Phoenix Descending

Jin Chai shook her head, her red face revealed a smile that seemed to cause wind and dust to fall. She sighed as her life's treasured sword was buried, not seeing Shuang Hua as young as it was today. He just took the rouge clasp and wiped away all his pride. When he saw the return of Wang Sun, his dream had been filled with gratitude. He had drunk too much and slept soundly.

***SOLO MEDALIST WINNER of the 2018 New Apple Summer eBook Awards for Excellence in Independent Publishing in the Young Adult Fantasy category*** Who must she become in order to survive? Since the outbreak of the phoenix fever in Drothidia, Tori Kagari has already lost one family member to the fatal disease. Now, with the fever threatening to wipe out her entire family, she must go against everything she believes in order to save them—even if that means making a deal with the enemy. When Tori agrees to join forces with the unscrupulous Khadulians, she must take on a false identity in order to infiltrate the queendom of Avarell and fulfill her part of the bargain, all while under the watchful eye of the unforgiving Queen’s Guard. But time is running out, and every lie, theft, and abduction she is forced to carry out may not be enough to free her family or herself from death.

In the vast expanse of the Azure Sky Prairie, the sky was covered in a haze. The biting cold gale swept through the entire prairie, causing layers of grass to turn over, causing people to be unable to open their eyes. Dark clouds also accumulated in the sky, and the clouds intersected and overlapped with each other. A thunderstorm that covered the entire prairie was about to arrive. Such weather was extremely rare in this famously sunny prairie.

Though the new metropolis is one of America's largest, many are unaware of Phoenix's rich and compelling history. Built on land once occupied by the most advanced pre-Columbian irrigation society, Phoenix overcame its hostile desert surroundings to become a thriving agricultural center. After World War II, its population exploded with the mid-century mass migration to the Sun Belt. In times of rapid expansion or decline, Phoenicians proved themselves to be adaptable and optimistic. Phoenix's past is an engaging and surprising story of audacity, vision, greed and a never-ending fight to secure its future. Chronicling the challenges of growth and change, fourth-generation Arizonan Jon Talton tells the story of the city that remains one of American civilization's great accomplishments.

This vivid, terrifying, and galvanizing novel reveals our future world after previous generations failed to halt climate change—perfect for fans of The Drowned World and World War Z. 2084: Global warming has proven worse than even the direst predictions scientists had made at the turn of the century. No country—and no one—has remained unscathed. Through interviews with scientists, political leaders, and citizens around the globe, this riveting oral history describes in graphic detail the irreversible effects the Great Warming has had on humankind and the planet. In short chapters about topics like sea level rise, drought, migration, war, and more, The 2084 Report brings global warming to life, revealing a new reality in which Rotterdam doesn’t exist, Phoenix has no electricity, and Canada is part of the United States. From wars over limited resources to the en masse migrations of entire countries and the rising suicide rate, the characters describe other issues they are confronting in the world they share with the next two generations. Simultaneously fascinating and frightening, The 2084 Report will inspire you to start conversations and take action.

This book studies both the tangible benefits and substantial barriers to sustainable development in the city of Phoenix, Arizona. Utilizing mixed research methods to probe downtown Phoenix’s political economy of development, this study illustrates how non-local property ownership and land speculation negatively impacted a concerted public-private effort to encourage infill construction on vacant land. The book elaborates urban sustainability not only as a set of ecological and design prescriptions, but as a field needing increased engagement with the growth-based impetus, structural economic forces, and political details behind American urban land policy. Demonstrating how land use policies evolved in relation to Phoenix’s historical dependence on outside investment, and are now interwoven across jurisdictional scales, the book concludes by identifying policy intervention points to increase the sustainability of Phoenix’s development trajectory.

Jin Chai shook her head, her red face revealed a smile that seemed to cause wind and dust to fall. She sighed as her life's treasured sword was buried, not seeing Shuang Hua as young as it was today. He just took the rouge clasp and wiped away all his pride. When he saw the return of Wang Sun, his dream had been filled with gratitude. He had drunk too much and slept soundly.