Present-day Russia is the setting for this stunning new novel from Robert Harris, author of the bestsellers Fatherland and Enigma. Archangel tells the story of four days in the life of Fluke Kelso, a dissipated, middle-aged former Oxford historian, who is in Moscow to attend a conference on the newly opened Soviet archives. One night, Kelso is visited in his hotel room by an old NKVD officer, a former bodyguard of the secret police chief, Lavrenty Beria. The old man claims to have been at Stalin's dacha on the night Stalin had his fatal stroke, and to have helped Beria steal the dictator's private papers, among them a notebook. Kelso decides to use his last morning in Moscow to check out the old man's story. But what starts as an idle inquiry in the Lenin Library soon turns into a murderous chase across nighttime Moscow and up to northern Russia--to the vast forests near the White Sea port of Archangel, where the final secret of Josef Stalin has been hidden for almost half a century. Archangel combines the imaginative sweep and dark suspense of Fatherland with the meticulous historical detail of Enigma. The result is Robert Harris's most compelling novel yet. From the Hardcover edition.From Library JournalWatkins, a gifted young novelist who stands head and shoulders above his more popular but less capable peers (e.g., Jay McInerney, Tama Janowitz, Douglas Coupland), most recently raised readers' eyebrows with his fascinating memoir, Stand Before Your God (LJ 11/15/93). In this return to fiction, the thinly veiled title character, Adam Gabriel, returns to his hometown in Maine to battle Jonah Mackenzie, a ruthless logging baron who is destroying the wilderness. Gabriel proves as single-minded as Mackenzie, however, and engages in dangerous "tree-spiking" (i.e., driving long nails into trees in order to discourage chainsaw-bearing loggers). When the dust clears, four men are dead. Unfortunately, the devices that worked so well in Watkins's other novels?idealistic, romantic characters; exotic settings; tight, affecting prose?fall flat here. Female characters in particular, most notably an unstable local woman known as "Mary the Clock," are poorly sketched. Archangel is not up to the author's usual standards, and unless Watkins has a following at your library you can pass on this one.?Mark Annichiarico, "Library Journal"Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. From BooklistWatkins chooses demanding themes, such as the portrayal of an SS trooper or, as in his last novel The Promise of Light (1992), the struggle for Irish independence. Here, in this riveting and shatteringly lyrical tale, he enters the realm of environmental issues. Jonah Mackenzie, the mill owner in a tiny logging town in northern Maine, is a ruthless man hell-bent on carrying out a vendetta against the forest that claimed one of his legs. He has purchased logging rights to a designated wilderness area and is determined to cut down as many old-growth trees as possible in the little time allotted. He drives his crews to the breaking point, even after a man dies. Mackenzie effects a cover-up, but forces conspire against him. There's courageous Madeline and her pro-environmental newspaper, the Forest Sentinel; an eco-warrior named Gabriel who is busy sabotaging logging operations; Mackenzie's increasingly guilt-ridden foreman; and even his wife. Watkins adeptly orchestrates a thoroughly believable escalation of tension, madness, and violence, all conveyed with bone-chilling accuracy. As taut and expressive as a violin string, this is an outstandingly intelligent and significant novel. Donna Seaman Views: 37
Введите сюда краткую аннотацию Views: 37
Short Story - approx. 3000 words Part of The Sisters of the Moon Series Maria is a werewolf—she’s supposed to be tough. But a recent ordeal of kidnap and torture has left her doubting herself, her courage and her will to go on. In an attempt to overcome this new fear, she decides to face her oldest. He’s not a werewolf, but he does have fangs… Views: 37
Aubrey Quinn has lived under her mother’s thumb ever since her third grade music teacher cast her in the lead of the school musical. After securing a spot on a singing reality show, Aubrey wins the opportunity to perform the National Anthem for a professional baseball team. Views: 37
Gail Connor and Anthony Quintana make a combustible mix on many levels. Passionately attracted to each other on a personal level, they are equally passionate defenders of their clients even when their interests don’t always work in tandem. Set all this against the sultry background of a Miami that is riddled with crime and corruption, drowning in drugs, illegal immigrants and shady deals, simmering with a melting-pot clash of cultures and you have a recipe for highly entertaining, hotly explosive crime and justice. In the second title in the Suspicion series, SUSPICION OF GUILT, Gail has the biggest case of her life, a career-maker and a guarantee that a partnership will soon be hers, until she discovers that a suspected forgery is only the top layer of a cover-up for brutal murder and a step into deep conspiracy and deadly risk. Attorney Gail Connor finally has the case that could make her career. But it involves a murder and a nasty battle over a vast inheritance. Gail is suspicious of everyone--even her mother. She's driven to win the case in order to forget her sister's death--and damn the consequences. From the author of Suspicion of Innocence. Views: 37
Something strange was happening - and only Chuin knew what it was.
In America, the Indian tribes had united and were delivering crushing blows to the U.S. Army. In the Middle East, the Arabs had regained their martial mastery and were demolishing all who resisted them. In Mongolia, scattered tribesman had joined together for the first time since Genghis Khan to form a new Golden Horde poised to ravish all the earth.
Something strange was obviously happening all over the globe. Remo had no idea what it was, even as he desperately tried to fight it. Chiun knew but wasn't saying anything, as he got ready to cut a deal and split the world with the fiendish for behind it all. With Remo and Chiun divided, the whole world was wide open for conquest, and an ancient evil was spawning modern terror. Humanity's greatest enemy was now in the driver's seat - and its ultimate nightmare was coming true.... Views: 37
The Quilliam sisters have a nose for fine food and good business. But when a nosy newspaperman goes sniffing around the local mini-mall project, Sarah and Meg begin to smell something rotten in Hemlock Falls. It's worse than corruption--it's murder. And the newsman is facing his final deadline. Includes a recipe from the Hemlock Falls Inn. Views: 37
