The Grass Crown

      Colleen McCullough
     The Grass Crown

In this great drama, Marius, the general who saved Rome from barbarian invasion and became consul an unprecedented six times, has fallen into decline. Sulla, his closest associate, has withdrawn himself from his commander's circle in preparation for his own bid for power. As a deadly enmity develops between the two men, Rome must fight its own battle for survival - first against her neighbouring Italian states, then against the barbaric Asian conqueror. Births, deaths, prophecies and rivalries combine to create a whirlwind of drama, and a remarkable insight into the passion and torment of ancient Rome.

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    City of Night

      John Rechy
     City of Night

John Rechy, recipient of the Publishing Triangle’s William Whitehead Lifetime Achievement Award, wrote City of Night in 1963. This radical and daring work, which launched Rechy’s reputation as one of America’s most courageous novelists, remains the classic document of the garish neon-lit world of hustlers, drag queens, and men on the make who inhabited the homosexual underground of the early sixties.

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    Five-Carat Soul

      James McBride
     Five-Carat Soul

The stories in Five-Carat Soul--none of them ever published before--spring from the place where identity, humanity, and history converge. McBride explores the ways we learn from the world and the people around us. An antiques dealer discovers that a legendary toy commissioned by Civil War General Robert E. Lee now sits in the home of a black minister in Queens. Five strangers find themselves thrown together and face unexpected judgment. An American president draws inspiration from a conversation he overhears in a stable. And members of The Five-Carat Soul Bottom Bone Band recount stories from their own messy and hilarious lives.

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    Here, There, Elsewhere: Stories From the Road

      William Least Heat-Moon
     Here, There, Elsewhere: Stories From the Road

From the acclaimed author of Blue Highways, PrairyErth, and Roads to Quoz, a dazzling collection of travel tales from the road. HERE, THERE, ELSEWHERE draws together for the first time William Least Heat-Moon's greatest short-form travel writing. Personally selected by the writer, these pieces take us from Japan, England, Italy, and Mexico to Long Island, Oregon, Arizona, from small towns to big cities, ocean shores and inland mysteries. Including Heat-Moon's reflections on writing these pieces, HERE, THERE, ELSEWHERE is much more than the usual collection of amber; it is a coupled summation of craft and memory. A perfect treasury of prose and provocation for readers old and new, Heat-Moon's most recent work reveals his absolute mastery across pages many and few.

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    Wicked!

      Jilly Cooper
     Wicked!

At Bagley Hall, a notoriously wild, but increasingly academic, independent, crammed with the children of the famous, trouble is afoot. The ambitious and fatally attractive headmaster, Hengist Brett-Taylor, hatches a plan to share the facilities of his school with Larkminster Comprehensive - known locally, as 'Larks'. His reasons for doing so are purely financial, but he is encouraged by the opportunities the scheme gives him for frequent meetings with Janna Curtis, the dynamic new head of Larks, who has been drafted in to save what is a fast-sinking school from closure. Janna is young, pretty, enthusiastic and vastly brave - and she will do anything to rescue her demoralised, run-down and cash-strapped school. Neither parents nor staff of either school are too keen on this radical move, although some can see the possible financial advantages. For the students, however, it offers great opportunities to get up to even more mayhem than usual.

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    The Future of Humanity

      Michio Kaku
     The Future of Humanity

Formerly the domain of fiction, moving human civilization to the stars is increasingly becoming a scientific possibility--and a necessity. Whether in the near future due to climate change and the depletion of finite resources, or in the distant future due to catastrophic cosmological events, we must face the reality that humans will one day need to leave planet Earth to survive as a species. World-renowned physicist and futurist Michio Kaku explores in rich, intimate detail the process by which humanity may gradually move away from the planet and develop a sustainable civilization in outer space. He reveals how cutting-edge developments in robotics, nanotechnology, and biotechnology may allow us to terraform and build habitable cities on Mars. He then takes us beyond the solar system to nearby stars, which may soon be reached by nanoships traveling on laser beams at near the speed of light. Finally, he brings us beyond our galaxy, and even beyond our universe, to the possibility of immortality, showing us how humans may someday be able to leave our bodies entirely and laser port to new havens in space. With irrepressible enthusiasm and wonder, Dr. Kaku takes readers on a fascinating journey to a future in which humanity may finally fulfill its long-awaited destiny among the stars.

