They joined an R.A.F. known as "the best flying club in the world," but when war pitches the young pilots of 409 Squadron into battle over Germany, their training, tactics and equipment are soon found wanting, their twin-engined bombers obsolete from the off. Chances of completing a 30-operation tour? One in three. At best. Robinson's crooked salute to the dogged heroes of the R.A.F.'s early bombing campaign is a wickedly humorous portrait of men doing their duty in flying death traps, fully aware, in those dark days of war, there was nothing else to do but dig in and hang on.
Madison Spencer, the liveliest and snarkiest dead girl in the universe, continues the afterlife adventure begun in Chuck Palahniuk’s bestseller Damned. Just as that novel brought us a brilliant Hell that only he could imagine, Doomed is a dark and twisted apocalyptic vision from this provocative storyteller. The bestselling Damned chronicled Madison’s journey across the unspeakable (and really gross) landscape of the afterlife to confront the Devil himself. But her story isn’t over yet. In a series of electronic dispatches from the Great Beyond, Doomed describes the ultimate showdown between Good and Evil. After a Halloween ritual gone awry, Madison finds herself trapped in Purgatory—or, as mortals like you and I know it, Earth. She can see and hear every detail of the world she left behind, yet she’s invisible to everyone who’s still alive. Not only do people look right through her, they walk right through her as well. The upside is that, no longer subject to physical limitations, she can pass through doors and walls. Her first stop is her parents’ luxurious apartment, where she encounters the ghost of her long-deceased grandmother. For Madison, the encounter triggers memories of the awful summer she spent upstate with Nana Minnie and her grandfather, Papadaddy. As she revisits the painful truth of what transpired over those months (including a disturbing and finally fatal meeting in a rest stop’s fetid men’s room, in which . . . well, never mind), her saga of eternal damnation takes on a new and sinister meaning. Satan has had Madison in his sights from the very beginning: through her and her narcissistic celebrity parents, he plans to engineer an era of eternal damnation. For everyone. Once again, our unconventional but plucky heroine must face her fears and gather her wits for the battle of a lifetime. Dante Alighieri, watch your back; Chuck Palahniuk is gaining on you.
When the Underworld burned, I thought that was the end. Turns out it was only the beginning. Lucifer’s death was a shot heard around the world. The sudden loss of magic turned the tides for the first time in over two decades. The humans are rallying. Rioting. It feels like the stirrings of war. As if that wasn’t enough, Bree isn’t the sister I remember—and her desire to return to Hell is creating more fires than I know how to put out. Things are changing. Lines are drawn. Everyone must choose a side. Even me. Sometimes the world needs a hero. In a city that’s already gone to hell in a hand basket, it might just need a demon. Note: Blood be Damned is book 3 of 4 in the COMPLETE Demons of New Chicago series. This story is an ADULT enemies-to-lovers urban fantasy romance.
Think adolescence is hell? You have no idea... Welcome to Dante's Inferno, by way of The Breakfast Club, from the mind of American fiction's most brilliant troublemaker. "Death, like life, is what you make out of it." So says Madison, the whip-tongued 11-year-old narrator of Damned, Chuck Palahniuk's subversive homage to the young adult genre. Madison is abandoned at her Swiss boarding school over Christmas while her parents are off touting their new film projects and adopting more orphans. Over the holidays she dies of a marijuana overdose--and the next thing she knows, she's in Hell. This is the afterlife as only Chuck Palahniuk could imagine it: a twisted inferno inspired by both the most extreme and mundane of human evils, where The English Patient plays on repeat and roaming demons devour sinners limb by limb. However, underneath Madison's sad teenager affect there is still a child struggling to accept not only the events of her dysfunctional life, but also the truth about her death. For Madison, though, a more immediate source of comfort lies in the motley crew of young sinners she meets during her first days in Hell. With the help of Archer, Babette, Leonard, and Patterson, she learns to navigate Hell--and discovers that she'd rather be mortal and deluded and stupid with those she loves than perfect and alone.
