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Random House, Inc.
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The third volume of Somerset Maugham's Collected Short Stories, introduced by the author, contains the celebrated series about Ashenden, a secret service agent in World War I. Based on Maugham's own experiences with the British Intelligence service in Switzerland, the stories are vignettes in which he dramatizes both the romance and absurdity of espionage as well as its ruthlessness and brutality. Accountable only to 'R', Ashenden travels all over the Continent on assignments which entangle him with such characters as the traitor Grantley Caypor, the passionate Guilia Lazzari, and the sinister 'hairless Mexican'. |
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A treasure trove is discovered deep beneath Camelot but when the spirit of an evil sorcerer is unwittingly unleashed, Merlin quickly discovers that all that glitters is not gold. Meanwhile, a deadly assassin has arrived in Camelot. His aim? To kill Arthur. Will Merlin be able to save the prince from the killer's lethal blade... |
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When Merlin and Morgana join forces to save a child the king has commanded to death, they soon discover that going against King Uther could prove fatal. Meanwhile, a mysterious black knight arrives to challenge the Knights of Camelot to mortal combat. Old secrets, long hidden, are stirring and the king is afraid for his only son. The black knight seems invincible and Merlin senses that only magic can stop him. |
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«Moonwalk» is the only book about his life that Michael Jackson ever wrote. It chronicles his humble beginnings in the Midwest, his early days with the Jackson 5, and his unprecedented solo success. Giving absolutely unrivalled insight into the King of Pop's life, it details his songwriting process for hits like «Beat It, Rock With You», «Billie Jean», and «We Are the World»; and describes how he developed his signature dance style, including the «Moon Walk». It also opens the door to his very private personal relationships with his family, including sister Janet, and stars like Diana Ross, Berry Gordy, Marlon Brando, Quincy Jones, Paul McCartney, and Brooke Shields. At the time of its original publication in 1988, «Moonwalk» broke the fiercely guarded barrier of silence that surrounded Michael Jackson. Candidly and courageously, Jackson talks openly about his wholly exceptional career and the crushing isolation of his fame, as well as the unfair rumors that have surrounded it. «Moonwalk» is illustrated with rare photographs from Jackson family albums and Michael's personal photographic archives, as well as a drawing done by Michael exclusively for the book. It reveals and celebrates, as no other book can, the life of this exceptional and beloved musician.» |
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No more struggling against the wind to fold back the extra large city map you picked up at the tourist office. The unique Everyman MapGuide series cleverly combines maps and text in an easy-to-use format, listing the best sights, restaurants and shops alongside fold-out maps of exceptional clarity. Each guide divides the city into sections and devotes two double pages to each of them. Sections are colour coded, and a small area map at the bottom of the page tells you where you are within the city, and within the guide. There are also four pages of useful information about the city at the front of the book, and a four-page city-wide hotel section at the back; plus a street index and thematic index. Stylish, clever, practical and, at GBP5.99, very good value for money, a MapGuide is the indispensable pocket companion to your week end or short break away. |
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Quintessential Tyler, yet full of surprises a perfectly pitched, enchanting and affecting novel about a man adrift in his own life, Noah's Compass chimes gently, heartbreakingly with our times. With the humour and poignancy of her classic The Accidental Tourist (though with a protagonist who doesn't venture far from home) Anne Tyler's new novel tells the story of a year in the life of Liam Pennywell, a man in his sixty-first year. A classical pedant, he's just been let go from his schoolteaching job and downsizes to a tiny out-of-town apartment, where he goes to bed early and alone on his first night. Widowed, re-married, divorced and the father of three daughters, Liam is a man who is proud of his recall but has learned to dodge issues and skirt adventure. An unpleasant event occurs, though, to jolt him out of his certainty. Obsessed with a frightening gap in his memory, he sets out to uncover what happened, and finds instead an unusual woman with secrets of her own, and a late-flowering love that brings its own thorny problems. His ex-wife (sensible Barbara) and daughters worry about him but Liam blunders on, His teenage daughter Kitty is sent to stay — though its not clear who is minding whom. His middle daughter, Louise, is a born-again Christian with a son called Jonah, but her certainties leave Liam still more perplexed. Noahs Compass is about memory and its loss, about incidents and relationships which open up sight lines into a painful past long dead for a man who becomes aware that merely trying to stay afloat may not be enough. |
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«Welcome to the village of Notwithstanding where a lady dresses in plus fours and shoots squirrels, a retired general gives up wearing clothes altogether, a spiritualist lives in a cottage with the ghost of her husband, and people think it quite natural to confide in a spider that lives in a potting shed. Based on de Bernieres' recollections of the village he grew up in, «Notwithstanding» is a funny and moving depiction of a charming vanished England.» |
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As the mighty alien fleet from the very latest computer game thunders across the computer screen, Johnny prepares to blow them into the usual million pieces. And they send him a message: We surrender. They're not supposed to do that! They're supposed to die. And computer joysticks don't have 'Don't Fire' buttons-But it's only a game, isn't it. Isn't it? |
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Wormold, a vacuum cleaner salesman, was short of money. His daughter had reached an expensive age — so he accepted Hawthorne's offer of $300-plus a month and became Agent 59200/5, MI6's man in Havana. To keep the job, he pretends to recruit sub-agents and sends fake stories. Then they come true. |
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They found him in a small town in Brazil, near the border with Paraguay. He had a new name, Danilo Silva, and his appearance had been changed by plastic surgery. The search had taken four years. They'd chased him around the world, always just missing him. It had cost their clients three and a half million dollars. But so far none of them had complained. The man they were about to kidnap had not always been called Silva. Before, he had another life, a life which ended in a car crash in February 1992. His gravestone lay in a cemetry in Biloxi, Mississippi. His name before his death was Patrick S. Lanigan. He had been a partner at an up and coming law firm. He had a pretty wife, a new daughter, and a bright future. Six weeks after his death, $90 million had disappeared from the law firm. It was then that his partners knew he was still alive, and the long pursuit had begun... |
