With his heart turned black, he rekindles the savagery of his race. In sacking Nantes, his bravery and luck earn him a place in the skalds' songs. Word of his deeds reaches his kin in the North, and more and more sea captains sail to Francia to join him, hoping his luck might help theirs.Thor of Dublin, Hasting's old rival, will seek him out and ask him to join his new alliance of sea kings. Together, they will launch the most ambitious raids their people have ever attempted. They will sail south to the land of the Moors to test their alliance's strength and, if successful, turn their sights to an even more daring prize: Paris.The Norns make nothing easy. A secret affair will risk unraveling the alliance and bring the sea kings to the brink of civil war.

    What’s meant to be an uneventful trip turns into a coming-of-age journey that teaches Jem that adulthood is not as easy as he might have expected, and life usually has a plan of its own.

     But Roland and his men were drawn through a magical gate, to a new and strange world of magic and deadly creatures. A world where every man, no matter what his estate or rank, no matter how poor or common or rich and influential, was born with the power of magic. But the magic of this world carries a deadly curse, and the price for abusing its power is ruinous. This, then, is the story of the kingdom they built, and the knight who would decide its fate.

    Standing, and straddling my broken body with a well-muscled leg on either side of me, she looked like an ethereal giant: a beautiful Amazon, impossible tall, and equally invincible. She fired immediately, spun quickly and fired again, then dropped down and crowded me against the antique safe that had become our sanctuary. Improbably, she grinned at me. "Two down, and one to go."A mass shooting, an FBI coverup, and a madman with his own militia and a political hit list. Adam Cain is caught in the middle with only one person to trust; the beautiful and mysterious woman that calls herself the Gypsy. She seems to have all the answers, and a hit list of her own.

    When the man she loves rejects her, she heads west to find love as a mail order bride.Owen looks for a mail order bride to start a family, but doesn’t know the first thing about loving a bride.Owen and Tilly start their relationship with very different goals. With the help of prayer and some adorable orphans, they just might find love.This book is a sweet, clean, western, historical, romance short story. It is a complete story, but it is also part of the Wyoming Brides and Babies series. Be sure to read them all - in any order!Always FREE on Kindle Unlimited

    Tasked with routing out enemy agents and thwarting an elaborate espionage ring, which includes beautiful American double agent Josephine Lafitte, MacLea’s mission is betrayed. Now, trapped in a dramatic showdown aboard a captured American warship headed for the breach at Niagara Falls, battle-hardened MacLea finds himself fighting not just for freedom, but for his life.

    But Mariamne has a further gift: an illness has left her with visions; she has the power of prophecy. It is her prophesying that drives the two girls to flee to Egypt, where they study philosophy, mathematics, and astronomy in the Great Library of Alexandria.After seven years they return to a Judaea where many now believe John the Baptizer is the messiah. Salome too begins to believe, but Mariamne, now called Magdalene, is drawn to his cousin, Yeshu'a, a man touched by the divine in the same way she was during her days of illness. Together they speak of sharing their direct experience of God; but Yeshu'a unexpectedly gains a reputation as a healer, and as the ill and the troubled flock to him, he and Magdalene are forced to make a terrible decision.This radical retelling of the greatest story ever told brings Mary Magdalene to life—not as a prostitute or demon-possessed—but as an educated woman who was truly the "apostle to the apostles."From the Hardcover edition.

    It was a burglary that went wrong, and four culprits were soon arrested. Their trial was concluded swiftly, their punishments were decisive, and society breathed a sigh of relief.In Ashraf El-Ashmawi's telling, there was a fifth accomplice, Abbas, who fled to his home in the countryside to lay low until the murder trial blew over. However, he did not escape empty-handed and kept stolen documents from Cicurel's villa, ones that he imagined would lead him to a hidden safe. Abbas hatched a plan to return to the capital, find the safe, and make his fortune. The first step was to place his sister Zeinab with Cicurel's widow, Paula.Abbas’s rags-to-riches story unfolds as a tale of modern Egypt, taking in the Second World War, the 1952 revolution and rise of Nasser, the 1967 war, and the Sadat and Mubarak eras. Spanning the 1920s to the 1990s, El-Ashmawi deftly weaves together history with fiction in this intriguing English-language debut.

    Jerked from a life of isolation with her mother, Willow learns what alone really means when she finds her mother still in her bed, never to awaken again in this life. From the moment Willow arrives in the police station with her startling announcement, Chad Tesdall fights the friendship he knows he can't avoid. This collection includes episodes fifteen through eighteen of Past Forward. In this volume, Chad and Willow start their life together. A surprise attack, Willow's first vacation, and a slow, gradual expansion of the farm brings more changes to Walden Farm. Follow as Willow's story unfolds past forward.

    Powerful brothers at war. An orphan girl sold as a bride. Long ago, the Kingdom of Estala was a place of dragons and sorcerers. Those with magical powers were more than human, they were Menti. But now Menti sorcery is outlawed by the capricious king, and those who wield it are hunted down by the fanatical Order of Insight to be made into slaves, or worse, executed. Two young heroes find themselves unwillingly thrown into the centre of these uncertain times. Prince Luca, King Davead’s second son, has always been the sickliest of the royal children, but in a shocking turn of events, Luca finds himself at the heart of a magical power so great it may consume him forever. If he fails to control those powers, he could be put to death by his own father. Reva Avalon grew up believing she would marry her childhood friend, Prince Luca. But after she is orphaned in the Menti uprising, the King of Estala sells her to his most feared general instead. Young and frightened, but still strong-willed, Reva must survive a harsh new life away from the palace. And in the realm rebellion looms, as do the return of the mighty dragon shifters. Some long for the return of the dragons… others fear it will be the end of the world as it is known.

