The details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention, and his historical existence is debated and disputed by modern historians. The sparse historical background of Arthur is gleaned from various sources, including the Annales Cambriae, the Historia Brittonum, and the writings of Gildas. Arthur's name also occurs in early poetic sources such as Y Gododdin. The legendary Arthur developed as a figure of international interest largely through the popularity of Geoffrey of Monmouth's fanciful and imaginative 12th-century Historia Regum Britanniae (History of the Kings of Britain). However, some Welsh and Breton tales and poems relating the story of Arthur date from earlier than this work; in these works, Arthur appears either as a great warrior defending Britain from human and supernatural enemies or as a magical figure of folklore, sometimes associated with the Welsh Otherworld, Annwn. How much of Geoffrey's Historia (completed in 1138) was adapted from such earlier sources, rather than invented by Geoffrey himself, is unknown. Although the themes, events and characters of the Arthurian legend varied widely from text to text, and there is no one canonical version, Geoffrey's version of events often served as the starting point for later stories. Geoffrey depicted Arthur as a king of Britain who defeated the Saxons and established an empire over Britain, Ireland, Iceland, Norway and Gaul. In fact, many elements and incidents that are now an integral part of the Arthurian story appear in Geoffrey's Historia, including Arthur's father Uther Pendragon, the wizard Merlin, the sword Excalibur, Arthur's birth at Tintagel, his final battle against Mordred at Camlann and final rest in Avalon. The 12th-century French writer Chretien de Troyes, who added Lancelot and the Holy Grail to the story, began the genre of Arthurian romance that became a significant strand of medieval literature. In these French stories, the narrative focus often shifts from King Arthur himself to other characters, such as various Knights of the Round Table. Arthurian literature thrived during the Middle Ages but waned in the centuries that followed until it experienced a major resurgence in the 19th century. In the 21st century, the legend lives on, not only in literature but also in adaptations for theatre, film, television, comics and other media. The Sir James Knowles version of King Arthur is considered as the most accurate and well known original story of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table.

    Instead, his younger half-brother, Lleu, is chosen to be prince of Britain. Lleu is fragile, often ill, unskilled in weaponry and statesmanship, and childishly afraid of the dark. Even Lleu's twin sister, Goewin, seems more suited to rule the kingdom.Medraut cannot bear to be commanded and contradicted by this weakling brother who he feels has usurped his birthright and his father's favor. Torn and bitter, haunted by jealousy, self-doubt, and thwarted ambition, he joins Morgause, the high king's treacherous sister, in a plot to force Artos to forfeit his power and kingdom in exchange for Lleu's life. But this plot soon proves to be much more - a battlefield on which Medraut is forced to decide, for good or evil, where his own allegiance truly lies...

    Already weakened in spirit by Guinevere’s infidelity with the now-exiled Lancelot, Arthur must rouse his knights to battle one last time against Mordred’s rebels and foreign mercenaries. Powerful, passionate, and filled with vivid imagery, this unfinished poem reveals Tolkien’s gift for storytelling at its brilliant best. Christopher Tolkien, editor, contributes three illuminating essays that explore the literary world of King Arthur, reveal the deeper meaning of the verses and the painstaking work his father applied to bring the poem to a finished form, and investigate the intriguing links between The Fall of Arthur and Tolkien’s Middle-earth.

    

    But destiny often changes people’s lives in ways they can’t imagine. When a dinosaur fossil is unearthed in the central Nevada desert, the last thing Andrea Alejandro, a graduate student in paleontology, expected to find was the tail section of an airplane in the same strata of earth.After Flight 839 crash lands in unfamiliar terrain, Sarah documents the daily routine she and her fellow passengers follow, waiting to be saved. Slowly but surely the survivors come to realize that they have crossed through time. The daily horrors of Cretaceous life become clearer as they encounter a family of Tyrannosaurus rexes that grows increasingly interested in the survivors and their shell of an airplane. As timelines collide, one woman’s battle for survival becomes another woman’s fight for the truth.Tomorrow’s Flight is the new novel from Amazon bestselling authors M.E. Ellington and Steven Stiefel.

