Merrie

Merrie

Maggie MacKeever

Maggie MacKeever

“If anyone ever offers you bodily harm, petite, it will be because you have poked your nose into what you should not.” So spoke Merrie’s guardian, the maddening Mephisto. But what else is a girl to do but investigate when there are so many curious matters surrounding her, not least concerning the handsome fortune hunter who holds her heart? Regency Romance by Maggie MacKeever writing as Grace South; originally published by Fawcett Coventry
Read online
  • 425
The Source of Magic

The Source of Magic

Piers Anthony

Science Fiction & Fantasy

Ordered by King Trent to determine the source of Xanth's magic, Bink and his companions were harried by an unseen enemy determined to thwart them. When even their protector turned against them, Bink still managed to reach his goal and carry out the King's orders...but the king did not expect Bink's next act--to destroy utterly the magic of Xanth!
Read online
  • 424
Blood Games

Blood Games

Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

Horror / Science Fiction & Fantasy / Mystery & Thrillers

Since 1978, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro has produced about two dozen novels and numerous short stories detailing the life of a character first introduced to the reading world as Le Comte de Saint‑Germain. We first meet him in Paris during the reign of Louis XV when he is, apparently, a wealthy, worldly, charismatic aristocrat, envied and desired by many but fully known to none. In fact, he is a vampire, born in the Carpathian Mountains in 2119 BCE, turned in his late thirties in 2080 BCE, and destined to roam the world forever, watching and participating in history and, through the author, giving us an amazing perspective on the time tapestry of human civilization. In Blood Games, beginning during the reign of Nero, Saint‑Germain finds his way through the political turmoil of the time and becomes the lover of the incomparable Atta Olivia Clemens. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Read online
  • 393
The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales From a Strange Time

The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales From a Strange Time

Hunter S. Thompson

Nonfiction / Entertainment / Gonzo Journalism

The first volume in Hunter S. Thompson’s bestselling Gonzo Papers offers brilliant commentary and outrageous humor, in his signature style. Originally published in 1979, the first volume of the bestselling “Gonzo Papers” is now back in print. The Great Shark Hunt is Dr. Hunter S. Thompson’s largest and, arguably, most important work, covering Nixon to napalm, Las Vegas to Watergate, Carter to cocaine. These essays offer brilliant commentary and outrageous humor, in signature Thompson style. Ranging in date from the National Observer days to the era of Rolling Stone, The Great Shark Hunt offers myriad, highly charged entries, including the first Hunter S. Thompson piece to be dubbed “gonzo”—“The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved,” which appeared in Scanlan's Monthly in 1970. From this essay a new journalistic movement sprang which would change the shape of American letters. Thompson's razor-sharp insight and crystal clarity capture the crazy, hypocritical, degenerate, and redeeming aspects of the explosive and colorful ‘60s and ‘70s.
Read online
  • 388
Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain

Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain

Isaac Asimov

Science Fiction & Fantasy / Mystery & Thrillers / Science

Deep within Russia, would-renowned scientist Pyotor Shapirov lies in a coma. Locked within his brain rests the key to the greatest scientific advance in the world's history. Only one scientist can hope to locate this secret—Dr. Albert Jonas Morrison, an American. Morrison's mission: to be miniaturized to molecular size along with a team of four Soviet scientists, travel in a specially designed submarine to the dying Shapirov's brain, and tap the secrets held there. Morrison and his companions have only twelve hours to accomplish their task—in the face of unexpected terrors and with their own lives hanging precariously in the balance. With his phenomenal two-million-copy bestseller Fantastic Voyage, Isaac Asimov took the world on its first amazing journey into the human body. Now, twenty year later, after deeper exploration into one of the most fascinating areas of science, Dr. Asimov delivers an all-new thriller that transports you to the far reaches of inner space. Electrifying, astonishing, and remarkably realistic, this new novel is certain to become a science fiction classic.
Read online
  • 383
If on a Winter's Night a Traveler

If on a Winter's Night a Traveler

Italo Calvino

Literature & Fiction / Biographies & Memoirs

If on a Winter's Night a Traveler is a marvel of ingenuity, an experimental text that looks longingly back to the great age of narration—"when time no longer seemed stopped and did not yet seem to have exploded." Italo Calvino's novel is in one sense a comedy in which the two protagonists, the Reader and the Other Reader, ultimately end up married, having almost finished If on a Winter's Night a Traveler. In another, it is a tragedy, a reflection on the difficulties of writing and the solitary nature of reading. The Reader buys a fashionable new book, which opens with an exhortation: "Relax. Concentrate. Dispel every other thought. Let the world around you fade." Alas, after 30 or so pages, he discovers that his copy is corrupted, and consists of nothing but the first section, over and over. Returning to the bookshop, he discovers the volume, which he thought was by Calvino, is actually by the Polish writer Bazakbal. Given the choice between the two, he goes for the Pole, as does the Other Reader, Ludmilla. But this copy turns out to be by yet another writer, as does the next, and the next. The real Calvino intersperses 10 different pastiches—stories of menace, spies, mystery, premonition—with explorations of how and why we choose to read, make meanings, and get our bearings or fail to. Meanwhile the Reader and Ludmilla try to reach, and read, each other. If on a Winter's Night is dazzling, vertiginous, and deeply romantic. "What makes lovemaking and reading resemble each other most is that within both of them times and spaces open, different from measurable time and space."
Read online
  • 382
The Secret Files of Solar Pons

