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Buffer Zone

A full moon hung over the Mississippi’s dark waters, meaning this was the time for hunters to arrive and take whatever they could capture. A device would be clamped to the backs of our necks and we’d never be able to shift back to human again. It was how they justified their enslavement of us; that we were only animals instead of sentient humans.

The Krelk had killed more than two-thirds of the human population, too, but they made the excuse that they’d thought them animal as well, until their High Council, wherever that was, decided otherwise.

When I heard the first yelp, even underground, I couldn’t breathe. Was that a shifter? Few shifters could take on a Krelk and their weapons and either survive or avoid being stunned. That’s how we were captured—frozen and only barely able to breathe while we were caged, tagged and hauled away from the buffer zone.

Another yelp—followed quickly by a third.

This was no shifter—the Krelk were the ones screaming. Terrified but still curious, I dipped into the watery entrance and slowly made my way out of my cave to peek at the river bank above my head.

A dead Krelk dropped into the water nearby, making me jump and squeak in terror.

”An otter?” Someone leaned down to look at me.

Not a Krelk—I knew their scent. This—I’d never scented someone like this before. I scrabbled backward, afraid of this newcomer, too, even if he did appear humanoid.

”Don’t be afraid—I killed all of them.”

I backed all the way into the water and scrambled to swim to my cave before he could grab me. Once there, I refused to come out.

”I understand,” he said, loud enough that I could still hear him. ”Be safe. I’ll patrol farther down, tonight.”

I listened, my heart beating so rapidly I feared it would burst while his footsteps, light as they were, faded as he walked southward.

He’d killed six Krelk, and I’d never heard one of their weapons fire.

Who could do that?

* * *

Earth wasn’t alone in its suffering. We were just another planet in a large group of suffering worlds, and help was either non-existent or difficult to come by.

There’d be no Marines landing here to save us; that hope had died years ago. What we had was a handful of people with unusual talents, helping a few of us stay alive against impossible odds.

—Clare Coquina

(source: Bol.com)

Bryant and May on the Loose

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BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Christopher Fowler’s *Bryant & May off the Rails*.
The Peculiar Crimes Unit is no more—disbanded, finished, kaput. After years of defying the odds and infuriating their superiors, detectives Arthur Bryant and John May have finally crossed the line. While Bryant takes to his bed, his bathrobe, and his esoteric books, the rest of the team takes to the streets looking for new careers—until one of them stumbles upon a gruesome murder.
Now the Unit is back for an encore performance—in a rented office with no computer network, no legal authority, and a broken toilet. They’ve got until the end of the week to solve a mystery with links to gangland crime, the 2012 London Olympics, and a half-man, half-stag creature that’s carrying off young women. It’s the kind of case that Bryant and May live to solve . . . and it could be the one that finally kills them.

A Brush With Death

When Penny Brannigan inherits a charming, old-fashioned cottage in the North Wales town of Llanelen, she soon realizes she has come into more than what real estate agents like to describe as a desirable period property: She’s also acquired memories, mystery, and an unsolved, decades-old crime.             As Penny sorts through the belongings of her benefactor, a deceased teacher, she comes upon a packet of letters from a promising young Liverpool artist, A. Jones, who was killed in an accident in 1970. An artist herself, Penny sets out to discover who killed this painter, and is helped by a small group of townsfolk, including her business partner, Victoria Hopkirk. While at a retrospective art exhibition in Liverpool, Penny recognizes what she believes to be a watercolor painted by Jones. But it is attributed to another artist, leading her to suspect that art theft was at the heart of the case, and that Jones’s death was no accident.             In her eagerly awaited sequel Duncan wonderfully revisits the bustling Welsh town and vibrant characters introduced in The Cold Light of Mourning. With its lyrical prose and tantalizing puzzle, this new mystery is a treat on many levels.

