Download or read book The Hickory Staff written by Rob Scott and published by Gollancz. This book was released on 2010-12-23 with total page 591 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Steven Taylor is an assistant bank manager in a quiet little Mid-West town; his roommate Mark Jenkins is a high school history teacher. Steven's bored with his job; the thought of going through all the accounts that haven't had a single transaction in the past 25 years sounds even more boring - until he discovers one old prospector left $17,000 in October 1870; it's now worth 6.3 million dollars. There's a safe deposit box too, 17C, that's never been opened in all those years. And it would have remained closed if Steven hadn't been browsing through a Denver antique store: as well as a dresser for his sister, he found a new girlfriend, Hannah, the owner's daughter ... and, in a jar of oddments, the long-missing key to Idaho Springs Safety Deposit Box 17C. And without that key, he'd never have found the tapestry that sucked him and Mark into the land of Rona in the strange new world of Eldarn, where they are immediately captured by a group of Ronan resistance fighters. Rona has been occupied by Malakasia for nearly a thousand Twinmoons. Now an evil tyrant rules the land, but he wants more: he wants the key that will open the path for an ancient evil to manifest once and for all. And Steven and Mark need this same key if they are ever to get home to Idaho Springs ...

Download or read book Lessek s Key written by Rob Scott and published by Gollancz. This book was released on 2010-12-23 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Larion spell table has been dormant for nearly a thousand Twinmoons. It waits in a forgotten chamber in Sandcliff Palace, the abandoned Larion Senate stronghold on Eldarn's North Sea. The spell table holds the power to see the people of the five lands safely through the oppression and brutality that have haunted them for generations, but without Lessek's key it is a worthless slab of granite - and Lessek's key itself is just a nondescript stone Steven Taylor and Mark Jenkins overlooked on the night they fell through the far portal into Eldarn. Retrieving the key and freeing Eldarn's people rests with Steven Taylor, the would-be sorcerer from Colorado, who is racing across America with Nerak, the fallen Larion dictator, hot on his heels. Steven must reach Idaho Springs and find Lessek's key before it falls into Nerak's hands and is lost for ever - and with it, the lives of untold millions, in both of Steven's worlds.

Download or read book A Taste for Monsters written by Matthew J. Kirby and published by Scholastic Inc.. This book was released on 2016-09-27 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A “lovely, suspenseful, lyrical” ghost story set in Jack the Ripper’s London from the Edgar and PEN Award-winning author of Icefall (Kirkus Reviews). London 1888, and Jack the Ripper is terrorizing the people of the city. Evelyn, a young woman disfigured by her dangerous work in a matchstick factory with nowhere to go, does not know what to make of her new position as a maid to the Elephant Man in London Hospital. Evelyn wanted to be locked away from the world, like he is, shut away from the filth and dangers of the streets. But in Joseph Merrick, the Elephant Man, she finds a gentle kindred, who does not recoil from her, and who understands her pain. When the murders begin, however, Joseph and Evelyn are haunted nightly by the ghosts of the Ripper’s dead, setting Evelyn on a path to facing her fears and uncovering humanity’s worst nightmares, in which the real monsters are men. “[A] grisly fantasy . . . Evelyn—all grit, anger, and distrust—is a complex and engaging character, the slums and slang of Victorian-era London are carefully delineated, and the eventual revelation of Leather Apron’s identity and fate will leave readers gasping.” —Publishers Weekly “This historical fiction blends horror with mystery and results in wonderfully crafted storytelling with strong, well-drawn characters . . . A great read for fans of history, true crime, or ghost stories.” —School Library Journal “Kirby’s character development, particularly his portrayal of the extraordinary Mr. Merrick, is consistently impressive. Austen devotees are sure to appreciate Kirby’s commitment to the gothic entanglements of Northanger Abbey.” —Booklist

