Patriot
Pearl S. Buck
Fiction / Biography / Children's
In this novel about dissidence and exile, a man is confronted with the decision to either desert his family or let his homeland be ravagedWhen Wu I-wan starts taking an interest in revolution, trouble follows: Winding up in prison, he becomes friends with fellow dissident En-lan. Later, his name is put on a death list and he's shipped off to Japan. Thankfully, his father, a wealthy Shanghai banker, has made arrangements for his exile, putting him in touch with a business associate named Mr. Muraki. Absorbed in his new life, I-wan falls in love with Mr. Muraki's daughter, and must prove he is worthy of her hand. As news spreads of what the Japanese army is doing back in China, I-wan realizes he must go back and fight for the country that banished him. The Patriot is an engrossing story of revolution, love, and reluctantly divided loyalties. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Pearl S. Buck including rare images from the author's estate.
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Shelley: The Pursuit
Richard Holmes
Biography
Shelley: The Pursuit is the book with which Richard Holmes—the finest literary biographer of our day—made his name. Dispensing with the long-established Victorian picture of Shelley as a blandly ethereal character, Holmes projects a startling image of "a darker and more earthly, crueler and more capable figure." Expelled from college, disowned by his aristocratic father, driven from England, Shelley led a life marked from its beginning to its early end by a violent rejection of society; he embraced rebellion and disgrace without thought of the cost to himself or to others. Here we have the real Shelley—radical agitator, atheist, apostle of free love, but above all a brilliant and uncompromising poetic innovator, whose life and work have proved an essential inspiration to poets as varied as W.B. Yeats and Allen Ginsberg.
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The Kaiser's Last Kiss
Alan Judd
Fiction / Biography
A fictionalised account of the Kaiser Wilhelm's last years in Nazi-occupied Holland. It is 1940 and the exiled Kaiser is living in Holland, at his palace Huis Doorn.The old German king spends his days chopping logs and musing on what might have been. When the Nazis invade Holland, the Kaiser's Dutch staff are replaced by SS guards, led by young, eager Untersturmfuhrer Krebbs, and an unlikely relationship develops between the king and his keeper. While they agree on the rightfulness of German expansion and on holding the country's Jewish population accountable for all ills, they disagree on the solutions. Krebbs's growing attraction and love affair with Akki, a Jewish maid in the house, further undermines his belief in Nazism. But as the tides of war roll around them, all three find themselves increasingly compromised and gravely at risk. This subtle, tender novel borrows heavily from real history and events, but remains a work of superlative, literary fiction.Through Judd's...
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The Driver
Alexander Roy
Nonfiction / Biography / Transport
The riveting memoir of a life lived at the right-hand edge of the speedometer.Alex Roy's father, while on his deathbed, hints about the notorious, utterly illegal cross-country drive from Los Angeles to New York of the 1970s, which then inspired his young son to enter the mysterious world of underground road rallies. Tantalized by the legend of the Driver--the anonymous, possibly nonexistent organizer of the world's ultimate secret race--Roy set out to become a force to be reckoned with. At speeds approaching 200 mph, he sped from London to Morocco, from Budapest to Rome, from San Francisco to Miami, in his highly modified BMW M5, culminating in a new record for the infamous Los Angeles to New York run: 32:07.Sexy, funny, and shocking, The Driver is a never-before-told insider's look at an unbelievably fast and dangerous society that has long been off-limits to ordinary mortals.
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The Chess Player
Andrew Parker
Childrens / Picture Books / Biography
Can Chief Inspector Howcroft and DS Williams solve the murder of a middle-aged woman found on a cold frosty winter's morning? It would seem the murder was of a sexual attack, wrists bound, and the body is found in Bournemouth, a coastal town where murders are few and far between, to say the least.As the investigation progresses they find themselves battling the powerfull Special Operations team at 'New Scotland Yard' and in the dangerous mind games of a high profile Judge. But the biggest uncertainty affecting the murder being solved, is the role of 'The Chess Player'...'The Chess Player' was a nickname given to Rafael Rojas who operates a Colombian money-laundering cartel and manipulates people as 'pawns' in his game. This rivetting short story will keep you guessing and takes you from London to Bogota in an attempt to unravel the murder.A gripping action thriller that you won't want to put down.
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John le Carré
Adam Sisman
Biography / Nonfiction
John le Carré is still at the top more than half a century after The Spy Who Came in from the Cold became a worldwide bestseller. Written with exclusive access to le Carré, his personal archives, and many of the people closest to him, Adam Sisman's definitive biography is a highly readable, fascinating portrait of the life, times and espionage career that inspired a literary master. Always secretive about his background and Secret Service career (blocking one biography from publication in the 1990s, then choosing a biographer who abandoned the project), John le Carré (David Cornwell) has finally given his blessing to Adam Sisman, who has delivered a biography that reads like a novel. From his bleak childhood--the departure of his mother when he was five was followed by "sixteen hugless years" in the dubious care of his father, a serial-seducer and con-man--through recruitment by both MI5 and MI6, his years as an agent for British...
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The Underground Railroad
Bonnie Bader
Biography / Nonfiction / History
Discover the stories of the real people and events that shaped American history in the Real Stories From My Time series. Perfect for book reports with full-page illustrations throughout, these nonfiction chapter books also include historical photos, maps, a timeline, a glossary, and a bibliography at the back. Plus, in each book, an American Girl historical character shares a bit of her own fictional story. The Underground Railroad includes miles of real stories of passengers, conductors, and abolitionists-well-known and unknown-that traveled on the slavery escape route known as the Underground Railroad. American Girl Addy Walker shares the story of her own journey to freedom.
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The Omega Terror
Nick Carter
Nonfiction / Biography / Music
I can handle a fight . . . a knife . . . a gun. I even tangled with a lethal bulldozer in a dark alleyway the other night. But Dr Zeno’s weapon was something else. Just thinking about it made my blood turn to ice.That’s why I was in Tangier. If I didn’t find him, he would get me - one way or another. I would be destroyed with my fellow Americans when he let his ‘omega mutation’ loose on the U.S. —Maybe Zeno had a price - something to keep him from selling out to the enemy - something to hold back those deadly little bugs. That’s what I thought at first - until I found myself in his grip. Then I knew there was only one payment he wanted from me - the last I’d ever make . . . .
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