     "Those who try to change Form without likewise shifting Function are doomed to a lifetime of agony and mediocrity--or they make the best assassins." -Auld Wynfor Ganlin An orphan with powers not seen in a thousand years, trapped in a world only she can see, her life a waking nightmare. A boy long ago lost to his family, forced to masquerade as the enemy by one of his own, his continued facade his people's only hope of salvation. An immortal trapped in the flesh of a man, a prisoner for something he has not yet done, fleeing something he thought he had killed. A girl abandoned in the mountains, without memories or a note, her people the stuff of legends, but whose villages have never been found. Meet these and many more incredible characters as they engage in a complex struggle for survival in the latest gripping King book, set in a realm about to plunge in a downward spiral of politics, death, and treachery. Like all King novels, every chapter of this epic fantasy adventure will leave you immersed in her world until you've turned the very last page, going toe-to-toe with the classics. If you enjoy sword and sorcery and are looking for a heart-pounding action & adventure, get ready to be blown away. This is an ILLUSTRATED serialized novel, with each part being approximately 70,000 words, and containing exclusive access to Lance MacCarty's desktop backgrounds and full-resolution downloadable images of the scenes contained within the book.

    When Doma is attacked, and she finds a daring way way to reach the capital, she discovers the attack isn’t what she thought. With no ability to shape, Elle must find some way to reach water, or not only will she lose her only friend, but all of Doma will fall. The first part in Elle’s story, a part of the Cloud Warrior Saga.

    Living in his motorhome, Walker is tasked with finding the daughter of the Mafia boss he befriended in Key West. She went missing while digging crystals in the mountains of Arkansas and to aid in his search, Walker reluctantly agrees to take along a mystery woman who supposedly has a psychic gift. She's smart, sexy, and single and the question is, does she have more on her quirky mind than finding the bosses daughter? Ride along as Walker, the mystery woman, and Mango Bob the cat travel cross country in Walker's motorhome, trying to avoid the trouble that seems to show up around every curve in the twisty mountain roads. A fun read!

    Set in England and India in the mutinous year of 1857, A Proper Education for Girls tells the story of Alice and Lilian Talbot, twins separated for the first time in their lives by their martinet father. After an affair comes to a tragic end, Lilian is banished from the Talbot mansion and married off to a sickly missionary in India. Unwilling to play the part of the demure missionary wife, beautiful, tomboyish Lilian quickly takes advantage of her husband’s hypochondria and her newfound freedom as a British expatriate, tramping off into the jungle to paint pictures of the indigenous flora and secretly learning the language and customs of her adopted homeland. Meanwhile, the plain but sharp-witted Alice remains on her father’s isolated estate, serving as curator to his strange and vast Collection under the watchful eye of the malevolent Dr. Cattermole. The Collection, which has taken over every inch of the rambling estate, is the essence of Victorian England—antiquated and ingen- ious, austere and excessive. Twelve perfectly synchronized grandfather clocks stand at attention at the bottom of a staircase. Botanical specimens have overrun the conservatory, turning the room into a tropical greenhouse. Forgotten houseguests roam amid fossilized sea creatures, display cases of Greek pottery, and mechanical contraptions. A peach tree, inherited from their mother and planted in a wheelbarrow for portability, is a constant reminder of Lilian’s absence. Though Mr. Talbot has cut off all communication between the sisters, a cryptic letter from Lilian manages to slip through, and hidden in the envelope is a puzzling photograph of a tiger hunt. Alice sets about cracking the code in the letter, finding an unlikely ally in Mr. Blake, the photographer hired to document the Collection. While Mr. Talbot is absorbed in the eccentric but seemingly benign Society for the Propagation of Useful and Interesting Knowledge, Alice plots her escape from both her oppressive father and Dr. Cattermole’s unspeakable plans for her future. Intrigue is rife in India as well, where Lilian continues to defy convention. Playing her many admirers off one another, she quietly works toward the goal of reuniting with her sister. But the violent onset of the Indian rebellion against British rule threatens to derail her plans. And back at the Talbot estate, the Society’s experiments are taking a menacing turn. Will the sisters' resourcefulness and profound devotion to each other be enough to save them? Capturing the Victorian era in all of its whimsy and horror, A Proper Education for Girls is a superb debut novel about the power of sisterhood.

    I can never get used to this, Alexi. Having you, that is. How did I deserve you? Deserve me? You don't have to do anything to deserve me. I love you. It's as simple as that. I love you for what you are. All you need to do is love me back. You don't earn love, as a payment in return.Peter Kingsmill's life had run into the sands since the death of his wife. What was a glittering London career had lost its shine. Until, that is, his life is turned upside down by an unexpected collision of events. He inherits the family estate, meets a girl seventeen years his junior and receives an anonymous letter which casts doubt on all the certainties on which he has built his past life.What follows is a journey of discovery which takes him back in time to war-torn Europe. To a story of betrayal in the secret world of spies and double agents, and ultimately to redemption and a bright new life.The narrative moves at speed from the dusty plains of pre-war Poland to the frozen winter landscapes of German-occupied Norway and finally to the gentle pastoral of the north Yorkshire hills. It is a story of a search for the pieces that make up a human life; and of the love that binds those pieces together....Do you remember the Snow Queen story? I can complete the pattern now. I have everything I need.