Random House, Inc.

Follows the power-hungry dark elf Jarlaxle and his assassin compatriot, Artemis Entreri, as they battle evil forces, in the second volume in a series chronicling the adventures of two characters from the Forgotten Realms universe. Reprint.

A murder in the silent after-hour halls of the Louvre museum reveals a sinister plot to uncover a secret that has been protected by a clandestine society since the days of Christ. The victim is a high-ranking agent of this ancient society who, in the moments before his death, manages to leave gruesome clues at the scene that only his granddaughter, noted cryptographer Sophie Neveu, and Robert Langdon, a famed symbologist, can untangle. The duo become both suspects and detectives searching for not only Neveu's grandfather's murderer but also the stunning secret of the ages he was charged to protect. Mere steps ahead of the authorities and the deadly competition, the mystery leads Neveu and Langdon on a breathless flight through France, England, and history itself. Brown has created a page-turning thriller that also provides an amazing interpretation of Western history. Brown's hero and heroine embark on a lofty and intriguing exploration of some of Western culture's greatest mysteries — from the nature of the Mona Lisa's smile to the secret of the Holy Grail. Though some will quibble with the veracity of Brown's conjectures, therein lies the fun. «The Da Vinci Code» is an enthralling read that provides rich food for thought.

Arthur and George grow up worlds and miles apart in late 19th-century Britain: Arthur in shabby-genteel Edinburgh, and George in the vicarage of a small Staffordshire village. Arthur becomes a doctor, and then a writer; George a solicitor in Birmingham. Arthur is to become one of the most famous men of his age, George remains in hardworking obscurity. But as the new century begins, they are brought together by a sequence of events, which made sensational headlines at the time as The Great Wyrley Outrages. With a mixture of detailed research and vivid imagination, Julian Barnes brings to life not just this long-forgotten case, but the inner lives of these two very different men. The reader sees them both with stunning clarity, and almost inhabits them as they face the vicissitudes of their lives, whether in the dock hearing a verdict of guilty, or trying to live an honourable life while desperately in love with another woman. This is a novel in which the events of a hundred years ago constantly set off contemporary echoes, a novel about low crime and high spirituality, guilt and innocence, identity, nationality and race; about what we think, what we believe, and what we know. Julian Barnes has long been recognised as one of Britain's most remarkable writers. While those already familiar with his work will enjoy its elegance, its wit, its profound wisdom about the human condition, Arthur & George will surely find him an entirely new audience.

Haunted is a novel made up of stories: twenty-three of them to be precise. Twenty-two of the most horrifying, hilarious, mind-blowing, stomach-churning tales you'll ever encounter — sometimes all at once. They are told by the people who have all answered the ad headlined 'Artists Retreat: Abandon your life for three months'. They are led to believe that here they will leave behind all the distractions of 'real life' that are keeping them from creating the masterpiece that is in them. But 'here' turns out to be a cavernous and ornate old theatre where they are utterly isolated from the outside world — and where heat and power and, most importantly, food are in increasingly short supply. And the more desperate the circumstances become, the more desperate the stories they tell — and the more devious their machinations become to make themselves the hero of the inevitable play/movie/non-fiction blockbuster that will certainly be made from their plight. Haunted is at one level a satire of reality television. It draws from a great literary tradition — The Canterbury Tales, The Decameron, the English storytellers in the Villa Diodati who produced, among other works, Frankenstein — to tell an utterly contemporary tale of people desperate that their story be told at any cost. Appallingly entertaining, Haunted is Chuck Palahniuk at his finest — which means his most extreme and his most provocative.

The book was called Pleasuring: One Couple's Journey to Fulfillment. The title, when the children had first heard it and begun to understand it, was so incontestably mortifying that it threatened to stunt them forever, leaving them clocked in time and steadfast refusal to enter the adult world. This is more or less what happens to Holly and Michael, Dashiell and Claudia, after they read the seminal book which their liberal parents Paul and Roz Mellow have written, a book that features tasteful pastel illustrations of their parents' lovemaking — and which has become a runaway bestseller. Thirty years later, when the children who have grown up in the shadow of these erotically charged parents are adults, and it looks as though the book may be reissued, we catch up individually with their conflicted, complicated 21st-century lives and those of the iconic couple whose marriage has not run as smoothly as it seemed set to do. The Jane Austen of sexual politics, with crackling intelligence, humour and a signature hint of suppressed rage, Meg Wolitzer takes us into the heart of a family that is dysfunctional in its very own way but heartbreakingly familiar.

