Download or read book Mary Toft Or the Rabbit Queen written by Dexter Clarence Palmer and published by Pantheon. This book was released on 2019 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: John cannot explain how or why Mary Toft, the wife of a local journeyman, has managed to give birth to a dead rabbit. John and Zachary realize that nothing in their experience as rural physicians has prepared them to deal with a situation like this. When King George I learns of Mary's plight, she and her doctors are summoned to London

Download or read book The Book of Form and Emptiness written by Ruth Ozeki and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2021-09-21 with total page 573 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the Women’s Prize for Fiction “No one writes like Ruth Ozeki—a triumph.” —Matt Haig, New York Times bestselling author of The Midnight Library “Inventive, vivid, and propelled by a sense of wonder.” —TIME “If you’ve lost your way with fiction over the last year or two, let The Book of Form and Emptiness light your way home.” —David Mitchell, Booker Prize-finalist author of Cloud Atlas A boy who hears the voices of objects all around him; a mother drowning in her possessions; and a Book that might hold the secret to saving them both—the brilliantly inventive new novel from the Booker Prize-finalist Ruth Ozeki One year after the death of his beloved musician father, thirteen-year-old Benny Oh begins to hear voices. The voices belong to the things in his house—a sneaker, a broken Christmas ornament, a piece of wilted lettuce. Although Benny doesn't understand what these things are saying, he can sense their emotional tone; some are pleasant, a gentle hum or coo, but others are snide, angry and full of pain. When his mother, Annabelle, develops a hoarding problem, the voices grow more clamorous. At first, Benny tries to ignore them, but soon the voices follow him outside the house, onto the street and at school, driving him at last to seek refuge in the silence of a large public library, where objects are well-behaved and know to speak in whispers. There, Benny discovers a strange new world. He falls in love with a mesmerizing street artist with a smug pet ferret, who uses the library as her performance space. He meets a homeless philosopher-poet, who encourages him to ask important questions and find his own voice amongst the many. And he meets his very own Book—a talking thing—who narrates Benny’s life and teaches him to listen to the things that truly matter. With its blend of sympathetic characters, riveting plot, and vibrant engagement with everything from jazz, to climate change, to our attachment to material possessions, The Book of Form and Emptiness is classic Ruth Ozeki—bold, wise, poignant, playful, humane and heartbreaking.

Download or read book The Tournament written by Matthew Reilly and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2015-07-21 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A complete success…action fans and PBS types can share their enthusiasm” (Booklist, starred review) when a young Queen Elizabeth I is thrust into a gripping game of deception and lust at the height of the Ottoman Empire in this edge-of-your-seat historical thriller from the New York Times bestselling author of The Great Zoo of China and Temple. The year is 1546, and Suleiman the Magnificent, the feared Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, issues an invitation to every king in Europe: You are invited to send your finest player to compete in a chess tournament to determine the champion of the known world. Thousands converge on Constantinople, including the English court’s champion and his guide, the esteemed scholar Roger Ascham. Seeing a chance to enlighten the mind of a student, Ascham brings along Elizabeth Tudor, a brilliant young woman not yet consumed by royal duties in Henry VIII’s court. Yet on the opening night of the tournament, a powerful guest of the Sultan is murdered. Soon, barbaric deaths, diplomatic corruption, and unimaginable depravity—sexual and otherwise—unfold before Elizabeth’s and Ascham’s eyes. The pair soon realizes that the real chess game is being played within the court itself…and its most treacherous element is that a stranger in a strange land is only as safe as her host is gracious.

Download or read book When We Cease to Understand the World written by Benjamín Labatut and published by Pushkin Press. This book was released on 2020-09-03 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: SELECTED FOR BARACK OBAMA'S SUMMER READING LIST 'A monstrous and brilliant book' Philip Pullman 'Wholly mesmerising and revelatory... Completely fascinating' William Boyd Sometimes discovery brings destruction When We Cease to Understand the World shows us great minds striking out into dangerous, uncharted terrain. Fritz Haber, Alexander Grothendieck, Werner Heisenberg, Erwin Schrödinger: these are among the luminaries into whose troubled lives we are thrust as they grapple with the most profound questions of existence. They have strokes of unparalleled genius, they alienate friends and lovers, they descend into isolated states of madness. Some of their discoveries revolutionise our world for the better; others pave the way to chaos and unimaginable suffering. The lines are never clear. With breakneck pace and wondrous detail, Benjamín Labatut uses the imaginative resources of fiction to break open the stories of scientists and mathematicians who expanded our notions of the possible.