The Secret Files of Solar Pons

Basil Copper

Mystery & Thrillers / Horror

The Game's Afoot . . .Whatever your fancy in the polished old world of deductive, detective cunning—a corpse/figure dragging itself from the edge of a misty marsh, burning and writhing with bluish fire; a bizarre murder staged on a play's opening night; a mysterious scoundrel's attempt to steal a set of rare idols; or a horrified heiress and her terrifying legacy of death—Solar Pons will quickly capture your curiosity and leave you hungering for more.Soon you will find yourself a regular visitor at No. 7B Praed Street, eagerly peering into the mind of the contemplative Pons. And as you faithfully follow the master about charming, chilling fin-de-siècle London, discreetly clutching and un-clutching your hands between counterplots and climaxes, you will know that you have found a lifelong companion—the inquisitive and incomparable Solar Pons, heir to the genius that was once uniquely Sherlock Holmes'.Contents"The Adventure of the Crawling Horror""The Adventure of the Anguished Actor""The Adventure of the Ignored Idols""The Adventure of the Horrified Heiress"
Read online
  • 380
Good as Gold

Good as Gold

Joseph Heller

Literature & Fiction

Bruce Gold, a middle-aged, Jewish professor of English literature, finds himself on the brink of a golden career in politics -- and not a moment too soon, as Gold yearns for an opportunity to transform a less-than-picture-perfect life: His children think little of him, his intimidating father endlessly bullies him, and his wife is so oblivious that she doesn't even notice he's left her. As funny as it is sad, Good as Gold is a story of children grown up, parents grown old, and friends and lovers grown apart -- a story that is inimitably Heller.
Read online
  • 376
The Mask of the Sun

The Mask of the Sun

Fred Saberhagen

Fred Saberhagen

When Mike Gabrieli's neer'do'well brother Tom disappears shortly after discovering a fabulously valuable Aztec relic, Mike rightly suspects that this time the family's black sheep has got himself into the kind of trouble from which even Mike won't be able to extricate him. But still, Tom is-or was-his brother, and Mike must do what he can. For Mike this is the beginning of an adventure beyond imagining, an adventure that will put him in constant peril of his life as he shuttles. between past, present and future of an alternate reality, fighting beside the descendants of the Incas as they battle to erase Pizarro's bloody footprints from the New World, and secure the reality of their own existence. But is the "alternate reality" really an alternate, or is Mike actually struggling to erase the very future that gave him birth? The answer lies in the source of all his troubles and his only hope of survival.
Read online
  • 358
The Golden Barge

The Golden Barge

Michael Moorcock

Science Fiction & Fantasy / Historical Fiction / Literature & Fiction

From back cover: "Then the mist eddied. Out of it, purposefully and with dignity, loomed a great golden barge, a barge which glittered with a light of its own. Tallow was astounded. He looked at the towering shape, agape. He was no longer the integrated and impenetrable thing he had been for he had not taken the golden barge into account before. He became worried that the barge should not escape as it passed. It disappeared in the mist again...." Jephraim Tallow's fantastic quest for the golden barge is the theme that runs through this unique novel. Unique in that it was Michael Moorcock's original novel in whose pages can be found the basic elements that were to emerge in his Eternal Champion novels as well as in his worlds of Jerry Cornelius, Karl Glogauer and Una Perrson. Unique, also, in that it has never been published in America before. The DAW book is therefore the first appearance in the New World and the myriad readers of Michael Moorcock's works will not want to miss this vivid fantasy experience.
Read online
  • 355
Lagrange Five (UC)

Lagrange Five (UC)

Mack Reynolds

Science Fiction & Fantasy

There was once a group of like-minded people called the L-5 Society, founded in 1975. Their sole purpose was to "place a colony at LaGrange Point #5, the one trailing the Moon at 60 degrees" or "to found the first colony in space." The board of directors included the sci-fi powerhouses of both Robert Heinlein and Jerry Pournelle. The Society even had a monthly magazine, eloquently named L-5 News. In 1986, the Society merged with the National Space Institute. In the novel LaGrange Five, Mack Reynolds shows us in fiction how such a society would exist, which ends up operating more like fantasy than reality. Rex Bader is a private investigator from earth who is called to Island Three at the LaGrange Point to solve the mystery of the missing professor and father of the entire LaGrange Point project. At the same time as the investigation, the cases of Wide Syndrome (a contagious kind of claustrophobia) are on the increase and there are talks of revolution. Who is behind all three scenarios and what can Rex do to save the day? Yes, the premise does sound hokey and the novel will disappoint you as it is, indeed, hokey. I admire Reynolds' gusto about the subject of the L-5 community, but the storyline is flat, all laid out and very predictable. I would say it was written for the juvenile audience if it wasn't for the occasional swear words and the one sex scene. I also admire Reynolds' insistence that the pseudo-syndicalism style of government with its superior intelligent human beings will make an `idyllic utopia.' The socialist/communist stance of the novel is clearly made as is the persistent claim that modern society isn't working and drastic social change is needed to raise equality, fairness and Utopian ideals. His head is obviously in the clouds. This all comes from me- one registered with the Socialist Party! Too dreamy, too optimistic. Besides the high idealism involved, the writing style is for the birds. I don't know why Reynolds insists on repeating the name Rex Bader at the beginning of every chapter and interspersed though the paragraphs. And why does the mild idiosyncratic expletive "Wizard" have to appear 30 times through the 227 page book? Its repetition is annoying, as is the reiteration of L-5 facts. It seemed like every fact had to be repeated twice even though very little of it led into the plot's predictable solution at all.
Read online
  • 353
Jem

Jem

Frederik Pohl

Science Fiction & Fantasy

The discovery of another habitable world might spell salvation to the three (Food Bloc, Fuel Bloc & People Bloc) bitterly competing power blocs of the war torn & resource-starved 21st century. But when their representatives arrive on Jem, with its three intelligent species, they discover instead the perfect situation into which to export their rivalries. Subtitled, with savage irony, 'The Making of a Utopia', Jem is one of Frederik Pohl's most powerful novels.
Read online
  • 353
183