The Final Testament

      Michael D. Britton
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A religious leader's unprecedented trip through a wormhole to another dimension to retrieve a sacred tome could save his planet's people - or perhaps doom them.Samurai Shark has a license plate stuck in his teeth and it's pissing him off. The pain makes him go on an epic rant that will make even the toughest dizen of the deep cower in fear. Watch out world, Samurai Shark is comin' to bite you in the butt!

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    Transmutation

      Daniel Olas
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It had a protagonist who seemed to get possessed. If you liked "The Matrix" you will find a similar theme here. Things are not as they appear. This hero suddenly went off to kill a friend, succeeded, then found out the friend was still alive. He then was given certain information, had to fight, kill, and then was told that he had not been given the true facts. The protagonist ended up making thIt had a protagonist who seemed to get possessed. If you liked "The Matrix" you will find a similar theme here. Things are not as they appear. This hero suddenly went off to kill a friend, succeeded, then found out the friend was still alive. He then was given certain information, had to fight, kill, and then was told that he had not been given the true facts. The protagonist ended up making the campus safer for others but at a price.

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    The Icarus Agenda: A Novel

      Robert Ludlum
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Colorado Congressman Evan Kendrick is trying to live out his term quietly when a political mole reveals his deepest secret: Kendrick was the anonymous hero who freed the hostages held by Arab terrorists in the American embassy in Masqat, and then silently disappeared. Now, brought into the light, Kendrick is a target, pursued by the terrorists he once outwitted. Together with the beautiful woman who saved his life, Kendrick enters a deadly arena where the only currency is blood, where frightened whispers speak of violence yet to come, and where the fate of the free world may ultimately rest in the powerful hands of a mysterious figure known only as the Mahdi. Praise for Robert Ludlum and *The Icarus Agenda *  “[Robert] Ludlum is light-years beyond his literary competition in piling plot twist upon plot twist, until the mesmerized reader is held captive. . . . Ludlum pulls out all the stops.”—Chicago Tribune  * “[An] intricate story of conspiracies within conspiracies . . . Once you start reading you just can’t stop.”—Library Journal  * “Readers will be hooked.”—The New York Times** BONUS: This edition includes an excerpt from Robert Ludlum’s *The Bourne Identity.*

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    Sin Killer

      Larry McMurtry
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From Pulitzer Prize-winning author Larry McMurtry comes the first in a four-volume epic journey through the early American frontier, featuring the Berrybender family, English nobility adrift in the American West in the 1830s. It is 1830, and the Berrybender family—rich, aristocratic, English, and hopelessly out of place—is on its way up the Missouri River to see the untamed West as it begins to open up. With irascible determination—and a great deal of outright chaos—the party experiences both the awesome majesty and brutal savagery of the unexplored land, from buffalo stampedes and natural disasters to Indian raids and encounters with frontiersmen and trappers, explorers, pioneers, and one part-time preacher known as "the Sin Killer." Packed with breathtaking adventure, charming romance, and a sense of humor stretching clear over the horizon, Sin Killer is a truly unique view of the West that could only come from the boundless skill and imagination of Larry McMurtry.

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    Pylon

      William Faulkner
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One of the few of William Faulkner’s works to be set outside his fictional Yoknapatawpha County, Pylon, first published in 1935, takes place at an air show in a thinly disguised New Orleans named New Valois.  An unnamed reporter for a local newspaper tries to understand a very modern ménage a trois of flyers on the brainstorming circuit. These characters, Faulkner said, “were a fantastic and bizarre phenomenon on the face of the contemporary scene. . . . That is, there was really no place for them in the culture, in the economy, yet they were there, at that time, and everyone knew that they wouldn’t last very long, which they didn’t. . . . That they were outside the range of God, not only of respectability, of love, but of God too.” In Pylon Faulkner set out to test their rootless modernity to see if there is any place in it for the old values of the human heart that are the central concerns of his best fiction.

