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Random House, Inc.
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Michael Farquhar doesn't write about history the way, say, Doris Kearns Goodwin does. He writes about history the way Doris Kearns Goodwin's smart-ass, reprobate kid brother might. I, for one, prefer it. Gene Weingarten, two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and Washington Post columnist Scandal! Intrigue! Cossacks! Here the world's most engaging royal historian chronicles the world's most fascinating imperial dynasty: the Romanovs, whose three-hundred-year reign was remarkable for its shocking violence, spectacular excess, and unimaginable venality. In this incredibly entertaining history, Michael Farquhar collects the best, most captivating true tales of Romanov iniquity. We meet Catherine the Great, with her endless parade of virile young lovers (none of them of the equine variety); her unhinged son, Paul I, who ordered the bones of one of his mother's paramours dug out of its grave and tossed into a gorge; and Grigori Rasputin, the Mad Monk, whose mesmeric domination of the last of the Romanov tsars helped lead to the monarchy's undoing. From Peter the Great's penchant for personally beheading his recalcitrant subjects (he kept the severed head of one of his mistresses pickled in alcohol) to Nicholas and Alexandra's brutal demise at the hands of the Bolsheviks, Secret Lives of the Tsars captures all the splendor and infamy that was Imperial Russia. Praise for Michael Farquhar's Behind the Palace Doors rollicking account of kings and queens gone wild. People Farquhar's style is a breezy pleasure throughout. Publishers Weekly A terrifically accessible history. |
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The prequel to the New York Times bestselling Maze Runner series — The Kill Order is a modern classic for fans of The Hunger Games and Divergent. It can be read alone or as a companion to the action-packed series. Before WICKED was formed, before the Glade was built, before Thomas entered the Maze, sun flares hit the earth and mankind fell to disease. Mark and Trina were there when it happened, and they survived. But surviving the sun flares was easy compared to what came next. Now a disease of rage and lunacy races across the eastern United States, and there's something suspicious about its origin. Worse yet, it's mutating, and all evidence suggests that it will bring humanity to its knees. Mark and Trina are convinced there's a way to save those left living from descending into madness. And they're determined to find it — if they can stay alive. Because in this new, devastated world, every life has a price. And to some, you're worth more dead than alive. |
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Thomas knows that Wicked can't be trusted, but they say the time for lies is over, that they've collected all they can from the Trials and now must rely on the Gladers, with full memories restored, to help them with their ultimate mission. It's up to the Gladers to complete the blueprint for the cure to the Flare with a final voluntary test. What Wicked doesn't know is that something's happened that no Trial or Variable could have foreseen. Thomas has remembered far more than they think. And he knows that he can't believe a word of what Wicked says. The time for lies is over. But the truth is more dangerous than Thomas could ever imagine. Will anyone survive the Death Cure? |
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When Thomas wakes up in the lift, the only thing he can remember is his first name. His memory is blank. But he's not alone. When the lift's doors open, Thomas finds himself surrounded by kids who welcome him to the Glade — a large, open expanse surrounded by stone walls. Just like Thomas, the Gladers don't know why or how they got to the Glade. All they know is that every morning the stone doors to the maze that surrounds them have opened. Every night they've closed tight. And every 30 days a new boy has been delivered in the lift. Thomas was expected. But the next day, a girl is sent up — the first girl to ever arrive in the Glade. And more surprising yet is the message she delivers. Thomas might be more important than he could ever guess. If only he could unlock the dark secrets buried within his mind. |
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Solving the Maze was supposed to be the end. No more puzzles. No more variables. And no more running. Thomas was sure that escape meant he and the Gladers would get their lives back. But no one really knew what sort of life they were going back to. In the Maze, life was easy. They had food, and shelter, and safety... until Teresa triggered the end. In the world outside the Maze, however, the end was triggered long ago. Burned by sun flares and baked by a new, brutal climate, the earth is a wasteland. Government has disintegrated — and with it, order — and now Cranks, people covered in festering wounds and driven to murderous insanity by the infectious disease known as the Flare, roam the crumbling cities hunting for their next victim... and meal. The Gladers are far from finished with running. Instead of freedom, they find themselves faced with another trial. They must cross the Scorch, the most burned-out section of the world, and arrive at a safe haven in two weeks. And WICKED has made sure to adjust the variables and stack the odds against them. Thomas can only wonder — does he hold the secret of freedom somewhere in his mind? Or will he forever be at the mercy of WICKED? |
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Hot on the heels of the New York Times best seller William Shakespeare's Star Wars comes the next two installments of the original trilogy: William Shakespeare's The Empire Striketh Back and William Shakespeare's The Jed Doth Return. Return to the star-crossed galaxy far, far away as the brooding young hero, a power-mad emperor, and their jesting droids match wits, struggle for power, and soliloquize in elegant and impeccable iambic pentameter. Illustrated with beautiful black-and-white Elizabethan-style artwork, these two plays offer essential reading for all ages. Something Wookiee this way comes! |
