This is the omnibus version containing the 3 volumes of the trilogy. Present Day Wall Street. Where intelligence agencies and the financial industry are strange bedfellows, and the two worlds are often intertwined in disturbing ways. In this chillingly plausible, controversial scenario of a military/industrial/financial complex run amok, Zero Sum pits Dr. Steven Archer Cross against powerful financier Nicholas Griffen in a conflict that raises troubling questions about our markets and our government. Racing against the clock in a chase that spans continents, one man's battle to expose the Machiavellian machinations of a ruthless Wall Street marauder forces him into a financial jungle populated by every variety of unscrupulous sociopath - rogue intelligence agencies, Russian mafia oligarchs, drug cartels and terrorist networks. As a white-collar game of chess transitions into a lethal real world cage-fight, Steven finds himself in a deadly showdown, where hunters can quickly become the hunted and blood is the ultimate currency. Zero Sum is the first novel featuring Dr. Steven Archer Cross ++++ Q & A for Zero Sum Question: Where did the idea for Zero Sum come from? RB: I thought the inside scoop of how a Wall Street pump and dump works would be a great framework for a thriller. The innate conspiracy begs to be told, and I also wanted to give some background on how the market actually functions. Q: Zero Sum offers readers a look behind the curtain on Wall Street's dark side. Do you think there's much of an audience for that? RB: With the current financial crisis & the emerging awareness that things are badly broken in the regulatory & law enforcement scheme, I think the novel's timely. Its depiction of Wall Street predators with their pet politicians, regulators & media cronies is spot on. I've found readers are fascinated once they understand it all. Q: Zero Sum paints a picture of Wall Street that's at odds with the sanitized image in the media. Have you gotten any flack because of it? RB: There's definitely a segment of the financial industry that would prefer nobody reads the book. The parasites that run the schemes described in it are alive & well & doing it every day, relying on the public's ignorance to prosper. There are some annoyed players who want this read about as much as they want a 60 Minutes crew at their office. It's a controversial story, & I'm not making any friends telling it. Q: Your characters seem real, especially the Wall Street villain, intelligence operatives & mob goons. Are these based in fact? RB: A good fiction author blends truth & fiction to the point where you aren't sure where the story starts & the facts leave off. Let's just say that the characters & scenarios that seem real, are likely that vivid & believable for a reason. Q: What authors do you read & which have most influenced you? RB: I grew up on Ludlum. Forsyth. Harris, Grisham. Fans of those authors will find my writing's similar - Bourne, Day of the Jackal, The Firm. + Zero Sum features Dr. Steven Archer Cross, from The Voynich Cypher** Views: 19
Mystery/Crime. 46831 words long. Views: 19
Canada was young during the First World War, and with as many as 20,000 underage soldiers leaving their homes to join the war effort, the country's army was, too. Jim, at 17, was one of them, and he penned countless letters home. But these weren't the writings of an ordinary boy. They were the letters of a lad who left a small farming community for the city on July 15, 1915, a boy who volunteered to serve with the 79th Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders.Jim's letters home gloss over the horrors of war, focusing instead on issues of the home front: of harvesting, training the horses, and the price of hogs. Rarely do these letters, especially those to his mother and father, mention the mud and rats, the lice and stench of the trenches, or the night duty of cutting barbed wire in no man's land. For 95 years his letters remained in a shoebox decorated by his mother.Jim was just 18 when he was wounded and died during the Battle of the Somme. Hold the Oxo! tells the... Views: 19
Mr. Popper has penguins in his fridge, an ice rink in the basement, and a family for whom life will never be the sameHow many penguins in the house is too many? Mr. Popper is a humble house painter living in Stillwater who dreams of faraway places like the South Pole. When an explorer responds to his letter by sending him a penguin named Captain Cook, Mr. Popper and his family's lives change forever. Soon one penguin becomes twelve, and the Poppers must set out on their own adventure to preserve their home.First published in 1932, Mr. Popper's Penguins is a classic tale that has enchanted young readers for generations. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Richard and Florence Atwater including rare photos from the authors' estate. Views: 19
Babala, golden-haired with eyes in which a man could drown, is trained to please by the Task Master of the kingdom of Ellipsis. Destined for the prince's use she is stolen by the mistress of the harem, the Lady Fazath. Four guards are sent to find them in the deep forest, and unable to resist Babala, nor Fazath's protestations, the men use the two females for their pleasure. Then stricken with fear the men take their captives over the border, where they are sold at auction. Babala is bought by a rich merchant who lives in a castle at the pinnacle of a crag. Here she is worked in the kitchens and put to tricks for the entertainment of guests. Meanwhile Fazath is disciplined to enjoy a man rather than the sensual beauty of a woman, which has always been her pleasure. Babala yearns for the safety of the harem, and Fazath bemoans her fate as she and her owner search high and low for the prince's favourite. Views: 19
Sometimes, it's the unplanned events that change your life the most. Dana never planned on getting pregnant from her one night stand. Galen never planned on being arrested for murder. They certainly never planned on meeting again during a jailbreak in Ecuador! Passion abounds in the steamy Amazon jungle as Dana and Galen search for a murderer and find a love that is unplanned!Galen Hall wakes in a Ecuadorian jail with a murderous headache, a murder charge, and a memory gap where his alibi should be. How does the jungle guide prove his innocence? His best friend comes to help, only to bring with him the woman whose unplanned love sent him fleeing the Amazon to begin with.One night of steamy jungle passion has botanist Dana Rutherford carrying a stranger's baby. While coming to terms with raising a child on her own, she learns of the father's captivity. In a town where corruption reigns, she unknowingly initiates a jailbreak, and finds herself again face-to-face with the... Views: 19
THE CASE OF THE KIDNAPPED MOMMY Officer Guy Tripopulous knew that this was not his usual type of case. The ransom note was smeared, the letters printed, and the victim's children seemed awfully...informed. But Guy was willing to play along. He'd been looking for a way to meet his beautiful next-door neighbor, and Addie and A. J. Douglas had just solved his problem very neatly. Finding the "missing" mommy was a piece of cake. But now Guy had a tougher case on his hands. Nancy Douglas and her two adorable kids had stolen his heart--and he wasn't sure he wanted it back! Views: 19
This spellbinding story introduces the unforgettable seventeen-year-old narrator, Luke Prescott, who has been brought up in a bohemian matriarchy by his divorced New Age mother, a religious grandmother, and two precocious half-sisters. Having spent a short lifetime swinging agreeably between the poles of Eastern mysticism and New England Puritanism, Luke is fascinated by the new fields of brain science and believes in having evidence for his beliefs. “Without evidence,” he declares, “you just have hope, which is nice, but not reliable.” Luke is writing his college applications when his father—a famous television star whom he never knew—calls and invites him to Los Angeles for the summer. Luke accepts and is plunged into a world of location shooting, celebrity interviews, glamorous parties, and premieres. As he begins to know the difference between his father’s public persona and his private one, Luke finds himself sorting through his own personal mythology. By the end of the summer Luke thinks he has found the answers he’s been seeking, only to discover that the differences between truth and belief are not always easy to spot, and that evidence can be withheld: when Luke returns home, his mother reveals something she knows will change everything for him. With Blind Sight, Meg Howrey gives us a smart, funny, and deeply moving story about truth versus belief, about what we do and don’t tell ourselves—with the result, as Luke says, that we don’t always know what we know.From the Hardcover edition. Views: 19
