The Everything Box


Richard Kadrey - 2016
    . . again and again.22000 B.C. A beautiful, ambitious angel stands on a mountaintop, surveying the world and its little inhabitants below. He smiles because soon, the last of humanity who survived the great flood will meet its end, too. And he should know. He’s going to play a big part in it. Our angel usually doesn’t get to do field work, and if he does well, he’s certain he’ll get a big promotion.And now it’s time . . . .The angel reaches into his pocket for the instrument of humanity’s doom. Must be in the other pocket. Then he frantically begins to pat himself down. Dejected, he realizes he has lost the object. Looking over the Earth at all that could have been, the majestic angel utters a single word.“Crap.”2015. A thief named Coop—a specialist in purloining magic objects—steals and delivers a small box to the mysterious client who engaged his services. Coop doesn’t know that his latest job could be the end of him—and the rest of the world. Suddenly he finds himself in the company of The Department of Peculiar Science, a fearsome enforcement agency that polices the odd and strange. The box isn’t just a supernatural heirloom with quaint powers, they tell him.It’s a doomsday device. They think . . .And suddenly, everyone is out to get it.

Wyrd Sisters: The Play


Stephen Briggs - 1996
    It's all there - a wicked duke and duchess, the ghost of the murdered king, dim soldiers, strolling players, a land in peril. And who stands between the Kingdom and destruction? Three witches. Granny Weatherwax (intolerant, self-opinionated, powerful), Nanny Ogg (down-to-earth, vulgar) and Magrat Garlick (naïve, fond of occult jewellery and bunnies).Stephen Briggs has been involved in amateur dramatics for over 25 years and he assures us that the play can be staged without needing the budget of Industrial Light and Magic. Not only that, but the cast should still be able to be in the pub by 10 o'clock!Oh, and a world of advice omitted from the play text:LEARN THE WORDSHavelock, Lord Vetinari

The Headless Bust: A Melancholy Meditation on the False Millennium


Edward Gorey - 1999
    The story, told in verse, takes up just after Edmund's riotous party. He and the Bug are whisked off to a faraway village for another round of strange and vaguely eerie encounters. Fans of Gorey's distinctive ink drawings, tending toward the well -dressed and slightly mad, will not be disappointed - they make for an engrossing book with or without the accompanying deliciously odd text. ("Reversing at a tango tea/In Snogg's Casino-not-on-Sea/L-- tripped and cried,'I am afraid/They tampered with the marmalade.'") There is also plenty to be had for aficionados of the mysterious little rituals, mentioned nonchalantly, that seem so logical to the inhabitants of Gorey's bizarre world - the Bandage Folder's Ball being a head-cocking highlight. "The Headless Bust" is perfect for a winter's read by the fireplace, just before drifting off into fruitcake-induced dreams. Ali DavisNB The sub-title has the word 'on' on the cover and the word 'for' on the title page, both in Gorey's script.

I am a Pole (And So Can You!)


Stephen Colbert - 2012
    "The sad thing is, I like it" - Maurice Sendak"The perfect gift to give a child or grandchild for their high school or college graduation.Also Father's Day.Also, other times." - Stephen Colbert

The Thing Beneath the Bed


Patrick Rothfuss - 2010
    It has pictures. It has a saccharine-sweet title. The main characters are a little girl and her teddy bear. But all of that is just protective coloration. The truth is, this is a book for adults with a dark sense of humor and an appreciation of old-school faerie tales.There are three separate endings to the book. Depending on where you stop, you are left with an entirely different story. One ending is sweet, another is horrible. The last one is the true ending, the one with teeth in it.The Adventures of the Princess and Mr. Whiffle is a dark twist on the classic children's picture-book. I think of it as Calvin and Hobbes meets Coraline, with some Edward Gorey mixed in.Simply said: This is not a book for children.

The Big Book of Barry Ween, Boy Genius


Judd Winick - 2009
    What does a ten-year-old boy do with a 350 I.Q.? Anything he wants! Cranky, egotistical, arrogant, and foul-mouthed, Barry in general wants to conduct his experiments and be left alone, but it never seems to work out. Hurdles that Barry must outmaneuver range from time warps, to art thieves, to inter-dimensional warfare with gorillas, to accidentally turning his best friend into a dinosaur! This massive volume collects all three BARRY WEEN mini-series—12 issues in all—for a complete compilation of the hit series, THE ADVENTURES OF BARRY WEEN, BOY GENIUS.

Motel of the Mysteries


David Macaulay - 1979
    Imagine, then, the excitement that Howard Carson, an amateur archeologist at best, experienced when in crossing the perimeter of an abandoned excavation site he felt the ground give way beneath him and found himself at the bottom of a shaft, which, judging from the DO NOT DISTURB sign hanging from an archaic doorknob, was clearly the entrance to a still-sealed burial chamber. Carson's incredible discoveries, including the remains of two bodies, one of then on a ceremonial bed facing an altar that appeared to be a means of communicating with the Gods and the other lying in a porcelain sarcophagus in the Inner Chamber, permitted him to piece together the whole fabric of that extraordinary civilization.

