An Aero Island Christmas Mystery


Book Description

In the depths of the Nordic winter, the beautiful Island of Aero is steeped in pre-Christmas cheer and Danish hygge. But in one dark and forbidding attic, a gruesome secret waits to be discovered. Two Italian sexagenarians and a stubborn, loveable Basset Hound are travelling across the sea to the historic town of Ærøskøbing. The ever-positive Dora is clasping her hands in delight at the prospect of their latest homeswap; her more feisty friend Etta is picking a fight with an equally belligerent Danish woman; and Leon? Well, Leon is saving a small child from certain death. Just another day in the life of a brave and noble dog. Little do the three travellers know just how significant the people they meet during the ferry crossing are going to become over the next couple of weeks. As Aero rises before them from the Baltic Sea, an unsolved murder, a mythical treasure, an unrequited love and a bitter family feud await them. Can the analytical Etta, empathetic Dora and sharp-nosed Leon finally lay the dead to rest and lead the living to the happiest of Christmases? And who is destined to receive the most precious gift of all? ◆◆◆ Wrap up warm, pack your cases and hop into the backseat. It's time to join Etta, Dora and Leon in their ancient yellow Fiat for another delightfully mysterious adventure, this time with a huge dollop of festive fun. ◆◆◆ *** An Aero Island Christmas Mystery is the fourth book in the The Homeswappers Mysteries, a humorous cosy series following the adventures of two retired teachers and their Basset Hound as they explore the most delightfully murderous European travel destinations and put their skills as sleuths to the test. Written in British English, each light-hearted mystery is clean - no violence, sex or strong language - and can be read as a standalone or enjoyed in sequence: 0. Castelmezzano, The Witch is Dead - An Italian Cosy Mystery (A Prequel Novella) 1. The Watchman of Rothenburg Dies - A German Cosy Mystery 2. A Wedding and a Funeral in Mecklenburg - A German Travel Mystery 3. An Aero Island Christmas Mystery - A Danish Cosy Mystery 4. Prague, A Secret from the Past - A Czech Travel Mystery (coming in Spring 2021) More adventures to follow!




An Aero Island Christmas Mystery


Book Description

In the depths of the Nordic winter, the beautiful Island of Aero is steeped in pre-Christmas cheer and Danish hygge. But in one dark and forbidding attic, a gruesome secret waits to be discovered. Two Italian sexagenarians and a stubborn, loveable Basset Hound are travelling across the sea to the historic town of Ærøskøbing. The ever-positive Dora is clasping her hands in delight at the prospect of their latest homeswap; her more feisty friend Etta is picking a fight with an equally belligerent Danish woman; and Leon? Well, Leon is saving a small child from certain death. Just another day in the life of a brave and noble dog. Little do the three travellers know just how significant the people they meet during the ferry crossing are going to become over the next couple of weeks. As Aero rises before them from the Baltic Sea, an unsolved murder, a mythical treasure, an unrequited love and a bitter family feud await them. Can the analytical Etta, empathetic Dora and sharp-nosed Leon finally lay the dead to rest and lead the living to the happiest of Christmases? And who is destined to receive the most precious gift of all? ◆◆◆ Wrap up warm, pack your cases and hop into the backseat. It's time to join Etta, Dora and Leon in their ancient yellow Fiat for another delightfully mysterious adventure, this time with a huge dollop of festive fun. ◆◆◆ *** An Aero Island Christmas Mystery is the fourth book in the The Homeswappers Mysteries, a humorous cosy series following the adventures of two retired teachers and their Basset Hound as they explore the most delightfully murderous European travel destinations and put their skills as sleuths to the test. Written in British English, each light-hearted mystery is clean - no violence, sex or strong language - and can be read as a standalone or enjoyed in sequence: 0. Castelmezzano, The Witch is Dead - An Italian Cosy Mystery (A Prequel Novella) 1. The Watchman of Rothenburg Dies - A German Cosy Mystery 2. A Wedding and a Funeral in Mecklenburg - A German Travel Mystery 3. An Aero Island Christmas Mystery - A Danish Cosy Mystery 4. Prague, A Secret from the Past - A Czech Travel Mystery (coming in Spring 2021)