Paul Rayment is on the threshold of a comfortable old age when a calamitous cycling accident results in the amputation of a leg. Humiliated, his body truncated, his life circumscribed, he turns away from his friends. He hires a nurse named Marijana, with whom he has a European childhood in common: hers in Croatia, his in France. Tactfully and efficiently she ministers to his needs. But his feelings for her, and for her handsome teenage son, are complicated by the sudden arrival on his doorstep of the celebrated Australian novelist Elizabeth Costello, who threatens to take over the direction of his life and the affairs of his heart. Unflinching in its vision of suffering and generous in its portrayal of the spirit of care, Slow Man is a masterful work of fiction by one of the world's greatest writers.

When a naval cruiser sinks in mysterious circumstances in the North Sea, all aboard are lost. Rose is saddened to learn that the brother of her friend, Keisha, was among the dead. And yet, he appears to them as a ghostly apparition, begging to be saved from the coming feast... the feast of the drowned.

Bestselling author Christopher Winn takes us on a fascinating journey around Ireland, to discover the tales buried deep in the country's history. Packed full of legends, firsts, birthplaces, inventions and adventures, this book visits each of the four provinces — Ulster, Leinster, Munster and Connaught — and unearths the hidden gems that each county in these provinces holds. Discover where people and ideas were born, where dreams were inspired and where the unforgettable figures of Ireland's past now slumber. You'll be able to visit the holy mountain, Croagh Patrick in Country Mayo, where St Patrick is said to have driven all the snakes in Ireland into the sea. At Lismore Castle in County Waterford you will uncover the bathroom dedicated to Fred Astaire, whose sister Adele was the hugely popular Chatelaine of Lismore in the 1930s and 40s. On the winter solstice you can bathe in the sunlight that fills the burial chamber at Newgrange, County Meath — the oldest solar observatory in the world. This irresistible compendium of facts and stories will give you a captivating insight into the people, ideas and events that have shaped the individual identity of every place you visit, and will have you exclaiming again and again: 'Well, I never knew that!'

Unsettled by her pregnancy, werewolf Elena Michaels is given the task of retrieving a stolen letter allegedly written by Jack the Ripper, but she soon discovers that the letter contains a portal to Victorian London's underworld, allowing the vicious killer access to the twenty-first century, where he and a pair of zombie thugs are searching for Elena.

Presents a tour of the politics and culture of football from Milan to Tehran. This work examines the game's role in sustaining ancient hatreds and rivalries; in supporting the migration of players and the rise of the football oligarchs; and in defending the virtues and vices of old-fashioned nationalism.

Three years on from the events in The Golem's Eye, the magicians' rule in London is teetering on a knife-edge, with strikes, riots and general unrest. The Prime Minister is largely controlled by two advisers, one of whom is 17-year-old Nathaniel. Meanwhile, living under a false identity, Kitty has been researching djinn; she has come to believe that the only way to destroy the magicians is with an alliance of some kind between djinn and ordinary people. Kitty seeks out Bartimaeus and embarks on a terrifying journey into the djinn's chaotic domain — the Other Place — which no human being has ever survived. But even as she does so, Makepeace engineers a dramatic coup d'etat. The outcome is a shattering of the magicians' control and all magical laws are turned upside down. Can Bartimaeus, Nathaniel and Kitty settle old scores if they are to survive and prevent the earth's destruction?

When my parents split up they didn't know what to do with me... My family always lived at Mulberry Cottage. Mum, Dad, me — and Radish, my Sylvanian rabbit. But now, Mum lives with Bill the Baboon and his three kids. Dad lives with Carrie and her twins. And where do I live? I live out of a suitcase. One week with Mum's new family, one week with Dad's. It's as easy as A B C. That's what everyone says. But all I want is to go home — back to Mulberry Cottage...

Presents a full-length biography of Isabella of France, Edward II's queen — one of the most notorious femme fatales in history — that aims to change the way we think of her and her world, for ever. She was popularly known as the 'She-Wolf of France'.

