The Florentine Deception

In this action-packed techno-thriller, a routine computer cleanup sets off an electrifying quest for an enigmatic—and deadly—treasure. After selling his dorm-room startup for millions and effectively retiring at the age of twenty-five, Alex Fife is eager for a new challenge. When he agrees to clean up an old PC as a favor, he never expects to find the adventure of a lifetime waiting for him inside the machine. But as he rummages through old emails, Alex stumbles upon a startling discovery: The previous owner, a shady antiques smuggler, had been trying to unload a mysterious object known as the Florentine on the black market. And with the dealer’s untimely passing, the Florentine is now unaccounted for and ripe for the taking. Alex dives headfirst into a hunt for the priceless object. What starts out as a seemingly innocuous pursuit quickly devolves into a nightmare when Alex discovers the true technological nature of the Florentine. Not just a lost treasure, it’s something far more insidious: a weapon that could bring the developed world to its knees. Alex races through subterranean grottos, freezing morgues, and hidden cellars in the dark underbelly of Los Angeles, desperate to find the Florentine before it falls into the wrong hands. Because if nefarious forces find it first, there’ll be nothing Alex—or anyone else—can do to prevent a catastrophic attack. Leading security specialist Carey Nachenberg delivers expert technical details in this gripping, highly entertaining cyber thrill ride—perfect for fans of Neal Stephenson and William Gibson.

In this action-packed techno-thriller, a routine computer cleanup sets off an electrifying quest for an enigmatic—and deadly—treasure. After selling his dorm-room startup for millions and effectively retiring at the age of twenty-five, Alex Fife is eager for a new challenge. When he agrees to clean up an old PC as a favor, he never expects to find the adventure of a lifetime waiting for him inside the machine. But as he rummages through old emails, Alex stumbles upon a startling discovery: The previous owner, a shady antiques smuggler, had been trying to unload a mysterious object known as the Florentine on the black market. And with the dealer’s untimely passing, the Florentine is now unaccounted for and ripe for the taking. Alex dives headfirst into a hunt for the priceless object. What starts out as a seemingly innocuous pursuit quickly devolves into a nightmare when Alex discovers the true technological nature of the Florentine. Not just a lost treasure, it’s something far more insidious: a weapon that could bring the developed world to its knees. Alex races through subterranean grottos, freezing morgues, and hidden cellars in the dark underbelly of Los Angeles, desperate to find the Florentine before it falls into the wrong hands. Because if nefarious forces find it first, there’ll be nothing Alex—or anyone else—can do to prevent a catastrophic attack. Leading security specialist Carey Nachenberg delivers expert technical details in this gripping, highly entertaining cyber thrill ride—perfect for fans of Neal Stephenson and William Gibson.

Winner, Oscar G. Brockett Book Prize in Dance Research, 2014 Honorable Mention, Sally Banes Publication Prize, American Society for Theatre Research, 2014 de la Torre Bueno® Special Citation, Society of Dance History Scholars, 2013 From Christopher Columbus to “first anthropologist” Friar Bernardino de Sahagún, fifteenth- and sixteenth-century explorers, conquistadors, clerics, scientists, and travelers wrote about the “Indian” dances they encountered throughout the New World. This was especially true of Spanish missionaries who intensively studied and documented native dances in an attempt to identify and eradicate the “idolatrous” behaviors of the Aztec, the largest indigenous empire in Mesoamerica at the time of its European discovery. Dancing the New World traces the transformation of the Aztec empire into a Spanish colony through written and visual representations of dance in colonial discourse—the vast constellation of chronicles, histories, letters, and travel books by Europeans in and about the New World. Scolieri analyzes how the chroniclers used the Indian dancing body to represent their own experiences of wonder and terror in the New World, as well as to justify, lament, and/or deny their role in its political, spiritual, and physical conquest. He also reveals that Spaniards and Aztecs shared an understanding that dance played an important role in the formation, maintenance, and representation of imperial power, and describes how Spaniards compelled Indians to perform dances that dramatized their own conquest, thereby transforming them into colonial subjects. Scolieri’s pathfinding analysis of the vast colonial “dance archive” conclusively demonstrates that dance played a crucial role in one of the defining moments in modern history—the European colonization of the Americas.

Machiavelli has been viewed as the forerunner of the humanists of our day, liberals and socialists, who have discovered that moral ends sometimes require immoral means. Against this interpretation, Mark Hulliung argues that Machiavelli's "humanism," was rooted in classical notions of grandeur and greatness, and that his prime reason for admiring the ancient Roman republic was that it conquered the world. In short, Machiavelli was at his most Machiavellian precisely when he voiced his "civic humanism."Hulliung argues that Machiavelli's embrace of fraud and violence cannot be justified by patriotism or a professed concern with the common good. He indicts Machiavelli's use and abuse of history in the service of his cynical agenda the quest for power. Hulliung sees Machiavelli as a republican imperialist, embracing the heroic pagan virtues and consciously subverting the humanistic tradition of Cicero, and the religious morality of Christianity, with an intentionally skewed interpretation of republican Rome.By inverting the Stoical and Christian elements of the classics, Machiavelli made the humanistic tradition give birth to Machiavellism, its terrible child. Hulliung's thesis is convincing, and his book is a valuable contribution to the debate on Machiavellian thought.