Download or read book The Wizard written by Gene Wolfe and published by Tor Books. This book was released on 2007-04-01 with total page 618 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A novel in two volumes, The Wizard Knight is in the rare company of those works which move past the surface of fantasy and drink from the wellspring of myth. Magic swords, dragons, giants, quests, love, honor, nobility-all the familiar features of fantasy come to fresh life in this masterful work. The first half of the journey, The Knight -- which you are advised to read first, to let the whole story engulf you from the beginning -- took a teenage boy from America into Mythgarthr, the middle realm of seven fantastic worlds. Above are the gods of Skai; below are the capricious Aelf, and more dangerous things still. Journeying throughout Mythgarthr, Able gains a new brother, an Aelf queen lover, a supernatural hound, and the desire to prove his honor and become the noble knight he always knew he would be. Coming into Jotunland, home of the Frost Giants, Able -- now Sir Able of the High Heart --claims the great sword Eterne from the dragon who has it. In reward, he is ushered into the castle of the Valfather, king of all the Gods of Skai. Thus begins the second part of his quest. The Wizard begins with Able's return to Mythgathr on his steed Cloud, a great mare the color of her name. Able is filled with new knowledge of the ways of the seven-fold world and possessed of great magical secrets. His knighthood now beyond question, Able works to fulfill his vows to his king, his lover, his friends, his gods, and even his enemies. Able must set his world right, restoring the proper order among the denizens of all the seven worlds. The Wizard is a charming, riveting, emotionally charged tale of wonders, written with all the beauty one would expect from a writer whom Damon Knight called "a national treasure." If you've never sampled the works of the man Michael Swanwick described as "the greatest writer in the English language alive today," the two volumes of The Wizard Knight are the perfect place to start. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Download or read book Science Fiction The 100 Best Novels written by David Pringle and published by Gateway. This book was released on 2014-06-30 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From one of the best-known editors in modern science fiction, this lively and authoritative guide will appeal to both newcomers and connoisseurs of the genre alike. Informative and readable, David Pringle's choices focus on landmark works by the likes of Ray Bradbury, Alfred Bester and J.G. Ballard, unearth less prominent talents such as Ian Watson, Octavia Butler and Joanna Russ, and highlight breakthrough novels by William Gibson and Philip K. Dick. An essential guide to science fiction literature.

Download or read book The Knight written by Gene Wolfe and published by Tor Books. This book was released on 2005-08-01 with total page 545 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A young man in his teens is transported from our world to a magical realm that contains seven levels of reality. Very quickly transformed by magic into a grown man of heroic proportions, he takes the name Able and sets out on a quest to find the sword that has been promised to him, a sword he will get from a dragon, the one very special blade that will help him fulfill his life ambition to become a knight and a true hero. Inside, however, Able remains a boy, and he must grow in every sense to survive the dangers and delights that lie ahead in encounters with giants, elves, wizards, and dragons. His adventure will conclude next year in the second volume of The Wizard Knight, The Wizard. Gene Wolfe is one of the most widely praised masters of SF and fantasy. He is the winner of the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement, the Nebula Award, twice, the World Fantasy Award, twice, the John W. Campbell Memorial Award, the British Fantasy Award, and France's Prix Apollo. His popular successes include the four-volume classic The Book of the New Sun. With this new series, Wolfe not only surpasses all the most popular genre writers of the last three decades, he takes on the legends of the past century, in a work that will be favorably compared with the best of J. R. R. Tolkien, E. R. Eddison, Mervyn Peake, and T. H. White. This is a book---and a series---for the ages, from perhaps the greatest living writer in (or outside) the fantasy genre. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Download or read book Beasts of Burden Animal Rites written by Evan Dorkin and published by Dark Horse Comics. This book was released on 2018-05-22 with total page 186 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Welcome to Burden Hill — a picturesque little town adorned with white picket fences and green, green grass, home to a unique team of paranormal investigators. Beneath this shiny exterior, Burden Hill harbors dark and sinister secrets, and it's up to a heroic gang of dogs — and one cat — to protect the town from the evil forces at work. These are the Beasts of Burden Hill — Pugs, Ace, Jack, Whitey, Red and the Orphan — whose early experiences with the paranormal (including a haunted doghouse, a witches' coven, and a pack of canine zombies) have led them to become members of the Wise Dog Society, official animal agents sworn to protect their town from evil. This turns out to be no easy task, as they soon encounter demonic cannibal frogs, tortured spirits, a secret rat society, and a bizarre and deadly resurrection in the Burden Hill cemetery — events which lead to fear and heartbreak as our four-legged heroes discover that the evil within Burden Hill is growing and on the move. Can our heroes overcome these supernatural menaces? Can evil be bested by a paranormal team that doesn't have hands? And even more importantly, will Pugs ever shut the hell up? Adventure, mystery, horror, and humor thrive on every page of Beasts of Burden — a comic-book series that will capture readers' hearts and haunt their dreams. Award-winning comics creators Evan Dorkin (Milk and Cheese) and Jill Thompson (Scary Godmother) first introduced these very special investigators in The Dark Horse Book of Hauntings and the other Dark Horse Book of . . . anthologies, for which they won coveted Eisner Awards for Best Short Story and Best Painter. Those first tales are collected here, along with the comic series Beasts of Burden issues #1–#4.

