The Sherwood Ring

Peggy Grahame moves to New York State to live with Uncle Enos, and meets several ghosts, who relate to her the history of her uncle's ancestral home.

In 1558 while imprisoned in a remote castle, a young girl becomes involved in a series of events that leads to an underground labyrinth peopled by the last practitioners of druidic magic.

As any reader of Jo Walton's Among Others might guess, Walton is both an inveterate reader of SF and fantasy, and a chronic re-reader of books. In 2008, then-new science-fiction mega-site Tor.com asked Walton to blog regularly about her re-reading—about all kinds of older fantasy and SF, ranging from acknowledged classics, to guilty pleasures, to forgotten oddities and gems. These posts have consistently been among the most popular features of Tor.com. Now this volumes presents a selection of the best of them, ranging from short essays to long reassessments of some of the field's most ambitious series. Among Walton's many subjects here are the Zones of Thought novels of Vernor Vinge; the question of what genre readers mean by "mainstream"; the underappreciated SF adventures of C. J. Cherryh; the field's many approaches to time travel; the masterful science fiction of Samuel R. Delany; Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children; the early Hainish novels of Ursula K. Le Guin; and a Robert A. Heinlein novel you have most certainly never read. Over 130 essays in all, What Makes This Book So Great is an immensely readable, engaging collection of provocative, opinionated thoughts about past and present-day fantasy and science fiction, from one of our best writers. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

In The Wood Burn Book, Instagram star Rachel Strauss (@woodburncorner) teaches you everything you’ll need to know to master your favorite new hobby: pyrography, or writing with fire. This essential guide opens with a brief background to the art of wood burning, a list of tools and how to use them, basic techniques that can be used over and over again, and even what to burn and how to be safe doing it. You will also find a detailed explanation of the process from start to finish, with patterns and frames, techniques for lettering and adding color, as well as dozens of projects ready for gifting, including picture frames, cutting boards, coasters, cards, wooden spoons, and jewelry. Above all, Strauss has created the book she wished she had when she first discovered pyrography: a simple guide that quickly gets the reader successfully burning. With the right tools and a little time, you'll be able to create meaningful handmade gifts without breaking the bank. Whether it’s to create a family name sign as a housewarming gift for newlyweds, or customize baby blocks for a new little one, wood burning is the versatile hobby that can be used time and time again to create memorable gifts for all of life’s occasions. In addition, wood burning is a practice in mindfulness, requiring patience and focus to awaken the senses and calm the mind. Mastering the art of writing with fire begins with the ability to follow a line. If you can trace, you can burn.

When Payton Sherwood takes a wrong turn on a Manhattan East Village side street, he stumbles into trouble--in the form of three bull-necked heavies and a tough sixteen-year-old runaway named Gloria. After taking a savage beating, Payton is robbed of his Rolex watch and left bleeding on the sidewalk. Tracking Gloria, Payton winds his way through Alphabet City--in and out of trendy after-hours dives, across vacant lots, and into barrio tenements. Here the shadows that frighten aren't those that shade the street but rather the soul. Payton's dusk-to-dawn nightmare on the wild side is about to begin--and nothing will stop it but death. . . .

Few settings in literature are as widely known or celebrated as J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle-Earth. The natural landscape plays a major role in nearly all of Tolkien's major works, and readers have come to view the geography of this fictional universe as integral to understanding and enjoying Tolkien's works. And in laying out this continent, Tolkien paid special attention to its plant life; in total, over 160 plants are explicitly mentioned and described as a part of Middle-Earth. Nearly all of these plants are real species, and many of the fictional plants are based on scientifically grounded botanic principles. In Flora of Middle Earth: Plants of Tolkien's Legendarium, botanist Walter Judd gives a detailed species account of every plant found in Tolkien's universe, complete with the etymology of the plant's name, a discussion of its significance within Tolkien's work, a description of the plant's distribution and ecology, and an original hand-drawn illustration by artist Graham Judd in the style of a woodcut print. Among the over three-thousand vascular plants Tolkien would have seen in the British Isles, the authors show why Tolkien may have selected certain plants for inclusion in his universe over others, in terms of their botanic properties and traditional uses. The clear, comprehensive alphabetical listing of each species, along with the visual identification key of the plant drawings, adds to the reader's understanding and appreciation of the Tolkien canon.

When Peggy went to live with her uncle in the old family house she did not expect to meet ancestral ghosts.

This compelling story of adventure, romance, and intrigue, set in ancient Egypt, was written by the three-time Newbery Honor and Edgar Award winning author Eloise Jarvis McGraw. Mara is a proud and beautiful slave girl who yearns for freedom in ancient Egypt, under the rule of Queen Hatshepsut. Mara is not like other slaves; she can read and write, as well as speak the language of Babylonian. So, to barter for her freedom, she finds herself playing the dangerous role of double spy for two arch enemies—each of whom supports a contender for the throne of Egypt. Against her will, Mara finds herself falling in love with one of her masters, the noble Sheftu, and she starts to believe in his plans of restoring Thutmose III to the throne. But just when Mara is ready to offer Sheftu her help and her heart, her duplicity is discovered, and a battle ensues in which both Mara’s life and the fate of Egypt are at stake. “Dangerous espionage, an unusual love story, and richly drawn background make this a book to capture quick and lasting interest.”—Horn Book “Thoroughly engrossing.”—Kirkus Reviews