Epic City

Everything that could possibly be wrong with a city was wrong with Calcutta. When Kushanava Choudhury arrived in New Jersey at the age of 12, he had already migrated halfway around the world four times. After graduating from Princeton, he moved back to the world which his immigrant parents had abandoned, to a city built between a river and a swamp, where the moisture-drenched air swarms with mosquitos after sundown.

Bryce Quinlan had the perfect life-working hard all day and partying all night - until a demon murdered her closest friends, leaving her bereft, wounded, and alone. When the accused is behind bars but the crimes start up again, Bryce finds herself at the heart of the investigation. She'll do whatever it takes to avenge their deaths. Hunt Athalar is a notorious Fallen angel, now enslaved to the Archangels he once attempted to overthrow. His brutal skills and incredible strength have been set to one purpose - to assassinate his boss' enemies, no questions asked.

Bryce Quinlan and Hunt Athalar are trying to get back to normal - they may have saved Crescent City, but with so much upheaval in their lives lately, they mostly want a chance to relax. Slow down. Figure out what the future holds.

Four decades after the Oblivion Crisis, Tamriel is threatened anew by an ancient and all-consuming evil. It is Umbriel, a floating city that casts a terrifying shadow-for wherever it falls, people die and rise again. And it is in Umbriel's shadow that a great adventure begins and a group of unlikely heroes meet. A legendary prince with a secret. A spy on the trail of a vast conspiracy. A mage obsessed with his desire for revenge. And Annaïg, a young girl in whose hands the fate of Tamriel may rest.

Up until now, Montana's gotten by pretending he's a regular guy. Well, a regular, overpowered, god-defeating guy who maybe just learned his hair is in all the wrong places. But the big city is calling, and in order to succeed there, Montana must actually prove himself a deserving duke. If Glaton finds him lacking, Coggeshall could be forced into even further isolation. But if Glaton falls in love with him, the regular guy from Motor City could end up with limitless power, in charge of it all. And just like that, the fate of the entire Empire is in Montana's hands.

Nahri has never believed in magic. Certainly, she has power; on the streets of 18th-century Cairo, she’s a con woman of unsurpassed talent. But she knows better than anyone that the trades she uses to get by - palm readings, zars, and a mysterious gift for healing - are all tricks, both the means to the delightful end of swindling Ottoman nobles and a reliable way to survive. But when Nahri accidentally summons Dara, an equally sly, darkly mysterious djinn warrior, to her side during one of her cons, she’s forced to reconsider her beliefs.

In this World Fantasy Award-winning novel of magic and kungfu, four siblings battle rival clans for honor and power in an Asia-inspired fantasy metropolis. Jade is the lifeblood of the island of Kekon. It has been mined, traded, stolen, and killed for - and for centuries, honorable Green Bone warriors like the Kaul family have used it to enhance their magical abilities and defend the island from foreign invasion. Now, the war is over and a new generation of Kauls vies for control of Kekon's bustling capital city.

Sacrificing his life to protect his best friend was a decision Hui Yue did not regret. Yet who could have known that death was not the final destination, but rather the beginning of a new adventure into a world filled with demonic beasts and martial arts cultivation? Hui Yue soon finds that within this world, strength is what determined your future accomplishments...and there is no space for the weak. Embarking upon this new life, Hui Yue meets friends, experiences betrayal, and embarks on his own journey of cultivation to overcome his limits and increase his strength.

The city of Bulikov once wielded the powers of the gods to conquer the world, enslaving and brutalizing millions - until its divine protectors were killed. Now Bulikov has become just another colonial outpost of the world's new geopolitical power, but the surreal landscape of the city itself - first shaped, now shattered, by the thousands of miracles its guardians once worked upon it - stands as a constant, haunting reminder of its former supremacy. Into this broken city steps Shara Thivani.

Heralded as an instant classic of fantasy literature, Maguire has written a wonderfully imaginative retelling of The Wizard of Oz told from the Wicked Witch's point of view. More than just a fairy tale for adults, Wicked is a meditation on the nature of good and evil.

