"MATT BRAUN IS A MASTER STORYTELLER OF FRONTIER HISTORY." —Elmer Kelton It takes a man with gutsA rare breed of bullbog and bloodhound, private detective Luke Starbuck has been hired to ferret out the Judas working for the Central Pacific—a mastermind behind a string of train robberies. The target: gold shipments from the Frisco mint. All Starbuck has to do is pass himself off as an outlaw and infiltrate the pack...To take on the Barbary CoastBut chumming up to a gang leader like Denny O'Brien means that Starbuck must follow him into the vice pits of the notorious Barbary Coast. Getting inside this hellhole of crime is dangerously easy if you make the right moves. Make the wrong ones, and getting out could be murder... "BRAUN IS ONE OF THE BEST!"—Don Coldsmith, author of the Spanish Bit... Views: 64
Aug 2011
“From this century, in France, three names will remain: de Gaulle, Picasso, and Chanel.” –André Malraux
Coco Chanel created the look of the modern woman and was the high priestess of couture.
She believed in simplicity, and elegance, and freed women from the tyranny of fashion. She inspired women to take off their bone corsets and cut their hair. She used ordinary jersey as couture fabric, elevated the waistline, and created bell-bottom trousers, trench coats, and turtleneck sweaters.
In the 1920s, when Chanel employed more than two thousand people in her workrooms, she had amassed a personal fortune of $15 million and went on to create an empire.
Jean Cocteau once said of Chanel that she had the head of “a little black swan.” And, added Colette, “the heart of a little black bull.”
At the start of World War II, Chanel closed down her couture house and went across the street to live at the Hôtel Ritz. Picasso, her friend, called her “one of the most sensible women in Europe.” She remained at the Ritz for the duration of the war, and after, went on to Switzerland.
For more than half a century, Chanel’s life from 1941 to 1954 has been shrouded in vagueness and rumor, mystery and myth. Neither Chanel nor her many biographers have ever told the full story of these years.
Now Hal Vaughan, in this explosive narrative—part suspense thriller, part wartime portrait—fully pieces together the hidden years of Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel’s life, from the Nazi occupation of Paris to the aftermath of World War II.
Vaughan reveals the truth of Chanel’s long-whispered collaboration with Hitler’s high-ranking officials in occupied Paris from 1940 to 1944. He writes in detail of her decades-long affair with Baron Hans Günther von Dincklage, “Spatz” (“sparrow” in English), described in most Chanel biographies as being an innocuous, English-speaking tennis player, playboy, and harmless dupe—a loyal German soldier and diplomat serving his mother country and not a member of the Nazi party.
In Vaughan’s absorbing, meticulously researched book, Dincklage is revealed to have been a Nazi master spy and German military intelligence agent who ran a spy ring in the Mediterranean and in Paris and reported directly to Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, right hand to Hitler.
The book pieces together how Coco Chanel became a German intelligence operative; how and why she was enlisted in a number of spy missions; how she escaped arrest in France after the war, despite her activities being known to the Gaullist intelligence network; how she fled to Switzerland for a nine-year exile with her lover Dincklage. And how, despite the French court’s opening a case concerning Chanel’s espionage activities during the war, she was able to return to Paris at age seventy and triumphantly resurrect and reinvent herself—and rebuild what has become the iconic House of Chanel. Views: 64
2 Months, 28 Days, 9 Hours, and 12 minutes earlier...Sally Simplesmith's life changed forever. She came face-to-face with death - a delightful, dearly departed little dog she lovingly calls Bones. But when the cadaverous canine is accused of a crime he didn't commit, Sally decides to solve the case herself!Does Sally have what it takes to fetch a thief?Sally's Bones is the impossibly possible tale of a girl, a crime, and a lovably lifeless, decidedly dead dog. Views: 64
What really happens behind the statistics of teenage promiscuity? Why will no one talk about the trend of young girls using sex to prove their worth—to boys, to friends, and to themselves? Kerry Cohen, psychotherapist and author of the provocative memoir Loose Girl, answers these questions while providing real-life stories from teenage girls in their own words. Dirty Little Secrets is a ground-breaking examination of the subject and a genuine discussion about how we can make changes for ourselves, our daughters, and our culture. Views: 64
Ever felt like you don't belong? When Libby Marchant and husband Ned made the monumental decision to sacrifice luxuries and holidays to see their only son Max through private education, they hadn’t expected to meet so many unsavoury and dislikeable personalities along the way. Happily, the cruel jibes of the pompous ‘Meemies’ are made more tolerable by the lasting and loyal friendship they strike up with the affluent Fenella & Josh. Follow Libby’s journey as she discovers the chasm between the Haves and the Have-Nots in her mad new world of school committees, designer handbags, bitching and botox. With Fenella by her side, Libby is able to maintain her sanity. But what happens when the credit crunch bites, you’re desperate for another baby and your Asian neighbour is trying to match-make you with her infatuated son? Views: 64