Download or read book The Best of Gene Wolfe written by Gene Wolfe and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2009-03-17 with total page 479 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The best stories of a long and influential career by “quite simply a superb writer” (The Washington Post Book World)

Download or read book Mestiza Blood written by V. Castro and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2022-01-25 with total page 115 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A short story collection of nightmares, dreams, desire and visions centered around the Chicana experience. The stunning, star-reviewed V. Castro weaves urban legend, folklore, life experience and heartache in this intimate anthology of modern horrors. From the lauded author of The Queen of the Cicadas (which picked up starred reviews from PW, Kirkus and Booklist who called her "a dynamic and innovative voice") comes a short story collection of nightmares, dreams, desire and visions focused on the Chicana experience. V.Castro weaves urban legend, folklore, life experience and heartache in this personal journey beginning in south Texas: a bar where a devil dances the night away; a street fight in a neighborhood that may not have been a fight after all; a vengeful chola at the beginning of the apocalypse; mind swapping in the not so far future; satan who falls and finds herself in a brothel in Amsterdam; the keys to Mictlan given to a woman after she dies during a pandemic. The collection finishes with two longer tales: The Final Porn Star is a twist on the final girl trope and slasher, with a creature from Mexican folklore; and Truck Stop is an erotic horror romance with two hearts: a video store and a truck stop. FLAME TREE PRESS is the imprint of long-standing Independent Flame Tree Publishing, dedicated to full-length original fiction in the horror and suspense, science fiction & fantasy, and crime / mystery / thriller categories. The list brings together fantastic new authors and the more established; the award winners, and exciting, original voices.

Download or read book German Culture through Film written by Robert C. Reimer and published by Hackett Publishing. This book was released on 2017-09-01 with total page 371 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: German Culture through Film: An Introduction to German Cinema is an English-language text that serves equally well in courses on modern German film, in courses on general film studies, in courses that incorporate film as a way to study culture, and as an engaging resource for scholars, students, and devotees of cinema and film history. In its second edition, German Culture through Film expands on the first edition, providing additional chapters with context for understanding the era in which the featured films were produced. Thirty-three notable German films are arranged in seven chronological chapters, spanning key moments in German film history, from the silent era to the present. Each chapter begins with an introduction that focuses on the history and culture surrounding films of the relevant period. Sections within chapters are each devoted to one particular film, providing film credits, a summary of the story, background information, an evaluation, questions and activities to encourage diverse interpretations, a list of related films, and bibliographical information on the films discussed.

Download or read book Naked Empire written by Terry Goodkind and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2010-12-28 with total page 752 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Sword of Truth saga continues with Naked Empire, from New York Times-bestselling Terry Goodkind-- a sprawling epic adventure focusing on the central figures of Richard and Kahlan. Beginning with Wizard's First Rule and continuing with subsequent fantasy masterpieces, Terry Goodkind has thrilled and awed millions of readers worldwide with his Sword of Truth series, the basis for the TV show Legend of the Seeker. Here Goodkind returns with a broad-canvas adventure of epic intrigue, violent conflict, and terrifying peril for the beautiful Kahlan Amnell and her husband, the heroic Richard Rahl, the Sword of Truth. Richard Rahl has been poisoned. Saving an empire from annihilation is the price of the antidote. With the shadow of death looming near, the empire crumbling before the invading hordes, and time running out, Richard is offered not only his own life but the salvation of a people, in exchange for delivering his wife, Kahlan, into bondage to the enemy. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Download or read book Protocol written by Alexander R. Galloway and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2006-02-17 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How Control Exists after Decentralization Is the Internet a vast arena of unrestricted communication and freely exchanged information or a regulated, highly structured virtual bureaucracy? In Protocol, Alexander Galloway argues that the founding principle of the Net is control, not freedom, and that the controlling power lies in the technical protocols that make network connections (and disconnections) possible. He does this by treating the computer as a textual medium that is based on a technological language, code. Code, he argues, can be subject to the same kind of cultural and literary analysis as any natural language; computer languages have their own syntax, grammar, communities, and cultures. Instead of relying on established theoretical approaches, Galloway finds a new way to write about digital media, drawing on his backgrounds in computer programming and critical theory. "Discipline-hopping is a necessity when it comes to complicated socio-technical topics like protocol," he writes in the preface. Galloway begins by examining the types of protocols that exist, including TCP/IP, DNS, and HTML. He then looks at examples of resistance and subversion—hackers, viruses, cyberfeminism, Internet art—which he views as emblematic of the larger transformations now taking place within digital culture. Written for a nontechnical audience, Protocol serves as a necessary counterpoint to the wildly utopian visions of the Net that were so widespread in earlier days.

