Don’t miss this special release from New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, Stephanie McAfee.

    Benny Aitken inadvertently opened a portal into another dimension. He found himself in a world called Rapto, a place where he was given magic powers, and killing stuff made him stronger. A dark mage guild soon discovered the portal and found a way to get through it. Dr. Benny Aitken, self-proclaimed genius, had unwittingly visited a fantasy apocalypse upon earth. It’s starting point? A small town called Pasture Downs. In a fit of desperation Benny sends blue orbs back through the portal in the hope that a few heroic residents of earth would find them and absorb their powers, granting them magical skills that they can level up by killing things. Who are these heroes of legend to be? Unfortunately, one of them is Ash Hobbes, a conman and self-confessed ass. After stumbling on an orb he becomes a blood mage. Together with a companion called FF, who lives in his head, Ash must learn to stop being such an ass and find the strength to save the world as a blood mage.

    It has been twenty years since the death of Rebecca, the hauntingly beautiful first wife of Maxim de Winter, and twenty years since Manderley, the de Winter family's estate, was destroyed by fire. But Rebecca's tale is just beginning.Colonel Julyan, an old family friend, receives an anonymous package concerning Rebecca. An inquisitive young scholar named Terence Gray appears and stirs up the quiet seaside hamlet with questions about the past and the close ties he soon forges with the Colonel and his eligible daughter, Ellie. Amid bitter gossip and murky intrigue, the trio begins a search for the real Rebecca and the truth behind her mysterious death.

    But when old Smiler takes a seat beside him, sucking in pint after pint through his gingery whiskers, a whole new world of battles and bones opens up before him…H. E. Bates – a prolific English novelist and short story writer – wrote 'Castle in the Air' for The Evening News in 1957, but the story was never re-printed in any of his later collections. In fact, its existence was forgotten until 2013 when it was spotted accidentally during a rummage through a newspaper archive. On re-discovering this charming and humorous short story – which exemplifies H.E. Bates's great skill of drawing vivid characters and his ability to create an almost tangible sense of a place – Bates's descendants felt it had to be shared with a wider audience.Bloomsbury Reader is delighted to be re-publishing 'Castle in the Air' alongside the whole body of H. E. Bates's short fiction and novellas, and here we offer it as a free taste of Bates's irresistible writing.

    Featuring: Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs, Gary Snyder, Neal Cassady, Gregory Corso, Diane Di Prima, Bob Dylan, Ken Kesey, Charles Bukowski, Michael McClure, and more.

    Since she was a child, Lucy Charlton has dreamed of working with her father in the family solicitor's firm. But a scandal shatters her dreams and, when her father disowns her, she finds herself on the streets, fighting for survival.Joe Hardy has returned to London after the Great War to find his life in tatters - his father is dead and his pregnant fiancée has disappeared. Then Joe learns he's unexpectedly inherited an old river house in Durham from a stranger called Margaret Lee. With nothing left for him in London, he makes arrangements to travel north and claim it.Lucy's determination has finally secured her a job as a legal secretary, campaigning for the rights of the poorest in society. As Joe arrives in her office to collect the keys to his new home, she promises to help him uncover information about his mystery benefactor. But before long, the past comes back to haunt them both, with shocking consequences...

    LAFFERTY is the authoritative collection of short fiction by R.A. Lafferty.Acclaimed as one of the most original voices in modern literature, Raphael Aloysius Lafferty has been awarded and nominated for a multitude of accolades over the span of his career, including the World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement.This collection contains 22 unique tall tales, including:1. Slow Tuesday Night (Introduction by Michael Dirda)2. Narrow Valley (Introduction by Michael Swanwick)3. Nor Limestone Islands (Introduction by Michael Bishop)4. Interurban Queen (Introduction by Terry Bisson)5. Thus We Frustrate Charlemagne (Introduction by Jack Dann)6. In Our Block (Introduction by Neil Gaiman)7. Ride a Tin Can (Introduction by Neil Gaiman)8. Nine Hundred Grandmothers (Introduction by Patton Oswalt/Afterword by Andy Duncan)9. Land of the Great Horses (Introduction by Harlan Ellison/Afterword by Gregory Frost)10. Eurema's Dam (Introduction by Robert Silverberg)11. Selenium Ghosts of the Eighteen Seventies (Introduction by Kelly Robson)12. The Primary Education of the Camiroi (Introduction by Samuel R. Delany)13. Continued on Next Rock (Introduction by Nancy Kress/Afterword by R.A. Lafferty)14. Sky (Introduction by Gwenda Bond)15. Cliffs That Laughed (Introduction by Gregory Feeley)16. Seven-Day Terror (Introduction by Connie Willis)17. Boomer Flats (Introduction by Cat Rambo)18. Old Foot Forgot (Introduction by John Scalzi)19. The World as Will and Wallpaper (Introduction by Samuel R. Delany)20. Funnyfingers (Introduction by Andrew Ferguson)21. Thieving Bear Planet (Introduction by Jeff VanderMeer)22. Days of Grass, Days of Straw (Introduction by Gary K. Wolfe)

    For the centennial celebration of this beloved annual series, master of the form Lorrie Moore selects forty stories from the more than two thousand that were published in previous editions. Series editor Heidi Pitlor recounts behind-the-scenes anecdotes and examines, decade by decade, the trends captured over a hundred years. Together, the stories and commentary offer an extraordinary guided tour through a century of literature with what Moore calls “all its wildnesses of character and voice.” These forty stories represent their eras but also stand the test of time. Here is Ernest Hemingway’s first published story and a classic by William Faulkner, who admitted in his biographical note that he began to write “as an aid to love-making.” Nancy Hale’s story describes far-reaching echoes of the Holocaust; Tillie Olsen’s story expresses the desperation of a single mother; James Baldwin depicts the bonds of brotherhood and music. Here is Raymond Carver’s “minimalism,” a term he disliked, and Grace Paley’s “secular Yiddishkeit.” Here are the varied styles of Donald Barthelme, Charles Baxter, and Jamaica Kincaid. From Junot Díaz to Mary Gaitskill, from ZZ Packer to Sherman Alexie, these writers and stories explore the different things it means to be American.

