To keep from serving jail time, Vince Templeton agrees to take on a false identity and go to Surlock, Wyoming. Once there he is to work as a teamster for Charles Huxton and try to prevent a war that is brewing between Huxton's Transport and the Yates freight outfit.However, he quickly discovers he is on the wrong side when he falls hard for Jessie Yates. While trying to prevent arson, sabotage and murder he also assumes the impossible task of winning over a girl who hates him and everyone working for Huxton.When the showdown comes, he must not only save the woman he loves but also outshoot a deadly gunman named Phoenix Cline and all of Huxton's henchmen. It's a job that will test his mettle: to fail the test is to die. Views: 37
From Publishers WeeklyIt doesn't take Lancaster long to live up to her lengthy subtitle ("Confessions of a Condescending, Egomaniacal, Self-Centered Smart-Ass, or Why You Should Never Carry a Prada Bag to the Unemployment Office"): in just one chapter, she gloats over cheating a homeless man, is rude to a waitress and passes judgment on all of her co-workers (including her "whore" best friend). She's almost gleeful about lacking "the internal firewall that keeps us from saying almost everything we think," but she doesn't come off as straightforward, just malicious. (Of course, it's possible she's making up much of her dialogue, which is a little too clever to be believable.) Lancaster expects sympathy for her downward slide after getting fired from her high-paying finance job in the post-9/11 recession, and chick lit fans may be entertained watching life imitate fiction, but just when you start to feel sorry for her, the snotty attitude returns. In later chapters, Lancaster increasingly relies on entries from her blog (www.jennsylvania. com) and caustic replies to criticisms, and though things start looking up—her husband finds a job, she lands a book deal—it's not clear that she's been as chastised by her experiences as she claims. (Mar. 7) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Product DescriptionJen Lancaster was living the sweet life-until real life kicked her to the curb. She had the perfect man, the perfect job-hell, she had the perfect life-and there was no reason to think it wouldn't last. Or maybe there was, but Jen Lancaster was too busy being manicured, pedicured, highlighted, and generally adored to notice. This is the smart-mouthed, soul-searching story of a woman trying to figure out what happens next when she's gone from six figures to unemployment checks and she stops to reconsider some of the less-than-rosy attitudes and values she thought she'd never have to answer for when times were good. Filled with caustic wit and unusual insight, it's a rollicking read as speedy and unpredictable as the trajectory of a burst balloon. Views: 37
More Than Male: Azar's Prize Reese Gabriel Book 3 in the More Than Male series. Theryssa is the first female graduate in the history of the Guardian Academy. Her primale genetics, inherited from Theron and Nyssa, make her more than a match for any man. But, when her first mission requires that she allow the notorious space pirate Azar Xenelion to capture her, she finds it is her female hormones she must battle. Little does she realize that Azar is primale, too. Azar quickly wins her submission, making her his willing sex slave. Theryssa desperately seeks to keep her true identity a secret while carrying out her mission of spying on her new Master. Just as things are coming to a head, Theron and Nyssa arrive. They reveal that Theryssa's real purpose is not to spy on Azar but to mate with him. He thinks they must have lost their minds to expect him to fall in with their plan. In the end it will be up to Azar to find the love in his heart to protect his prize and save the galaxy. Views: 37
Johnny Vermillion's theater troupe brings masterpieces to the Wild West. The four actors are versatile enough to wear many costumes and play many roles. A few props, a little makeup, a costume and—voilà—applause on the rugged frontier.Johnny also arranges a special attraction for each town. While his actors bustle in and out of costumes, on and off the stage in many roles, one plays the villain in the bank. Then the actors take their curtain calls and railroad away.Who? Us? Rob a bank? But you saw all of us on stage. When could we have done that?A Pinkerton man becomes the troupe's severest critic: He notices the news reports of stage performances one day and bank robberies the next. He follows the troupe, packing his suspicions. Finally, he sets a clever trap.Johnny Vermillion is one of the most entertaining rogues ever to turn a dishonest dollar. Any audience will love a troupe that can transform A Midsummer Night's Dream... Views: 37
