Weapons of power can be double edged. For every enchanted blade there is a cursed sword. The warrior who wields one of these weapons will triumph against foe after foe, and yet the blade may be his own downfall. Tyrfing, forged by dwarfs under duress, had three curses to leaven its three virtues. Kullervo used the talking sword of the god Ukko to slay all his foes, and yet in the end it was with that blade that the troubled hero took his own life. Elric's sentient blade Stormbringer drank the blood and souls of its victims in return for victory in the fight, but it was an uneasy, Faustian pact between swordsman and sword, ending in tragedy... -Gavin Chappell
Weapons of power can be double edged. For every enchanted blade there is a cursed sword. The warrior who wields one of these weapons will triumph against foe after foe, and yet the blade may be his own downfall. Tyrfing, forged by dwarfs under duress, had three curses to leaven its three virtues. Kullervo used the talking sword of the god Ukko to slay all his foes, and yet in the end it was with that blade that the troubled hero took his own life. Elric's sentient blade Stormbringer drank the blood and souls of its victims in return for victory in the fight, but it was an uneasy, Faustian pact between swordsman and sword, ending in tragedy...
From distant lands they hear the cry, to take up arms against or die. With weapons forged of bones as blade, the Devil's armory's been paid. A lone rider must use them well, to rid this realm of blackest Hell. Others trade their soul in place of powers endowed to knife or mace. What earnest follows - good or bad - is as HE had hoped from such evil bag. For trade now plyed from regal throne gifts deceitful prince his new-found home. - Nathan J.D.L. Rowark Join the authors of Barbwire Butterfly Books for high adventure tales from long lost realms, in an anthology of sword and sorcery forged from the Devil's armory.
The third installment in New York Times bestselling author Joanna Wylde's Reapers Motorcycle Club series Liam “Hunter” Blake hates the Reapers MC. Born and raised a Devil’s Jack, he knows his duty. He’ll defend his club from their oldest enemies—the Reapers—using whatever weapons he can find. But why use force when the Reapers’ president has a daughter who’s alone and vulnerable? Hunter has wanted her from the minute he saw her, and now he has an excuse to take her. Em has lived her entire life in the shadow of the Reapers. Her overprotective father, Picnic, is the club’s president. The last time she had a boyfriend, Picnic shot him. Now the men in her life are far more interested in keeping her daddy happy than showing her a good time. Then she meets a handsome stranger—a man who isn't afraid to treat her like a real woman. One who isn't afraid of her father. His name is Liam, and he’s The One. Or so she thinks.
Was it the rebirth of a Martial Soul? Or was it relying on the Martial Skills? Because he had offended the three great families, Yi Zhou, a youngster with nine large veins who had been trapped in the Seal, finally emerged from the three great academies of the Azure Sun Dynasty due to his fortuitous encounter in the Misty Forest, obtaining an unknown Martial Soul and the Four Arts of the Sky Demons. However, in the end, the Azure Sun Empire was only a small country that was subordinate to a large country. What Yi Zhou had to face were not only the various countries, but also that mysterious sect and that mysterious world. Under so many dangers, would Yi Zhou be able to succeed?
As Barnet Schecter dramatically shows in The Devil's Own Work, the cataclysm in New York was anything but an isolated incident; rather, it was a microcosm-within the borders of the supposedly loyal northern states-of the larger Civil War between the North and South. The riots erupted over the same polarizing issues--of slavery versus freedom for African Americans and the scope of federal authority over states and individuals--that had torn the nation apart. And the riots' aftermath foreshadowed the compromises that would bedevil Reconstruction and delay the process of integration for the next 100 years. The story of the draft riots come alive in the voices of passionate newspaper rivals Horace Greeley and Manton Marble; black leader Rev. Henry Highland Garnet and renegade Democrat Fernando Wood; Irish soldier Peter Welsh and conservative diarist Maria Daly; and many others. In chronicling this violent demonstration over the balance between centralized power and civil liberties in a time of national emergency, The Devil's Own Work (Walt Whitman's characterization of the riots) sheds new light on the Civil War era and on the history of protest and reform in America.
“I see God,” wrote Norman Mailer, “as a Creator, as the greatest artist. I see human beings as His most developed artworks.” In these moving, amusing, and probing dialogues conducted in the years before his death, Mailer establishes his own system of belief, rejecting both organized religion and atheism. He avows that sensual pleasures were bestowed on us by God; he finds fault with the Ten Commandments; and he holds that technology was the Devil’s most brilliant creation. In short, Mailer is original and unpredictable in this inspiring journey, in which “God needs us as much as we need God.” Praise for On God “[Norman Mailer’s] theology is not theoretical to him. After eight decades, it is what he believes. He expects no adherents, and does not profess to be a prophet, but he has worked to forge his beliefs into a coherent catechism.”—New York “The glory of an original mind in full provocation.”—USA Today “At once illuminating and exciting . . . a chance to see Mailer’s intellect as well as his lively conversational style of speech.”—American Jewish Life “Remarkable . . . [Mailer’s] a believer—in his own fashion. . . . He has made [God] into a complex character.”—The Globe and Mail Praise for Norman Mailer “[Norman Mailer] loomed over American letters longer and larger than any other writer of his generation.”—The New York Times “A writer of the greatest and most reckless talent.”—The New Yorker “Mailer is indispensable, an American treasure.”—The Washington Post “A devastatingly alive and original creative mind.”—Life “Mailer is fierce, courageous, and reckless and nearly everything he writes has sections of headlong brilliance.”—The New York Review of Books “The largest mind and imagination [in modern] American literature . . . Unlike just about every American writer since Henry James, Mailer has managed to grow and become richer in wisdom with each new book.”—Chicago Tribune “Mailer is a master of his craft. His language carries you through the story like a leaf on a stream.”—The Cincinnati Post
