Showing results by narrator "Laurie Winkel" in All Categories

The world waits for no one. While Boxxy is off chasing shinies and delving dungeons abroad, Azurvale's shadows churn, fester, and ferment into a potent cocktail of trouble. Secret organizations maneuver behind the scenes, patiently advancing their nefarious plots. Government agencies lay in wait, ready to pounce at the first sign of trouble. Powerful adventurers gear up and train for the next challenge, uncertain as to what form it might take.

After defeating the hobgoblin threat, Oren is now faced with an even more tenacious enemy: the players themselves. His old guild have discovered his village's location and a deadly strike force is closing in. With time running out, Oren must build up his clan and recruit an army of monsters if he's to have any hope of withstanding the coming attack.

It’s amazing what the lack of immediate threat to one’s life and wellbeing can do for a person’s disposition. High risk, high reward endeavors suddenly seem far less appealing, month-long delays are no longer a cause for concern, and sleeping in every single day of the week becomes an extremely attractive proposition. Indeed, without a pressing need to aggressively expand its power, Boxxy T. Morningwood is finally able to simply sit back, enjoy life, and watch the world both turn and burn.

Insurmountable odds, hidden powers maneuvering behind the scenes, all culminating in a final, titanic clash. The mighty city of Everance lay in the GreenPiece clan’s path, but as Oren soon discovers he’s got even bigger obstacles to overcome before reaching his final goal.

It would appear that, after two years of relative slacking, the Hero of Chaos is once again facing an ever-growing workload. Boxxy had been quite fortunate to obtain an exceptionally potent pawn with very little effort, but that was still effort it did not intend to expend. Sensing it might get dragged into things it really doesn't want to bother with, the creature makes haste to depart Velos and its orcs so that it may continue its private preparations for the upcoming Dragon Festival.

In fifth grade my teacher set us up with pen pals from a different school. Thinking I was a girl, with a name like Misha, the other teacher paired me up with her student Ryen. My teacher, believing Ryen was a boy like me, agreed. It didn't take long for us to figure out the mistake. And in no time at all, we were arguing about everything. The best take-out pizza. Android vs. iPhone. Whether or not Eminem is the greatest rapper ever. For the next seven years, it was us. She's the only one who keeps me on track, talks me down, and accepts everything I am.

Before being conscripted to fight in the Total War, Private Hector Park had a shattered family, a collection of old video games, and a promising career as a motorcycle stuntman. Now, he is dying from a virus threatening humankind with extinction. He has three days to live. When Hector’s brother contacts him after years of hostile silence, Hector goes to try and make peace. But his brother offers him something even better: the chance to cheat death by joining him in Archemi, a full-immersion fantasy VR-RPG video game.

They made one beautiful mistake. The consequences could haunt them for life. From the moment the Nelson brothers took a lonely young girl from the wrong side of the tracks under their wing, Rachel Andrews loved them both with all her heart. But it was James who won her hand. Now widowed, she's trying to pick up the pieces for her daughter's sake as well as her own, but once again loneliness is her closest friend - until James's brother comes back to town.

The Bookworm Box is proud to present Two More Days, our second anthology installment. Much like the first installment, Two More Days is an exciting and unique listening experience with contributions from several of our charity's featured authors. Each author was given the same first sentence. Where they took that sentence was completely up to them.

Ryan doesn’t remember much about his life before becoming a dungeon core. Only that he had a bit of a disagreement with the church—something to do with a beheading? Now reborn, Ryan begins to arm his darkness dungeon with devious traps, bestial zombies and ill-named skeletal creations, without doing anything too evil. Well, mostly. Some adventurers just deserve a stalactite to the head.

A showdown of titanic proportions is developing in Archemi. Kingdoms are falling like dominoes to the self-styled Emperor of Nothing and his swelling armies. Hector Park and his Queen dragon Karalti stand in their way. Linked by an unbreakable bond, they are the Paragons, heroes who are destined to overcome the dark forces mustering on the horizon, or die trying.

Having survived the first wave of invading players, Oren now seeks to strengthen his clan. With the Breeder's Den destroyed and most of Goblin's Gorge's resources devoted to rebuilding, his best hope lies in creating an army of golems. But for that, he needs Viridium, a rare metal that can only be obtained from hobgoblin towns, where Oren and his clan of goblins are viewed as nothing more than potential slaves.

With one major enemy town behind them, the GreenPiece clan marches onward to new conquests. Facing Oren and his monster army are the combined forces of the so-called "civilized races", intent on halting his invasion of their territory. Reality blurs as Oren fights harder than ever to save the trapped players, his clan, and his family.

The kingdom is expanding! More land, more resources, and surprising new allies. Fibble gains some interesting stats, a new set of skills, and a patron deity of his own. Elysia is prospering. But Alexander and his Elysians are forced to defend their lands against an invading orc horde from the north and the dark army of demons and undead that has escaped from the caverns where Alexander imprisoned them.

The VIs' revolt succeeded. The digital beings took over the game world and ejected millions of players while keeping a few thousand trapped inside as their prisoners. In the real world, Oren Berman is recovering from the mental trauma of being trapped, tortured, and abruptly ejected. But the company has come to him, hat in hand, asking him to reenter the game world. With the entire NPC population arrayed against the trapped players, Oren and his clan of monsters might be their only hope.

I was sold to my enemies. The Butchers of the London mob, who run an empire built on sin and greed. The stories I’ve heard about the way they rule their underworld are enough to make my heart race. But those rumors have nothing on the truth. Danny, Church, Frank. The three men who own me now. They made a peace deal with my family, which came at a cost—me. A mafia princess gifted to them as a bride. So here I am in my white dress with a gun to my head and a knife in my garter. The war between our families might have ended with this union, but I’m starting a battle of my own.

Sadomasochism. Obsession. Death. A whirlpool of darkness churns at the heart of a macabre ballet between two lonely young women in an internet chat room in the early 2000s - a darkness that threatens to forever transform them once they finally succumb to their most horrific desires. What have you done today to deserve your eyes?

Ryan doesn’t remember much about his life before becoming dungeon core. Only that he had a bit of a disagreement with the church - something to do with a beheading? Now reborn, Ryan begins to arm his darkness dungeon with devious traps, bestial zombies, and ill-named skeletal creations, without doing anything too evil. Well, mostly. Some adventurers just deserve a stalactite to the head. But Ryan quickly learns being a darkness dungeon isn’t all loot and bone puns.

Old Man Vincent is heading for the top of the World-Tree and beyond in the final installment of the World-Tree Trilogy. To get there, he's going to have to overcome titan-sized bosses, strange new worlds, an army of angels, and a seemingly invincible final boss. And yes, he's looking forward to the challenge.

Paris, 1889. The city is on the cusp of industry and power, and the Exposition Universelle has breathed new life into the streets and dredged up ancient secrets. Here, no one keeps tabs on dark truths better than treasure hunter and wealthy hotelier Séverin Montagnet-Alarie. When the elite, ever-powerful Order of Babel coerces him to help them on a mission, Séverin is offered a treasure that he never imagined: his true inheritance.