Lindsay Buroker's Blog: Lindsay Buroker, page 54

Urban Fantasy for the Kindle: Shadowfever by Karen Marie Moning

If you're a fan of urban fantasy, bestselling Karen Marie Moning is an author to check into. Her latest, Shadowfever, just came out for the kindle.

MacKayla Lane was just a child when she and her sister, Alina, were given up for adoption and banished from Ireland forever.

Twenty years later, Alina is dead and Mac has returned to the country that expelled them to hunt her sister's murderer. But after discovering that she descends from a bloodline both gifted and cursed, Mac is plunged into a secret history: an ancient conflict between humans and immortals who have lived concealed among us for thousands of years.

What follows is a shocking chain of events with devastating consequences, and now Mac struggles to cope with grief while continuing her mission to acquire and control the Sinsar Dubh—a book of dark, forbidden magic scribed by the mythical Unseelie King, containing the power to create and destroy worlds.

In an epic battle between humans and Fae, the hunter becomes the hunted when the Sinsar Dubh turns on Mac and begins mowing a deadly path through those she loves.
Who can she turn to? Who can she trust? Who is the woman haunting her dreams? More important, who is Mac herself and what is the destiny she glimpses in the black and crimson designs of an ancient tarot card?

From the luxury of the Lord Master's penthouse to the sordid depths of an Unseelie nightclub, from the erotic bed of her lover to the terrifying bed of the Unseelie King, Mac's journey will force her to face the truth of her exile, and to make a choice that will either save the world . . . or destroy it.

Just shy of $10: Shadowfever

Terry Goodkind Phantom--Kindle Ebook out Today

Kindle-owning Terry Goodkind fans may want to grab today's newest epic fantasy to get uploaded to the Kindle Store: Phantom

In the eagerly awaited second volume of bestseller Goodkind's Chainfire trilogy, which will wrap up his long-running Sword of Truth series, star-crossed Richard Cypher (aka Lord Richard Rahl) searches for his beautiful "phantom" wife, Kahlan Amnell, who lost her memory in 2005's Chainfire after the Sisters of the Dark cast a spell on her. Meanwhile, Richard has memorized a magical instruction book, The Book of Counted Shadows, which will help open the three boxes of the Orden, though the consequences could be dire for the Old World: "Open the correct box, and one gains the power of Orden-the essence of life itself, power over all things living and dead... Open the wrong box... and every living thing in existence is incinerated into nothingness. It would be the end of all life." Despite the simplistic good vs. evil conflict and bland prose, the author expertly juggles many complex plot lines and brings to life a host of colorful characters.


It's one of those $9 ebooks, but at least you know you're getting a dense read with a Goodkind book (700 pages in the dead-tree version): Phantom

Masterworks of Technology: The Story of Creative Engineering, Architecture, and Design

Today's kindle find is for history buffs and technology enthusiasts: Masterworks of Technology: The Story of Creative Engineering, Architecture, and Design

In the largest sense, this book is about making colossal connections. Lewis, a professor of mechanical engineering, has undertaken the ambitious feat of showing how science and engineering synergized over time to produce today's technologically advanced world. He supports this premise by surveying such wide-ranging topics as medieval cathedral construction, Leonardo's notebooks and the building of a Boeing 777. Throughout, he makes astute connections between the past and the present, noting, for example, that the medieval cathedral builders' "habits of mind and processes of design formed the foundation that would later coalesce through the advances of the Renaissance, Scientific Revolution, and Industrial Revolution to create the engineering of today." Line drawings and diagrams illustrate this connection. 

The book can be long winded and the prose awkward, particularly when Lewis moves away from the scientific realm and tries his hand at travel writing. Many chapters start with a heavy-handed statement, such as "The towering tones of the brass rising above the orchestra and organ in the great fugue that is the finale of the Saint-Saens third symphony always transplant my thoughts to the first trip that my wife and I made to France many years ago, and to where we first experienced the grandeur of medieval engineering." This turgid writing detracts from an otherwise informative look at science and engineering through the ages.

Sounds like some purple prose, there, but at least it's under $10 (unlike a lot of the non-fiction ebooks in the store!): Masterworks of Technology

99 Cent Time Travel Ebooks for Your Kindle

If your favorite fantasy/science fiction novels involve time-travel plots, then today's post is for you.