Download or read book The Accidental written by Ali Smith and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2007-04-10 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Filled with the bestselling, award-winning author's trademark wordplay and inventive storytelling, here is the dizzyingly entertaining, wickedly humorous story of a mysterious stranger whose sudden appearance during a family’s summer holiday transforms four variously unhappy people. Each of the Smarts—parents Eve and Michael, son Magnus, and the youngest, daughter Astrid—encounter Amber in his or her own solipsistic way, but somehow her presence allows them to see their lives (and their life together) in a new light. Smith’s narrative freedom and exhilarating facility with language propel the novel to its startling, wonderfully enigmatic conclusion.

Download or read book The Plot Against America written by Philip Roth and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2004-10-05 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Philip Roth's bestselling alternate history—the chilling story of what happens to one family when America elects a charismatic, isolationist president—is soon to be an HBO limited series. In an extraordinary feat of narrative invention, Philip Roth imagines an alternate history where Franklin D. Roosevelt loses the 1940 presidential election to heroic aviator and rabid isolationist Charles A. Lindbergh. Shortly thereafter, Lindbergh negotiates a cordial “understanding” with Adolf Hitler, while the new government embarks on a program of folksy anti-Semitism. For one boy growing up in Newark, Lindbergh’s election is the first in a series of ruptures that threaten to destroy his small, safe corner of America–and with it, his mother, his father, and his older brother. "A terrific political novel . . . Sinister, vivid, dreamlike . . . creepily plausible. . . You turn the pages, astonished and frightened.” — The New York Times Book Review

Download or read book We Cast a Shadow written by Maurice Carlos Ruffin and published by One World/Ballantine. This book was released on 2019 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In a near-future Southern city, everyone is talking about a new experimental medical procedure that boasts unprecedented success rates. In a society plagued by racism, segregation, and private prisons, this operation saves lives with a controversial method--by turning people white. Like any father, our unnamed narrator just wants the best for his son Nigel, a biracial boy whose black birthmark is getting bigger by the day. But in order to afford Nigel's whiteness operation, our narrator must make partner as one of the few black associates at his law firm, jumping through a series of increasingly absurd hoops--from diversity committees to plantation tours to equality activist groups--in a tragicomic quest to protect his son. This electrifying, suspenseful novel is, at once, a razor-sharp satire of surviving racism in America and a profoundly moving family story. In the tradition ofRalph Ellison's Invisible Man, We Cast a Shadow fearlessly shines a light on the violence we inherit, and on the desperate things we do for the ones we love"--

Download or read book Tournament written by Shelby Foote and published by . This book was released on 1949 with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book A Tip for the Hangman written by Allison Epstein and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2022-01-04 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An Elizabethan espionage thriller in which playwright Christopher Marlowe spies on Mary, Queen of Scots while navigating the perils of politics, theater, romance—and murder. England, 1585. In Kit Marlowe's last year at Cambridge, he is approached by Queen Elizabeth's spymaster offering an unorthodox career opportunity: going undercover to intercept a Catholic plot to put Mary, Queen of Scots on Elizabeth's throne. Spying on Queen Mary turns out to be more than Kit bargained for, but his salary allows him to mount his first play, and over the following years he becomes the toast of London's raucous theater scene. But when Kit finds himself reluctantly drawn back into the world of espionage and treason, he realizes everything he's worked so hard to attain—including the trust of the man he loves—could vanish in an instant. Pairing modern language with period detail, Allison Epstein brings Elizabeth's lavish court, Marlowe's colorful theater troupe, and the squalor of sixteenth-century London to vivid, teeming life. At the center of the action is Kit himself—an irrepressible, irreverent force of nature.

Download or read book Golden State written by Ben H. Winters and published by Mulholland Books. This book was released on 2019-01-22 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From award-winning, New York Times bestselling novelist Ben H. Winters comes a mind-bending novel set in a world governed by absolute truth, where lies are as dangerous as murder. In a strange alternate society that values law and truth above all else, Laszlo Ratesic is a nineteen-year veteran of the Speculative Service. He lives in the Golden State, a nation standing where California once did, a place where like-minded Americans retreated after the erosion of truth and the spread of lies made public life and governance impossible. In the Golden State, knowingly contradicting the truth is the greatest crime -- and stopping those crimes is Laz's job. In its service, he is one of the few individuals permitted to harbor untruths, to "speculate" on what might have happened. But the Golden State is less of a paradise than its name might suggest. To monitor, verify, and enforce the truth requires a veritable panopticon of surveillance and recording. And when those in control of the facts twist them for nefarious means, the Speculators are the only ones with the power to fight back.

