Showing results by narrator "Cris Dukehart" in All Categories

Modern medicine has conquered or contained many of the diseases that used to carry children away before their time, reducing mortality and improving health. Vaccination and treatment are widely available. There are still monsters left to fight, but the old ones, the simple ones, trouble us no more. Or so we thought. For with the reduction in danger comes the erosion of memory, as pandemics fade from memory into story into fairy tale. Those old diseases can't have been so bad, people say, or we wouldn't be here to talk about them. They're never coming back.... It begins with a fever.

Portia Kane is having a meltdown. After escaping her cheating husband and their posh Florida life, she finds herself transported back home and back to square one. In need of saving herself, she sets out to find and resurrect a beloved high-school English teacher who has retired after a violent incident in the classroom.But she quickly learns that it's not a one-woman job. Luckily she meets a few people on her journey.

Elizabeth Chapman is saved from an armed robber by a giant Kodiak bear who shifts into a large, well-muscled, and fully naked human male. But when it's revealed that the robber is the brother of a dangerous criminal, Elizabeth finds herself the target of a vendetta. Ronan, the Bear Shifter, takes her to Shiftertown for safety, where Elizabeth learns that the mateless Ronan, alone in the world, takes care of Shifters who have also been left on their own. Having grown up in foster care, Elizabeth can only admire how protective Ronan is.

Carolina Cold Fury star Garrett Samuelson never wants to miss out on a single minute of fun. Whether he's playing hockey, hanging out with friends, or walking the red carpet with a new date on his arm, he lives every day to the fullest. When he meets Olivia Case, he sees someone who's exactly his type: confident, sexy, and smart. But the more he pursues her, the more Garrett shares a side of himself that other women don't normally get to see.

Cormac has been moving from one Shiftertown to the next in search of a mate. Now he's in southern Nevada, where a beautiful, unmated bear Shifter greets him - with a shotgun in her hands. Nell is a hot-tempered mother of two cubs, and she doesn't take kindly to new Shifters showing up in town without her consent - even one with a sexy smile and brilliant blue eyes. But when her sons are endangered and she desperately needs help protecting them, Cormac proves he's worthy of her trust as well as her desire.

After over 25 years of researching, writing, and speaking on this subject, in Healthy Me, Healthy Us the Parrotts have whittled down their answer to the truth contained in this single sentence: If you try to build intimacy with another person before you have gotten whole on your own, all your relationships become an attempt to complete yourself.

When the Faction shows up in Creel Creek, it may mean Constance will finally find out the truth about her mother's disappearance. But the secretive magical organization has a long history of covering up the facts. She won't get them so easily. When murders begin popping up all over the country with ties to the supernatural, a hunter sets his sights on the small town. He kills three shifters with his sword. And he's not the only thing that's putting the paranormal community in danger. The Creel Creek After Dark podcast convention has its own surprise in store.

How do you kill someone who cannot die? The wrath of Poseidon is falling upon land and sea. In Mera's search for a way to destroy him, she returns to the kingdom she once abandoned. Atlantea. Meanwhile, Bast tackles the frail political balance in Tagrad, and tries to regroup with his soulmate. He will do anything to see Mera again, and she will do anything to protect him. Even if the price might be her own life. The stakes have never been higher, and the fall has never been steeper. Poseidon is here. And it's time to end it all.

New Canaan is under attack. Driven by Uriel, the Hegemony and its last remaining allies have sent their fleets against the ISF's homeworld. It's a final solution, little more than an attempt to bring about mutually assured destruction. Of course, the humans of Sol don't know that their leader is under the control of core AIs who do not care which side wins, so long as humanity is weakened. Tanis and Tangel have returned from the core, ready to defend their homes, but they lost a month in a temporal jump, and the core AIs are ready for them, led by one of Epsilon's lieutenants.

Melena Sanders is locked away in purgatory - which is no vacation - but she'll soon be returning to Alaska, where troubles are mounting once again. Suspicious fires are breaking out, supernaturals are being attacked, and there's an enemy lurking out there waiting for his chance to strike. Her lover, Lucas, is managing to hold their home together during her absence, but he's more than ready for her to return.

I wake in the night knowing something is wrong. Carly, mate of my heart, is next to me, and I hear my son’s breathing. They are safe. But someone, someone cries out with a despair I can’t ignore.

