Tiny Burlington, tucked away on the slopes of Nova Scotia's North Mountain. In 1904 it was home to hardworking farmers, complicated family dynamics, passionate lovers, and a murderer. Laura Churchill Duke's carefully-researched tale brings to life the shocking events that ended a life and changed a community. Wendy Robicheau, archivist at Acadia University: "As I read the book and the details spoke to my imagination, I needed to visit the sites--to be in the spaces and fill my senses. I love it when words on a page come alive, compelling me to acknowledge our ancestors. Thank you, Laura, for telling our herstories."
“An epic tale in the tradition of Watership Down and Lord of the Rings.”—Alan Yentob, BBC Director of Drama and Entertainment Darkness has fallen over the realm of Birddom. The skies rain blood, no nest is safe, and the winds are thick with fear, pain, and death. Driven by an unslakable desire to kill and conquer, the black-feathered magpies—aided by their brutish cousins, the crows—have hunted down and slaughtered countless species of smaller birds into extinction. Led by the malevolent, power-mad Slyekin and his sadistic assassin, Traska, their reign of terror has laid waste to the beauty and freedom that was once Birddom. Now Slyekin is preparing to launch his final assault against all that was once pure and proclaim his vile dominion. To stop the gathering storm, Kirrick, a lone robin who witnessed the massacre of everything he loved, must undertake a journey beyond all reckoning. Through danger and deceit, Kirrick soars to all corners of the land, rallying those who would fight to save Birddom. From the proud might of the eagles, to the ancient wisdom of the owls, to the unlikeliest earthbound creatures, the allies of good must join together to oppose the shadowy menace that threatens them all—or fall from the sky forever. In an epic conflict of bloodied beak and razor-sharp talon, of undaunted courage and unspeakable evil, of love, loyalty, and wings of honor, the battle for the very soul of Birddom is about to begin.
This charming book is filled with sayings, legends and proverbs derived from the oral history of the countryside and unveils how they came about, what they mean, and how they came to be such a big part of the language we use today.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A daring story of adventure, friendship, and love in the shadow of WWII” (Harper’s Bazaar) from the renowned author of Ape House and Water for Elephants “Gripping, compelling . . . Gruen’s characters are vividly drawn and her scenes are perfectly paced.”—The Boston Globe In January 1945, when Madeline Hyde and her husband, Ellis, are cut off financially by his father, a retired army colonel who is ashamed of his son’s inability to serve, Ellis decides that the only way to regain his father’s favor is to succeed where the Colonel very publicly failed—by hunting down the famous Loch Ness monster. Leaving her sheltered world behind, Maddie reluctantly follows Ellis and his best friend, Hank, to a remote village in the Scottish Highlands. Gradually, the friendships Maddie forms with the townspeople open her up to a larger world than she knew existed. Maddie begins to see that nothing is as it first appears, and as she embraces a fuller sense of who she might be, she becomes aware not only of darker forces around her but of life’s surprising possibilities.
On a dangerous quest to the troll city of Underth, the healer, Little Fur, is mystified by a new companion--a scarred and angry fox whose strong spirit keeps him alive despite his wish to die.
In Widowsbury, an isolated village where people believe "known is good, new is bad," three outcasts form the girls' school join forces with a home-schooled boy to uncover and combat the evil that is making people disappear.
Buffy's former flame Riley Finn is up to his neck in vampires in an Arizona-Mexico border town. Surprisingly, he turns to Angel for advice, while his wife calls the Slayer for help. Romantic bloodlines are about to converge in a town that is not what it seems. Original.
A captivating novel of rich spectacle and royal scandal, Days of Splendor, Days of Sorrow spans fifteen years in the fateful reign of Marie Antoinette, France’s most legendary and notorious queen. Paris, 1774. At the tender age of eighteen, Marie Antoinette ascends to the French throne alongside her husband, Louis XVI. But behind the extravagance of the young queen’s elaborate silk gowns and dizzyingly high coiffures, she harbors deeper fears for her future and that of the Bourbon dynasty. From the early growing pains of marriage to the joy of conceiving a child, from her passion for Swedish military attaché Axel von Fersen to the devastating Affair of the Diamond Necklace, Marie Antoinette tries to rise above the gossip and rivalries that encircle her. But as revolution blossoms in America, a much larger threat looms beyond the gilded gates of Versailles—one that could sweep away the French monarchy forever.
Haunting gothic elements are exquisitely re-imagined in this strange tale of madness, murder and dark secrets set on the rugged Bay of Fundy coast by the acclaimed author of Heave. The Memento tells the story of Fancy Mosher as she lives and works in the servants' quarters at Petal's End, a formerly illustrious private land surrounded by dense forest belonging to the famed Parker family. Since the Great War, the estate has been slowly crumbling at the same rate as the family's reputation. Fancy grows up listening to her family's ghost stories and watching the Parkers from a safe distance with her best friend, Art, but the summer she turns twelve she not only learns that her family has been hiding a terrifying truth about who she is and what she is capable of, she also begins to experience firsthand the magnitude of secrets and horrors held within the estate's walls and buried in its lush gardens--secrets and lies that come to haunt Fancy and the large, fabulous cast of Petal's End, all of whom refuse to move on from a dying way of life. Christy Ann Conlin gives us a lyrical and chilling meditation on human nature and the manner of recollection in this captivating ghost story where webs of memories haunt and distort reality and ultimately destroy those who weave them.
One crow for sorrow, Two crows for joy, Three crows a girl, Four crows a boy, Five crows for silver, Six crows for gold, Seven crows a story, Never to be told. - anonymous folk poem Seven orphan children; Bron: poor child of sorrow and resolve in the face of a town of bullies. Mab: capricious child of boundless mirth, and fierce protectiveness. Kendra: young girl struggling to find herself in the whirlwind of an exclusive school. Akeem: a reader of what should not be, withdrawn and scheming. Onshuuko: a student of perfection and tradition, haunted by demons. Nathaniel: a "good" boy, struggling with his own power and just trying to remain good. Unknown: perhaps the biggest mystery, will this story ever be uncovered? Bound together by fate and a mysterious friend that only they can see, these seven have been separated ever since the incident that left their orphanage in ruins. Years later, something powerful and frightening begins to awaken within them, darkness stirs around them, and they are propelled out into the world to find each other once again. This is only the beginning... Bound by fate, Seven Crows awaken to power and tragedy.
