Listen Inside - Daily Book Previews From Readers In The Know By Simon Denman

Synopsis When an unstoppable warlord meets an unyielding rebel, their link becomes a new force of nature.Taryn's dream of forging an alliance with a powerful alien race has become a nightmare. She is linked to a ruthless warlord, an alien killing machine who could destroy humanity on a whim.Taryn will go down fighting before she surrenders to the monster invading her mind.But in her struggle to regain control, she finds her tormentor has irreversibly changed her, and she has in turn changed him. The link is turning her into a weapon, drawing strength from the world-slayer who had no regard for another's life—until now.As death and destruction erupt around them, they carve their way out of their old lives with a single common purpose: unite their forces and change the future. Excerpt The elevator slows and stops. It opens onto a broad, dim corridor with sparkling walls arched outward like the curvature of a tunnel. The alien nudges me out, and the shift in gravity shunts me into the air. I flail, but manage t

Synopsis After losing his sight in a terrible accident, only to learn that the woman he was planning to marry did not love him enough to accept him, Damien Falconer was devastated. Struggling to cope with his disability, he isolated himself from society, allowing no one to get close to him, but his personal assistant, Jake. Upon learning Jake was soon to leave his employ and return to Scotland, Damien was forced to advertise for his replacement. Among the applicants who answered his ad was Lisa Andrews, a registered nurse from Connecticut. But Damien was adamant that he would not be replacing Jake with a woman. His argument was, he did not feel comfortable with a woman doing the things that Jake did for him, but one whiff of Lisa’s unique scent and Damien found himself fighting a blistering physical attraction the likes of which he’d never known before. Should he hire her or should he ignore what his “other” senses were screaming at him, about this woman. Damien rustled with the question for several days, but

Synopsis “This novel is a book in which I was able to express a new divine awareness.  I realized I had experienced a lot in life that had left me strewn and unsettled; the book brought about the resurgence of a strong feeling of cohesion.  In this book I have tried to present some of the elementary principles of human nature that can be outside of perceiving, but not outside of holding dear, I call it “Ugly People.”  For example, the violence of feelings, the slave of passion and the dark tyranny of despair.  My life might not have been full of ease and luxury; but I preferred to glorify my existence, as I lived it, enticed by the wealth of experiences placed in my path.  Watching the world around me, I became interested in Fate.  Stories, of the sudden deaths of the rich and famous awakened even more trains of thought on Destiny.  We strive to travel, what we think are the right paths in life, but, does destiny have to have the final say?  Is  fate everywhere we are, involved in everything we do and not onl

Synopsis Fast approaching forty, life’s experiences haven’t mellowed Terry Gallagher. He’s become an angry man. Sickened by the mindless violence all around him while trying to come to terms with his own thuggish past, he despairs as his near neighbour, old Mr. Johnson, war hero, is almost beaten to death in his own home while the police fail to bring anyone to justice. He rails at the apathy and neglect of incompetent politicians past and present who use an already deprived community as a dumping ground for social misfits, bad debtors, drug addicts and so called economic migrants. This was your legacy If you had the misfortune to grow up on the notorious Broughton estates, and all that Terry Gallagher had wanted to do was make a difference... From these lawless streets, a rag bag bunch of thirteen year old scallies are shaped into a football team by one disillusioned man and his unwilling buddy. On a forgotten piece of waste ground, with stolen scaffolding for goalposts and a twenty-four hour pitch surveilla

Synopsis After Billy Reeves had survived a poverty ridden and violent childhood on a council estate in Newcastle he thought he had it all; a loving family, money and respect but a face from the past with a point to prove and muscles to flex is out to bring  his world crashing down on him. He turns down an offer of a job with Tyneside’s most paranoid  and psychotic gang lord and is faced with bent police, a corrupt judge, an army of bouncers and the knowledge that if he makes one wrong move in this game of cat and mouse his family will end up imprisoned, abused or worse. Billy is going to have to work very hard just to keep everyone he cares about alive and that means the gloves are coming off... Excerpt He's waiting in the alley under the bridge for me; I spotted that big, pretentious Shogun of his by Kwiksave. It's a contradiction of visions that just sums up the coke addled, muddled up prick quite nicely. Vince Merry, he believes himself to be the top man on Tyneside, my nemesis for so many years. He's had

Synopsis What if evil visited the one place where you feel the most safe? Following the breakup of her marriage, Rachael retreats to the old beachhouse in Jenny's Cove, where she once lived with her grandmother. It is the one place where she had always felt safe and loved. Devasted and lost, Rachael longs for the simplicity of her childhood.  But Jenny’s Cove has changed. From the moment of Rachael’s arrival, a man watches. He has already killed, and mercilessly will do so again. Soon Rachael becomes a target for a vicious predator whose own dark and twisted past forms a deadly bond between them. And sets her on a collision course with a crazed killer.

