Cyber-warfare: the kind that brings nations to their knees, switching off energy lifelines, crippling the financial markets, starving leaders of authority. An old Russian nuclear reactor goes into Chernobyl-style meltdown while, on the other side of the world, the US Eastern Seaboard is plunged into darkness. No one knows - yet - who is responsible for the chaos.Hidden from view of the rest of the world, an extraordinary meeting of the US President, the Russian President and the British Prime Minister is about to take place. They have the weekend to save the world - and they must do it alone.Something serious is going on in Beijing. Military manoeuvres. Troops on the streets. It's as though the Chinese are preparing for the final thrust against their old enemies, bringing them to their knees in a war that will see not a single shot being fired.Review"Fascinating and pretty frightening stuff." —Frederick Forsyth, author, The Cobra"Dobbs was clearly put on this earth to write thrillers of the most shamelessly page-turning quality." —Daily Express"There are no half measures in Michael Dobbs's thrillers." —GuardianAbout the AuthorMichael Dobbs is the author of 15 thrillers including the major bestsellers The Lords' Day, Winston's War, and House of Cards which became a hugely successful BBC TV drama. He lives near Salisbury in Wiltshire. Visit his website www.michaeldobbs.com Views: 119
From the winner of the first Lannan Prize for Cultural Freedom, a bitingly funny, kaleidoscopic vision of the first world through the eyes of the thirdEduardo Galeano, author of the incomparable Memory of Fire Trilogy, combines a novelist's intensity, a poet's lyricism, a journalist's fearlessness, and the strong judgments of an engaged historian. Now his talents are richly displayed in Upside Down, an eloquent, passionate, sometimes hilarious exposé of our first-world privileges and assumptions. In a series of lesson plans and a "program of study" about our beleaguered planet, Galeano takes the reader on a wild trip through the global looking glass. From a master class in "The Impunity of Power" to a seminar on "The Sacred Car"—with tips along the way on "How to Resist Useless Vices" and a declaration of "The Right to Rave"—he surveys a world unevenly divided between abundance and deprivation, carnival and torture, power and helplessness. We have... Views: 119
Valentine returns from the dead, and now she wants vengeance!Valentine's last memories were of the brutal last stand on Deimos. It was a battle that costs the lives of thousands, and left the moons of Mars shattered, perhaps never to recover. Valentine lost so much more than just her life. She watched her friends and comrades fall one by one, with many sacrificing themselves in vain to stoop the onslaught until she too fell in battle. They might be gone, but a Nova never really dies. Broken and dying, she has been patched together like so many times before. Valentine has little idea of where she ends and the machine begins, and now she does not care.After the brutal Siege of Deimos little matters to her more than her need for vengeance. The dreadnoughts, cruisers and transports are ready, and so are the Novas. They will not stop until those that brought destruction to Mars and its moons pay for their crimes. The war has just begun.Vengeance is the... Views: 119
SUMMARY:In a work of extraordinary narrative power, filled with brilliant personalities and vivid scenes of dramatic action, Robert K. Massie, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Peter the Great, Nicholas and Alexandra, and Dreadnought, elevates to its proper historical importance the role of sea power in the winning of the Great War.The predominant image of this first world war is of mud and trenches, barbed wire, machine guns, poison gas, and slaughter. A generation of European manhood was massacred, and a wound was inflicted on European civilization that required the remainder of the twentieth century to heal.But with all its sacrifice, trench warfare did not win the war for one side or lose it for the other. Over the course of four years, the lines on the Western Front moved scarcely at all; attempts to break through led only to the lengthening of the already unbearably long casualty lists.For the true story of military upheaval, we must look to the sea. On the eve of the war in August 1914, Great Britain and Germany possessed the two greatest navies the world had ever seen. When war came, these two fleets of dreadnoughts—gigantic floating castles of steel able to hurl massive shells at an enemy miles away—were ready to test their terrible power against each other.Their struggles took place in the North Sea and the Pacific, at the Falkland Islands and the Dardanelles. They reached their climax when Germany, suffocated by an implacable naval blockade, decided to strike against the British ring of steel. The result was Jutland, a titanic clash of fifty-eight dreadnoughts, each the home of a thousand men.When the German High Seas Fleet retreated, the kaiser unleashed unrestricted U-boat warfare, which, in its indiscriminate violence, brought a reluctant America into the war. In this way, the German effort to “seize the trident” by defeating the British navy led to the fall of the German empire.Ultimately, the distinguishing feature of Castles of Steel is the author himself. The knowledge, understanding, and literary power Massie brings to this story are unparalleled. His portrayals of Winston Churchill, the British admirals Fisher, Jellicoe, and Beatty, and the Germans Scheer, Hipper, and Tirpitz are stunning in their veracity and artistry.Castles of Steel is about war at sea, leadership and command, courage, genius, and folly. All these elements are given magnificent scope by Robert K. Massie’s special and widely hailed literary mastery.From the Hardcover edition. Views: 119
An unabridged, digitally enhanced edition, with updated layout and typeface. Views: 118
Jerusalem is the universal city, the capital of two peoples, the shrine of three faiths; it is the prize of empires, the site of Judgement Day and the battlefield of today's clash of civilizations. From King David to Barack Obama, from the birth of Judaism, Christianity and Islam to the Israel-Palestine conflict, this is the epic history of three thousand years of faith, slaughter, fanaticism and coexistence. How did this small, remote town become the Holy City, the "center of the world" and now the key to peace in the Middle East? In a gripping narrative, Simon Sebag Montefiore reveals this ever-changing city in its many incarnations, bringing every epoch and character blazingly to life. Jerusalem's biography is told through the wars, love affairs and revelations of the men and women--kings, empresses, prophets, poets, saints, conquerors and whores--who created, destroyed, chronicled and believed in Jerusalem. As well as the many ordinary Jerusalemites who have left... Views: 118
Unfurling like a medieval book of days, each page of Eduardo Galeano’s Children of the Days has an illuminating story that takes inspiration from that date of the calendar year, resurrecting the heroes and heroines who have fallen off the historical map, but whose lives remind us of our darkest hours and sweetest victories.Challenging readers to consider the human condition and our own choices, Galeano elevates the little-known heroes of our world and decries the destruction of the intellectual, linguistic, and emotional treasures that we have all but forgotten.Readers will discover many inspiring narratives in this collection of vignettes: the Brazilians who held a “smooch-in” to protest against a dictatorship for banning kisses that “undermined public morals”; the astonishing day Mexico invaded the United States; and the “sacrilegious” women who had the effrontery to marry each other in a church in the Galician... Views: 117
High drama and ancient history combine in this novel of the early life of Egypt's infamous queen, at once a beautiful seductress, brilliant politician, and the most powerful ruler of her time. Views: 117
Paul Chowder, the poet protagonist of Nicholson Baker's widely acclaimed novel The Anthologist, is turning fifty-five and missing his ex-girlfriend, Roz, rather desperately. As he approaches the dreaded birthday, Paul is uninspired by his usual artistic outlet (although he's pleased that his poetry anthology, Only Rhyme, is selling "steadily"). Putting aside poetry in favor of music, and drawing on his classical bassoon training, Paul turns instead to his new acoustic guitar with one goal in mind: to learn songwriting. As he struggles to come to terms with the horror of America's drone wars and Roz's recent relationship with a local NPR radio host, Paul fills his days with Quaker meetings, Planet Fitness workouts, and some experiments with tobacco. Written in Baker's beautifully unconventional prose, and scored with musical influences from Debussy to Tracy Chapman to Paul himself, Traveling Sprinkler is an enchanting, hilarious—and very... Views: 116