Download or read book The Tournament in England 1100 1400 written by Juliet R. V. Barker and published by Boydell Press. This book was released on 2003 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A survey of the tournament in England from its first emergence in the 12th century to the beginning of the 15th, when technical changes altered its very nature. Juliet Barker surveys the tournament in England from its first emergence in the twelfth century to the beginning of the fifteenth, when it was revolutionised by the emergence of technical changes which altered its very nature. Theoriginal publication of this study, deriving from Juliet Barker's PhD thesis supervised by Maurice Keen, reestablished the importance of the tournament at the heart of medieval chivalric culture. The first serious scholarly publication for over half a century, it dramatically reawakened interest in the historical context of tournaments, and is especially valuable for its detailed evidence on the early years. Tournaments are shown as far more than just sport. They had wide political, social and military implications; in England their potential as a political instrument was quickly realised: for the disaffected they became a means of rebellion and feuding, but for the king and court they were a powerful propaganda machine. Participation in tournaments was also a way to earn a coveted reputation for chivalry; the passion for tourneying could bring knights lasting fame. Military demands accounted for the increasing sophistication of armour and weapons, partly in response to the demands of the tourneyers, who needed military training that reflected their role in actual combat. This wide-ranging study looks at the tournament fromall these angles, and in so doing produces an exemplary history of the first three hundred years of their development. JULIET BARKER is a well-known broadcaster and writer, whose other books include The Brontesand Wordsworth: A Life in Letters.

Download or read book Hill William written by Scott McClanahan and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Scott McClanahan is the only real successor we have to Breece D'J Pancake. Old-fashioned storytelling from modern Appalachia.

Download or read book I Am Not Sidney Poitier written by Percival Everett and published by Graywolf Press. This book was released on 2011-08-02 with total page 275 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: I Am Not Sidney Poitier is an irresistible comic novel from the master storyteller Percival Everett, and an irreverent take on race, class, and identity in America I was, in life, to be a gambler, a risk-taker, a swashbuckler, a knight. I accepted, then and there, my place in the world. I was a fighter of windmills. I was a chaser of whales. I was Not Sidney Poitier. Not Sidney Poitier is an amiable young man in an absurd country. The sudden death of his mother orphans him at age eleven, leaving him with an unfortunate name, an uncanny resemblance to the famous actor, and, perhaps more fortunate, a staggering number of shares in the Turner Broadcasting Corporation. Percival Everett's hilarious new novel follows Not Sidney's tumultuous life, as the social hierarchy scrambles to balance his skin color with his fabulous wealth. Maturing under the less-than watchful eye of his adopted foster father, Ted Turner, Not gets arrested in rural Georgia for driving while black, sparks a dinnertable explosion at the home of his manipulative girlfriend, and sleuths a murder case in Smut Eye, Alabama, all while navigating the recurrent communication problem: "What's your name?" a kid would ask. "Not Sidney," I would say. "Okay, then what is it?"

Download or read book The Tournament Trilogy written by B. B. Griffith and published by Griffith Publishing LLC. This book was released on 2014-01-17 with total page 1057 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Tournament Trilogy follows the rise of the Tournament, a secretive, state-sponsored war game...and the stakes couldn't be higher. This collection contains the first three books in the series and is over 1000 pages of conspiracy, warfare, and murder! _____ Blue Fall (Book 1) If you knew about The Tournament, you'd know why they want it kept secret. People don't like to hear that state-sponsored war games are going on under their noses, in their cities, and on their streets. The world isn't ready to know that the most powerful among us can shape the future by wagering on these fights. People wouldn't understand if they learned that teams in The Tournament have the freedom to do almost anything, anywhere, to win. The Tournament was supposed to be the perfect game, and the perfect secret. Frank Youngsmith, a hapless insurance agent, was supposed to be a nobody, none the wiser. But sometimes things just don't work out like they're supposed to. When Frank stumbles into the dark world of The Tournament when the game is on, it's up to him to expose the secret...or die trying. Grey Winter (Book 2) Two players have been murdered. Two killers are on the loose. Nothing is what it seems. The world is awake now. The Tournament has captivated everyone, but no winner can be declared until the mystery of what happened to Team Blue is solved. Meanwhile, three new players are chosen to rebuild the fallen team, but they are young and inexperienced, and instantly targeted. Their survival is dependent upon their existence remaining a secret. But in the Tournament, secrets are hard to keep. New alliances are formed, old enemies are confronted, and the truth is finally revealed in Grey Winter. Black Spring (Book 3) The Black House gathers power and the remaining teams are divided. The Tournament will fall into the hands of Eddie Mazaryk and Team Black unless Ellie Willmore and Team Blue can stop them. But to stop Black, Ellie needs to pull off a miracle: unite sworn enemies to beat the best of the best. The stakes have never been higher. The winners own the Tournament. The losers forfeit everything...even their lives. Ties of friendship, love, and hate are put to the test under a hail of gunfire in Black Spring, the spectacular conclusion to The Tournament Trilogy.

