They sought the final secret of the Universe.Show Excerpt ied a million times till he floated in a ball of blue-white fire. Scarcely visible, the air about him blazed with bluish incandescence of ionization. "Increase the power," suggested Morey. Fuller turned on more power. The blue halo was shot through with tiny violet sparks, the sharp odor of ozone in the air was stifling; the heat of wasted energy was making the room hotter. The power increased further, and the tiny sparks were waving streamers, that laced across the surface of the blue fire. Little jets of electric flame reached out along the beam of the ray now. Finally, as full power of the molecular ray was reached, the entire halo was buried under a mass of writhing sparks that seemed to leap up into the air above the man's head, wavering up to extinction. The room was unbearably hot, despite the molecular ray coolers absorbing the heat of the air, and blowing cooled air into the room. Fuller snapped off the ray, and put the pistol on the table beside him. The halo died, and went out a momen

Star Wars meets Jurassic Park as dinosaurs return to earth from space. Now humans are the endangered species!Wildlife biologist Chase Armstrong and Montana rancher's daughter Kit Daniels find themselves in the center of a battle between US military forces and intelligent dinosaurs returning to earth after 65 million years in space. Fighting for their lives and the future of humanity, Kit and Chase may find romance--if they live long enough! Great adventure reading for all ages and both genders.

The New York Times Top Five Bestseller - Michael Pollan's uniquely enjoyable quest to understand the transformative magic of cooking In a culture of celebrity chefs and food reality shows, in countries which are crammed with fresh ingredients flown in from every corner of the Earth, we nonetheless year-on-year wade ever deeper into a great swamp of processed foods. The more we watch food on television, the less food we actually prepare and cook. Michael Pollan's marvellous new book is a clarion-call for the virtues and values of proper cooking - an essential, defining human activity which sits at the heart of our cultures, shapes family life and is in itself hugely enjoyable. Pollan recreates the transformative fundamentals of how we cook, building from the most basic principles: cooking with fire, cooking with water, cooking with air and cooking with earth. Cooked is an extremely funny and surprising plea to Pollan's readers to take control of their own fates and revel again in what should be a lifetime's engagement with the almost magical activity of making food. And it is, of course, about so much more - how cooking can transform both how we think about ourselves and about our families and friends. Reviews: 'Pollan's book is many things, among them a memoir of learning to master the absolute basics of culinary creation: fire, water, air and earth. As Pollan chats with cheesemaking nuns and discovers Walt Whitman's views on composting, he reminds us that cooking used to be all about connection - with the world around us, with other times and cultures, and with those we cook for ... this book [is] both approachable and rewarding' Hephzibah Anderson, *Prospect* About the author: Michael Pollan is the author of Second Nature, A Place of My Own, The Botany of Desire, The Omnivore's Dilemma, In Defence of Food and Food Rules. He lives in California.

At Blind Lake, a large federal research installation in northern Minnesota, scientists are using a technology they barely understand to watch everyday life in a city of lobster like aliens upon a distant planet. They can't contact the aliens in any way or understand their language. All they can do is watch. Then, without warning, a military cordon is imposed on the Blind Lake site. All communication with the outside world is cut off. Food and other vital supplies are delivered by remote control. No one knows why. The scientists, nevertheless, go on with their research. Among them are Nerissa Iverson and the man she recently divorced, Raymond Scutter. They continue to work together despite the difficult conditions and the bitterness between them. Ray believes their efforts are doomed; that culture is arbitrary, and the aliens will forever be an enigma. Nerissa believes there is a commonality of sentient thought, and that our failure to understand is our own ignorance, not a fact of nature. The behavior of the alien she has been tracking seems to be developing an elusive narrative logic--and she comes to feel that the alien is somehow, impossibly, aware of the project's observers. But her time is running out. Ray is turning hostile, stalking her. The military cordon is tightening. Understanding had better come soon...

