Nathan Yocum - The Zona

“Welcome to New Pueblo,” the leader said.

Lead looked up at the man. He looked past him to the Jacaranda groves and the Nineteen and mountains and horizon beyond. Lead looked down the highway to the place where Terence was gunned down, to the place where he had been captured. Lead looked to his hand and saw sparkling chunks of glass in the cracks of the road. He saw ants running around the cracks, infinitely small. His blood ran into the cracks, creating rivers for the industrious ants to perplex over. Lead smiled at the creatures, for he understood that there is no difference between them and us in our wanderings and labor. Lead smiled and bled and clutched the earth outside of New Pueblo.

© 2011 Nathan L. Yocum

http://bit.ly/nathan-yocum

Curiosity Quills Press

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Please visit http://curiosityquills.com/reader-survey/to share your reading experience with the author of this book!

“It did not surprise me to learn that Nathan Yocum, author of The Zona , is an award-winning screenwriter. As I was reading this, his debut novel, I could not stop picturing it as a movie. (I will honestly be very surprised if it isn’t optioned, especially with the popularity of dystopias generally and the upcoming Hunger Games specifically!)”

• For paranormal mystery in the highest levels of US Federal Government, search for The Department of Magic by Rod Kierkegaard, Jr.

• For excellent cyberpunk-fueled dark sci-fi, look for Shadow of a Dead Star by Michael Shean

• For a high-concept action-packed technothriller, seek out The God Particle by Rod Kierkegaard, Jr.

• For lovers of detective noir with a horror twist, look up Michael Panush’s Stein & Candle Detective Agency series

Nathan L. Yocum is an author, teacher, and entrepreneur living in the jungles of Hawai’i. As a writer Nathan’s inspirations include Kurt Vonnegut, Cormac McCarthy, George Orwell, Aldous Huxley, Charles Bukowski, but admits that the list goes on and on. Nathan is also the editor-in-chief of SpecLit Masters Magazine , an eZine featuring the best in new speculative short fiction, as well as an award winning screenwriter for Catbrain Film Factory. His first novel, The Zona , was published via Curiosity Quills Press in February, 2012.

Family Cursemas, by Rod Kierkegaard, Jr. ( http://bit.ly/family-cursemas)

When the wealthy Goodman family assembles for its gloomy annual holiday reunion in their divorced mother’s crumbling mansion, Holly Singletary is pressed into service to help cater the Christmas Eve dinner. When “the storm of the century” hits, the attendees have more than a blackout to worry about. Someone — or something — is killing off the Goodman family one by one.

Only Holly can solve the mystery of the murderer’s identity before her first-grade sweetheart becomes the final victim…

Shadow of a Dead Star, by Michael Shean ( http://bit.ly/shadow-of-a-dead-star)

As an agent of the Industrial Security Bureau, it is Thomas Walken’s duty to keep the city of Seattle free of black-market technology. But when a trio of living sex-dolls he has recently intercepted are stolen from custody, Walken finds himself seeking a great deal more than just contraband.

He will be forced to use his skills and preternatural instincts to try and keep his career, his freedom, and his life.

Worlds Burn Through, by Vicki Keire. ( http://bit.ly/worlds-burn-through)

Chloe Burke has nightmares of a world burned to ash and the strange boy who saves them both. Underneath the dreams lurks a deeply buried reality; Chloe and a handful of others are survivors of a decade old apocalypse that burned their home world to the ground.

Now their ancient enemies hunt them again. To keep their adopted world safe, Chloe must undergo a ritual of blood sacrifice that will have life-long consequences if she survives. Her lethal protector, Eliot Gray, must keep her alive long enough to do it.

Together they will uncover even more dangerous secrets buried in the past’s deepest, darkest ashes.

Bone Wires, by Michael Shean ( http://bit.ly/bone-wires)

In the wasteland of commercial culture that is future America, police are operated not by government but by private companies. In Seattle, that role is filled by Civil Protection, and Daniel Gray is a detective in Homicide Solutions.

What used to be considered an important – even glamorous – department for public police is very different for the corporate species, and Gray finds himself stuck in a dead end job.

That is, until the Spine Thief arrives.

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ISBN 978-1-62007-020-8 (ebook)

ISBN 978-1-62007-021-5 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-62007-022-2 (hardcover)