Urban City

America is obsessed with Los Angeles. And America has been thinking about Los Angeles all wrong, for decades, on repeat. Los Angeles is not just the place where the American dream hits the Pacific. (It has its own dreams.) Not just the vanishing point of America's western drive. (It has its own compass.) Functionally, aesthetically, mythologically, even technologically, an independent territory, defined less by distinct borders than by an aura of autonomy and a sense of unfurling destiny - this is the city-state of Los Angeles.

Step into Juicy’s world as she takes you on a wild drama filled ride. Juicy’s life was never perfect but born in raise in Baltimore Maryland, she was living better than most. She grew up in a home with both of her parents, who worked hard and managed a good lifestyle for their kids. Doing everything possible not to fall between the cracks and have to forced into poverty and become dependable on the system. Juicy’s world was turned upside down when the gritty streets of Baltimore got a hold of her mother. Her life turned into a complete nightmare. With tragedy after tragedy, she ...

Along the streets of Manhattan, a young Nigerian doctor doing his residency wanders aimlessly. The walks meet a need for Julius: They are a release from the tightly regulated mental environment of work, and they give him the opportunity to process his relationships, his recent breakup with his girlfriend, his present, his past. Though he is navigating the busy parts of town, the impression of countless faces does nothing to assuage his feelings of isolation.

Meet Mickey Friday: San Diego’s newest werewolf private investigator. In a city where shifters—werewolves, bears, cougars, and more—live in secret, Mickey Friday is trying to carve out her niche. Street-smart but still building her reputation, most of her cases involve tracking down cheating spouses and solving petty mysteries. That changes when Mrs. Laine, a wealthy werewolf, hires her to recover stolen heirlooms. The catch? The suspects are bear shifters, and Mrs. Laine doesn’t want the police involved. As Mickey digs into the case, her love life takes a surprising twist with the ...

Still coming to terms with their unexpected partnership, Augustine and Harlow have a tentative truce. Although with Harlow slowly working to accept being fae, Augustine still learning how to be Guardian, and feelings growing on both sides, they do not have an easy road ahead. But when a young girl is stolen from the Mardi Gras Exemplar Ball - the biggest fae event of the year - Harlow and Augustine must put all their issues aside to bring her home alive.

Sigrud je Harkvaldsson has nothing left to live for. He is a fugitive and an exile, wanted for murder throughout the empire of Saypur. His entire existence has seemed only to visit suffering and death upon those he wants most to protect - while he himself has emerged from each battle cruelly unscathed, inexplicably immune to forces both natural and divine. Then his closest friend and ally, former prime minister Shara Komayd, is assassinated.

One wild night to celebrate landing my dream job. I never imagined my new client would be the commanding alpha billionaire who'd left marks on my neck just hours before. One night. Pure fire. Forever changed. I meet a stranger at a bar - older, commanding. His experienced touch ignites me, his masterful kisses consume me. By morning, I'm ruined for any other man. Twenty-four hours later, I'm frozen in a boardroom doorway. There he sits - Dante Romano, billionaire and my new client. My unforgettable one-night stand. He's not just a billionaire. He's the city's most powerful mafia boss. As ...

Fleeing a homicide in Brooklyn, Ace and Stacy find themselves in Miami, a city pulsing with opportunity and danger. As they reconnect, the weight of their past hangs heavy, leading to a crucial conversation about their futures. Ace proposes a daring shift from their life as robbers to the enticing but perilous world of drug trafficking—a move that promises wealth but also invites peril. Stacy, inspired by Ace's ambition and seeking a fresh start, willingly follows him into this new path. Their initial success in the Miami drug market quickly escalates, drawing the attention of Soul, the ...

In Saving America's Cities, Lizabeth Cohen follows the career of Edward J. Logue, whose shifting approach to the urban crisis tracked the changing balance between government-funded public programs and private interests that would culminate in the neoliberal rush to privatize efforts to solve entrenched social problems. A Yale-trained lawyer, rival of Robert Moses, and sometime critic of Jane Jacobs, Logue saw renewing cities as an extension of the liberal New Deal.

