This gripping tale of bigotry and class distinctions includes political corruption, greed, injustice, murder, and betrayal. While Albo Jablonski endures the atrocious conditions of the state penitentiary, his son Nickels, daughter Antonia, and their friends Kurt and Charlie are tormented by the knowledge that he is innocent. Zemsta is a powerful, character-driven story of three boyhood friends during the tumultuous days of Prohibition that explores the meaning of friendship, family, love, and loyalty."Brown's debut novel recounts how a young woman's murder affects the lives of childhood friends. But it is the portrayal of real-world history--the height of Prohibition, the early days of cinema--that makes the book such a gem. A nostalgic, authentic novel that charms with its vintage hue." --Kirkus ReviewsFrom the Author: Zemsta makes an excellent choice for book clubs. If you are interested in having the author join your book club discussion by Skype, just send a note by e-mail (located in the back of the book) to set it up.

    The East India Company rules India - or most of it; and its most notorious and celebrated son, Xavier Mountstuart, has gone missing.William Avery, a down-at-heel junior officer in the Company's army, is sent to find him, in the unlikely company of the enigmatic and uncouth Jeremiah Blake. A more mismatched duo couldn't be imagined, but they must bury their differences as they are caught up in a search that turns up too many unanswered questions and seems bound to end in failure.What was it that so captivated Mountstuart about the Thugs, the murderous sect of Kali-worshippers who strangle innocent travellers by the roadside? Who is Jeremiah Blake and can he be trusted? And why is the whole enterprise shrouded in such secrecy?In the dark heart of Company India, Avery will have to fight for his very life, and in defence of a truth he will wish he had never learned.M. J. Carter is a former journalist and the author of two acclaimed works of non-fiction: Anthony Blunt: His Lives and The Three Emperors: Three Cousins, Three Empires and the Road to World War One.

     It is 219 BC and Carthage has a new General who is intent on expanding their colonies in Iberia, but resistance is growing. Violent raids up and down the east coast of Iberia are occurring. Caros is the son of a wealthy trader and discovers his family murdered after a raid on their village. Honour bound to avenge their murders Caros turns from trader to warrior to hunt his family's killers. In doing so he befriends a gifted tracker, gains prestige among strange, foreign horsemen and falls in love with a beautiful woman. For Caros, peace and happiness are elusive though as resistance to Carthage finally ignites a conflagration that will change the course of history. He finds himself riding to battle in the army a young Carthaginian General and while doing so becomes a hero of his people. Even heroes can be broken though... A portion of the net proceeds of the sale of this book goes to FFI (Registered Charity Number 1011100) for the preservation of our natural world and wildlife. This is inspired by their work to save the critically endangered Iberian Lynx which is referred to numerous times in the novel.

    Comprised of a surprising mix of newly minted professionals, ex-prisoners, intellectuals, musicians, and faithful Party workers, the community is vibrant and resilient and life in Magadan thrives even under the cover of near-perpetual snow. By blending history and fable, each of Melnik's stories transports us somewhere completely new: a married Magadan woman considers a proposition from an Italian footballer in '70s Moscow; an ailing young girl visits a witch doctor’s house where nothing is as it seems; a middle-aged dance teacher is entranced by a new student’s raw talent; a former Soviet boss tells his granddaughter the story of a thorny friendship; and a woman in 1958 jumps into a marriage with an army officer far too soon.Weaving in and out of the last half of the twentieth century, Snow in May is an inventive, gorgeously rendered, and touching portrait of lives lived on the periphery where, despite their isolation—and perhaps because of it—the most seemingly insignificant moments can be beautiful, haunting, and effervescent.

    As Aimee tries to unravel the web of lies and secrets surrounding her husband’s death, she unwittingly becomes a pawn in a revolutionary plot against Egypt’s king. With the discovery of a twenty-year-old diary, the mystery only deepens. As Aimee gets ever closer to the truth, she discovers startling parallels between her own life and that of the mother she never knew. Unfolding in the city’s brothels, hashish cafes, and jasmine-scented colonial mansions, The Hidden is a gritty, sensual tale of revolution, betrayal, and the lengths we will go to for love—and truth.

    When Hitler came to power in 1933, one Jewish family refused to be destroyed and defied the Nazis only to come up against another struggle-confronting apartheid in South...

    With uncommon perception and wit, duBois explores the power of memory, the depths of human courage, and the endurance of love.In St. Petersburg, Russia, world chess champion Aleksandr Bezetov begins a quixotic quest: He launches a dissident presidential campaign against Vladimir Putin. He knows he will not win—and that he is risking his life in the process—but a deeper conviction propels him forward.   In Cambridge, Massachusetts, thirty-year-old English lecturer Irina Ellison struggles for a sense of purpose. Irina is certain she has inherited Huntington’s disease—the same cruel illness that ended her father’s life. When Irina finds an old, photocopied letter her father wrote to the young Aleksandr Bezetov, she makes a fateful decision. Her father asked the chess prodigy a profound question—How does one proceed in a lost cause?—but never received an adequate reply. Leaving everything behind, Irina travels to Russia to find Bezetov and get an answer for her father, and for herself.

    He is excited and afraid; he wants to recapture the love he knew with his parents before they died and become a doctor like his father. But in his new home of celebrities, crooks, untrustworthiness, and excessively wealthy deviants, lust and want thwart his search for selfless caring love, and in his quest to become a doctor, he discovers the altruism of health care and scientific discovery riddled with profit motivation and deficient moral standards. A finalist in the 2012 William Faulkner-William Wisdom Creative Writing Competition.