No matter they might be young, snobby, tough or pompous, there's nowhere to hide when their comeuppance arrives and they find themselves in the poo, in more ways than one.Four short stories based on the scatological misadventures of otherwise normal folks. Some young hillbillies' adventure with an army surplus motor cycle runs afoul of Bessie the cow and ends in a dramatic and memorable fashion. A young post-WWII emigrant unleashes appropriate revenge on his workplace bullies. An over-bearing and snobby aunt lays the foundation for her own comeuppance. Some pompous feminist university staff go looking for evidence of the Yowie, the Australian Bigfoot, and get more evidence than they really hoped for.

Poetry that moves. Poetry that inspires from the master of prose.This is a story of a young boy (Bill) growing up under the influence of his grandfather (Grampy). Bill's dad travels for his job and Grampy becomes a role model for Bill. Bill learns many lessons from his grandfather. He learns about everything from fishing to religion to dying. Grandfather teaches Bill the same values he taught his father years earlier. Enjoy this light hearted look at the adventures of a young boy and the things he learns as he matures.

The year is 1905. Eighteen year old Kate Barrington is getting ready for a ball. She has fallen deeply in love with Jonathan Wentworth, heir to his uncle’s estate. But when she arrives, Jon’s attention is captivated by her frail but enigmatic cousin Cassandra. Consumed by jealousy Kate tries to leave, but is stopped by Rick Ferris, a charming and handsome business tycoon. Kate knows she cannot love Rick like she loved Jon - but when Rick proposes she agrees, and becomes Mrs Ferris. Shortly after Jon marries Cassandra. Yet when he tries to touch her she shrinks in fear. With Kate longing for another man, and Jon unable to consummate his marriage with his wife, both relationships are put under terrible strain. Will Kate be able to forget Jon and fall in love with her husband? Or will Jon and Kate’s attraction to each other prove their undoing? ‘The Velvet Glove’ is a moving social drama following the lives of two women from very different social backgrounds at the beginning of the 20th century. “Mrs Williams is a skillful scene-setter, and piles up her bricks of fear with a malevolent daintiness which makes her final climax more fearful.” The Times Mary Williams was born in Leicestershire and attended Leicester College of Art where she trained as an illustrator. During a varied and colourful life she wrote and illustrated children’s programmes for BBC Wales and worked as a newspaper columnist. She has had many occult novels published as well as her bestselling Cornish romances which she wrote under the pseudonym Marianne Harvey. Endeavour Press is the UK's leading independent publisher of digital books.

From the author of Steve Jobs and other bestselling biographies, this is the astonishingly intimate story of the most fascinating and controversial innovator of our era—a rule-breaking visionary who helped to lead the world into the era of electric vehicles, private space exploration, and artificial intelligence. Oh, and took over Twitter. When Elon Musk was a kid in South Africa, he was regularly beaten by bullies. One day a group pushed him down some concrete steps and kicked him until his face was a swollen ball of flesh. He was in the hospital for a week. But the physical scars were minor compared to the emotional ones inflicted by his father, an engineer, rogue, and charismatic fantasist. His father's impact on his psyche would linger. He developed into a tough yet vulnerable man-child, prone to abrupt Jekyll-and-Hyde mood swings, with an exceedingly high tolerance for risk, a craving for drama, an epic sense of mission, and a maniacal...

The computer and the internet are among the most important innovations of our era, but few people know who created them. They were not conjured up in a garret or garage by solo inventors suitable to be singled out on magazine covers or put into a pantheon with Edison, Bell, and Morse. Instead, most of the innovations of the digital age were done collaboratively. There were a lot of fascinating people involved, some ingenious and a few even geniuses. This is the story of these pioneers, hackers, inventors, and entrepreneurs—who they were, how their minds worked, and what made them so creative. It’s also a narrative of how they collaborated and why their ability to work as teams made them even more creative.”

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • For the child in all of us, a timeless illustrated story about connection and compromise brought to life with imagination, from the acclaimed author of Born a Crime “But sooner or later your mother will find us,” Walter said, looking back at the house. “She always does.”The boy’s eyes lit up again. He had an idea.“Then this time we need to go where we’ve never gone before,” he said. “Into the uncut grass!” In the tradition of The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse comes a gorgeously illustrated fable about a young child’s journey into the world beyond the shadow of home, a magical landscape where he discovers the secrets of sharing, connection, and finding peace with the people we love. Infused with the author’s signature wit and imagination, in collaboration with visionary artist Sabina Hahn,...

