Kinji had it made--a swank apartment, a real estate empire, and enough cash to lounge around living the good life. After a freak magical accident, he washes up in another world, all but enslaved to a crooked corporation. In a fantastical land where money is everything, there's only one way for an Earthling to get ahead: make your fortune, by any means necessary! Dragons, goblins, and the occasional dubious potion won't stop Kinji's quest for the world's biggest bank account. The Black Company is open for business!
The Affair of the Poisons was the greatest court scandal of the seventeenth century. From 1679 to 1682 the French crown investigated more than 400 people&—including Louis XIV&’s official mistress and members of the highest-ranking circles at court&—for sensational crimes. In Strange Revelations, Lynn Mollenauer brings this bizarre story to life, exposing a criminal magical underworld thriving in the heart of the Sun King&’s capital. The macabre details of the Affair of the Poisons read like a gothic novel. In the fall of 1678, Nicolas de la Reynie, head of the Paris police, uncovered a plot to poison Louis XIV. La Reynie&’s subsequent investigation unveiled a loosely knit community of sorceresses, magicians, and renegade priests who offered for sale an array of services and products ranging from abortions to love magic to poisons known as &“inheritance powders.&” It was the inheritance powders (usually made from powdered toads steeped in arsenic) that lent the Affair of the Poisons its name. The purchasers of the powders gave the affair its notoriety, for the scandal extended into the most exalted ranks of the French court. Mollenauer adroitly uses the Affair of the Poisons to uncover the hidden forms of power that men and women of all social classes invoked to achieve their goals. While the exercise of state power during the ancien r&égime was quintessentially visible&—ritually displayed through public ceremonies&—the affair exposes the simultaneous presence of other imagined and real sources of power available to the Sun King&’s subjects: magic, poison, and the manipulation of sexual passions. Highly entertaining yet deeply researched, Strange Revelations will appeal to anyone interested in the history of court society, gender, magic, or crime in early modern Europe.
"Arcimboldo, a 16th century Italian artist [working in Vienna and Prague] is an artist with an indisputable claim, he single mindedly pursued his invention, the so-termed "composite head", applying it to numerous and varied subjects. Apt and witty combinations of animals, fish, fruit, vegetables, and a variety of other objects, all painted with meticulous realism, are fitted together into head and shoulder figures that sometimes have the look of portraits. He also devised compositions that can be hung upside down as well as right side up. Arcimboldo's major works were his numerous series on allegorical themes, especially the Four Seasons and the Four Elements."--Amazon.
Viktor Koralovski was Russia's Oil King--a title that earned him the wrath of President Khanine and ten years in prison. An unexpected missile attack allows Koralovski to escape. However, he soon learns that while he was locked up, his friends and enemies have become almost indistinguishable, which leads to his current position at the centre of a vast conspiracy that threatens to engulf the entire oil industry!
Princess. Prisoner. Orphan. Rebel. Theodosia was six when her country was invaded and her mother, the Fire Queen, was murdered. On that day the Kaiser took Theodosia's land and her name. Theo was crowned Ash Princess - a title of shame to wear in her new life as a prisoner. For ten years Theo has been a captive in her own palace. She's endured the relentless abuse and ridicule of the Kaiser and his court. She is powerless, surviving in her new world only by burying the girl she was deep inside. Then, one night, the Kaiser forces her to do the unthinkable. With blood on her hands and all hope of reclaiming her throne lost, she realizes that surviving is no longer enough. But she does have a weapon: her mind is sharper than any sword. And power isn't always won on the battlefield. "Tense and imaginative. Ash Princess is a smart, feminist twist on a traditional tale of a fallen heroine, with plenty of court intrigue, love, and lies to sweeten the deal. Good luck putting this one down." Virginia Boecker, author of the Witch Hunter series
A killer of a crossword draws Inspector Tibbett into a mystery with “considerable charm, atmosphere (an Isle of Wight travelogue), and English geniality” (Kirkus Reviews). It’s a slow day at Scotland Yard, so Inspector Henry Tibbett takes a busman’s holiday, immersing himself in the world of puzzling puzzlers. The hijinks kick off with an amusing gift: Someone unnamed has sent Henry the beginnings of a crossword puzzle. Even more mysterious: The clues point to the group of mystery writers to whom Henry has pledged to give a presentation. Most mysterious of all: None of the writers are who they claim to be, and one is a murderer. Which one? For that you’ll need to solve the puzzle. Six across and then down, down, down. Praise for Patricia Moyes “The author who put the ‘who’ back in whodunit.” —Chicago Daily News “A new queen of crime . . . her name can be mentioned in the same breath as Agatha Christie and Ngaio Marsh.” —Daily Herald “An excellent detective novel in the best British tradition. Superbly handled.” —Columbus Dispatch “Intricate plots, ingenious murders, and skillfully drawn, often hilarious, characters distinguish Patricia Moyes’ writing.” —Mystery Scene
In this fascinating, informative, and entertaining collection, internationally acclaimed, award-winning author Colm Tóibín turns his attention to the intricacies of family relationships in literature and writing. In pieces that range from the importance of aunts (and the death of parents) in the English nineteenth-century novel to the relationship between fathers and sons in the writing of James Baldwin and Barack Obama, Colm Tóibín illuminates not only the intimate connections between writers and their families but also, with wit and rare tenderness, articulates the great joy of reading their work. In the piece on the Notebooks of Tennessee Williams, Tóibín reveals an artist "alone and deeply fearful and unusually selfish" and one profoundly tormented by his sister's mental illness. Through the relationship between W.B. Yeats and his father, or Thomas Mann and his children, or J.M. Synge and his mother, Tóibín examines a world of family relations, richly comic or savage in its implications. In Roddy Doyle's writing on his parents we see an Ireland reinvented. From the dreams and nightmares of John Cheever's journals Tóibín makes flesh this darkly comic misanthrope and his relationship to his wife and his children.The majority of these pieces were previously published in the Londron Review of Books, the New York Review Review of Books, and the Dublin Review. Three of the thirteen pieces have never appeared before.
After devouring every available book on Bengal tigers, a great scholar travels to the jungle and discovers that his encyclopedic knowledge cannot compete with his guide's practical experience.
