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Shooting Gallery

A new short story by New York Times bestselling thriller writer Ben Coes — with time running out, Dewey Andreas is the last hope for a prominent kidnapping victim. The newly sworn in Vice President of the United States has a problem. Her son, off in college, doesn't care for his security detail. So when Spring Break comes around, he slips away from his bodyguard, picks up his best friend, and heads to Mexico for an intended week of sun, sand, women, and hoped-for debauchery. But when he arrives at the airport, a team of well-armed kidnappers grab both him and his friend and escape. Now they're demanding that an exorbitant ransom be paid in only a few hours — and if it's not, both boys will be killed. Dewey Andreas, CIA operative and former Delta, happens to be in Mexico, taking some time away and helping friends Katie Fox and Rob Tacoma with a private job. Hoping to relax, Andreas is now the only hope these two young men have of surviving their misadventure. But Mexico is a big country and, before anything else, Dewey has to find the missing boys. Even then, it's a race against the clock, with a highly-trained group of vicious men waiting at the other end. An original Dewey Andreas short story by bestseller Ben Coes. **
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The Metrognome and Other Stories

Forget what you thought you knew about the universe and enter the fantastic world of master storyteller Alan Dean Foster . . . OPERATOR ASSISTED CALLS ARE CHARGED AT A HIGHER RATE. Mr. Parkworthy had a score to settle with the telephone company, and he was a man used to getting his own way. But he should have remembered that it is not polite to be rude to a lady . . . especially when the lady is Ma Bell.THE METROGNOME. Charlie Dimsdale was only a little man in the company that ran New York City's subways . . . until some odd little denizens of the city's subterranean tunnels showed him who was really in charge!THE TESSELATED TETRAHEXAHEDRAL YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS. Country people in America are a fair but mighty independent bunch. So when some government scientists rudely demanded that the Shattucks turn over the UFO that crashed on their Texas ranch, the Shattucks became a bit obstinate. Besides, the shining little spacecraft looked real cute hanging on the barn with the Christmas decorations.COLLECTIBLE. When young Pearl's life was collapsing around her, she could always find comfort in her extensive collection of dragon memorabilia -- but some youngsters are more fragile than others, and dragons can be deadly.Plus eleven more stories!**
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Lightning of Gold

From legendary Western author Max Brand comes a tale of covert espionage, gold, and a mysterious figure on horseback.In this dramatic and strange story, Lefty Bill Ranger, an Alaskan mail carrier, travels to Circle City through a terrific snowstorm. There he meets Menneval—a man who is widely feared throughout the territory—and is offered a job. He is to go to Tuckerville, California, and from there to the mountain fastness where Peter Crosson and his son, Oliver, live in total isolation. Menneval wants Ranger to watch and report what he sees for a period of six months. The pay for this espionage will be $6,000 in gold. Ranger, attracted by the money, accepts the assignment.In the Sierra Mountains, Ranger sets up his camp and, pretending to be a trapper, keeps the Crosson ranch under surveillance. One day, Ranger is amazed to witness a gigantic mountain lion being pursued by a pack of wolves and followed by a bronzed youth on horseback. The wolf pack...
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Short Stories 1895-1926

The publication of Short Stories 1895-1926 celebrates the fiftieth anniversary of Walter de la Mare's death. It is also the culmination of a major literary enterprise. For many people Walter de la Mare (1873-1956) is as great a writer of fiction as of poetry. But the majority of his short stories, of which there are a hundred, have long been unavailable. Short Stories brings them all together in three volumes in the first comprehensive collection to be published. De la Mare's earliest published works were stories, and he continued writing and rewriting stories throughout the rest of his life. There was always a creative counterpoint between the themes and imagery of his prose and his poetry - such as the dream, childhood, the house, night, love lost and regained, solitude and the traveller. A full understanding of either is impossible without knowledge of both. TLS on Short Stories 1895-1926 and Short Stories 1927-1956: ‘What strikes one most about [them] is how truly...
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Big Boned

Life is reasonably rosy for plus-size ex-pop star turned Assistant Dormitory Director and sometime sleuth Heather Wells. Her freeloading ex-con dad is finally moving out. She still yearns for her hot landlord, Cooper Cartwright, but her relationship with "rebound beau," vigorous vegan math professor Tad Tocco, is more than satisfactory. Best of all, nobody has died lately in "Death Dorm," the aptly nicknamed student residence that Heather assistant-directs. Of course every silver lining ultimately has some black cloud attached. And when the latest murdered corpse to clutter up her jurisdiction turns out to be her exceedingly unlovable boss, Heather finds herself on the shortlist of prime suspects—along with the rabble-rousing boyfriend of her high-strung student assistant and an indecently handsome young campus minister who's been accused of taking liberties with certain girls' choir members.With fame beckoning her back into show business (as the star of a new kids' show!)...
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Game On

Welcome to Last  Bachelor Standing!   How long can three sexy single men hold out?  First up? Mr. No Commitment...Detective Adam Shawnigan.  As you can see, ladies, he has the protective cop hero thing happening - plus he's all gorgeous height, piercing dark  eyes, sensuous mouth and lean hot body. But here comes  sweet temptation....  Performance coach Serena Long is helping Adam prepare for  his hockey league playoffs. As it turns out, he's also in a position to help out with her little stalker problem. It's quid pro quo, both in the bedroom and out. And now the bets - and the bedroom games - are on!
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I Met Someone

An emotional thriller by novelist Bruce Wagner, I Met Someone is the story of a fictional Hollywood marriage on the precipice of disaster—and an enthralling meditation on the world in which we live. Bruce Wagner's I Met Someone is the story of Oscar award-winning actress Dusty Wilding, her wife Allegra, a long-lost daughter, and the unspeakable secret hidden beneath the glamor of their lavish, carefully calibrated, celebrity life. After Allegra suffers a miscarriage, Dusty embarks on a search for the daughter she lost at age sixteen and uncovers the answer to a question that has haunted for decades. With riveting suspense, Wagner moves between the perspectives of his characters, revealing their individual trauma and the uncanny connections to each other's past lives. I Met Someone sends the reader down a rabbit hole of the human psyche, with Wagner's remarkable insights into our collective obsession with great wealth and fame, and...
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Gone to Soldiers

Ten characters, from occupied France to the Pacific Theater and from the frontlines to the home front, are profoundly changed by the events of World War II in this New York Times bestseller Epic in scope, Marge Piercy's sweeping novel encompasses the wide range of people and places marked by the Second World War. Each of her ten narrators has a unique and compelling story that powerfully depicts his or her personality, desires, and fears. Special attention is given to the women of the war effort, like Bernice, who rebels against her domineering father to become a fighter pilot, and Naomi, a Parisian Jew sent to live with relatives in Detroit, whose twin sister, Jacqueline—still in France—joins the resistance against Nazi rule. The horrors of the concentration camps; the heroism of soldiers on the beaches of Okinawa, the skies above London, and the seas of the Mediterranean; the brilliance of code breakers; and the resilience of...
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The Sheikh's Proposal

Marriage by royal command!Sara Kinsale is stunned to be thrown together with a prince of the desert, and even more so to find herself unbelievably attracted to the elusive Sheikh Kahrun bak Samin.... Especially as she's indebted to the sheikh and it's only a matter of time before he demands to be repaid!Kahrun soon names his price--marriage! He needs a trophy wife, and Sara is already living under his roof.But will she be the sheikh's bride in name only--or will her marriage duties be a little more intimate...?
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