Ex-Heroes

Series · 5 books · 2010-2016

By Peter Clines

Books in series

Ex-Heroes

2010

The first in a spectacularly genre-mashing adventure series that pits a small group of courageous, flawed, terrified superheroes against hordes of undead. Stealth. Gorgon. Regenerator. Cerberus. Zzzap. The Mighty Dragon. They were heroes, using their superhuman abilities to make Los Angeles a better place. Then the plague of living death spread around the globe. Now, a year later, the heroes struggle to overcome their differences and recover from their own scars as they protect the thousands of survivors huddled in their film-studio-turned-fortress, the Mount. But the hungry ex-humans are not the only threat the survivors face. Across the city, another group has grown and gained power.

Ex-Patriots

2011

It's been two years since the plague of ex-humans decimated mankind. Two years since the superheroes St. George, Cerberus, Zzzap, and Stealth gathered Los Angeles’s survivors behind the walls of their fortress, the Mount. Since then, the heroes have been fighting to give the Mount’s citizens hope, and something like a real life. But now supplies are growing scarce, the zombies are pressing in . . . and the heroes are wondering how much longer they can hold out. Then hope arrives in the form of a surviving US Army battalion—and not just any battalion. The men and women of the Army's Project Krypton survived the outbreak because they are super-soldiers, created before mankind's fall to be better, stronger, faster than normal humans—and their secure base in Arizona beckons as a much needed refuge for the beleaguered heroes and their charges. But a dark secret lies at the heart of Project Krypton, and those behind it wield an awesome and terrifying power.

Ex-Communication

2013

“All of us try to cheat death. I was just better prepared to do it than most folks.” In the years since the wave of living death swept the globe, St George and his fellow heroes haven’t just kept Los Angeles’ last humans alive—they’ve created a real community, a bustling town that’s spreading beyond its original walls and swelling with new refugees. But now one of the heroes, perhaps the most powerful among them, seems to be losing his mind. The implacable enemy known as Legion has found terrifying new ways of using zombies as pawns in his attacks. And outside the Mount, something ancient and monstrous is hell-bent on revenge. As Peter Clines weaves these elements together in yet another masterful, shocking climax, St. George, Stealth, Captain Freedom, and the rest of the heroes find that even in a city overrun by millions of ex-humans... …there’s more than one way to come back from the dead.

Ex-Purgatory

2013

George Bailey is an ordinary guy, working the nine to five as a handyman and trying to make the best of the little he’s got. But when he sleeps, he dreams of fire and flying, of zombies and superheroes. When the two realities start to merge, George begins to question if e’s gone mad. That, or something has gone terribly wrong... The latest instalment in the Ex Series.

Ex-Isle

2016

“It is an easy thing to rule by fear.” It’s been years since the tidal wave of ex-humans washed over the world. Since then, thanks to St George and his fellow heroes, the community known as the Mount has been the last known outpost of safety, sanity, and freedom left to humanity. But even for the Mount, survival still balances on a razor’s edge—and after a disaster decimates the town’s food supply, the heroes must make a risky gamble to keep its citizens from starving. And then the news arrives of a strange, man-made island in the middle of the Pacific. An island populated not just by survivors, but by people who seem to be farming, raising children, living—people who, like the heroes, have somehow managed to keep the spark of civilization alive. Paying this place a visit should be a simple goodwill mission, but as the island reveals itself to be a sinister mirror-image of what the heroes have built at the Mount, the cost of their good intentions becomes dangerously high.

Author

Peter Clines

Author · 15 books

Peter Clines is the author of the genre-blending -14- and the Ex-Heroes series. He grew up in the Stephen King fallout zone of Maine and—inspired by comic books, Star Wars, and Saturday morning cartoons—started writing at the age of eight with his first epic novel, Lizard Men From The Center of The Earth(unreleased). He made his first writing sale at age seventeen to a local newspaper, and at the age of nineteen he completed his quadruple-PhD studies in English literature, archaeology, quantum physics, and interpretive dance. In 2008, while surfing Hawaii's Keauwaula Beach, he thought up a viable way to maintain cold fusion that would also solve world hunger, but forgot about it when he ran into actress Yvonne Strahvorski back on the beach and she offered to buy him a drink. He was the inspiration for both the epic poem Beowulf and the motion picture Raiders of the Lost Ark, and is single-handedly responsible for repelling the Martian Invasion of 1938 that occurred in Grovers Mills, New Jersey. Eleven sonnets he wrote to impress a girl in high school were all later found and attributed to Shakespeare. He is the writer of countless film articles, several short stories, The Junkie Quatrain, the rarely-read The Eerie Adventures of the Lycanthrope Robinson Crusoe, the poorly-named website Writer on Writing , and an as-yet-undiscovered Dead Sea Scroll. He currently lives and writes somewhere in southern California. There is compelling evidence that he is, in fact, the Lindbergh baby.