A Stranger Comes To Town

ANTHONY AWARD FINALIST FOR BEST ANTHOLOGY Including NYT bestselling author Michael Connelly’s story “Avalon,” soon to be adapted for television by David E. Kelley. "The very best of what crime fiction should deliver." -New York Journal of Books The latest Mystery Writers of America story collection, featuring surprising, page-turning twists on the genre from some of the top bestsellers and award winners in crime fiction It’s been said that all great literature boils down to one of two stories—a man takes a journey, or a stranger comes to town. While mystery writers have been successfully using both approaches for generations, there’s something undeniably alluring in the nature of a stranger: the uninvited guest, the unacquainted neighbor, the fish out of water. No matter how or where they appear, strangers are walking mysteries, complete unknowns in once-familiar territories who disrupt our lives with unease and wonder. In the newest collection of stories by the Mystery Writers of America, each author weaves a fresh tale surrounding the eerie feeling that comes when a stranger enters our midst, featuring stories by prolific mystery writers such as Michael Connelly, Dean Koontz and Joe Hill.

An aetheric chain-reaction sends a wave of death rolling around the world, warping living beings and aether-based technology alike. In one afternoon, trains go from being the power that pushed civilization out to the frontier, to being very expensive sheds of scrap metal, filled with rotting produce and dying cattle. Cities go hungry. The farmers are in hardly better shape than their former customers in the city. Some trees bear withered fruit, while gobbets of exploded fruit flesh drape the limbs of others. One wheat stalk might be strong and firm, but its neighbor disintegrates to dust at a touch. Harvesting crops takes more work, but yields less food. People try not to starve, using a variety of tactics. The Loyale traveling circus survives the aether storm mostly unscathed. When the circus comes to Seppanen Town, all seems well until a ragged fugitive plunges into their camp and begs for sanctuary.

Henry meets a lost polar bear and helps it get home.

The world of the Runelords has been combined by magic with another parallel world to form a new one, the beginning of a process that may unify all worlds into the one true world. This story picks up after the events of The Wyrmling Horde and follows two of Farland's well-known heroes, Borenson and Myrrima, on a quest to save their devastated land and the people of the new world from certain destruction. But the land is not the only thing that has been altered forever: in the change, Borenson has merged with a mighty and monstrous creature from the other world, Aaath Ulber. He begins to be a different person, a berserker warrior, as well as having a huge new body because of the transformation of worlds. Thousands have died, lands have sunk below the sea and, elsewhere, risen from it. The supernatural rulers of the world are part of a universal evil, yet play a Byzantine game of dark power politics among themselves. And Aaath Ulber is now the most significant pawn in that game. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

When the last of Vivienne Ulman's four children left home, she and her husband were poised to enjoy their freedom. Then, her mother's Alzheimer's intervened. In Alzheimer's; A Love Story, Ulman records with tender lyricism and searing honesty the progress of her mother's Alzheimer's, her own grief over the gradual loss of her beloved mother, and...

"Successful Wall Street fund manager retired at age 35 guides investors to use intuitive and creative right-brained processes to complement traditional left-brain financial analysis. Author describes his principles based on spiritual insights and provides professional anecdotes to support his. theories"--Provided by publisher.

A classic western