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    Forfeit

      Dick Francis
     Forfeit

A classic mystery from Dick Francis, the champion of English storytellers. Bert Checkov, a racing correspondent, drunkenly confesses to fellow Fleet Street hack James Tyrone that he's been giving his readers bum tips for years. Five minutes later, Checkov's fallen out a seventh floor window. Tyrone has a nose for a story and he's convinced there's more to his friend's death than meets the eye. When he starts digging, he discovers that many of Checkov's tips never even made it to the start. But the deeper Tyrone gets, the dirtier and more dangerous this business appears to be. If he's not careful he'll be following Checkov to his death... Praise for Dick Francis: 'As a jockey, Dick Francis was unbeatable when he got into his stride. The same is true of his crime writing' Daily Mirror 'Dick Francis's...

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    Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me

      Richard Farina
     Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me

In an unerring, corrosively comic depiction of a campus in revolt, Richard Farina evokes the 1960s as surely as F. Scott Fitzgerald captured the 1920s. A landlocked, college-age hipster called Gnossos Pappadopoulis weaves his way through the psychedelic landscape, encountering - among other things - mescaline, women, demonology, hunting, truth, smuggling, falsehood, gluttony, prayer, science, fetishes, and occasional art. This is a classic novel of an explosive, expansive decade, a book that resonates as social history, sparkles with novellistic inventiveness and embodies the attitudes of an entire generation. Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me, as Thomas Pynchon writes in the introduction, "comes on like the Hallelujah Chorus done by 200 kazoo players with perfect pitch."

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  • 374

    Gerry Souter

      Frida Kahlo
     Gerry Souter

Behind Frida Kahlo’s portraits, lies the story of both her life and work. It is precisely this combination that draws the reader in. Frida’s work is a record of her life, and rarely can we learn so much about an artist from what she records inside the picture frame. Frida Kahlo truly is Mexico’s gift to the history of art. She was just eighteen years old when a terrible bus accident changed her life forever, leaving her handicapped and burdened with constant physical pain. But her explosive character, raw determination and hard work helped to shape her artistic talent. And although he was an obsessive womanizer, the great painter Diego Rivera was by her side. She won him over with her charm, talent and intelligence, and Kahlo learnt to lean on the success of her companion in order to explore the world, thus creating her own legacy whilst finding herself surrounded by a close-knit group of friends. Her personal life was turbulent, as she frequently left her relationship with Diego to one side whilst she cultivated her own bisexual relationships. Despite this, Frida and Diego managed to save their frayed relationship. The story and the paintings that Frida left us display a courageous account of a woman constantly on a search of self discovery.

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    Hushed

      Gina Robinson
     Hushed

When Mount St. Helens erupts in 1980, the ash cloud blankets a college campus and sets off a chain of events that reach across decades in Gina Robinson’s latest College Age New Adult Romance.Now, Maddie Foster, the daughter of a college girl from that time, falls for former Double Deltsie sorority house boy Seth Butler, and their romance threatens to expose secrets that have been hushed for too long.

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  • 374

    Whisper of Love (The Bradens at Peaceful Harbor, Book Five)

      Melissa Foster
     Whisper of Love (The Bradens at Peaceful Harbor, Book Five)

The Bradens are a series of stand-alone romances that may also be enjoyed as part of the larger Love in Bloom series."You can always rely on Melissa Foster to deliver a story that's fresh, emotional and entertaining. Make sure you have all night, because once you start you won't want to stop reading. Every book's a winner!" NYT Bestselling Author Brenda Novak"With her wonderful characters and resonating emotions, Melissa Foster is a must-read author!" New York Times Bestseller Julie Kenner"Melissa Foster is synonymous with sexy, swoony, heartfelt romance!" New York Times Bestseller Lauren BlakelyTempest Braden adores her family and her small hometown, but sometimes too much of a good thing can be confining. At almost thirty, having watched most of her siblings find true love, she's anxious to experience her own happily ever after, and the move to Pleasant Hill, Maryland, is just the change she needs. When she rents a room from ruggedly handsome, and closed-off, artist Nash Morgan...

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