Book picks similar to
Eskkar & Trella - The Beginning by Sam Barone
historical-fiction
sam-barone
fantasy
mesopotamia
Once in Every Life
Kristin Hannah - 1992
Though deaf, she is a free spirit--a woman full of life and love. She is struck down all too soonBut for Tess, a new life begins at her death, in post-Civil War America. She is now Amarylis Rafferty, wife and mother of three--and she can hear. Shocked and disoriented by her new surroundings, she is drawn into the savage heartache burdening the family, especially her husband, Jack, a man who fears himself capable of anything.
The Far Arena
Richard Ben Sapir - 1978
It chronicles the adventures of Eugeni, a Roman gladiator from Domitian's period, who, due to an unlikely series of events, is frozen in ice for 1900 years before being found by the Houghton Oil Company on a prospecting mission in the N. Atlantic. Lew McCardle is a geologist working for Houghton. While running a test drill, the machine accidentally uncovers a frozen body. Lew is given charge. He immediately calls his friend Semyon Petrovitch, a Soviet scientist. Petrovitch, who specializes in cryonics takes the body to be revived, explaining that it's easier to treat such a case as alive until it's proven life cannot be restored. The blood is pumped from it & various treatments are administered until, amazingly, it comes back to life. It spends the next 15 days in a deep sleep, muttering to itself. The mutterings are recorded, but no-one can figure out the language. Finally, Lew McCardle, who has eight years of Latin, sends for a Catholic nun, who joins him & Petrovitch on their quest to sort out the mysteries of the body.
The Traveling Vampire Show
Richard Laymon - 2000
All over the rural town of Grandville, tacked to power poles and trees, taped to store windows, blowing along the sidewalks, fliers have appeared announcing the mysterious one-night-only performance of The Traveling Vampire Show.The show will feature Valeria, the only known vampire in captivity. According to the fliers, she is a gorgeous, stunning beauty. In the course of the performance, she will stalk volunteers from the audience, sink her teeth into their necks and drink their blood!For three local teenagers who see the fliers, this is a show they don't want to miss. But they may have to.Though they can probably scrape up the price of admission, other obstacles stand in the way. One problem, nobody under 18 years of age is allowed into the show. Dwight, Rusty, and Slim are only 16. Another problem, the show begins at midnight and the three teens always have to be home by then. If that weren't bad enough, the show is to take place at Janks Field -- a desolate patch of ground with a nasty history -- that has been declared off limits by their parentsThe situation appears hopeless.Though Dwight and his friends fear they won't be able to attend the actual performance of the Traveling Vampire Show, they do have the entire day to themselves. Why not hike out to Janks Field and take a look around? With any luck, they might be able to watch the crew make preparations for tonight's performance. If they're really lucky, maybe they'll get a peek at Valeria, the gorgeous vampire.And so the three friends set off on foot for Janks Field...Dwight is a solid, honest kid, long on common sense and loyalty to his friends. He always tries to do what's right.Rusty is a husky guy who relishes trouble.Slim, their long-time pal, is the brains of the outfit, a voracious reader of novels, an aspiring writer, and a girl. Also, she is sometimes too brave for her own good.The Traveling Vampire Show is the tale, told in Dwight's own words, of what happened to him, Rusty and Slim on that hot summer day they hiked to Janks Field. It's the story of their friendship and love, their temptations, their betrayals, and their courage as they went where they shouldn't go, did what they shouldn't do...and ran into big trouble.
The Lioness of Morocco
Julia Drosten - 2017
Still single at twenty-three, she is treated like a child and feels stifled in her controlling father’s house.When Benjamin Hopkins, an ambitious employee of her father’s trading company, shows an interest in her, she realizes marriage is her only chance to escape. As Benjamin’s rising career whisks them both away to exotic Morocco, Sibylla is at last a citizen of the world, reveling in her newfound freedom by striking her first business deals, befriending locals…and falling in love for the first time with a charismatic and handsome Frenchman.But Benjamin’s lust for money and influence draws him into dark dealings, pulling him ever further from Sibylla and their two young sons. When he’s arrested on horrible charges, the fate of Sibylla’s family rests on her shoulders, as she must decide whether she’ll leave him to his fate or help him fight for his life.