Led Zeppelin IV, often called heavy metal's greatest album, kicks off an exciting new series that takes a fresh, in-depth look at some of the greatest works from the most influential artists of the rock era. Fans may know the songs, but wait until they hear the stories behind them!The music contained in Led Zeppelin IV is part of the soundtrack to a generation. Released in 1971, it rocks, stomps, glides, and shimmers as it covers all the bases the band had mastered: heavy blues, barroom rock and roll, mandolin-driven folk, epic Tolkien-infused mysticism, acoustic Americana, and more. Certified gold one week after its release, the album went to #2 on the U.S. charts and #1 in the U.K. It remained on U.S. charts for 259 weeks. There probably isn't an aspiring rock guitarist anywhere who hasn't plucked out the notes and chords to "Stairway to Heaven" or "Black Dog," and yet many music lovers are unaware of the intriguing backstory to this genre-defining work.To this day there is confusion about what is the actual title of the album. And what about those mysterious symbols? Barney Hoskyns pierces those veils and more as he tells the fascinating story of the evocative set that cemented Led Zeppelin's standing as the biggest, baddest, loudest band in the world—and that remains today the apex of their art. Views: 37
From USA Today Bestselling Author Aileen Erin For the first time since Tessa met Dastien, life is quiet. The evil witch, Luciana, is six glorious feet under, St. Ailbe's is closed due to human trespassers, and people are finally getting used to the fact that supernaturals exist in the world. It seems like the perfect time for a honeymoon.After traveling to Dastien's house in Provence, clubbing in Paris, and attending Meredith and Donovan's Full Moon Ceremony in Ireland, Tessa and Dastien head to the Caribbean. Their trip is turning out to be the honeymoon that fantasies are made of-sunset cruises, long walks on the beach, and every romantic cliché you can imagine. Tessa couldn't be happier. Except that Tessa's visions are on the fritz. She hopes that means that nothing is brewing. That everything is quiet because all is well. But Tessa's never been one to assume anything.When she's magically attacked and nearly dies, Tessa knows she can't ignore the signs... Views: 37
I have this annoying problem that gives me a lot of trouble: a conscience. Neil Bridges attends a Catholic boys' school in which teachers rule with iron fists and thick leather straps. Some crumble under the pressure but Neil toughs it out, just as his Vietnam-bound older brother has done before him. He has to be a man, after all. But at sixteen, how can he be sure of himself when he's not sure of anything else? He loses a friend and finds another, falls in love and unwittingly treads a path that leads to revenge and possibly murder . . . Views: 37
Hypnotic and beautifully written, Aftermath of Dreaming is an incandescent first novel of odern life and love.Other than the little problem that she is waking up screaming in the middle of the night, life is wonderful for Yvette Broussard. Her jewelry-design career is taking off, she's back with her sort-of boyfriend, and, best of all, she no longer thinks about her once-in-a-lifetime love, international movie star Andrew Madden. Until a chance encounter with him changes everything.Swept up by memories of their complex relationship, Yvette is plunged into an obsession with Andrew that ultimately forces her to confront the past she thought she had left behind. At the same time, she is juggling the demands of her bride-to-be sister and her male best friend, who is jealous of other men, and thoughts of her estranged father.Set against the glittering worlds of Los Angeles and New York, and told with both humor and pathos,... Views: 37
"Jonathan L. Howard has such an effortless way with monsters and the undead that you might suspect him of being, like his creation, Johannes Cabal, a necromancer. The series is addictive." —Richard Kadrey, author of the Sandman Slim series"The Brothers Cabal is smart, funny, and dark in all the right places. Imagine Mycroft and Sherlock — if one were a polite vampire and the other were a surly necromancer — up against an army of monsters and magicians. Like Pratchett and Fforde, Jonathan L. Howard puts it all together and makes it look effortless."—Christopher Farnsworth, author of Blood OathHorst Cabal has risen from the dead. Again. Horst, the most affable vampire one is ever likely to meet, is resurrected by an occult conspiracy that wants him as a general in a monstrous army. Their plan: to create a country of horrors, a supernatural homeland. As Horst sees the lengths to which they are prepared to go and the evil they... Views: 37