Mai 2025: Die Energieversorgung der Erde scheint gesichert, seit die USA auf dem Mond das Element Helium-3 fördern. Bahnbrechende Technologien des Konzerngiganten Orley Enterprises haben die Raumfahrt revolutioniert, in einem erbitterten Kopf-an-Kopf-Rennen versuchen Amerikaner und Chinesen, auf dem Trabanten ihre Claims abzustecken. Während der exzentrische Konzernchef Julian Orley mit einer Schar prominenter Gäste zu einer Vergnügungstour ins All aufbricht, soll Detektiv Owen Jericho, den eine unglückliche Liebe nach Shanghai verschlagen hat, die untergetauchte Dissidentin Yoyo ausfindig machen. Was nach Routine klingt, ist tatsächlich der Auftakt zu einer alptraumhaften Jagd von China über Äquatorialguinea und Berlin bis nach London und Venedig. Denn auch andere interessieren sich für Yoyo, die offenbar im Besitz streng gehüteter Geheimnisse und ihres Lebens nicht mehr sicher ist. Jericho muss sich mit der bildschönen, aber ziemlich anstrengenden Chinesin zusammentun, um den phantomgleichen Gegnern auf die Spur zu kommen. In einer Zeit, in der multinationale Konzerne der Politik zunehmend das Zepter aus der Hand nehmen, führen beide einen verzweifelten Kampf ums Überleben, gehetzt von einer Übermacht hochgerüsteter Killer. Die Suche nach den Drahtziehern führt mitten hinein in die Wirren afrikanischer Söldnerkriege, Machtkämpfe um Öl und alternative Energien, Vorherrschaftsträume im Weltraum – und zum Mond, auf dem sich Orleys Reisegruppe unvermittelt einer tödlichen Bedrohung gegenüber sieht.

On the outside, Dina Demille is the epitome of normal. She runs a quaint Victorian Bed and Breakfast in a small Texas town, owns a Shih Tzu named Beast, and is a perfect neighbor, whose biggest problem should be what to serve her guests for breakfast. But Dina is. . . different: Her broom is a deadly weapon; her Inn is magic and thinks for itself. Meant to be a lodging for otherworldly visitors, the only permanent guest is a retired Galactic aristocrat who can’t leave the grounds because she’s responsible for the deaths of millions and someone might shoot her on sight. Under the circumstances, "normal" is a bit of a stretch for Dina. And now, something with wicked claws and deepwater teeth has begun to hunt at night. . . . Feeling responsible for her neighbors, Dina decides to get involved. Before long, she has to juggle dealing with the annoyingly attractive, ex-military, new neighbor, Sean Evans—an alpha-strain werewolf—and the equally arresting cosmic vampire soldier, Arland, while trying to keep her inn and its guests safe. But the enemy she’s facing is unlike anything she’s ever encountered before. It’s smart, vicious, and lethal, and putting herself between this creature and her neighbors might just cost her everything.

He had taken a chance to be first in line to submit his request. If granted, he would finally obtain his freedom. He wondered when They had taken over. In had been so gradual that no one realized until They were in control. After a while, one simply stopped caring. They were here. They ruled. Bill swiped his IdentiCard, made his request and waited. His answer proved shocking!Bill had taken a chance to be first in line to submit his request. He had slipped out of the Senior Resting Center early. If his request was granted, he would finally obtain his freedom. He wondered when They had taken over. It had been so gradual that no one realized until They were in control. After a while, one simply stopped caring. They were here. They ruled. They would never relinquish their authority. Swiping his IdentiCard, Bill entered his request and waited. The final answer proved shocking!

In this electrifying one-hundred-page companion novella to the New York Times bestselling I Am Number Four series, discover what happened to Malcolm Goode after the Mogadorian invasion began. When the Garde split up, heading off to New York City and Mexico, Malcolm decided to stay behind in Ashwood Estates, the Mog’s formerly hidden base located near Washington DC. He wanted to search the facility for anything that might help John Smith and the others stop the alien invasion. But once the spaceships descended, that plan went up in smoke. Before he gets a chance to come up with a plan B, armed soldiers storm the base. As one of the few humans who knows anything about Loric and their war with the Mogadorians, Malcolm is an invaluable asset—and they’ve been tasked with safely escorting him to the president’s secret bunker. With Mogs hot on their trail, though, it’ll be easier said than done. Luckily, Malcolm has some backup in the form of a Chimæra. But even if he makes it to his destination, will Malcolm be able to help what’s left of the government find a way to defeat the Mogs? Or will he be too late?

