The Wizards' University is short of cash. Nothing comes from the tourists anymore and efforts to drum up support by writing letters to students' families come to nought. And then the first reply arrives to a begging letter in the form of assassins
This historic year is vividly pictured as a young American surgeon and Canadian wife dare to enter exotic Manchu (Ching) Empire only a decade after the Empress Dowagers Boxers massacred foreigners. Admired as missionaries, deeply in love, Nell on the ocean liner - begins to doubt James judgment. James, eager to bring modern medicine to antique China, is shocked by the shabbiness of his assigned Hospital-of-Last-Resort with only male apprentices as aides. He faces poor patients with monstrous tumors, plague, stones, does operations never observed, is opposed by unbelievable superstitions. Astonishingly, the foreign doctor (true) is called to Military Headquarters where the Vice-roy of the two Kwang Provinces -- as large as Germany -- has called brilliantly robed Mandarins Ministers of Army, Navy, Law, Treasury, Literary chancellor. Why? Unknown anarchists tried to assonate the Tartar General! Is Revolution brewing? On return, James sedan chair is waylaid by Ming Secret Society dissidents. Different Chinese factions seek James USA support. Pretty teacher, impetuous Stephanie, sponsors returned student radicals. Medical assistants-- for Republic therefore anti-Manchu (very dangerous) -- hide a rebel in his neutral Hospital. Chinese Officials in Manchu Administration expect support for their Self-Strengthening moderates. Meanwhile Nell struggles with her new house knowing no Cantonese, then with intelligent cook-helper knowing no English. Sir Gladwyn, British diplomat, takes her to ancient pagoda; she climbs inside! Shocked at primitive child-birthing in this medieval village, shes chased as Blue-Eyed Witch! Visiting the British Yamn they hear a threatening rocket. Returning to Hospital, James is captured by the Manchu General, is horrified at cruel but brilliant strategy, watches Manchus win historic Battle of Seventy-Two Heroes. Mr.Colocott, Hong Kong tea exporter, Mr.Paronel, British consul, M.Zint, disillusioned but fluent French liaison, Mr. Fa, Hospital pharmacist, argue with the North Americans, fearful and fascinated, as this tumultuous year -1910 - will change World History.
The exciting second book in the fantastical series for ages 10-14 by NYT bestselling author, Kelley Armstrong. Rowan is now the Royal Monster Hunter, and her twin brother, Rhydd, is destined to be king. But her mother's cousin Heward is still determined that his children be the ones to inherit the titles, and will stop at nothing to show that Rowan and Rhydd are too immature to properly lead. After the gryphon that Rowan captured in Book One gives birth but then dies, Rowan is left with a baby gryphon she knows she cannot keep. And it grows faster than anyone can imagine . . . In order to save face after an accident involving the troublesome gryphon, Rowan, with the help of her friends Dain and Alianor, along with an entourage of monstrous companions, must make a journey to the mountains to release the gryphon back into the wild. What starts off as a simple enough task soon becomes a dangerous quest, as the group encounters numerous rare and deadly monsters along the way, including wyverns and ceffyl-dwrs. Nothing is easy when you're a "monster magnet" like Rowan. Can she prove herself worthy of the title of Royal Monster Hunter? Find out in this exciting second book in the Royal Guide to Monster Slaying series!
A bloody massacre. A looming civil war. Can two opposed gryphons work together to save their kind? Zeph thrills at the wind in his wings and the hunt for wild parrot. As a simple forest gryphon, he never thought much about his sophisticated city-dwelling cousins living in the lofty eyrie at the edge of the woods. But his carefree life turns upside down when he comes across a young city gryphon stunned by her discovery of a field littered with slaughtered animals. Kia always has her beak in a book. But when her best friend goes missing, she flies down to the woodland and gets tangled up with a wild country gryphon and a shocking conspiracy. With food in short supply and war on the horizon, Kia must choose between forsaking her own or allowing Zeph’s people to be wiped off the map. Forced to overcome their prejudice and misconceptions, the unlikely pair races against time to prevent an apocalypse. Can Zeph and Kia unite their species before a fiery conflict destroys them all? Eyrie is the first book in the high-flying Gryphon Insurrection epic fantasy series. If you like mythical creatures, graphic battles, and moral dilemmas, then you’ll love K. Vale Nagle’s darkly compassionate tale. Buy this boxed set to soar into action today! Includes three complete fantasy novels: Eyrie, Ashen Weald, and Starling.
Boxed set includes both full length gryphon shifter novels, Wingspan and Skyfall. Wingspan: Jenn Klein was raised in the human world unaware of her gryphon heritage or the legacy before her. Devastated by the death of her twin brother, she makes the uncharacteristic decision to find emotional connection with a stranger, a man she knows only as Talon in the cave-like sleeper cab of his rig. But no sooner is she introduced to the gryphon world they’re meant to share than she’s violently taken and forced to fight, delicately balancing the human world she knows with the world of the gryphons. Born and reared a proud warrior, Talon’s life takes the turn of most male gryphons; that of a rogue, existing in both the human world and on the fringes of his adopted Rocky Mountain eyrie. After proving himself to the beautiful but emotionally damaged rogue female in his truck they part ways. He’s haunted by her presence in his heart until they’re reunited in his eyrie. When she’s torn from his arms he’ll stop at nothing to have the woman he now calls Shadow returned to his side. Skyfall: When Cloud is expelled from Master Sky’s ranger training program, the last gryphon she expects to find at her den is her old lover Soar. Now she’s the only gryphon with the skills to get inside a corrupt Calgary eyrie and Soar needs her in more ways than one. Cloud has little choice but to accept the mission. Success will get her back in Sky’s good books but accepting Soar as her working partner will either heal her broken heart or ruin it completely. Master Soar walked out of Cloud’s life when her departure to the ranger program was inevitable. She was motivated, beautiful and too young to tie herself to someone like him. As much as it hurt, it was better to let her go. But when the Calgary eyrie is at the centre of a conspiracy to destroy his own, he’s forced to play every card he has, including Cloud. When Cloud shuts him out and starts to operate on her own he has no choice but to go in after her, risking the entire mission to get the gryphon he loves out alive.
Washed-up seventies glam rock star and British ex-pat, Harrington Gloss, has been contracted to write a fantasy novel. As the deadline looms, he is at a loss as to how to begin, never having written a novel before in his life. Help arrives when he ducks into the Gryphons Claw Cafe one fateful evening. He meets there a prickly lesbian rock diva, Kincaid McAllister, and inspiration takes hold. The would-be writer embarks on a fictional tale about a scarred and battle-hardened medieval knight-errant, Sir Fenmar of Raventry, the preeminent warrior of the age. Sir Fenmar is sent on an improbable quest into the Jagged Mountains by Princess Isabella of Castle Splendour. His assignment? To locate a mythical dragon she believes can save the kingdom from a mysterious calamity that has befallen it. So begins a serpentine and scaly saga, which parallels and finally intersects its writers own story as it builds to a climax, pitting its heroes against a diabolical evil and impossibly long odds as the fate of the world hangs precariously in the balance. As the hero, Sir Fenmar, is given a final shot at redemption, can his hapless author, Harrington Gloss, find a way to transform his own destiny?
This vast tapestry of the Hellenic world unfolds in a stirring tale of two traders from the island of Rhodes, who journey across the wind-blown face of the beautiful and treacherous Mediterranean in search of adventure and profits.