When Eloise moves to the town where, centuries ago, Joan of Arc fought her greatest battle, her life takes a shocking turn. Like Joan before her, she hears a voicehave never been forgotten. Views: 1 029
On her long journey home from school after a fight which will surely lead to her expulsion, Karigan G'ladheon ponders her future as she trudges through the immense forest called Green Cloak. But her thoughts are interrupted by the clattering of hooves as a galloping horse bursts from the woods, the rider slumped over his mount's neck, impaled by two black-shafted arrows. As the young man lies dying on the road, he tells Karigan that he is a Green Rider, one of the legendary messengers of the king, and that he bears a "life and death" message for King Zachary. He begs Karigan to carry his message, warning her not to read it, and when she reluctantly agrees, he makes her swear on his sword to complete his mission "for love of country." As he bestows upon her the golden winged-horse brooch which is the symbol of his office, he whispers on his dying breath, "Beware the shadow man..."
Karigan's promise changes her life forever. Pursued by unknown assassins, following a path only her horse seems to know, and accompanied by the silent specter of the original messenger, she herself becomes a legendary Green Rider. Caught up in a world of deadly danger and complex magic, compelled by forces she cannot understand, Karigan is hounded by dark beings bent on seeing that the message, and its reluctant carrier, never reach their destination. Views: 1 018
This volume contains three masterpieces by the Greek playwright Sophocles, widely regarded since antiquity as the greatest of all the tragic poets. The vivid translations, which combine elegance and modernity, are remarkable for their lucidity and accuracy, and are equally suitable for reading for pleasure, study, or theatrical performance. The selection of Antigone, Oedipus the King, and Electra not only offers the reader the most influential and famous of Sophocles' works, it also presents in one volume the two plays dominated by a female heroic figure, and the experience of the two great dynasties featured in Greek tragedy--the houses of Oedipus and Agamemnon. Views: 1 017
River Heights is covered with snow, and school has been canceled. Nancy, George, Bess, and their friends spend the entire day sledding -- until Molly Angelo's brand-new super-fast sled disappears! Views: 1 015
From the New York Times best-selling author of The Dovekeepers, Alice Hoffman is at her haunting, thought-provoking best with these interconnected stories about a Long Island family, the Samuelsons, and the lessons in survival and transformation that life brings to every family...
"Pulls the reader in effortlessly...Hoffman has the power to make you really laugh and really cry." --USA Today
"Moving and deadpan funny...Epiphanies about passion, pain, and resiliency induce smiles and shivers in equal measure." --Entertainment Weekly Views: 1 011
Have you ever loved someone who's mortally wounded you? Phineas Poe, disgraced cop and morphine addict, has just been released from a psych ward when he meets a beautiful woman named Jude in a hotel bar. Red dress, black hair, body like a knife. He takes her back to his room and wakes the next morning in a bathtub full of blood and ice, missing a kidney.
Dragging himself from a hospital bed, Phineas discovers he wants to be with Jude like a hunger -- and he wants to find her and kill her. Falling for her is the start of a twisted love story that takes him from the snowy streets of Denver to the high plains of Texas where the boundaries between torturer and victim, killer and accomplice, become nightmarishly distorted. Views: 1 010
This is the dramatic, heartwrenching tale of Max and Worm, two outsiders who turn to each other for survival. Written in a haunting yet uplifting first-person voice, this compelling novel is destined to become a classic. Views: 1 010
Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! is the funny, serious, and compelling new novel by Fannie Flagg, author of the beloved Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe (and prize-winning co-writer of the classic movie).
Once again, Flagg's humor and respect and affection for her characters shine forth. Many inhabit small-town or suburban America. But this time, her heroine is urban: a brainy, beautiful, and ambitious rising star of 1970s television. Dena Nordstrom, pride of the network, is a woman whose future is full of promise, her present rich with complications, and her past marked by mystery.
Among the colorful cast of characters are:
Sookie, of Selma, Alabama, Dena's exuberant college roommate, who is everything that Dena is not; she is thrilled by Dena's success and will do everything short of signing autographs for her; Sookie's a mom, a wife, and a Kappa forever
Dena's cousins, the Warrens, and her aunt Elner, of Elmwood Springs, Missouri, endearing, loyal, talkative, ditsy, and, in their way, wise
Neighbor Dorothy, whose spirit hovers over them all through the radio show that she broadcast from her home in the 1940s
Sidney Capello, pioneer of modern sleaze journalism and privateer of privacy, and Ira Wallace, his partner in tabloid television
Several doctors, all of them taken with--and almost taken in by-Dena
There are others, captivated by a woman who tries to go home again, not knowing where home or love lie.
From the Hardcover edition. Views: 1 006
We could blame everything that happened on Marco. He was the one who heard about the downed submarine. He was the one who thought we should check it out. And everyone knows that if Marco's up to a challenge, I'm definitely there.
