Implement intelligent agents using PyTorch to solve classic AI problems, play console games like Atari, and perform tasks such as autonomous driving using the CARLA driving simulator Key Features *Explore the OpenAI Gym toolkit and interface to use over 700 learning tasks *Implement agents to solve simple to complex AI problems *Study learning environments and discover how to create your own Book Description Many real-world problems can be broken down into tasks that require a series of decisions to be made or actions to be taken. The ability to solve such tasks without a machine being programmed requires a machine to be artificially intelligent and capable of learning to adapt. This book is an easy-to-follow guide to implementing learning algorithms for machine software agents in order to solve discrete or continuous sequential decision making and control tasks. Hands-On Intelligent Agents with OpenAI Gym takes you through the process of building intelligent agent algorithms using deep reinforcement learning starting from the implementation of the building blocks for configuring, training, logging, visualizing, testing, and monitoring the agent. You will walk through the process of building intelligent agents from scratch to perform a variety of tasks. In the closing chapters, the book provides an overview of the latest learning environments and learning algorithms, along with pointers to more resources that will help you take your deep reinforcement learning skills to the next level. What you will learn *Explore intelligent agents and learning environments *Understand the basics of RL and deep RL *Get started with OpenAI Gym and PyTorch for deep reinforcement learning *Discover deep Q learning agents to solve discrete optimal control tasks *Create custom learning environments for real-world problems *Apply a deep actor-critic agent to drive a car autonomously in CARLA *Use the latest learning environments and algorithms to upgrade your intelligent agent development skills Who this book is for If you’re a student, game/machine learning developer, or AI enthusiast looking to get started with building intelligent agents and algorithms to solve a variety of problems with the OpenAI Gym interface, this book is for you. You will also find this book useful if you want to learn how to build deep reinforcement learning-based agents to solve problems in your domain of interest. Though the book covers all the basic concepts that you need to know, some working knowledge of Python programming language will help you get the most out of it.

Build, design, and style beautiful and informative applications on the Salesforce Lightning platform Key Features *Build and Test Lightning Components that enhance application usability and adaptability *Apply Security Best Practices to your Custom Lightning Components *Design Lightning Components for Salesforce UIs such as Lightning Pages, Salesforce 1 Application, Communities, and more. Book Description Built on the Salesforce App Cloud, the new Salesforce Lightning Experience combines three major components: Lightning Design System, Lightning App Builder, and Lightning Components, to provide an enhanced user experience. This book will enable you to quickly create modern, enterprise apps with Lightning Component Framework. You will start by building simple Lightning Components and understanding the Lightning Components architecture. The chapters cover the basics of Lightning Component Framework semantics and syntax, the security features provided by Locker Service, and use of third-party libraries inside Lightning Components. The later chapters focus on debugging, performance tuning, testing using Lightning Testing Services, and how to publish Lightning Components on Salesforce AppExchange. What you will learn *Understand Lightning Components architecture *Learn Locker security best practices *Debug and Improve performance of your Lightning Components *Use third-party libraries along with Lightning Component Framework *Learn how to publish Lightning Components on AppExchange *Use Lightning Out to take your Lightning Components outside the Salesforce platform Who this book is for This book is for Salesforce developers or developers from other platforms who are familiar with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript and want to build and test Salesforce Lightning components. No knowledge of Salesforce Lightning is required.