Jules Verne, the most translated novelist in the world and best known for books such as Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Seas and Around the World in Eighty Days, was also a prolific playwright. Journey Through the Impossible, a play of fantasy and science fiction, ran for 97 performances in Paris in 1882 and 1883. In the three acts, the characters go first to the center of the Earth, then under the sea, and finally to the planet "Altor." Characters from Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Seas, From the Earth to the Moon, Doctor Ox, and Journey to the Center of the Earth appear again in Journey through the Impossible, including Captain Nemo, President Barbican, Michel Ardan, Doctor Ox, and Professor Lidenbrock. Verne wrote this play in the middle of his life, between his optimistic (science helps humanity and is good) and pessimistic (science is dangerous and bad) works; the play is a vehicle for Verne to ask himself and his readers whether science, technology, and the pursuit of knowledge are good or bad. He used the play to pose questions about life and wisdom that are still important in our time. The script of the play was lost to Verne scholars for almost a century, until the text was discovered in 1978 in the Archives of the Censorship Office of the Third French Republic and was published in French in 1981. The play had many reviews in 1882 and two of them are included here to give the reader insight into how the play was staged in Paris in the second half of the 19th century. Also included are many wonderful illustrations showing set designs for the original play, a page from a lost scene, the original frontispiece, and other interesting details. This is the first complete edition and the first English translation of a surprising work by a popular French novelist whose works continue to delight readers and audiences to this day.

Tom Wolfe began The Right Stuff at a time when it was unfashionable to contemplate American heroism. Nixon had left the White House in disgrace, the nation was reeling from the catastrophe of Vietnam, and in 1979--the year the book appeared--Americans were being held hostage by Iranian militants. Yet it was exactly the anachronistic courage of his subjects that captivated Wolfe. In his foreword, he notes that as late as 1970, almost one in four career Navy pilots died in accidents. "The Right Stuff," he explains, "became a story of why men were willing--willing?--delighted!--to take on such odds in this, an era literary people had long since characterized as the age of the anti-hero." Wolfe's roots in New Journalism were intertwined with the nonfiction novel that Truman Capote had pioneered with In Cold Blood. As Capote did, Wolfe tells his story from a limited omniscient perspective, dropping into the lives of his "characters" as each in turn becomes a major player in the space program. After an opening chapter on the terror of being a test pilot's wife, the story cuts back to the late 1940s, when Americans were first attempting to break the sound barrier. Test pilots, we discover, are people who live fast lives with dangerous machines, not all of them airborne. Chuck Yeager was certainly among the fastest, and his determination to push through Mach 1--a feat that some had predicted would cause the destruction of any aircraft--makes him the book's guiding spirit. Yet soon the focus shifts to the seven initial astronauts. Wolfe traces Alan Shepard's suborbital flight and Gus Grissom's embarrassing panic on the high seas (making the controversial claim that Grissom flooded his Liberty capsule by blowing the escape hatch too soon). The author also produces an admiring portrait of John Glenn's apple-pie heroism and selfless dedication. By the time Wolfe concludes with a return to Yeager and his late-career exploits, the narrative's epic proportions and literary merits are secure. Certainly The Right Stuff is the best, the funniest, and the most vivid book ever written about America's manned space program. --Patrick O'Kelley

