What happens when you visit a place that blurs the lines between the present and the past, where your reality gets tangled with a shadow of an alternate reality? When Aparna comes to the village to assist her mother in selling their ancestral house, little does she know that she is going to embark on a journey, which will shake the very core of her sanity. An antiquated Haveli, an echoing past, a spectre from beyond will put her on a path that would be strewn with secrets; secrets that were kept from her by her own family. In order to solve the puzzle that is consuming her very being, she will have to make some difficult choices. Will she find the answers she is looking for?
In December of 1282, English soldiers ambushed and murdered Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, the Prince of Wales. His death marked the end of Wales as an independent nation and the beginning of over seven hundred years under the English boot. Footsteps in Time is the story of what might have happened had Llywelyn lived. And what happens to the two teenagers who save him.
Richard Holmes knew he had become a true biographer the day his bank bounced a check that he had inadvertently dated 1772. Because for the acclaimed chronicler of Shelley and Coleridge, biography is a physical pursuit, an ardent and arduous retracing of footsteps that may have vanished centuries before. In this gripping book, Holmes takes us from France’s Massif Central, where he followed the route taken by Robert Louis Stevenson and a sweet-natured donkey, to Mary Wollstonecraft’s Revolutionary Paris, to the Italian villages where Percy Shelley tried to cast off the strictures of English morality and marriage. Footsteps is a wonderful exploration of the ties between biographers and their subjects, filled with passion and revelations. “Deeply impressive . . . Footsteps is a singular event in the modern history of biography, and in itself a delightful reading experience.”—Alfred Kazin “This exhilarating book, part biography, part autobiography, shows the biographer as sleuth and huntsman, tracking his subjects through space and time.”—The Observer “A modern masterpiece . . . [Holmes is] the most romantic of contemporary biographers and probably the most revolutionary in spirit and form.”—Michael Holroyd, author of Bernard Shaw
The sequel to the award-winning Stepping on the Cracks. “Sometimes heart-rending, sometimes funny, Gordy Smith will prove memorable to all who meet him.”—Booklist (starred review) In Following My Own Footsteps, sixth-grader Gordy Smith comes to grips with the fear that he’ll turn out no better than his abusive father . . . With his father now in jail and one brother hospitalized, Gordy’s mother has no choice but to take the family to their wealthy grandmother’s house in North Carolina. There Gordy meets William, a boy who had polio and is now wheelchair bound. Though they become friends, Gordy’s plans to help William fail spectacularly. Matters only get worse when Gordy’s father is released from prison and his mother is poised to give him a second chance. Gordy must decide where he belongs—with his dysfunctional parents or with the grandma who is more than his match in toughness, in courage, and in love. “A cast of unforgettable characters inhabit this work, seasoned with WW II setting but utterly contemporary in its concerns. Hahn is in top form, proving through Gordy’s first-person narration that real love can triumph over all kinds of adversity, and often does.”—Kirkus Reviews “The complex characterizations, period setting and Gordy’s brave attempts to break a cycle of violence will hold readers’ interest.”—Publishers Weekly “It’s a timeless social issue really, in any era, of having a dysfunctional abusive parent . . . A very good story showcasing complex friendships, familial relationships, and inner conflict, all set in WW2 America.”—Cats and Fiction
In Putin’s Footsteps is Nina Khrushcheva and Jeffrey Tayler’s unique combination of travelogue, current affairs, and history, showing how Russia’s dimensions have shaped its identity and culture through the decades. With exclusive insider status as Nikita Khrushchev’s great grand-daughter, and an ex-pat living and reporting on Russia and the Soviet Union since 1993, Nina Khrushcheva and Jeffrey Tayler offer a poignant exploration of the largest country on earth through their recreation of Vladimir Putin’s fabled New Year’s Eve speech planned across all eleven time zones. After taking over from Yeltsin in 1999, and then being elected president in a landslide, Putin traveled to almost two dozen countries and a quarter of Russia’s eighty-nine regions to connect with ordinary Russians. His travels inspired the idea of a rousing New Year’s Eve address delivered every hour at midnight throughout Russia’s eleven time zones. The idea was beautiful, but quickly abandoned as an impossible feat. He correctly intuited, however, that the success of his presidency would rest on how the country’s outback citizens viewed their place on the world stage. Today more than ever, Putin is even more determined to present Russia as a formidable nation. We need to understand why Russia has for centuries been an adversary of the West. Its size, nuclear arsenal, arms industry, and scientific community (including cyber-experts), guarantees its influence.
