Showing results by narrator "Natalie Naudus" in All Categories

Advancement has come quickly to Ling Qi. With help from strong allies and connections, her foe has been defeated. The enemies of the alliance she has helped to build have surrendered. Her talent no longer goes unnoticed in the Celestial Empire, casting new eyes on her path. Those like her are accounted for; a title of nobility is within her reach...a prize with implications that will stretch over her now long life. 

For cynical 23-year-old August, moving to New York City is supposed to prove her right: that things like magic and cinematic love stories don’t exist, and the only smart way to go through life is alone. She can’t imagine how waiting tables at a 24-hour pancake diner and moving in with too many weird roommates could possibly change that. And there’s certainly no chance of her subway commute being anything more than a daily trudge through boredom and electrical failures. 

The emperor's reign has lasted for decades, his mastery of bone shard magic powering the animal-like constructs that maintain law and order. But now his rule is failing, and revolution is sweeping across the Empire's many islands. Lin is the emperor's daughter and spends her days trapped in a palace of locked doors and dark secrets. When her father refuses to recognise her as heir to the throne, she vows to prove her worth by mastering the forbidden art of bone shard magic.

Lin Sukai finally sits on the throne she won at so much cost, but her struggles are only just beginning. Her people don’t trust her. Her political alliances are weak. And in the northeast of the Empire, a rebel army of constructs is gathering, its leader determined to take the throne by force. Yet an even greater threat is on the horizon, for the Alanga - the powerful magicians of legend - have returned to the Empire. They claim they come in peace, and Lin will need their help in order to defeat the rebels and restore peace. But can she trust them?

When violinist Anna Sun accidentally achieves career success with a viral YouTube video, she finds herself incapacitated and burned out from her attempts to replicate that moment. And when her longtime boyfriend announces he wants an open relationship before making a final commitment, a hurt and angry Anna decides that if he wants an open relationship, then she does, too. 

In 1345, China lies under harsh Mongol rule. For the starving peasants of the Central Plains, greatness is something found only in stories. When the Zhu family’s eighth-born son, Zhu Chongba, is given a fate of greatness, everyone is mystified as to how it will come to pass. The fate of nothingness received by the family’s clever and capable second daughter, on the other hand, is only as expected. 

As a Striker, Talin was taught loyalty is life. Loyalty to the Shield who watches your back, to the Strikers who risk their lives on the battlefield, and most of all, to Mara, which was once the last nation free from the Karensa Federation’s tyranny. But Mara has fallen. And its destruction has unleashed Talin’s worst nightmare. With her friends scattered by combat and her mother held captive by the Premier, Talin is forced to betray her fellow Strikers and her adopted homeland. She has no choice but to become the Federation’s most deadly war machine as their newest Skyhunter.

Karl Deisseroth has spent his life pursuing truths about the human mind, both as a renowned clinical psychiatrist and as a researcher creating and developing the revolutionary field of optogenetics, which uses light to help decipher the brain’s workings. In Projections, he combines his knowledge of the brain’s inner circuitry with a deep empathy for his patients to examine what mental illness reveals about the human mind and the origin of human feelings - how the broken can illuminate the unbroken.

A library apprentice, a sorcerer prince, and an unbreakable magic bond.... The Solaris Empire is one conquest away from uniting the continent, and the rare elemental magic sleeping in 17-year-old library apprentice Vhalla Yarl could shift the tides of war. Vhalla has always been taught to fear the Tower of Sorcerers, a mysterious magic society, and has been happy in her quiet world of books. But after she unknowingly saves the life of one of the most powerful sorcerers of them all - the Crown Prince Aldrik - she finds herself enticed into his world.

A strange darkness grows in Allward. Even Corayne an-Amarat can feel it, tucked away in her small town at the edge of the sea. She soon discovers the truth: She is the last of an ancient lineage - and the last hope to save the world from destruction. But she won’t be alone. Even as darkness falls, she is joined by a band of unlikely companions.

What exactly is sexual attraction and what is it like to go through life not experiencing it? What does asexuality reveal about gender roles, about romance and consent, and the pressures of society? This accessible examination of asexuality shows that the issues that aces face - confusion around sexual activity, the intersection of sexuality and identity, navigating different needs in relationships - are the same conflicts that nearly all of us will experience.

A groundbreaking book that boldly claims the key to success in business is not talent, connections, or ideas, but the ability to persuade people to take a chance on potential. 

The Dragon Singers of old summoned typhoons and routed armies, liberating mankind from the orcs before fading into legend. Now, with evil stirring and hostile empires on the rise, the power of music stirs in Kaiya, a gangly misfit with the perfect voice. Without a master to guide her, she must rely on the lessons of a foreign paladin, an enigmatic doctor, a flippant elf lord, and an evil sorcerer to rediscover lost magic. Yet doing so means taking dire risks....

Maud Demille is a daughter of Innkeepers - a special group who provide "lodging" to other-planetary visitors - so she knows that a simple life isn't in the cards. Once a wife to a powerful vampire knight, Maud and her young daughter, Helen, were exiled with him for his treachery to the desolate, savage planet of Karhari. Karhari killed her husband, and Maud - completely abandoned by his family - has spent over a year avenging his debts. Rescued by her sister Dina, she's sworn off all things vampire.

This funny, down-to-earth parody of Marie Kondo’s The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up hands listeners the most useful tools for keeping crap clean and organized without all the pressure.

In the Celestial Empire, a land ruled by Immortals and stalked by Spirits and Beasts, a young girl from the slums of an unimportant city is found to have the Talent that may allow her to become an Immortal herself. Sent to the storied Argent Peak Sect to harness her talent, she must work desperately to catch up to peers who have been preparing to walk the Way for years. The Sect grants new students only three months to prepare and grow before the true challenges begin and the disciples are freed to battle each other for resources and strength. 

When two strangers are linked by a mail-in DNA test, it’s an answered prayer- that is, for one half sister. For the other, it will dismantle everything she knows to be true. But as they step into the unfamiliar realm of sisterhood, the roles will reverse in ways no one could have foreseen. Caroline lives a full, happy life - thriving career, three feisty children, enviable marriage, and a close-knit extended family. She couldn’t have scripted it better. Except for one thing: She’s about to discover her fundamental beliefs about them all are wrong.

From Cixin Liu, the New York Times best-selling author of The Three-Body Problem, To Hold Up the Sky is a breathtaking collection of imaginative science fiction.

Jordan Baker grows up in the most rarefied circles of 1920s American society - she has money, education, a killer golf handicap, and invitations to some of the most exclusive parties of the Jazz Age. She’s also queer and Asian, a Vietnamese adoptee treated as an exotic attraction by her peers, while the most important doors remain closed to her. But the world is full of wonders: infernal pacts and dazzling illusions, lost ghosts and elemental mysteries. In all paper is fire, and Jordan can burn the cut paper heart out of a man. She just has to learn how.

Girls of Paper and Fire meets A Song of Wraiths and Ruin in June CL Tan’s stunning debut, where ferocious action, shadowy intrigue, rich magic, and a captivating slow-burn romance collide.