Marie-Madeleine is the pen name of a once-famous German Jewish lesbian writer whose sensuality and love for morphine was revealed in many of her bestselling books, originally released in the early twentieth century. Priestess of Morphine: The Lost Writings of Marie-Madeleine contains many of this fascinating woman's works, and also contains Stephen J. Gertz's foreword explaining why Marie-Madeleine has become a rediscovered heroine of lesbian and drug literature. Fascinating images from Marie-Madeleine's lost literature and career supplement this volume.
For generations, The American Colony Hotel in Jerusalem has been a well-known retreat for journalists, diplomats, pilgrims and spies. However, few know the story of Anna Spafford, the enigmatic evangelist who was instrumental in its founding Branded heretics by Jerusalem’s established Christian missionaries when they arrived in 1881, the Spaffords and their followers nevertheless won over Muslims and Jews with their philanthropy. But when her husband Horatio died, Anna assumed leadership, shocking even her adherents by abolishing marriage and establishing an uneasy dictatorship based on emotional blackmail and religious extremism. With a controversial heroine at its core, American Priestess provides a fascinating exploration of the seductive power of evangelicalism as well as an intriguing history of an enduring landmark.
"What if I said you could go back? Ophelia, you could change... everything." She left behind the modern world she knew to save the man she loves. Now in the trenches of the Great War, Ophelia must find a way to reach her lover of several lifetimes. Her existence is limited, making her journey all the more complicated, for she is in the Afterworld - the place between this life and the next. New memories of a wilder, untamed past life will either be a welcome reprieve from the pain of war or a deadly distraction. Trapped in the past, will she be able to change her future? Priestess continues the journey begun in the first book of the Afterworld series, Ophelia.
The indomitable Annie Szabo has lost too many friends and loved ones, so the death of Margo Spanger hits hard. Margo, Annie's neighbor, was a cultural icon with money and fame. Maybe too much. She used one of her projects, a New Age circus, to fund a women's shelter. When Margo's partner, Lili, goes missing the day of Margo's death, the circus and shelter fall into disarray. It turns Annie's world upside down, too. Her daughter is a resident of the women's shelter and could become the next victim. More trouble: Annie's mother-in-law, the Gypsy fortune-teller Madame Mina, plants her trailer in Annie's yard with a vengeance, right next to Annie's pet giraffes. Aided by an ex-cop and Mina's plant medicine, Annie uncovers Margo's past. She'd rattled the power elite, a trapeze flier, one jealous lover, a captain of industry, a long-lost son, and an ice-blond philanthropist. As Annie delves into their surprisingly tangled lives, one thing becomes clear---the killer is a master of disguises, and time is running out. However, when Annie and Madame Mina stop arguing long enough to put their heads together, the truth can't hide. Meredith Blevins, author of the acclaimed novel The Hummingbird Wizard, continues the tale of the juicy Szabo family women. They learn that, under or outside the big top, anything and everything may be an illusion. Engaging and exotic, sexy and fun, The Vanished Priestess is an unforgettable mystery featuring a heroine who must walk a treacherous tightrope to save a new lover, her home, and her life.
Cuban voodoo, a vice lord, and a woman with power over death itself—Dr. Owen Orient picked a lethal time to visit Miami Cut off from his friends, students, and lover while on the run from the CIA and a powerful voodoo cult—just another day in the life of Dr. Owen Orient, psychic investigator. When the ink on his fake ID dries, Orient finds himself in sultry Miami working at a small pharmacy in a rundown neighborhood. He manages to stay under the radar until his boss turns up dead after refusing to sell his business to a syndicate headed by Cuban voodoo priest Mojo Pay. Orient has no choice but to investigate. Orient moves through a world of cocaine, sexual excess, dark voodoo rites, and occult murder in this riveting paranoir tale. The Priestess is an audacious new step forward in Frank Lauria’s genre-defying mix of horror, erotica, mystery, and thriller.