"Sometimes the greatest things are the most embarrassing." Ellen Degeneres' winning, upbeat candor has made her show one of the most popular, resilient and honored daytime shows on the air. (To date, it has won no fewer than 31 Emmys.) Seriously... I'm Kidding, Degeneres' first book in eight years, brings us up to date about the life of a kindhearted woman who bowed out of American Idol because she didn't want to be mean. Lively; hilarious; often sweetly poignant.

Take a Mexican political party that demands the territorial return of Texas... and New Mexico... and Arizona... and California. Add a Chinese paper exporting operation that exports a fine engraver's surface for the familiar five-dollar portrait of Lincoln. Stir with a Countess who has made a fortune in cosmetics and runsa private little kingdom at her castle deep in the Mexican jungle. Mix in the CIA and AXE, prickling each other's sensitivities while the nation and the highest men in government are stumped to stop the ruin of America's economy... And suddenly, in the meeting between Hawk and the CIA man, the ingredients have blended into a little pill they hand Nick Carter. His instructions are: straighten things out-or swallow your defeat in L pills!

A father must protect his family from monsters he thought were only in the movies. When a tragedy strikes help is offered from an unexpected source. But is the help worse than the tragedy? Monsters are real. Werewolves stalk their prey and vampires hide in the shadows in this story about a family facing horrors.Chris Hixon's family is being hunted by a monster he thought was only in movies and old legends. His son carries a talisman that is sought by one of the oldest werewolves in the world. And he will stop at nothing to get it. When tragedy strikes his daughter, he is offered help from a strange source. A centuries old vampire is willing to help. But is the cost too high?This Novella is the first in a series.

What can we learn from the stunning rise and mysterious death of the ancient world's greatest conqueror? An acclaimed biographer reconstructs the life of Alexander the Great in this magisterial revisionist portrait."Reads as easily as a novel . . . Nearly unparalleled insight into the period and the man make this a story for everyone."—Kirkus Reviews (starred review) More than two millennia have passed since Alexander the Great built an empire that stretched to every corner of the ancient world, from the backwater kingdom of Macedonia to the Hellenic world, Persia, and ultimately to India—all before his untimely death at age thirty-three. Alexander believed that his empire would stop only when he reached the Pacific Ocean. But stories of both real and legendary events from his life have kept him evergreen in our imaginations with a legacy that has meant something different to every era: in the Middle Ages he became an exemplar of knightly...

The minotaur will be recognised by his strength.Kelly doesn't believe in ancient prophecies. Then again, up until recently, she also didn't believe a horn could grow out of her forehead.Now the Collector is holding her mother hostage, and if Kelly wants to rescue her she needs to learn how to wield all the powers of the Unicorn. She also needs some help.She needs to find . . . the Minotaur.Minh knows something epic is going on. For the last year, he has been getting stronger and stronger. He can pull a plough as well as any horse. He can lift cars.But he has no idea that this is just the beginning...Kelly and Minh will need to help each other if they are to have any hope of bringing down the Collector and rescuing the people they love.