Brunswick Gardens

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Brunswick Gardens (Thomas and Charlotte Pitt Series #18) by Anne Perry
Like the great Victorian novelists whose mantle she wears with such distinction, Anne Perry creates a rich and intimate world and fills it with remarkably vivid characters who experience the majesty—and shame—of the British Empire at its brilliant zenith. Now, in Brunswick Gardens, she explores the controversial birth of a philosophy that enflamed fiery debate—and possibly murder.
A century ago, Charles Darwin’s revolutionary theory of evolution rocked the civilized world, and the outraged Anglican church went on the warpath against it. In a mansion in London’s affluent Brunswick Gardens, the battle is intense, as that most respected clergyman, the Reverend Ramsay Parmenter, is boldly challenged by his beautiful assistant, Unity Bellwood—a “new woman” whose feminism and aggressive Darwinism he finds appalling.
When Unity, three months pregnant, tumbles down the Parmenter staircase to her death, Thomas Pitt, commander of the Bow Street police station, is virtually certain that one of the three deeply devout men in the house committed murder. Could it have been the Reverend Parmenter, his handsome curate, or his Roman Catholic son? Powerful forces demand that the scandalous matter be cleared up immediately. But Pitt and his clever wife, Charlotte, refuse to settle for less than the truth . . . and justice.
Like all Anne Perry’s novels, Brunswick Gardens translates great moral issues into deeply moving human dramas. Perhaps the most psychologically penetrating book she has written, it is a distinguished addition to her acclaimed body of work.

The Brothers Karamazov

Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s powerful meditation on faith, meaning and morality, *The Brothers Karamazov* is translated with an introduction and notes by David McDuff in Penguin Classics.
When brutal landowner Fyodor Karamazov is murdered, the lives of his sons are changed irrevocably: Mitya, the sensualist, whose bitter rivalry with his father immediately places him under suspicion for parricide; Ivan, the intellectual, whose mental tortures drive him to breakdown; the spiritual Alyosha, who tries to heal the family’s rifts; and the shadowy figure of their bastard half-brother Smerdyakov. As the ensuing investigation and trial reveal the true identity of the murderer, Dostoyevsky’s dark masterpiece evokes a world where the lines between innocence and corruption, good and evil, blur and everyone’s faith in humanity is tested.
This powerful translation of *The Brothers Karamazov* features and introduction highlighting Dostoyevsky’s recurrent themes of guilt and salvation, with a new chronology and further reading.
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky (1821-1881) was born in Moscow. From 1849-54 he lived in a convict prison, and in later years his passion for gambling led him deeply into debt. His other works available in Penguin Classics include *Crime & Punishment*, *The Idiot* and *Demons*.
If you enjoyed *The Brothers Karamazov* you might like Nikolai Gogol’s *Dead Souls*, also available in Penguin Classics.
‘There is no writer who better demonstrates the contradictions and fluctuations of the creative mind than Dostoyevsky, and nowhere more astonishingly than in *The Brothers Karamazov*’
Joyce Carol Oates
‘Dostoyevsky was the only psychologist from whom I had anything to learn: he belongs to the happiest windfalls of my life’
Friedrich Nietzsche
‘The most magnificent novel ever written’
Sigmund Freud
**

Brothers Karamazov

In 1880 Dostoevsky completed *The Brothers Karamazov*, the literary effort for which he had been preparing all his life. Compelling, profound, complex, it is the story of a patricide and of the four sons who each had a motive for murder: Dmitry, the sensualist, Ivan, the intellectual; Alyosha, the mystic; and twisted, cunning Smerdyakov, the bastard child. Frequently lurid, nightmarish, always brilliant, the novel plunges the reader into a sordid love triangle, a pathological obsession, and a gripping courtroom drama. But throughout the whole, Dostoevsky searhes for the truth–about man, about life, about the existence of God. A terrifying answer to man’s eternal questions, this monumental work remains the crowning achievement of perhaps the finest novelist of all time.
*From the Paperback edition.*