Download or read book The Insidious Dr Fu Manchu written by Sax Rohmer and published by Hyweb Technology Co. Ltd.. This book was released on 2011-11-15 with total page 1173 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Simple Sabotage Field Manual was authored byby The United States Office of Strategic Services and is a must for any student of strategy and sabotage.

Download or read book The Larion Senators written by Rob Scott and published by Gollancz. This book was released on 2010-12-23 with total page 530 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nerak is defeated. Steven Taylor has cast the malevolent dictator's soul into the Fold's inky void - but the evil that controlled Nerak and brutalised the people of Eldarn has escaped, and taken Mark Jenkins with it. Steven must put his own feelings to one side, for Eldarn's fate still hangs in the balance, and he remains the land's only real hope. As he and his companions make their way across country, rallying what remains of their allies, Mark, no longer the affable teacher from Colorado, disappears into the foothills of the Blackstone Mountains, determined to excavate the Larion spell table and use its awesome power to destroy Eldarn. During an epic sea journey to the enemy strongholds of northern Malakasia, Steven discovers he is stronger than he thought, but a confrontation with Mark is inevitable ... Is Steven willing to kill his best friend and face eternal exile in Eldarn to save two worlds from annihilation? Return to Eldarn for this towering finale, where our heroes face a terrifying army of mutated beasts, and the mysteries of the Larion Senators are waiting to be unlocked, for good or for evil ...

Download or read book The Riddle Master of Hed written by Patricia A. McKillip and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2015-08-13 with total page 167 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Long ago, the wizards had vanished from the world, and all knowledge was left hidden in riddles. Morgon, prince of the simple farmers of Hed, proved himself a master of such riddles when he staked his life to win a crown from the dead Lord of Aum. But now ancient, evil forces were threatening him. Shape-changers began replacing friends until no man could be trusted. Morgon was forced to flee to hostile kingdoms, seeking the High One who ruled from mysterious Erlenstar Mountain. Beside him went Deth, the High One's Harper. Ahead lay strange encounters and terrifying adventures. And with him always was the greatest of unsolved riddles; the nature of the three stars on his forehead that seemed to drive him toward his ultimate destiny.

Download or read book The Stress of Her Regard written by Tim Powers and published by Tachyon Publications. This book was released on 2008-08 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: World Fantasy Award Winner Michael Crawford is forced to flee when discovers his bride brutally murdered in their wedding bed. Yet it is not the revengeful townspeople he fears but the deadly embrace of the malignant spirit that is claiming him as her bridegroom. Crawford will not travel alone; soon he is aided by his fellow victims, the greatest poets of his day--Byron, Keats, and Shelley. Together they embark upon a desperate journey, crisscrossing Europe and battling the vampiric fiend who seeks her ultimate pleasure in their ravaged bodies and imperiled souls. Telling a secret history of passion and terror, Tim Powers (The Anubis Gates, Declare, Three Days to Never) masterfully recasts the tragic lives of the Romantics into a uniquely frightening tale. Back in print for the first time since 1994, this newly revised edition of The Stress of Her Regard will thrill both Powers fans and newcomers to this gripping Gothic tour de force.

Download or read book Araminta Station written by Jack Vance and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2011-12-19 with total page 474 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Travel out along the galaxy's Perseid Arm. Branch off to follow the ten thousand stars of Mircea's Wisp. Eventually you will come to the Purple Rose System - three stars, Lorca, Sing and Syrene, that seem about to drift away into the void. Three planets circle Syrene. On one, Cadwal, there is Life. Long ago the Naturalist Society of Earth had listed Cadwal as a natural preserve. An administration centre had been set up and staffed to protect the planet from all exploitation. Araminta Station. Now, centuries later, the young Glawen Clattuc is beginning to wonder what the future may hold for him in the hierarchic, carefully ordered hereditary society that is life on Cadwal.