The original Santa Claus stories, by the creator of The Wizard of Oz L. Frank Baum created the unforgettable world of Oz, but he also had an enormous impact on American culture by creating and memorializing the mythos of Santa Claus. Writing to entertain his own children, Baum also captured the imaginations of children around the world with his images of Santa and his reindeer, stockings by the chimney, and a magical trip around the world in a single night. Here in one volume for the first time are five of Baum's Santa Claus tales. Gathered from book, magazine, and Sunday paper, these are the stories that shaped the legend of the "Patron Saint of Children." From Little Bun Rabbit in Santa's workshop to the Wogglebug and friends making toys, over a century ago Baum created a legacy that captures hearts and imaginations to this day. Baum's Santa stories may have been written for children, but will appeal to anyone of any age... Views: 107
From the award-winning author of the international bestsellers Rise of the Flame, and The Chronicles of Koa series comes Goddess of War, an epic fantasy series set in a world of humans, fairies, and a battle between dueling gods.
After escaping the Vault, a prison for gods, twin siblings Preeti and Vineet make a desperate journey to another world.
The Abyss, also known as the human world.
The Abyss is nothing like they imagined, and soon they find that they may like it more than the world of the gods, especially when relationships form with their human friends.
Three years are all they have to hide from the Goddess of Law, a woman determined to either imprison or kill the twins and take their spot as rulers of the gods.
The human world will never be the same with the Goddess of War and the God of Peace hiding in their land.
Preeti and Vineet are thrust into a war for more than their lives, but their souls, and those of the humans they have grown to love. The Goddess of Law will stop at nothing to destroy them, even if that means tearing the human world apart.
Goddess of War is the first installment in a three book series.
God of Peace will be released January 2016
Love and Law will be released February 2016
For those that pre-ordered and received the wrong final copy, please visit knlee.com/goddess-of-war/ and fill out the contact form to receive an updated copy and free gift. Or, you can refresh your kindle December 3rd for the updated version. Thank you.
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WAS VIRTUAL KILLING JUST THE BEGINNING?When eminent psychiatrist Dr Liz Sullivan is found dead in her bed, suspicion falls on local gamer and YouTube celebrity Jaden 'JD' Dodds. Did he target her because of her anti-gaming views and the work she undertook to expose the dangers of playing online games? And what was her connection with Valiant, an independent game manufacturer about to hit the big time, and its volatile boss?Judith Burton and Constance Lamb team up once more to defend JD when no one else is on his side. But just because he makes a living killing people on screen doesn't mean he'd do it in real life. Or does it?Another thought-provoking courtroom drama from the acclaimed author of the Burton & Lamb series. Views: 107
2012
A riveting historical narrative of the shocking events
surrounding the assassination of John F. Kennedy, and the follow-up to
mega-bestselling author Bill O'Reilly's Killing Lincoln. More than a million readers have thrilled to Bill O'Reilly's Killing Lincoln,
the page-turning work of nonfiction about the shocking assassination
that changed the course of American history. Now the anchor of The O'Reilly Factor;
recounts in gripping detail the brutal murder of John Fitzgerald
Kennedy--and how a sequence of gunshots on a Dallas afternoon not only
killed a beloved president but also sent the nation into the cataclysmic
division of the Vietnam War and its culture-changing aftermath. In
January 1961, as the Cold War escalates, John F. Kennedy struggles to
contain the growth of Communism while he learns the hardships, solitude,
and temptations of what it means to be president of the United States.
Along the way he acquires a number of formidable enemies, among them
Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, and Alan
Dulles, director of the Central Intelligence Agency. In addition,
powerful elements of organized crime have begun to talk about targeting
the president and his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy. In
the midst of a 1963 campaign trip to Texas, Kennedy is gunned down by
an erratic young drifter named Lee Harvey Oswald. The former Marine
Corps sharpshooter escapes the scene, only to be caught and shot dead
while in police custody. The events leading up to the most notorious crime of the twentieth century are almost as shocking as the assassination itself. Killing Kennedy
chronicles both the heroism and deceit of Camelot, bringing history to
life in ways that will profoundly move the reader. This may well be the
most talked about book of the year.
