Insatiable Machine


Book Description

Wave goodbye to the American dream. Just a heartbeat into the future, America is being dragged to its knees by social unrest and economic inequality. The furious pace of technological advancement has made medicine capable of near-miracles but has also enabled the widespread displacement of workers by automated systems. As unemployment and poverty levels rise to dangerous heights, those with fortunes to lose are pitted against those with nothing left. The threat of rebellion looms greater every day. When a chance meeting in a Washington, D.C., slum leads journalist Richard LaPointe to a heinous discovery, he and his wife, internationally respected physician and medical technologist Allie MacKay, start down a path that exposes just how far those in power will go to protect themselves from the impending crisis. When their daughter, Skyie, an online video activist sensation, gets involved after pulling off a spectacular protest stunt, they are all plunged into a world in which no one is safe. What they find behind the curtain is not an America made great again. It is an empire in ruin.




Insatiable Machine


Book Description

A work of speculative fiction that explores how America's growing economic inequalities and social unrest spiral into an empire in ruins.




Narrative Machine


Book Description

Narrative Machine: The Naturalist, Modernist, and Postmodernist Novel advances a new history of the novel, identifying a crucial link between narrative innovation and the historical process of mechanization. In the late nineteenth century, the novel grapples with a new and increasingly acute problem: In its attempt to represent the colossal power of modern machinery—the steam-driven machines of the Industrial Revolution, the electrical machines of the modern city, and the atomic and digital machines developed after the Second World War—it encounters the limitations of traditional representative strategies. Beginning in the naturalist novel, the machine is typically portrayed as a mythic monster, and though that monster represents a potentially horrific reality—the superhuman power of mechanization—it also disrupts the documentary objectives of narrative realism (the dominant mode of nineteenth-century fiction). The mechanical monster, realistic and yet at odds with traditional realist strategies, tears the form of the novel apart. In doing so, it unleashes a series of innovations that disclose, critique, and contest the force of mechanization: the innovations associated with literary naturalism, modernism, and postmodernism.







Mary Gaunt


Book Description

This is a rare biography of the pioneering Australian author, Mary Gaunt. Born on the Victorian Goldfields in Chiltern in 1861, Mary was well-educated and well-connected. She was a tomboy and a rebel - her father encouraged her, her mother disapproved. One of the first female students to attend the University of Melbourne, she wrote articles and stories in order to fund her travels. She trekked through the great mahogany forests of West Africa. She went to China in the chaos that followed the downfall of the Ch'ing dynasty, and narrowly avoided the marauding White Wolf. She proved that a woman could live by her pen in that era. When war came, she was trapped behind enemy lines and never made it home to Australia.




The junkyard Misfits


Book Description

In a world powered by steam, a disgraced inventor must navigate the dangerous politics of a steampunk city to clear his name and uncover a conspiracy that threatens the entire nation. A young mechanic discovers an abandoned, sentient automaton in the junkyard and embarks on an adventure to uncover its mysterious origins, all while being pursued by shadowy figures who want it back at any cost. In a steampunk society where magic and technology coexist, a skilled airship captain must race against time to prevent a powerful artifact from falling into the wrong hands, all while dealing with a crew of misfits and saboteurs. A brilliant but reclusive scientist invents a time machine powered by steam, only to unintentionally disrupt the timeline and create a steampunk dystopia ruled by an oppressive regime. Now, she must find a way to set things right before it's too late. In a world where airships rule the skies and clockwork automatons walk the streets, a group of unlikely allies must band together to stop a mad inventor from unleashing a powerful weapon that could spell doom for the entire world. A detective in a steampunk city populated by humans, automatons, and otherworldly creatures must solve a series of murders that seem to be connected to a secret society dabbling in forbidden alchemy and dark magic. After crash-landing in a mysterious and hostile steampunk wilderness, a group of survivors must repair their damaged airship using salvaged parts from clockwork beasts and ancient ruins, all while evading the savage tribes that roam the land. In a steampunk version of Victorian London, a notorious thief with a knack for clockwork gadgets and daring heists is hired by a wealthy noble to steal a priceless artifact, only to uncover a sinister plot that could change the course of history. A young inventor stumbles upon a hidden workshop filled with advanced steam-powered technology and mysterious blueprints, unlocking a world of possibilities and danger as rival factions vie for control of his newfound discoveries. In a post-apocalyptic steampunk world where society has collapsed, a lone survivor scavenges the wastelands for spare parts to repair his broken automaton companion, unaware that they hold the key to unlocking a long-forgotten secret that could save or doom what remains of humanity.