It was just a bit of fun, a local legend. The Devil's Footsteps: thirteen stepping stones, and whichever one you stopped on in the rhyme could predict how you would die. A harmless game for kids - and nobody ever died from a game. But it's not a game to Bryan. He's seen the Dark Man, because the Dark Man took his brother five years ago. He's tried to tell himself that it was his imagination, that the Devil's Footsteps are just stones and the Dark Man didn't take Adam. But Adam's still gone. And then Bryan meets two other boys who have their own unsolved mysteries. Someone or something is after the children in the town. And it all comes back to the rhyme that every local child knows by heart: Thirteen steps to the Dark Man's door, Won't be turning back no more . . .
Inspector Alan Grant of Scotland Yard, recuperating from a broken leg, becomes fascinated with a contemporary portrait of Richard III that bears no resemblance to the Wicked Uncle of history. Could such a sensitive, noble face actually belong to one of the world's most heinous villains, a venomous hunchback who may have killed his brother's children to make his crown secure? Or could Richard have been the victim, turned into a monster by the usurpers of England's throne? Grant determines to find out once and for all, with the help of the British Museum and an American scholar, what kind of man Richard Plantagenet really was and who killed the Princes in the Tower.
Cumberland Island is the southernmost and largest barrier island on the Georgia coast, with a history that predates the arrival of Western civilization in the Americas. Currently, it has few full- time residents, but its beauty brings thousands of visitors each year from around the world. Day hikers and overnight campers bask in Cumberland's tranquility and marvel at its natural treasures, walking beneath canopies of live oak trees draped in Spanish moss. Comprising three major ecosystem regions, Cumberland is home to large areas of salt marshes and a dense maritime forest, but its most famous ecosystem is its beach, which stretches over seventeen miles. The island is also home to many native and nonnative species, such as white-tailed deer, turkey, feral hogs and horses, wild boar, nine-banded armadillos, and American alligators, as well as many species of birds. Aside from wild horses and the remains of Thomas M. Carnegie's estate, most visitors are unaware of the details of the island's varied history. Cumberland's past tells a rich and complex story, one of conquest by indigenous tribes, French and Spanish explorers, English settlers, cotton planters, and occupation by British and Union naval forces. Cumberland Island: Footsteps in Time is the first book about the island that offers readers a complete history of the island combined with stunning photography and historical images. Richly illustrated with more than 250 color and black-and-white photographs, it is a comprehensive history, from native occupation to the present. Author Stephen Doster takes the reader on a chronological journey, outlining the key events and influential inhabitants that have left their mark on this stretch of Georgia's coast. Each chapter focuses on a specific era: indigenous occupation; Spanish occupation; English occupation; the colonial period and War of 1812; the planter era and Civil War; the Gilded Age; north-end settlements and hotels; and the creation of a protected national seashore.
A celebration of the San Francisco films of Alfred Hitchcock, this book examines the master director's familiarity with Northern California and how it greatly influenced his decision to use the Bay Area location in several of his landmark motion pictures. More importantly, this book shows how San Francisco was often the source of inspiration for many of these same cinema classics. The masterpieces that are examined are Shadow of a Doubt, Vertigo, The Birds, Suspicion, Psycho, and Family Plot. Hitchcock fans are taken on a journey around the Bay Area, experiencing cinematographic intrigue and learning about Bay Area history, lore, and the timeless elegance of San Francisco and its picturesque surroundings. Hundreds of historical and contemporary photos are included, with an emphasis on those buildings and businesses that no longer exist.--From publisher description.