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    Forever

      Rebecca Royce
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Devin Owen has come back from the Dragon Wars a changed Werewolf. For one thing, he's lost his wolf side as well as much of his desire to live. He spends most of his life doped up to handle the pain from his injured leg. Lena Knox knew the moment she met Devin that he was her mate. But, she'd been a child at the time and he hadn't noticed her at all. Now, all grown up, she wants Devin to be the wolf she's waited for. Not that she has a lot of time for longing with life and home crumbling around her. A couple of heated encounters draw them together, but is it enough to overcome the war wounds they both carry? Or will an outside enemy destroy them before they get the chance to find forever?

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    Kearny's March

      Winston Groom
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In June 1846, General Stephen Watts Kearny rode out of Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, with two thousand soldiers, bound for California. At the time, the nation was hell-bent on expansion: James K. Polk had lately won the presidency by threatening England over the borders in Oregon, while Congress had just voted, in defiance of the Mexican government, to annex Texas. After Mexico declared war on the United States, Kearny’s Army of the West was sent out, carrying orders to occupy Mexican territory. When his expedition ended a year later, the country had doubled in size and now stretched from the Atlantic to the Pacific, fulfilling what many saw as the nation’s unique destiny—and at the same time setting the stage for the American Civil War. Winston Groom recounts the amazing adventure and danger that Kearny and his troops encountered on the trail. Their story intertwines with those of the famous mountain man Kit Carson; Brigham Young and his Mormon followers fleeing persecution and Illinois; and the ill-fated Donner party, trapped in the snow of the Sierra Nevada. Together, they encounter wild Indians, Mexican armies, political intrigue, dangerous wildlife, gold rushes, and land-grabs. Some returned in glory, others in shackles, and some not at all. But these were the people who helped America fulfill her promise. Distilling a wealth of letters, journals, and military records, Groom gives us a powerful account that enlivens our understanding of the exciting, if unforgiving, business of country-making.

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    A Land Torn

      Spencer Johnson
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Now edited by an actual editor. Many thanks to Robin S. Enter a tale of intrigue, secrets, betrayals, and a continent on the verge of falling apart. Woven from a number of characters, each with their own hopes, fears, and dreams, the story chronicles the birth of a new age in Den'dra. A teenaged boy awakens one morning after a nightmare and sees it coming to pass in the waking world. He takes flight to escape a terrible fate. The Asgare, a fabled assassin that vanished fifteen years ago, has a surprise encounter that precipitates a trek across the land in search of his son. A dragon patrolling the border between draconic and human lands discovers a human child that is not all it seems. A princess watches her father's health decline and dreads the consequences held in her future. Their goals are not as disconnected as would first appear. In the end, they must all rely on each other to survive the coming trials.

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    The Winthrop Woman

      Anya Seton
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In 1631 Elizabeth Winthrop, newly widowed with an infant daughter, set sail for the New World. In those days of hardship, famine, and Indian attack, there was only one way, in the minds of the governors of the Massachusetts Bay and Connecticut colonies, to hold together the sanity and identity of the colonists. That was through a strong and bigoted, theocratic government.It is against this background of rigidity and conformity that Bess Winthrop dared to befriend Anne Hutchinson at the moment of her banishment from the Bay Colony; dared to challenge a determined army captain bent on the massacre of her friends the Siwanoy Indians; and, above all, dared to love a man as her heart and her whole being commanded. And so, as a response to this almost unmatched courage and vitality, Governor John Winthrop came to refer to this woman in the historical records of the time as his "unregenerate niece." Anya Seton's riveting historical novel portrays the fortitude, humiliation, and...

