John Nickel is a black ex-jazz musician who only wants to be a good father. But when his son is taken away from him, he's left with nothing but the Memphis bar he manages. Then he hires Fay, a young white waitress, who has a volatile brother named Carl in tow. Nickel finds himself consumed with the idea of Taft -- Fay and Carl's dead father -- and begins to reconstruct the life of a man he never met. But his sympathies for these lost souls soon take him down a twisting path into the lives of strangers... Views: 399
Razio Yamata is one of Japan's most influential industrialists, and part of a relatively small group of authority who wield tremendous authority in the Pacific Rim's economic powerhouse.
He has devised a plan to cripple the American greatness, humble the US military, and elevate Japan to a position of dominance on the world stage.
Yamata's motivation lies in his desire to pay off aDebt of Honor to his parents and to the country he feels is responsible for their deaths—America. All he needs is a catalyst to set his plan in motion.
When the faulty gas tank on one Tennessee family's car leads to their fiery death, an opportunistic U. S. congressman uses the occasion to rush a new trade law through the system. The law is designed to squeeze Japan economically. Instead, it provides Yamata with the leverage he needs to put his plan into action.
As Yamata's plan begins to unfold, it becomes clear to the world that someone is launching a fully-integrated operation against the United States. There's only one man to find out who the culprit is—Jack Ryan, the new President's National Security Advisor. Views: 398
When Mary Anne tries to get Jenny Prezzioso, a fussy little girl known as "Miss Priss", to join a kickball team, she faces opposition from the kids - and from Jenny, who does not want to play. Views: 397
Eager to secure a permanent loyalty from this promising young knight, King Henry commands Bracken to marry into one of the crown's most loyal families. But Lord Vincent's oldest daughter, the beautiful yet deceitful Marigold, scorns the king's edict. She will never marry a lowly earl. Now Vincent must call his beloved Megan from the abbey and send her to Hawkings Crest to wed.
When Marigold discovers that Bracken has been made a duke for his obedience, jealousy drives her to madness - a madness that will stop at nothing to bring her youngest sister pain. Will Bracken rescue Megan from Marigold's wicked scheme? Will Megan ever hear the words she longs to hear from her knight?
A moving epic of God's tender care in even the darkest moments. Views: 396
The classic book on the development of human language by the world’s leading expert on language and the mind.
In this classic, the world's expert on language and mind lucidly explains everything you always wanted to know about language: how it works, how children learn it, how it changes, how the brain computes it, and how it evolved. With deft use of examples of humor and wordplay, Steven Pinker weaves our vast knowledge of language into a compelling story: language is a human instinct, wired into our brains by evolution. The Language Instinct received the William James Book Prize from the American Psychological Association and the Public Interest Award from the Linguistics Society of America. This edition includes an update on advances in the science of language since The Language Instinct was first published. Views: 394
After several installments of gallivanting around the South Seas, Aubrey and Maturin return home to England, where the surgeon-cum-intelligence-agent discovers that his wife has disappeared.
As if such a domestic crisis weren't enough, the intrepid pair are also dispatched to the Gulf of Guinea (to suppress the slave trade) and to Ireland (to rebuff an impending French invasion).
O'Brian's stunning range, coupled with his mind-bending command of minutiae, explain why James Hamilton-Paterson has called him "the Homer of the Napoleonic Wars." Views: 392
Wally McDoogle, klutz–extraordinaire, has stumbled his way into sports stardom. But only Wally could end up playing hockey goalie against the monstrous Mad Dog Miller while being trapped in a chicken suit. Before his misadventures end, Wally finally learns the real dangers of jealousy and envy, and the true value of aspirin. Views: 391
A hurricane is on it's way . . . And Betsey can't wait! Join her as she helps prepare for the storm, is entered into a very strange contest, and even attempts to eat a MONSTER hamburger in four fabulously funny adventures.
