The publication of volume two of this landmark collection celebrates the close of the centennial year of Thornton Wilder's birth. This volume collects 17 plays from the author's three-minute and five-minute plays for five actors series and includes the full-length play "The Alcestiad," a major work by the author of "Our Town" and "The Skin of Our Teeth" which has long been unavailable. Views: 1 081
Set both in a real and imaginary Manchester, Jeff Noon's story concerns a revolutionary lottery game that is engulfing the city in a tide of gambling fever. As a group of mathematics students look at the mind-numbing probabilities involved, they soon find more sinister realities. The Company has developed the nymphomation, and has the power to devour the city's dreams Views: 1 077
While sightseeing in Niagara Falls, the Boxcar children investigate a rash of souvenir store thefts. Includes related puzzles, games, and activities. Views: 1 076
In this sequel to Till Death Do Us Part, a grief-stricken April Lancaster flees to St. Croix island to cope with the loss of her fiancee. There on the beach, she meets a dark and broody Brandon Benedict who is still dealing with the pain of his mother's recent suicide. Though the two quickly become close through their shared grief, April does not reveal that she is battling an incurable brain tumor. When April's health condition worsens, she is forced to fly back home without telling Brandon. April is dying. Can she bring herself to tell Brandon that he'll soon lose another person he loves? Views: 1 074
Mary Anne is in big trouble. She's bought loads of Christmas presents--and has no way of paying for them all. Baby-sitting money won't be enough to pay for this mistake.
There's only one thing Mary Anne can do. She can take on a second job. A job that no one can know about. Not Logan. Not Dawn. Not even Mary Anne's father.
Mary Anne's Christmas will be ruined. . .unless he secret life pays off. Views: 1 066
Bess is dying to be the Pumpkin Princess in the fall parade. But only one girl can wear the crown and the beautiful gown. And the winner is...Brenda Carlton, Princess Snooty Nose! Views: 1 063
In each of these elegant and mesmerizing stories, Kim Edwards explores the lives of those who exist on the fringes of society--a fire-eater, an American and his Korean war bride, a juggler and a trapeze artist. Spanning several generations and transporting us to exotic locations in Europe, Asia, and America, this wise and exquisite story collection marks the debut of a gifted new voice in literature. Views: 1 051
Rupert of Hentzau: From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim by Anthony Hope Views: 1 048
Driven by his sense of "dharma," or honor, young King Tamar sets off on a perilous journey, with a significance greater than he can imagine, during which he meets talking animals, villainous and noble kings, demons, and the love of his life.
Alexander's latest epic adventure is rooted in the mythology of ancient India. A losing game of chance with a mysterious stranger seems like a dream to young King Tamar, but the iron ring on his finger is a very real token that his life may be forfeit. A journey to the stranger's distant kingdom seems his only chance to discover the truth. Many adventures and diversions crop up along the way as Tamar gains some surprising companions, including a brave and beautiful milkmaid, a cowardly eagle, and a wiley monkey king who used to be a man. The author's flexible style moves smoothly from comedy to tragedy and back again; from battle scenes to ridiculous situations, Alexander never loses the thread. Set within the action are small gems of poetry and folktales. The concept of dharma, or proper conduct, and the rigid caste system deeply affect Tamar's actions. Plot, characters, and setting all have their parts to play, but it is the tension set up among the lively characters and the cultural conventions binding them that create the structure of the story and lead inevitably to its conclusion. This wise and witty adventure can be enjoyed on many levels. Views: 1 048
The Slocum family of Northeastern Pennsylvania are the best of the white settlers, peace-loving Quakers who believe that the Indians hold the Light of God inside. It is from this good-hearted family that Frances is abducted during the Revolutionary war.
As the child's terror subsides, she is slowly drawn into the sacred work and beliefs of her adoptive mother and of all the women of these Eastern tribes. Frances becomes Maconakwa, the Little Bear Woman of the Miami Indians. Then, long after the Indians are beaten and their last hope, Tecumseh, is killed, the Slocums hear word of their long-lost daughter and head out to Indiana to meet their beloved Frances. But for Maconakwa, it is a moment of truth, the test of whether her heart is truly a red one.
From the Paperback edition. Views: 1 047
A missing prince...A mythical creature...An age-old mystery
Like his physician father, sixteen-year-old Garth Baxtor is gifted with the Touch. By laying his hands upon his patients, Garth can sense the illness that dwells within and promote healing. But illness is not all he can sense, as he learns when he accompanies his father to the underground mines known as the Veins to minister to the criminals condemned to labor there, beyond the hanging wall. Applying his hands to the wound of one prisoner known only as Lot No. 859, Garth is stunned to discover that the man is no common criminal....