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    The Rebels of Ireland

      Edward Rutherfurd
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The reigning master of grand historical fiction returns with the stirring conclusion to his bestselling Dublin Saga. The Princes of Ireland, the first volume of Edward Rutherfurd’s magisterial epic of Irish history, ended with the disastrous Irish revolt of 1534 and the disappearance of the sacred Staff of Saint Patrick. The Rebels of Ireland opens with an Ireland transformed; plantation, the final step in the centuries-long English conquest of Ireland, is the order of the day, and the subjugation of the native Irish Catholic population has begun in earnest. Edward Rutherfurd brings history to life through the tales of families whose fates rise and fall in each generation: Brothers who must choose between fidelity to their ancient faith or the security of their families; a wife whose passion for a charismatic Irish chieftain threatens her comfortable marriage to a prosperous merchant; a young scholar whose secret rebel sympathies are put to the test; men who risk their lives and their children’s fortunes in the tragic pursuit of freedom, and those determined to root them out forever. Rutherfurd spins the saga of Ireland’s 400-year path to independence in all its drama, tragedy, and glory through the stories of people from all strata of society--Protestant and Catholic, rich and poor, conniving and heroic. His richly detailed narrative brings to life watershed moments and events, from the time of plantation settlements to the “Flight of the Earls,” when the native aristocracy fled the island, to Cromwell’s suppression of the population and the imposition of the harsh anti-Catholic penal laws. He describes the hardships of ordinary people and the romantic, doomed attempt to overthrow the Protestant oppressors, which ended in defeat at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, and the departure of the “Wild Geese.” In vivid tones Rutherfurd re-creates Grattan’s Parliament, Wolfe Tone's attempted French invasion of 1798, the tragic rising of Robert Emmet, the Catholic campaign of Daniel O’Connell, the catastrophic famine, the mass migration to America, and the glorious Irish Renaissance of Yeats and Joyce. And through the eyes of his characters, he captures the rise of Charles Stewart Parnell and the great Irish nationalists and the birth of an Ireland free of all ties to England. A tale of fierce battles, hot-blooded romances, and family and political intrigues, The Rebels of Ireland brings the story begun in The Princes of Ireland to a stunning conclusion.

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    All These Things I've Done

      Gabrielle Zevin
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In 2083, chocolate and coffee are illegal, paper is hard to find, water is carefully rationed, and New York City is rife with crime and poverty. And yet, for Anya Balanchine, the sixteen-year-old daughter of the city's most notorious (and dead) crime boss, life is fairly routine. It consists of going to school, taking care of her siblings and her dying grandmother, trying to avoid falling in love with the new assistant D.A.'s son, and avoiding her loser ex-boyfriend. That is until her ex is accidentally poisoned by the chocolate her family manufactures and the police think she's to blame. Suddenly, Anya finds herself thrust unwillingly into the spotlight--at school, in the news, and most importantly, within her mafia family. Engrossing and suspenseful, All These Things I've Done is an utterly unique, unputdownable read that blends both the familiar and the fantastic.

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    Land's Edge

      Tim Winton
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On childhood holidays to the beach the sun and surf kept Tim Winton outside in the mornings, in the water; the wind would drive him indoors in the afternoons, to books and reading. This ebb and flow of the day became a way of life. In this beautifully delicate memoir, Tim Winton writes about his obsession with what happens where the water meets the shore – about diving, dunes, beachcombing – and the sense of being on the precarious, wondrous edge of things that haunts his novels. Complemented by the breathtaking photographs of Narelle Autio, Land's Edge is a celebration of the coastal life and those who surrender themselves to it.

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    The Sisters Brothers

      Patrick deWitt
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Hermann Kermit Warm is going to die. The enigmatic and powerful man known only as the Commodore has ordered it, and his henchmen, Eli and Charlie Sisters, will make sure of it. Though Eli doesn't share his brother's appetite for whiskey and killing, he's never known anything else. But their prey isn't an easy mark, and on the road from Oregon City to Warm's gold-mining claim outside Sacramento, Eli begins to question what he does for a living - and whom he does it for. With The Sisters Brothers, Patrick deWitt pays homage to the classic Western, transforming it into an unforgettable comic tour de force. Filled with a remarkable cast of characters - losers, cheaters, and ne'er-do-wells from all stripes of life - and told by a complex and compelling narrator, it is a violent, lustful odyssey through the underworld of the 1850s frontier that beautifully captures the humor, melancholy, and grit of the Old West and two brothers bound by blood, violence, and love.

