Selden Edwards, apparently, took 35 years to write this dismal piece of drivel. He started writing at age 25, but I suspect that he conceived the idea at the age of 15. How else to explain the wholly un-ironic adoption of the puerile schoolboy nickname for the main character's guru - the Venerable Haze, a.k.a. the Haze - throughout the book? On page 6, Mr Edwards employs the word 'momentarily' to mean 'in a moment' - when in fact it means 'for a moment'. I would say that if it is English teaching that he has recently retired from, then it is just as well that he has retired. Time travel, I can (only just) live with, but the plot is contrived, and the story wholly devoid of humour, takes itself far too seriously, and employs tortured coincidences to allow the hero to make his way through life in 19th Century 'fin de siecle' (he loves that term!) Vienna. I managed 36 pages of this rubbish, and then gave up in disgust. I trust that Mr Edwards, if he ever does write another novel, will again take 35 years t
A deadly love triangle Elena: beautiful and popular, the girl who can have any guy shewants. Stefan: brooding and mysterious, desperately trying to resist hisdesire for Elena . . . for her own good. Damon: sexy, dangerous, and driven by an urge for revenge againstStefan, the brother who betrayed him. Elena finds herself drawn to both brothers . . . who will shechoose?
Set during the Napoleonic wars at a time of national economicstruggles, Shirley is an unsentimental yet passionatedepiction of conflict among classes, sexes, and generations.Struggling manufacturer Robert Moore considers marriage to thewealthy and independent Shirley Keeldar, yet his heart lies withhis cousin Caroline. Shirley, meanwhile, is in love with Robert’sbrother, an impoverished tutor. As industrial unrest builds to apotentially fatal pitch, can the four be reconciled?
A new collection from David Sedaris is cause for jubilation. His recent move to Paris has inspired hilarious pieces, including Me Talk Pretty One Day, about his attempts to learn French. His family is another inspiration. You Cant Kill the Rooster is a portrait of his brother who talks incessant hip-hop slang to his bewildered father. And no one hones a finer fury in response to such modern annoyances as restaurant meals presented in ludicrous towers and cashiers with 6-inch fingernails. Compared by The New Yorker to Twain and Hawthorne, Sedaris has become one of our best-loved authors. Sedaris is an amazing reader whose appearances draw hundreds, and his performancesincluding a jaw-dropping impression of Billie Holiday singing I wish I were an Oscar Meyer weinerare unforgettable. Sedariss essays on living in Paris are some of the funniest hes ever written. At last, someone even meaner than the French! The sort of blithely sophisticated, loopy humour that might have resulted if Dorothy Parker and James Thurbe
Nicholas Nickleby,a gentleman's son fallen upon hard times,must set out to make his way in the world.Along the way various older,money-grubbing villains attempt to injure him.Eventually,with the assistance of kind patrons,he and his family achieve economic security and a happy home.Sounds rather trite,doesn't it? Not with characters written by Dickens(Hard Times,Audio Reviews,LJ 5/1/98).Schoolmaster Squeers would make a fine poster boy for child abusers.Ralph Nickleby's initial desire to injure Nicholas gradually develops into a full-blown obsession.Then there are the kind Cheeryble brothers,the gentle,much-abused Smike,and a host of other friends who provide comic relief.Martin Jarvis does an outstanding job of reading this book.His ingenues sound young(a frequent problem area for male readers)while his villains are deliciously evil.The only problems are with the abridgment.In several places,choppy editing has left brief,disconnected scenes and/or character cameos without relevance to the abridged tale.Still
The controversial bestseller from Tom Clancy, the all-time master of the techno-thriller. CIA Deputy Director Jack Ryan joins the war on drugs. And when three American officials are assassinated in Colombia, the U.S. response is swift-and shocking.
Calvino shows that the novel, far from being a dead form, iscapable of endless mutations. If on a winter's night a travelerturns out to be not one novel but ten, each with a different plot,style, ambience, and author. Translated by William Weaver. A Helenand Kurt Wolff Book
Que vient faire ce chien errant dans une petite ville italienne? Pourquoi cinq frères s'évitent-ils soudain ? Qui a composé cettemusique révolutionnaire et obsédante? Trois nouvelles aux décors etaux situations sans lien apparent. Pourtant, à la lecture, toujoursla même atmosphère inquiétante et mystérieuse. L'auteur du " Désertdes Tartares " et du " K ", tout en se plaisant à détourner labanale anecdote vers le fantastique ou l'irréel, sonde ici le genrehumain à travers ses passions et ses vanités.