Develop, test, and deploy decentralized applications for Ethereum platform About This Book ? Build your first Ethereum Dapp with Truffle: the most popular Ethereum development framework ? Build, compile, and deploy smart contracts in your development environment ? Embrace Blockchains and utilize it to create new generation of secured and scalable apps Who This Book Is For This book is for web developers who are interested in the new world blockchain. Some basic understanding of JavaScript and web services is required. No prior knowledge of Decentralized applications or blockchain is required. What You Will Learn ? Understand the fundamentals of Truffle and Web3 ? Build a decentralized application with Truffle, while choosing the correct Ethereum client ? Connect your Dapp to Ethereum clients including Geth, Parity, and Ganache ? Migrate and test your Dapp with the correct networks such as Ropsten and Rinkeby ? Package a decentralized application into a user-friendly product by integrating Truffle with JavaScript frameworks such as Angular, React and Vue ? Explore tools including Ethereum Package Manager, the Registrar and browser wallets, and exploit third-party smart contract libraries. ? Evaluate the common migration pitfalls and how to mitigate them In Detail Truffle is a world-class development environment, testing framework and asset pipeline for Ethereum, aiming to make life as an Ethereum developer easier. If you are a web developer wanting to try your hand at developing Dapps with Truffle, then this is the book for you. This book will teach you to write smart contracts and build Dapps with Truffle. You will begin with covering the basics of Truffle, briefly explaining how it integrates Solidity and Web3, in orderto start building a mini decentralized application. Also, you will dive into migration, testing and integrating Truffle with the use of popular JavaScript frameworks. Lastly, you will ship your decentralized application and package it into a product. Moreover, you will go through the best practices in Truffle,so as to increase your proficiency in building Dapps with Truffle. By the end of the book, you will be able to write smart contracts and build decentralized applications with Truffle on Ethereum blockchains. Style and approach An intuitive, step-by-step and engaging guide that will teach you to build a real-world, decentralized application with Truffle.

Bring realism to your games by mastering post-processing effects and advanced shading techniques in Unity 2018 About This Book ? Learn the secrets of creating AAA quality shaders without writing long algorithms ? Master shader programming through easy-to-follow examples ? Create stunning visual effects that can be used in 3D games Who This Book Is For Unity Shaders and Effects Cookbook is for developers who want to create their first shaders in Unity 2018 or wish to take their game to a whole new level by adding professional post-processing effects. A solid understanding of Unity is required to get the most from this book. What You Will Learn ? Understand physically based rendering to fit the aesthetic of your game ? Write shaders from scratch in ShaderLab and HLSL/Cg ? Combine shader programming with interactive scripts to add life to your materials ? Design efficient shaders for mobile platforms without sacrificing their realism ? Use state-of-the-art techniques, such as volumetric explosions and fur shading ? Master the math and algorithms behind the most used lighting models ? Understand how shader models have evolved and how you can create your own In Detail Since their introduction to Unity, shaders have been seen as notoriously difficult to understand and implement in games. Complex mathematics has always stood in the way of creating your own shaders and attaining the level of realism you crave. Unity 2018 Shaders and Effects Cookbook changes that by giving you a recipe-based guide to creating shaders using Unity. It will show you everything you need to know about vectors, how lighting is constructed with them, and how textures are used to create complex effects without the heavy math. This book starts by teaching you how to use shaders without writing code with the post-processing stack. Then, you’ll learn how to write shaders from scratch, build up essential lighting, and finish by creating stunning screen effects just like those in high-quality 3D and mobile games. You'll discover techniques, such as normal mapping, image-based lighting, and animating your models inside a shader. We'll explore how to use physically based rendering to treat light the way it behaves in the real world. At the end, we’ll even look at Unity 2018’s new Shader Graph system. With this book, what seems like a dark art today will be second nature by tomorrow. Style and approach The recipes in this book contain step-by-step instructions, complemented with screenshots, code, and real-world examples.

