She expected to die saving her world… Magna’s existence was once filled with laughter, love and joy. Her life changes in a single night when a mysterious object falls from the sky into the ocean and she wakes to find herself held captive in her own body. As the centuries pass, she becomes known as the Sea Witch—a creature who is feared and reviled. Her efforts to save the Seven Kingdoms and destroy the alien creature living inside her should have ended both their lives—instead, Magna wakes to find herself in a strange, new realm. Gabe Lightfoot and his best friend, Kane Field, have stood side by side through thick and thin. Brothers by circumstance, they have seen the darker side of life and lived to remember it. When Gabe rescues a wounded woman in the waters off the coast of Oregon, they have no idea what’s in store for them. It doesn’t take long for Magna to learn that she is no safer in this new world than she was in her own. Fearful of endangering the two men who have taken her under their wing, Magna is torn between trying to return to her world or staying in this one. The choice may be decided for her when strangers come to town searching for clues regarding a series of strange disappearances. Can Gabe and Kane protect her from those who would lock her up to study her, or will the curse of the Sea Witch destroy them as well?

In this follow-up to Bech: A Book, Henry Bech, the priapic, peripatetic, and unproductive Jewish American novelist, returns with seven more chapters from his mock-heroic life. He turns fifty in a confusing blend of civic and erotic circumstances while publicizing himself in Australia and Canada. He marries a shiksa and travels with her to Israel, where she falls in love with the land, and to Scotland, where he does. And—sweating buckets! thinking big! minting miracles!—he writes an ingeniously tawdry bestseller. Bech’s aesthetic and moral embarrassments reveal acid truths about both his trade and our times. From the Trade Paperback edition.

Jane Green has become a nationally bestselling author with legions of fans through her novels about the true-life dilemmas of real women—their relationships, their careers, their loves, their triumphs and disappointments. In her latest book, Green tells the story of a group of people who haven’t seen each other since they were best friends at school. When one of them dies in a terrible tragedy, the reunited friends work through their grief together and find that each of their lives is impacted in ways they could have never foreseen. Warm, witty, and as wise as ever, this is a story of friendship, of family, and of life coming full circle.

The tomb of China’s First Emperor, guarded by an underground army of terra-cotta warriors, has remained sealed for more than 2,000 years. Though it’s regarded as one of the greatest archaeological sites in the world, the Chinese government won’t allow anyone to open it. Why? That question is at the heart of a dilemma faced by former Justice Department operative Cotton Malone, whose life is shattered when he receives an anonymous note carrying an unfamiliar Web address. Logging on, he sees Cassiopeia Vitt, a woman who’s saved his life more than once, being tortured at the hands of a mysterious man who has a single demand: Bring me the artifact she’s asked you to keep safe. The only problem is, Malone doesn’t have a clue what the man is talking about, since Cassiopeia has left nothing with him. So begins Malone’s most harrowing adventure to date; one that offers up astounding historical revelations, pits him against a ruthless ancient brotherhood, and sends him from Denmark to Belgium to Vietnam then on to China, a vast and mysterious land where danger lurks at every turn.

For how thy memory has lingered on– In spite of cruelest winter’s drear and howl– By inner mirror seen; I’ve dwelled upon, I must confess, my treachery most foul. Did Shakespeare pen a series of passionate sonnets, unknown to modern scholarship, ardently praising a mysterious dark-haired beauty? This tantalizing question is raised in a letter to literature professor Rose Asher. But the letter’s author, Rose’s star pupil, is not telling. A troubled, enigmatic young man, he plunged to his death in front of the college’s entire faculty, an apparent suicide. Determined to find the truth, Rose journeys from New York to Italy, back to the magnificent Tuscan villa where as an undergraduate she first fell in love. La Civetta is a dreamlike place, resplendent with the heady scent of lemon trees and the sunset’s ocher wash across its bricks and cobbles. Once there Rose finds her first love still in residence. Torn between her mission and her rekindled feelings, Rose becomes enmeshed in a treacherous tangle of secrets and scandal. A folio containing what some believe to be one of Shakespeare’s lost sonnets has vanished, and literary immortality awaits whoever finds the manuscript–as do a vast Italian estate and a Hollywood movie deal. Uncertain whom she can trust and where she can turn, Rose races against time and unseen enemies in a bid to find the missing masterpiece. Lush, lyrical, and enthralling, The Sonnet Lover vividly brings to life the Tuscan countryside and the fascinating world of the Renaissance poets. Unmatched in her ability to evoke atmosphere and intrigue, Carol Goodman delivers her most ambitious and satisfying work to date, a seductive novel that skillfully propels its reader headlong to the final suspenseful page. From the Hardcover edition.