Synopsis Rose Haldane is confident about her identity. She pulls the same face as her grandfather when she has to do something she doesn’t want to do, she knows her DNA is the same as his. Except it isn’t: because Rose is adopted and doesn’t know it. 'Ignoring Gravity' connects two pairs of sisters separated by a generation of secrets. Finding her mother’s lost diaries, Rose begins to understand why she has always seemed the outsider in her family, why she feels so different from her sister Lily. Then just when she thinks there can’t be any more secrets… Excerpt Rose Haldane is confident about her identity. She pulls the same face as her grandfather when she has to do something she doesn’t want to do, she knows her DNA is the same as his. Except it isn’t: because Rose is adopted and doesn’t know it. Ignoring Gravity connects two pairs of sisters separated by a generation of secrets. Finding her mother’s lost diaries, Rose begins to understand why she has always seemed the outsider in her family, why she fee

Synopsis When unimaginable calamities strike, Mercy Carver, a poor London woman, wonders what she has done to deserve such immeasurable suffering. It is only when she faces imminent death in the snow and ice-encrusted Virginia wilderness that she finally understands the power of destiny. After escaping from sadistic criminals, she crosses an ocean and falls in love with Jacob Stone, a plantation owner determined to fight Abraham Lincoln and his government. Mercy is passionate. She loves and hates in equal measure. Can love and hatred give her the strength she needs now to reach a Northern state and free a runaway slave, wanted for murders she committed, in order to save him? America and her people are strangled in an uncompromising political stalemate. Southern states have seceded from the Union, and a civil war is imminent. Will Jacob find Mercy before he is embroiled in a war which could see them separated forever? Can Mercy’s determination to exact revenge on the criminal who imprisoned her be realised bef

Synopsis Sandy Lovett's confused mother and chaotic life are having an effect on her waistline. She knows she needs to change her life but doesn't know how until she buys a risqué dress which sets in motion a sequence of life-changing events. After years as a mother, carer and full-time employee, Sandy quits her job and places her mother in a care home, and life seems on the up. But disaster is never far away for the hapless Sandy as her mother’s obsessions continue to wreak havoc and her husband’s business begins to fail. Short of cash and needing a flexible job, Sandy joins a sex-chat service. At The Beaver Club Sandy discovers a talent for selling telephone sex - a skill she later regrets when she meets unscrupulous local politician and prospective MP, Trewin Thackeray. The Changing Room is a comedy-drama for all those whose glass is half-full. Preferably with gin and a big fat cherry. Excerpt “Did I tell you I used to play cards during the war?” says Mum. “Yes, you did,” I say, trying to disguise the we

Synopsis They take his sister, attack his family and mean to kill him with extreme prejudice … What’s a guy to do? BIZZ is a greedy collusion of organised crime, banking, government, business, politicians and corrupted spooks. They’re making lot’s of money. They aim to stay invisible, and no one gets in their way. When investigative journalist, Eilidh Duncan, uncovers BIZZ … it’s only a matter of time When BIZZ finds Eilidh … uhh-ohh! When big brother, Sam Duncan, wonders why she’s offline … OMG! Sam goes to London and joins some dots … KABOOM! Excerpt Nearby, the executioner waited, patient and ready. He couldn’t kill the soldier in the pisser, not with publicity one of the goals. Tension-fuelled humour rippled in his gut.   In a lavatory stall, air cut by a sharp scent of bleach, the target pulled out a Browning Hi Power. He jacked a round into the chamber and eased the safety-catch off.  He stepped from the cubicle, ready. Empty space. He made a quizzical face at the mirror, eased the gun back into his hol

