Stories to keep you enthralled into the wee hours of the morning… From horror to romance. From heroism to tragedy. From shipwreck to murder. From abduction to seduction. Covering the entire spectrum of human emotions, these tales will stun you.

A far from willing conscript into a war instigated by a foreign empire, Graven, not much more than a boy, is forced to take up the sword - or die. He finds his life spiraling into a web of violence and betrayal. In a world of uncertain alliances and where life is cheap, he must stay alive and prove his worth. His simple, sheltered village upbringing has not prepared him for the carnage and horror he must now face if ever he is to see his homeland again. In a bitter struggle that will rip a...

A charming tale of the animals living around an African waterhole. The intrigues, anxieties and relationships between such diverse characters as Walter, the warthog, Larry the evil leopard, Percival, the African Grey parrot and Michael the meercat will both amuse young readers and widen their appreciation of the natural world.

An anthology of adult short stories dealing with personal relationships, biblical background tales, fantasy situations, and life and death struggles. In Running Scared, the protagonist, Shane Curtain, finds himself in an unfamiliar mansion with a devastatingly lovely stranger. But his amorous intentions soon transmute into a horrific fight for survival. l. The Other chronicles the experiences of a care worker trapped in a position of trust which quickly descends into a nightmare. Damien Br...

Take a set of aged and somewhat confused gods. Add to this a rampaging and bottomless box, about to cause a terminal event on the backwater planet of Tharin. Throw in a deaf mystic, who sends a complete and utter coward on the most important mission in the planet's history - and you have the basis for the strange and peculiar story of The Quest. When Longmar, the hero of the hour, is mistakenly sent to avert the predicted destruction of Tharin, it is his misfortune to become involved with ...

A Twist of the Knife is Peter James’s gripping first full-length collection of short stories, now containing the novellas The Perfect Murder, Footloose written with Val McDermid and In The Nick of Time written with Ian Rankin.With each twist of the knife, a chilling new journey begins . . . From a woman intent on bizarre revenge to a restaurant critic with a morbid fear of the number thirteen, and from a man arra...

In sparkling prose and with a desire to express essential truths of life in stories ranging from historical sagas to incisive observations of contemporary life, the distinct voices of the students of Faber Academy at Allen & Unwin are united in this volume.Under the expert guidance of course directors Kathryn Heyman, Sophie Cunningham and Carrie Tiffany, a group of talented new writers embarked on the six-month creative writing course in Sydney and Melbourne in 2013. They shared th...

These twenty superbly crafted linked stories navigate the difficult realm of friendship, charting its beginnings and ends, its intimacies and betrayals, its joys and humiliations. A mother learns something of the nature of love from watching her young daughter as she falls in and out of favour with a neighbourhood girl. An intricate story of two women reveals a friendship held together by the steely bonds of passivity. A chance sighting in a library prompts a woman to recall the “unconsumm...

In the epic conclusion to the Fallen Kings Cycle, set in the world of The Chronicles of the Necromancer, the long awaited battle has begun.War has come to the Winter Kingdoms. The Dread will rise. Kings will fall. Summoner-King Tris Drayke takes what remains of his army north for a war he is ill-prepared to fight, as reports from spies confirm Tris's worst fear. A new threat rises across the sea: a dark summoner who intends to make the most of the Winter Kingdoms's...

They called him Bane the Bastard - though none said it to his face. Born of treachery, his name a curse, he grew up among the warriors of the Rigante. They valued his skills in war, but they feared the violence in his heart.And when, as a Wolfshead and Outlaw, he left Rigante lands, they breathed sighs of relief.But Bane would return, the destiny of the Rigante in his hands, the fate of the world resting on his skills with a blade.Midnight Falcon continues the tale ...

122 fantastic stories from Britain's best crime writersFor ten years the Mammoth Best British Crime series has been publishing an annual volume of the most outstanding crime and mystery short fiction published in the UK. Over 400 stories by the very best writers in the field have been published. Contributors have included, among many others, Mark Billingham, Liza Cody, Roger Jon Ellory, Reginald Hill, Peter James, Simon Kernick, Alexander McCall Smith, Val McDermid...

The best things in life are those you don't expect…Dana Harris's world has turned upside down. So when she receives the unexpected opportunity to attend Montford University in Shelter Valley, Arizona, she sees it as the perfect time to start over. Especially when Josh Redmond adopts a puppy she's rescued. That's the beginning of an instant friendship between them, even though she senses that he's holding something back…. Still, their friendship culminates in romance—and a n...