Enterprise Agility is practical framework for enhancing Agility and equipping your company with the tools to survive. About This Book ? Prepare your company to navigate the rapidly-moving business world ? Enhance Agility in every component of your organization ? Build a framework that meets the unique requirements of your enterprise Who This Book Is For Enterprise Agility is a tool for anyone with the motivation to influence outcomes in an enterprise, who aspires to improve Agility. Readers from the following backgrounds will benefit: chief executive officer, chief information officer, people/human resource director, information technology director, head of change program, head of transformation, and Agile coach/consultant. What You Will Learn ? Drive agility-oriented change across the enterprise ? Understand why agility matters (more than ever) to modern enterprises ? Adopt and influence an Agile mindset in your teams and in your organization ? Understand the concept of a CAS and how to model enterprise and leadership behaviors on CAS characteristics to enhance enterprise agility ? Understand and convey the differences between Agile and true enterprise agility ? Create an enterprise-specific action plan to enhance agility ? Become a champion for enterprise agility ? Recognize the advantages and challenges of distributed teams, and how Agile ways of working can remedy the rough spots ? Enable and motivate your IT partners to adopt Agile ways of working In Detail The biggest challenge enterprises face today is dealing with fast-paced change in all spheres of business. Enterprise Agility shows how an enterprise can address this challenge head on and thrive in the dynamic environment. Avoiding the mechanistic construction of existing enterprises that focus on predictability and certainty, Enterprise Agility delivers practical advice for responding and adapting to the scale and accelerating pace of disruptive change in the business environment. Agility is a fundamental shift in thinking about how enterprises work to effectively deal with disruptive changes in the business environment. The core belief underlying agility is that enterprises are open and living systems. These living systems, also known as complex adaptive systems (CAS), are ideally suited to deal with change very effectively. Agility is to enterprises what health is to humans. There are some foundational principles that can be broadly applied, but the definition of healthy is very specific to each individual. Enterprise Agility takes a similar approach with regard to agility: it suggests foundational practices to improve the overall health of the body—culture, mindset, and leadership—and the health of its various organs: people, process, governance, structure, technology, and customers. The book also suggests a practical framework to create a plan to enhance agility. Style and approach Enterprise Agility is a step-by-step guide to facing change and uncertainty head-on. The books provides practical ways to apply Agile methodologies and boost Agility throughout a business.

Learn how to implement the reactive programming paradigm with C++ and build asynchronous and concurrent applications About This Book ? Efficiently exploit concurrency and parallelism in your programs ? Use the Functional Reactive programming model to structure programs ? Understand reactive GUI programming to make your own applications using Qt Who This Book Is For If you’re a C++ developer interested in using reactive programming to build asynchronous and concurrent applications, you’ll find this book extremely useful. This book doesn’t assume any previous knowledge of reactive programming. What You Will Learn ? Understand language-level concurrency in C++ ? Explore advanced C++ programming for the FRP ? Uncover the RxCpp library and its programming model ? Mix the FP and OOP constructs in C++ 17 to write well-structured programs ? Master reactive microservices in C++ ? Create custom operators for RxCpp ? Learn advanced stream processing and error handling In Detail Reactive programming is an effective way to build highly responsive applications with an easy-to-maintain code base. This book covers the essential functional reactive concepts that will help you build highly concurrent, event-driven, and asynchronous applications in a simpler and less error-prone way. C++ Reactive Programming begins with a discussion on how event processing was undertaken by different programming systems earlier. After a brisk introduction to modern C++ (C++17), you’ll be taken through language-level concurrency and the lock-free programming model to set the stage for our foray into the Functional Programming model. Following this, you’ll be introduced to RxCpp and its programming model. You’ll be able to gain deep insights into the RxCpp library, which facilitates reactive programming. You’ll learn how to deal with reactive programming using Qt/C++ (for the desktop) and C++ microservices for the Web. By the end of the book, you will be well versed with advanced reactive programming concepts in modern C++ (C++17). Style and approach The book includes real-world problems that you will solve with the reactive programming model. It highlights the way event processing has evolved in the programming world.

