The Salt Black Tree

A Best SFF Books of the Month pick by Amazon! What happens when you find a way to save your loved one... but the price might not be worth it—the stunning conclusion to New York Times bestseller Lilith Saintcrow’s The Dead God’s Heart Nat Drozdova has crossed half the continent in search of the stolen Dead God’s Heart, the only thing powerful enough to trade for her beautiful, voracious, dying mother’s life. Yet now she knows the secret of her own birth—and that she’s been lied to all her young life. The road to the Heart ends at the Salt-Black Tree, but to find it Nat must pay a deadly price. Pursued by mouthless shadows hungry for the blood of new divinity as well as the razor-wielding god of thieves, Nat is on her own. Her journey leads through a wilderness of gods old and new, across a country as restless as its mortal inhabitants, and it’s too late to back out now. Blood may not always prevail. Magic might not always work. And the young Drozdova is faced with an impossible choice: Save her mother’s very existence... ...or accept the consequences of her own. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

A lesbian love story set during the Nazi occupation in Holland.

Canadian botanist, biochemist and visionary Diana Beresford-Kroeger's startling insights into the hidden life of trees have already sparked a quiet revolution in how we understand our relationship to forests. Now, in a captivating account of how her life led her to these illuminating and crucial ideas, she shows us how forests can not only heal us but save the planet. When Diana Beresford-Kroeger--whose father was a member of the Anglo-Irish aristocracy and whose mother was an O'Donoghue, one of the stronghold families who carried on the ancient Celtic traditions--was orphaned as a child, she could have been sent to the Magdalene Laundries. Instead, the O'Donoghue elders, most of them scholars and freehold farmers in the Lisheens valley in County Cork, took her under their wing. Diana became the last ward under the Brehon Law. Over the course of three summers, she was taught the ways of the Celtic triad of mind, body and soul. This included the philosophy of healing, the laws of the trees, Brehon wisdom and the Ogham alphabet, all of it rooted in a vision of nature that saw trees and forests as fundamental to human survival and spirituality. Already a precociously gifted scholar, Diana found that her grounding in the ancient ways led her to fresh scientific concepts. Out of that huge and holistic vision have come the observations that put her at the forefront of her field: the discovery of mother trees at the heart of a forest; the fact that trees are a living library, have a chemical language and communicate in a quantum world; the major idea that trees heal living creatures through the aerosols they release and that they carry a great wealth of natural antibiotics and other healing substances; and, perhaps most significantly, that planting trees can actively regulate the atmosphere and the oceans, and even stabilize our climate. This book is not only the story of a remarkable scientist and her ideas, it harvests all of her powerful knowledge about why trees matter, and why trees are a viable, achievable solution to climate change. Diana eloquently shows us that if we can understand the intricate ways in which the health and welfare of every living creature is connected to the global forest, and strengthen those connections, we will still have time to mend the self-destructive ways that are leading to drastic fires, droughts and floods.

With the same unique vision that brought his now classic Mars trilogy to vivid life, bestselling author Kim Stanley Robinson boldly imagines an alternate history of the last seven hundred years. In his grandest work yet, the acclaimed storyteller constructs a world vastly different from the one we know. . . . “A thoughtful, magisterial alternate history from one of science fiction’s most important writers.”—The New York Times Book Review It is the fourteenth century and one of the most apocalyptic events in human history is set to occur—the coming of the Black Death. History teaches us that a third of Europe’s population was destroyed. But what if the plague had killed 99 percent of the population instead? How would the world have changed? This is a look at the history that could have been—one that stretches across centuries, sees dynasties and nations rise and crumble, and spans horrible famine and magnificent innovation. Through the eyes of soldiers and kings, explorers and philosophers, slaves and scholars, Robinson navigates a world where Buddhism and Islam are the most influential and practiced religions, while Christianity is merely a historical footnote. Probing the most profound questions as only he can, Robinson shines his extraordinary light on the place of religion, culture, power—and even love—in this bold New World. “Exceptional and engrossing.”—New York Post “Ambitious . . . ingenious.”—Newsday