Legion
Geraint Jones - 2019
AD6: The greatest army assembled in a generation. Battle, plunder, and glory await. But not for Legionary Corvus. He and half of his legion have been left behind to garrison the province of Pannonia; a wild place where the mountains are as deadly as any foe. Corvus despairs as he watches his closest friend Marcus march to war, not knowing that his own eager thirst for battle is about to be quenched; a huge rebel army has revolted against The Empire, and Corvus and his few comrades are all that stand against them. ‘Blood and guts, but also a clever exploration of the moral ambiguity of war and loyalty to a flag.’ Mail on Sunday. ‘Historical fiction written by a real war veteran who knows all there is to know about blood and bonding in battle.’ Weekend Sport. Legion is the eagerly anticipated prequel to Blood Forest (Ambush) and Siege.
Death in the Beginning
Gary Williams - 2011
First, he discovered a magnificent manmade cave in the Canary Islands off the African coast. Then, while exploring a newly-found gunpowder magazine inside a 300-year-old stone Spanish fort in St. Augustine, Florida, a man emerged. The man is killed by police before his identity can be ascertained. All evidence indicates that the man had been sealed in the room for centuries. When Curt uncovers a link between the Canary Island cave and the unidentified man, he realizes that he has stumbled upon a secret lost in history; the catalyst for the Fountain of Youth legend. But the revelation holds terrifying consequences. And there are those willing to murder to guard the truth. As Northeast Florida braces for a deadly hurricane, Curt and his friends are drawn into a monumental conspiracy which could alter the balance of power…and destroy humanity.
Enemy of God: A Novel of Arthur by Bernard Cornwell Summary & Study Guide
BookRags - 2011
84 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more – everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of Enemy of God: A Novel of Arthur. This detailed literature summary also contains Topics for Discussion and a Free Quiz on Enemy of God: A Novel of Arthur by Bernard Cornwell.
Song of the River
Sue Harrison - 1997
Eighty centuries before our time -- in the frozen interior of a place that would someday be called Alaska -- a clubfooted babe was left in the snow to die...until he was rescued by a young woman ravaged by her enemies and sworn to vengeance.Twenty years later, the child, called Chakliux, has grown to manhood and occupies an honored place as his tribe's treasured storyteller, while his adoptive mother K'os has grown cunning and cold. But in the neighboring village of the Near River People -- where he has been sent to make peace by wedding the shaman's daughter -- a shocking double murder occurs that sets Chakliux on a remarkable journey. Driven by the ancient songs of sea and sky, earth and animals, the storyteller traverses a harsh, unknown, yet enthralling landscape in search of the strange truth about the offenses for which his people have suffered...and about the hateful, ambitious woman who raised him, who may be his most dangerous enemy of all.
Pride of Carthage
David Anthony Durham - 2005
After conquering the Roman city of Saguntum, Hannibal wages his campaign through the outposts of the empire, shrewdly befriending peoples disillusioned by Rome and, with dazzling tactics, outwitting the opponents who believe the land route he has chosen is impossible. Yet Hannibal's armies must take brutal losses as they pass through the Pyrenees mountains, forge the Rhone river, and make a winter crossing of the Alps before descending to the great tests at Cannae and Rome itself. David Anthony Durham draws a brilliant and complex Hannibal out of the scant historical record?sharp, sure-footed, as nimble among rivals as on the battlefield, yet one who misses his family and longs to see his son grow to manhood. Whether portraying the deliberations of a general or the calculations of a common soldier, vast multilayered scenes of battle or moments of introspection when loss seems imminent, Durham brings history alive.
The Burning Times
Jeanne Kalogridis - 2001
The Inquisition rages throughout medieval France, searching ruthlessly for heretics. In an epic tale of passion, mystery, and unspeakable danger, one woman faces the flames...and triumphs. Mother Marie Francoise, born Sybille, is a midwife with a precocious gift for magic -- a gift that makes her a prime target for persecution at the hands of the Church. She flees her village and takes refuge in a Franciscan sisterhood. Before long, Sybille's unusual powers bring her under the scrutiny of the Inquisition. Michel, a pious and compassionate monk sent to hear her confession, finds himself drawn more intimately into Sybille's life and destiny than either of them could have imagined. Like a magician herself, Jeanne Kalogridis weaves a tale of star-crossed love, of faith and heresy, of mysticism and witchcraft, against a fascinating historical backdrop -- the Black Death, the Hundred Years' War, and the catastrophic defeat of France at the hands of the English. The result is a page-turning novel about one of the most intriguing periods in history.
