The Chronicle of Secret Riven


Book Description

"An uncanny child born to brilliant parents, befriended by a prince, mentored by a wise woman, pursued by a powerful man, Secret Riven has no idea what destiny will demand of her or the courage she must have to confront it in the ... genre-spanning sequel to The Mapmaker's War"--




The Plague Diaries


Book Description

"Secret Riven, the mystically gifted heroine ... is adjusting to her new life working for the mysterious magnate Fewmany as an archivist in his private library when she stumbles upon the arcane manuscript that had vanished following her mother's untimely death. But deciphering the manuscript may wrench her towards a cataclysmic fate, one set into motion over a thousand years ago and linked to an ancient war. What does Fewmany really want from Secret? And what is the true meaning of the bizarre symbol she has dreamed of since childhood? Secret must at last confront the lingering questions haunting her and depart on a quest to find the truth about herself, her dead mother, and her fate-- to unleash a Plague of Silences meant to destroy and transform the world as we all have known it"--




The Chronicle of Secret Riven


Book Description

A girl with wondrous, hidden powers must find the courage to confront her destiny in this breathtaking sequel to The Mapmaker’s War, which New York Times bestseller Deborah Harkness called “an otherworldly tale that charts the all-too-human territory between heartbreak and hope.” To see is a trick of the mind, but to believe is a trick of the heart. Born to brilliant parents one thousand years after a great conflict known as The Mapmaker’s War, Secret Riven is an uncanny child who can mysteriously communicate with plants and animals. When her knowledge of an esoteric symbol brings unwelcome attention, gentle, watchful Secret finds acceptance from Prince Nikolas, her best friend, and Old Woman, who lives in the distant woods. When Secret is twelve, her mother, Zavet, receives an arcane manuscript to translate. Zavet begins to suffer nightmares and withdraws into herself. Secret sickens with a fever and awakens able to speak an ancient language, in which her mother is also fluent. Suddenly, Zavet dies—and the manuscript is missing. The only clue left is a cipher for Secret to find. Soon, she will have a choice to make: confront a destiny tied to an ancient past or deny it, never to know its whole truth. “With the cadence of a fairy tale and the sweeping scope of an epic” (Amy Shearn, author of The Mermaid of Brooklyn), The Chronicle of Secret Riven is a spellbinding tale of love and adventure, myth and legend, fate and free will—and an introduction to an unforgettable heroine.




The Mapmaker's War


Book Description

From the critically acclaimed author of The Mercy of Thin Air comes the profound story of a strong, resilient woman who risks everything to be true to herself, “an otherworldly tale that charts the all-too-human territory between heartbreak and hope” (Deborah Harkness, New York Times bestselling author of A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night). In an ancient time, in a faraway land, a young woman named Aoife is allowed a rare apprenticeship to become her kingdom’s mapmaker, tasked with charting the entire domain. Traveling beyond its borders, she finds a secretive people who live in peace, among great wealth. They claim to protect a mythic treasure, one connected to the creation of the world. When Aoife reports their existence to her kingdom, the community is targeted as a threat. Aoife is exiled for treason and finds refuge among the very people who had been declared her enemy. With them, she begins a new life surrounded by kindness, equality, and cooperation. But within herself, Aoife has no peace. She cannot share the grief she feels for the home and children she left behind, nor can she bear the warrior scars of the man she comes to love. And when she gives birth to their gifted daughter, Aoife cannot avoid what the child forces her to confront about her past and its truth. On this most important of journeys, there is no map to guide her.




The Mercy of Thin Air


Book Description

Following her death in 1920s New Orleans, beautiful Raziela chooses to remain in The Between--a place between life and death--rather than pass on to what lies ahead, hoping to find out what happened to her beloved Andrew.