Breathers: A Zombie's Lament


S.G. Browne - 2009
    Resented by his parents, abandoned by his friends, and reviled by a society that no longer considers him human, Andy is having a bit of trouble adjusting to his new existence. But all that changes when he goes to an Undead Anonymous meeting and finds kindred souls in Rita, an impossibly sexy recent suicide with a taste for the formaldehyde in cosmetic products, and Jerry, a twenty-one-year-old car-crash victim with an exposed brain and a penchant for Renaissance pornography. When the group meets a rogue zombie who teaches them the joys of human flesh, things start to get messy, and Andy embarks on a journey of self-discovery that will take him from his casket to the SPCA to a media-driven class-action lawsuit on behalf of the rights of zombies everywhere.Darkly funny, surprisingly touching, and gory enough to satisfy even the most discerning reader, Breathers is a romantic zombie comedy (rom-zom-com, for short) that will leave you laughing, squirming, and clamoring for more.

The Eyre Affair


Jasper Fforde - 2001
    Baconians are trying to convince the world that Francis Bacon really wrote Shakespeare, there are riots between the Surrealists and Impressionists, and thousands of men are named John Milton, an homage to the real Milton and a very confusing situation for the police. Amidst all this, Acheron Hades, Third Most Wanted Man In the World, steals the original manuscript of Martin Chuzzlewit and kills a minor character, who then disappears from every volume of the novel ever printed! But that's just a prelude . . .Hades' real target is the beloved Jane Eyre, and it's not long before he plucks her from the pages of Bronte's novel. Enter Thursday Next. She's the Special Operative's renowned literary detective, and she drives a Porsche. With the help of her uncle Mycroft's Prose Portal, Thursday enters the novel to rescue Jane Eyre from this heinous act of literary homicide. It's tricky business, all these interlopers running about Thornfield, and deceptions run rampant as their paths cross with Jane, Rochester, and Miss Fairfax. Can Thursday save Jane Eyre and Bronte's masterpiece? And what of the Crimean War? Will it ever end? And what about those annoying black holes that pop up now and again, sucking things into time-space voids . . .Suspenseful and outlandish, absorbing and fun, The Eyre Affair is a caper unlike any other and an introduction to the imagination of a most distinctive writer and his singular fictional universe.

Return to Centaur


Richard Pini - 1990
    

The Truth Is a Cave in the Black Mountains


Neil Gaiman - 2010
    This gorgeous full-color illustrated book version was born of a unique collaboration between writer Neil Gaiman and artist Eddie Campbell, who brought to vivid life the characters and landscape of Gaiman's story. In August 2010, The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains was performed in the concert hall of the Sydney Opera House to a sold-out crowd—Gaiman read his tale live as Campbell's magnificent artwork was presented, scene-by-scene, on large screens. Narrative and art were accompanied by live music composed and performed especially for the story by the FourPlay String Quartet.

The World of Jeeves


P.G. Wodehouse - 1967
    Contains the books Carry On, Jeeves, The Inimitable Jeeves and Very Good, Jeeves and the short stories Jeeves Makes an Omelette and Jeeves and the Greasy Bird.

The End of the World


Derek Landy - 2012
    But unfortunately, sometimes people DO get what they wish for. Ryan hasn’t gone far before he is set upon by a bunch of scary, nihilistic punk-sorcerers who need him to set off a doomsday device that will destroy the planet and everyone on it. Fun!Riding to the rescue, however, is a certain skeleton detective and his teenage partner/combat accessory. Now Skulduggery and Valkyrie only have a few hours to figure out what's going on, while saving Ryan and – incidentally – the whole world.And all that time, the punk-sorcerors are closing in…

RWBY Official Manga Anthology Vol. 1: Red Like Roses


Monty Oum - 2017
    1: Red Like Roses has a total of 20 side stories.One side story includes Mercury persuading Ruby to dance with him during the Beacon Dance.Another side story is about Weiss asking the rest of her team to search for a shadow entity that she saw in the middle of Beacon Academy. It turns out to be a sleepwalking Nora, whom Ren finds and brings back to their dorm.

Two Gentlemen of Lebowski: A Most Excellent Comedie and Tragical Romance


Adam Bertocci - 2010
    . .  William Shakespeare had written The Big Lebowski? The Dude has met the Bard—and he doth abide. Join “The Knave” and Sir Walter on a wild tale of mistaken identity, kidnapping, bowling, and a rug that, in faith, really tied the room together—in a sidesplitting Shakespearean comedy of errors and ninepins, told in five glorious acts of iambic pentameter and impeccable period prose. Already a theatrical hit and a worldwide viral phenomenon, Two Gentlemen of Lebowski comes alive anew in this definitive and lavishly illustrated edition, featuring recently discovered historical engravings, scholarly annotations, and a revelatory afterword from the author.