The Girl in the Glass
Jeffrey Ford - 2005
and the hucksters who feed upon them. Diego, a seventeen-year-old illegal Mexican immigrant, owes his salvation to master grifter Thomas Schell. Together with Schell's gruff and powerful partner, they sail comfortably through hard times, scamming New York's grieving rich with elaborate, ingeniously staged séances -- until an impossible occurrence changes everything.While "communing with spirits," Schell sees an image of a young girl in a pane of glass, silently entreating the con man for help. Though well aware that his otherworldly "powers" are a sham, Schell inexplicably offers his services to help find the lost child -- drawing Diego along with him into a tangled maze of deadly secrets and terrible experimentation.At once a hypnotically compelling mystery and a stunningly evocative portrait of Depression-era New York, The Girl in the Glass is a masterly literary adventure from a writer of exemplary vision and skill.
The Stolen One
Suzanne Crowley - 2009
But I did. Kat's true identity is a secret, even from her. All she has ever known are Grace and Anna and their small village. Kat wants more than hours spent embroidering finery for wealthy ladies and more than Christian, the gentle young farmer courting her. But there are wolves outside, Grace warns. Waiting, with their eyes glowing in the dark . . . and Grace has given Kat safety and a home when no one else would. Then a stranger appears in their cottage, bringing the mystery of Kat's birth with her. In one night, Kat's destiny finds her: She will leave. She will journey to London, and her skill with the needle will attract the notice of the magnificent Queen Elizabeth—and of the wolves of the court. She will discover what Grace would never tell her. Everything will unravel.
The Double Tongue
William Golding - 1995
It is a fictional memoir of an aged prophetess at Delphi, the most sacred oracle of ancient Greece, just prior to Greece's domination by the Roman Empire. As a young girl, Arieka is ugly, unconventional, a source of great shame to her uppity parents, who fear they'll never marry her off. But she is saved by Ionides, the High Priest of the Delphic temple, who detects something of a seer (and a friend) in her and whisks her off to the shrine to become the Pythia - the earthly voice of the god Apollo. Arieka has now spent a lifetime at the mercy of a god, a priest, and her devotees, and has witnessed firsthand the decay of Delphi's fortunes and its influence in the world. Her reflections on the mysteries of the oracle, which her own weird gifts embody, are matched by her feminine insight into the human frailties of the High Priest himself, a true Athenian with a wicked sense of humor, whose intriguing against the Romans brings about humiliation and disaster. This extraordinary short novel, left in draft at the author's death in 1993, is a psychological and historical triumph. Golding has created a vivid and comic picture of ancient Greek society as well as an absolutely convincing portrait of a woman's experience, something rare in the Golding oeuvre. Arieka the Pythia is one of his finest creations.Left in draft at the author's death in 1993, this extraordinary short novel is a psychological and historical triumph. An aged prophetess at Delphi, the most sacred oracle in ancient Greece, looks back over her strange life as the Pythia, the voice of the god Apollo. Golding was the author of Lord of the Flies, and a Nobel Laureate.
The Charmer
C.J. Archer - 2013
Charming. Devastating. He was the last man she needed, but the only one she wanted. Orlando Holt has never assassinated a woman before. The lovely, feisty Lady Lynden will be his first. She's supposed to be a vicious murderess, but when Orlando begins to have doubts, he sets out to discover the identity of the person who hired him. What he learns will turn his world upside down, and propel him headlong into love with a woman who's immune to his charms. Twice widowed by the age of twenty-four, Lady Susanna Lynden has had enough of charming men. Her last husband knew all the right things to say to get her to the marriage bed…then made her life miserable. Money may be scarce and her house falling down around her, but the exotic fruit from her orange trees will keep poverty away. Except someone is thwarting her at every turn. Someone who may even want her dead. The books in the Assassins Guild series are: #1 The Charmer #2 The Rebel #3 The Saint #4 The Sinner
London, Part 1 of 3
Edward Rutherfurd - 1998
He brings this vibrant city's long and noble history alive through the ever-shifting fortunes, fates, and intrigues of half-a-dozen families, from the age of Julius Caesar to the 20th century. Generation after generation, these families embody the passion, struggle, wealth, and verve of the greatest city in the world.