Mordecai


Book Description

Years have passed since the last of the Dark Gods was defeated, and Lothion has entered an age of peace and prosperity. Mordecai’s oldest children have already begun to make a place for themselves, and his youngest are on the cusp of adulthood. By every outward measure, his life has been a success; he has earned his reward. However, Tyrion, the first wizard and brutal liberator of mankind, has returned with an agenda of his own, and dark things continue to stir at the edges of civilization, threatening to undo Mordecai’s accomplishments. He must meet the expectations of his queen, his family, and his people, all while finding a way to protect them from the ancient enemy of the She’Har, but his greatest challenge may be dealing with the lingering darkness that is growing within his own heart.




Move Forward


Book Description

MOVE FORWARD is a story about how, 'domestic violence,' affects the victim. Susan Anderson, who had led a charmed life until her first husband died in an accident many years ago. Susan was lonely after her two sons went away to university. She met and married Joe, she now finds herself subjected to violence by her new husband. The whole experience has left her with phobia issues. This story tells how Susan dealt with these issues, with the help of friends and doctors; she was then able to Move Forward ' and enjoy her life.




The Mapmaker's War


Book Description

After being given an apprenticeship to chart her entire kingdom, young Aoife encounters a secretive culture of wealthy and peaceful people who she protects by enduring a harrowing exile.




Little Black Book of Stories


Book Description

An unforgettable collection of fairy tales for grownups—from the Booker Prize-winning author of Possession. • “A delight.... provoking and alarming, richly yet tautly rendered.... [She] has the sheer narrative skill to raise the hairs on the back of your neck and make your pulse race.” —The New York Times Book Review Like Hans Christian Andersen and the Brothers Grimm, Isak Dinesen and Angela Carter, A. S. Byatt knows that fairy tales are for adults. And in this ravishing collection she breathes new life into the form. Little Black Book of Stories offers shivers along with magical thrills. Leaves rustle underfoot in a dark wood: two middle-aged women, childhood friends reunited by chance, venture into a dark forest where once, many years before, they saw–or thought they saw–something unspeakable. Another woman, recently bereaved, finds herself slowly but surely turning into stone. A coolly rational ob-gyn has his world pushed off-axis by a waiflike art student with her own ideas about the uses of the body. Spellbinding, witty, lovely, terrifying, the Little Black Book of Stories is Byatt at the height of her craft.




The Gypsy Moth Summer


Book Description

"Fierro doesn't just observe, she knows. Like all great novelists, she gives us the world." - Amy Bloom, bestselling author of Away and Lucky Us It is the summer of 1992 and a gypsy moth invasion blankets Avalon Island. Ravenous caterpillars disrupt early summer serenity on Avalon, an islet off the coast of Long Island--dropping onto novels left open on picnic blankets, crawling across the T-shirts of children playing games of tag and capture the flag in the island's leafy woods. The caterpillars become a relentless topic of island conversation and the inescapable soundtrack of the season. It is also the summer Leslie Day Marshall—only daughter of Avalon’s most prominent family—returns with her husband, a botanist, and their children to live in “The Castle,” the island's grandest estate. Leslie’s husband Jules is African-American, and their children bi-racial, and islanders from both sides of the tracks form fast and dangerous opinions about the new arrivals. Maddie Pencott LaRosa straddles those tracks: a teen queen with roots in the tony precincts of East Avalon and the crowded working class corner of West Avalon, home to Grudder Aviation factory, the island's bread-and-butter and birthplace of generations of bombers and war machines. Maddie falls in love with Brooks, Leslie’s and Jules’ son, and that love feels as urgent to Maddie as the questions about the new and deadly cancers showing up across the island. Could Grudder Aviation, the pride of the island—and its patriarch, the Colonel—be to blame? As the gypsy moths burst from cocoons in flocks that seem to eclipse the sun, Maddie’s and Brooks’ passion for each other grows and she begins planning a life for them off Avalon Island. Vivid with young lovers, gangs of anxious outsiders; a plotting aged matriarch and her husband, a demented military patriarch; and a troubled young boy, each seeking his or her own refuge, escape and revenge, The Gypsy Moth Summer is about love, gaps in understanding, and the struggle to connect: within families; among friends; between neighbors and entire generations.