It's that time of year in New York: one of the city's premier magazines is compiling its annual "Hottest Private School Boy" issue. Jonathan, Mickey, David, Arno, and Patch all figure they're shoo-ins, but will the competition to be chosen as the cover model tear the guys apart? Add to that a few twists and turns in their love lives, a visit from an internationally acclaimed photographer (whose specialty happens to be nude crowd shots), and an invasion by a clique of Upper East Side It Girls, and the Insiders might find themselves clamoring for a way out. Views: 29
Paige Turner is the keeper of The Angel Falls Library Files, a journal of taboo secrets. The first entry focuses on Paige's own sexual awakening, guided by the loving hand of Adam and the watchful eye of Brenda. Together, all three try to navigate through the forbidden intimacies that begin to form, paving the way toward further exploration of desires that simmer in each. ~~~~~ Excerpt ~~~~~ Adam opened the door and saw his wife sitting up in the bed, book in hand, none the wiser that his wife was spying on him spying on Paige just seconds earlier. "Oh, you're still awake," he said nonchalantly. "I thought I heard you coming up a little while ago," Brenda replied, trying to sound as equally nonchalant. "I did. I thought I heard something in Paige's room, and peeked in to check it out." Well, at least he was being partially honest, Brenda thought as he stripped down to his boxers and crawled into bed. "Is everything okay?" she asked, setting the book down on the nightstand and... Views: 29
It's World War II and the A-bomb is here to stay.The only question: Who's going to drop it first?The Battle of Midway takes on a whole new dimension with the sudden appearance of a U.S.-led naval task force from the twenty-first century, the result of a botched military experiment. State-of-the-art warships are scattered across the Pacific, armed to the teeth with the latest instruments of mass destruction. Nuclear warheads, rocket-propelled grenades, AK-47s, computer-guided missiles--all bets are off as the major powers of 1942 scramble to be the first to wield the weapons of tomorrow against their enemies. The whole world now knows of the Allied victory in 1945, and the collapse of communism decades later. But that was the first time around. With the benefit of their newly acquired knowledge, Stalin and Hitler rapidly change strategies. A Russian-German ceasefire leaves the Führer free to bring the full weight of his vaunted Nazi war machine... Views: 29
A bitter, dark childhood has left Hunter Stone hardened to the world around him. Giving his heart to anyone, even Amy Linton, the woman he cares most about, is impossible. Hunter will do anything for Amy, anything, that is, except commit. At the same time, he can't tolerate any guy getting close to her. But Amy is tired of being his 'go-to' girl and now Hunter faces the prospect of losing her for good. Amy Linton has loved Hunter Stone since childhood, a childhood that was nearly as grim as the one Hunter and his brothers endured. She can't imagine a life without Hunter but mentally, he remains distant and even cold. She needs more, and if he can't return her love, she is determined to break free of the hold Hunter Stone has on her heart and her life. Views: 29
Ranulph Fiennes, the world's greatest living explorer, has travelled to some of the remotest most dangerous parts of the globe. Well-known for his experiences at the poles and climbing Everest, he has also endured some of the hottest conditions on the planet, where temperatures regularly exceed 40 degrees and without water and shelter, death is inevitable. Views: 29
Elizabeth is a modern
woman. Smart. Independent. As sexual as she wants to be–with whomever
she wants to be. But a breakup with her academic boyfriend has hit her
harder than she cares to admit. And while her latest gig, translating a
glitzy Czech thriller into English, offends her literary sensibilities,
it arouses others with its steamy scenes of eroticism, violence,
submission, and dominance. Then, when her favorite Van Morrison
CD disappears from its rack and her house is inexplicably violated,
Elizabeth is afraid she’s starting to lose it–she even consults a local
vicar about the possibility of poltergeists.But what this woman
in the lovely Victorian is experiencing is not supernatural. Nor is it
madness. For in the dead of night, she will suddenly come face-to-face
with her tormentor. She will smell him, she will touch him, and she will
make a choice. Then the real haunting will begin. Views: 29
W. Sledge is a successful young criminal who has achieved too much, too soon. Living in a pleasant council flat in a London tower block, he owns a Jaguar, receives unemployment benefit and keeps an underage mistress. In his own eyes, W. Sledge has everything, until a routine robbery goes too far. The result is murder, and when the crime incites latent psychopathic tendencies, he murders again. As his path intertwines with a runaway girl and his childhood friend, this award-winning story comes to an immoral but extraordinary climax. Views: 29