    Believing in his vision for a glorious Britain, Elaine is soon swept up in the intrigues of Camelot and caught firmly between her warring siblings - the High King Arthur, the vengeful Morgan LeFay and the devious Morgause. She is a queen, a warrior and a witch. Yet none of these things may save her brother from those who plot against him, or the poison at the very heart of his kingdom. He became myth, but she was forgotten. This is her tale. Perfect for fans of Alison Weir, Philippa Gregory and the Mists of Avalon, this magical, thrilling Arthurian retelling makes familiar characters new once more.

    these tales constitute a powerful work of the imagination, ranking with Tokien's Lord of the Rings novels and T.H. White's The Once and Future King. Evangeline Walton's compelling rendition of these classic, thrilling stories of magic, betrayal, lost love, and bitter retribution include the encounter between Prince Pwyll and Arawn, the God of Death, which Pwyll survives by agreeing to kill the one man that Death cannot fell, and the tale of bran the blessed and his family's epic struggle for the throne.The Mabinogion is internationally recognized as the world's finest arc of Celtic mythology; Walton's vivid retelling introduces an ancient world of gods and monsters, heroes, kings and quests, making accessible one of the greatest fantasy sagas of all time.

    A sheep-herder turned Noble. Their path to ascendance through cultivation. The Divine Dungeon complete series plus the Master's short story, 560,000 words of epic adventure! Conquering dungeons and using them to grow has long been the most efficient way to become a powerful adventurer. The only thing keeping the process from being easy is the Beasts that inhabit these places. Questions plague those entering this particular place of power: Where do the ‘rewards’ of weapons, armor, and heavy gold coins come from? Why is a fluffy bunny charging at me? For abyss-sake, why are there so many monsters?Cal has all of the answers to these age-old questions for a very simple reason. He is a Dungeon Core, a soul forced against his will into a magical stone. With the help of an energetic friend, Cal grows a dungeon around himself to bring in new sources of power.When a threat he doesn’t fully comprehend bares its many teeth, Cal is determined to survive the attempt on his life. Unfortunately for adventurers, the only way for him to achieve his goal is to eat anyone that enters his depths.What readers are saying:"One of the most original, humorous and well-crafted novels I've read..." ★★★★★"...I bought it today... And read it all, today. I also stopped playing World of Warcraft during that time which for anyone who has become addicted to that understands how good something has to be to interrupt that form of addiction." ★★★★★"I can only compare Dakota's literary genius to that of our current industry titans, J.K. Rowling, George R. R. Martin, Brandon Sanderson, and James S. A. Corey." ★★★★★Buy the 5-book boxed set today to read Dakota Krout's Dungeon Born, Dungeon Madness, Dungeon Calamity, Dungeon Desolation, and Dungeon Eternium as well as Butcher Boy, the Master's short story!

    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: A Storm of Swords, a Game of Thrones, a Feast for Crows, a Clash of Kings, Tales of Dunk and Egg, a Dance With Dragons, the Mystery Knight, the Hedge Knight, the Sworn Sword. Source: Wikipedia. Free updates online. Not illustrated. Excerpt: A Storm of Swords is the third of seven planned novels in A Song of Ice and Fire, an epic fantasy series by American author George R. R. Martin. It was first published on 8 August 2000 in the United Kingdom, with a United States edition following in November 2000. Its publication was preceded by a novella called Path of the Dragon, which collects some of the Daenerys Targaryen chapters from the novel into a single book. To date, A Storm of Swords is the longest novel in the series. It was so long that in the UK its paperback edition was split in half, Part 1 being published as Steel and Snow in June 2001 (with the one-volume cover) and Part 2 as Blood and Gold in August 2001 (with a specially-commissioned new cover). In France, the decision was made to cut the novel into four separate editions. A Storm of Swords won the 2001 Locus Award, the 2002 Geffen Award for Best Novel and was nominated for the 2001 Nebula Award for Best Novel. Significantly, it was the first novel in the series to be nominated for the Hugo Award, one of the two most prestigious awards in science fiction and fantasy publishing, although it lost to J. K. Rowling's novel Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Meisha Merlin, who had previously issued limited, illustrated editions of both A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings, were planning to release a similar version for A Storm of Swords in two volumes. However, lengthy delays on the release of A Clash of Kings caused Meisha Merlin to lose the printing rights for the book, which were picked up...More: http: //booksllc.net/?id=71362

    The story of the Cornish knight and the Irish princess who meet by deception, fall in love by magic, and pursue that love in defiance of heavenly and earthly law has inspired artists from Matthew Arnold to Richard Wagner. But nowhere has it been retold with greater eloquence and dignity than in Joseph Bédier’s edition, which weaves several medieval sources into a seamless whole, elegantly translated by Hilaire Belloc and Paul Rosenfeld.