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    Dachshund Disaster

      Tui T. Sutherland
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Contest winner! PET TROUBLE readers voted online to choose the dog for this book, and the overwhelming winner was the adorable dachshund! Readers voted online to choose the next PET TROUBLE dog -- and the dachshund was the runaway winner! But he's still a little bit of trouble ... Charlie can't wait to have a dog of his own, and King is just what he wished for: playful and very loyal. So loyal, in fact, that he doesn't like anyone else -- Charlie's brothers, the family's other pets, other people ... Can Charlie find a way to make King part of the group? Or is this dachshund an un-trainable tyrant?

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    Kissing Perfect

      Lauren Barnholdt
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Brynn is completely broken-hearted, and the only reason she’s even going to Emily Mulally’s stupid party is to get revenge on her ex-boyfriend. So what if what she has planned is kind of sort of illegal? Aaron deserves it. But when cute and popular Josh Noth catches her in the act, Brynn thinks she’s in trouble. Josh is a player, super popular, super hot, and known for being a little bit (read: a lot) of a kiss slut. So Brynn does her best to ignore the butterflies in her stomach, chalking it up to post-break-up craziness. But Josh can’t stop thinking about Brynn. And suddenly, he doesn’t want to kiss any other girls. Ever. But will he be able to convince her that he’s for real? KISSING PERFECT is the fourth novella in the romantic At the Party series by Lauren Barnholdt.

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    War of the Realms

      Kate O'Hearn
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In the world of Asgard, living among Odin, Thor and Loki are the Valkyries of legend. They are Norse goddesses who reap the fallen souls from human battlefields and have the power to cause death with just one touch. At the end of The Runaway, Freya and the Valkyries are about to leave the human world when they learn that the Frost Giants, Fire Giants and Dark Searchers have united to declare war on the Realms. Bitfrost, the legendary rainbow bridge linking the human world to Asgard, has been closed. With their only entry back to Asgard barred, how can the Valkyries get back to fight to protect their homeland? Loki claims he knows another, secret route but can they trust him? And even if they found a way - is there anything they can do to stop the war? As the War of the Realms spills over into Earth, Freya and the Valkyries must find a way to save not just the Norse world but the human world as well. With everything at stake, can Freya become the Hero she was destined to be? 'Kate O'Hearn serves up a winning mix of modern adventure and classic fantasy.' Rick Riordan, author of Percy Jackson

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    Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay

      Elena Ferrante
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Since the publication of My Brilliant Friend, the first of the Neapolitan novels, Elena Ferrante's fame as one of our most compelling, insightful, and stylish contemporary authors has grown enormously. She has gained admirers among authors--Jhumpa Lahiri, Elizabeth Strout, Claire Messud, to name a few--and critics--James Wood, John Freeman, Eugenia Williamson, for example. But her most resounding success has undoubtedly been with readers, who have discovered in Ferrante a writer who speaks with great power and beauty of the mysteries of belonging, human relationships, love, family, and friendship. In this third Neapolitan novel, Elena and Lila, the two girls whom readers first met in My Brilliant Friend, have become women. Lila married at sixteen and has a young son; she has left her abusive husband and now works as a common laborer. Elena has left the neighborhood, earned her college degree, and published a successful novel, all of which have opened the doors to a world of learned interlocutors and richly furnished salons. Both women have pushed against the walls of a prison that would have seen them living a life of misery, ignorance, and submission. They are afloat on the great sea of opportunities that opened up during the nineteen-seventies. Yet they are still very much bound to each other by a strong, unbreakable bond.

