Chapter Eleven Lane “How was group therapy,” my mom asked. I turned to her, and I didn’t even want to get into how the session was. I turned and looked out the window. I just stared at the trees as they were passing by. I couldn’t look at my mom once again. She had been […]

The General took a valiant role in sweeping through the land and seizing the vital areas that the Sultan had lusted for. He did all of this with a stain on his heart. His beloved wife had fallen ill and was hospitalized in a northern medical hospital. The General took his earnings back to pay […]

Chapter One Estella’s Childhood 1940’s Texas Two decades later, a frustrated mother was shouting at her young daughter to clean up for supper. “Estellaaaaaa, get out of the sun! You look like a field hand and your hair is a mess! I told you a million times not to go swimming in the lake when […]

THE BEGINNING… It was one of those coastal towns—you know the type—charming in a coastal town sort of way and yet rugged in a coastal town sort of way, with jutting rocks and turbulent waves. And yet, when the sun was shining, and the inland waters were sparkling, it seemed crisp and fresh and alive […]

CHAPTER 12 The Devil had come home to Tartarus. Seventy-five yards from the Vault’s partially-submerged entrance, Natalya Dragunova watched with disbelieving eyes as the Octopus giganteus continued its frenzied assault. The sounds of straining metal and the shrill cry of claxons repeatedly rent the air, and she grimaced and clamped her hands over her ears. All […]

Few tourists come to San Francisco in mid-April, at least, not ones familiar with San Francisco weather. The Bay Area is only comfortably warm from about late June to mid-November. The rest of the time, it’s rainy, foggy, cool, and windy. Very nice if you’re half Eskimo. Of course, it does have its sporadic days […]

Death smells of macaroons. Amelie was slumped over the kitchen table, face in a plate of meringues. Spearmint-green flakes stuck to her left cheek. Her glazed irises remained fixed upon a vase of spiky dahlias, cut and arranged by Grace that very morning. Every tangerine petal was bug and blemish free; my sister was well […]

…‘I told Saul I’d do as he asked.’ Perdita thought it best to slip that in while Luke and Gavin were distracted by the food. ‘I think,’ Luke said, ‘you need to tell us what you just said again as I don’t think I could have possibly heard right.’ ‘I didn’t hear right either,’ Gavin […]

Alma-Jane I am Alma-Jane, and I am genetically happier than the average person.  I know this because 5 days ago one of the researchers at the New York City Hospital, where I go once a week, told me so. “My dear AJ,” she said, eyeing me between quick, nervous blinks, “your Genetic Happiness score is […]

Prologue The middle of the China Sea, 1885 From his position on the wet floor in the corner of the dark and dank room, the boy rubbed his blood-shot eyes and looked around him. The room resembled a medieval battlefield littered by the slain. Men and women of all backgrounds lay slumped over chairs, tables […]

Most people no longer believe in Unicorns, and I ashamedly admit that I was one of those.  Even the so-called “Unicorn horns” collected by certain unmentionable people were proven actually to be from a type of sea creature!  What if there were more than one type of Unicorn?  Yet, wasn’t the Unicorn a fairy tale?  […]

Long ago, on a calm night in the early years of ancient Arabia, Behas entered a palm-farming settlement near the southern tip of the Arabian Desert. He snaked his way between mud-walled farms in a palm grove, moving towards his next victim and dragging his dark blue cloak over the wet path with effort. To […]

CHAPTER ONE The snow storm’s intensity had peaked, waves of snow rushing against my car as I drove down Highway 43 to my small hometown of Starling. The storm should have been at the height of my concerns, but the dread sitting heavy in my chest was mostly due to the fanatical ramblings of my […]

Amid her meditation, something in the forest sends the hairs on the back of Atae’s neck on end. When the distinct and high-pitch zing of a hilt forming a blade flitters through the wilds and settles on Atae’s ears, panic overrides her senses. She launches to her feet and twirls around. Her eyes bounce from […]