The Phoenix Effect Part 1

 

The Reuniting

Margaret M. MacDonald
Book Cover: The Phoenix Effect Part 1
Part of the The Phoenix Effect series:
Editions:ebook, Hardcover, Paperback

The world has long been divided. The Unity, and all their bounty, are protected by an army strengthened by nanites, which heal instantly but block the experience of emotion. Those who “resist” the technology live in isolated pockets on the infertile fringes. The wars between each faction died off long before young love blossomed between Arin and Lia... or so it seemed.

Arin, now a Unity commander, captures an enemy assassin only to discover she is Lia. Faced with the prospect of turning the only woman he ever loved over for execution or facing his own, Arin decides to flee with Lia into the unknown territories. Lia introduces Arin to life in the Resistance world, a harsh existence exacerbated by Unity oppression. Upon arrival at Lia’s secret destination, a hidden paradise in resistance territory, Arin discovers that Lia is no lone assassin but an integral part of a clandestine Resistance army and wife of the army’s formidable leader, Roland.

Faced with life as a prisoner or life without his healing nanites, Arin chooses to live as a mortal once again, reawakening his impulsive spirit, along with his feelings for Lia. Arin soon joins the Resistance forces and proves his newfound loyalties by confronting the cold army he once commanded.

But growing suspicion of Roland’s true motivations leads Arin to uncover a great secret hidden by Roland and his fellow army leaders, one that may change the world forever.

About the Author

Margaret M. MacDonald

Writer and Filmmaker Margaret M. MacDonald is passionate about telling stories which transport people into other worlds and make this one a little more extraordinary. Her visual writing style, shaped by her background as a designer, conveys a tangible sense of place, inviting readers into the story world. Born and raised in the United States and currently living in Australia, Margaret likes to bring a mix of both cultures into her work. She has written a library of screenplays and novels in a mix of genres, has directed several short films, and has been lucky enough to win a few awards along the way. She enjoys embracing a creative challenge and wants, more than anything else, to tell a story audiences will love.

Other Books By Margaret M. MacDonald

Clementine

 

A Song for the End of the World

John T. Biggs
Cover: Clementine: A Song for the End of the World
Part of the Clementine series:
Editions:ebook, Hardcover, Paperback

What Kills You Makes You Stronger

Clementine is a teenage girl from rural Oklahoma who hears voices. At first, it’s nothing special. Lost dogs and ice cream socials—things on local radio, complete with commercials. But when when she slips into a trance and foretells the beginning of World War III mere hours before the bombs start falling, the locals realize just how special Clem may be.

Carl is a government scientist with a secret laboratory. He’s trying to figure out how to save the human race once the war ends and the radiation clears, and Clem’s special gift may be exactly what he needs. First, though, he’ll have to do a few experiments. Nothing painful, he tells her—well, not too painful, anyway.

With no interest in becoming Carl’s experimental lab rat, Clem runs, leading the scientist and his cronies on a wild chase through the ruins of the American heartland. She’s almost free when one of her pursuers decides to shoot her rather than allow her to escape. Bullets tear through her chest—a fatal wound—and it looks like things are finished for young Clem, to say nothing of Carl’s grand plans to save the world and gain fame and fortune… until Clem wakes up in Carl’s secret lab a thousand years later.

Well, it’s not Clementine, exactly, but she has Clem’s memories and some of her voices. Carl is there, too. In fact, now there are two of him. (238 pages)

Published:
Publisher: Dragonbrae

About the Author

John T. Biggs

Everything John T. Biggs writes is so full of Oklahoma that once you read it, you'll never get the red dirt stains washed out of your mind. The tribes play a significant role. No authentic discussion of the state is possible without them. Traditional Native American legends are reworked and set in the modern era, the way oral historians always intended. One of John's stories, "Boy Witch" took grand prize in the 80th annual Writer's Digest Competition in 2011. Another won third prize in the 2011 Lorian Hemingway short story contest. Eighty of his short stories have been published in one form or another, along with several of his novels.

Other Books By John T. Biggs

The Palimpsest

 

A Clementine Novella

John T. Biggs
Cover: The Palimpsest
Part of the Clementine series:
Editions:ebook

Inside the Jack Fork Installation is a high tech civilization maintained by a pair of mad scientist clones. Outside, humanity has degenerated to a stone age culture. The world is wild and dangerous. A thousand years has passed since the apocalypse. It may be another thousand years before humanity recovers. Perhaps they never will.

Clementine is the most important clone of all. Her central nervous system is the only one that can be programmed again and again. She can learn all the skills necessary to take high tech civilization across the galaxy to a new planet the scientists have chosen. But the cost is slavery for her and for everyone who follows the New World Plan.

How will Clem choose to use her special brain? Will she start over with the savage human race outside the installation? Or will she help the scientists build a brave new world that includes every comfort but freedom—even an immortality of sorts?

Her only advisers are the ghosts of a few old friends who speak only inside her mind. And she suspects they might be her imagination. (63 pages)

Published:
Publisher: Dragonbrae

About the Author

John T. Biggs

Everything John T. Biggs writes is so full of Oklahoma that once you read it, you'll never get the red dirt stains washed out of your mind. The tribes play a significant role. No authentic discussion of the state is possible without them. Traditional Native American legends are reworked and set in the modern era, the way oral historians always intended. One of John's stories, "Boy Witch" took grand prize in the 80th annual Writer's Digest Competition in 2011. Another won third prize in the 2011 Lorian Hemingway short story contest. Eighty of his short stories have been published in one form or another, along with several of his novels.

Other Books By John T. Biggs

Ghost Radio

 

A Clementine Novella

John T. Biggs
Cover: Ghost Radio
Part of the Clementine series:
Editions:ebook

When Clementine goes into a trance and predicts WWIII at a meeting of a rural spiritualist church, the congregation is convinced she is a prophet with a direct connection to the other side.

Carl, a scientist with a nearby secret lab, has other ideas. He’s certain she has a special kind of epilepsy that opens a previously unknown channel of communication—just the thing he needs to produce clones who’ll be the key to the survival of the human race. But first, he has to “get a close up look at Clem’s fascinatin’ little brain.”

It sounds like she’s about to become some kind of lab rat, but Clementine narrowly escapes him the night the atomic bombs start falling. None close enough to set her little corner of the world on fire, but cities go up in smoke and modern technology is ruined forever‚ no power, no transportation, no communication. Through it all, Clem she stays one step ahead of Carl and the ragged survivors of the holocaust.

After a few months of close calls and near disasters, though, Clem knows she can’t keep running. Her only way out is to meet Carl face to face. If he wins, it might mean the end of Clementine. If she wins, it might mean the end of the world… (80 pages)

Published:
Publisher: Dragonbrae

About the Author

John T. Biggs

Everything John T. Biggs writes is so full of Oklahoma that once you read it, you'll never get the red dirt stains washed out of your mind. The tribes play a significant role. No authentic discussion of the state is possible without them. Traditional Native American legends are reworked and set in the modern era, the way oral historians always intended. One of John's stories, "Boy Witch" took grand prize in the 80th annual Writer's Digest Competition in 2011. Another won third prize in the 2011 Lorian Hemingway short story contest. Eighty of his short stories have been published in one form or another, along with several of his novels.

Other Books By John T. Biggs

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