Two young vacationers to the Chisholm Ranch in Colorado witness a strange series of events within the Archer House, an old, clandestine distillery built on the ranch during the Prohibition days. With the help of a Chiricahua Apache warrior and a Kiowa squaw they solve the mystery.
A “fascinating [and] evocative” novel of crime and intrigue in fourteenth-century England and Wales (The Plain Dealer). It is late spring in the year of our Lord 1370, and Owen Archer is anxious to leave Wales for home. His mission for the Duke of Lancaster complete, he attempts to arrange safe passage on a ship sailing for England—but the hanging of a stonemason interrupts his plans. On the surface, it appears the young man was driven to suicide by a broken heart, but to Owen the signs all point to murder. As his investigation stretches on, however, Owen finds himself drawn into the influence of the leader of a Welsh rebellion whose manifesto speaks to his heart, and a choice is offered to him: join or die. Meanwhile, at home in York, Owen’s wife, Lucie, is troubled by rumors that her husband’s long absence is permanent—as well as threats by a customer who claims she was poisoned by a physic from the Wilton apothecary. And while her husband remains distant, Lucie will be sorely tempted by the attentions of a friend’s steward, even as she uncovers a shattering betrayal in her own household . . . “A pleasing medieval series.” —Library Journal
A wonderfully dark, pitch-perfect noir prequel to The Maltese Falcon, featuring Dashiell Hammett’s beloved detective, Sam Spade. It’s 1921—seven years before Sam Spade will solve the famous case of the Maltese Falcon. He’s just set up his own agency in San Francisco and he gets off to a quick start, working cases (he doesn’t do domestic) and hiring a bright young secretary named Effie Perrine. When he’s hired by a prominent San Francisco banker to find his missing son, Spade gets the break he’s been looking for. He spends the next few years dealing with booze runners, waterfront thugs, banking swindlers, gold smugglers, and bumbling cops. He brings in Miles Archer as a partner to help bolster the agency, though it was Archer who stole his girl while he was fighting in World War I. All along, Spade will tangle with an enigmatic villain who holds a long-standing grudge against Spade. And, of course, he’ll fall in love—though it won’t turn out for the best. It never does with dames.
“Set in 1970s Bombay, the novel explores art, ambition, gender roles and class with the same shimmering prose of Swamy’s first book, the story collection A House Is a Body.” —San Francisco Chronicle “[A] sublime, boundary-pushing exploration of sexuality, creativity, and love.” —NPR In this transfixing novel, a young woman comes of age in 1960s- and 1970s-era Bombay, a vanished world that is complex and indelibly rendered. Vidya’s childhood is marked by the shattering absence and then the bewildering reappearance of her mother and baby brother at the family home. Restless, observant, and longing for connection with her brilliant and increasingly troubled mother, Vidya navigates the stifling expectations of her life with a vivid imagination until one day she peeks into a classroom where girls are learning kathak, a dazzling, centuries-old dance form that requires the utmost discipline and focus. Her pursuit of artistic transcendence through kathak soon becomes the organizing principle of her life, even as she leaves home for college and falls in complicated love with her best friend. As the uncertain future looms, she must ultimately confront the tensions between romantic love, her art, and the legacy of her own imperfect mother. Lyrical and deeply sensual, with writing as mesmerizing as kathak itself, Shruti Swamy’s The Archer is a bold portrait of a singular woman coming of age as an artist—navigating desire, duty, and the limits of the body. It is also an electrifying and utterly immersive story about the transformative power of art, and the possibilities that love can open when we’re ready.
No matter what cases private eye Lew Archer takes on—a burglary, a runaway, or a disappeared person—the trail always leads to tangled family secrets and murder. Widely considered the heir to Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe, Archer dug up secrets and bodies in and around Los Angeles. Here, The Archer Files collects all the Lew Archer short stories ever published, along with thirteen unpublished “case notes” and a fascinating biographical profile of Archer by Edgar Award finalist Tom Nolan. Ross Macdonald’s signature staccato prose is the real star throughout this collection, which is both a perfect introduction for the newcomer and a must-have for the Macdonald aficionado.