Set in the reign of Richard I,Coeur de Lion,Ivanhoe is packed with memorable incidents-sieges,ambushes and combats-and equally memorable characters:Cedric of Rotherwood,the die-hard Saxon:his ward Rowena;the fierce Templar knight,Sir Brian de Bois-Guilbert;the lew,isaac of Yourk,and his beautiful,spirited daughter Rebecca;Wamba and Gurth,Jester and swineherd respecitively. Scott explores the conflicts betwwen the Crown and the powerful Barons,between the Norman overlords and the conquered Saxons,and between Richard and his scheming brother,Prince John.At the same time he brings into the novel the legendary Robin Hood and his band,and creates a brilliant,colourful account of the age of chivalry with all its elaborate rituals and costumes and its values of honour and personal glory.
Three Star Wars: Young Jedi Knights Adventures. One SpecialPrice The million-copy "New York Times" bestselling trilogy, now inone deluxe omnibus edition. Volume One includes the complete novels"Heirs of the Force," "Shadow Academy," and "The Lost Ones."
Theodore Boone is back in a new adventure, and the stakes arehigher than ever. When his best friend, April, disappears from herbedroom in the middle of the night, no one, not even Theo Boone -who knows April better than anyone - has answers. As fear ripplesthrough his small hometown and the police hit dead ends, it's up toTheo to use his legal knowledge and investigative skills to chasedown the truth and save April. Filled with the page-turningsuspense that made John Grisham a number one internationalbestseller and the undisputed master of the legal thriller,Theodore Boone's trials and triumphs will keep readers guessinguntil the very end.
#1 "New York Times" bestselling author Nora Roberts invitesreaders to the wedding event of the year #1 "New York Times"bestselling author Nora Roberts presents her first trade original-anovel of love, friendship, and family-Book One in the BrideQuartet. Wedding photographer Mackensie "Mac" Elliot is most athome behind the camera, but her focus is shattered moments beforean important wedding rehearsal when she bumps into thebride-to-be's brother...an encounter that has them both seeingstars. A stable, safe English teacher, Carter Maguire is definitelynot Mac's type. But a casual fling might be just what she needs totake her mind off bridezillas. Of course, casual flings can turninto something more when you least expect it. And Mac will have toturn to her three best friends-and business partners-to see her wayto her own happy ending.
Frank, no ordinary sixteen-year-old, lives with his fatheroutsIde a remote Scottish village. Their life is, to say the least,unconventional. Frank's mother abandoned them years ago: his elderbrother Eric is confined to a psychiatric hospital; and his fathermeasures out his eccentricities on an imperial scale. Frank hasturned to strange acts of violence to vent his frustrations. In thebizarre daily rituals there is some solace. But when news comes ofEric's escape from the hospital Frank has to prepare the ground forhis brother's inevitable return - an event that explodes themysteries of the past and changes Frank utterly. Iain Banks'celebrated first novel is a work of extraordinary originality,imagination and horrifying compulsion: horrifying, because itenters a mind whose realities are not our own, whose values of lifeand death are alien to our society; and compulsive, because thehumour and compassion of that mind reach out to us all.
"Northanger Abbey," by Jane Austen, is part of the ""Barnes and Noble Classics" "series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of "Barnes and Noble Classics": New introductions commissioned from today's top writers and scholars Biographies of the authors Chronologies of contemporary historical, biographical, and cultural events Footnotes and endnotes Selective discussions of imitations, parodies, poems, books, plays, paintings, operas, statuary, and films inspired by the work Comments by other famous authors Study questions to challenge the reader's viewpoints and expectations Bibliographies for further reading Indices and Glossaries, when appropriateAll editions are beautifully designed and are printed to superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest. "Barnes and Noble Classics "pulls together a constella
In the summer after the Anglo-Irish Agreement, when tension washigh in Northern Ireland, Colm Toibin walked along the border fromDerry to Newry. "Bad Blood" is a stark and evocative account ofthis journey through fear and hatred, and a report on ordinary lifeand the legacy of history in a bleak and desolate landscape. Toibindescribes the rituals - the marches, the funerals, thedemonstrations - observed by both communities along the border, andlistens to the stories which haunt both sides. With sympathy andinsight "Bad Blood" captures the intimacy of life along one of themost contested strips of land in Western Europe. 'Toibin has thenarrative poise of Brian Moore and the patient eye for domesticdetail of John McGahern, but he is very much his own man' -"Observer". 'High-class reportage ...Toibin was conscientious abouttalking to real people, not just 'names' with a good line in TVchat, and went to see and hear and sense things at a local,grassroots level' - "Irish Times".