This book is one of five collections featuring Betsey Biggalow from Children's Laureate, Malorie Blackman. Beautifully illustrated by Jamie Smith, these stories are ideal for building confidence in young readers, whether reading aloud or alone. Views: 389
It is, perhaps, the fifteenth century and the ordered tranquillity of a Mediterranean island is about to be shattered by the appearance of two outsiders: one, a castaway, plucked from the sea by fishermen, whose beliefs represent a challenge to the established order; the other, a child abandoned by her mother and suckled by wolves, who knows nothing of the precarious relationship between Church and State but whose innocence will become the subject of a dangerous experiment. But the arrival of the Inquisition on the island creates a darker, more threatening force which will transform what has been a philosophical game of chess into a matter of life and death... Views: 389
Set around three thousand years before the rest of the Valdemar series, this is the ancient history of Velgarth and the story of Skandranon Rashkae, a gryphon with gleaming ebony feathers, keen magesight and acute intelligence. He is the fulfillment of all that the Mage of Silence, the human sorcerer called Urtho, intended to achieve when he created these magical beings to be his champions, the defenders of his realm. Views: 387
From the Nobel Prize winner, a coming-of-age story that illuminates the harshness and beauty of an Africa on the brink of colonization Shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the Whitbread Award, Paradise was characterized by the Nobel Prize committee as Abdulrazak Gurnah's "breakthrough" work. It is at once the chronicle of an African boy's coming-of-age, a tragic love story, and a tale of the corruption of African tradition by European colonialism. Sold by his father in repayment of a debt, twelve-year-old Yusuf is thrown from his simple rural life into complexities of pre-colonial urban East Africa. Through Yusuf's eyes, Gurnah depicts communities at war, trading safaris gone awry, and the universal trials of adolescence. The result is what Publishers Weekly calls a "vibrant" and "powerful" work that "evokes the Edenic natural beauty of a continent on the verge of full-scale imperialist takeover." Views: 385
The unfinished manuscript of The First Man was discovered in the wreckage of car accident in which Camus died in 1960. Although it was not published for over thirty years, it was an instant bestseller when it finally appeared in 1994. The 'first man' is Jacques Cormery, whose poverty-stricken childhood in Algiers is made bearable by his love for his silent and illiterate mother, and by the teacher who transforms his view of the world. The most autobiographical of Camus's novels, it gives profound insights into his life and the powerful themes underlying his work. Views: 383
Description from the inside sleeve:
This scintillating, disturbing, and altogether outrageous collection of stories introduces to these shores a young writer already being called "the Scottish Celine of the 1990s" (Guardian) and "a mad postmodern Roald Dahl" (Weekend Scotsman). Using a range of approaches from bitter realism to demented fantasy, Irvine Welsh is able to evoke the essential humanity, well hidden as it is, of his generally depraved, lazy, manipulative, and vicious characters. He specializes particularly in cosmic reversals--God turns a hapless footballer into a fly; an acid head and a newborn infant exchange consciousnesses with sardonically unexpected results--always displaying a corrosive wit and a telling accuracy of language and detail. Irvine Welsh is one hilariously dangerous writer and he is bound to create a sensation.
Includes the following stories:
"The Shooter"
"Eurotrash"
"Stoke Newington Blues"
"Vat '96"
"A Soft Touch"
"The Last Resort on the Adriatic"
"Sexual Disaster Quartet"
"Snuff"
"A Blockage in the System"
"Wayne Foster"
"Where the Debris Meets the Sea"
"Granny's Old Junk"
"The House of John Deaf"
"Across the Hall"
"Lisa's Mum Meets the Queen Mum"
"The Two Philosophers"
"Disnae Matter"
"The Granton Star Cause"
"Snowman Building Parts for Rico the Squirrel"
"Sport for All"
"The Acid House"
A Smart Cunt: a novella Views: 382
Dawn's California baby-sitting club is perfect for her. The We Love Kids Club holds informal meetings, they eat healthy snacks, and they don't keep records. And now, after being interviewed by the local newspaper and TV station, the We Love Kids Club is famous!
But fame is not easy for Dawn and her friends. Their laid-back club is swamped with business. And Dawn's father has just sprung a gigantic - and awful - surprise on her.
Dawn thought that moving back to California was going to be a good thing. But now there's not one good thing about it. Views: 381
Stacey's vacation is full of mishaps when she tells one litle lie which leads to another and another and another. Views: 380
