The year is 1364, and the brothers Grossbart have embarked on a naïve quest for fortune. Descended from a long line of graverobbers, they are determined to follow their family's footsteps to the fabled crypts of Gyptland. To get there, they will have to brave dangerous and unknown lands and keep company with all manner of desperate travelers-merchants, priests, and scoundrels alike. For theirs is a world both familiar and distant; a world of living saints and livelier demons, of monsters and madmen. The Brothers Grossbart are about to discover that all legends have their truths, and worse fates than death await those who would take the red road of villainy.

    But before Zel has a plan, Dyl is taken by strangers using bizarre sensory weapons, and Zel finds herself in a safe house for teens who aren’t like any she’s ever seen before—teens who shouldn’t even exist. Using broken-down technology, her new friends’ peculiar gifts, and her own grit, Zel must find a way to get her sister back from the kidnappers who think a powerful secret is encoded in Dyl’s DNA. Set in 2150—in a world of automatic cars, nightclubs with auditory ecstasy drugs, and guys with four arms—this is about the human genetic “mistakes” that society wants to forget, and the way that outcasts can turn out to be heroes.

    Sending one young woman through may be the key to survival for the kingdom of Fourline. Strapped for cash, college student Natalie Barns agrees to take a job at a costume shop. Sure, Estos—her classmate who works in the shop—is a little odd, but Nat needs the money for her tuition.Then she stumbles through the mysterious door behind the shop—and her entire universe transforms.Discovering there’s far more to Estos than she ever imagined, Nat gets swept up in an adventure to save his homeland, an incredible world filled with decaying magic, deadly creatures, and a noble resistance of exiled warriors battling dark forces. As she struggles with her role in an epic conflict and wrestles with her growing affection for a young rebel, Soris, Nat quickly learns that nothing may go as planned…and her biggest challenge may be surviving long enough to make it home.

    He was so impressed with the entries that he recommended they be published together in one book, which Cemetery Dance Publications and Hodder & Stoughton are pleased to report has become a reality. The six stories are: WILD SWIMMING by Elodie Harper EAU-DE-ERIC by Manuela Saragosa THE SPOTS by Paul Bassett Davies THE UNPICKING by Michael Button LA MORT DE L'AMANT by Stuart Johnstone THE BEAR TRAP by Neil Hudson Reader beware: the stories will make you think twice before cuddling up to your old soft toy, dipping your toe into the water or counting the spots on a leopard…

    Now the nobleman, and collector of rare artifacts, has entrusted Bingmei and the skilled team with a treacherous assignment: brave the wilderness’s dangers to retrieve the treasures of a lost palace buried in a glacier valley. But upsetting its tombs has a price.Echion, emperor of the Grave Kingdom, ruler of darkness, Dragon of Night, has long been entombed. Now Bingmei has unwittingly awakened him and is answerable to a legendary prophecy. Destroying the dark lord before he reclaims the kingdoms of the living is her inherited mission. Killing Bingmei before she fulfills it is Echion’s. Thrust unprepared into the role of savior, urged on by a renegade prince, and possessing a magic that is her destiny, Bingmei knows what she must do. But what must she risk to honor her ancestors? Bingmei’s fateful choice is one that neither her friends nor her enemies can foretell, as Echion’s dark war for control unfolds.

    Over time, humans lost their connection with a world they had been created to protect, they forgot the ways of their ancient creators, and accepted the Tyrant’s lies as truths from the mouth of a god.  Now, deep in the forests that surround Gray Mountain, two bears find a small child that is abandoned and left for dead. The bears name him Evercloud, raise him as a member of their kingdom, and teach the boy of the Ancients, all underneath the light of the Everflame, the flame that burns atop Gray Mountain as a monument to the integrity and spirit of the bears.  As Evercloud grows, rumors reach the bear kingdom of the Ancients’ return, and now the young man must leave his home to find them and help save the world he holds dear.  Will Evercloud lose himself in the darkness of the Great Tyrant’s lies, or will he have the courage to judge his own heart, the strength to master the darkness, and the faith to follow his purpose until it burns within his heart like the Everflame?

    Aldwinkle. Here, Mrs. Aldwinkle yearns to recapture the glories of the Italian Renaissance, but her guests ultimately fail to fulfill her naive expectations. Among her entourage are: a suffering poet and reluctant editor of the "Rabbit Fanciers' Gazette" who silently bears the widowed Mrs. Aldwinkle's desperate advances; a popular novelist who records every detail of her affair with another guest, the amorous Calamy, for future literary endeavors; and an aging sensualist philosopher who pursues a wealthy yet mentally-disabled heiress. Stripping the houseguests of their pretensions, Huxley reveals the superficiality of the cultural elite. Deliciously satirical, Those Barren Leaves bites the hands of those who dare to posture or feign sophistication and is as comically fresh today as when first published.

