The Shadow Master

In a land riven with plague, in the infamous Walled City, two families vie for control – the Medicis with their genius inventor Leonardo; the Lorraines with Galileo, the most brilliant alchemist of his generation. And when two star-crossed lovers, one from either house, threaten the status quo, a third, shadowy power – one that forever seems a step ahead of all of the familial warring – plots and schemes, and bides its time, ready for the moment to attack...

Hi, how are you? Yes, I am talking to you, the reader of the this book's description. It's rude not to answer a person when they ask you a question. OK, I get it, 4th wall breaking is overdone. Get over it. This book, Villains Rule, is a fantasy action-comedy which you have to read. Not because it redefines the genre, far from it. But rather for what it contains. A villain's tale. How often do you get to read a story where the villain is the protagonist? No, not an anti-hero, or a brooding monster, nor a hero thinly disguised as a villain. And not evil. If you want evil, take that nonsense to therapy. No, I mean a villain's villain. The ones who use their power because they can, while morality is only a philosopher's complex. This is the story of Jackson Blackwell, the Shadow Master and the top villain adviser. Sadly, even the top villain occasionally gets double-crossed. Trapped in one of the fantasy realms, Jackson has to use his skill and wits to exploit the rules, points out the genre flaws, undermine godly authority, and win the day. Because, that is what villains should do, shouldn't they? Read this book, have a few laughs, and find out.

Jackson Blackwell, the Shadow Master, returns. And lo, the multiverse shall tremble. Why? For someone dared to kidnap his daughter. In this third installment of the multiple award-nominated Shadow Master novels (which we perpetually lose), Jackson and his crew of malicious malcontents are going on a road trip! Er, well, space . . . trip? Look, this time we're mocking sci-fi, so you know, just go with it. While on a consultation trip to a sci-fi dimension, Evie Blackwell is taken by hired mercenaries, and Jackson is stranded on a remote planet. Using all of his devious and deadly tricks, Jackson must escape, assemble his team, and travel through space and time to find those responsible. Jackson will stop at nothing to prove his commitment to his family while wreaking his patented comedic havoc in a way that only a man-turned-god can. Follow this thrilling, hilarious, and yes, oddly touching book, as Jackson hops dimensions, fights the forces of light and shadow, and even confronts an entire pantheon of pissed-off gods. Won't this be a hoot?

A stunning new mythical adventure, set in a troubled world where one young girl may hold the key to healing old wounds and restoring life to the drought-ridden land a book to set alongside Pullman, Nicholson, Le Guin and other fantasy greats.

Paul Czanne, Claude Monet, and Auguste Rodin. The names of these brilliant nineteenth-century artists are known throughout the world. But what is remembered of their wives? What were these unknown women like? What roles did they play in the lives and the art of their famous husbands? In this remarkable book of discovery, art historian Ruth Butler coaxes three shadowy women out of obscurity and introduces them for the first time as individuals. Through unprecedented research, Butler has been able to create portraits of Hortense Fiquet, Camille Doncieux, and Rose Beuretthe models, and later the wives, respectively, of Czanne, Monet, and Rodin, three of the most famous French artists of their generation. The book tells the stories of three ordinary women who faced issues of a dramatically changing society as well as the challenges of life with a striving genius. Butler illuminates the ways in which these model-wives figured in their husbands achievements and provides new analyses of familiar works of art. Filled with captivating detail, the book recovers the lives of Hortense, Camille, and Rose, and recognizes with new insight how their unique relationships enriched the quality of their husbands artistic endeavors."

In a land riven with plague, inside the infamous Walled City, two families vie for control: the Medicis with their genius inventor Leonardo; the Lorraines with Galileo, the most brilliant alchemist of his generation. And when two star-crossed lovers, one from either house, threaten the status quo, a third, shadowy power – one that forever seems a step ahead of all of the familial warring – plots and schemes, and bides its time, ready for the moment to attack... Assassination; ancient, impossible machines; torture and infamy – just another typical day in paradise. File Under: Fantasy [ Wherefore Art Thou | Fathers of Invention | Unexpected Journeys | Secrets & Lies ]

The death of an archeologist leads to an inexorable unfolding of the events that caused it. The investigator of the crime that may be more or less than murder is Klement Zeman, the brother of the dead man and an intelligence officer. The revelations that he discovers propel the book from Africa to Budapest, Prague and Vienna, where the climactic scenes occur. Will the world survive the turning of the year 2001 or will it turn back into chaos?

The Shadow Master (a.k.a. Overlay) Armageddon is coming and only one man can stop it! Defense ministers in Arab nations are systematically assassinated. All eyes stare suspiciously at Israel. The Middle East is a powder keg ready to explode. Only a handful of covert U.S. government officials are aware that the heads of Russia and China are targeted next—and that the elderly and senile American ex-President is responsible. Rance Colby, the man who never existed–presumed dead—and torn by internal demons, enlists the only men he can trust . . . the Chairman of The Joint Chiefs and the highest ranking Russian General . . . to aid him in stopping the real brains behind the assassinations and to help kidnap the Russian president without him realizing he was kidnaped. Rance is aware of the thin sheet of plastic called an overlay. When placed over the map of the Middle East, it pinpoints the countries scheduled for assassinations. Trapped in the Great Khufu Pyramid, blown up on an isolated Greek island, attacked repeatedly by assassins, kidnapping the Russian President—Rance’s life hangs in the balance in the icy waters below Norway’s Pulpit Rock—Rance and his team provide all the ingredients of an intriguing international political suspense-thriller with general mass appeal.