Terrified, a young Navaron child watches helplessly from his hiding place as a young Shinili woman is brutally beaten and abused by a group of drunken Navaron men. Too frightened to answer her pleas for help, the child runs away, taking with him the sacred bone carving of the Shinili people. In doing so, he forever binds himself and his fate to them. Gabriel is no ordinary boy. His life is now marked out for greatness by powers beyond his understanding...He's never wanted to follow in his father's footsteps and become a wealthy, sea-faring merchant, celebrated by all in the ancient empire of Navora - but cold and distant to his family. Haunted by a terrible childhood secret Gabriel spurns family tradition and duties as the eldest son, to pursue a life of helping others. Derived from a deep sense of guilt and strange mysterious visions Gabriel knows that he is destined to become a healer, with the power to decipher dreams, no matter what his overbearing family argues. But against his will, Gabriel finds himself caught up in the power struggles of a corrupt Empire, endangering all that he loves. His decision to hold true to his destiny is one that will cost him dearly, and one that threatens to tear apart the entire Navoran Empire - but which might just end up saving an entire people. Views: 822
The Boxcar children are helping out at a guide dog training school, there they notice a rare obsession with a particular dog, Ginger, and other mysterious events. Views: 821
*Watership Down* was one of this century's best-loved works of imaginative literature. Now Richard Adams returns, to tell us what happened to the rabbits after their defeat of General Woundwort.
*Tales From Watership Down* begins with some of the great folk stories well known to all rabbits. Then we listen in as Dandelion, the rabbits' master storyteller, relates the thrilling adventures experienced by El-ahrairah, the mythical rabbit hero, and his stalwart, Rabscuttle, during the long journey home after their terrible encounter with the Black Rabbit of Inlé (as narrated in *Watership Down*). Finally, in the principal part of the book, we are told eight enchanting stories about the rabbits of the Down - Hazel, Fiver, Bigwig, and their companions - including the impact on the warren of the obsessive doe Flyairth, and the appointment of Hyzenthlay as a female Chief Rabbit and partner to Hazel.
All listeners - the millions who remember *Watership Down* with the deepest affection, and also those for whom this volume will be their first encounter with the rabbits - will find these nineteen tales utterly compelling, the fruit of Richard Adams spellbinding narrative power and ability to conjure up a world that is at the same time both real and unreal. Views: 820
And so it came to pass...
Through science, faith and force of will, the Harmonics carved out for themselves a society that they conceived of as perfect. Diverse peoples held together by respect for each other and the prospect of swift punishment if they disobeyed their laws. Fertile land that embraced a variety of climates and seasons. Angels to guard the mortals and mystics to guard the forbidden knowledge. Jehovah to watch over them all...
But an age of corruption has come to the land, threatening their peace and placing the Samarians in grave danger. Their only hope lies in the crowning of a new Archangel. The oracles have chosen for this honor the angel named Gabriel, and further decreed that he must first wed a mortal woman named Rachel.
It is his destiny and hers. And Gabriel is certain that she will greet the news of her betrothal with enthusiasm, and a devotion to duty equal to his own.
Rachel, however, has other ideas... Views: 815
Ms. Colman's class prepares for Author Day, and no one is more excited than Ricky, whose favorite author will be visiting. Views: 815
After five thousand years she was again mortal. The dead alchemist's experiment has worked. Alisa is no longer a vampire, but a frail and confused human. Not only that -- she is pregnant. The baby grows in her at supernatural speed. As the stranger watches. The stranger from the past. But what child will Alisa's seed produce? A demon or an angel? Alisa does not know. But the stranger does. He knows everything that ever was. And he knows everything that is to be. Views: 813
Diamond had him Dead in her Sights, And Adam Winter Didn't Even Flinch But she still hated him. It had to be hate, no matter what her newfound sisters claimed. For what else could make her blood burn as hot as a prairie fire? Diamond was a hellcat bent on revenge. Yet Adam looked beyond the glittering hardness that she showed her wranglers, and saw a woman as soft and free as a Texas breeze. Views: 813
The Tears of All Oceans are missing. Six magnificent rose-colored pearls, which inspire passion and greed in all who see them, have been stolen and passed from hand to hand, leaving a cryptic trail of death and deception in their wake. And now Ublaz Mad Eyes, the evil emperor of a tropical isle, is determined to let no one stand in the way of his desperate attempt to claim the pearls as his own. At Redwall Abbey, a young hedgehog maid, Tansy, is equally determined to find the pearls first, with the help of her friends. And she must succeed, for the life of one she holds dear is in great danger. . . . Views: 812
The stunning continuation of the timeless classic The Phantom of the Opera.
In The Phantom of Manhattan, acclaimed, bestselling suspense novelist Frederick Forsyth pens a magnificent work of historical fiction, rife with the insights and sounds of turn-of-the-century New York City, while continuing the dramatic saga which began with Gaston Leroux's brilliant novel The Phantom of the Opera...