To think of Chicago in the 1930s is to conjure up pictures of the Chicago Outfit and its earlier crime lords like Capone, to envision a gangsters' and bootleggers' haven in the Roaring Twenties and in the Depression that ended them. Even the storied history of the Cubs or of the city's merchant princes and philanthropists can't quite shake the city's gritty image.It's time for a new look. And here it is, a mystery with a warm family of widowed mother and four daughters at its core. Elodie (Elodie—rhymes with "melody"), the Browne family bread-winner, lacks direct experience with crime, but she's full of curiosity, sharply observant, and nobody's fool. So when a man stumbles into a party given by a Chinese importer of jade and antiques where she is working "for a lark—and extra cash" and utters a dying word—mingdow—she doesn't turn aside. Instead she begins to connect the murder with some odd doings in the office building where she works, events that... Views: 64
The first baby was found early on a weekend morning in September 1985, as the whole broad length of the Upper Valley braced for its annual riptide of strangers, and as the first maples on the banks of the Sabbathday River prepared to burst, obligingly, into flame. Jogging outside the town of Goddard, New Hampshire, Naomi Roth finds the body of a newborn baby girl floating facedown in the Sabbathday River. News of the dead child spreads quickly through Goddard, and Naomi--an aging idealist, a former VISTA volunteer, and the founder of a women's quilting cooperative--is shocked when the community swiftly, implausibly fingers Heather Pratt, a young single mother notorious for her affair with a married man, as the prime suspect. It comes as an even greater shock when, after a long interrogation behind closed doors, Heather confesses to the crime.Moved and angered by Heather's plight--and increasingly isolated in conservative Goddard--Naomi engages the... Views: 64
Product DescriptionFor a tough as nails Dom hunting a sadistic serial killer is nothing compared to losing his heart.Harmless #6Rome Carino is hunting a predator. One who likes to hurt submissives, and the most popular BDSM club’s patrons are being targeted. With each fresh kill he gets more brazen. Rome knows he just needs one little break, but before he can make headway, the FBI shows up. Worse, the uptight, buttoned-down Special Agent Maria Callahan suggests a plan that is dangerous, but worth it because it might just catch the killer. If Rome can keep his mind on the case and off the beautiful FBI agent, he'll be just fine.Maria is still trying to step out of her legendary father's shadow and knows just how to do it. Luring the killer by posing as Rome's new sub seems like a good idea. That is, until undercover becomes real life and she finds herself tangled up with a man who amazes and scares her at the same time. Her growing attraction to the Honolulu Police Detective is a little too much to handle. Even knowing that, she can't help falling in love with the tough Dom and losing herself in the games they play in the bedroom. Rome is overwhelmed by his need for Maria. He has never had a sub respond to him the way she does, and no matter what he does, he feels himself slipping off that cliff into love. As their relationship starts to unfold, he realizes that he will do anything to win her heart, to convince her to become his sub for a lifetime. But before he can do anything, the killer turns his attention on Rome and the one thing he holds dear: Maria.WARNING: The following book contains: A Dom who thinks he can do no wrong, a new sub who is about to teach him he can, palm trees, a trip or two to Rough ‘n Ready, a flirty Aussie Dom with questionable motives, old friends, and a new enemy. Yeah, it might be called Harmless, but you Addicts know it’s anything but. Views: 64
Robert: Left on the steps of a church as a baby, Robert was often hungry but never stole food like the other orphans in town. Introverted and extraordinarily intelligent, he knew all the Latin prayers and hymns by heart by the time he was five years old.Georgette: Her own mother died in childbirth, leaving Georgette with a father who, seventeen at the time, had neither experience nor aptitude as a nurturing parent, and a brother known in town as Le Fuer - The Spitfire - for his terrible temper.Perhaps to replace something missing from their own lives, both Robert and Georgette are drawn to the news of a crusader, twelve or thirteen, no older than themselves, travelling down through France with thousands of followers - all, unbelievably, children too.Of those thousands, this is the incredible story of two. A story of hardship, loss and love. A masterful and superlative telling of an extraordinary event, seen through the eyes of two equally extraordinary characters. Read it and... Views: 64
