In a vast land where dark and light spirits have fought for domination over thousands of years, two orphans adopted by the Monastery of the Brotherhood rejoin the fight to sustain the light. Ophelia is traveling home to Ringell, the crown jewel and capital of the land of Hinnom. She goes there to meet Kempis, her surrogate brother also adopted by the brotherhood, now turned priest. She hopes to convince him to travel with her to Havenwood, an ancient site of conflicts between light and dark, where the cold war has again come alive. Abba, the spiritual leader of the creatures of light, reveals his wishes and wisdom through the oracles sent to Ophelia. These oracles prove evasive and dangerous, yet are enlightening to Ophelia and her companions, as their god leads them through a web of darkness that threatens to destroy them all.
The Helot slave and the Spartan Prince shouldn’t cross paths. Yet supernaturally, Lyra and Leonid’s fates happened to become interwoven. Lyra, the one true oracle in the temple, saw him bleeding to death in her visions. Refusing to accept this end, she tagged along on his treacherous journey to Athens. She had a simple undercover mission at the Temple of Delphi, to compete for a priestess position, but the Pythia in charge had other plans in mind— an inhumane set of trials designed for betrayals and bloodshed. The strong resistance Lyra encountered forced her to race with time. But from the start, are futures able to be rewritten? Leonid loathed the throne of Sparta that was paved by his brothers’ assassinations. He had fought tooth and nail to consolidate his young kingship, but his revenge, however, didn’t account for her, the girl he once vowed to protect. Newfound feelings for her thus began to get in the way. As he walks a dangerous line between Athenian rivals, he must weigh her and Sparta on opposite ends of the balance. But only fate will know the ultimate price of his decision.
From USA Today bestselling author Leslie Langtry comes the next wacky, wild, wonderful Merry Wrath mystery... Whether they like it or not, culture is coming to Who’s There, Iowa in the form of community theater! Merry Wrath, former CIA operative turned suburban Girl Scout Troop leader has high hopes when Ye Olde Opera House is renovated, and newcomers Ophelia and her husband Dante arrive from off-off-off Broadway (…Street in Peoria) with their stage pig, Iago, to put on a production of Derek the Sparkly Unicorn Ninja, which was written by the mysterious SeBasquetian deCatalonia Braveheart. But chaos is the name of the game when half the town and their hamsters show up for auditions, Merry has been volunteered as Stage Manager, and her precocious troop are planning death-defying stunts and dangerous special effects. It certainly doesn’t help that Ophelia emotes like a deranged drama queen and Dante seems to think there’s a Tony Award for seducing women. When one of the thespians takes Method Acting a bit too far and ends up an actual corpse on stage, Merry has to work fast to find a killer before the curtain falls on another victim! What critics are saying about Leslie Langtry's books: "I laughed so hard I cried on multiple occasions! Girl Scouts, the CIA, and the Yakuza... what could possibly go wrong?" ~ Fresh Fiction "Darkly funny and wildly over the top, this mystery answers the burning question, 'Do assassin skills and Girl Scout merit badges mix…?'" ~ RT BOOKreviews "Mixing a deadly sense of humor and plenty of sexy sizzle, Leslie Langtry creates a brilliantly original, laughter-rich mix of contemporary romance and suspense." ~ Chicago Tribune "Langtry gets the fun started from page one." ~ Publisher's Weekly
Three complete novels from the Jade Ihara Adventures series by USA Today Bestselling Author David Wood and Sean Ellis! ORACLE Sometimes, knowing the future is not enough…. For more than a millennium, the Oracle of Delphi guided kings and conquerors with stunningly accurate visions of the future. But, with the rise of a new God, the Oracle faded from memory. Now, the power of the Oracle is about to change the world once more. While excavating a previously uncharted passage beneath the ancient city of Teotihuacan, archaeologist Jade Ihara makes a startling discovery: enormous stone spheres, arranged to resemble a model of the solar system, slowly orbiting a golden sun. Even more fantastic, when Jade attempts to move one of the spheres, she catches a glimpse of the future…a premonition that will save her life and launch her into a desperate race to unlock the mysterious secret of the oracular orbs. Jade is accompanied by her old friend, former Navy SEAL Pete “Professor” Chapman, and pursued by a relentless secret society intent on burying the secret of the Oracle forever. Return to the world of