REVIEWS "This is one of my favourite books I've read this year... I can't praise it enough... The real stand out for this was the writing and the character voice." - The Moonlight Library "The writing in The Wrong Girl was beautiful. There were so many quotes that I wanted to write down, and keep... The world building, and the plot drew me in from the get go, and didn't falter until the last sentence." - Books For A Delicate Eternity "This was one fantastic read! A really fascinating story which I couldn't put down, so this is easily a 5 stars." - Tea Party Princess BOOK DESCRIPTIONIt's customary for Gothic romance novels to include a mysterious girl locked in the attic. Hannah Smith just wishes she wasn't that girl. As a narcoleptic and the companion to an earl's daughter with a strange affliction of her own, Hannah knows she's lucky to have a roof over her head and food in her belly when so many orphans starve on the streets. Yet freedom is something Hannah longs for. She did not, however, want her freedom to arrive in the form of kidnapping. Taken by handsome Jack Langley to a place known as Freak House, she finds herself under the same roof as a mad scientist, his niece, a mute servant and Jack, a fire starter with a mysterious past. They assure Hannah she is not a prisoner and that they want to help her. The problem is, they think she's the earl's daughter. What will they do when they discover they took the wrong girl? THE WRONG GIRL is a historical gothic paranormal romance that is now FREE for your reading pleasure. It's also included in a 3-book bundle with the other books in the trilogy. You can purchase the complete set of The 1st Freak House Trilogy at a cheaper price than buying the ebooks individually. Keywords: fantasy, urban fantasy, historical fantasy, fantasy series, speculative fiction, dark fantasy, paranormal, female protagonist, female main character, paranormal romance, historical romance, historical paranormal romance, action, adventure, ghosts, spirits, demons, magic, alternative history, parallel world, victorian romance, victorian era, victorian london, gothic, teen fiction, young adult, free, freebie, bestseller, bestselling, similar to books by Sarah J Maas, Cassandra Clare, Bella Forest's A Shade of Vampire, Maria V Snyder's Poison Study
India Steele is desperate. Her father is dead, her fiancé took her inheritance, and no one will employ her, despite years working for her watchmaker father. Indeed, the other London watchmakers seem frightened of her. Alone, poor, and at the end of her tether, India takes employment with the only person who'll accept her - an enigmatic and mysterious man from America. A man who possesses a strange watch that rejuvenates him when he's ill. Matthew Glass must find a particular watchmaker, but he won't tell India why any old one won't do. Nor will he tell her what he does back home, and how he can afford to stay in a house in one of London's best streets. So when she reads about an American outlaw known as the Dark Rider arriving in England, she suspects Mr. Glass is the fugitive. When danger comes to their door, she's certain of it. But if she notifies the authorities, she'll find herself unemployed and homeless again - and she will have betrayed the man who saved her life. With a cast of quirky characters, an intriguing mystery, and a dash of romance, THE WATCHMAKER'S DAUGHTER is the start of a thrilling new historical fantasy series from the author of the bestselling Ministry of Curiosities, Freak House, and Emily Chambers Spirit Medium books.
This is not a children's or teenagers' story, but it definitely 'hits home' where adults are concerned. This is fiction but several real people are included in this story. The two main characters have firm convictions about several issues, to include politics, love, war, economics, life styles, and religion. So be ready to either cheer for or against the positions taken in this book. This is a story about two old soldiers in their late fifties, both ex-army men, who have retired from their military services and are soon planning to fully retire from industry so they can enter their 'golden years'. One is an American, Bryan Wetherington, a retired Major from the U. S. Army, and the second is Timothy O'Doul, a citizen of the United Kingdom (UK), a retired Major from the Royal Army. The two men have known each other since the glory days of the 'Gulf War', the battles fought in Iraq in the early 1990s to put down Saddam Hussein. The two men spent most of their military days in armored units, the behemoth 'panzers' of the twentieth and twenty-first century. They became acquainted in Basra, Iraq during the war. After the war ended they went their separate way. Fourteen years passed, and the two men corresponded with each other, first in letters written on lightweight stationery, and now in emails. Then, one day in 2005, Timothy O'Doul sent a special email to Bryan Wetherington, imploring him to come to Scotland and attend a two-man, week long, Persian Gulf War fourteenth year reunion. At first Bryan was hesitant to attend, but his wife, Carlie, read a lot more into Timothy's email, and prevailed upon Bryan to make the trip to the UK. This is the story of that reunion.
This is a story about a Desert Storm era photo-interpreter named Jerry Simmons, who discovers a large mass of metal residing in an isolated area in the eastern Rocky Mountains near Palmer Lake, Colorado. It is a retelling of his adventures to locate the metal on the ground after it was spotted from the air above, and the search through the pages of history to find out why the metal blob was there in the first place.