The Watchman of Rothenburg Dies


Book Description

A holiday is a time to relax, unwind and see the sights. But for two adventurous sexagenarians, the sights have a tendency to include dead bodies. Etta and Dora, both newly retired teachers, travel from their home in Southern Italy to a fairy-tale German town for their first home swap holiday, delighted by their neighbours' warm welcome. But the welcome turns sour when the Night Watchman of Rothenburg is brutally murdered while his tour group takes photographs nearby, a halberd buried in his chest and a peculiar iron mask by his side. When the murderer claims a second victim and the son of their hospitable neighbours becomes the number-one suspect, Etta's analytical mind goes to work. Why was a shame mask left at the scene of each murder? Is there a clandestine trade going on behind the scenes of apparently upstanding local businesses? And why does every lead take her back to the sinister Devil's Ale pub and the terrifying gang who lurk within? Meanwhile, Dora has a puzzle of her own - how can she persuade Etta that a loveably disobedient Basset Hound called Napoleon is now a permanent part of their lives? ◆◆◆ Pack your bags, jump into the backseat of Etta and Dora's old Fiat 500, and join them on their travels around Europe. There'll be mystery, murder and mayhem aplenty wherever they go. ◆◆◆ The Night Watchman of Rothenburg Dies is the first book in The Homeswappers Mysteries a new travel mystery series from Italian author Adriana Licio.




Solving the 1897 Airship Mystery


Book Description

In 1897, people in western United States began seeing airships in the night skies. Despite abundant reports of sightings from California to Michigan, little explanatory information was given to the public. Speculation arose that the United States government had started a secret flight program or that life from another world had contacted Earth. The implications of each conjecture were staggering, pointing to a major governmental or scientific cover-up that wouldchange the course of history.While this book focuses on the sightings in Texas, it takes into account all of the reports filed. After addressing previous theories of what the airships were and where they came from, Solving the 1897 Airship Mystery puts forth a new analysis, using detailed accounts from period newspapers and other documents left behind. By writing in chronological order, Michael Busby traces the course of the flights that led to the mystery. Included are numerous appendixes, figures, and tables that present the information in an easy-to-handle format.




Mystery Women, Volume Two (Revised)


Book Description

Many bibliographers focus on women who write. Lawyer Barnett looks at women who detect, at women as sleuths and at the evolving roles of women in professions and in society. Excellent for all women's studies programs as well as for the mystery hound. Look at the popularity of such reading guides as Willetta Heising's Detecting Women (3rd ed. 0-9644593-7-X) or Amanda Cross' fiction (Honest Doubt 0-345-44011-0 11/00).




The Well of Lost Plots


Book Description

The third novel in the New York Times bestselling Thursday Next series is “great fun—especially for those with a literary turn of mind and a taste for offbeat comedy” (The Washington Post Book World). “Delightful . . . the well of Fforde’s imagination is bottomless.”—People “Fforde creates a literary reality that is somewhere amid a triangulation of Douglas Adams, Monty Python, and Miss Marple.”—The Denver Post With the 923rd Annual Bookworld Awards just around the corner and an unknown villain wreaking havoc in Jurisfiction, what could possibly be next for Detective Thursday Next? Protecting the world’s greatest literature—not to mention keeping up with Miss Havisham—is tiring work for an expectant mother. And Thursday can definitely use a respite. So what better hideaway than inside the unread and unreadable Caversham Heights, a cliché-ridden pulp mystery in the hidden depths of the Well of Lost Plots, where all unpublished books reside? But peace and quiet remain elusive for Thursday, who soon discovers that the Well itself is a veritable linguistic free-for-all, where grammasites run rampant, plot devices are hawked on the black market, and lousy books—like Caversham Heights—are scrapped for salvage. To top it off, a murderer is stalking Jurisfiction personnel and nobody is safe—least of all Thursday. Don’t miss any of Jasper Fforde’s delightfully entertaining Thursday Next novels: THE EYRE AFFAIR • LOST IN A GOOD BOOK • THE WELL OF LOST PLOTS • SOMETHING ROTTEN • FIRST AMONG SEQUELS • ONE OF OUR THURSDAYS IS MISSING • THE WOMAN WHO DIED A LOT