Akia (Kia) Masters has been backed into a corner by the love of her life’s father, Anton Morales. She will do anything to protect her family, even if that means giving up what she wants the most, a life with Santano“Tan” Morales. Tan knows that something is going on between Kia and his father but is not sure what. Tan has a lot on his plate with trying to keep his ex-wife’s advances at bay and finding out the secrets his wife and father are keeping from him. Will Kia trust Tan enough to confide in him? Sable Mills thought she had escaped her troubled past life in Nashville. Her ...

Charley is a cleaner by day and a professional gambler by night. She might be haunted by her tragic past but she's never thought of herself as anything or anyone special. Until, that is, things start to go terribly wrong all across the city of Manchester. Between plagues of rats, firestorms, and the gleaming blue eyes of a sexy Scottish werewolf, she might just have landed herself in the middle of a magical apocalypse. She might also be the only person who has the ability to bring order to an utterly chaotic new world.

Half-Fae, half-human Bryce Quinlan loves her life. Every night is a party and Bryce is going to savour all the pleasures Lunathion - also known as Crescent City - has to offer. But then a brutal murder shakes the very foundations of the city, and brings Bryce's world crashing down. Two years later, Bryce still haunts the city's most notorious nightclubs - but seeking only oblivion now. Then the murderer attacks again. And when an infamous Fallen angel, Hunt Athalar, is assigned to watch her every footstep, Bryce knows she can't forget any longer.

They called us threats. Today, we become legends. In a future where society fears “System Users” like me, we don't hide in the shadows—we step into the spotlight. I’m Kai. A Level 10 Network Hub user, bonded to a team of elite women each with powers as deadly as they are beautiful. Together, we’ve formed the Affinity Network—a tactical, connected alliance born not of lust, but purpose. And yeah, the chemistry doesn’t hurt. Our mission? Save lives. Shift public opinion. Stay one step ahead of Paragon—the corporate-backed enforcers hunting us like criminals. When a ...

It's tough being a faery in New Orleans, a city fraught with vampires.... From New York Times best-selling author Deanna Chase comes the complete set of the Crescent City Fae saga (Books 1-3). Includes Influential Magic, Irresistible Magic, and Intoxicating Magic.

If you've never read a Repairman Jack novel, this is the place to begin. It's 1990. A twenty-one-year-old named Jack has dropped out of college, leaving his old life behind to build a new one in New York City. Manhattan's rough edges are jagged enough to shred any unwary newcomer, but perhaps not one who is determined to stay off the grid, at any cost, in the busiest metropolis on earth. And to do so, he'll have to take jobs of a less than legal nature.

Every city has a soul. Some are as ancient as myths and others are as new and destructive as children. New York City? She's got five. But every city also has a dark side. A roiling, ancient evil stirs beneath the earth, threatening to destroy the city and her five protectors unless they can come together and stop it once and for all.

The Mist Casino sits just above a kemana with an interior that would make a ghost feel right at home. Of course it does. After all, Magic City has to compete with nearby Vegas. Ruby is just back from University for the summer, catching up with an old friend, when everything changes with a bang! A series of small blasts are exploding all around her. Chips are flying through the air. Someone wanted to announce their arrival in town. But who? Ruby is about to get drawn into a battle for control of Magic City. They just made the fight personal. Is the Ebon Dragon Casino next?

Breana "Baby Doll" Winbush grew up in the fast streets of Brownsville, Brooklyn. She is stunningly beautiful, a fighter by nature, and like most people in her neighborhood, her ultimate dream is to become rich. Her ambitious quest for money knows no boundaries. During an after-school fight with jealous high school foes, Baby Doll's life takes a turn when she meets Big Daddy Blue, a reformed gangster who turned his ill-gotten gains into legitimate business enterprises. Ironically it's Baby Doll's relationship with Big Daddy Blue that totally changes her perception and outlook on life in ...

The post-Katrina New Orleans of The City of Lost Fortunes is a place haunted by its history and by the hurricane's destruction, a place that is hoping to survive the rebuilding of its present long enough to ensure that it has a future. Street magician Jude Dubuisson is likewise burdened by his past and by the consequences of the storm, because he has a secret: the magical ability to find lost things, a gift passed down to him by the father he has never known - a father who just happens to be more than human.

Before Area X, there was Ambergris. Jeff VanderMeer conceived what would become his first cult classic series of speculative works: the Ambergris trilogy. Now, for the first time ever, the story of the sprawling metropolis of Ambergris is collected into a single volume, including City of Saints and Madmen, Shriek: An Afterword, and Finch.