ReviewWinner of the 2006 Arthur Ellis Award for Best Novel“April Fool thrusts itself brashly into the reader’s psyche like a lumber-jacketed logger at a black-tie affair. Ruggedly individualistic, demanding and determined, its characters are shrewdly etched and realistically rendered.” — Globe and Mail“Deverell brings back one of his classic characters, wily B.C. Queen’s Counsel Arthur Beauchamp, in this droll, witty novel about crime in the Gulf Islands.” — Toronto Sun“The dialogue crackles, the style is sharp and compelling, and it’s a treat to spend another book with Beauchamp.” — Vancouver Sun “Deverell burrows into Beauchamp’s soul, and we see almost everything unfold through his addled but fascinating perspective.” — *Vancouver Province “Deverell writes breathless prose, commas flying here and there with exuberant abandon, as he dissects the nuttiness of his various locations. . . . April Fool spills over with idiosyncratic characters.” — Edmonton Journal“Hugely entertaining.” — Calgary Herald “Deverell is one of Canada’s best and funniest mystery writers.” — Ottawa Citizen*“Readers gladly follow all of Deverell’s distinctly drawn characters through tiny outposts on Canada’s West Coast to the courtrooms of Victoria and Vancouver and the fine hotels of Europe. He is a master storyteller with a wonderful sense of humour. The story flows effortlessly, and readers are twigs on the river, along for one hell of a ride.” — Quill & Quire“[Deverell] is a hugely amusing and self-assured writer, and when you have his gifts it is hard to go wrong.” — National Post Views: 29
Amazon.com ReviewIf you judge books by their covers, Jack Welch's Winning certainly grabs your attention. Testimonials on the back come from none other than Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Rudy Giuliani, and Tom Brokaw, and other praise comes from Fortune, Business Week, and Financial Times. As the legendary retired CEO of General Electric, Welch has won many friends and admirers in high places. In this latest book, he strives to show why. Winning describes the management wisdom that Welch built up through four and a half decades of work at GE, as he transformed the industrial giant from a sleepy "Old Economy" company with a market capitalization of $4 billion to a dynamic new one worth nearly half a trillion dollars.Welch's first book, Jack: Straight from the Gut, was structured more as a conventional CEO memoir, with stories of early career adventures, deals won and lost, boardroom encounters, and Welch's process and philosophy that helped propel his success as a manager. In Winning, Welch focuses on his actual management techniques. He starts with an overview of cultural values such as candor, differentiation among employees, and inclusion of all voices in decision-making. In the second section he covers issues around one's own company or organization: the importance of hiring, firing, the people management in between, and a few other juicy topics like crisis management. From there, Welch moves into a discussion of competition, and the external factors that can influence a company's success: strategy, budgeting, and mergers and acquisitions. Welch takes a more personal turn later with a focus on individual career issues--how to find the right job, get promoted, and deal with a bad boss--and then a final section on what he calls "Tying Up Loose Ends." Those interested in the human side of great leaders will find this last section especially appealing. In it, Welch answers the most interesting questions that he's received in the last several years while traveling the globe addressing audiences of executives and business-school students. Perhaps the funniest question in this section comes at the very end, posed originally by a businessman in Frankfurt, who queried Welch on whether he thought he'd go to heaven (we won't give away the ending).While different from the steadier stream of war stories and real-life examples of Welch's first book, Winning is a very worthwhile addition to any management bookshelf. It's not often that a CEO described as the century's best retires, and then chooses to expound on such a wide range of management topics. Also, aside from the commentary on always-relevant issues like employee performance reviews and quality control, Welch suffuses this book with his pugnacious spirit. The Massachusetts native who fought his way to the top of the world's most valuable company was in many ways the embodiment of "Winning," and this spirit alone will provide readers an enjoyable read. --Peter HanFrom Publishers WeeklyStarred Review. One oft-heard comment about Welch's generally praised (and bestselling) 2001 memoir, Jack: Straight from the Gut, was that the book skimped on useful business advice. The respected but controversial former chief of General Electric pays readers back double here. Written with Welch's wife, a onetime editor of the Harvard Business Review, the book delivers a brilliant career's worth of consistently astute (and often iconoclastic) business wisdom and knowledge from the man Fortune magazine called "the manager of the century." Welch knows what he's talking about, and here offers an admirably concise primer on how to do business that's a paragon of tough common sense. From practices he employed at GE (e.g., the much-debated differentiation, which includes winnowing 10% of the workforce at regular intervals), to the personal qualities that lead to success (to Welch, candor is essential), to advice on job hunting and how to work with a bad boss, to ways to maximize