Brotherhood Of The Wolf

Brotherhood of the Wolf (Runelords Series #2) by David Farland
Praise for David Farland’s *The Runelords*:
“*The Runelords* heralds the arrival of a serious contender for the Jordan crown.” –Michael Stackpole
“A first-rate tale, an epic fantasy that more than delivers on its promise. Read it soon and treat yourself to an adventure you won’t forget.” –Terry Brooks
“When I reached the end of this first volume and saw grace arise from a devastating battlefield where too many great hearts lay dead, Farland had earned the tears that came to my eyes. It was not sentiment but epiphany.” –Orson Scott Card
“In *The Runelords* David Farland has created a vivid, detailed, different world that becomes perfectly believable. The characters are real, the action fast, and the sum a brilliant and engrossing novel.” –David Drake
“David Farland is the single greatest discovery of my professional career.” –Algis Budrys
“With *The Runelords*, David Farland breaks new ground in fantasy fiction and wakes up anyone who thought they’d read everything the genre had to offer.” –Kevin J. Anderson
“A bloody, violent, grim saga, with thoughtfully devised magics and a well-turned plot…satisfying and involving.” –*Kirkus Reviews*
“*The Runelords* is a wonderful fantasy novel.” –Robert J. Sawyer
“The intriguing hook behind Farland’s first novel–and launch of a new fantasy series–is a complex magical technology whereby abilities such as wit, brawn, and stamina are transferable from person to person. The magic is basic to Farland’s story, not just painted on, and it and the society in which it plays out are rigorously and imaginatively elaborated.” –*Publishers Weekly*

Brother Odd

EDITORIAL REVIEW: *Loop me in, odd one. *The words, spoken in the deep of night by a sleeping child, chill the young man watching over her. For this was a favorite phrase of Stormy Llewellyn, his lost love, and Stormy is dead, gone forever from this world. In the haunted halls of the isolated monastery where he had sought peace, Odd Thomas is stalking spirits of an infinitely darker natureThrough two *New York Times* bestselling novels Odd Thomas has established himself as one of the most beloved and unique fictional heroes of our time. Now, wielding all the power and magic of a master storyteller at the pinnacle of his craft, Dean Koontz follows Odd into a singular new world where he hopes to make a fresh beginning—but where he will meet an adversary as old and inexorable as time itself. St. Bartholomew’s Abbey sits in majestic solitude amid the wild peaks of California’s high Sierra, a haven for children otherwise abandoned, and a sanctuary for those seeking insight. Odd Thomas has come here to learn to live fully again, and among the eccentric monks, their other guests, and the nuns and young students of the attached convent school, he has begun to find his way. The silent spirits of the dead who visited him in his earlier life are mercifully absent, save for the bell-ringing Brother Constantine and Odd’s steady companion, the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll.But trouble has a way of finding Odd Thomas, and it slinks back onto his path in the form of the sinister bodachs he has met previously, the black shades who herald death and disaster, and who come late one December night to hover above the abbey’s most precious charges. For Odd is about to face an enemy who eclipses any he has yet encountered, as he embarks on a journey of mystery, wonder, and sheer suspense that surpasses all that has come before.*******From the Hardcover edition.*

Brother Cadfael’s Penance: The Twentieth Chronicle of Brother Cadfael

SUMMARY: While Cadfael has bent Abbey rules, he has never broken his monastic vows–until now. Word has come to Shrewsbury of a treacherous act that has left 30 of Maud’s knights imprisoned. All have been ransomed except Cadfael’s secret son, Olivier. Conceived in Cadfael’s soldiering youth and unaware of his father’s identity, Olivier will die if he is not freed.

