Simon Vance
Author
Summary
"English anthropologist Andrew Banson has been alone in the field for several years, studying the Kiona river tribe in the Territory of New Guinea. Haunted by the memory of his brothers' deaths and increasingly frustrated and isolated by his research, Bankson is on the verge of suicide when a chance encounter with colleagues, the controversial Nell Stone and her wry and mercurial Australian husband, Fen, pulls him back from the brink. Nell and Fen...
Author
Summary
"At age twenty-four, Winston Churchill was utterly convinced it was his destiny to become prime minister of England one day, despite the fact he had just lost his first election campaign for Parliament. He believed that to achieve his goal he must do something spectacular on the battlefield. Despite deliberately putting himself in extreme danger as a British Army officer in colonial wars in India and Sudan, and as a journalist covering a Cuban uprising...
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Series
Defenders of Shannara volume 1
Summary
"Paxon Leah never thought of the old family sword hanging above his living room hearth as anything other than an intriguing ornament...until his sister is kidnapped by a sorceror. Following the dark mage with nothing but this piece of steel to protect him, Paxon stumbles into a plot to overthow the Druids and remake the world...and accidentally unlocks the powers of the ancient blade. Now, he must learn to master the sword's power in order to protect...
Author
Summary
A ne'er-do-well exploits his gentle daughter's beauty for social advancement in this masterpiece of tragic fiction. Hardy's 1891 novel defied convention to focus on the rural lower class for a frank treatment of sexuality and religion. Then and now, his sympathetic portrait of a victim of Victorian hypocrisy offers compelling reading.
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Series
Temeraire volume 5
Appears on list
Summary
Separated by their own government and threatened at every turn by Napoleon's forces, Laurence and Temeraire must struggle to find each other amid the turmoil of war and to aid the resistance against the invasion.-publishers information.
Author
Summary
Life is close to perfect for Emil Larsson, a self-satisfied bureaucrat in the Office of Customs and Excise in 1791 Stockholm. He is a true man of the Town--a drinker, card player, and contented bachelor--until one evening when Mrs. Sofia Sparrow, a fortune-teller and proprietor of an exclusive gaming parlor, shares with him a vision she has had: a golden path that will lead him to love and connection. She lays an Octavo for him, a spread of eight...
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Series
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British secret agent James Bond is lured into a trap using the beautiful Russian spy Tatiana Romanova as bait. She's asked for passage to Paris with Bond as her chaperone in exchange for a top secret decoding machine. To survive the train ride from Istanbul, 007 will need to keep his wits about him and his Beretta close at hand, dealing with SMERSH's deadliest assassin and their operations chief, Rosa Klebb.
29) Casino Royale
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Series
Summary
Casino Royale is the first novel by the British author Ian Fleming. Published in 1953, it is the first James Bond book, and it paved the way for a further eleven novels by Fleming, followed by numerous continuation Bond novels by other authors. The story concerns the British secret agent James Bond, gambling at the casino in Royale-les-Eaux to bankrupt Le Chiffre, the treasurer of a French union and a member of the Russian secret service. Bond is...
30) The key
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Series
Sancti trilogy volume 2
Summary
Liv Adamsen, unable to recall the events that transpired within the ancient walls of the Citadel, reunites with Gabriel, a warrior for a group working to bring down the Sancti, and together they uncover a revelation that holds the key to humankind's survival.
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Series
Temeraire volume 6
Appears on list
Summary
Convicted of treason despite their heroic defense against Napoleon's invasion of England, Temeraire the dragon and his friend and rider, Capt. Will Laurence, are transported to the prison colony in Australia. They carry with them three dragon eggs intended to help establish a covert in the colony.
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Series
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"Lisbeth Salander returns, in a trailblazing new installment to the best-selling Millennium series. Change is coming to Sweden's far north: its untapped natural resources are sparking a gold rush with the criminal underworld leading the charge. But it's not the prospect of riches that brings Lisbeth Salander to the small town of Gasskas. She has been named guardian to her niece Svala, whose mother has disappeared. Two things soon become clear: Svala...
33) Dune messiah
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Series
Summary
Dune Messiah continues the story of Paul Atreides, better known -- and feared -- as the man christened Muad'Dib. As Emperor of the known universe, he possesses more power than a single man was ever meant to wield. Worshipped as a religious icon by the fanatical Fremen, Paul faces the enmity of the political houses he displaced when he assumed the throne -- and a conspiracy conducted within his own sphere of influence. And even as House Atreides begins...
34) Dune
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Series
Appears on these lists
Summary
This Hugo and Nebula Award winner tells the sweeping tale of a desert planet called Arrakis, the focus of an intricate power struggle in a byzantine interstellar empire. Arrakis is the sole source of Melange, the "spice of spices." Melange is necessary for interstellar travel and grants psychic powers and longevity, so whoever controls it wields great influence. The troubles begin when stewardship of Arrakis is transferred by the Emperor from the...
Author
Series
Temeraire volume 1
Appears on list
Summary
When the HMS Reliant captures a French ship and its priceless cargo, an unhatched dragon egg, Captain Will Laurence is swept into an unexpected kinship with an extraordinary creature and joins the elite Aerial Corps as a master of the dragon Temaraire, in which role he must match wits with the powerful dragon-borne forces of Napoleon Bonaparte.
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Summary
"The bestselling author of the groundbreaking novels Under Heaven and River of Stars, Guy Gavriel Kay is back with a new novel, Children of Earth and Sky, set in a world inspired by the conflicts and dramas of Renaissance Europe. Against this tumultuous backdrop the lives of men and women unfold on the borderlands--where empires and faiths collide. From the small coastal town of Senjan, notorious for its pirates, a young woman sets out to find vengeance...
37) The terror
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Summary
The men on board HMS Terror have every expectation of triumph. As part of the 1845 Franklin Expedition, the first steam-powered vessels ever to search for the legendary Northwest Passage, they are as scientifically supported an enterprise as has ever set forth. As they enter a second summer in the Arctic Circle without a thaw, though, they are stranded in a nightmarish landscape of encroaching ice and darkness. Endlessly cold, with diminishing rations,...
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Summary
"Florence, Italy, 1944: The city is under heavy Nazi occupation, but for thirteen-year-old Paolo, war is a long and boring wait. Too young to fight for the resistance, yet desperate for action and adventure, he sneaks out each night to ride his bicycle along the darkened city streets. For Paolo, the risk is thrilling. But when he is accosted by Partisans--covert members of the anti-Nazi movement--thrilling quickly becomes dangerous as Paolo and his...
Author
Series
Temeraire volume 9
Appears on list
Summary
"The final adventure in the New York Times bestselling Temeraire series. The deadly campaign in Russia has cost both Napoleon and those allied against him. Napoleon has been denied his victory...but at a terrible price. Lawrence and the dragon Temeraire pursue the fleeing French army back west, but are demoralized when Napoleon makes it back to Paris unscathed. Worse, they soon learn that the French have stolen Termeraire and Iskierka's egg. Now,...
40) The other story
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Summary
"Vacationing at a luxurious Tuscan island resort, Nicolas Duhamel is hopeful that the ghosts of his past have finally been put to rest... Now a bestselling author, when he was twenty-four years old, he stumbled upon a troubling secret about his family - a secret that was carefully concealed. In shock, Nicholas embarked on a journey to uncover the truth that took him from the Basque coast to St. Petersburg - but the answers wouldn't come easily. In...