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From Publishers WeeklyMontefiore (The Prince of Princes: The Life of Potemkin) is more interested in life at the top than at the bottom, so he includes hundreds of pages on Stalin's purges of top Communists, while devoting much less space to the forced collectivization of Soviet peasants that led to millions of deaths. In lively prose, he intersperses his mammoth account of Stalin's often-deadly political decisions with the personal lives of the Soviet dictator and those around him. As a result, the reader learns about sexual peccadilloes of the top Communists: Stalin's secret police chief Lavrenti Beria, for one, "craved athletic women, haunting the locker rooms of Soviet swimmers and basketball players." Stalin's own escapades after the death of his wife are also noted. There's also much detail about the food at parties and other meetings of Stalin's henchmen. The effect is paradoxical: Stalin and his cronies are humanized at the same time as their cruel misdeeds are recounted. Montefiore offers little help in answering some of the unsettled questions surrounding Stalin: how involved was he in the 1934 murder of rising official Sergei Kirov, for example. He also seems to leave open the question of Stalin's paranoia: he argues that the Georgian-born ruler was a charming man who used his people skills to get whatever he wanted. Montefiore mainly skirts the paranoia issue, noting that only after WWII, when Stalin launched his anti-Semitic campaigns, did he "become a vicious and obsessional anti-Semite." There are many Stalin biographies out there, but this fascinating work distinguishes itself by its extensive use of fresh archival material and its focus on Stalin's ever-changing coterie. Maps and 24 pages of photos not seen by PW. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From The New YorkerAny biography of a tyrant runs the risk of humanizing its subject to the point of appearing to mitigate his crimes. But Montefiore's intimate portrait actually throws the coldhearted murderousness with which Stalin pursued and defended power into sharper relief. The book—much of it based on fresh archival material—moves smoothly between detailed sketches of everyday life at the Kremlin and accounts of the paranoid and sanguinary scheming that determined Soviet politics. This juxtaposition captures the vertiginous quality of life in Stalin's court, where no allegiance was permanent. Just as strikingly, Montefiore shows how Stalin, a "master of friendships," used charm to win the support of members of the Party's inner circle (many of whom ended up regretting it). This haunting book gets us as close as we are likely to come to the man who believed that "the solution to every human problem was death." Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker Views: 107
Ellis Hock never believed that he would return to Africa. He runs an old-fashioned menswear store in a small town in Massachusetts but still dreams of his Eden, the four years he spent in Malawi with the Peace Corps, cut short when he had to return to take over the family business. When his wife leaves him, and he is on his own, he realizes that there is one place for him to go: back to his village in Malawi, on the remote Lower River, where he can be happy again.Arriving at the dusty village, he finds it transformed: the school he built is a ruin, the church and clinic are gone, and poverty and apathy have set in among the people. They remember him—the White Man with no fear of snakes—and welcome him. But is his new life, his journey back, an escape or a trap?Interweaving memory and desire, hope and despair, salvation and damnation, this is a hypnotic, compelling, and brilliant return to a terrain about which no one has ever written better than Theroux.Review"What we have finally is a relentless tale of suspense adroitly presented. Theroux’s practiced hand in the matter of dialogue and scene-making is strongly in evidence. No one will nod off reading The Lower River...It’s a particular kind of frightening fun to watch evil flexing and spreading its leathery wings, and really feel it. The Lower River gives the reader just that." -- The New York Review of Books " ‘The Lower River’ is riveting in its storytelling and provocative in its depiction of this African backwater, infusing both with undertones of slavery and cannibalism, savagery and disease. Theroux exposes paternalism in Hock’s Peace Corps nostalgia, his ‘sense of responsibility, almost a conceit of ownership.’ That sense of responsibility, and Hock’s modest contribution to the welfare of a people he was once genuinely fond of, has been replaced by a harsher mode of operation, run by coldhearted contractors living apart in impregnable compounds. ‘I have to leave,’ Hock pleads. ‘I’m going home.’ To which the village headman replies, with chilling menace, ‘This is your home, father.’ " -- New York Times Book Review"In this hypnotically compelling fiction, [Theroux] wrestles with questions of good intentions and harsh reality...A gripping and vital novel that reads like Conrad or Greene—in short, a classic." -- Booklist, starred"Theroux successfully grafts keen observations about the efficacy of international aid and the nature of nostalgia to a swift-moving narrative through a beautifully described landscape." -- PW, starred"Extraordinary...The suspense is enriched by Theroux’s loving attention to local customs and his subversive insights...Theroux has recaptured the sweep and density of his 1981 masterpiece The Mosquito Coast. That’s some achievement." -- Kirkus, starred"Theroux's latest can be read as straight-up suspense, but those unafraid of following him into the heart of darkness will be rewarded with much to discuss in this angry, ironic depiction of misguided philanthropy in a country dense with natural resources yet unable to feed its people." -- Library JournalAbout the AuthorPAUL THEROUX is the author of many highly acclaimed books. His novels include The Lower River and The Mosquito Coast, and his renowned travel books include Ghost Train to the Eastern Star and Dark Star Safari. He lives in Hawaii and on Cape Cod. Views: 107
Paul Theroux, one of the world’s most popular authors, both for his travel books and his fiction, has produced an off-beat story of 1960s weirdos unlike anything he has ever written.During the time of Lyndon Johnson’s presidency, Herbie Gneiss is forced to leave college to get a job. His income from the Kant-Brake toy factory, which manufactures military toys for children, keeps his chocolate-loving mother from starvation. Mr. Gibbon, a patriotic veteran of three wars, also works at Kant-Brake. When Herbie is drafted, Mr. Gibbon falls in love with Herbie’s mother and they move in together at Miss Ball’s rooming house. Since Herbie is fighting for his country, Mr. Gibbon feels that he, too, should do something for his country and convinces Miss Ball and Mrs. Gneiss to join him in the venture. They decide to rob the Mount Holly Trust Company because it is managed by a small dark man who is probably a communist. There are some complications. Combine... Views: 107
A taut, complex psychological thriller from the author of The Doctor's WifeLike The Doctor's Wife - which The Boston Globe called "a compelling read"-Somebody Else's Daughter is a literary page-turner peopled with fascinating and disturbing characters. In the idyllic Berkshires, at the prestigious Pioneer School, there are dark secrets that threaten to come to light. Willa Golding, a student, has been brought up by her adoptive parents in elegant prosperity, but they have fled a mysterious and shameful past. Her biological father, a failing writer and former drug addict, needs to see the daughter he abandoned, and so he gains a teaching position at the school. A feminist sculptor initiates a reckless affair, the Pioneer students live in a world to which adults turn a blind eye, and the headmaster's wife is busy keeping her husband's current indiscretions well hidden. Building to a breathtaking collision between two fathers-biological and adoptive,... Views: 107