Some of the following stories feature romances while others are simple action adventures, but they all involve time travel in some way or another. They range from young adult to adult (very adult), so make sure to read the full descriptions so you know what you're getting.

All except one of these ebooks is 99 cents in the Kindle Store or at Smashwords. Enjoy!

Out of Time: A Paranormal Romance by Monique Martin


Professor Simon Cross has spent his life searching for evidence of vampires and avoiding emotional entanglements. When a mysterious accident transports Simon and his new assistant, Elizabeth West, back in time, Simon finally finds both the proof that he's been looking for, and the romance that he hasn't.

In 1920s Manhattan, there are more than mobsters vying for power in the city's speakeasies. Will Simon and Elizabeth's developing relationship survive the vampires' teeth? Will they survive to make it back? Or will they be forever out of time?

Faces in Time: A Time Travel Thriller by Lewis E Aleman

A 20-Year Race Through Time...

In the near future, one man holds the key to our past. Chester Fuze lived a solitary life until he flung himself twenty years back in time. For years, he had loved movie star Rhonda Romero through television screens, movie theaters, and magazine covers. It wasn't until she had fallen so far as to sell her face for a cosmetic transplant that he knew he had to travel back and save her before her life headed down such a tragic and destructive path.

Lunging backward through two decades in a flash, Chester races across country and enters the world of seedy gambling and the bizarre jungle of behind-the-scenes Hollywood, while being hunted down by a deranged bookie, an escaped convict, and even his past self, all of whom are determined to kill him. He had put aside the secret to time travel, daring not risk the world to test his theory. It had placed him in a straight jacket for several years of his life. It had estranged his own mother from him. He had let it go for his own sanity. Now, he'll pick it back up to save Rhonda. God help us all.

Out of Time by Cliff Ball


A scientist discovers time is actually fluid; past, present, and future all exist at the same time. What he doesn't know, is if the current timeline can change when something is changed in the past. The US government wants him to find out. The theme being to make right what once went wrong.

The time travelers meet all sorts of 20th century icons, from the Titanic to Anne Frank to Roswell to the Apollo 13. However, someone is trying to stop them, and the future may never be the same again. 

PORTAL (Portal Chronicles) by Imogen Rose
Come Find Me Two Years Ago...

Six words that propelled ice hockey playing tomboy, Arizona, into an alternate dimension.

She suddenly found herself in the past. In one moment she went from being an ice hockey playing teenager in New Jersey to a glamorous cheerleader in California. She found herself transported from a happy life with her dad, Dillard, to a new, strange one living with her mother whom she hates. Apparently it's a life she's always lived in.

Everyone knows her as Arizona Darley, but she isn't. She is Arizona Stevens. As she struggles to find answers she is certain of one thing--that her mother Olivia, a brilliant physicist, is somehow responsible.

PORTAL is the story of the repercussions of Olivia Darley's attempt at creating a perfect world for herself and her children. Arizona's quest for answers threatens to undermine the seemingly perfect world that her mother has so carefully constructed. PORTAL is the first book of the Portal Chronicles. Fans of time travel, romance, and the supernatural will enjoy Arizona's quest for answers.


Never Love a Stranger by Ellen Fisher


A hero like no other...

One seemingly ordinary evening, Annie Simpson finds an extremely gorgeous (and totally nude) man in her kitchen. When James tells her he's an escaped criminal from the future, she figures he's crazy. Before long Annie and James are running for their lives, and Annie's falling for James in a big way. But now they have to find a way to change the future before fifty million people die... [explicit sex in this one!]


Killing Max by S. Wolf
Max seems like an ordinary teenager, but hidden behind his charismatic smile are lofty aspirations. When Max meets Zoe, it's love at first sight, but he's hiding a few terrible secrets from his past. But Max has no idea that Zoe is harboring some shocking secrets of her own. Secrets that will force Max to confront his future - if he survives long enough to have one. Sex and graphic violence.

The Time Hunters by Carl Ashmore

Becky is a typical thirteen year old English girl. She likes Facebook, gossiping and plenty of sleep. So when she and her brother Joe are invited to stay with their 'loony' Uncle Percy at his stately home, she thinks it'll be the worst summer ever. What she doesn't realise is that Bowen Hall is also home to a baby Triceratops, two Sabre-tooth tigers and the mythic hero, Will Scarlet...