The Bronze Skies

TOUGH FEMALE P.I. EXPLORING THE UNDERWORLD OF A VAST STAR EMPIRE. Book two in a new series set in the world of Catherine Asaro’s Skolian Empire series.
Major Bhaajan achieved the impossible. Born to the Undercity, the slums below the City of Cries on the planet Raylicon, she broke free from crushing poverty and crime to become a military officer with Imperial Space Command. Now retired from military duty, she walks the mean streets of Undercity as a private investigator. And she is about to embark on her most challenging case yet.
Summoned by no less than the Ruby Pharaoh herself, Major Bhaajan is tasked with finding a killer. But this is no ordinary murderer. The Ruby Pharaoh witnessed a Jagernaut cut down Assembly Councilor Tap Benton – which shouldn’t have been possible. The Jagernauts are the elite of the elite soldiers in the Imperial Space Command. What’s more, the spinal node implanted in all Jagernauts should have prevented the murder. But the Ruby Pharaoh is sure of what she saw, and she has reason to believe that the Jagernaut will kill again.
Now, Major Bhaajan must hunt down a killer before it is too late. To do so, she must return to the one place on Raylicon she knows best: Undercity.
At the publisher’s request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management).
About prequel Undercity:
“Asaro plants herself firmly into that grand SF tradition of future history franchises favored by luminaries like Heinlein, Asimov, Herbert, Anderson, Dickson, Niven, Cherryh, and Baxter. . .They don’t write em like that anymore! Except Asaro does, with . . . up-to-the-minute savvy!” – Locus
“[Baahjan], who starts out keeping an emotional distance from the people in the Undercity soon grows to think of them as her community once more. Asaro . . . returns to the Skolian empire’s early history to tell Bhajaan’s story.” – Booklist
“Asaro delivers a tale rich with the embedded history of her world and bright with technical marvels. Her characters are engaging and intriguing and there is even a bit of romance. What really touched my heart was Bhaaj’s interaction with the children of the aqueducts. I spent the last fifty pages of the book sniffling into a tissue.” – SF Crowsnet
“I’m hooked, both on her writing and her Skolian universe. This book had everything I wanted: strong characters, a new and unique world, and a plot that isn’t as simple as it first appears.” – TerryTalk
About Catherine Asaro’s Skolian saga:
“Entertaining mix of hard SF and romance.” – Publishers Weekly
“Asaro’s Skolian saga is now nearly as long and in many ways as compelling as Dune, if not more so, featuring a multitude of stronger female characters.” – Booklist
“Rapid pacing and gripping suspense.” – Publisher’s Weekly
Two-time Nebula-award winner Catherine Asaro has an M.A. in physics and a Ph.D. in chemical physics from Harvard. A former ballet and jazz dancer, she founded the Mainly Jazz Dance program at Harvard and now teaches at the Caryl Maxwell Classical Ballet. She has recently taken up singing, doing several gigs with contemporary and jazz styles. She’s the creator of the popular Skolian Saga science fiction series with The Ruby Dice, Diamond Star, and Carnelians, published by Baen. Her other books include near-future technothrillers Alpha and Sunrise Alley. Asaro lives in Maryland with her husband and daughter.

Broken Skies

### **A rift has opened**
A portal to an alien world.
**And the visitors coming through… aren’t friendly.**
**Julianne and Marcus race back to Tahn to deal with a new threat – strange, alien creatures flooding through a mysterious portal. **
The influx hasn’t just unsettled the human inhabitants in the region, either. The remnant are restless, and attacking like they never have before.
**Tahn rises to the threat, and sends Julianne and her team on a whole new kick ass adventure.**
**Set on the foundation laid by the Kurtherian Gambit Series, Broken Skies tells a new story in the Age of Magic.**

The Broken Kingdom

Book One : The Chronicles of Arandor Y/A Fantasy Fiction Luca, the young prince and heir to the throne of Arandor, finds his world turned upside down. The wedding of his sister turns out to be anything but a joyous occasion, as he finds himself taken away from his luxurious lifestyle. As the noblemen of the kingdom are left to determine his fate, he soon finds his life in danger. With those who plot against him seeking to take control of the kingdom, Luca is kept safe by an unexpected ally. Soldiers, assassins and even dark magic are used against him as he endeavours to survive and fulfil his legacy. UK Eng.

Broken Bones: Age of Magic – a Kurtherian Gambit Series

**Irth is a vast place**
*Concerned by the Skrima attacks, Julianne, Marcus, and Garrett have set off to visit the outlying settlements this side of the Madlands and make sure their people are safe.*
It’s not just the Skrima and the remnant they’re fighting – the people they find out there have lost all hope and see no way out.
*Julianne needs to teach them to fight. More than that, she needs to remind them why it’s worth it.*
Set on the foundation laid by the Kurtherian Gambit Series, Broken Skies tells a new story in the Age of Magic.
*NOTE: This book contains cursing. Perhaps humorous cursing, but cursing nevertheless. If this offends you, I don’t suggest reading this book.*