Deputy Andrews pulls Nora into the sci-fi section and asks her to help him plan a wedding proposal. His bride-to-be, Hester, loves Little Women, and Nora sets to work arranging a special screening at the town's new movie theater. But right before the deputy pops the question, Nora makes an unsettling discovery—someone has mutilated all her store's copies of The Scarlet Letter, slicing angrily into the pages wherever Hester Prynne's name is mentioned.

Rhianne, daughter of the powerful Lady Aisling, is in a jam. She’s been imprisoned by an ambitious Fae lord, who is abetted by Rhianne’s ruthless and cruel father. Her prison door is shattered by an incredibly powerful creature, who in a flash settles into the guise of a handsome man with a warm smile. He tells her his name is Ben, and that he’s been sent to be her guide and a protector.

Angus Murray, a bouncer for a New Orleans Shifter bar, is sent to round up an elusive, collar-less Shifter woman, Tamsin Calloway, who is causing trouble for Shifter Bureau and possesses information they want. If Angus refuses, he risks losing his cub. He finds Tamsin but she's slippery and not about to be rounded up quietly. In fact, quiet is nothing Tamsin will ever be. She leads Angus on a wild chase, but he's determined to bring her in to save his son. Can Tamsin convince Angus she's worth helping before she's locked away by Shifter Bureau, Collared, or perhaps killed?

Diviners have told Audrun that the child she carries must be born in a haven of peace, far from her war-scourged homeland, but as she flees she finds only far greater danger. For her karavan is overtaken by Alisanos, the deepwood - a dangerous magical forest that harbors not only demons, gods, and other otherworldly creatures, but also its own sinister intentions - and which may have already claimed Audrun and her child for its own.

Six years ago, the dark elves murdered most of humanity. Thanks to the sacrifice of Elizabeth "Gunz" Chambers, some few survived, safe behind walled shelters. For now. Former Special Forces operator Alex Benoit is a broken man. Driven to rage by the evil of the dark elves, he and his team of rangers hunt them in the wilderness of northern Canada. No weapon is forbidden, no method too severe. But Alex has stared too long into the abyss, and vengeance comes at a cost.

Chosen as the Guardian of her Montana Shiftertown, wolf Shifter Rae Lyall is facing opposition - for no woman has ever been selected for this powerful position. Still adjusting to the new authority thrust upon her, Rae travels to train with Zander Moncrieff, a Shifter healer, tasked with teaching her about her new role and its responsibilities. A polar bear Shifter, Zander wears no collar and follows no rules but his own. Rae finds him arrogant and demanding, yet compelling and intriguing. Zander has no wish to mate, but the sassy Guardian is drawing him out of his shell.

Graham McNeil knows that his pack is unruly, but he's not sure he can take the next step toward pack stability. After losing his first mate long ago, Graham has worked hard to keep his heart in check. Besides, even if he was inclined to choose a new mate, his girlfriend, Misty, is human - a fact that won't sit well with Graham's old-fashioned pack.But Misty is going through a crisis of her own, one that brings danger and death to the pack. With the wolves doubly convinced that there needs to be a shake-up, Graham must now defend his leadership.

In the third installment of the Significance series, we begin with Maggie and Caleb in the clutches of a new enemy: the Virtuoso council. Not only do they have to deal with the consequences of taking the lives of the Watsons and the council attempting to take Maggie away to keep their precious Visionary safe, but they must deal with Marla as well. All are determined to undermine, control, and use Caleb and Maggie's rare gifts for their own uses, and some wish to destroy them entirely. A new challenge emerges when Maggie's father and Bish are threatened.

Stuart Reid is an Iron Master - a Dark Fae with a rare ability to make iron do his bidding. Exiled by the High Fae who fear him, he now lives in a simple house in Shiftertown outside Las Vegas, watching over Peigi, a bear Shifter woman, and the cubs she cares for. Peigi, rescued from an evil Shifter and welcomed into the Vegas Shiftertown, knows Reid and the cubs have helped her survive and heal. When Reid’s people send him a call for help, Peigi senses danger to him - too much of it. She finds she’ll do anything, even sacrifice herself and her happiness, to keep him safe.