Essays include discussion of the psychological implications in the novel as well as themes and character analysis.

    

    

    One is a magnificent dog of astonishing intelligence. The other, a hybrid monster of a brutally violent nature. And both are on the loose.… Bestselling author Dean Koontz presents his most terrifying, dramatic and moving novel: The explosive story of a man and a woman, caught in a relentless storm of mankind’s darkest creation.… Midnight In picturesque Moonlight Cove, California, inexplicable deaths occur and spine-tingling terror descends to this "edge of paradise." Growing numbers of residents harbor a secret so dark it is sure to cost even more lives. Tessa Lockland comes to town to probe her sister's seemingly unprompted suicide. Independent and clever, she meets up with Sam Booker, an undercover FBI agent sent to Moonlight Cove to discover the truth behind the mysterious deaths. They meet Harry Talbot, a wheelchair-bound veteran, who has seen things from his window that he was not meant to see. Together they begin to understand the depth of evil in Moonlight Cove. Chrissie Foster, a resourceful eleven-year-old, running from her parents who have suddenly changed and in whom darkness dwells, joins them. Together they make a stand against darkness and terror.

    There was no ship in sight, and the seagulls were motionless upon its even greyness. The sky was dark with lowering clouds, but there was no wind. The line of the horizon was clear and delicate. The shingly beach, no less deserted, was thick with tangled seaweed, and the innumerable shells crumbed under the feet that trod them. The breakwaters, which sought to prevent the unceasing encroachment of the waves, were rotten with age and green with the sea-slime. It was a desolate scene, but there was a restfulness in its melancholy; and the great silence, the suave monotony of color, might have given peace to a heart that was troubled. They could not assuage the torment of the woman who stood alone upon that spot. She did not stir; and, though her gaze was steadfast, she saw nothing. Nature has neither love nor hate, and with indifference smiles upon the light at heart and to the heavy brings a deeper sorrow. It is a great irony that the old Greek, so wise and prudent, who fancied that the gods lived utterly apart from human passions, divinely unconscious in their high palaces of grief and joy, the hope and despair, of the turbulent crowd of men, should have gone down to posterity as the apostle of brutish pleasure. But the silent woman did not look for solace. She had a vehement pride which caused her to seek comfort only in her own heart; and when, against her will, heavy tears rolled down her cheeks, she shook her head impatiently.

    Eventually uncovered and arrested, Boyce was convicted of espionage in Los Angeles, California, on June 20, 1977, and sentenced to forty years in a maximum-security federal penitentiary. Soon after his imprisonment, Boyce--the man prosecutors said had done more harm to the security of the United States than any Soviet agents since the Rosenbergs--escaped. Boyce was to become America's most wanted fugitive and the focus of an unprecedented, massive manhunt for eighteen months. Scores of FBI agents and U.S. Marshals sifted through hundreds of false leads. They traveled countless miles back and forth across America, to South Africa, through the isolated jungles of Central America. They were called on the carpet by Congressional committees for the often-publicized and embarassing lack of reults. Although THE FLIGHT OF THE FALCON is a thrilling chase and suspense story, it is also a fine study of character and psychological drama--the metamorphosis of an idealistic young man into a coarse and violent criminal fugitive.

    In THE BEAR AND THE DRAGON, the future is very near at hand indeed.Newly elected in his own right, Jack Ryan has found that being President has gotten no easier. Domestic pitfalls await him at every turn, there's a revolution in Liberia, the Asian economy is going down the tubes, and now, in Moscow, someone may have tried to take out the chairman of the SVR - the former KGB - with a rocket - propelled grenade. Things are unstable enough in Russia without high-level assassination, but even more disturbing may be the identities of the potential assassins. Were they political enemies, the Russian Mafia, disaffected former KGB? Or, Ryan wonders, is something far more dangerous at work here?Ryan is right. For even wile he dispatches his most trusted eyes and ears, including black ops specialist John Clark, to find out the truth of the matter, forces in China are moving ahead with a plan of truly audacious proportions. If they succeed, the world as we know it will never look the same. If they fail...the consequences will be unspeakable.Blending the exceptional realism and authenticity that are his hallmarks with intricate plotting, razor-sharp suspense and a remarkable cast of characters, this is Clancy at his best - and ther is none better.

    Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Chapters: Novels by Yann Martel, Life of Pi, Self, the Facts Behind the Helsinki Roccamatios. Source: Wikipedia. Free updates online. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ISBN 0-15-602732-1 (US paperback edition) ISBN 1-565-11780-8 (audiobook, Penguin Highbridge)Life of Pi is a fantasy adventure novel written by Yann Martel. The story was inspired by Martel's childhood friend Eleanor and her adventures in India. In the story, the protagonist Piscine "Pi" Molitor Patel, an Indian boy from Pondicherry, explores issues of spirituality and practicality from an early age. He survives 227 days after a shipwreck, while stranded on a boat in the Pacific Ocean. Martel brought the idea of rituals many times throughout the novel as well as storytelling. Rituals give structure to abstract ideas and emotionsin other words, ritual is an alternate form of storytelling. It was rituals and storytelling that kept Pi Patel sane. The novel was first published by Knopf Canada in September 2001, and the UK edition won the Man Booker Prize for Fiction the following year. It was chosen for CBC Radio's Canada Reads 2003, where it was championed by author Nancy Lee. It won the 2003 Boeke Prize, a South African novel award. Its French translation, L'Histoire de Pi, was also chosen in the French version of the reading competition, Le combat des livres. Life of Pi has three parts. The first one is where the main character, Pi, being an adult now, looks back upon his childhood. How he was named after a swimming pool, being named Piscine Molitor Patel. How he dramatically changed his name to Pi when he started to attend secondary school, because he was tired of being mistakenly called "Pissing Patel." How he was born as a Hindu, but as a fourteen-year-old, came into contact with Christianity and Isla...More: http: //booksllc.net/?id=41907