'The Time Hunters' is a thrilling adventure that takes Becky, Joe, Uncle Percy and Will on a quest through time to find the legendary Golden Fleece.

The Clock is ticking....

A couple more time travel ebooks that are more than 99 cents (but under $4 so still a good deal!):

Blue Bells of Scotland: Book One of the Blue Bells Trilogy by Laura Vosika


Shawn Kleiner has it all: money, fame, a skyrocketing career as an international musical phenomenon, his beautiful girlfriend Amy, and all the women he wants-- until the night Amy has enough and leaves him stranded in a Scottish castle tower.
He wakes up to find himself mistaken for Niall Campbell, medieval Highland warrior. Soon after, he is sent shimmying down a wind-torn castle wall into a dangerous cross country trek with Niall's tempting, but knife-wielding fiancee. They are pursued by English soldiers and a Scottish traitor who want Niall dead.
Thrown forward in time, Niall learns history's horrifying account of his own death, and of the Scots' slaughter at Bannockburn. Undaunted, he navigates the roiled waters of Shawn's life-- pregnant girlfriend, amorous fans, enemies, and gambling debts--- seeking a way to leap back across time to save his people, especially his beloved Allene. His growing fondness for Shawn's life brings him face to face with his own weakness and teaches him the true meaning of faith.
Laws of Time by Jeff Yee

Sean Harrison's life-long ambition is to travel in time. Upon reaching his fifties, the powerful CEO of Tace Technologies realizes that his time is short and that a scientific breakthrough leading to time travel capabilities may not happen in his lifetime. Along with his beloved wife Stacey, he embarks on a cryogenic journey to the future in the hopes that by freezing himself into hibernation, that it will be possible to skip through time until a point in the future where the true technology exists to travel in time: forwards and backwards.

The Harrisons soon run into many issues with the laws of time, both political and scientific. When Sean's plans are leaked to the world, every country scrambles to find the answer to the time travel problem. It becomes a race against time - to control time itself.

The Penguin Dictionary of Curious and Interesting Numbers (Kindle Ebook)

I'm not a big television person, but one of my favorite shows is Numbers. I love the idea of math being used to solve problems. If you also enjoy math and numbers, you may want to download this nicely geeky read for your kindle: The Penguin Dictionary of Curious and Interesting Numbers

Why was the number of Hardy's taxi significant? Why does Graham's number need its own notation? How many grains of sand would fill the universe? What is the connection between the Golden Ratio and sunflowers? Why is 999 more than a distress call? All these questions and a host more are answered in this fascinating book, which has now been newly revised, with nearly 200 extra entries and some 250 additions to the original entries. From minus one and its square root, via cyclic, weird, amicable, perfect, untouchable and lucky numbers, aliquot sequences, the Cattle problem, Pascal's triangle and the Syracuse algorithm, music, magic and maps, pancakes, polyhedra and palindromes, to numbers so large that they boggle the imagination, all you ever wanted to know about numbers is here. There is even a comprehensive index for those annoying occasions when you remember the name but can't recall the number.


It's just shy of $10 in the Kindle store, and the reviews are positive. As one person says, "No recreational mathematician should be without it."

The Penguin Dictionary of Curious and Interesting Numbers

Steampunk Kindle Skin, Oh, Yeah!

It's the weekend, and I wasn't going to post today, but I stumbled across a steampunk kindle skin in the Amazon store, and I had to share. I've yet to consider getting a "skin" (which is basically a non-permanent decal that lets your kindle express itself), but this one is temping me. Gears, and cogs, and brass, oh, my!

GelaSkins are removable vinyl skins for protecting and customizing your 6" display, latest generation Kindle. They feature photo-quality graphics ranging from fine art prints to contemporary urban images designed by our growing family of artists from around the world. GelaSkins protect your Kindle with a durable anti-scratch, anti-UV coating. The removable skins are thin enough that they won't interfere with any other accessories (ie. other cases, bags, peripherals, etc.). With patented adhesive technology by 3M, GelaSkins remove cleanly when you want to remove them or switch them for another design.

It sounds like it wouldn't interfere with the leather kindle cover I already have. I'm tempted. It's out of stock as I write this, though. I hope they get more in! 