Create microservices using Java EE technologies using WildFly Swarm,deploy them in the OpenShift cloud, make them resilient to network failures using Hystrix, configure continuous integration using Jenkins, and security using Keycloak. About This Book ? Create functional microservices with WildFly Swarm ? Use OpenShift to deploy your microservices in the cloud ? Make your application production-ready using Jenkins, Hystrix, and Keycloak Who This Book Is For If you're an experienced developer familiar with Java EE technologies and would like to learn how you can use those technologies in the cloud with WildFly and OpenShift, then this book is for you. What You Will Learn ? Utilize Java EE technology to develop modern cloud-enabled applications ? Easily create microservices with WildFly Swarm using proven Java EE technologies ? See the benefits of OpenShift – easy deployment of your services, out of the box scalability and healing, and integration with Continuous Integration tools ? Integrate the sample application with Jenkins’ Continuous Integration server ? Utilize Netflix OSS to connect your services and provide resilience to your application ? Provide security to your application using Keycloak In Detail The book starts by introducing you to WildFly Swarm—a tool that allows you to create runnable microservices from Java EE components. You’ll learn the basics of Swarm operation—creating a microservice containing only the parts of enterprise runtime needed in a specific case. Later, you’ll learn how to configure and test those services. In order to deploy our services in the cloud, we’ll use OpenShift. You’ll get to know basic information on its architecture, features, and relationship to Docker and Kubernetes. Later, you’ll learn how to deploy and configure your services to run in the OpenShift cloud. In the last part of the book, you’ll see how to make your application production-ready. You’ll find out how to configure continuous integration for your services using Jenkins, make your application resistant to network failures using Hystrix, and how to secure them using Keycloak. By the end of the book, you’ll have a fully functional example application and will have practical knowledge of Java EE cloud development that can be used as a reference in your other projects. Style and approach This example-based tutorial guides you step by step through creating an application based on well-known Java EE technologies (JAX-RS, CDI, JPA, and JSF) and modern architectural patterns.

Discover solutions to all your Tkinter and Python GUI development problems About This Book ? Integrate efficient Python GUI programming techniques with Tkinter ? Efficiently implement advanced MVC architectures in your Python GUI apps ? Solve all your problems related to Tkinter and Python GUI development Who This Book Is For This book is for Python developers who are familiar with the basics of the language syntax, data structures, and OOP. You do not need previous experience with Tkinter or other GUI development libraries. What You Will Learn ? Add widgets and handle user events ? Lay out widgets within windows using frames and the different geometry managers ? Configure widgets so that they have a customized appearance and behavior ? Improve the navigation of your apps with menus and dialogs ? Apply object-oriented programming techniques in Tkinter applications ? Use threads to achieve responsiveness and update the GUI ? Explore the capabilities of the canvas widget and the types of items that can be added to it ? Extend Tkinter applications with the TTK (themed Tkinter) module In Detail As one of the more versatile programming languages, Python is well-known for its batteries-included philosophy, which includes a rich set of modules in its standard library; Tkinter is the library included for building desktop applications. Due to this, Tkinter is a common choice for rapid GUI development, and more complex applications can benefit from the full capabilities of this library. This book covers all of your Tkinter and Python GUI development problems and solutions. Tkinter GUI Application Development Cookbook starts with an overview of Tkinter classes and at the same time provides recipes for basic topics, such as layout patterns and event handling. Next, we cover how to develop common GUI patterns, such as entering and saving data, navigating through menus and dialogs, and performing long-running actions in the background. You will then make your apps leverage network resources effectively, perform 2D and 3D animation-related tasks, create 3D objects, and perform advanced graphical operations. Finally, this book covers using the canvas and themed widgets. By the end of the book, you will have an in-depth knowledge of Tkinter classes, and will know how to use them to build efficient and rich GUI applications. Style and approach A practical recipe-based guide that will help you find solutions to all your Tkinter and Python GUI development-related problems.