the budget process (divorce it from performance rewards), Welch comments frankly and by myriad example, with a common touch that will draw readers in ("that was hardly the first time I'd gotten my clock cleaned by the press"). He explains upfront that the book arose as an attempt to codify his beliefs, in response to the many questions he's received at numerous public appearances since he retired from GE in 2001; as such the book has a somewhat lumpy feel, like an overstuffed bag of presents. But the writing, full of personality and ideas, is a model of clarity and insight, even on such dense subjects as the quality control program Six Sigma. It's difficult to think of anyone in business who wouldn't benefit from reading this savvy, engaging cubicle-to-boardroom guide to success; and it's likely, given Welch's reputation and the massive ad/promo HarperCollins is putting behind the book, that enough business people will want to read it to push it toward the top of the charts. (Apr. 5) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Views: 29
While the vampire Devlin rejoices at news of his impending progeny with Sar, werecougar Theo braces for more challenges to his Ranked title, content that after Sarelle has the dhamphir child Devlin will be out of their lives forever. Yet when The Lust reappears, Sar’s world again turns upside down as old hatreds make themselves known, resulting in a steamy affair with the weresnake Lash. Views: 29
It’s October, and you know what that means . . . well, sure, Halloween, but it’s also Max’s birthday! Now that a bunch of ghosts have entered Max’s life, no birthday celebration will ever be the same! All Max wants for his birthday is a great party–but will he live to see another new year?From the Hardcover edition.About the AuthorR. L. Stine began his writing career when he was nine years old, and today he has achieved the position of the bestselling children’s author in history. In the early 1990s, Stine was catapulted to fame when he wrote the unprecedented bestselling Goosebumps® series, which sold more than 250 million copies and became a worldwide media phenomenon.R.L. Stine has received numerous awards of recognition. He lives in New York, NY. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.11At dinner that night, Mom was very upset. She told Dad the whole story. “The principal called me this afternoon. Max told a teacher to shut up. And he tossed clay all over the art room.”Dad’s face turned even redder than usual. Steam started to pour from his ears. He gripped his fork and knife in his big, meaty fists. “In trouble again? Why did you do that, Max?”“Hard to explain,” I muttered.The dragon tattoo on Dad’s right bicep appeared to lower its fiery head and stare at me. “Why can’t you be more like Colin?” Dad growled. “Is that asking too much? Colin is perfect. Why can’t you be perfect?”“I don’t know,” I whispered, head down.Colin kicked me hard under the table. Then, grinning, he pulled out a sheet of paper. “Here is my new honor roll certificate,” he told Dad. “Would you like to get it framed like all the others?”I was grounded for a week. I didn’t see Nicky or Tara the whole time. I knew they were angry at me. Angry because I’d told them to stay away from my birthday party.But I didn’t expect them to totally disappear.A week after the pottery room incident, Quentin came over to practice magic tricks. My party was only a few days away. I wanted to rehearse and rehearse until our act was perfect.After all, Traci Wayne was coming. I wasn’t allowed to get near her. But this was my big chance to impress her.“Let me show you a hat trick that everyone loves,” Quentin said. “Do you have a real hat I could use?”I rubbed my chin, thinking hard. “No. I only have baseball caps,” I said. “Oh, wait. My dad has a really good hat he uses for weddings and funerals and things.”“Go get it,” Quentin said. “You’ll like this trick.”I hesitated. “But it’s my dad’s only hat, and it’s very expensive. You have to be very careful.”“No problem,” Quentin said. “The trick is perfectly safe. I’ve done it a thousand times.”I went down to my parents’ bedroom closet to borrow Dad’s hat. He and Mom were in the den, watching wrestling on TV. They were both shouting at the screen: “Kill him! Kill! Kill! Break him in two!”They both love wrestling. But sometimes they get carried away. Last week after a big match, Mom jumped on Dad and started slapping his bald head with both hands. He had to pick her up and carry her into the shower to snap her out of it.I pulled Dad’s hat down from the top shelf. And I also borrowed one of his neckties. He only has three, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen him wear one. I had learned a nifty new necktie trick that I knew Quentin would love.“Kill! Kill! Ruin him!” My parents’ shouts rang out from the den.Back in my room, I handed Quentin the hat.“What’s the trick?” I asked. “Will it be good for the party?”He nodded. He pulled a few things from his magic kit. He held up two eggs. “I crack these two eggs into the hat,” he said. “Then I pour in this jar of honey. Then I turn the hat right side up, and it’s perfectly dry.”I gulped. “Are you sure about this?”“Of course I’m sure,” Quentin said. “It’s an easy trick. Watch.”He pushed his blond hair off his forehead. Then he cracked the two eggs and let them run into the hat. Then he opened the honey jar and turned it upside down, and the honey slowly oozed into the hat with the egg yolks.