She was well-named-Sin-foul witch and raving beauty. Black Priestess and beloved of Sasso, the Dark Power from another dimension who strove to capture, with her help, Varda, a lovely little world. Outlawed, sentenced to the Vat, a few foresters still defied foul Sasso's loveliest witch. ExcerptA shriveled blood-red moon cast slanting beams through gigantic, weirdly distorted trees. The air was dead still where he lay, but overhead a howling wind tossed the top branches into eerie life. He was lying on moss. Moss that writhed resentfully under his weight. His stomach was heaving queasily and his head was one throbbing ache. His right leg refused to move. It seemed to be stuck in something.He was not alone. Something was prowling nearby among the unbelievably tall trees. He sat up weakly, automatically, but somehow he did not care very deeply what happened to him. Not at first.The prowling creature circled, trying to outline him against the slanting shafts of crimson moonlight. He heard it move, then saw its eyes blue-green and luminous in the shadows, only a foot or two from the ground.Then his scalp gave a sudden tingle, for the eyes rose upward. Abruptly they were five feet above ground level. He held his breath, but still more wondering than afraid. A vagrant gust brought a spicy odor to his nostrils, something strongly reminiscent of sandalwood. Not an animal smell.He moved slightly. The moss beneath him squeaked a protest and writhed unpleasantly.The thing with the glowing eyes moved closer. Squeak-squeak, squeak-squeak, the strange moss complained. And then a human figure appeared momentarily in a slender shaft of red light.
Soon to be banned in Beijing, this work suggests that Lin Zexu, often called the first modern Chinese nationalist, popular icon for present-day prohibitionists, who legend says caused the first Opium War (1839-1842) by destroying some 20,000 chests of British opium, may deserve a second look from historians. His method of using lime and salt to "destroy" the opium simply shares too many parallels with European methods for extracting morphine from opium. Morphine salts were sold in both China and Europe in the 19th century as substitutes for opium or as opium "cures". Could the mandarin Lin Zexu have stolen from the British, conned the Americans, hastened the downfall of the parasitical Manchu dynasty, and manufactured a simple morphine salt? -- Graffii Milante, Valpaaiso, Chile --from book cover.
BUZZFEED'S "BEST BOOKS OF JUNE" FROLIC'S "UNDER THE RADAR" SELECTED JUNE READS Mona is a Millennial perfectionist who fails upwards in the midst of the 2008 economic crisis. Despite her potential, and her top-of-her-class college degree, Mona finds herself unemployed, living with her parents, and adrift in life and love. Mona's the sort who says exactly the right thing at absolutely the wrong moments, seeing the world through a cynic's eyes. In the financial and social malaise of the early 2000s, Mona walks a knife's edge as she faces down unemployment, underemployment, the complexities of adult relationships, and the downward spiral of her parents' shattering marriage. The more Mona craves perfection and order, the more she is forced to see that it is never attainable. Mona's journey asks the question: When we find what gives our life meaning, will we be ready for it?
Priestess in a Desert Night is a drama that begins on a desert night, when Sam and Justin pull into a roadside tavern In El Paso, Texas. Sam decides to go for a walk in the immediate surroundings of the tavern. The moonlight gives Sam enough light to stroll about and eye the desert floor and its dwellers. Justin, Sam's buddy, heads into the tavern to get a table. The foreshadowing is on display as Sam eyes a desert owl large in stature. The owl waits for its evening prey to slither along. The owl eventually is attacked by hawks, and Sam encounters the owl's demise. The owl's final resting place is, in part, a foreshadowing of a present danger. The desert is the soul and stage of this story. The priestess is an old story of a Navajo woman, presented to Sam by Becky, a lady he meets by chance in the tavern. The story of the Navajo priestess runs concurrently with this drama. The tale of the Navajo priestess is the crux or bridge of this story. The priestess of days gone by has fatalistic importance to this novel. She, the early priestess, was captured by Spanish soldiers; and she, White Sun, escaped and returned to her tribe. The elders had dismissed her. She had to go into the desert for days, and if she survived, she could rejoin her people. What happens to White Sun in her trial has bearing hundreds of years later to the fate of Sam and Becky and an American hero, Virginia, a Navajo descendant, who is instrumental in this drama concerning Sam, Becky, Justin, Connie, and Uncle Jack--ordinary Americans fighting to keep their farms.
