With a compassionate realism and narrative sweep that recall the work of Charles Dickens, this magnificent novel captures all the cruelty and corruption, dignity and heroism, of India. The time is 1975. The place is an unnamed city by the sea. The government has just declared a State of Emergency, in whose upheavals four strangers–a spirited widow, a young student uprooted from his idyllic hill station, and two tailors who have fled the caste violence of their native village–will be thrust together, forced to share one cramped apartment and an uncertain future.,As the characters move from distrust to friendship and from friendship to love, A Fine Balance creates an enduring panorama of the human spirit in an inhuman state.
Barack Obama, via Facebook: ???A compelling story of how the transformative events of history weigh on individual lives and relationships.???,The Nobel Prize???nominated Kenyan writer???s best-known novel.,Set in the wake of the Mau Mau rebellion and on the cusp of Kenya’s independence from Britain, A Grain of Wheat follows a group of villagers whose lives have been transformed by the 1952???1960 Emergency. At the center of it all is the reticent Mugo, the village’s chosen hero and a man haunted by a terrible secret. As we learn of the villagers’ tangled histories in a narrative interwoven with myth and peppered with allusions to real-life leaders, including Jomo Kenyatta, a masterly story unfolds in which compromises are forced, friendships are betrayed, and loves are tested.
In 2013, the skeletal remains of two elderly people, William and Patricia Wycherley, were unearthed from the back garden of the house they had mysteriously left 15 years earlier. But why were their relatives still getting Christmas cards from them until the year before they were found? Why were they still on the electoral roll and why were they still replying to letters from their doctor? Suspicion soon falls on their daughter Susan Edwards, who tells a tale of family feud and betrayal, and a freak accident that led to her parents??? deaths and a forced cover-up. But is she telling the truth, or have she and her husband Christopher concocted the story so they can literally get away with murder? Based on real events, A Garden of Bones explores one of the most brutal and notorious murders in recent times and is told through the eyes of a down-at-heel news reporter looking for the scoop that could revive his career, a senior detective hoping for the next step up the greasy career ladder, and Susan Edwards, the downtrodden daughter whose fantasist personality makes it hard to know what is real and what is not.
Don???t miss the thrilling sneak peek of George R. R. Martin???s A Song of Ice and Fire: Book Six, The Winds of Winter,Dubbed ???the American Tolkien??? by Time magazine, George R. R. Martin has earned international acclaim for his monumental cycle of epic fantasy. Now the 1 New York Times bestselling author delivers the fifth book in his landmark series???as both familiar faces and surprising new forces vie for a foothold in a fragmented empire.,A DANCE WITH DRAGONS ,In the aftermath of a colossal battle, the future of the Seven Kingdoms hangs in the balance???beset by newly emerging threats from every direction. In the east, Daenerys Targaryen, the last scion of House Targaryen, rules with her three dragons as queen of a city built on dust and death. But Daenerys has thousands of enemies, and many have set out to find her. As they gather, one young man embarks upon his own quest for the queen, with an entirely different goal in mind.,Fleeing from Westeros with a price on his head, Tyrion Lannister, too, is making his way to Daenerys. But his newest allies in this quest are not the rag-tag band they seem, and at their heart lies one who could undo Daenerys???s claim to Westeros forever.,Meanwhile, to the north lies the mammoth Wall of ice and stone???a structure only as strong as those guarding it. There, Jon Snow, 998th Lord Commander of the Night???s Watch, will face his greatest challenge. For he has powerful foes not only within the Watch but also beyond, in the land of the creatures of ice.,From all corners, bitter conflicts reignite, intimate betrayals are perpetrated, and a grand cast of outlaws and priests, soldiers and skinchangers, nobles and slaves, will face seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Some will fail, others will grow in the strength of darkness. But in a time of rising restlessness, the tides of destiny and politics will lead inevitably to the greatest dance of all.
Anthony Powell’s universally acclaimed epic encompasses a four-volume panorama of twentieth century London. Hailed by , as “brilliant literary comedy as well as a brilliant sketch of the times,” , opens just after World War I. Amid the fever of the 1920s and the first chill of the 1930s, Nick Jenkins and his friends confront sex, society, business, and art. In the second volume they move to London in a whirl of marriage and adulteries, fashions and frivolities, personal triumphs and failures. These books “provide an unsurpassed picture, at once gay and melancholy, of social and artistic life in Britain between the wars” (Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.). The third volume follows Nick into army life and evokes London during the blitz. In the climactic final volume, England has won the war and must now count the losses.,Four very different young men on the threshold of manhood dominate this opening volume of ,. The narrator, Jenkins???a budding writer???shares a room with Templer, already a passionate womanizer, and Stringham, aristocratic and reckless. Widermerpool, as hopelessly awkward as he is intensely ambitious, lurks on the periphery of their world. Amid the fever of the 1920s and the first chill of the 1930s, these four gain their initiations into sex, society, business, and art. Considered a masterpiece of modern fiction, Powell’s epic creates a rich panorama of life in England between the wars.