“Say the magic words!” Quentin cried. “Hat be good!” He turned the hat over–and honey and yellow egg yolk came dripping out.“You–you ruined my dad’s hat!” I wailed.Quentin squinted at the sticky mess inside the hat. “I don’t get it. That trick always works.”My heart started leaping in my chest. I shoved the hat under my bed. Later I’d have to figure out a good hiding place for it.“What’s up with the necktie?” Quentin asked, picking up the tie and pulling it through his fingers.“Here’s a good trick for the party,” I said. “And this one is totally safe.”I took the tie from him and picked up a pair of scissors. “See? I make it look like I cut the tie into four pieces. But I don’t really cut it. I cut this piece of cloth instead.”I pulled the cloth from my magic kit and tucked it under the tie. “Now watch,” I said. “It looks like I’ve cut the tie up. But when I tug on it, it’s all together again.” “Cool,” Quentin muttered.“Ladies and gentlemen,” I boomed, holding the tie in front of me. “The Amazing Indestructible Necktie!”I snipped it into four pieces. I balled the pieces up in my hand. And then I gave a hard tug. “Back together again!” I exclaimed.Wrong.I’d sliced my dad’s tie into four pieces.“Oh, wow.” I stared at the pieces of tie in my hand.Then I pictured my dad, as big as a truck, a bellowing bull when he was angry. When he saw what I’d done to his hat and tie, he’d . . . he’d . . .I couldn’t even think about it.Trembling, I shoved the pieces of necktie under my bed next to the hat.Quentin tried a few easy card tricks. The cards fell from his hands and scattered over the floor.He tried the trick where he waves his magic wand and it turns into a bouquet of flowers. It didn’t work. The wand broke in two.He shook his head. “Max, everything is messed up tonight. I can’t figure out why.”I could.I knew what was happening. Nicky and Tara were messing up our tricks.I gritted my teeth and balled my hands into fists. I felt so angry, I wanted to scream.But no way could I tell Quentin about them.Nicky and Tara were angry because they couldn’t come to my party. So they were doing their best to mess up our magic act.We tried a few more easy tricks, and they were ruined too. “It just isn’t our night,” Quentin said. “Maybe we should try again tomorrow night.”He left, shaking his head, very confused.As soon as he was out the door, my two ghost friends appeared. “How’s it going, Max?” Tara asked, grinning at me.“You know how it’s going,” I snapped.“Did you have a bad night?” Nicky asked, acting innocent.I realized I was grinding my teeth. I’d never been so angry at them. “You have no right to do that,” I shouted. “You have no right to ruin all our tricks.”“I’ll bet your tricks will go a lot better if you invite us to your party,” Tara said.“For sure,” Nicky chimed in. “Invite us to your birthday party, and we’ll be your best friends again.”“No way!” I cried. “You’re not my best friends. And stop begging me. No way are you coming to my party!”They both put on these really hurt faces. Tara pulled off her hat, tossed it on the floor, and started stomping on it.I turned away from them and walked to the window. I took deep breaths, trying to calm down. I didn’t like being angry at them. They were two poor young ghosts, after all. They probably wouldn’t have any more birthdays–because they were dead.But messing up our magic tricks like that was just plain mean.I gazed out the window, pressing my forehead against the cool glass. A few stars twinkled dimly in the night sky. I lowered my eyes–and gasped when I saw the boy in black staring up at me. He stood at the side of my yard, leaning against a tree trunk.I pulled up the window, stuck my head out, and shouted down at him. “Go away! I’m warning you! Go away!”He took a few steps closer to the house. Light from the kitchen downstairs washed over him, and I saw his face. An old man’s face, lined and wrinkled and sagging.He cupped his hands around his mouth and called up to me. “Be careful!”Gripping the windowsill, I stared down at his ancient face, at his pale, sunken eyes. “What do you want?” I screamed. “Why are you doing this?”“Be careful,” he repeated in a breathy rasp of a voice. “They are going to kill you. The ghosts are going to kill you!”A chill ran down my back. I stepped away from the window. Shivering, I turned to Nicky and Tara.“What did he mean?” I asked. “Why did he say that? Why did he say you are going to kill me?”I saw the shock on Nicky’s and Tara’s faces.And then they disappeared. 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Product DescriptionBack home in Texas and ready to get her life in order, Gloria Mendoza knew men were a distraction she couldn't afford. So when she was offered assistance from CEO Jack Fortune to get her business up and running, Gloria sensed it would take incredible willpower to ignore the not-so-subtle attraction that simmered between them....As a top-notch businessman, Jack was used to being in control. And yet whenever he was around feisty, sultry Gloria, control was the last thing on his mind. Could the workaholic, famous for having ice in his veins, be ready to surrender to something even a Fortune couldn't deny? Views: 29
Science Fiction. 124946 words long. Views: 29