Flight Lieutenant Silk, a twice-decorated Lancaster pilot in WW II, rejoins the R.A.F. and qualifies to fly the Vulcan bomber. Piloting a Vulcan is an unforgettable experience: no other aircraft comes close to matching its all-round performance. And as bombers go, it's drop-dead gorgeous. But there's a catch. The Vulcan has only one role: to make a second strike. To act in retaliation for a Russian nuclear attack. Silk knows that knows that if he ever flies his Vulcan in anger, he'll be flying from a smoking wasteland, a Britain obliterated. But in the mad world of Mutually Assured Destruction, the Vulcan is the last - the only - deterrent. Derek Robinson returns with another rip-roaring, gung-ho R.A.F. adventure, one that exposes and confronts the brinkmanship and sabre-rattling of the Cold War Era.
The debut novel from Akashic’s new imprint, Punk Planet Books. Also check out the smash hits How the Hula Girl Sings, Tender as Hellfire, and The Boy Detective Fails. “A funny, hard-rocking first-person tale of teenage angst and discovery.” —Booklist “Captures the loose, fun, recklessness of midwestern punk.” —MTV.com Hairstyles of the Damned is an honest, true-life depiction of growing up punk on Chicago’s south side: a study in the demons of racial intolerance, Catholic school conformism, and class repression. It is the story of the riotous exploits of Brian, a high school burnout, and his best friend, Gretchen, a punk rock girl fond of brawling. Based on the actual events surrounding a Chicago high school’s segregated prom, this work of fiction unflinchingly pursues the truth in discovering what it means to be your own person.
The extraordinary humanitarian Samantha Nutt gives a bracing and uncompromising account of her work in some of the most devastated corners of the world - and a new, provocative vision for changing course on growing militarisation. It is a brilliant distillation of Dr Nutt's observations over the course of 15 years providing hands-on care in some of the world's most violent flashpoints. Combining original research with her personal story, it is a deeply thoughtful meditation on war as it is being waged around the world against millions of civilians.
Kagen the Damned marks the first installment of an exciting new series of dark epic fantasy novels from bestselling author Jonathan Maberry. Sworn by Oath Kagen Vale is the trusted and feared captain of the palace guard, charged with protection of the royal children of the Silver Empire. But one night, Kagen is drugged and the entire imperial family is killed, leaving the empire in ruins. Abandoned by the Gods Haunted and broken, Kagen is abandoned by his gods and damned forever. He becomes a wanderer, trying to take down as many of his enemies as possible while plotting to assassinate the usurper, the deadly Witch-king of Hakkia. While all around him magic—long banished from the world—returns in strange and terrifying ways. Fueled by Rage To exact his vengeance, Kagen must venture into strange lands, battle bizarre and terrifying creatures, and gather allies for a suicide mission into the heart of the Witch-king’s empire. Kings and gods will fear him. Kagen the Damned
Instant New York Times and Indie Bestseller! New York Times bestselling author Renée Ahdieh returns with a sumptuous, sultry and romantic new series set in 19th century New Orleans where vampires hide in plain sight. In 1872, New Orleans is a city ruled by the dead. But to seventeen-year-old Celine Rousseau, New Orleans is a safe haven after she's forced to flee her life as a dressmaker in Paris. Taken in by the sisters of the Ursuline convent in the middle of the carnival season, Celine is quickly enraptured by the vibrant city, from its music to its fancy soirées and even its danger. She becomes embroiled in the city's glitzy underworld, known as La Cour des Lions, after catching the eye of the group's enigmatic leader, Sébastien Saint Germain. When the body of one of the girls from the convent is found in Sébastien's own lair--the second dead girl to turn up in recent weeks--Celine battles her attraction to Sébastien and suspicions about his guilt along with the shame of her own horrible secret. After a third murder, New Orleans becomes gripped by the terror of a serial killer on the loose--one who has now set Celine in his sights. As the murderer stalks her, Celine finally takes matters into her own hands, only to find herself caught in the midst of an age-old feud between the darkest creatures of the night, where the price of forbidden love is her life. At once a sultry romance and a decadent, thrilling mystery, master storyteller Renée Ahdieh embarks on her most potent fantasy series yet.
