Kitianna Tomar has lost everything-her husband, her son, and a career she once loved-but now she has come full circle, returning to her long-ago dream of a commission in the Commonwealth Space Service, flying solo for the Fleet on the fringes of the Commonwealth, charting new worlds for future exploration and research. But when her tiny ship is hit by an interstellar disturbance, she barely manages to affect a controlled crash landing on a primitive world listed as "Closed"-off-limits to anyone from the Commonwealth. Survival is the first order of business, however, and she can only hope it...

Jane Warren is content. She might not be on the bestsellers list, yet, but her sci fi is selling steadily, and she has her little cabin in the woods where she explores the stars of her dreams. Her fantasies become reality, however, when the real bad guys decide she knows more than she should about life beyond Earth's atmosphere, and her dreams become a living nightmare when she is kidnapped, whisked away to be questioned relentlessly about her sources for one of her books, the details of which too closely mirror a real-life military coup in progress. But when a group of real good guys comes...

An anthology of four adventures of Detective Cahal "Mac" MacAlastair and his sometimes art consultant, shapeshifter Catherine "Cat" O'sullivan, as they work together to solve crimes on the dark side of Seattle's Pioneer Square. In "Eyewitness," three young female artists have been found brutally murdered in the back alleys of Seattle's Pioneer Square, and Police Detective Cahal "Mac" MacAlastair must find a serial killer, before someone else dies. But the only eyewitness is a black cat apparently left for dead by the killer, and Mac doesn't have a lot of confidence in her ability to identify...