Showing results by publisher "Tantor Media" in Dystopian

Welcome to Apex City, formerly Bangalore, where everything is decided by the mathematically perfect Bell Curve. With the right image, values, and opinions, you can ascend to the glittering heights of the Twenty Percent—the Virtual elite—and have the world at your feet. Otherwise you risk falling to the precarious Ten Percent, and deportation to the ranks of the Analogs, with no access to electricity, running water, or even humanity. The system has no flaws. Until the elusive "Ten Percent Thief" steals a single jacaranda seed from the Virtual city.

When does silent compliance with an oppressive regime become unbearable? For Charlie Simpkins, the manager of a small vegetable shop in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley, part of the West Coast People's Democratic Republic, the breaking point comes when he is asked to display a meaningless propaganda poster in his shop window. It is a seemingly insignificant act in a lifetime of obedience. But Charlie just can't bring himself to do it. This minor act of defiance, however, shows too much independent thinking on Charlie's part, setting off a chain of escalating consequences.

There is a huge, bold black streak in the sky. Branches appear out of nowhere over North America, Southern Europe, and Central Africa. People who live beneath The Rift can see it. But scientists worldwide are distressed - their equipment cannot pick up any type of signal from it. The rift appears to consist of nothing. Literally. Nothing. Nada. Niente. Most people are curious but not overly concerned. The phenomenon seems to pose no danger. It is just there. Then something jolts the most hardened naysayers, and surpasses the worst nightmares of the world's greatest scientists.

When my best friend and the only person who knows who - and what - I really am gets selected for the Mating Games, I know the only way to save her is to try and win her for myself. All I need to do is navigate three trials while not letting anyone know I'm a woman, or, and this might be even more important, that I have magic. Easy, right? Easier than slaving away for all hours of the day swinging an ax in the mines. Or so I thought. I certainly didn't count on the one man I've longed for, the one man who stirs feelings of femininity and desire within me, to enter the games as well.

Amri was a Rabbit, one of a tribe of survivors scratching out an existence in the blasted landscape of a shattered, poisoned world. The Seagull fight, the Pigeon trade and the Cockroach scavenge, but the Rabbit had one rule: If you want to see tomorrow, you run. But they didn't run fast enough when a weapon fell from the sky and consumed their home, and now Amri is alone, in the company of a fallen god named Guy Vesten. A god who promises revenge against the three gods who turned against him, and who killed her tribe.

Time Rider follows Bowie, an agent from a post-democracy future state known as the Design—where humanity is stratified into genetic castes, and emotional connections have been engineered away. Sent to 1963 on a mission to preserve a lynchpin moment of history from temporal terrorists: the assassination of the American President. Baffled by what he finds in Dallas, Bowie soon discovers that something far more strange and sinister is at work.

Like all Purebred with their menial jobs, Ken ekes out a living sweeping the floors of Kyoto Peacekeeping Central. His kind serves as a benchmark for XHumans to measure how far they've progressed and a reminder of what Homo sapiens once was. His life changes when 800-year-old Ryu crosses over from the World of Rivers and Lakes, looking for a lost temple; and Aya, a beautiful hacker whose Sensory Interface perceives the EtherCloud as Feudal Japan, learns that XHumans aren't as perfect as they thought.

My name is Bird Howsley, and I'm a beautiful disaster. Okay, "beautiful" is probably being generous. But the "disaster" part is right. In a brutal dystopian waterworld, where survival depends on skill and smarts, I'm pretty much always one bad decision away from watching my life go completely down the drain. Luckily, I have a lifeline: my cute, level-headed sailing teacher, Sargo Paz. Did I say cute? I didn't mean cute. He's just a friend. I definitely don't have weird sex dreams about him.

London's Maxwell Towers have long been under the control of Max—an all-seeing AI intent on punishing wrongdoers and wicked tenants by sending them to the Thirteenth Floor, where unspeakable horrors come to life. Now, Max's coding has been embedded in computer systems all over the world, and there is no escape from his nightmarish reign.

Elin Peer presents Book 0.5 in the Men of the North series. Contains mature themes.

In Yellow Jessamine, shipping magnate Evelyn Perdanu controls the dying city of Delphinium with trade deals and secrets. But when mysterious sickness sparks death and obsession, all leading back to her, Evelyn's brittle existence is strained to breaking. She retreats to her estate, amidst paranoia and poisonous secrets, intent on rooting out this plague before it destroys everything she has built.

Manna City is a climate-controlled utopia for the elite, enclosed in a massive wall. But when an unknown female is found dead in the shantytown outside full of desperate people hoping to get in, the local Body Collector takes an interest. His usual job is to burn unclaimed dead to earn a meager wage. However, the victim bears the strange markings of the Olduvai survivalists who manage to live in the surrounding wasteland by cultivating dala, a medicinal plant with hallucinogenic properties.

I was taught to fear the truth, a lesson my mother instilled in me from birth, but that was before. Before she disappeared without a trace and left me to navigate a world she taught me was dangerous but never explained why. I thought I could handle it alone, with only my best friend to share my secrets, but that was before them - before the men that plowed into my life and found a place for themselves. They gave me everything - love, respect, but there was one thing I needed that they didn't have: answers.

The United States of America has been gone for over a century. In its place, The Unified American Territories—a nation divided, the impoverished and the wealthy are separated by a looming steel wall. In the Northern Territories—The Vault, as it is known by its inhabitants—the government rules with an iron fist: All citizens are tested for intelligence and aptitude, thrust into compulsory higher education and saddled with insurmountable debt.

Mackenzie works for Catch and Release, a bounty-hunting guild, and she loves her job. She goes after the usual suspects: Rogue vampires, feral shifters, and crazed mages. Nightmare stuff. The last thing she ever imagined was Lucan, an infuriating and high-ranking dragon shifter, hiring her to find a child kidnapped from his Tribe. Even though her magical talents lean more towards bodyguarding and hunting dangerous beings, condemning a kid to death isn't who she is. But as Mackenzie gets deeper into her hunt, she uncovers deadly secrets surrounding the child, the kidnapper, and Lucan himself...

As they struggle to survive in a barbarous fantasy land, a mother and daughter attempt to shake off the bonds of female slavery and escape to freedom.

I was there the day the wall fell from the sky. The day they gunned down my mother and permanently separated the rich from the poor. I was there the day my father decided he could force utopia on a certain half of the population and leave the rest to rot. Pragmapax was once a great city, the only remaining outpost of civilization in our part of the world. But now, divided by an impossible wall, we've become two cities. Two peoples that despise each other. Two different ways of life—one idyllic and peaceful, the other savage and lawless. Civil war seethes in the air, breathing down our necks.

One year has passed since the nail-biting conclusion of the previous book. Life is good for Aoife. She is surviving at Sanctuary, a new community on the south coast. The twist? Sanctuary has electricity. It has power. And its reach and influence is only growing further. Slowly but surely, the new world is starting to feel like the old world, all over again. But when a devastating attack cripples power supplies and leaves masses of residents dead, Sanctuary is completely rocked. The only option? To go after the terrorists responsible, and wipe them out, once and for all.

Six months have passed since the devastating conclusion of the previous book. Aoife travels alone, seeking shelter. Winter has passed, and summer is on the horizon. But survival is difficult. Especially in an EMP-ravaged world where resources are completely scarce. But everything changes when Aoife stumbles upon a mysterious stranger offering hope in the most unexpected form: a safe haven.

Serenity Ward must come to terms with her role in Kaycie's flawed society. The Establishment is corrupt, but there are those pushing for change from within. Division isn't exclusive to the elite group, though. The islands splinter in the wake of the uprising as webs of lies are untangled.