 $20: GelaSkins Steampunk Kindle Skin

Encrypted: a Science-Fantasy Romance for the Kindle

My fellow geeks, you'll have to forgive me, but I'm writing up my own novel today. Encrypted went live at Amazon this morning and is available for $2.99. If you like mystery, action, assassins, love stories, creepy alien artifacts, and geeky heroes who burble about their passions, give it a try!

Professor Tikaya Komitopis isn't a great beauty, a fearless warrior, or even someone who can walk and chew chicle at the same time, but her cryptography skills earn her wartime notoriety. When enemy marines show up at her family's plantation, she expects the worst. But they're not there to kill her. They need her to decode mysterious runes, and they ask for help in the manner typical of a conquering empire: they kidnap her, threaten her family, and throw her in the brig of their fastest steamship.

Her only ally is a fellow prisoner who charms her with a passion for academics as great as her own. Together, they must decipher mind-altering alchemical artifacts, deadly poison rockets, and malevolent technological constructs, all while dodging assassination attempts from a rival power determined the expedition should fail. As if Tikaya didn't have troubles enough, her new ally turns out to be exiled fleet admiral, Federias Starcrest, the man who recommended taking over her nation. To trust him could be a mistake; to fall in love with him would be a betrayal to her people, her family, and the fiancé she lost in the war. Those runes cloak more than mysteries, however, and he may be the only one who can help her unravel them before their secrets destroy the world.

Encrypted

Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History

Ever wonder about money? I'm not talking about staying awake worrying about whether you'll ever save enough to retire. I'm talking about the history of money and where things are heading (seems pretty relevant given all the turmoil out there today!).

Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History is written by Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman, which means it's probably a little dry (I'm just saying these guys aren't known for scintillating prose), but most of the reviews at Amazon are positive, saying the book is surprisingly interesting. If you're geek enough, it might hold your attention!

From the Micronesian Yap islands' 12-foot stone "coins" to today's paper currencies backed only by fiat, Nobel-laureate economist Friedman ( Free to Choose ) here examines anomalies of world monetary history, including the effect of successive 19th-century gold ore discoveries and refining improvements on U.S. and British tender. He traces American currency's long, contentious gold-silver bimetalist saga, marked by the so-called Congressional coinage "crime of 1873" and ending with William Jennings Bryan's unsuccessful "Cross of Gold" presidential campaign in 1896. Friedman cites harsh lessons from postwar hyperinflation in many countries and declares that Roosevelt's 1933 silver-buying program may have skewed China's silver-based economy toward eventual communism. Uncontrolled money growth is the cause of inflation, the author stresses, and only monetary reform, despite undesirable side effects like unemployment, can cure it. Abstruse, theoretical and chiefly for the initiate, the book recycles parts of earlier works by Friedman, who himself suggests here that the general reader might wish to skip a particularly challenging chapter.

Right now, it's $9 for the Kindle edition: Money Mischief

99-Cent Space Opera Ebooks for Science Fiction Lovers

Looking for some extra affordable science fiction? Some adventure-filled space opera, perhaps? Today we're looking at a few 99-cent finds from the Kindle store. Some are humorous, some are serious, some are romances, and some are just...unclassifiable. But they all involve adventures in space!

99-Cent Space Opera Ebooks:

Space Prison, The Survivors (The science fiction thriller classic!)

Space Prison (original title: The Survivors) - A ship heading from Earth to Athena, a planet 500 light years away, is suddenly attacked by the Gerns, an alien empire in its expansion phase. People aboard are divided by the invaders into Slaves and Rejects. The former to work under Gern's command on Athena, the latter to stay in the nearest Earth-like planet, called Ragnarok and to be later returned to their mother planet.

Ragnarok, however, turns out to be an inhospitable world, populated by deadly, aggressive creatures. The novels follows the stranded humans through several generations as they try to survive there.


Space Command and the Planets of Doom

In an irregular galaxy somewhere in the universe, the officers of Space Command voyage through the planetary systems, forever exploring, researching, and hunting for vulnerable, potential colonial outposts.

Join them on their sometimes absurd, sometimes surreal, always bizarre ventures to The Planet of the Miniature Mummies, The Planet of the Telepathic Jellyfish, The Putrid Moon and The Planet of the Dehydrated Primates.

