter Raven committed a heinous act, he covers it up to save her life. This pits him against the police he’s respected since he was a child and places him in the crosshairs of Kieran, a ruthless federal Agent. To survive, Dray must overcome the surveillance system he helped build and the technology implanted in people’s heads, for everyone has a microcomputer in their brain and computer-screen lenses in their eyes.To protect his family, he turns to a group of fighters who also discovered the government’s secret. But their help isn’t enough, for his adversaries have a level of control he’s unable to escape. That no one can.Hunted and betrayed, with time running out, Dray must choose between saving Raven and dismantling the near-perfect society he helped create. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean Whittlesea was there when his wife was murdered. He saw the light leave her eyes. He held her dead body in his arms. He knows he wept, but he cannot recollect a single other detail. Tormented by the tragedy, Sean relives the horror over and over again. As he struggles to recall what really happened, his imagination serves up an endless chain of scenarios. The truth, however, remains hidden in the vault of his memory, and the key is nowhere to be found.   Nearly two decades later, Sean, now remarried and a father of two, wins a bizarre contest hosted by his eccentric boss. The prize is the Memory Palace, astate-of-the-art black box that purportedly allows its possessor to relive every moment he has ever experienced, playing out all the memories on a screen.While the small machine at first appears to be the answer to the mystery surrounding the death of his wife, it instead upends Sean’s life. He pushes his family further and further away as the Memory Palace forces him to confront harsh realities and difficult questions that he lacks the strength to face or answer. Spiraling downward, Sean encounters increasingly harrowing challenges that force him to realize that his memory is not the only thing at stake. To recover the truth about his past, Sean must fight for his very life. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Since the age of fourteen Damon Leiter has had a brain-computer interface implanted beneath his skull to correct a neurological disorder. As a teenager, it branded him as an outcast—as an adult it endows him with extraordinary abilities: he may represent the next step in human evolution. When computerized brain augments replace smartphones as the must-have status item, mega-corporations and governments conspire together and marketing becomes mind control. Damon is the only one equipped to lead a global resistance movement. Caught between the fervour of his followers and the tide of rampant consumerism, he can’t be sure he isn’t playing into the hands of the rich and powerful. They may even be in the right. Maybe the real enemy of humankind is Damon Leiter. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.