The Lost Continent


Book Description

I could not repress a sigh at the thought of the havoc war had wrought in this part of England, at least. Farther east, nearer London, we should find things very different. There would be the civilization that two centuries must have wrought upon our English cousins as they had upon us. There would be mighty cities, cultivated fields, happy people. There we would be welcomed as long-lost brothers. There would we find a great nation anxious to learn of the world beyond their side of thirty, as I had been anxious to learn of that which lay beyond our side of the dead line. ~ ~ ~ Edgar Rice Burroughs created one of the most iconic figures in American pop culture, Tarzan of the Apes, and it is impossible to overstate his influence on entire genres of popular literature in the decades after his enormously winning pulp novels stormed the public's imagination. The Lost Continent is one of the rarest and least-known of Burrough's thrilling science-fiction adventure stories. Since its first appearance-in the February 1916 issue of All-Around Magazine, under the title "Beyond Thirty"-it has languished in undeserved obscurity. In the year 2137, global civilization has been in decline for nearly two centuries, and war-ruined Europe is but a distant memory, practically a legend, to the isolationist United States. But one intrepid American traveler is about to rediscover the Old World, which has become a startling and savage land in its solitude. American novelist EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS (1875-1950) wrote dozens of adventure, crime, and science fiction novels that are still beloved today, including Tarzan of the Apes (1912), At the Earth's Core (1914), A Princess of Mars (1917), The Land That TimeForgot (1924), and Pirates of Venus (1934). He is reputed to have been reading a comic book when he died.




The Boy in the Suitcase


Book Description

Nina Borg, a Red Cross nurse, wife, and mother of two, is a compulsive do-gooder who can't say no when someone asks for help—even when she knows better. When her estranged friend Karin leaves her a key to a public locker in the Copenhagen train station, Nina gets suckered into her most dangerous project yet. Inside the locker is a suitcase, and inside the suitcase is a three-year-old boy: naked and drugged, but alive. Is the boy a victim of child trafficking? Can he be turned over to authorities, or will they only return him to whoever sold him? When Karin is discovered brutally murdered, Nina realizes that her life and the boy's are in jeopardy, too. In an increasingly desperate trek across Denmark, Nina tries to figure out who the boy is, where he belongs, and who exactly is trying to hunt him down.




The Next War in the Air


Book Description

In the early twentieth century, the new technology of flight changed warfare irrevocably, not only on the battlefield, but also on the home front. As prophesied before 1914, Britain in the First World War was effectively no longer an island, with its cities attacked by Zeppelin airships and Gotha bombers in one of the first strategic bombing campaigns. Drawing on prewar ideas about the fragility of modern industrial civilization, some writers now began to argue that the main strategic risk to Britain was not invasion or blockade, but the possibility of a sudden and intense aerial bombardment of London and other cities, which would cause tremendous destruction and massive casualties. The nation would be shattered in a matter of days or weeks, before it could fully mobilize for war. Defeat, decline, and perhaps even extinction, would follow. This theory of the knock-out blow from the air solidified into a consensus during the 1920s and by the 1930s had largely become an orthodoxy, accepted by pacifists and militarists alike. But the devastation feared in 1938 during the Munich Crisis, when gas masks were distributed and hundreds of thousands fled London, was far in excess of the damage wrought by the Luftwaffe during the Blitz in 1940 and 1941, as terrible as that was. The knock-out blow, then, was a myth. But it was a myth with consequences. For the first time, The Next War in the Air reconstructs the concept of the knock-out blow as it was articulated in the public sphere, the reasons why it came to be so widely accepted by both experts and non-experts, and the way it shaped the responses of the British public to some of the great issues facing them in the 1930s, from pacifism to fascism. Drawing on both archival documents and fictional and non-fictional publications from the period between 1908, when aviation was first perceived as a threat to British security, and 1941, when the Blitz ended, and it became clear that no knock-out blow was coming, The Next War in the Air provides a fascinating insight into the origins and evolution of this important cultural and intellectual phenomenon, Britain's fear of the bomber.




Into the Bermuda Triangle


Book Description

Still unsolved, still baffling, still claiming new victims. Here are the untold stories. A pilot reports a strange haze enveloping his plane, then disappears; eleven hours after fuel starvation, as if calling from a void, he is heard 600 miles away. He requests permission to land, then vanishes forever. A freighter steaming over placid seas disappears without a trace. A pleasure yacht ghosts past without a soul on board. A pilot calls for help because a "weird object" is harassing his plane. A jet collides with an "unknown" and is never found. . . . Into the Bermuda Triangle is the first comprehensive examination of these baffling disappearances in more than a generation. Drawing on official reports from the NTSB and other investigative agencies as well as interviews with scientists, theorists, and survivors, leading authority Gian Quasar not only sets the record straight on previously examined cases, he also offers a bulging file of new cases, the collective results of his twelve-year investigation. In meticulous detail this unflinching account: Documents confirmed disappearances of airplanes and ships Gathers new testimony and reexamines old interviews from eyewitnesses and survivors Explores possible explanations ranging from zero-point energy to magnetic vortices Challenges our assumptions with the sheer weight of accumulated evidence In this age of technological and scientific discovery, there are still mysteries that transcend understanding. The Bermuda Triangle is one. "The best book I've ever read on this important subject."—Andrew Griffin, The Town Talk