Terrified, a young Navaron child watches helplessly from his hiding place as a young Shinili woman is brutally beaten and abused by a group of drunken Navaron men. Too frightened to answer her pleas for help, the child runs away, taking with him the sacred bone carving of the Shinili people. In doing so, he forever binds himself and his fate to them. Gabriel is no ordinary boy. His life is now marked out for greatness by powers beyond his understanding...He's never wanted to follow in his father's footsteps and become a wealthy, sea-faring merchant, celebrated by all in the ancient empire of Navora - but cold and distant to his family. Haunted by a terrible childhood secret Gabriel spurns family tradition and duties as the eldest son, to pursue a life of helping others. Derived from a deep sense of guilt and strange mysterious visions Gabriel knows that he is destined to become a healer, with the power to decipher dreams, no matter what his overbearing family argues. But against his will, Gabriel finds himself caught up in the power struggles of a corrupt Empire, endangering all that he loves. His decision to hold true to his destiny is one that will cost him dearly, and one that threatens to tear apart the entire Navoran Empire - but which might just end up saving an entire people.

On the day Dr. Ray Klein wins his parole, the disciplinary perfection of Green River Penitentiary in Texas is torn apart by riot - more a tribal war - of unimaginable ferocity. As the inmates take over, the River sucks all inside further toward the abyss. Klein must choose. He must either claim his freedom and abandon his friends and the woman he loves to die, or he must risk all and fight. "Green River Rising" is a thriller that grabs you at the outset and imprisons you in the iron grip of its headlong plot until the final page. It is also an intelligent, literate, philosophical novel about choice, courage, and love - the dark, violent, sexy story of one man's moral choices in the amoral maelstrom.

When Theo discovers the father he thought died when he was a baby is still alive, he's determined to find him. The clues lead him to lonely Rachel, who has problems of her own, including parents who compare her unfavourably to her long-dead sister. But when Rachel and Theo are attacked by men from RAGE - the Righteous Army against Genetic Engineering - they are rescued by strangers and taken to meet a mysterious figure who leads them to make startling discoveries about their identities, which will affect their past, present, and future in dramatic and life-altering ways...

But, for all that, I went on writing short fiction all through the seventh and eighth decades of my life, and though I’m not very active these days, I would still pay attention if someone were to approach me with an interesting and challenging short-story project, or if some absolutely irresistible story idea were to come into my mind. I will not, at this point, try to claim that the stories that are collected here are the last short stories I will ever write. Surely some editor, in the years ahead, will tickle my imagination with a proposal I can’t resist. But I doubt that will be happening very often; and, meanwhile, here’s the harvest of the fourteen years that began in 1995—not an enormous number of stories, no, but stories nevertheless that I think are worth reading and reprinting. —Robert Silverberg, from his Introduction

A novel of loss, identity, and, in the strangest of places, hope. Max Trader is a luthier, a maker of guitars. Johnny Devlin is chronically unemployed. Max is solitary, quiet, responsible. Johnny is a lady-killer, a drunk, a charming loser. When they inexplicably wake up in each other's bodies, Johnny gleefully moves into Max's comfortable and stable existence, leaving Max to pick up the pieces of a life he had no part in breaking. Penniless, friendless, homeless, Max begins a journey that will take him beyond the streets of the city to an otherworld of dreams and spirits, where he must confront both the unscrupulous Johnny Devlin and his own deepest fears.