Netty’s influence transcends a full century as the United States evolves to a point of politically driven economic collapse. The year is 2033 as a young mother, abused by her shiftless husband, heroically decides to remove her two sickly children, Scotty and Abby, from the mean streets of their government subsidized tenement town of Short Hills, New Jersey to the hills and old farmland of Sussex County. There they unite with a Latino family that adopted Jose, a young boy from Costa Rica, traumatized at the age of seven by the brutal murder of his parents and the kidnapping of his infant sister. The two families unite to pool finances, creating the love and bonds that will enable them to survive the psychotic attention of Armoni, a soul damaged beyond redemption, discovery of Baby’s miraculous offspring, Echo; and their subsequent body changes. Through the efforts of Echo who develops an unexplained passion for the curly haired dog, Barney, they flee the clutches of Armoni after the murder of Armoni’s sidekicks by Echo, to Sarasota, Florida, one of the last remaining enclaves of wealth in the U.S. Scotty learns to utilize Echo as a co-conspirator in his intrigue to thwart the efforts of heinous people that prey on the lives of creatures in their environmentally rich new home, where the insidious miscreant, Armoni, tracks them; dragging along Ginger Mae, a New York City prostitute looking for opportunity with her mute child, Daisy; bringing brutality and violence to all. Having fallen in love, the young Abby and Jose draw close, only to be separated by the transcendental Netty, who tries to use Abby as a conduit in her plan to rescue as much wildlife as they can before despicable political events bring on the specter of Armageddon.

The Conglomerate’s most dangerous convicts have made the prison ship Perdition their home. And they will defend it… Perdition is under siege. Mercenaries have boarded the station with orders to take control of the facility—and execute the prisoners. Their commander is offering full pardons to the first five inmates willing to help the mercs complete their mission. Dresdemona “Dred” Devos hasn’t survived hard time just to surrender to the Conglomerate’s armored thugs. Leading a ragtag army of inmates, Dred and her champion, Jael, wage a bloody guerilla war of chaos and carnage against impossible odds. But no matter how dire the outlook, the Dread Queen never backs down…

In 1978, Stephen King introduced the world to the last gunslinger, Roland of Gilead.  Nothing has been the same since. More than twenty years later, the quest for the Dark Tower continues to take readers on a wildly epic ride. Through parallel worlds and across time, Roland must brave desolate wastelands and endless deserts, drifting into the unimaginable and the familiar. A classic tale of colossal scope—crossing over terrain from *The Stand*, *The Eyes of the Dragon*, *Insomnia*, *The Talisman*, *Black House*, *Hearts in Atlantis*, *’Salem’s Lot*, and other familiar King haunts—the adventure takes hold with the turn of each page. And the tower awaits.... **The Second Volume in the Epic Dark Tower Series… The Drawing of the Three** While pursuing his quest for the Dark Tower through a world that is a nightmarishly distorted mirror image of our own, Roland is drawn through a mysterious door that brings him into contemporary America. Here he links forces with the defiant young Eddie Dean, and with the beautiful, brilliant, and brave Odetta Holmes, in a savage struggle against underworld evil and otherworldly enemies. Once again, Stephen King has masterfully interwoven dark, evocative fantasy and icy realism.

Terry is an ordinary girl living in an ordinary world. But a secret buried nine years ago is about to rear its ugly head. Joined by her childhood friend Connor and her uncle Lyle, Terry must hunt down her old nemesis whilst coming to terms with what she left behind and more importantly, who and what she is. Set between Terry's adoptive home in Edinburgh, Scotland, and the fictional world of Santerria where she and her friends hail from, Terry, Connor and Lyle must seek out old companions and unravel the mysterious reappearance of the long thought dead war criminal Edward. They will be joined on their adventure by the races of the four elements; The Pyrovites (Fire), The Water Elementals, The Alchemists (Metal) and the Phantoms (Wind) and the Acara; the refugees of the stars. Alchemist is an introduction to the The Four Corners of Santerria series, setting the scene for a much larger tale that will unfold across four novels. If you are looking for something fantasy-based and unlike anything you have read before, pick-up a copy today.

Six months after the fall of The Program, ex-handler Michael Realm is struggling with his guilt. After all, he was instrumental in erasing the memories of several patients—including one he claimed to love. With a lifetime of regret stretched before him, Realm vows to set things right. Along with his friend, James Murphy, Realm will track down those he’s hurt in an attempt to give them back their lives—starting with Dallas Stone. He’s not looking for forgiveness or redemption; he’s not a hero. But Realm hopes that with each recovered past, he’ll be able to reclaim a small bit of his own.