Synopsis These are linked stories, in the spirit of Ray Bradbury's Dandelion Wine. They are about a sixteen-year old girl, Kedzie Greer, who was raised in a utopian community and leaves home to make her way in a dystopian society. The year is 2199; the place, the Reunited States.In these stories, technology coexists with a haunted world. There are witches and robots, ghosts and e-beasts, a mystical lake and a human warehouse. Excerpt In the end, it was the town gates that got to Kedzie. The gates were symbols of the caged feeling that was driving her crazy, and the fact that they had stood for hundreds of years was particularly maddening. Except for the summer tourists who came to gawk at what they called its quaintness, no one new ever showed up in Stillwater. Everybody who was already there knew everybody else who was already there. She could not walk past those heavy ironwork gates without wanting to shake them and cry out. The vigilbots that manned the gates were polite and amiable. They said hello and wi

Synopsis Lady Chrissie Wellsby and her two country friends research dozens of rogues before selecting the notorious Viscount Hawkesbury, owner of London’s most exclusive and expensive brothel, to educate them in erotic seduction. The ladies abandon respectability and coerce Justin Tremayne into letting them visit The Pleasure House and to teaching them the sensual tricks mistresses and prostitutes use to entertain men.  Though Justin believes three naive ladies will see the debauched romps in his themed rooms, cover their eyes and ears, and run back to their sheltered lives, he underestimates the desperation of abandoned women who imagine a wider knowledge of sex will keep the men in their lives at home, in their own beds. But despite watching several of their friends, men and women, perform raunchy acts at his brothel, the ladies insist on participating in the last of Justin’s infamous Sultan’s galas, held in numerous silk tents and outdoor bathing areas on his estate.  Justin concedes to Chrissie’s demands

Synopsis When people call her a control freak, Peri Milano takes it as a compliment. As the preferred go-to special assistant to Philadelphia’s rich and almost famous, having everything under control is part of her job description.  With the organizational skills of a data processing program, the discretion of the CIA, and the creativity of an Ikea research and design engineer, Peri fulfills whatever whim her customers fancy and finds methods for their madness.   Never has she received a request she couldn’t complete nor a problem she couldn’t solve.  So when she finds the dead body of one of her clients and lands smack in the middle of a murder investigation, Peri simply adds a few more items on her to-do list. It's nothing she can’t handle.   But when another client receives a blackmail letter, her son’s type-1 diabetes nearly kills him and her mother ends up in jail (again), Peri starts to doubt whether anything is truly ever under control. She can’t help but wonder just who will be the next to Show Up Dea

Synopsis Kick back and enjoy this mini-anthology of spine-tingling short stories from Diane Wing, author of "Thorne Manor And Other Bizarre Tales" and "Coven: Scrolls of the Four Winds."   Another Walk in the Park: A familiar walking path leads to a disturbing encounter in an unexpected realm.   Dark Hollow Road: A grieving sister searches for her brother on a road notorious for missing persons.   The Restaurant: An adventurous foodie couple are consumed by a life-changing meal when they explore the peculiar cuisine at a mysterious new restaurant.   Wrong Directions: Jealousy prompts a technological genius to conjure a diabolical solution to deal with unfaithful husbands. Excerpt It was just another walk in the park. A gentle summer breeze blowing, rustling the dense leaves on the trees. The occasional chipmunk suddenly bounding across my path and disappearing on the other side. Butterflies flew alongside, guiding my journey. I followed the same path I had countless times before, knowing what was around the n

Synopsis Based on a true story. Ted and Florrie were childhood sweethearts who in 1936, married in the church on top of the Hill where they both lived, unaware of the dark rumblings from Europe, which in a few short years were to change their lives forever.  Ted is called up and joins an elite Airborne glider force tasked with capturing and holding the Pegasus and Horsa bridges in enemy-held Normandy vital to the success of the D-Day invasion. Their mission is a complete success but this is only the awful beginning. From there he continues to fight at the bloody Rhine Crossing, across Germany until finally meeting the Russian Army on the Baltic coast. Casualties are terrible.  In 1946 Ted is demobbed and returns to Florrie and his young family unscathed. But only physically so, for Florrie doesn't recognise the man who returns and soon the experience of constant death and the horror of battle takes its destructive toll on him. Both he and Florrie struggle to understand and come to terms with the problem in th

