Sure to mesmerize fans of Deborah Harkness, Laurell K. Hamilton, and Karen Marie Moning, these novels introduce a trio of kickass heroines who perfectly showcase Armstrong’s thrilling imagination.  DIME STORE MAGIC   Paige Winterbourne was always either too young or too rebellious to succeed her mother as leader of the elite American Coven of Witches. Now that she’s twenty-three, the Elders can no longer deny her. But even Paige’s wildest antics can’t hold a candle to those of her new charge, Savannah, who is all too willing to use her budding powers for evil, and evil is all too willing to claim her. For this girl is being pursued by a dark faction of the supernatural underworld. It’s an initiation into adulthood, womanhood, and the brutal side of magic—and Paige will have to do everything within her power to make sure they both survive.  INDUSTRIAL MAGIC  Someone is murdering the teenage offspring of the underworld’s most influential Cabals—a circle of families that makes the mob look like amateurs. And none is more powerful than the Cortez Cabal, a faction with which Paige is intimately acquainted. Her boyfriend is none other than Lucas Cortez, the rebel son and unwilling heir. But love isn’t blind, and Paige has her eyes wide open as she is drawn into a hunt for an unnatural-born killer. Pitted against shamans, demons, and goons, it’s a battle chilling enough to make a wild young woman grow up in a hurry. If Paige gets the chance.  HAUNTED   Eve Levine—half-demon, black witch, and devoted mother—has been dead for three years. She has a great house and an interesting love life, and she can’t be killed again, which comes in handy when you’ve made as many enemies as Eve has. All she needs to do is find a way to communicate with her daughter, Savannah, and she’ll be happy. But the Fates have other plans. They want Eve to hunt down an evil spirit called the Nix, who has escaped from hell, before she does any more damage. But the Nix is a dangerous enemy: The only way to stop her is with an angel’s sword—and Eve is no angel.  Praise for Kelley Armstrong and the Otherworld series  “Gripping . . . [a] sexy supernatural romance [whose] special strength lies in its seamless incorporation of the supernatural into the real world.”—Publishers Weekly, on Dime Store Magic   “One of my favorite writers.”—New York Times bestselling author Karin Slaughter   “Up there with the big girls of the genre like Laurell K. Hamilton.”—The Kansas City Star   “Armstrong writes page-turning prose.”—Booklist   “One of the masters of urban fantasy.”—Fresh Fiction

    And all religious beliefs are "crutches" hindering the free locomotive efforts of an advancing humanity. There are no problems related to human progress and happiness in this age which any theology can solve, and which the teachings of freethought cannot do better and without the aid of encumbrances.

    101 hilarious and dirty jokes for adults.

    Last year, Guardian journalist Ariane Sherine launched the Atheist Bus Campaign and ended up raising over GBP150,000, enough to place the advert 'There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life' on 800 UK buses in January 2009. Now Ariane and dozens of other atheist writers, comedians and scientists are joining together to raise money for a very different cause. The Atheist's Guide to Christmas is a funny, thoughtful handbook all about enjoying Christmas, from 42 of the world's most entertaining atheists. It features everything from an atheist Christmas miracle to a guide to the best Christmas pop hits, and contributors include Richard Dawkins, Charlie Brooker, Derren Brown, Ben Goldacre, Jenny Colgan, David Baddiel, Simon Singh, AC Grayling, Brian Cox and Richard Herring. The full book advance and all royalties will go to the UK HIV charity Terrence Higgins Trust.(less)

    D. Salinger published The Catcher in the Rye in 1951, he was stalked by besotted fans, would-be biographers, and pushy journalists. In this collection of rare and revealing encounters with the elusive literary giant, Salinger discusses sometimes willingly, sometimes grudgingly what that onslaught was like, the autobiographical origins of his art, and his advice to writers. Including his final, surprising interview, and with an insightful introduction by New York Times journalist David Streitfeld, these enlightening, provocative, and even amusing conversations reveal a writer fiercely resistant to the spotlight but powerless to escape its glare."

    Scott Fitzgerald's writing career, beginning with the autobiographical essay called "Who's Who - and Why," which he wrote for The Saturday Evening Post in 1920, and ending with "News of Paris - Fifteen Years Ago," a story found among Fitzgerald's papers, apparently written in 1940, and posthumously published in Furioso. Here, clearly, is a book to be read both for the enjoyment of good writing, and for its illumination of an important figure in American letters. To supplement the reader's own insight into Fitzgerald's art, Arthur Mizener, author of the highly successful biography of Fitzgerald, The Far Side of Paradise, provides a revealing introduction and pertinent notes heading each selection.

    His new collection, The Three Battles of Wanat and Other True Stories, features the best of his long-form pieces on war, as well as notable profiles, sports reporting, and essays on culture.Including pieces from the Atlantic, Vanity Fair, the New Yorker, and the Philadelphia Inquirer, this collection is Bowden at his best. The titular article, “The Three Battles of Wanat,” tells the story of one of the bloodiest days in the War in Afghanistan and the extraordinary years-long fallout it generated within the United States military. In “The Killing Machines,” Bowden examines the strategic, legal, and moral issues surrounding armed drones. And in a brilliant piece on Kim Jong-un, “The Bright Sun of Juche,” he recalibrates our understanding of the world’s youngest and most baffling dictator. Also included are profiles of newspaper scion Arthur Sulzberger; renowned defense attorney and anti-death-penalty activist Judy Clarke; and David Simon, the creator of “The Wire.”Absorbing and provocative, The Three Battles of Wanat is an essential collection for fans of Mark Bowden’s writing, and for anyone who enjoys first-rate narrative nonfiction.