Enjoy these and nine more unusual, but short, adventures with the Space Command crews. You'll never look at the universe the same way again.

Farthest Space: The Wrath of Jan

In the vein of Galaxy Quest, except with sex:

Captain Steven T. McNeill, famous explorer and even more famous playboy, finds himself stranded on an remote planet, alone except for his gorgeous, lavender-haired first officer Vaish and a neurotic computer named Fred.

Steven has worked with Vaish for years, yet never really noticed her. But as they face deadly dangers that include the threat of starvation and large, hungry saber-toothed cats, Steven begins to realize how much he admires Vaish's mental and physical attributes.

The galaxy's biggest playboy can't really fall in love... can he?

Space Junque (In Flagrante Apocalypto 1)

The DOGs want to destroy the world. The gods want to make a new one. The trick is to survive both. 
The world is on the brink of ecological cataclysm set off by the Oil Spill of 2010 and the Great Sea Level Rise of 2070. When the Defenders of Gaia set off dirty bombs in random cities, Char Meadowlark races to the airport to get off planet until the terror subsides.  Char's friend Mike Augustine secures her a place on the Imperial transport, but the DOGs strike before she can board. Jake Ardri, pilot of the shuttle Space Junque, rescues her and delivers her to the Imperial Space Station where Mike awaits.  When the DOGs' final onslaught goes global and the physical world threatens to implode, the ancient gods reemerge to stop humanity from annihilating all material existence. In this chaos, Char must juggle two men, orbiting eco-terrorists, and a goddess with her own agenda for a new world order.  Will there be room for love in flagrante apocalypto?
Surface in Heaven: A Novel


Set in 2047, SURFACE IN HEAVEN follows the adventures of Maher and Jules, two would-be lovers who find out as teens that they are direct descendants of an advanced elder race known as the Sarvesarians. Born on a planet called Juniper in the Milky Way, they are cheated from experiencing the beauty and privilege of their majestic homeland that has evolved to a near heavenly state.

Soon enough the rebellious teens learn that their lives have already been mapped out. They are expected to help set neighboring worlds on the same path as their ancestral planet called Sarvesario.

When Maher discovers a powerful function shared by all solar systems, it leads to a new and better method of intergalactic travel for the Junipereans. After the discovery both teens are outed as alien beings. Adventure follows...

Doris Daring: Star Captain of the Spaceways



Thrill to the the strange adventures of Captain Doris Daring, hotshot pilot Dash Watson, lethal weapons master Clint Walker, his brother Rick (a troubled genius) and the alluring robot Automata.

As they make their way across the cosmos, Doris and her crew meet the last of an order of intergalactic superbeings, ancient aliens, a race of hi-tech bird-women and plenty of other surprises, including one they thought they'd left far behind them. Facing down external threats and their own internal demons, this crew of explorers race from one end of the galaxy to the other, desperately seeking something to save their world from an ever-growing tyranny.

The Pirates of Ersatz by Murray Leinster (Halcyon Classics)

This Halcyon Classics ebook is THE PIRATES OF ERSATZ by acclaimed science fiction/mystery writer Murray Leinster (William Fitzgerald Jenkins). Leinster (1896-1975) was a mainstay of the pulp magazines of the 1920s and 1930s, and following World War II he broadened his audience by writing for Radio, Television, and Hollywood. Among his accomplishments, Leinster is credited with popularizing the notion of parallel universes and the concept of the internet.

Sometimes it seems nobody loves a benefactor ... particularly nobody on a well-heeled, self-satisfied planet. Grandpa always said Pirates were really benefactors, though....


There you have it: several 99-cent space opera reads to check out!

If you enjoyed this post, you may also want to browse earlier ones on 99-Cent Steampunk Ebooks and Free Star Wars Ebooks.

Free Science Ebooks for Your Kindle

Free is everybody's favorite word when it comes to ebooks. Yesterday, we looked at some free epic fantasy and swords & sorcery reads, but today it's about education, not entertainment (unless you're one of those true geeks who find education entertaining!). Let's check out some free science ebooks in the kindle store:

Sidelights on Relativity

Yes, you can read Einstein on your kindle! Reviewers say...