American Gods vs. Baba Yaga in this contemporary fantasy: Spring's Arcana, by New York Times bestseller Lilith Saintcrow. Nat Drozdova is desperate to save a life. Doctors can do little for her cancer-ridden mother, who insists there is only one cure—and that Nat must visit a skyscraper in Manhattan to get it. Amid a snow-locked city, inside a sleek glass-walled office, Nat makes her plea and is whisked into a terrifying new world. For the skyscraper holds a hungry winter goddess who has the power to cure her mother...if Nat finds a stolen object of great power. Now Nat must travel with a razor-wielding assassin across an American continent brimming with terror, wonder, and hungry divinities with every reason to consume a young woman. For her ailing mother is indeed suffering no ordinary illness, and Nat Drozdova is no ordinary girl. Blood calls to blood, magic to magic, and a daughter may indeed save what she loves... ...if it doesn’t consume her first. This is the way to the Dead God’s Heart. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

From the author of The Tenth Gift comes another story of exotic, foreign lands, entwining storylines spanning generations, and the quests to overcome love lost. The desert lay before them, and the secrets of the amulet . . . From Tafraout's magnificent mountainside, Isobel absorbs the heat and romance of the Moroccan vista before her, with mosque and homes scattered far below. But a mere slip sees her tumbling uncontrollably into the arms of handsome rescuer Taïb, who notices her unusual silver amulet, and that her fall has revealed a tiny scroll hidden within. Entranced by the possibilities of its intricate and illegible script, they set out for the Sahara in search of a Tuareg elder to unlock the riddles of its past. Little does Izzy realize that the desert holds the key to more mysteries than the amulet's. From beneath the beating sun emerges nomadic Princess Mariata, whose stories of tortured love bind her to the precious talisman in Izzy's hands. She's battled the sands; she's found and lost love among its dunes. And where the amulet crosses both their paths, answers to the deepest secrets lie.

Have you ever looked at a tree? That may sound like a silly question, but there is so much more to notice about a tree than first meets the eye. Seeing Trees celebrates seldom seen but easily observable tree traits and invites you to watch trees with the same care and sensitivity that birdwatchers watch birds. Many people, for example, are surprised to learn that oaks and maples have flowers, much less flowers that are astonishingly beautiful when viewed up close. Focusing on widely grown trees, this captivating book describes the rewards of careful and regular tree viewing, outlines strategies for improving your observations, and describes some of the most visually interesting tree structures, including leaves, flowers, buds, leaf scars, twigs, and bark. In-depth profiles of ten familiar species—including such beloved trees as white oak, southern magnolia, white pine, and tulip poplar—show you how to recognize and understand many of their most compelling (but usually overlooked) physical features.

Der erste Leitfaden zu den Funktionen, Strukturen und Anwendungen natürlicher Hydrokolloide. Heutzutage liegt der Nachdruck auf einer gesundheitsbewussten Lebensweise und Ernährung. Die Nachfrage nach natürlichen Lebensmitteln wächst ständig, und natürliche Hydrokolloide sind so beliebt wie nie zuvor. Sie dienen als Dickungsmittel, Stabilisatoren, Geliermittel, Fettersatz und Bindemittel. Als natürliche, pflanzenbasierte Polymere erfüllen sie eine Vielzahl der Funktionen handelsüblicher Inhaltsstoffe wie Xanthan, Guar, Gummiarabikum, Pektin und Stärke. Darüber hinaus bieten sie aufgrund der häufig enthaltenen aktiven biologischen Stoffe und ballaststoffreichen Zusammensetzung gesundheitliche Vorteile. Sie können präbiotische Wirkung haben und den Cholesterinspiegel senken. Die Anwendung diese neuartige Hydrokolloide ist noch immer unzureichend erforscht. Emerging Natural Hydrocolloids möchte hier Abhilfe schaffen und bietet einen fundierten Überblick über strukturell-funktionale Zusammenhänge, rheologische Aspekte und die potenzielle Nützlichkeit insbesondere in der Lebensmittel- und Pharmaindustrie. Dieses praktische Nachschlagewerk - bietet einen umfassenden und aktuellen Überblick über die derzeit verfügbaren Forschungsergebnisse zu natürlichen Hydrokolloiden. - untersucht die Hauptfunktionen und rheologischen Aspekte neuartiger Hydrokolloide. - informiert über mögliche Anwendungen von Biopolymeren in Lebensmitteln und Arzneistoffen. - zeigt die Zusammenarbeit international tätiger Lebensmittelwissenschaftler. Emerging Natural Hydrocolloids: Rheology and Functions bietet Wissenschaftlern, Ingenieuren, Technologen und Forschern einen einzigartigen und tiefen Einblick in die Welt neuartiger Hydrokolloide, deren Anwendungen, Eigenschaften und möglicher Vorteile.