    Men and women from every walk of life talk to him, telling him of their likes and dislikes, fears, problems, and happinesses on the job. Once again, Terkel has created a rich and unique document that is as simple as conversation, but as subtle and heartfelt as the meaning of our lives.... In the first trade paperback edition of his national bestseller, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Studs Terkel presents "the real American experience" (Chicago Daily News) -- "a magnificent book . . .. A work of art. To read it is to hear America talking." (Boston Globe)

    But prim and proper behavior isn't always so easy when hearts are involved. From the ballrooms to the gaming hells, these five Regency couples are turning the ton on its ear with their scandals and secrets. Once an Heiress Well-known rogue Ethan Helling is over his ears in gambling debts and must marry a fortune. Enter Lily Bachman with the largest dowry the haute ton has seen in years and zero interest in marriage. But when the seducer becomes the seduced, Lily and Ethan are forced into a hasty union. Now, to gain her fortune, Ethan must find a way to make his unwilling bride happy. Once Upon a Scandal Caught in a scandal of her father's making, Jane is an outcast in the society that once prized her refinement. Can Lord Benjamin Marworth, whose reputation as a rake conceals his role as a spy for the Crown, save both England and Jane by faking her death and reincarnating her as a French cousin who can ferret out the stolen war secrets he needs? It's a proposition steeped in scandal if they're caught - but love just might be worth the risk. Merry's Wonderful Christmas Gift The winter holidays used to be Miss Merry Damonson's favorite time of year. Until her almost-fiance Edward Everton abandoned her two days before Christmas. Now he's returned to their country village, but is it too late to reignite old flames? A holiday ball might just offer these unlucky lovers a second chance. The Glass Orchid Determined to take charge of her own fate, orphan Adel Beaumont pursues the only means to an independent life available to her: become a courtesan to wealthy and powerful men. Twenty-one-year-old Rhys Camden is his father's answer to increasing the family's social standing to match their newfound wealth. When Adel and Rhys's lives entwine, they vow to defy society and family and risk everything to be together. But they soon learn how dangerous that defiance can be. How to Wed an Earl To inherit the family coffers, Lucas, Earl of Ravenstone, must claim a fiancée who will no doubt be thrilled at the prospect of finally being able to use his name and become his countess. But Penelope Maitland has already been using Lucas's name - to fend off her stepfamily's creditors. Lucas finds that in order to keep his fortune, he will have to lose his heart to a woman who is tired of waiting for him.Sensuality Level: Sensual

    Do you require fire, police or ambulance?' asked the female switchboard operator with brisk professionalism. I thought fast. 'I actually need all three,' I answered .It's not every day that a home visit turns out to be an eco-protestor with appendicitis stuck up a tree. But as Dr Rosemary shares in this book, it's all part of a day's work for a south London GP. From an octogenarian nymphomaniac to a teenager in labour with a baby she didn't know about, when Dr Rosemary opens her surgery door she doesn't know who's going to walk in...

    Fred Daniels, a black man, is picked up randomly by the police after a brutal murder in a Chicago neighborhood and taken to the local precinct where he is tortured until he confesses to a crime he didn't commit. After signing a confession, he escapes--or is permitted to escape--from the precinct and takes up residence in the sewers below the streets of Chicago.This is the simple, horrible premise of Richard Wright's scorching novel, The Man Who Lived Underground, a masterpiece written in the same period as his landmark books Native Son (1940) and Black Boy (1945) that he was unable to publish in his lifetime. Only small parts of it have appeared in print, and in a significantly redacted form it would eventually be included in the short story collection Eight Men (1961). Now, for the first time, this incendiary novel about race and violence in America, the work that meant more to Wright than any other ("I have never written anything in my life that stemmed more from sheer inspiration"), is published in full, in the form that he intended.

    Frederick Barthelme creates an unforgettably wistful cast of characters, ordinary people moving carefully and curiously through a gently painful world.

    Exploring many of the same themes as in his longer works, these small masterpieces move from the tender and romantic White Nights, an archetypal nineteenth-century morality tale of pathos and loss, to the famous Notes from the Underground, a story of guilt, ineffectiveness, and uncompromising cynicism, and the first major work of existential literature. Among Dostoevsky's prototypical characters is Yemelyan in The Honest Thief, whose tragedy turns on an inability to resist crime. Presented in chronological order, in David Magarshack's celebrated translation, this is the definitive edition of Dostoevsky's best stories.

    The exalted, memorable characters in Kirn's acclaimed debut short story col lection confront the real hard bargains in life that spring up from the business of simply living, and Kirn transforms these hard-luck stories into strapping moral lessons which evoke the bonds that unite us all.