    Vividly portraying legendary and semi-legendary figures such as Lear, Cymbeline, Merlin the magician and the most famous of all British heroes, King Arthur, it is as much myth as it is history and its veracity was questioned by other medieval writers. But Geoffrey of Monmouth's powerful evocation of illustrious men and deeds captured the imagination of subsequent generations, and his influence can be traced through the works of Malory, Shakespeare, Dryden and Tennyson.

    One waiter, one customer. The overnight fry cook rambles up to the pie case to take his nightly hit of dessert-topping propellant. It’s not a complete surprise when he falls to the floor; the stuff gives him the spins. That’s the point. It’s a bad moment for the boss to arrive, though. It’s worse when the cook turns out to be dead - from a bullet no one heard. For the waiter, it’s the start of the the worst few months of his life, and before it’s done he’ll be neck-deep in drug deals, romances with a faithless minx and an unintelligible Russian teacher - and a plot by campus radicals to blow something big. It’s 1980, after all. No shortage of things to deplore. They’re not too concerned with disco, though; that seems to be on the way out. “Graveyard Special” is another humorous mystery by the author of “Falling Up the Stairs,” and the first in a series of interconnected mysteries that span six decades.

    . ."On a brisk autumn day in 1686, eighteen-year-old Nella Oortman arrives in Amsterdam to begin a new life as the wife of illustrious merchant trader Johannes Brandt. But her new home, while splendorous, is not welcoming. Johannes is kind yet distant, always locked in his study or at his warehouse office--leaving Nella alone with his sister, the sharp-tongued and forbidding Marin.But Nella's world changes when Johannes presents her with an extraordinary wedding gift: a cabinet-sized replica of their home. To furnish her gift, Nella engages the services of a miniaturist--an elusive and enigmatic artist whose tiny creations mirror their real-life counterparts in eerie and unexpected ways . . .Johannes' gift helps Nella to pierce the closed world of the Brandt household. But as she uncovers its unusual secrets, she begins to understand--and fear--the escalating dangers that await them all. In this repressively pious society where gold is worshipped second only to God, to be different is a threat to the moral fabric of society, and not even a man as rich as Johannes is safe. Only one person seems to see the fate that awaits them. Is the miniaturist the key to their salvation . . . or the architect of their destruction?Enchanting, beautiful, and exquisitely suspenseful, The Miniaturist is a magnificent story of love and obsession, betrayal and retribution, appearance and truth.

    There, housed in royal splendor, its awesome powers will be freely available to Arthur's suffering people, becoming the symbol of Arthur's reborn realm. But mysteriously, the Grail disappears. Missing as well is one of Arthur's most trusted men, who has not only taken the Grail but kidnapped Arthur's queen, Guinevere. A desperate search ensues, and a diabolical plot is uncovered, masterminded by none other than the evil Morgian, Queen of Air and Darkness.-- The epic tale of the legendary King Arthur, his lady love guinevere, stalwart advisor Merlin and loyal companion Sir Galahad has entertained and delighted people around the world for generations.

    This small farm on the outer reaches of Cape Cod is a place that is as bewitching and alive as the characters we meet: Violet, a brilliant girl who is in love with books and with a man destined to betray her; Lysander Wynn, attacked by a halibut as big as a horse, certain that his life is ruined until a boarder wearing red boots arrives to change everything; Maya Cooper, who does not understand the true meaning of the love between her mother and father until it is nearly too late. From the time of the British occupation of Massachusetts to our own modern world, family after family’s lives are inexorably changed, not only by the people they love but by the lives they lead inside Blackbird House.These interconnected narratives are as intelligent as they are haunting, as luminous as they are unusual. Inside Blackbird House more than a dozen men and women learn how love transforms us and how it is the one lasting element in our lives. The past both dissipates and remains contained inside the rooms of Blackbird House, where there are terrible secrets, inspired beauty, and, above all else, a spirit of coming home.From the writer Time has said tells "truths powerful enough to break a reader’s heart" comes a glorious travelogue through time and fate, through loss and love and survival. Welcome to Blackbird House.