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During a vicious persecution of the clergy in Mexico, a worldly priest, the whisky priest is on the run. With the police closing in, his routes of escape are being shut off, his chances getting fewer. But compassion and humanity force him along the road to his destiny. |
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Rudy Taylor is a newly qualified lawyer: he has one case, and one case a lone, to save himself from his mounting debts. It is a bad faith case against a giant insurance company which could have saved a young mans life, but has instead refused to pay the claim until it is too late. The settlement could be worth millions of dollars, but there is one problem: Rudy has never argued a case in court before and he is up against the most expensive lawyers that money can buy. |
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«In these pages you can enjoy Christmas dinner with Begbie, and see how warmly Franco greets his sister's boyfriend and the news of their engagement. You will discover, in «The Rosewell Incident», how aliens addicted to Embassy Regal have Midlothian under surveillance, and plan to install the local casuals as the new governors of Planet Earth. You will not be surprised to read that a televised Hibs v. Hearts game might matter more to one character than the life of his wife, or that two guys fighting over a beautiful girl might agree — on reflection, and after a few pills and many pints of lager — that their friendship is actually more important. And you will be delighted to welcome back 'Juice' Terry Lawson, and to watch what happens when he meets his old nemesis, retired schoolmaster Albert Black, under the strobe-lights of a Miami Beach nightclub.» |
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«'Sell the Hall unseen; burn it to the ground and plough the earth with salt, if you will; but never live there...' London, the 1880s. A young girl grows up in a household marked by death, her father distant, her mother in perpetual mourning for the child she lost. Desperate to coax her mother back to health, Constance Langton takes her to a seance. Perhaps they will find comfort from beyond the grave. But that seance has tragic consequences. Constance is left alone, her only legacy a mysterious bequest will blight her life. So begins «The Seance», John Harwood's brilliant second novel, a gripping, dark mystery set in late Victorian England. It is a world of apparitions, of disappearances and unnatural phenomena, of betrayal and blackmail and black-hearted villains — and murder. For Constance's bequest comes in two parts: a house, and a mystery. Years before a family disappeared at Wraxford Hall, a terrifying stately home near the Suffolk coast. Now Constance must find the truth behind the mystery, even at the cost of her life. Because without the truth, she is lost.» |
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A historical tale marking a new turn in Doyle's writing. Born in the slums of Dublin in 1902, his father a one-legged whorehouse bouncer, Henry Smart has to grow up fast. He eventually becomes a Fenian, a rebel, a republican legend — one of Michael Collins's boys, an assassin on a stolen bike. |
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When my parents split up they didn't know what to do with me... My family always lived at Mulberry Cottage. Mum, Dad, me — and Radish, my Sylvanian rabbit. But now, Mum lives with Bill the Baboon and his three kids. Dad lives with Carrie and her twins. And where do I live? I live out of a suitcase. One week with Mum's new family, one week with Dad's. It's as easy as A B C. That's what everyone says. But all I want is to go home — back to Mulberry Cottage... |
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A breathtakingly beautiful supermodel disappears from a swimsuit photo shoot at the most glamorous hotel in Hawaii. Only hours after she goes missing, Kim McDaniels' parents receive a terrifying phone call. Fearing the worst, they board the first flight to Maui and begin the hunt for their daughter. Ex-cop Ben Hawkins, now a reporter for the LA Times, gets the McDaniels assignment. The ineptitude of the local police force defies belief — Ben has to start his own investigation for Kim McDaniels to have a prayer. And for Ben to have the story of his life. All the while, the killer sets the stage for his next production. His audience expects the best — and they won't be disappointed. Swimsuit is a heart-pounding story of fear and desire, transporting you to a place where beauty and murder collide and unspeakable horrors are hidden within paradise. |
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Shy, sensible banker Stuart has trouble with women; that is, until a fortuitous singles night, where he meets Gillian, a picture restorer recovering from a destructive affair. Stuart's best friend Oliver is his complete opposite — a language teacher who 'talks like a dictionary', brash and feckless. Soon Stuart and Gillian are married, but it is not long before a tentative friendship between the three evolves into something far different. Talking it Over is a brilliant and intimate account of love's vicissitudes. It begins as a comedy of misunderstanding, then slowly darkens and deepens, drawing us compellingly into the quagmires of the heart. |
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Written in 1944 but first published in 1985, The Tenth Man is set in a prison in occupied France during World War II and concerns Lewis Chavel, a captured rich lawyer who is probably going to be shot in a German act of reprisal. In a prison in Occupied France one in every ten men is to be shot. The prisoners draw lots among themselves — and for lawyer Louis Chavel it seems that his whole life has been leading up to an agonizing failure of nerve. Hysterical with panic, fear, and a sense of injustice, he offers to barter everything he owns for someone to take his place. |
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«'Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird'. A lawyer's advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee's classic novel — a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. Through the young eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with exuberant humour the irrationality of adult attitudes to race and class in the Deep South of the thirties. The conscience of a town steeped in prejudice, violence and hypocrisy is pricked by the stamina of one man's struggle for justice. But the weight of history will only tolerate so much. «To Kill a Mockingbird» is a coming-of-age story, an anti-racist novel, a historical drama of the Great Depression and a sublime example of the Southern writing tradition.» |
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