    Literature and film adaptations studies students will find plenty of material to support their courses and essay writing on how the film versions provide different readings of the original text. Focussing on several film versions and adaptations, the book discusses: the literary text in its historical context, key themes and dominant readings of the text, how the text is adapted for screen and how adaptations have changed our reading of the original text. There are many references to the literary text and screenplays and the book also features quotations from directors, critics and others linked with the chosen film and text.

    The life we know and another one, that lies waiting for us. Alice is a “nose”—a creator of perfumes. She is passionate about her work and her only distraction from her job is her motley group of friends, who convene for late night soirees in her apartment—much to the annoyance of her cantankerous neighbor Mr. Daldry. On Christmas Eve 1950, something happens that will change Alice's life forever: during an outing to Brighton with her friends, a fortune teller makes a mysterious prediction about Alice's future. Alice has never believed in soothsayers but she cannot stop thinking about the old woman's words. “The most important man in your life was walking behind you a few moments ago. To find him, you will have to undertake a long journey and meet six people who will lead you to him. You have two lives in you, Alice. The life you know and another one, which is waiting for you…” From then on her nights are plagued with nightmares that are as real as they are incomprehensible. Alice's neighbor, Mr. Daldry, notices the unrest that the fortune teller provokes in Alice. For reasons he will not reveal, Daldry encourages Alice to take the predictions seriously and convinces her to set off to find the six people who will shape her fate. To make sure that Alice does not change her mind, the eccentric bachelor even agrees to accompany her on the journey… The Strange Journey of Mr. Daldry takes us into the heart of Europe in the 1950s, into lives that are haunted by the demons of a recent past. It's a story of friendship and things left unsaid, personified above all by Mr. Daldry, an unforgettable character who is as passionate as he is restrained, as serious as he is funny, as reliable as he is surprising.“One of Marc Levy’s best novels to date.” - Le Figaro“Another success for Marc Levy.” - L'ExpressOne of France’s bestselling authors, Marc Levy’s novels have been translated into 45 languages and over 28 million copies of his books have been sold worldwide.

    His search for untouched civilizations had revealed cruelty and ignorance beside startling beauty, a flawed paradise.If you know London primarily through novels like White Fang, these stories will provide a new perspective. Full of intriguing characters and snippets of pidgin, they also highlight London's concern with social issues.Cover photograph by Jack London.

    . . A sprawling tome that combines fact with fiction and covers 900 years in the history of New Forest, a 100,000-acre woodland in southern England . . . Rutherfurd sketches the histories of six fictional families, ranging from aristocrats to peasants, who have lived in the forest for generations. . . . But the real success is in how Rutherfurd paints his picture of the wooded enclave with images of treachery and violence, as well as magic and beauty.”–The New York Post

    In The Road Show we meet Zachary Edge, a Confederate soldier, on his way home at the war's close. He stumbles upon a traveling troupe, a chance encounter that is the start of an unforgettable odyssey. Edge hits the road with bawdy showgirls, roguish tricksters, and a host of colorful characters. He soon finds himself in the arms of Autumn Auburn, the lithesome artiste known for her breathtaking sensuality.

    Hunter, a professional big-game hunter and former chairman of Tanganyika National Parks. J A. Hunter led a life of adventure, but, perhaps, the most astonishing tale in this book is his incredible adventures while hunting rhino. As a game ranger, he was ordered by the Tanganyikan government to clear out dozens of rogue rhinos from the area around Makueni, and the accounts of his experiences are spine-tingling. Hunter hunted throughout East Africa-for bongo in the Ituri rain forest (former Zaire), lion in Masailand (Kenya), and the man-killing buffalo near Thomson's Falls with his favorite dog (Kenya).

    With The Testaments, the wait is over. Margaret Atwood's sequel picks up the story more than 15 years after Offred stepped into the unknown, with the explosive testaments of three female narrators from Gilead. The Handmaid's Tale: Offred is a Handmaid in The Republic of Gilead, a religious totalitarian state in what was formerly known as the United States. She is placed in the household of The Commander, Fred Waterford - her assigned name, Offred, means 'of Fred'. She has only one function: to breed. If Offred refuses to enter into sexual servitude to repopulate a devastated world, she will be hanged. Yet even a repressive state cannot eradicate hope and desire. As she recalls her pre-revolution life in flashbacks, Offred must navigate through the terrifying landscape of torture and persecution in the present day, and between two men upon which her future hangs.