A battle is brewing in the underworld, and at the center of it all is Damali Richards, spoken word artist and vampire huntress. But she is not just any huntress; she is the millennium Neteru, a woman so powerful that the vampire world is about to start a war-one that threatens to spread onto her streets-in order to possess her. . . Fallon Nuit, a rogue vampire who is one of the most powerful Damali has ever encountered, has allied himself with the deadly Amanthra demons in order to claim her. But the Vampire Council has plans for her as well. And now an unlikely variable has entered the equation: an ex-lover turned master vampire with an agenda of his own. Damali must risk trusting him once more if they are to survive.

This book is perfectly layout for reading on e-Reader.

What would you do if you were born to be a predator? Would you fight your natural instincts or give in to your nature? Eden is a soul eater closing in on her awakening. Her family has convinced her that soon she will have to take a life in order to save her own. It’s a decision Eden doesn’t want to deal with even as her hunger for souls grows stronger every day. To complicate her impossible position, new guy in school Noah Valois’ determination to befriend her puts Eden in touch with a humanity she’s never known. Addicted to his company, his friendship and affection, she becomes more and more terrified that giving into her hunger will mean losing him forever… … But when she discovers that Noah is not what he seems, his betrayal forces her to face two choices. One will offer her revenge and the destruction of a boy she loved. The other may offer her a life of eternal redemption…

Lyman Frank Baum was an American author widely known for his children’s books. Baum was born Chittenango, New-York into a devout Methodiste family He had German, Scots-Irish, and English ancestry, and was the seventh of nine children of Cynthia Ann and Benjamin Ward Baum, only five of whom survived into adulthood. "Lyman" is the name of his father's brother, but he always disliked it and preferred his middle name "Frank". The Sea Fairies is a children's fantasy novel published in 1911 by the Reilly & Britton Company, the publisher of Baum's series of Oz books. Baum dedicated the book to the otherwise-unknown “Judith of Randolph, Massachusetts” most likely one of the child readers who corresponded with the author.

Isabella had everything she wanted until a corset took it all away. (A Cinderella story.)After her mother's passing, Isabella took comfort in dance, her father, and the company of her new mother and step-sisters. Unfortunately, a corset took it all away from her.

When starfighter pilot Simon Dodds is enrolled in a top secret military project, he and his wingmates begin to suspect that there is a lot more to the theft of a legendary battleship and an Imperial nation's civil war than either the Confederation Stellar Navy or the government are willing to let on.Abby refuses to marry the monster to whom she is betrothed. As she flees, she meets a mysterious stranger at a wayside inn. His startling proposition will either save her, or leave her mired in scandal.

Colin and Mary are a couple whose intimacy knows no bounds. Away on a holiday together in a nameless city, they get lost one evening in a labyrinth of streets and canals. They happen upon Robert, a stranger with a dark history, who takes them to a bar and ushers them down into a subterranean land of violence and obsession.

True Detective fans should read this book, the first of the Val Bosanquet mystery series. Val, a former New Orleans detective, is offered a job as Chief of a campus PD. A Haitian child killer he helped convict for the murder of her mother has just been enrolled at the university. Val stumbles across new evidence. Corporate corruption and Voodoo make for a volatile mix in the Deep South.All Bailey wants is to be a good negotiator, and to impress his boss and teacher, the legendary Drew Fletcher. He admires Fletcher for his skills in the field, but that doesn’t stop him admiring the man for other, more romantic reasons as well. In a tense hostage situation, it’s pretty unlikely Bailey’s usual, rash behaviour will cover him in glory, but in his dreams, it’s all going to happen just like in the movies.When he finally acts to protect his boss, it doesn’t go the way he hopes -- or does it? Will Bailey get to play the hero and get the guy of his dreams?