More than two decades have passed since Antoinette Giry, the mistress of the corps de ballet at the Paris Opera, rescued a hideously disfigured boy named Erik from a carnival and brought him to live in the labyrinthine cellars of the opera house. Soon thereafter, his intense, unrequited love for a beautiful chorus girl set in motion a tragic string of events, forcing him to flee Paris forever. Now, as she lies dying in a convent, Madam Giry tells the untold story of the Phantom and his clandestine journey to New York City to start anew, where he would become a wealthy entrepreneur and build the glorious Manhattan Opera House...all so he could see his beloved, now a famous diva, once again. But the outcome of her visit would prove even more devastating than before-- and yet, would allow the Phantom to know, for the first time in his brutal life, the true meaning of love... Views: 808
These eleven masterful stories – the first collection from acclaimed author Jennifer Egan – deal with loneliness and longing, regret and desire. Egan’s characters – models and housewives, bankers and schoolgirls – are united by their search for something outside their own realm of experience. They set out from locations as exotic as China and Bora Bora, as cosmopolitan as downtown Manhattan, or as familiar as suburban Illinois to seek their own transformations. Elegant and poignant, the stories in Emerald City are seamless evocations of self-discovery.
From the Trade Paperback edition. Views: 806
It seemed like a normal cat -- at first. Adam and his friends are exploring the area around Spooksville when they come across a black cat. It seems like a friendly animal: it purrs when they rub its back, and licks its paws like any other cat.
But then if follows them back to town, and strange things begin to happen. A tree falls down, and a house catches fire. Each time something bad happens, the cat is there -- watching, with its strange green eyes. And it won't go away. Adam and his friends don't know what to do. Especially when the cat begins to use its powers on them. Views: 805
"PUZO IS IN TOP FORM."
Time
The Last Don is Mario Puzo at his finest, thrilling us with his greatest Mafia novel since The Godfather a masterful saga of the last great American crime family and its powerful reach into Hollywood and Las Vegas.
"THE MOST ENTERTAINING READ SINCE THE GODFATHER."
*The New York Times Book Review
The Last Don is Domenico Clericuzio, a wise and ruthless old man who is determined to see his heirs established in legitimate society but whose vision is threatened when secrets from the family's past spark a vicious war between two blood cousins.
"SKILLFULLY CRAFTED . . . IT GIVES US HOLLYWOOD, LAS VEGAS, AND THE MOB IN ONE SWEET DISH."
*Los Angeles Times Book Review
The Last Don is a mesmerizing tale that takes us inside the equally corrupt worlds of the mob, the movie industry, and the casinos *where beautiful actresses and ruthless hitmen are ruled by lust and violence, where sleazy producers and greedy studio heads are drunk on power, where crooked cops and desperate gamblers play dangerous games of betrayal, and where one man controls them all. . . .
"Head-long entertainment, bubbling over with corruption, betrayal, assassinations, Richter-scale romance, and, of course, family values."
*Time
"Puzo returns after a quarter century to the terrain of his greatest success, The Godfather, to tell a second masterful tale of Mafia life."
*Variety
"A compelling tale peopled by memorable characters. . . . Puzo is a master storyteller with an uncanny facility for details that force the reader to keep the pages turning."
*USA Today
"From the Paperback edition." Views: 803
Excerpt: ...you uncivil scoundrel," cried the fierce doctor, "is that the way you respond to the kindness of your best friends? Then let me tell you the truth. You have no more found the Unpardonable Sin than yonder boy Joe has. You are but a crazy fellow,--I told you so twenty years ago,-neither better nor worse than a crazy fellow, and the fit companion of old Humphrey, here!" He pointed to an old man, shabbily dressed, with long white hair, thin visage, and unsteady eyes. For some years past this aged person had been wandering about among the hills, inquiring of all travellers whom he met for his daughter. The girl, it seemed, had gone off with a company of circus-performers, and occasionally tidings of her came to the village, and fine stories were told of her glittering appearance as she rode on horseback in the ring, or performed marvellous feats on the tight-rope. The white-haired father now approached Ethan Brand, and gazed unsteadily into his face. "They tell me you have been all over the earth," said he, wringing his hands with earnestness. "You must have seen my daughter, for she makes a grand figure in the world, and everybody goes to see her. Did she send any word to her old father, or say when she was coming back?" Ethan Brand\'s eye quailed beneath the old man\'s. That daughter, from whom he so earnestly desired a word of greeting, was the Esther of our tale, the very girl whom, with such cold and remorseless purpose, Ethan Brand had made the subject of a psychological experiment, and wasted, absorbed, and perhaps annihilated her soul, in the process. "Yes," he murmured, turning away from the hoary wanderer, "it is no delusion. There is an Unpardonable Sin!" While these things were passing, a merry scene was going forward in the area of cheerful light, beside the spring and before the door of the hut. A number of the youth of the village, young men and girls, had hurried up the hill-side, impelled by curiosity to see Ethan Brand, the hero of so... Views: 799
Spectacular mayhem ensues when Timothy Brights, in typically dim fashion, lands in bed with the Chief Constable’s wife. And things go seriously wrong when the Chief Constable tries to frame his old adversary, the upright Miss Midden. Views: 797
Mary-Lynnette, 17, loves to watch the stars from her Oregon backyard. Then one day, she thinks she's witnessed a murder through her telescope. She's wrong: it's only three vampire sisters burying their mysteriously-killed aunt. The sisters, Rowan, Kestral, and Jade ran away from their enclave home to live the lives of regular teenagers. However, when their brother Ash is sent to bring the girls back, he falls in love with Mary-Lynnette. But will she accept him because of his lurid vampire past and can a now-repentant Ash convince Mary-Lynnette to let him atone for his former sins and be his soulmate? Views: 794