Brighid’s Quest

TORN BETWEEN THE POSSIBILITIES… Fleeing her centaur clan’s increasingly militant beliefs, Brighid Dhianna has begun to find peace and acceptance among the humans of Clan MacCallan. Still, she agrees to leave her newly formed friendships to guide her clan chieftain’s grieving brother home. As she journeys, Brighid discovers that the long-dormant Shaman blood that runs so thickly in her veins will no longer be silenced. As seductive new powers begin to beckon, Brighid glimpses a future that is more impossible — and more magical — than any she could have dared to imagine. But when tragedy summons her back to the Centaur Plains, Brighid must make a decision that will affect not only her friendship with the humans, but the centaur herd and indeed the world. For the Great Goddess Epona has set her on a new path that demands everything she has to give. When the whole world is turning to her for help, healing the heart of a warrior doesn’t sound so daunting….

Brief Answers to the Big Questions

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER ‘A beautiful little book by a brilliant mind’ DAILY TELEGRAPH ‘Effortlessly instructive, absorbing, up to the minute and – where it matters – witty’ GUARDIAN The world-famous cosmologist and #1 bestselling author of A Brief History of Time leaves us with his final thoughts on the universe’s biggest questions in this brilliant posthumous work. Is there a God? How did it all begin? Can we predict the future? What is inside a black hole? Is there other intelligent life in the universe? Will artificial intelligence outsmart us? How do we shape the future? Will we survive on Earth? Should we colonise space? Is time travel possible? Throughout his extraordinary career, Stephen Hawking expanded our understanding of the universe and unravelled some of its greatest mysteries. But even as his theoretical work on black holes, imaginary time and multiple histories took his mind to the furthest reaches of space, Hawking always believed that science could also be used to fix the problems on our planet. And now, as we face potentially catastrophic changes here on Earth – from climate change to dwindling natural resources to the threat of artificial super-intelligence – Stephen Hawking turns his attention to the most urgent issues for humankind. Wide-ranging, intellectually stimulating, passionately argued, and infused with his characteristic humour, BRIEF ANSWERS TO THE BIG QUESTIONS, the final book from one of the greatest minds in history, is a personal view on the challenges we face as a human race, and where we, as a planet, are heading next. A percentage of all royalties will go to charity.
**Recensie(s)**

The best, most mind-bending sort of physics: black holes, time travel, the origins of the universe * The Times * It is that ultra-distinctive voice (modest, profound, sometimes very funny) that knits this book together * Sunday Times * It is that ultra-distinctive voice (modest, profound, sometimes very funny) that knits this book together * Sunday Times * The best, most mind-bending sort of physics: black holes, time travel, the origins of the universe * The Times * Almost everything in Brief Answers is effortlessly instructive, absorbing, up to the minute and – where it matters – witty * Guardian * A beautiful book from a brilliant mind * Daily Telegraph *
(source: Bol.com)

The Bride Collector

The Bride Collector by Ted Dekker
FBI Special agent Brad Raines is facing his toughest case yet. A Denver serial killer has killed four beautiful young women, leaving a bridal veil at each crime scene, and he’s picking up his pace. Unable to crack the case, Raines appeals for help from a most unusual source: residents of the Center for Wellness and Intelligence, a private psychiatric institution for mentally ill individuals whose are extraordinarily gifted.
It’s there that he meets Paradise, a young woman who witnessed her father murder her family and barely escaped his hand. Diagnosed with schizophrenia, Paradise may also have an extrasensory gift: the ability to experience the final moments of a person’s life when she touches the dead body.
In a desperate attempt to find the killer, Raines enlists Paradise’s help. In an effort to win her trust, he befriends this strange young woman and begins to see in her qualities that most ‘sane people’ sorely lack. Gradually, he starts to question whether sanity resides outside the hospital walls…or inside.
As the Bride Collector picks up the pace-and volume-of his gruesome crucifixions, the case becomes even more personal to Raines when his friend and colleague, a beautiful young forensic psychologist, becomes the Bride Collector’s next target.
The FBI believes that the killer plans to murder seven women. Can Paradise help before it’s too late?