Adamma


Book Description

Adamma is a dazzling beauty and Nigeria's biggest female musician. She has clawed her way to the top through sheer talent, uncommon drive and a shocking ability to adapt to people's musical needs. And, she intends to stay at the top no matter what. Obinna Obiekwe is a tycoon and a known playboy, the Casanova of fashionable Lagos society. He loves women, and he spends money on them recklessly. Years ago, he had met Adamma, and now he wants to be back in her life. However, she has kept a deep, devastating secret away from him...a secret he discovers and intends to break her with. He never forgets, he never lets go, and he has Adamma in his sights. He is rich, handsome and powerful, and he wants her to pay. A heartbreaking, emotional saga, so begins the thrilling, exotic story of Adamma, the woman everyone thinks is living the big dream, but whose life is a living nightmare. In the lush playgrounds of Lagos’s high brow areas, the saga of her life plays out, with a bitter past rearing its head at all turns, and a desperate future waiting for her everywhere she turns.




The Majesty of Big Steam


Book Description

Relive the romance and power of the steam locomotive era, the product of a century of continuous research and development. In the United States, the final decades of steam power were characterized by very large and capable locomotives. Beginning in the 1920s with Alco's three-cylinder types and Lima's "Super Power" concept, steam locomotive design crossed new thresholds of power and efficiency. A host of new wheel arrangements combined with innovative technology and new materials to create a final generation of refinement. Lima's Berkshire of 1925 demonstrated the value of the four-wheel radial trailing truck in its ability to support a firebox large enough to supply high power and fast running. Within a few years the 2-10-4 Texas, 4-6-4 Hudson, and 4-8-4 Northern had led the way, and by the late 1920s, large modern articulated types were taking shape. The Majesty of Big Steam is full of these late-era locomotives, the last generation of steam power before the diesels took over. Dramatic photos show Berkshires, Hudsons, and Northerns at work, as well as massive articulateds at their finest. Witness New York Central's Great Steel Fleet being whisked along behind some of the most refined American-designed engines. See Southern Pacific's cab-forward oil burners crest the California Sierra, and Baltimore & Ohio's EM-1 war babies lift tonnage over the Appalachian mountains. Norfolk & Western continued to refine 4-8-4s and articulated types, even as the rest of America was buying diesels, and ran these well-oiled machines longer than any other line. Don't miss a single one!




EASY MONEY


Book Description

The Book (Easy Money): Debbie and Wayne arrive on the Gold Coast from New Zealand intent on living the easy life. They have decided to con some of the rich holidaymakers out of their money and set about their nefarious business in the Casino at Broad Beach. However things don’t go according to plan and before long they run foul of the authorities. Their business problems cause their relationship great stress and before long they are fighting ferociously between themselves. The story is constructed around the Jupiters Casino as it was in the 1990s.




The Boundaries of Her Body


Book Description

Whatever your political beliefs, if you are a woman, you must know what the law says about you. The Boundaries of Her Body is the definitive history of the cycle of advances and setbacks that characterizes women's rights in America. Author Debran Rowland covers emotionally charged issues with thoughtful detail, offering insight into the strategies used by politicians and lobbyists to defeat long-standing law. The defeat for women's rights is an emotional and often polarized debate: A debate over what a woman is What a woman ought to be And what a woman should, therefore, be allowed to do Today, the future of women's rights is in jeopardy. "If I had to guess at the future for women, I would say we stand to lose many more significant battles—and the rights that go with them—if we don't begin to abandon the niceties of a comfortable life with educated opinions and start waging the kind of aggressive, no-holds-barred guerrilla war that our opponents have been riding to victory." —from the Epilogue to The Boundaries of Her Body Rowland combines provocative arguments with exhaustive research and affirms that, in spite of advancements, the boundaries of women's bodies will continue to be a source of bitter contention in the law. "Debran Rowland brilliantly argues the continuing inequality of women's rights in America with the most meticulous and comprehensive research in our times." —Betty Friedan author of The Feminine Mystique