Synopsis A humorous, animal detective story for 7-12 year-olds. When Mr Woodland Mouse mysteriously disappears, Constable Mole is quick to enlist the help of Leon Chameleon, Private Investigator, whose expertise enabled the Pigeon Valley Police to solve the case of the missing canary eggs. After organising a search, Leon realises that there is only one creature in the valley who can spring the captured mouse from his prison. But just when he thinks Mr Woodland Mouse is safely on his way home, the plan goes horribly wrong..." All the animal details of food, habits, and lifestyle are true to nature (apart from Constable Mole’s sunglasses!) and the animals solve the crimes using their own natural abilities.  Children will absorb much knowledge of the small creatures of Africa without being aware of it.  A section of interesting facts has been added to this second detective story in the Leon Chameleon PI series. It provides valuable and little-known information on chameleons, moles and other creatures featured in

Synopsis Richmond, California. World War II. A cross burning takes innocent lives and unsettles the town. After Japan attacks Pearl Harbor, American Italians start to disappear, a rapist promises to revisit his victims, and someone viciously beats shipyard workers – to death. His failure to solve these seemingly unrelated events haunts homicide detective Oliver Wright, even after he reenlists in the Marines and finds himself fighting in the Pacific.  Oliver returns to Richmond near the end of the war, injured and afraid his career is over. But when an Italian Prisoner of War is murdered the night the Port Chicago Mutiny verdicts are announced, and black soldiers are suspected of the crime, the Army asks Oliver to find out the truth. He joins forces with an Italian POW captain and with a black MP embittered by a segregated military. During their investigation, these unlikely allies expose layers of deceit and violence that stretch back to World War I, and uncover a common thread that connects the earlier crime

Synopsis When Jamie Keller's father is killed in Iraq by a roadside bomb, her mother decides to combat the financial and emotional stress by moving the family from Hamilton, Ohio to the rural town of Promise, Oregon. Fourteen-year-old Jamie narrates the tale of the journey, intermingling descriptions of family dynamics with her own personal philosophy of life. The victims of Jamie's scrutiny include: older sister Jenny, who listens to praise music and wears a WWJD bracelet; younger brother Jake, contained and brainy, with know-it-all tendencies; and little sister Jana, lover of animals and sometimes the comic relief. In Reno, Nevada, the mystery begins when Jamie's mother fails to pick the kids up at the mall as had been previously arranged. After waiting for hours in the blazing heat, brother Jake finally goes in search of his mom only to return with an amazing story. He has located the car, and everything in it is intact (including the family's pet cats), but Mrs. Keller is nowhere to be found. Intensive se

Synopsis Known for hunting the supernatural, no mortal man realizes Lord Cedric is one of Sorceress Morrighan’s abominations. After competing in a tournament, he is wed to a Lady of the Court, Angeline. Cedric’s senses begin to overwhelm him and he struggles to decipher his feelings; Are they a creation of his incubine bloodline or truly heartfelt emotions for the girl who has lost it all to him? He finds himself forced to choose between falling in love or continuing his suicidal quest to kill his creator. Epic battles against all manners of beasts and demons fill this story with memorable antagonists such as Morrighan and her two sisters; Romasanta the Father of Werewolves; Succubus Queen Lillith and many more. Find yourself engulfed in lores and history long forgotten from the 12th Century and beyond. Excerpt Angeline’s face mottled. Raised on a farm, she couldn’t help but scoff at the fact his lordship was rather bold for someone of his rank. In all her years at the Castle, not even a peasant had dared to

Synopsis When Beth's eccentric boss at the government research lab asks her to try out his latest duplicating machine, she'd be crazy to do any such thing. She's not cleared for this, insured or authorized; it's late Friday evening and she wants to go home. But Beth is fatally unassertive. She agrees, and unknown to her another Beth is created. The replica overhears MI5 chief, Sir Peter Ellis, discussing her future - or rather, lack of it. Terrified, she goes on the run. Penniless, friendless and homeless, she has to find the inner strength and aggression to survive on icy London streets. Spec op Nick Cavanagh likes to win. Though Beth thinks he's outside her apartment to protect her, in fact he's hunting her double. As the replica proves difficult to catch and the stakes get higher, he has to decide whose side he is on. Excerpt Beth had stacked the dishes and was wiping surfaces when Nick returned with Ollie’s tray. He moved to the sink and turned the tap on, then got the Fairy Liquid from the cupboard under