“The novel buzzes with the energy of numerous adventures, love affairs, [and] twists of fate.” ???The Wall Street Journal,He can???t leave his hotel. You won???t want to.,From the New York Times bestselling author of Rules of Civility???a transporting novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel.,In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and must now live in an attic room while some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history are unfolding outside the hotel???s doors. Unexpectedly, his reduced circumstances provide him entry into a much larger world of emotional discovery.,Brimming with humor, a glittering cast of characters, and one beautifully rendered scene after another, this singular novel casts a spell as it relates the count???s endeavor to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be a man of purpose.
Few books have captivated the imagination and won the devotion and praise of readers and critics everywhere as has George R. R. Martin???s monumental epic cycle of high fantasy. Now, in A Feast for Crows, Martin delivers the long-awaited fourth book of his landmark series, as a kingdom torn asunder finds itself at last on the brink of peace . . . only to be launched on an even more terrifying course of destruction.,A FEAST FOR CROWS,It seems too good to be true. After centuries of bitter strife and fatal treachery, the seven powers dividing the land have decimated one another into an uneasy truce. Or so it appears. . . . With the death of the monstrous King Joffrey, Cersei is ruling as regent in King???s Landing. Robb Stark???s demise has broken the back of the Northern rebels, and his siblings are scattered throughout the kingdom like seeds on barren soil. Few legitimate claims to the once desperately sought Iron Throne still exist???or they are held in hands too weak or too distant to wield them effectively. The war, which raged out of control for so long, has burned itself out.,But as in the aftermath of any climactic struggle, it is not long before the survivors, outlaws, renegades, and carrion eaters start to gather, picking over the bones of the dead and fighting for the spoils of the soon-to-be dead. Now in the Seven Kingdoms, as the human crows assemble over a banquet of ashes, daring new plots and dangerous new alliances are formed, while surprising faces???some familiar, others only just appearing???are seen emerging from an ominous twilight of past struggles and chaos to take up the challenges ahead.,It is a time when the wise and the ambitious, the deceitful and the strong will acquire the skills, the power, and the magic to survive the stark and terrible times that lie before them. It is a time for nobles and commoners, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and sages to come together and stake their fortunes . . . and their lives. For at a feast for crows, many are the guests???but only a few are the survivors.
George R. R. Martin, a writer of unsurpassed vision, power, and imagination, has created a landmark of fantasy fiction. In his widely acclaimed A Game of Thrones, he introduced us to an extraordinary world of wonder, intrigue, and adventure. Now, in the eagerly awaited second volume in this epic saga, he once again proves himself a master myth-maker, setting a standard against which all other fantasy novels will be measured for years to come.,Time is out of joint. The summer of peace and plenty, ten years long, is drawing to a close, and the harsh, chill winter approaches like an angry beast. Two great leaders???Lord Eddard Stark and Robert Baratheon???who held sway over an age of enforced peace are dead . . . victims of royal treachery. Now, from the ancient citadel of Dragonstone to the forbidding shores of Winterfell, chaos reigns, as pretenders to the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms prepare to stake their claims through tempest, turmoil, and war.,As a prophecy of doom cuts across the sky???a comet the color of blood and flame???six factions struggle for control of a divided land. Eddard???s son Robb has declared himself King in the North. In the south, Joffrey, the heir apparent, rules in name only, victim of the scheming courtiers who teem over King???s Landing. Robert???s two brothers each seek their own dominion, while a disfavored house turns once more to conquest. And a continent away, an exiled queen, the Mother of Dragons, risks everything to lead her precious brood across a hard hot desert to win back the crown that is rightfully hers.,A Clash of Kings transports us into a magnificent, forgotten land of revelry and revenge, wizardry and warfare. It is a tale in which maidens cavort with madmen, brother plots against brother, and the dead rise to walk in the night. Here a princess masquerades as an orphan boy; a knight of the mind prepares a poison for a treacherous sorceress; and wild men descend from the Mountains of the Moon to ravage the countryside.,Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, the price of glory may be measured in blood. And the spoils of victory may just go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel . . . and the coldest hearts. For when rulers clash, all of the land feels the tremors.,Audacious, inventive, brilliantly imagined, A Clash of Kings is a novel of dazzling beauty and boundless enchantment???a tale of pure excitement you will never forget.
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Jess Aarons’ greatest ambition is to be the fastest runner in his grade. He’s been practicing all summer and can’t wait to see his classmates’ faces when he beats them all. But on the first day of school, a new girl boldly crosses over to the boys’ side and outruns everyone.,That’s not a very promising beginning for a friendship, but Jess and Leslie Burke become inseparable. Together they create Terabithia, a magical kingdom in the woods where the two of them reign as king and queen, and their imaginations set the only limits.
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| Published By |
Jess Aarons’ greatest ambition is to be the fastest runner in his grade. He’s been practicing all summer and can’t wait to see his classmates’ faces when he beats them all. But on the first day of school, a new girl boldly crosses over to the boys’ side and outruns everyone.,That’s not a very promising beginning for a friendship, but Jess and Leslie Burke become inseparable. Together they create Terabithia, a magical kingdom in the woods where the two of them reign as king and queen, and their imaginations set the only limits.