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Two centuries of literary homages to the fascinating feline: stories by writers of every stripe — from P.G. Wodehouse to Doris Lessing, from Damon Runyon to Steven Millhauser. The essential unknowableness of cats has inspired many flights of fancy: Italo Calvino's secret city of cats in The Garden of Stubborn Cats, the disappearing feline in Ursula K. Le Guin's mind-twisting Schrodinger's Cat, the cartoon rodent and his cartoon nemesis in Steven Millhauser's Cat 'n' Mouse. Cats flaunt their superiority in Angela Carter's bawdy retelling of Puss-in-Boots and in Stephen Vincent Benet's The King of the Cats, in which two impossibly suave foreigners are revealed as even more exotic than they pretend to be. In The Islands by Alice Adams and I See You, Bianca by Maeve Brennan we see how much cats can mean to their humans. And the inimitable Saki lets us hear what cats really think of us in Tobermory, his tale of a tactless talking animal. In these and other stories, this delightful book offers cat lovers a many-faceted tribute to the beguilingly mysterious objects of their affection. |
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Eating and drinking and the rituals that go with them are at least as important as loving in most people's lives, yet for every hundred anthologies of poems about love, hardly one is devoted to the pleasures of the table. Eat, Drink, and Be Merry abundantly fills the gap. All kinds of foods and beverages are laid out in these pages, along with picnics and banquets, intimate suppers and quiet dinners, noisy parties and public celebrations — in poems by Horace, Catullus, Hafiz, Rumi, Rilke, Moore, Nabokov, Updike, Mandelstam, Stevens, and many others. From Sylvia Plath's ecstatic vision of juice-laden berries in Blackberrying to D. H. Lawrence's lush celebration of Figs, from the civilized comfort of Noe l Coward's Something on a Tray to the salacious provocation of Swift's Oysters, from Li Po on Drinking Alone to Baudelaire on The Soul of the Wine, and from Emily Dickinson's Forbidden Fruit to Elizabeth Bishop's A Miracle for Breakfast, Eat, Drink, and Be Merry serves up a tantalizing and variegated literary feast. |
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Explosive in both its pace and its revelations, The Third Secret is a remarkable international thriller. Bestselling author Steve Berry tackles some of the most controversial ideas of our time in a breakneck journey through the history of the Church and the future of religion. Fatima, Portugal, 1917: The Virgin Mary appears to three peasant children, sharing with them three secrets, two of which are soon revealed to the world. The third secret is sealed away in the Vatican, read only by popes, and not disclosed until the year 2000. When revealed, its quizzical tone and anticlimactic nature leave many faithful wondering if the Church has truly unveiled all of the Virgin Mary’s words–or if a message far more important has been left in the shadows. Vatican City, present day: Papal secretary Father Colin Michener is concerned for the Pope. Night after restless night, Pope Clement XV enters the Vatican’s Riserva, the special archive open only to popes, where the Church’s most clandestine and controversial documents are stored. Though unsure of the details, Michener knows that the Pope’s distress stems from the revelations of Fatima. Equally concerned, but not out of any sense of compassion, is Alberto Cardinal Valendrea, the Vatican’s Secretary of State,. Valendrea desperately covets the papacy, having narrowly lost out to Clement at the last conclave. Now the Pope’s interest in Fatima threatens to uncover a shocking ancient truth that Valendrea has kept to himself for many years. When Pope Clement sends Michener to the Romanian highlands, then to a Bosnian holy site, in search of a priest–possibly one of the last people on Earth who knows Mary’s true message–a perilous set of events unfolds. Michener finds himself embroiled in murder, suspicion, suicide, deceit, and his forbidden passion for a beloved woman. In a desperate search for answers, he travels to Pope Clement’s birthplace in Germany, where he learns that the third secret of Fatima may dictate the very fate of the Church–a fate now lying in Michener’s own hands. |
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The perfect gift for fans of The Hunger Games and Divergent, this boxed set includes all of the paperback editions of James Dashner's #1 New York Times bestselling series--The Maze Runner, The Scorch Trials, The Death Cure and The Kill Order. The first book, The Maze Runner, is now a major motion picture featuring the star of MTV's Teen Wolf, Dylan O’Brien; Kaya Scodelario;Aml Ameen; Will Poulter; and Thomas Brodie-Sangster! Also look for James Dashner’s newest novels, The Eye of Minds and The Rule of Thoughts, the first two books in the Mortality Doctrine series. |
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From this magically right beginning came the concept of Beginner Books, exacting blends of words and pictures that encourage children to read — all by themselves. Hailed by elementary educators and remedial reading specialists, these enormously popular books are now used in schools and libraries throughout the English-speaking world. |
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In Innocence, Dean Koontz blends mystery, suspense, and acute insight into the human soul in a masterfully told tale that will resonate with readers forever. He lives in solitude beneath the city, an exile from society, which will destroy him if he is ever seen. She dwells in seclusion, a fugitive from enemies who will do her harm if she is ever found. But the bond between them runs deeper than the tragedies that have scarred their lives. Something more than chance—and nothing less than destiny—has brought them together in a world whose hour of reckoning is fast approaching. |