Molho (European history, Brown U.) shows that the propertied families of late-medieval and early-modern Florence maintained their power and influence through arranged marriage and the dowry. While elsewhere in Europe the elite were toppling under the onslaught of commerce and personal freedom, in Florence they married carefully within a narrow and well-defined class, used dowries as both speculation and instruments of manipulation, and remembered every detail for a long time. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Featuring the signature character of New York Times bestselling author Steve Berry, the Cotton Malone novels fuse page-turning suspense and fascinating historical insight into one heart-stopping thriller after another. “In Malone, Berry has created a classic, complex hero.”—USA Today A former Justice Department operative who can’t seem to stay out of trouble, Cotton Malone has crisscrossed the globe on electrifying quests. With the smart and sexy Cassiopeia Vitt by his side, Malone faces down the world’s deadliest terrorists, assassins, and con men—and unravels some of history’s most legendary and iconic mysteries along the way. Now in one exclusive eBook bundle are the first eight novels of Steve Berry’s extraordinary series: THE TEMPLAR LEGACY THE ALEXANDRIA LINK THE VENETIAN BETRAYAL THE CHARLEMAGNE PURSUIT THE PARIS VENDETTA THE EMPEROR’S TOMB THE JEFFERSON KEY THE KING’S DECEPTION Also includes the eBook novella The Tudor Plot as well as an excerpt from Steve Berry’s ninth Cotton Malone novel, The Lincoln Myth! Praise for Steve Berry and his Cotton Malone novels “Steve Berry gets better and better with each new book.”—The Huffington Post “Berry has become the king of intrigue. You don’t just read a Steve Berry novel. You live it.”—James Rollins “Berry raises this genre’s stakes.”—The New York Times “I love this guy.”—#1 internationally bestselling author Lee Child “Malone, a hero with a personal stake in the proceedings, is a welcome respite from the cold, calculating superspies who litter the genre.”—Entertainment Weekly “Richly detailed and fantastically suspenseful, this thriller grips the reader for a wild literary ride that continues until the very last page.”—Tucson Citizen, on The Templar Legacy “Bigger than life . . . The reader will be engaged from the first page, thrilled by the story, entertained by the characters, and spellbound by the author’s sheer bravado. A must for high-adventure thriller fans.”—Booklist, on The Venetian Betrayal “[An] amazing blend of suspense and history . . . [Readers] cannot go wrong with Cotton Malone.”—Library Journal, on The Paris Vendetta “A superbly paced novel of mystery and adventure . . . [Berry’s] love of history resonates throughout this lively and imaginative tale.”—The Denver Post, on The Jefferson Key “A Dan Brown-ian secular conspiracy about the Virgin Queen driving nonstop international intrigue.”—Kirkus Reviews, on The King’s Deception

Quantitative Studies of the Renaissance Florentine Economy and Society is a collection of nine quantitative studies probing aspects of Renaissance Florentine economy and society. The collection, organized by topic, source material and analysis methods, discusses risk and return, specifically the population’s responses to the plague and also the measurement of interest rates. The work analyzes the population’s wealth distribution, the impact of taxes and subsidies on art and architecture, the level of neighborhood segregation and the accumulation of wealth. Additionally, this study assesses the competitiveness of Florentine markets and the level of monopoly power, the nature of women’s work and the impact of business risk on the organization of industrial production.

Featuring the signature character of New York Times bestselling author Steve Berry, the Cotton Malone novels fuse page-turning suspense and fascinating historical insight into one heart-stopping thriller after another. “In Malone, Berry has created a classic, complex hero.”—USA Today A former Justice Department operative who can’t seem to stay out of trouble, Cotton Malone has crisscrossed the globe on electrifying quests. With the smart and sexy Cassiopeia Vitt by his side, Malone faces down the world’s deadliest terrorists, assassins, and con men—and unravels some of history’s most legendary and iconic mysteries along the way. Now in one exclusive eBook bundle are the first nine novels of Steve Berry’s extraordinary series: THE TEMPLAR LEGACY THE ALEXANDRIA LINK THE VENETIAN BETRAYAL THE CHARLEMAGNE PURSUIT THE PARIS VENDETTA THE EMPEROR’S TOMB THE JEFFERSON KEY THE KING’S DECEPTION THE LINCOLN MYTH Also includes the eBook short stories “The Balkan Escape,” “The Devil’s Gold,” and “The Admiral’s Mark,” as well as the novella The Tudor Plot! Praise for Steve Berry and his Cotton Malone novels “Steve Berry gets better and better with each new book.”—The Huffington Post “Berry has become the king of intrigue. You don’t just read a Steve Berry novel. You live it.”—James Rollins “Berry raises this genre’s stakes.”—The New York Times “I love this guy.”—#1 internationally bestselling author Lee Child “Malone, a hero with a personal stake in the proceedings, is a welcome respite from the cold, calculating superspies who litter the genre.”—Entertainment Weekly “Richly detailed and fantastically suspenseful, this thriller grips the reader for a wild literary ride that continues until the very last page.”—Tucson Citizen, on The Templar Legacy “Bigger than life . . . The reader will be engaged from the first page, thrilled by the story, entertained by the characters, and spellbound by the author’s sheer bravado. A must for high-adventure thriller fans.”—Booklist, on The Venetian Betrayal “[An] amazing blend of suspense and history . . . [Readers] cannot go wrong with Cotton Malone.”—Library Journal, on The Paris Vendetta “A superbly paced novel of mystery and adventure . . . [Berry’s] love of history resonates throughout this lively and imaginative tale.”—The Denver Post, on The Jefferson Key “A Dan Brown-ian secular conspiracy about the Virgin Queen driving nonstop international intrigue.”—Kirkus Reviews, on The King’s Deception