The Big Blue Jobbie The Caging of a Well-Padded Scotswoman In March 2020 the Prime Minister told Mrs V to shield for 12 weeks. Then for a bit longer. And just a little bit longer. No cuddles, no snogging, no tasting other people's cocktails to see if they were nicer than hers; pick a spot and stay put. This was bad news for everyone, except possibly the ice cream industry. Mrs V immediately laid claim to the dining room and created her little slice of self-isolation. From her perch in Covid Corner, she blogged about the daily ups and downs of family life in lockdown, keeping her readers laughing as the world got weirder. This book is a compilation of those posts, along with lots of extra bits and commentary. Like Mrs V, it's slightly unconventional, quirky, full of warmth (both the loving and the menopausal kind) and has a filthy sense of humour.
Frock In Hell Have you ever been on a train and wondered what would happen if you didn't get off - just carried on to the end of the line? In the throes of a spectacular mid-life crisis, Katie Frock takes an unplanned journey from the North of England to a new life in Fancy London. She misses her husband and irresponsible daughter, but she needs something for herself. While her family bumble about back at home and her emotionally repressed husband reorganises his CD collection for the fiftieth time, Katie makes new friends, becomes the Banksy of the culinary world and accidentally gets caught up in some very shady business. However, when her world comes crashing down, what she actually needs is her family. "Made me laugh...couldn't help imagining my husband" Laugh out loud moments...farting dogs and spreadsheets...Loved it"
"What would the world be like if the dinosaurs hadn't gone extinct? As this very funny book shows, for one thing, L.A. would be even weirder than it is now." --Dave Barry Vincent Rubio, a Los Angeles private investigator, is down on his luck: He's out of work. His car's been repossessed. His partner has died under mysterious circumstances. And his tail just won't stay put. Vincent is a dinosaur--a Velociraptor, to be precise. It seems the dinosaurs faked their extinction 65 million years ago and still roam the earth, disguised in convincing latex costumes that help them blend perfectly into human society. A heightened sense of smell allows the dinos to detect one another--Vincent's got an odor like a tasty Cuban cigar. When Vincent is called to investigate a two-bit case of arson at a hip dino nightclub, he discovers something much more sinister, which lures him back to New York City--the scene of his partner's death and a dangerous nexus of dinosaur and human intermingling. Will Vincent solve the mystery of his partner's death? Will a gorgeous blond chanteuse discover his true identity, jeopardizing both their lives? Will Vincent be able to conquer his dangerous addiction to basil, or will he wind up in Herba-holics Anonymous? Will he find true love, or resort to crumpled issues of Stegolicious? Somewhere between Jurassic Park and L.A. Confidential lies Eric Garcia's Anonymous Rex, one of the smartest, wittiest, and most entertaining debuts this side of the Ice Age.
A photographic look into the world of vinyl record collectors—including Questlove—in the most intimate of environments—their record rooms. Compelling photographic essays from photographer Eilon Paz are paired with in-depth and insightful interviews to illustrate what motivates these collectors to keep digging for more records. The reader gets an up close and personal look at a variety of well-known vinyl champions, including Gilles Peterson and King Britt, as well as a glimpse into the collections of known and unknown DJs, producers, record dealers, and everyday enthusiasts. Driven by his love for vinyl records, Paz takes us on a five-year journey unearthing the very soul of the vinyl community.
It's your dream job: Playing video games. Writing about them. Getting paid. It will never happen, right? Actually, it can. It's definitely not easy to get this dream job-it requires a lot of perseverance, plenty of patience, a certain amount of skill, and a fair amount of luck. But with the right combination of elements, this job can be yours. Critical Path: How to Review Videogames for a Living will tell you what you need to know and what you need to do to make a run at this career, for real. This includes how to write compelling reviews, how to pitch yourself as a writer, how to tackle some tricky ethical quandaries, and yes, even how to get free games. Based on Dan Amrich's own experience as a game journalist for more than 15 years, it's advice that can serve you for your entire career, from press start to game over.