Build full-stack shopping list applications from scratch for web and mobile platforms using Xcode, Vapor, and Swift About This Book ? Build, package, and deploy an end-to-end app solution for mobile and web with Swift 4 ? Increase developer productivity by creating reusable client and server components ? Develop backend services for your apps and websites using Vapor framework Who This Book Is For This book is for developers who are looking to build full-stack web and native mobile applications using Swift. An understanding of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript would be beneficial when building server-rendered pages with Vapor. What You Will Learn ? Get accustomed to server-side programming as well as the Vapor framework ? Learn how to build a RESTful API ? Make network requests from your app and handle error states when a network request fails ? Deploy your app to Heroku using the CLI command ? Write a test for the Vapor backend ? Create a tvOS version of your shopping list app and explore code-sharing with an iOS platform ? Add registration and authentication so that users can have their own shopping lists In Detail Making Swift an open-source language enabled it to share code between a native app and a server. Building a scalable and secure server backend opens up new possibilities, such as building an entire application written in one language—Swift. This book gives you a detailed walk-through of tasks such as developing a native shopping list app with Swift and creating a full-stack backend using Vapor (which serves as an API server for the mobile app). You'll also discover how to build a web server to support dynamic web pages in browsers, thereby creating a rich application experience. You’ll begin by planning and then building a native iOS app using Swift. Then, you'll get to grips with building web pages and creating web views of your native app using Vapor. To put things into perspective, you'll learn how to build an entire full-stack web application and an API server for your native mobile app, followed by learning how to deploy the app to the cloud, and add registration and authentication to it. Once you get acquainted with creating applications, you'll build a tvOS version of the shopping list app and explore how easy is it to create an app for a different platform with maximum code shareability. Towards the end, you’ll also learn how to create an entire app for different platforms in Swift, thus enhancing your productivity. Style and approach A step-by-step tutorial-based approach that teaches you full-stack Swift through the development of a single application on several platforms.

Become a better web programmer by writing efficient and modular code using ES6 and ES8 About This Book ? Learn to write asynchronous code and improve the readability of your web applications ? Explore advanced concepts such as closures, Proxy, generators, Promise, async functions, and Atomics ? Use different design patterns to create structures to solve common organizational and processing issues Who This Book Is For If you’re a web developer with a basic understanding of JavaScript and wish to learn the latest features of ECMAScript for developing efficient web applications, this book is for you. What You Will Learn ? Organize JavaScript programs across multiple files, using ES modules ? Create and work with promises using the Promise object and methods ? Compose async functions to propagate and handle errors ? Solve organizational and processing issues with structures using design patterns ? Use classes to encapsulate and share behavior ? Orchestrate parallel programs using WebWorkers, SharedMemory, and Atomics ? Use and extend Map, Set, and Symbol to work with user-defined classes and simulate data types ? Explore new array methods to avoid looping with arrays and other collections In Detail ECMAScript Cookbook follows a modular approach with independent recipes covering different feature sets and specifications of ECMAScript to help you become an efficient programmer. This book starts off with organizing your JavaScript applications as well as delivering those applications to modem and legacy systems. You will get acquainted with features of ECMAScript 8 such as async, SharedArrayBuffers, and Atomic operations that enhance asynchronous and parallel operations. In addition to this, this book will introduce you to SharedArrayBuffers, which allow web workers to share data directly, and Atomic operations, which help coordinate behavior across the threads. You will also work with OOP and Collections, followed by new functions and methods on the built-in Object and Array types that make common operations more manageable and less error-prone. You will then see how to easily build more sophisticated and expressive program structures with classes and inheritance. In the end, we will cover Sets, Maps, and Symbols, which are the new types introduced in ECMAScript 6 to add new behaviors and allow you to create simple and powerful modules. By the end of the book, you will be able to produce more efficient, expressive, and simpler programs using the new features of ECMAScript. Style and approach This book will follow a modular approach covering independent recipes on different features of ECMAScript throughout the book.