    This is undoubtably an ineffective way of encouraging people to develop critical thinking about religion. This unique approach to skepticism presents fifty commonly heard reasons people often give for believing in a God and then raises legitimate questions regarding these reasons, showing in each case that there is much room for doubt. Whether you're a believer, a complete skeptic, or somewhere in between, you'll find this review of traditional and more recent arguments for the existence of God refreshing, approachable, and enlightening.From religion as the foundation of morality to the authority of sacred books, the compelling religious testimony of influential people, near-death experiences, arguments from Intelligent Design, and much more, Harrison respectfully describes each rationale for belief and then politely shows the deficiencies that any good skeptic would point out. As a journalist who has traveled widely and interviewed many highly accomplished people, quite a number of whom are believers, the author appreciates the variety of belief and the ways in which people seek to make religion compatible with scientific thought. Nonetheless, he shows that, despite the prevalence of belief in God or religious belief in intelligent people, in the end there are no unassailable reasons for believing in a God.For skeptics looking for appealing ways to approach their believing friends or believers who are not afraid to consider a skeptical challenge, this book makes for very stimulating reading.

    "A stinging indictment of 'Christianity' by which Armstrong means not the teaching of Jesus or official Christian doctrine but the influence of major scholars and theologians throughout Western history."—Library Journal

    No round of beef or tongue or ham is expressly cooked for me, no pigeon-pie is especially made for me, no hotel-advertisement is personally addressed to me, no hotel-room tapestried with great-coats and railway wrappers is set apart for me, no house of public entertainment in the United Kingdom greatly cares for my opinion of its brandy or sherry.

    "Before You Read This" (first published as Todd Klein print)"Featherquest" (first published in Imagine #14)"Jerusalem" (first broadcast by BBC Radio 4)"Feminine Endings" (first published in Four Letter Word)"Orange" (first published in The Starry Rift)"Orphee" (first published in Orphee (CD))"Ghosts in the Machines" (first published in The New York Times[3])"The Annotated Brothers Grimm: Grimmer Than You Thought" (first published in The New York Times[4])"Black House" (first published in The Washington Post)"Summerland" (first published in The Washington Post)"The View from the Cheap Seats" (first published in The Guardian[5])"Once Upon a Time" (first published in The Guardian[6])"Introduction to Hothouse" (first published in Hothouse)"Entitlement Issues" (first published at Neil Gaiman's Blog[7]))"Freedom of Icky Speech" (first published at Neil Gaiman's blog[8]))"Harvey Awards Speech 2004" (first published at Neil Gaiman's blog[9]))"Nebula Award Speech 2005" (first published at Neil Gaiman's blog[10]))"Conjunctions" (first published in Mythic Delirium #20)

    But the truth is, they're not nearly skeptical enough.While they champion the importance of a critical stance toward religion, they often fail to take that same stance toward their own beliefs. This double standard results in grandiose claims about the certainty of unbelief. However, their confidence in the rational strength of their own position is logically inconsistent at best and intellectually dishonest at worst. Turning atheists' skepticism around on their own naturalist worldview, philosopher Mitch Stokes critically examines two things that such skeptics hold dear—science and morality—revealing deep inconsistencies among atheists' most cherished beliefs, inconsistencies that threaten to undo atheism itself.

    I'm a Time Lord. I'm from the planet Gallifrey in the constellation of Kasterborous. And I'm the man who's going to save your life.'He's made a mark on almost every era of history, and he's touched millions of lives across space and time. In these pages you'll find just some of the stories behind those brief encounters, each of them addressing the question that must never, ever be answered: 'Doctor Who?'This is the story of an impossible life - of a man who borrowed a spaceship, travelled through time and continually saved the universe - as told by the Doctor's friends, by his enemies, and by the man himself. Letters, journals, trial records, secret government files and the occasional bit of tabloid journalism reveal the never-before-told story of Gallifrey's last Time Lord.

    intelligence agencies wracked by internal power struggles and paralyzed by bureaucracy, the president has been forced to establish his own clandestine group--Covert-One. It's activated only as a last resort, when the threat is on a global scale and time is running out.THE UTOPIA EXPERIMENTWhen Dresner Industries unveils the Merge, a device that is destined to revolutionize the world and make the personal computer and smartphone obsolete, Covert-One operative Colonel Jon Smith is assigned to assess its military potential. He discovers that enhanced vision, real-time battlefield displays, unbreakable security, and near-perfect marksmanship are only the beginning of a technology that will change the face of warfare forever--and one that must be kept out of the hands of America's enemies at all costs.Meanwhile, in the mountains of Afghanistan, CIA operative Randi Russell encounters an entire village of murdered Afghans--all equipped with enhanced Merge technology that even the Agency didn't know existed. As Smith and Russell delve into the circumstances surrounding the Afghans' deaths, they're quickly blocked by someone who seems to have access to the highest levels of the military--a person that even the president knows nothing about.Is the Merge really as secure as its creator claims? And what secrets about its development is the Pentagon so desperate to hide? Smith and Russell are determined to learn the truth. But they may pay for it with their lives . . .

    The nearly one hundred of his prayers gathered here from published works and private papers, not only illuminate his own life of prayer, but speak to the concerns of Christians today.The second part of the volume is a reinterpretation of the life and thought of Kierkegaard. Long regarded as primarily a poet or a philosopher, Kierkegaard is revealed as a fundamentally religious thinker whose central problem was that of becoming a Christian, of realizing personal existence. Perry D. LeFevre's penetrating analysis takes the reader to the religious center of Kierkegaard's world.