the Dane Maddock Adventures in the first book of a thrilling new series, as Jade crosses the globe in pursuit of the secret of the Oracle. CHANGELING You can’t always recognize the face of your enemy. Two thousand years ago, the legendary mathematical genius Archimedes was poised on the brink of the greatest discovery in human history when his life was brutally snuffed out. His murder has never been explained. While investigating the strange Paracas skulls—believed by some to be the remains of extraterrestrial explorers—archaeologist Jade Ihara receives an unexpected visit from an old foe seeking her help against entities he calls “Changelings” and their plot to manufacture a false chapter of human history. Hounded by radical extremists led by Atash Shah—a man bent on becoming the Mahdi prophesied to unite the Islamic world—and haunted by the faceless puppetmasters who secretly control the world, Jade must follow the trail of clues to uncover a deadly truth that has been erased from history. Can she solve the mystery of Archimedes’ murder, or will she become the next victim of the conspiracy to hide the truth? EXILE Jade Ihara is caught in a centuries old power struggle between a slave cult who believes she might be the incarnation of the goddess of liberty, and a secret cabal with plans for world domination. Can she unravel the mystery of the Cult of Veritas and find their sacred relics before it’s too late? David Wood and Sean Ellis deliver another action-packed thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat! Fans of Indiana Jones, Tomb Raider, Rogue Angel, and Dane Maddock will love Exile! Praise for David Wood and Sean Ellis “I'll admit it. I am totally exhausted after finishing the latest Jade Ihara page-turner by David Wood and Sean Ellis. What an adventure! I kept asking myself how the co-authors came up with all this fantastic stuff. This is a great read that provides lots of action, and thoughtful insight as well, into strange realms that are sometimes best left unexplored.” Paul Kemprecos, author of Cool Blue Tomb and The NUMA Files "Dane and Bones.... Together they're unstoppable. Rip-roaring action from start to finish. Wit and humor throughout. Just one question - how soon until the next one? Because I can't wait."- Graham Brown, author of Shadows of the Midnight Sun “Ellis and Wood are a partnership forged in the fires of Hell. Books don’t burn hotter than this!”- Steven Savile, author of the Ogmios thrillers
Ten weeks after the events in Tales of the Axis: The Hunter's Prey, Val Novak continues a lonely life on the remote colony of Coldstock, remaining isolated from the war between the United Commonwealth and the Valderian Empire. However, dark forces are at play across the galaxy, threatening to draw the adept vanguard out of exile. Follow Val's journey as she searches for the mysterious enemy that has left behind a trail of death in its wake. Between clashes against fiendish monsters, displays of supernatural powers, and encounters with familiar faces, this tale will explore the multifaceted conflicts waged through might and truth.
Ophelia struggles to find her own identity and clashes with her mother over her strict rules. Her Japanese grandmother helps her find herself by telling her stories about goddesses.
The idea of Shakespearean genius and sublimity is usually understood to be a product of the Romantic period, promulgated by poets such as Coleridge and Byron who promoted Shakespeare as the supreme example of literary genius and creative imagination. However, the picture looks very different when viewed from the perspective of the myriad theater directors, actors, poets, political philosophers, gallery owners, and other professionals in the nineteenth century who turned to Shakespeare to advance their own political, artistic, or commercial interests. Often, as in John Kemble’s staging of The Winter’s Tale at Drury Lane or John Boydell’s marketing of paintings in his Shakespeare Gallery, Shakespeare provided a literal platform on which both artists and entrepreneurs could strive to influence cultural tastes and points of view. At other times, Romantic writers found in Shakespeare’s works a set of rhetorical and theatrical tools through which to form their own public personae, both poetic and political. Women writers in particular often adapted Shakespeare to express their own political and social concerns. Taken together, all of these critical and aesthetic responses attest to the remarkable malleability of the Shakespearean corpus in the Romantic period. As the contributors show, Romantic writers of all persuasions”Whig and Tory, male and female, intellectual and commercial”found in Shakespeare a powerful medium through which to claim authority for their particular interests.