Download or read book Beeswing written by Richard Thompson and published by Algonquin Books. This book was released on 2021-04-06 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Rolling Stone Best Music Book of 2021 “Thompson is a master showman . . . [Beeswing is] everything you’d hope a Richard Thompson autobiography would be . . . It’s both major and minor, dirge and ditty, light on its feet but packing a punch.” —The Wall Street Journal Now Featuring an Interview with Elvis Costello In this moving, immersive, and long-awaited memoir, beloved international music legend Richard Thompson recreates the spirit of his early years, where he found, and then lost, and then found his way again. Considered one of the top twenty guitarists of all time, Thompson also belongs in the songwriting pantheon alongside Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, and Randy Newman. Here the British folk musician takes us back to the late 1960s, a period of great change and creativity for both him and the world at large. During the pivotal years of 1967 to 1975, just as he was discovering his passion for music, he formed the band Fairport Convention with some schoolmates and helped establish the genre of British folk rock. It was a thrilling period of massive tours, where Thompson was on the road in both the UK and the US, crossing paths with the likes of Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, and Jimi Hendrix, as well as a time of heady and explosive creativity for Thompson, who wrote some of his most famous songs during this time. But as Thompson reveals, those eight years were also marked by upheaval and tragedy. Honest, moving, and compelling, Beeswing vividly captures the life of a remarkable man and musician during a period of artistic intensity, in a world on the cusp of change. “An absorbing, witty, often deliciously biting read, as all rock memoirs should be.” —Los Angeles Review of Books

Download or read book Lithium for Medea written by Kate Braverman and published by Seven Stories Press. This book was released on 2002-03-05 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lithium for Medea is as much a tale of addiction—to sex, drugs, and dysfunctional family chains—as it is one of mothers and daughters, their mutual rebellion and unconscious mimicry. Here is the story according to Rose—the daughter of a narcissistic, emotionally crippled mother and a father who shadowboxes with death in hospital corridors—as she slips deeply and dangerously into the lair of a cocaine-fed artist in the bohemian squalor of Venice. Lithium for Medea sears us with Rose’s breathless, fierce, visceral flight—like a drug that leaves one’s perceptions forever altered.

Download or read book Writer s Digest University written by The Editors of Writer's Digest and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2010-10-08 with total page 678 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Everything You need to Write and Sell Your Work This is the ultimate crash course in writing and publishing! Inside you'll find comprehensive instruction, up-to-date market listings, a CD featuring recorded live webinars with industry professionals, an all-access pass to WritersMarket.com, and more. Writer's Digest University is the perfect resource for you, no matter your experience level. This one-stop resource contains: • Quick and comprehensive answers to common questions including: "How do I write a successful novel?" and "How do I know if self-publishing is right for me?" • Instruction and examples for formatting and submitting fiction, nonfiction, articles, children's writing, scripts, and verse. • Advanced instruction on business-related issues like marketing and publicity, using social media, freelancing for corporations, keeping finances in order, and setting the right price for your work. • A detailed look at what agents want and how to get one that best fits your needs. • Market listings for publishers and agents open to unsolicited work and new writers, contests and awards, and conferences and workshops. • A CD with recordings of 4 popular WD webinars: How Do I Get My Book Published?, How to Land a Literary Agent, How Writers Can Succeed in the Future of Digital Publishing, and Freelance Basics.* • A scratch-off code that gives you a one-year subscription to WritersMarket.com and a 20% discount on the WritersDigestUniversity.com course of your choice.* Get started now with everything you need to build a thriving writing career. Whether you're starting from scratch or have a bit of experience, you'll find the tools you need for success. *PLEASE NOTE: CDs and one-year subscription are NOT included with the ebook version of this title.