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Crazy Rich Asians is the outrageously funny debut novel about three super-rich, pedigreed Chinese families and the gossip, backbiting, and scheming that occurs when the heir to one of the most massive fortunes in Asia brings home his ABC (American-born Chinese) girlfriend to the wedding of the season. When Rachel Chu agrees to spend the summer in Singapore with her boyfriend, Nicholas Young, she envisions a humble family home, long drives to explore the island, and quality time with the man she might one day marry. What she doesn't know is that Nick's family home happens to look like a palace, that she'll ride in more private planes than cars, and that with one of Asia's most eligible bachelors on her arm, Rachel might as well have a target on her back. Initiated into a world of dynastic splendor beyond imagination, Rachel meets Astrid, the It Girl of Singapore society; Eddie, whose family practically lives in the pages of the Hong Kong socialite magazines; and Eleanor, Nick's formidable mother, a woman who has very strong feelings about who her son should--and should not--marry. Uproarious, addictive, and filled with jaw-dropping opulence, Crazy Rich Asians is an insider's look at the Asian JetSet; a perfect depiction of the clash between old money and new money; between Overseas Chinese and Mainland Chinese; and a fabulous novel about what it means to be young, in love, and gloriously, crazily rich. |
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John Grisham takes you back to where it all began. One of the most popular novels of our time, A Time to Kill established John Grisham as the master of the legal thriller. Now we return to Ford County as Jake Brigance finds himself embroiled in a fiercely controversial trial that exposes a tortured history of racial tension. Seth Hubbard is a wealthy man dying of lung cancer. He trusts no one. Before he hangs himself from a sycamore tree, Hubbard leaves a new, handwritten will. It is an act that drags his adult children, his black maid, and Jake into a conflict as riveting and dramatic as the murder trial that made Brigance one of Ford County’s most notorious citizens, just three years earlier. The second will raises many more questions than it answers. Why would Hubbard leave nearly all of his fortune to his maid? Had chemotherapy and painkillers affected his ability to think clearly? And what does it all have to do with a piece of land once known as Sycamore Row? |
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Colorful illustrations and exciting words make these spelling flashcards fun for any kid! We’ve selected 230 words to help your child develop skills in phonics and spelling, and included 10 more blank cards so your child can add personal words like family names or favorite foods. Plus, you can keep track of which words your child has learned with the color-coded meter on the side of this box. Once your child feels comfortable with a card, flip it upside down, move it to the back of the box behind the divider, and watch your child’s reading skillset grow! |
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Never go back — but Jack Reacher does, and the past finally catches up with him... Never Go Back is Lee Child’s new novel of action-charged suspense starring “one of the best thriller characters at work today” (Newsweek). |
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Marriage can be a real killer. One of the most critically acclaimed suspense writers of our time, New York Times bestseller Gillian Flynn takes that statement to its darkest place in this unputdownable masterpiece about a marriage gone terribly, terribly wrong. The Chicago Tribune proclaimed that her work “draws you in and keeps you reading with the force of a pure but nasty addiction.” Gone Girl’s toxic mix of sharp-edged wit and deliciously chilling prose creates a nerve-fraying thriller that confounds you at every turn. On a warm summer morning in North Carthage, Missouri, it is Nick and Amy Dunne’s fifth wedding anniversary. Presents are being wrapped and reservations are being made when Nick’s clever and beautiful wife disappears from their rented McMansion on the Mississippi River. Husband-of-the-Year Nick isn’t doing himself any favors with cringe-worthy daydreams about the slope and shape of his wife’s head, but passages from Amy's diary reveal the alpha-girl perfectionist could have put anyone dangerously on edge. Under mounting pressure from the police and the media—as well as Amy’s fiercely doting parents—the town golden boy parades an endless series of lies, deceits, and inappropriate behavior. Nick is oddly evasive, and he’s definitely bitter—but is he really a killer? As the cops close in, every couple in town is soon wondering how well they know the one that they love. With his twin sister, Margo, at his side, Nick stands by his innocence. Trouble is, if Nick didn’t do it, where is that beautiful wife? And what was in that silvery gift box hidden in the back of her bedroom closet? With her razor-sharp writing and trademark psychological insight, Gillian Flynn delivers a fast-paced, devilishly dark, and ingeniously plotted thriller that confirms her status as one of the hottest writers around. |
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Collected for the first time, here are the twelve extraordinary illustrated volumes that form the graphic novel of THE VAMPIRE LESTAT. Evocative full-color paintings and an artful abridgment of the original text capture the inimitable spirit and atmosphere of this passionate, complex, and thrilling tale. The story begins in our own time with Lestat, tall, blond, and handsome, a world-renowned rock star. His gifts are timeless, his youth never withers. But he was not always the powerful and famous child of darkness. Before his long earth-encrusted sleep, he was an aristocrat in the heady days of pre-Revolutionary France. It was then that he came face-to-face with the incarnation of evil and the temptations of love that he has ravenously pursued through time. Where it has led him and what he has become is the heart of the tale that has captured millions of readers. |
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First published in the late 1980s and then made into a multiple Academy Award-winning film starring Tom Hanks, Forrest Gump is a heartwarming classic about the amazing adventures of a modern (and unexpected) hero, now in a 25th-anniversary edition. |
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