This is the first book of I have read in which Einstein wrote directly rather than the many reiterations of his works. Sidelights on Relativity is a two part book of lectures in which he gave in 1920 and 1921. The first titled "Ether and the Theory of Relativity." Einstein explores the concepts given by Newton, Maxwell and Lorentz of the ether arguing the universe is not mechanical in nature. The other argument is the purely physical aspect in which the mechanical perspective seems to propose what is seen is that exists, and/or can be measured and proven to exist. That "space without ether is unthinkable," that is, the effects of spce/time gives credence to ethers existence just as "the undulatory surface forming the boundary between water and air alters the course of time." This, then, creates the contradiction. The second lecture is titled "Geometry and Experience" in which Einstein argues Euclidean geometry by noting the difference of experiencing and proposing laws of earth-measurement. He demonstrates this through the plane and the globe asking the reader to imagine the globe and a plane. While the plane is infinite in all directions, similarly one can fill the plane up infinately. This is not an all together accurate picture of our universe. Rather if we imagine a sphere and fill that up, we realize only a finite amount can fill up the space.


On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection

If you've been meaning to read Darwin, but just haven't gotten around to it yet, here's your chance to get his classic work for free.

Almost everyone has heard of this book. But, how many people have actually read it? If you haven't yet, it is well-worth reading.

Darwin spent over 20 years researching his ideas, preparing his arguments, and writing this book. He did a great job! "On the Origin" is surprisingly easy to understand. Just look at the beginning. Instead of trying to leap directly into his basic idea and premise, Darwin chooses to gradually lead the reader up to the basic idea of evolution by first point out how humans have caused evolution to occur in our domesticated animals (something very easy for all humans to see even in the 1850s). Darwin then goes on to point out some of the evidence that he and others had seen at that time that indicated that evolution had occurred. His leap in understanding the basic premise of evolution is amazing especially when you consider that he did not understand or have access to information about the basics of genetic passing of traits within species. 

CK-12 Biology I - Honors


CK-12 Biology I is a textbook for high school students covering cell biology, genetics, evolution, ecology, and physiology.

Biology is one of the fundamental scientific disciplines, and in terms of the impact on our everyday life it is perhaps one of the most important. It is also one of the scientific disciplines with the greatest amount of new research, and hardly a year passes without some new profound discovery being made. Sometimes even the experts are hard to keep up with all of the recent developments, and new and updated textbooks are published on a yearly basis. Unfortunately, the prices of new textbooks have been steadily increasing over the years, so it is incredibly refreshing to come across a well-organized free textbook that can be used in introductory biology classes.

This is by and large a very approachable and well presented introductory biology textbook. It is written with an advanced high school student or beginning college student in mind. Topics covered include foundational topics, chemical basis of life, cell structure and function, photosynthesis, cell division and reproduction, genetics, biotechnology, evolutionary theory, biological classification, ecology, human body, various tissues and organs, and many others. 

History of Astronomy
This starts with the ancient Chinese, then goes through the Chaldeans, Greeks, and Arabs, then Copernicus and others of the Renaissance, and lastly the 18th and 19th centuries. There are chapters about the telescope and other instruments, the sun, moon, planets and the stars.

The author does a good job of showing how astronomers used the findings of earlier astronomers to increase their own knowledge of the subject. It's amazing to read how much was known about astronomy in the past, and how accurate their findings were. It's also funny to read things which were thought to be true at the time when the book was written. Several people reported having seen a planet inside Mercury's orbit. One man thought Mars had artificially made canals with vegetation growing on their banks. There are lots more. Maybe in 100 years astronomers will be laughing at us for thinking that dark matter and dark energy exist.


CK-12 Life Science

CK-12 Life Science covers seven units: Understanding Living Things; Cells: The Building Blocks of Life; Genetics and Evolution; Prokaryotes, Protists, Fungi, and Plants; The Animal Kingdom; The Human Body; and Ecology.

This is by and large a very approachable and well presented introductory life science textbook, and it is written with a high school student or beginning college student in mind. Topics covered include scientific theories in general, the theory of evolution, tools of science, cells, genetics, prokaryotes, fungi, plants, invertebrates, fishes, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals, animal behavior, animal tissues, reproductive systems, ecosystems, and the environmental problems. 

These might not be the most scintillating science books on the planet, but there's a lot to be said for the free price tag. Enjoy!