This first book of a new sci-fi series introduces an alternate earth where powerful Threads have the power to alter reality as we know it. Pulled from his world by an experiment gone wrong, Darwin Lloyd is one of the few that can see the Threads—quantum strings that can be manipulated to change or control reality. On an alternate Earth ravaged by war, Darwin is torn between the Qabal and SafeHaven, his only goal to find a way back home and stop the same fate from happening in his time line. Threads—thought of as a gift from the machine he helped his father create—and Threaders are both loved and hated, treated as gods by some and as criminals by others. Out of his element, Darwin must learn how to control the Threads and possibly join the hated Qabal to find the path back to his dad. But Thread use comes at a price. Follow the possibilities and probabilities too far and the human mind shatters, leaving the Threader a mindless, drooling husk. Yet the Thread’s pull is almost irresistible, and a constant battle for those that can see them. In this strange new world, Darwin discovers what he could never find on his own: friends, family, love, a mother he lost years before, and a younger sister he never had.

This second book of a groundbreaking sci-fi series introduces an alternate earth where powerful Threads can alter reality as we know it. After almost a year, the gate between worlds has opened again, and through it Darwin Lloyd hears the anguished screams of Teresa, the love he left behind. He returns to her world--one where quantum Threads can change or control reality and ordinary people can do extraordinary things. But nothing is as he had left it. The Threads, though still plentiful, no longer respond the way they once had. Groups of Threaders must work together to perform even the simplest of tasks. Yet the Qabal continue to grow and create Skends to do their bidding. With the changes, war has returned to the world, pitting the Qabal against the Threaders of SafeHaven and Forsyth. With the weakened Threads and the increase in Skends, SafeHaven is losing. Darwin's return is greeted with hatred by some, and worship by others... all for the same reason. He changed the world by turning off the Source. Darwin needs to find Teresa, and reverse what he has done before the Qabal take away everything he loves about world he has entered.

The third and final book of the Quantum Empirica sci-fi series explores an alternate earth where powerful Threads have the power to alter reality as we know it. Scarred and disfigured, Darwin Lloyd travels the country with Teresa, trying to find a life without Threads--quantum strings that can change or control reality. His only real skill in the new reality he helped create is the Dance, passed on to him by Baila as she took his ability to use Threads. But time doesn't stand still. Though SafeHaven and Forsyth have control of the QPS, the machine Darwin and his dad built and the reason the Threads exist, and the remnants of Salem and the Qabal are building an army to take it back. With another brutal war looming over him, Darwin will have to make a decision that may change his and Teresa's lives forever.

Welcome to the Helios Academy: evolve or die It's the year 2050 and life is increasingly hard for 'non–citizens'. A slowly emerging young minority has been exposed as 'talents'; they harbour mutations that give them special gifts – super strength, regenerative powers, psychic gifts or the ability to sink through shadows and travel through time and space. As governments unite to form a global talent registry and powerful corporations step in to take control, a 'talent' can be a passport to citizenship and a better life, but there is a cost as Josie Ryder is about to discover. Orphaned at six, Josie Ryder has been raised by her uncle. Her talent is an unusual one: she is a threader, able to weave a combination of psychic talents around others to manipulate their powers. Working in her uncle's antique store and dreaming of a better life, Josie has done everything to keep a promise to her late father: stay off the global talent registry and keep her talents hidden. But as Josie tries to make ends meet with the occasional illegal act, she risks a third strike with local law enforcement and, desperate for a better life, Josie finally breaks her promise to her father's memory and sends an enquiry to the prestigious Helios Academy, a training facility in a distant country for talents. When the Helios Academy respond by sending mysterious slider, Blake Galloway to extract Josie, then offer her a position at their select and highly competitive institution, things begin to get really interesting, and more than a little dangerous...

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 23rd International Conference on Computer Aided Verification, CAV 2011, held in Snowbird, UT, USA, in July 2011. The 35 revised full papers presented together with 20 tool papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 161 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on the following workshops: 4th International Workshop on Numerical Software Verification (NSV 2011), 10th International Workshop on Parallel and Distributed Methods in Verifications (PDMC 2011), 4th International Workshop on Exploiting Concurrency Efficiently and Correctly (EC2 2011), Frontiers in Analog Circuit Synthesis and Verification (FAC 2011), International Workshop on Satisfiability Modulo Theories, including SMTCOMP (SMT 2011), 18th International SPIN Workshop on Model Checking of Software (SPIN 2011), Formal Methods for Robotics and Automation (FM-R 2011), and Practical Synthesis for Concurrent Systems (PSY 2011).