I wrote this short story for a class in intermediate fiction at the University of Colorado back in 1987 after reading a short story by John Ashbery titled, "Description of a Masque." I wrote it during the spring semester and just before I attended the Aspin Writers Conference, a life-altering event for me.You are blind and standing at the south rim of the Canyon. Gently and with kind words, as if performing a long overdue service for a patient of some convalescent hospital, he takes the cane from you, and you listen to the dull clunk of wood as he leans it against a rock. You learn that place, knowing you may have to return to it alone. The heat of midday sun is on your head, and you wish to see the wall of the north rim, realizing that the image can be nothing more than a mental fabrication. He returns, encourages you to stand a little closer to the edge. "To see," he says, "if you can sense what she must have — the ground plunge downward to the first plateau." He solicits more courage, urging you ahead, creating a comforting, therapeutic confidence in your action. "Don't be so timid. That's where they found her, you know, on the first plateau more than 2,000 feet below, which now has a thin covering of desert grass, just enough to give it a tinge of green. That's where she stopped."This world is a stranger to you, to both of you. But with the untimeliness of her passing, you must take extraordinary measures. And surely, it was your fault. You, who see even the fall of the least sparrow, failed to see the fall of your only daughter, the Little One. And so you are here. And since you refuse to discuss it, he treats it as amnesia. You feel strange standing on the very spot where the accident occurred. It was a very human event, simply a death.Now taking his suggestion, you lean, tentatively at first, then take a short step, feeling the ground gently slope off, the gravel move under your feet. Knowing he's close, you touch the thick hair and flesh of his arm, then feel him move from you, slightly back but still in touch, leaving you a little unsteady. An updraft rushes by, and then you detect a difference, an absence of reflected sound, a void in front of you as deep as that left in the heart from a sudden death. You yearn to cry out, to bounce an echo from the far wall, to make the abyss finite, to make it part of the Canyon. Instead, from within it comes the wordless cry of a human voice, a sound so strange, yet so complete in intent, young and old at the same time like that of a reincarnated child, lost and doomed to walk the face of the earth as an unaging spirit. "Do you hear that?" you ask. "Do you hear the voice from the Canyon?""I hear nothing but someone on horseback hurrying away on the dirt path and the occasional caw of a crow." His voice is now stiff and unconvincing. "If I try to listen with the ears of the blind, I hear the claws of squirrels in the trees behind us and just now the sound of children's laughter around the bend. But if I can't hear it, perhaps it is she calling you. Perhaps it would be only fitting for you to follow.""No. This is nothing like that. It comes from below. Maybe a climber stranded on a cliff," you lie. "There. I hear it again. It comes on the updraft."He leaves your touch and moves away from the edge as if seeking some strategic position. You hear him behind you, shuffling among the rocks, and you wonder if he's moving your cane. You wish to feel the tip on the ground, rake it from side to side, feel the dirt and push around loose rocks. You reach out in front as if with cane in hand, the other arm out to the side for balance. He's talking to you again, his voice subtly changed, hardly disguising an air of inquisition, asking if you remember being here, asking if the presence of the Canyon is somewhat familiar? Is it filtering through your darkness? He's close behind you, too close. "In the past, your eyes would have filled with a palette of colors, painting," he suggests, "the layered rim that cuts off the blue sky and the strata that goes from dirt-pink to chalk-white to rust, and the cliffs that fall away to the green valley and the river below."

Barbara W. Tuchman—the acclaimed author of the Pulitzer Prize–winning classic The Guns of August—once again marshals her gift for character, history, and sparkling prose to compose an astonishing portrait of medieval Europe.   The fourteenth century reflects two contradictory images: on the one hand, a glittering age of crusades, cathedrals, and chivalry; on the other, a world plunged into chaos and spiritual agony. In this revelatory work, Barbara W. Tuchman examines not only the great rhythms of history but the grain and texture of domestic life: what childhood was like; what marriage meant; how money, taxes, and war dominated the lives of serf, noble, and clergy alike. Granting her subjects their loyalties, treacheries, and guilty passions, Tuchman re-creates the lives of proud cardinals, university scholars, grocers and clerks, saints and mystics, lawyers and mercenaries, and, dominating all, the knight—in all his valor and “furious follies,” a “terrible worm in an iron cocoon.” Praise for A Distant Mirror “Beautifully written, careful and thorough in its scholarship . . . What Ms. Tuchman does superbly is to tell how *it was. . . . No one has ever done this better.”—The New York Review of Books  * “A beautiful, extraordinary book . . . Tuchman at the top of her powers . . . She has done nothing finer.”—The Wall Street Journal  * “Wise, witty, and wonderful . . . a great book, in a great historical tradition.” —Commentary* NOTE: This edition does not include color images.

From New York Times bestselling author Amy Hill Hearth comes her first historical thriller, inspired by the story of the 1916 Jersey Shore shark."Sharks are as timid as rabbits," says a superintendent of the Coast Guard, dismissing the possibility that a shark could be the culprit in an unprecedented fatal attack at the Jersey Shore. It's July, and swimming in the sea is a popular new pastime, but people up and down the East Coast are shocked and mystified by the swimmer's death. A prominent surgeon at the shore, Dr. Edwin Halsey is the one who examines the victim, and the only one who believes the perpetrator was a shark—and that it will strike again.With the public and the authorities—and even those who witnessed the attacks—so stubbornly disbelieving, Dr. Halsey finds himself fighting widespread confusion, conspiracy theories, and outright denial. Seeking the input of commercial fisherman, he soon learns they have long been concerned about a...