Showing results by narrator "Joe Hempel" in All Categories

When John Rast signed up for Knight Watch, he expected it to be all fighting dragons and rescuing maidens. You know, hero stuff. But instead he's stuck patrolling game conventions and cosplayer competitions, looking for dangerous anachronisms and the villains who may be trying to exploit them. Fortunately, all that changes when an honest-to-goodness necromancer shows up wielding a weapon created by Nazi occultists and accompanied by some badass evil valkyries, hell-bent on kicking off the end of the world.

Book 2 in a post-apocalyptic road trip amongst monsters and the supernatural, perfect for fans of stories like A Quiet Place, The Demon Cycle, and Attack on Titan.

In 2043, Capes Online is the biggest, most popular VRMMORPG in the world. With over one billion active players and counting, gamers can become brave Heroes or cunning Villains, their every choice determining their alignment. Everyone wants to play this game and almost everyone does. Except for 25-year-old police officer Nyle Maxwell, who can't log out. Killed in a car accident on his first day on the job, Nyle gets his mind uploaded to Capes Online to save his life.

If you have felt (1) massive relief at cancelled plans, (2) mild annoyance in huge gatherings of strangers, and (3) want to figure out how to socialize better and more effectively without social fatigue, this book is for you - written by someone exactly like you. Introvert Survival Tactics is going to shed light on exactly how you function, and how to use your tendencies to your advantage.

Grim Marie knows far too much about the wolves of the world, a world where little girls go missing. After all, she had married one before he showed his claws, and what that wolf did to her little girl was unforgiveable. Grim Marie isn't certain if she can ever forgive herself for putting her Little Aleta in harm's way. When Grandmother becomes ill, Aleta offers to take the bus through the concrete forest to Grandmother's house to bring her some goodies. She knows the way. What could possibly go wrong?

Bookish librarians are totally capable of finding missing people in the Alaskan wilderness. Said no one. Ever. So why is Grace Tumbler jetting off to do just that? She doesn’t know. All she has are books and a somewhat positive attitude that she can survive her first-ever trip away from home. That is, until her plane crashes....

Death stalks the living. Seven writers have fled to Mirror House, a picturesque mansion by the sea. Each member of the group is running from a terrible premonition of their own death on July 24. What they don’t know is they were, in fact, prophesizing the end of the world, for on that very day, billions will die from a relentless heatwave triggered by global warming.

Kyrie Kent hates baseball. She hates players even more. When her best friend drags her to a Ravens game, she spends the innings reading a book. Until she gets a glimpse of the closer - a pitcher who draws her like a magnet. Fighting her attraction to Easton Holliday is easy. All she has to do is keep her distance, avoid the ballpark, and keep her head down. At least, all that would have worked, but Easton doesn't intend to let Kyrie walk so easily. When another player vies for Kyrie's attention, Easton will swing for the fences.

Meet Lawson: A cynical, wise-cracking vampire charged with protecting the Balance - the secret existence of a race of living vampires who have evolved alongside humanity for thousands of years. A fixer. Part-spy, and part-commando-James Bond with fangs, Lawson mixes shrewd cunning with unmatched lethality to get his job done. He tries his best to dismantle conspiracies, dispatch bad guys, and live long enough to get home. Arvella: A power-hungry member of the vampire governing body, the Council. She wants power and will stop at nothing to get it. Even if it means kidnapping a child.

Meet Lawson. A cynical, wisecracking vampire charged with protecting the Balance - the secret existence of a race of living vampires that have evolved alongside humanity for thousands of years. Named after the Hindu god of destruction, Shiva is half-vampire and half-lycanthrope. Able to change her appearance into anyone she pleases, she is one of the most dangerous assassins on the planet. Belarus, the head of the vampire governing body, the Council, is Shiva's next target.

Does public speaking make you feel paralyzed and tie your stomach into knots? Or do you want to learn how to get a standing ovation every time? Does the prospect of facing embarrassing judgment make your heart race? Maybe you just want to learn how to absolutely own a room from the stage and become a magnetic speaker? Wait...what do people even say to open and close?!

Deep down you know you were meant for more in this world but you can't shake this feeling. What's stopping you from making it happen? What's holding you back from unlocking your maximum potential? I know exactly what is holding you back. Everything you want in life can still happen. Financial freedom, personal success, creating a legacy; it's not out of reach. In fact it's all within your grasp. But first you need to do one very important thing. You need to get out of your own way.

A missing family member sends Lawson on a trip to New York City only to run smack into vampire organized crime. Now they've got Lawson right where they want him - and they want him to switch sides and betray the Balance. But Lawson's got more than one play in his book, and if he has to go to the wall to rescue his cousin and stop the Syndicate from unleashing a new synthetic drug on the masses, that's just what he'll do.

A husband armed with a sword hacks apart his wife in a Denver grocery store. There are dozens of witnesses, and the crime is captured on the security cameras. To the police, it's an open-and-shut case. To Naomi, the daughter of the couple, it's evidence of dark magic. She hires her ex-lover, a private investigator named Jonathan Shade to prove her father is innocent.

For over 100 years, the Temple of Ran has been sacrificing young wizards in order to steal their power. When Lorit discovers that he holds the rare ability to use magic, he becomes their next target. At first, he runs, working to master his abilities on the move so that one day he might be able to resist them. But that was before the Temple targets his beloved sister, Chihon. In order to save her life, he infuses her with his own power. Now, they're both targets.

Were you passed over for a promotion, or do you want to ensure that never happens? Are you sometimes unsure how to fit in and get along? The modern workplace is a stressful pressure cooker and a dangerous maze, and how you fare is determined not by your work - but by politics, your workplace conversation skills, and how to make yourself essential and likable.

Dreams do come true, they suddenly find, as a staggering string of successes changes the fledgling academy to a small federation almost overnight. Chris and his friends are living their dreams, but to stay on this unlikely trajectory, they're forced to keep topping themselves. Can the Ramsay boys keep satisfying the blood-lust of the die-hard fans before the stakes reach life and death? What if they never had a choice in the first place?

It will take everything they've learned to stop the rise of evil. The last dragon's egg is discovered in the treasury of Veldwaite, launching Lorit and Chihon into a battle with the Temple Priests. They rescue a young Wizard and enlist his help in the fight to stop the Temple from harnessing the power of the last dragon. Now they're the masters, training him. They've come a long way since the farm. Fought many battles. But will it be enough to save the dragons from the clutches of the Temple in their last effort to ensnare the world in darkness?

On the night of a long-awaited comet sighting, Erich, a university student, comes back from the dead. Making a miraculous recovery after a horrific car accident, he quickly returns to his musical studies and seems to have a new zest for life. Though he mingles with his fellow students and dedicates himself to his work, those close to him can't help but notice something is wrong. Very wrong. Erich isn't himself anymore. His personality has changed radically, and where he was once a middling musician, he's suddenly and unaccountably developed a virtuosic talent....

On a cold, rainy night in Seattle, a legendary journalist is found facedown in the street below a posh high-rise. Local police are calling it a suicide, but Alex Vane sees signs of murder. With help from a brash young journalist, Alex pieces together clues from the dead man's extraordinary career. But an unexpected discovery leads him to believe that all those legendary scoops may have been built on a lie so great it led to his murder.