Learn about cryptography and cryptocurrencies, so you can build highly secure, decentralized applications and conduct trusted in-app transactions. About This Book ? Get to grips with the underlying technical principles and implementations of blockchain ? Build powerful applications using Ethereum to secure transactions and create smart contracts ? Explore cryptography, mine cryptocurrencies, and solve scalability issues with this comprehensive guide Who This Book Is For This book will appeal to those who wish to build fast, highly secure, transactional applications. It targets people who are familiar with the concept of blockchain and are comfortable with a programming language. What You Will Learn ? Master the theoretical and technical foundations of the blockchain technology ? Understand the concept of decentralization, its impact, and its relationship with blockchain technology ? Master how cryptography is used to secure data - with practical examples ? Grasp the inner workings of blockchain and the mechanisms behind bitcoin and alternative cryptocurrencies ? Understand the theoretical foundations of smart contracts ? Learn how Ethereum blockchain works and how to develop decentralized applications using Solidity and relevant development frameworks ? Identify and examine applications of the blockchain technology - beyond currencies ? Investigate alternative blockchain solutions including Hyperledger, Corda, and many more ? Explore research topics and the future scope of blockchain technology In Detail A blockchain is a distributed ledger that is replicated across multiple nodes and enables immutable, transparent and cryptographically secure record-keeping of transactions. The blockchain technology is the backbone of cryptocurrencies, and it has applications in finance, government, media and almost all other industries. Mastering Blockchain, Second Edition has been thoroughly updated and revised to provide a detailed description of this leading technology and its implementation in the real world. This book begins with the technical foundations of blockchain technology, teaching you the fundamentals of distributed systems, cryptography and how it keeps data secure. You will learn about the mechanisms behind cryptocurrencies and how to develop applications using Ethereum, a decentralized virtual machine. You will also explore different other blockchain solutions and get an introduction to business blockchain frameworks under Hyperledger, a collaborative effort for the advancement of blockchain technologies hosted by the Linux Foundation. You will also be shown how to implement blockchain solutions beyond currencies, Internet of Things with blockchain, blockchain scalability, and the future scope of this fascinating and powerful technology. Style and approach This comprehensive guide allows you to build smart blockchain applications and explore the power of this database. The book will let you quickly brush up on the basics of the blockchain database, followed by advanced implementations of blockchain in currency, smart contracts, decentralization, and so on.

Building a Dream Reid Blackthorn arrives in Dover on a personal mission—to make sure his terminally ill brother gets a chance to meet his daughter. Deceiving little Lily’s guardian isn’t his intention. Yet once Tori Montgomery mistakes Reid for her new handyman, he knows it’s the only way to be close to his niece. Tori is honoring her friend’s last wish by keeping Lily away from her father’s family. And once she learns who Reid truly is, she realizes there’s too much at stake—including custody of Lily—for her to fall for the former DEA agent. But in keeping a promise, is she losing out on her chance for a happily-ever-after?

Winning the Lawman’s Heart Forced to work with the woman who left his brother at the altar five years ago, police chief Chance Morgan must also face his own guilt. Sadie Jenkins’s return to town stirs feelings he thought he’d buried along with his soldier brother, who died overseas. Almost kissing Sadie the night before her wedding was a mistake—one he won’t make again. Planning a remembrance ceremony for the town’s military men is a chance for Sadie to build her event planning business. But working with Chance is bringing up all the emotions she once ran from. Is she ready to finally take that leap into the future…together? Comfort Creek Lawmen: Men in blue with hearts of gold

Their Marriage Bargain Carly Morrison’s father issues an ultimatum: get married or lose her ranch. But while she can rope and ride as well as any man, leading one to the altar is another matter—until newcomer Sawyer Gallagher suggests a marriage of convenience. Their arrangement might be a sensible solution to her predicament but Carly’s growing feelings are a genuine complication. Desperate to provide a home for his orphaned sister, Sawyer takes a chance on lassoing himself to headstrong cowgirl Carly. He’s convinced he’s too hardened by life to love anyone…until their union is threatened. Is it too late to turn this practical partnership into a real Big Sky family?