This is the crafty tale of Luke the Hun, a fearsome warrior and a pretty good option quarterback, who decides to go straight, to become a man of peace and dreams, and to find the one right answer. He searches the world, gathers words of wisdom from dragons and trolls, cavemen and farmer's daughters, finally meets Jesus and returns home healed: with strength of kings and words of praise of his own.This book has almost everything. Dragons, Genies and Trolls; princes and fair maidens; talking animals and a really tough fish; Huns and Vikings; Cavemen and Canadians; bread and circuses; fistfights and fishermen; brass knuckles and basketball, euchre games and lacrosse battles; the snows of Baffin Island and the swamps of Atlantis; bus chases and space travel; angels and aliens; bluesmen speaking softly and sea serpents speaking Portuguese; the biography of a king, and the journal of everyman; and last and best, Jesus Christ our Lord. All pleasantly garnished with slogans and banners, sestinas and limericks, haikus and knock-knock jokes, an aroma of postmodernism and a hearty portion of old-fashioned values, simmered in a tasteful sauce of joviality, spirituality, and Cornhusker references. It has everything but surprise endings, that is. Coz I’ll tell ya now: ‘I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.’This book is for almost everyone. For Christians, may you find something in it, some stories or phrases, to stretch your faith, steel your resolve, strengthen your commitments. Or, just dig on the corny humor (it’s harmless). And maybe it’s the kind of book you could lend to a friend.For skeptics and searchers, may you find something in it, some poems or sermons to challenge your faith--to create some questions, or to answer some, and to encourage an open and willing spirit: so that you may begin to seek God, and in seeking, to find! (Remembering the wise words of Hans Denck: “When you hear your brother say something that is strange to you do not immediately argue with him, but listen to see whether he may be right and you also can accept it. If you cannot understand him you must not judge him, and if you think that he may be in error, consider that you may be in greater error.”) For the gospel of Christ is true. Don’t be afraid to at least consider it. Begin with that. I was a scoffer once too. It wasn’t until I seriously searched, not until I first humbled myself enough to admit ‘Maybe I’m wrong’, that I finally saw truth I never could have dreamed of, miracles I always would have missed! But mostly I write this book for myself: Any lessons I would pass on, I must first hear myself. When I write another man’s story, I doubtless project a little of my own, and when I read of another man’s life, I must evaluate my own life as well. If anything in these pages blesses you, know that it has blessed me also. I have written what I have written. Each chapter began as an act of faith, and ended by drawing me closer to God. It’s always that way.So here it is: the story of Luke the Hun, a fearsome warrior and a pretty good option quarterback, who decided to go straight, to become a man of peace and dreams, and to find the one right answer.His story takes place on the pretty planet of Timnalauren, which is kinda like Earth in some respects, different in others. As the legendary Bertralamus J explains it, Timnalauren was the world he designed for a fantasy role-playing game, with monsters and treasures, and middle-ages technology...except then they couldn’t help sprucing it up with all the good stuff they liked from Earth! We’ll have fun there too. Not everything is where you would expect it to be, but everything is where it needs to be.Whether the pretty planet of Timnalauren and its people are real or merely a clever fiction I know not. I only know that I have been among them: driving buses, cracking jokes, and eating sandwiches. The one thing I am sure of is, wherever they are, whether in some strange corner of the mind, or in some far-off corner of God’s creation, they are perpetually working out their own salvation with fear and trembling. Should not we who certainly exist do likewise?

My name is Kiev Novalic. I am a vampire, and a murderer. Having betrayed the trust of my own kind and that of the enemies I sold myself to, I have three days left to live. I stare at the girl in the cell opposite mine. Mona, she calls herself. A witch born without magic. She might be my key to freedom, but I should know to stay away. I should know: some scars are etched too deep to heal.

LILAH KNOWS THE rules better than anyone, but between her newfound visions, an absolutely fatal attraction to a boy who isn't real, and the threat of a supernatural enemy with a sting deadlier than any Queen Bee, it's going to take everything she has to stay on top at Emory. And to prove once and for all that - highlights and high heels aside - those who make the rules are the only ones who can break them.