    It is the moment when the universe suffers a crisis of conscience. Should it expand or make a great big bang? It decides to wind the clock back a decade to 1991, making everyone in the world endure ten years of deja-vu and a total loss of free will - not to mention the torture of reliving every nanosecond of one of the tawdiest and most hollow decades. With his trademark wicked wit, Vonnegut addresses memory, suicide, the Great Depression, the loss of American eloquence, and the obsolescent thrill of reading books.

    It is, in its earliest form, a spontaneous and instinctive endeavor to shape the facts of the world to meet the needs of the imagination, the cravings of the heart.Classics included in this volume include:One Eye, Two Eyes, Three Eyes,The Magic Mirror,The Enchanted Stag,Hansel and Grethel,The Story of Aladdin,This Story of Ali Baba,The Second Voyage of Sinbad the Sailor,The White Cat,The Golden Goose,The Twelve Brothers,The Fair One With the Golden Locks,Tom Thumb,Blue Beard,Cinderella,Puss In Boots,The Sleeping Beauty In the Wood,Jack and The Bean-Stalk

    Over the centuries, cities and governments have risen and fallen beyond the concent's walls. Three times during history's darkest epochs violence born of superstition and ignorance has invaded and devastated the cloistered mathic community. Yet the avout have always managed to adapt in the wake of catastrophe, becoming out of necessity even more austere and less dependent on technology and material things. And Erasmas has no fear of the outside—the Extramuros—for the last of the terrible times was long, long ago.Now, in celebration of the week-long, once-in-a-decade rite of Apert, the fraas and suurs prepare to venture beyond the concent's gates—at the same time opening them wide to welcome the curious "extras" in. During his first Apert as a fraa, Erasmas eagerly anticipates reconnecting with the landmarks and family he hasn't seen since he was "collected." But before the week is out, both the existence he abandoned and the one he embraced will stand poised on the brink of cataclysmic change.Powerful unforeseen forces jeopardize the peaceful stability of mathic life and the established ennui of the Extramuros—a threat that only an unsteady alliance of saecular and avout can oppose—as, one by one, Erasmas and his colleagues, teachers, and friends are summoned forth from the safety of the concent in hopes of warding off global disaster. Suddenly burdened with a staggering responsibility, Erasmas finds himself a major player in a drama that will determine the future of his world—as he sets out on an extraordinary odyssey that will carry him to the most dangerous, inhospitable corners of the planet . . . and beyond.

    Unlike other translations of the Bar do thos grol, the so-called Tibetan Book of the Dead , Robert Thurman's takes literally the entire gamut of metaphysical assumptions. The Bar do thos grol, or as Thurman translates, The Great Book of Natural Liberation through Understanding in the Between, is but one of many mortuary texts of Nyingma sect of Tibetan Buddhism and is commonly recited to or by a person facing imminent death. Thurman reproduces it for this purpose, explaining in some depth the Tibetan conception of post-mortem existence. Over as many as 12 days, the deceased person is given explanations of what he or she sees and experiences and is guided through innumerable visions of the realms beyond to reach eventual liberation, or, failing that, a safe rebirth. Like a backpacker's guide to a foreign land, Thurman's version is clear, detailed, and sympathetic to the inexperienced voyager, including background and supplementary information, even illustrations (sorry, no maps). Don't wait until the journey has begun, every page should be read and memorised well ahead of time. --Brian Bruya

    When an opportunity to join the Mechanized Infantry presents itself, Pete is first in line. He knows that he's going to get shot at one way or another, but the idea of sitting in a warm and more importantly, dry mechanized suit appeals to him almost beyond reason. While still training in the jungle, Pete's squad is called out to intervene in a skirmish in a nearby village. Of course, the Marines haven't seen fit to certify his squad with ordnance. The fact that they'll be up against a platoon of squishies doesn't convince him that's it's any better of an idea and things turn quickly to crap when they discover the squishies are protected by grav-tanks. Pete, Popeye and Olive is a fast paced, short-story with plenty of action.

    That edition was on the cutting edge of what was then known about the origins and nature of the universe. But the intervening years have seen extraordinary advances in the technology of observing both the micro- and the macrocosmic worlds. These observations have confirmed many of Professor Hawking's theoretical predictions in the first edition of his book, including the recent discoveries of the Cosmic Background Explorer satellite (COBE), which probed back in time to within 300,000 years of the universe's beginning and revealed wrinkles in the fabric of space-time that he had projected. Eager to bring to his original text the new knowledge revealed by these observations, as well as his own recent research, Professor Hawking has prepared a new introduction to the book, written an entirely new chapter on wormholes and time travel, and updated the chapters throughout.