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    Take Your Last Breath

      Lauren Child
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Crack open Ruby Redfort’s second adventure — and you will literally be on the edge of your wits. Everyone’s favorite girl detective is back for a second mind-blowing installment, packed with all the off-the-wall humor, action, and friendship of the first book. This time, though, it’s an adventure on the wide-open ocean, and Ruby is all at sea. . . . Can she crack the case of the Twinford pirates while evading the clutches of a vile sea monster as well as the evil Count von Viscount? Well, you wouldn’t want to bet against her.

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    Your Face Tomorrow: Fever and Spear

      Javier Marías
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A daring masterwork by Javier Marias: "Spain's most subtle and gifted writer." (The Boston Globe) Part spy novel, part romance, part Henry James, Your Face Tomorrow is a wholly remarkable display of the immense gifts of Javier Marias. With Fever and Spear, Volume One of his unfolding novel Your Face Tomorrow, he returns us to the rarified world of Oxford (the delightful setting of All Souls and Dark Back of Time), while introducing us to territory entirely new--espionage. Our hero, Jaime Deza, separated from his wife in Madrid, is a bit adrift in London until his old friend Sir Peter Wheeler--retired Oxford don and semi-retired master spy--recruits him for a new career in British Intelligence. Deza possesses a rare gift for seeing behind the masks people wear. He is soon observing interviews conducted by Her Majesty's secret service: variously shady international businessmen one day, would-be coup leaders the next. Seductively, this metaphysical thriller explores past, present, and future in the ever-more-perilous 21st century. This compelling and enigmatic tour de force from one of Europe's greatest writers continues with Volume Two, Dance and Dream.

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    Brass Ring

      Diane Chamberlain
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Claire Harte-Mathias is an infinitely capable solver of other people's problems. Along with her husband, she has established a prestigious foundation to aid in the rehabilitation of people with spinal cord injuries. Training therapists, counseling patients, and conducting workshops keeps Claire busy, fulfilled, and happy. It is a life she wouldn't trade for anything...and one that is about to fall apart. One snowy night, Claire tries and fails to prevent a tragedy from occurring. The incident at first obsesses her, then seems to trigger something deep in her soul. Soon she is haunted by momentary disturbing visions - terrifying images that are vaguely familiar, yet unexplainable. Slowly Claire comes to realize that the pictures are in fact fragmented and forgotten memories of her childhood - a childhood she has always remembered as close to perfect. While part of her wants to see where these memories will lead her another part wants only to run from them, to bury them once again. Confused and frightened, Claire is caught up in a complex and devastating struggle between yesterday and today; between the man who wants to help her and the husband who cannot; between terrible secrets and life-altering revelations. In her fight to uncover and accept the truth, Claire discovers that the past, present, and future are intertwined in a way she can never change...or forget. Written with sensitivity, Brass Ring is a heartfelt and mesmerizing novel of great loss and even greater courage.

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    Project Pope

      Clifford D. Simak
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Robot believers at the far end of the galaxy endeavor to create a true religion, but their efforts could be shattered by a shocking revelation Far in the future, on the remote planet End of Nothing, sentient robots are engaged in a remarkable enterprise. They call their project Vatican-17: an endeavor to create a truly universal religion presided over by a pope, whose extreme godliness and infallible artificial intelligence are fed by telepathic human Listeners who psychically delve into the mysteries of the universe. But the great and holy mission could be compromised by one shocking revelation that threatens to inspire serious crises of faith among the spiritual, truth-seeking robotic acolytes while tearing them into warring religious factions.  For the Listener Mary is claiming that she has just discovered Heaven. There are those among the Clifford D. Simak faithful who consider Project Pope his masterpiece. But whether the crowning literary achievement of a multiple Hugo and Nebula Award–winning science fiction Grand Master or merely another brilliant novel of speculative fiction to stand among his many, Simak’s breathtaking search for God in the machine ingeniously blends science and spirituality in a truly miraculous way that few science fiction writers, if any, have been able to accomplish.

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