From Publishers WeeklyLevy presents a sympathetic but unremarkable biography of the legendary frontiersman in colloquial if occasionally florid prose (an election loss "burned into Crockett like a brand searing a cow's flank"). Those whose image of Crockett was formed by the cultishly successful Disney treatment will find much that is familiar: the Indian fighter with Andrew Jackson, the congressmen from Tennessee and, finally, the Texas patriot who died defending the Alamo. But Levy (Echoes on Rimrock: In Pursuit of the Chukar Partridge) offers more (although not a lot more) in the way of background and complexity, and is willing to expose some of Crockett's deficiencies without making judgments: Crockett clearly indulged his wanderlust at the expense of his wife, a strong figure in her own right, and was, for a variety of reasons, an ineffective, bumbling politician. But despite his faults, readers will find Crockett likable and talented. In Levy's view, Crockett's abilities were expansive, and he opines that Crockett's bestselling 1834 autobiography "prefigures by some fifty years the literary genre of 'realism,' with nothing remotely like it" until Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. And Crockett's falling out with President Jackson over, in part, Jackson's brutal Indian Removal Act of 1830 is to the frontiersman's credit. B&w illus. (Jan.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistCrockett was born in 1786 in Tennessee and died at the Alamo in 1836. In his brief lifetime, he became a folk hero, a three-time congressman, and a potential presidential contender. In this meticulously researched book, Levy chronicles Crockett's remarkable rise to fame. For most of the first half of his life, Crockett lived from day to day, driven by the barest necessities of food, clothing, and shelter. He married and then rented a small farm, and the couple had two sons and a daughter; his wife died from complications after their daughter's birth. He fought in the War of 1812 against Great Britain and later became a magistrate, the first step in his career in public life. In the end, as Levy has it, Crockett transcended the facts of his life to become an enduring symbol of possibility, remembered not for his deeds or his greatness, but for the tenacity of his spirit. George CohenCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved Views: 37
Gathering a wide range of traditional African myths, this compelling new collection offers tales of heroes battling mighty serpents and monstrous birds, brutal family conflict and vengeance, and desperate migrations across vast and alien lands. From accounts of the inventive wiles of animal-creators and a community forced to flee a giant crocodile to the heroic story of the cripple Sunjata who rose to found an empire, all the narratives here concern origins. They offer a kaleidoscopic picture representative of the rich cultures and societies of the African continent: the ways of life, the peoples—from small hunting bands to great empires—and the states that have taken shape over many generations and environments.First time in Penguin ClassicsStories span the centuries and range across the entire continent, from ancient Egypt and Ethiopia through the Sahara to ZimbabweIncludes individual prefaces to each section, putting the stories in their geographical and social context; maps; suggestions for further reading, and an index of people, places, and themes** Views: 37
A slick gothic tale, a murder mystery, a reflection on the works of the masters of the French Enlightenment, a tour of Edwardian England, and a work of atmosphere, unease, and suspenseDavid Morris lives the quiet life of a book-valuer for a London auction house, traveling every day by omnibus to his office in the Strand. When he is asked to make a trip to rural Somerset to value the library of the recently deceased Lord Buff-Orpington, the sense of trepidation he feels as he heads into the country is confirmed the moment he reaches his destination, the dark and impoverished village of Ashbrittle. These feelings turn to dread when he meets the enigmatic Professor Richard Hunt and catches a glimpse of a screaming woman he keeps prisoner in his house. Views: 37