    But as she forms an unlikely connection with her abductor, Luke, her adventure takes a strange turn.There is nothing magical about growing up in a mountainside castle, when it’s your prison. Kaya’s ruthless and powerful father keeps her under lock and key, watched every second of the day–and Kaya’s not really sure why. She’s just a normal girl…no one special. She doesn’t understand her father’s obsession with her safety – until she is kidnapped. Dragged through a brutal wilderness, Kaya’s captor shows her the devastating truth, and even though he has dark secrets of his own, she is inexplicably drawn to him–when the stars are in your eyes, sometimes the line between right and wrong is blurred. Passion obliterates common sense. Love... makes you reckless. As Kaya's father’s men and her devoted bodyguard scour the woods to find her, she wonders if staying in the arms of her abductor is the safer place to be. At least, that’s what her heart is saying—her head is saying run… Dangerously passionate and darkly romantic, SERENADE is a page-turning thriller and seductive love story.

    Inspired by old favorites as well as lesser-known tales, find retellings of Cinderella, Beauty and the Beast, Sleeping Beauty, The Little Mermaid, Old Rinkrank, King Thrushbeard, The Princess and the Pea, and many more - all with fresh, romantic twists - just in time for Valentine’s Day~ THE GLASS MOUNTAIN - Alethea Kontis On the way to her wedding, brave and clever Princess Sabine falls into a Glass Mountain, where she is trapped with a crotchety man she calls “Old Rinkrank.” The two form a unique, unlikely friendship while working to escape. THE BAKERS GRIMM - Hailey Edwards When two struggling business owners compete for the contract of a lifetime, it’s all bakers on deck. Mix in a dollop of rivalry, a tablespoon of romance, and a pinch of magic, and you’ve got the recipe for one heck of a bake-off. May the best decorator win! GALATEA AND PYGMALION - Kate Danley A young woman in ancient Greece is tasked with carving a new statue for Aphrodite's temple. But what happens when she falls in love with her art? RED– Sarra Cannon Charlotte is searching for a cure to save her sister, but what she finds in the woods is not at all what she expects... PRINCESS CHARMING – Yasmine Galenorn Sometimes, the road to Happily Ever After leads a girl right past Prince Charming... into the arms of his sister. MAD ABOUT YOU – Jennifer Blackstream Alice doesn't want to marry the Mad Hatter. Will an unexpected trip to Wonderland change her mind? THE SEA KING'S DAUGHTER—Anthea Sharp A mermaid gives up everything to be with the mortal man she loves – but can there be a happy ending when the Sea Witch intervenes? ROMEO AND JULIET: THE AFTERLIFE – Julia Crane Juliet enters the afterlife and discovers the truth behind her relationship with Romeo and Paris - and that their greatest challenge is yet to come. SOOT AND STONE: A Fae Tale of the Otherworld - Jenna Elizabeth Johnson Aisling, a young Faelorehn artist, finds herself falling for the son of one of the famed Tuatha De Danann. The only problem is, she’s unaware of his true identity, and her selfish uncle will do anything to keep her from realizing her dreams. THE HUNTSMAN'S SNOW – Mandy M. Roth Sometimes, a prince isn’t as charming as history would like you to believe. And sometimes, a princess needs an alpha male shifter to find her happily ever after. RUMPELIMPSKIN - Debra Dunbar An imp finds herself in a fairytale world without her infernal powers facing an impossible task. Will Sam barter away her firstborn? Will her angelic main-squeeze save her? Or will she come up with a devilish solution of her own? THE GLASS SKY - Alexia Purdy Star’s refusal of suitors lined up for her hand has her family in knots, but when the city is bombed and overthrown, she loses everything. After she’s rescued by a handsome stranger named Clyde, she sneaks away to save her parents but finds herself trapped in the new president’s clutches. RUSH - C. Gockel Misogyny is a beast. When the incarnation of Creation gets angry at Rush for innocently stating his opinion, she curses him to find true love in two weeks … or else. PERCHANCE TO DREAM – Phaedra Weldon Her first love has been placed under a spell.THE TOAD PRINCE - Nikki JeffordIsabel Ivers’s stepfather will do anything to secure his place as Far North’s new ruler, even if it means marrying her off to the depraved prince of the lowlands.CRAFTED WITH A KISS - Shawntelle MadisonDespite fighting in countless battles to bring peace to warring kingdoms, Pynnelope, a warrior maiden made of wood, knows no fear. Becoming human is all she desires until she discovers she can have so much more.A SMALL MAGIC - Devon MonkA cursed princess, a talking pea, and a wish that changes everything.