With the help of Ravenna, a witch from the marshes, and a mythical creature from the land of dreams, Garth sets out to solve a centuries-old mystery--a mystery that will pit one king against another and shake the Kingdom of Escator to its foundations. Views: 1 043
Seventeen-year-old Sarah doesn’t believe in magic, but she thinks it’s fun to pretend to be a psychic—until her startling visions of the future turn deadly
When Sarah Zoltanne moves from sunny California to a small town in Missouri, she feels like she’ll never fit in. Her mother is dating a jerk, the kids at her school despise her, and she misses her old home. So when a popular boy asks her to tell fortunes at a school fair, she jumps at the chance. But soon her crystal ball begins to swirl with strange visions and her outlandish predictions start to come true with startling accuracy. Now Sarah must confront a community that not only mistrusts her, but also fears her strange powers.
Gallows Hill is a spine-chilling thriller based on the story of the Salem witch trials. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Lois Duncan including rare images and never-before-seen documents from the author’s personal collection. Views: 1 040
Kate Powell is a successful young businesswoman, but her life feels empty. When she hears of someone who had a baby through artificial insemination, she decides she wants a baby, and advertises for a suitable father. Alex Turner seems perfect, but Kate's plans have devastating consequences. Views: 1 030
With the same brilliant combination of humor and warmth that marked Operating Instructions and Bird by Bird, her two bestselling works of nonfiction, Anne Lamott now gives us an exuberant richly absorbing portrait of a family for whom the joys and sorrows of everyday life are magnified under the glare of the unexpected.
The Fergusons make their home in a small California town where life is supposed to resemble paradise, but for thirteen-year-old Rosie (last seen in Lamott's beloved novel Rosie), reality is a bit harsher. Her mother, a recovering alcoholic, is still beset by grief over the early death of her first husband. Rosie's stepfather is a struggling writer plagued by doubts and hilarious paranoia. And Rosie, aching in the bloom of young womanhood and obsessed with tournament tennis, finds that her athletic gifts, initially a source of triumph, now place her in peril, as a shadowy man who stalks her from the bleachers seems to be developing an obsession of his own.
Written with enormous emotional honesty, inhabited by superbly realized characters, riotously funny and wonderfully suspenseful, Crooked Little Heart is Anne Lamott writing at the height of her considerable powers.
From the Hardcover edition. Views: 1 024
Peter Matthiessen is one of the few American writers ever nominated for the National Book Award for both fiction and nonfiction.
When his novel Killing Mister Watson was published in 1990, the reviews were extraordinary. It was heralded as "a marvel of invention . . . a virtuoso performance" (The New York Times Book Review) and a "novel [that] stands with the best that our nation has produced as literature" (Los Angeles Times Book Review). Now Peter Matthiessen brings us the second novel in his Watson trilogy, a project that has been nearly twenty years in the writing. A story of epic scope and ambition, Lost Man's River confronts the primal relationship between a dangerous father and his desperate sons and the ways in which his death has shaped their lives.
Lucius Watson is obsessed with learning the truth about his father. Who was E. J. Watson? Was he a devoted family man, an inspired farmer, a man of progress and vision? Or was he a cold-blooded murderer and amoral opportunist? Were his neighbors driven to kill him out of fear? Or was it envy? And if Watson was a killer, should the neighbors fear the obsessed Lucius when he returns to live among them and ask questions?
The characters in this tale are men and women molded by the harsh elements of the Florida Everglades--an isolated breed, descendants of renegades and pioneers, who have only their grit, instinct, and tradition to wield against the obliterating forces of twentieth-century progress: Speck Daniels, moonshiner and alligator poacher turned gunrunner; Sally Brown, who struggles to escape the racism and shame of her local family; R. B. Collins, known as Chicken, crippled by drink and rage, who is the custodian of Watson secrets; Watson Dyer, the unacknowledged namesake with designs on the remote Watson homestead hidden in the wild rivers; and Henry Short, a black man and unwilling member of the group of armed island men who awaited E. J. Watson in the silent twilight. Only a storyteller of Peter Matthiessen's dazzling artistry could capture the beauty and strangeness of life on this lawless frontier while probing deeply into its underlying tragedy: the brutal destruction of the land in the name of progress, and the racism that infects the heart of New World history. Views: 1 024