Ahren and his companions journey on to Evergreen, finding new courage after the traumas of the Green Sea. Setting off, then, to traverse the continent in search of the missing Paladin Yollock, it isn't long before they find themselves sucked into a maelstrom of adventures involving a woman who has been robbed, a desperate Cape Verstaad grandee, not to mention a cutthroat city which proves itself a veritable nest of ne'er-do-wells. Controlled by the brilliant assassin Reik Silvermantle, this hub of lawlessness and immorality presents Ahren and his friends with one of their greatest challenges.

The city of Voortyashtan was once the home of the goddess of death, war, and destruction, but now it's little more than a ruin. General Turyin Mulaghesh is called out of retirement and sent to this hellish place to find a Saypuri secret agent who's gone AWOL in the middle of a mission. But the ghosts of past wars have followed her there, and soon she begins to wonder what happened to the souls in the afterlife when the gods were defeated by her people, the Polis. Do the dead sleep soundly in the land of death?

For three long years, the militant Chleuh have occupied the Kingdom of Quimper and its great capital, Lutesse. Times are hard since they won the war. There’s not much food or fuel—the Chleuh take anything that isn’t nailed down. People in Lutesse have terrible choices to make. Do they go along with the Chleuh and try to make the best of a bad situation? Or do they try to fight back, hoping the occupation can’t last forever?

There has always been a darkness to Ilmar, but never more so than now. The city chafes under the heavy hand of the Palleseen occupation, the choke-hold of its criminal underworld, the boot of its factory owners, the weight of its wretched poor and the burden of its ancient curse. What will be the spark that lights the conflagration? Despite the city's refugees, wanderers, murderers, madmen, fanatics and thieves, the catalyst, as always, will be the Anchorwood–that dark grove of trees, that primeval remnant, that portal, when the moon is full, to strange and distant shores.

Here, witness Chicago's growth from a desolate fur-trading post in the 1830s to one of the world's most explosively alive cities by 1900. Donald Miller's powerful narrative embraces it all: Chicago's wild beginnings, its reckless growth, its natural calamities (especially the Great Fire of 1871), its raucous politics, its empire-building businessmen, its world-transforming architecture, its rich mix of cultures, its community of young writers and journalists, and its staggering engineering projects.

Ivan Susanin, a typical guy and unemployed techie, is initiated by the System and transported, together with a thousand other players, to an unknown location beyond Earth. Ivan has an interface, a spear, and basic weapon skills. All he has to do to return to Earth is complete a simple quest and reach the second level. But experience points are only awarded for kills in this game, and the clock is ticking.

Rus, a fearless runner by day and racer by night, stands at the brink of eviction, with his family's home hanging in the balance. After a catastrophic accident, he's faced with a life-changing choice: undergo experimental modifications and be forever indebted to the ominous M-Corp or be left to perish. As Rus grapples with his new reality, Pim's journey of hope and despair intertwines with Shay, a ten-year-old scavenger, revealing the harshest aspects of city life.

Despite his victory against the Guild, Kers soon learns that there is now an even greater target upon his cloudy back. Typical. Then there’s the small matter of Marwan, the Dark Lord who wants to take over the world, and the Jade Citadel sortie that is on the verge of collapsing. Not to mention the fact that he now has to ‘get along’ with his neighboring core and deal with a mysterious orca-like monster that has started flying nearby…

Khat, a member of a humanoid race created by the Ancients to survive in the Waste, and Sagai, his human partner, are relic dealers working on the edge of society, trying to stay one step ahead of the Trade Inspectors and to support Sagai's family. When Khat is hired to find relics believed to be part of one of the Ancients' arcane engines, they are both reluctant to become involved. But the request comes from the Warders, powerful mages who serve Charisat's Elector.

Hardly have Ahren and his fellow adventurers returned to Deepstone following his Naming as Thirteenth Paladin when troubling news forces them into action again. They learn through the Ancients that one of their kind, the Paladin Bergen Olgitram, along with his band of mercenaries, the Blue Cohorts, are being besieged within the Brazen City by the headstrong Sun Emperor.