Suddenly Reunited Liza Fitzpatrick is stunned when her fiancé finally arrives in Oregon City—with amnesia. Matthew Dean refuses to honor a marriage proposal he doesn’t recall, and Liza is forced to consider he may not have loved her after all. But she needs his help now to bring in the harvest, and maybe she can help him remember… Matthew is attracted to the spirited Liza, and as she tries to help him regain his old memories, the new ones they’re creating together start to make him feel whole. Even as he falls for her again, though, someone’s determined to keep them apart. Will his memory return in time to save their future?

A Convenient Arrangement Lady Helena Stanhope's reputation is in tatters…and she’s lost any hope for a “respectable” ton marriage. An arranged union is the only solution. But once Helena weds formidable Scottish widower John Gordon, Lord Ardoch, and encounters his four mischievous children, she's determined to help her new, ever-surprising family. Even if she's sure love is too much to ask for. All John needs is someone to mother his admittedly-unruly brood. He never imagined that beautiful Lady Helena would be a woman of irresistible spirit, caring and warmth. Or that facing down their pasts would give them so much in common. Now as danger threatens, John will do whatever it takes to convince Helena their future together—and his love—are for always.

KIDNAPPED IN AMISH COUNTRY After catching a glimpse of something she wasn’t supposed to see days before Christmas, Irene Martello is run off the road and barely survives. More shocking is the backseat whimper of an Amish toddler stowaway and the familiar sight of their rescuer—the man who'd let her down years earlier. Police chief Paul Kennedy fears Irene stumbled onto a kidnapping ring with two dangerous agendas: retrieving the girl and silencing the witness for good. Only Paul can keep them safe for the holidays. Guarding Irene means risking his heart—and his secret—but to save the child and the woman he never stopped loving, it's a risk he has to take. AMISH COUNTRY JUSTICE: Protected in Plain sight

CHRISTMAS FRAME-UP Nothing will stop Secret Service agent Liberty Westmark from warning her ex-fiancé that he's wanted on a terrorism charge—not even gunmen determined to kill them both. After breaking his heart, she owes Tate Almers that…especially since only she believes his innocence. Partnering with Liberty again is the last thing Tate, a former Secret Service agent, wants for Christmas. But with a mountain of evidence against him and both the feds and a rogue cartel behind him, Tate needs Liberty beside him. They've become the targets of a manhunt with only one ending…and they have only each other to stay alive. Secret Service Agents: Always watching, always ready to protect.

NO EASY ESCAPE Chased across Amsterdam by a human trafficking ring, social advocate Kayla Brooks refuses to help them recapture Mercy, the young girl she rescued from their clutches. Even if they’ve already abducted her father as a hostage…and wouldn’t hesitate to kill her. There’s only one man Kayla can turn to for help: her ex-fiancé’s brooding older brother, Levi Cummings. Though Kayla relies on the handsome former Army Intelligence Officer’s experience, fully trusting Levi seems impossible after she helped send his brother to jail. But as they struggle to save her father, protect Mercy, and outmaneuver the traffickers, Kayla and Levi’s bond transcends pure survival. Armed with only a few clues about her father’s location, though, Kayla and Levi must bring down the crime ring…or lose all their lives.

AMISH COUNTRY SECRETS For reporter Grace Miller, her Amish hometown seems the perfect place to recuperate from surgery—until a tragedy puts her on the trail of her mother's long-unsolved murder. Now someone's set their lethal sights on her, determined to keep the truth behind her mother’s death and a fatal car crash involving local teens hidden. Discovering Grace is in danger, police captain Conner Gates drops everything to protect her…and help solve the cold case his father could not. But as they delve into the past, can they face down the dangerous foe hiding in plain sight, threatening to turn their blossoming love into a deadly trap?

Simon Cooper is one of the UK’s leading chalkstream conservationists. He lives and works on the English rivers, where otters are once again thriving.