Everything was going fine. Until the explosion. An explosion that blows us millions of years back in time. Back to the age of dinosaurs. Now Tobias, Cassie, Marco, Ax, Jake and I are fighting for our lives with every step we take. But that's not our biggest problem. Our biggest problem is we have no idea how to get back to our own time ... Views: 1 006
Ben Okri's new novel, continuing the adventures of Azaro, the spirit-child in the perplexing world of the living Views: 1 004
In the 1880s, as the European powers were carving up Africa, King Leopold II of Belgium seized for himself the vast and mostly unexplored territory surrounding the Congo River. Carrying out a genocidal plundering of the Congo, he looted its rubber, brutalized its people, and ultimately slashed its population by ten million--all the while shrewdly cultivating his reputation as a great humanitarian. Heroic efforts to expose these crimes eventually led to the first great human rights movement of the twentieth century, in which everyone from Mark Twain to the Archbishop of Canterbury participated. King Leopold's Ghost is the haunting account of a megalomaniac of monstrous proportions, a man as cunning, charming, and cruel as any of the great Shakespearean villains. It is also the deeply moving portrait of those who fought Leopold: a brave handful of missionaries, travelers, and young idealists who went to Africa for work or adventure and unexpectedly found themselves witnesses to a holocaust. Adam Hochschild brings this largely untold story alive with the wit and skill of a Barbara Tuchman. Like her, he knows that history often provides a far richer cast of characters than any novelist could invent. Chief among them is Edmund Morel, a young British shipping agent who went on to lead the international crusade against Leopold. Another hero of this tale, the Irish patriot Roger Casement, ended his life on a London gallows. Two courageous black Americans, George Washington Williams and William Sheppard, risked much to bring evidence of the Congo atrocities to the outside world. Sailing into the middle of the story was a young Congo River steamboat officer named Joseph Conrad. And looming above them all, the duplicitous billionaire King Leopold II. With great power and compassion, King Leopold's Ghost will brand the tragedy of the Congo--too long forgotten--onto the conscience of the West Views: 1 003
Laura Logan dreams of a glorious Cape Cod day when all the dark secrets are swept away....
For Laura Logan, life on Cape Cod has been nearly perfect, full of magical days spent enjoying the sea with her beloved twin brother, Cary. But then, like the creeping of the tides, the vicious rumors at school begin — cruel voices saying unspeakable things about the Logans. Laura tries to ignore them, but not until handsome, gentle Robert Royce moves to their town does she feel truly carefree and happy again.
While Robert's smile drives the shadows from Laura's heart, she still worries about Cary, whose gloomy moods drift in like the coastal fog. And then Grandma Olivia issues a chilling threat, forbidding Laura to see Robert ever again. Alone to suffer because of dark secrets no one will explain, Laura obeys...until the miracle of a glorious summer leads her back into Robert's arms. But dark thunderclouds have been gathering on the horizon, and when they suddenly burst with tragedy, they howl a name from the Logans' shameful past that plunges Laura into a silent, terrible agony. Now Laura can only dream of the warm, sun-filled life she so desperately desires.... Views: 997
Animals bring out the goodness, humanity and optimism in people and speak directly to our souls. This joyous, inspiring and entertaining Chicken Soup collection relates the unique bonds between animals and the people whose lives they've changed. Such as the dolphins who helped a paralyzed woman heal when doctors offered little hope; the dog who brought life into a failing marriage; the kitten who helped a mother mourn; and the flying squirrel who taught a man the power of laughter. Packed with celebrity pet-lore, Chicken Soup for the Soul relates the unconditional love, loyalty, courage and companionship that only animals possess. Just like our furry, feathered and four-legged friends, this enchanting book will bring a smile to any pet lover's face ... and it's housebroken! Views: 997
"You can't trust anyone who sleeps with the monsters. " That's what I've always said. That's what I've always believed. But now I'm the one sharing a bed with the Master Vampire of the City. Me, Anita Blake. The woman the vampires call the Executioner. From part of the solution, I've become part of the problem. So it hits close to home when an arsonist begins to target vampire-owned businesses all over town -- an arsonist who seems to want to destroy more than just property. It's the monsters who are in danger now. And it's up the the Executioner to save them from the inferno. . . Views: 997
Winner of the 2006 Man Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction for her second novel The Inheritance of Loss, Kiran Desai is one of the most talented writers of her generation. Now available for the first time as a Grove Press paperback, Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard--Desai's dazzling debut novel--is a wryly hilarious and poignant story that simultaneously captures the vivid culture of the Indian subcontinent and the universal intricacies of human experience. Sampath Chawla was born in a time of drought into a family not quite like other families, in a town not quite like other towns. After years of failure at school, failure at work, of spending his days dreaming in tea stalls, it does not seem as if Sampath is going to amount to much--until one day he climbs a guava tree in search of peaceful contemplation and becomes unexpectedly famous as a holy man, sending his tiny town into turmoil. A syndicate of larcenous, alcoholic monkeys terrorize the pilgrims who cluster around Sampath's tree, spies and profiteers descend on the town, and none of Desai's outrageous characters goes unaffected as events spin increasingly out of control. Views: 993