VAMPIRE FOR HIRE Raylene Pendle (AKA Cheshire Red), a vampire and world-renowned thief, doesn’t usually hang with her own kind. She’s too busy stealing priceless art and rare jewels. But when the infuriatingly charming Ian Stott asks for help, Raylene finds him impossible to resist—even though Ian doesn’t want precious artifacts. He wants her to retrieve missing government files—documents that deal with the secret biological experiments that left Ian blind. What Raylene doesn’t bargain for is a case that takes her from the wilds of Minneapolis to the mean streets of Atlanta. And with a psychotic, power-hungry scientist on her trail, a kick-ass drag queen on her side, and Men in Black popping up at the most inconvenient moments, the case proves to be one hell of a ride.
Scott Weidensaul chronicles scientists' search for extinct species, discussing how some plants and animals have reappeared after being lost for hundreds of years.
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Diana Gabaldon returns with the “vast and sweeping” (The Washington Post) newest novel in the epic Outlander series. War leaves nobody alone. Neither the past, the present, nor the future offers true safety, and the only refuge is what you can protect: your family, your friends, your home. Jamie Fraser and Claire Randall were torn apart by the Jacobite Rising in 1746, and it took them twenty years of loss and heartbreak to find each other again. Now it’s 1779, and Claire and Jamie are finally reunited with their daughter, Brianna, her husband, Roger, and their children, and are rebuilding their home on Fraser’s Ridge—a fortress that may shelter them against the winds of war as well as weather. But tensions in the Colonies are great: Battles rage from New York to Georgia and, even in the mountains of the backcountry, feelings run hot enough to boil Hell’s teakettle. Jamie knows that loyalties among his tenants are split and it won’t be long before the war is on his doorstep. Brianna and Roger have their own worry: that the dangers that provoked their escape from the twentieth century might catch up to them. Sometimes they question whether risking the perils of the 1700s—among them disease, starvation, and an impending war—was indeed the safer choice for their family. Not so far away, young William Ransom is coming to terms with the mysteries of his identity, his future, and the family he’s never known. His erstwhile father, Lord John Grey, has reconciliations to make and dangers to meet on his son’s behalf and on his own, and far to the north, Young Ian Murray fights his own battle between past and future, and the two women he’s loved. Meanwhile, the Revolutionary War creeps ever closer to Fraser’s Ridge. Jamie sharpens his sword, while Claire whets her surgeon’s blade: It is a time for steel.
Meet Edinburgh Detective Inspector Liz Kavanaugh, head of the Innovative Crimes Investigation Unit, otherwise known as the Rule 34 Squad. They monitor the Internet for potential criminal activity, analyzing trends in the extreme fringes of explicit content. And occasionally, even more disturbing patterns arise… Three ex-cons have been murdered in Germany, Italy, and Scotland. The only things they had in common were arrests for spamming—and a taste for unorthodox entertainment. As the first officer on the scene of the most recent death, Liz finds herself sucked into an international investigation that isn’t so much asking who the killer is, but what—and if she doesn't find the answer soon, the homicides could go viral.
Faith, I tell them, is a mystery, elusive to many, and never easy to explain. Sweeping and lyrical, spellbinding and unforgettable, David Ebershoff’s The 19th Wife combines epic historical fiction with a modern murder mystery to create a brilliant novel of literary suspense. It is 1875, and Ann Eliza Young has recently separated from her powerful husband, Brigham Young, prophet and leader of the Mormon Church. Expelled and an outcast, Ann Eliza embarks on a crusade to end polygamy in the United States. A rich account of a family’s polygamous history is revealed, including how a young woman became a plural wife. Soon after Ann Eliza’s story begins, a second exquisite narrative unfolds–a tale of murder involving a polygamist family in present-day Utah. Jordan Scott, a young man who was thrown out of his fundamentalist sect years earlier, must reenter the world that cast him aside in order to discover the truth behind his father’s death. And as Ann Eliza’s narrative intertwines with that of Jordan’ s search, readers are pulled deeper into the mysteries of love and faith. Praise for The 19th Wife “This exquisite tour de force explores the dark roots of polygamy and its modern-day fruit in a renegade cult . . . Ebershoff brilliantly blends a haunting fictional narrative by Ann Eliza Young, the real-life 19th “rebel” wife of Mormon leader Brigham Young, with the equally compelling contemporary narrative of fictional Jordan Scott, a 20-year-old gay man. . . . With the topic of plural marriage and its shattering impact on women and powerless children in today's headlines, this novel is essential reading for anyone seeking understanding of the subject.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