The ne'er-do-well son of a Texas millionaire presidential hopeful winds up murdered, apparently by a heroin-addicted hooker. Assigned to defend the prime suspect, Dallas attorney Scott Fenney must choose between his lifestyle and doing what he knows is right.

When a «perfect» couple commits double suicide, alarms go off in the offices of the high-tech matchmaking company. Investigation into a second couple's double suicide reveals a stunning labyrinth of artificial intelligence, creative genius, and a melding of technology that does indeed deliver on the company's guarantee of a perfect, lifelong mate.

Equipped with space suits, golf clubs and a flag, the Doctor and Rose are planning to live it up, Apollo mission-style, on the Moon. But the TARDIS has other plans, landing them instead in a village on the south coast of England; a picture-postcard sort of place where nothing much happens.

Meredith Gentry, P.I., a.k.a. Princess Merry, heir to the throne of Faerie, faces dark and erotic encounters which grow ever stronger, threatening to consume her as she challenges new and ominous enemies in this fourth book of the sexually charged series by #1 «New York Times» bestselling author Hamilton.

In this Bram Stoker Award-winning chiller, a children's book author discovers frightening parallels between her loss and a manuscript by a struggling horror writer, who suggests they must join forces to confront the evils surrounding them.

Brilliant plotting, relentless suspense, raved the Washington Post, A new synonym for terror, crowned the Detroit Free Press. The critics agree: no one writes suspense like Karin Slaughter, whose thrillers featuring medical examiner Sara Linton and her ex-husband, police chief Jeffrey Tolliver, have propelled her to the top of bestseller lists the world over. Now Slaughter fuses her unmatched grasp of forensic science and a mastery of complex relationships in a riveting tale of faith, doubt, and murder. The victim was buried alive in the Georgia woods-then killed in a horrifying fashion. When Sara Linton and Jeffrey Tolliver stumble upon the body, both become consumed with finding out who killed the pretty, impeccably dressed young woman. And for Sara and Jeffrey, a harrowing journey begins, one that will test their own turbulent relationship and draw dozens of lives into the case. Lena Adams is one of them. A Grant County detective for years, she has her own reasons for being drawn to this case and a fierce drive to see justice done. For these three people, who have each seen the darkest side of human nature, the body of the murdered girl is but the first in a series of shocking and sordid revelations. Now, as Jeffrey and Sara narrow the field of suspects, they must confront their own doubts and indiscretions, while Lena Adams sees herself reflected in the frightened eyes of a battered woman who may be the key figure in the case. As Faithless builds to a stunning and unforgettable climax, Karin Slaughter masterfully brings together strands of interlocking lives, family secrets, and hidden passions with one astounding truth: the identity of a killer who is more eviland dangerous than anyone could have guessed.

Saturday, February 15, 2003. Henry Perowne is a contented man — a successful neurosurgeon, the devoted husband of Rosalind and proud father of two grown-up children. Unusually, he wakes before dawn, drawn to the window of his bedroom and filled with a growing unease. What troubles him as he looks out at the night sky is the state of the world — the impending war against Iraq, a gathering pessimism since 9/11, and a fear that his city and his happy family life are under threat. Later, Perowne makes his way to his weekly squash game through London streets filled with hundreds of thousands of anti-war protestors. A minor car accident brings him into a confrontation with Baxter, a fidgety, aggressive, young man, on the edge of violence. To Perowne's professional eye, there appears to be something profoundly wrong with him. Towards the end of a day rich in incident and filled with Perowne's celebrations of life's pleasures, his family gathers for a reunion. But with the sudden appearance of Baxter, Perowne's earlier fears seem about to be realised.

Alice Hoffman is at her electrifying best in this fairy tale for grown-ups. The story begins with a little girl who makes a wish one snowy night and ruins her life. She grows up with a splinter of ice in her heart until one day, standing be her kitchen window, she is struck by lightning.

A collection of macabre short stories. Ian McEwan received the Somerset Maugham Award in 1976 for a previous collection of short stories entitled First Love, Last Rites.

Taut, brooding and densely atmospheric, these stories show us the ways in which murder can arise out of boredom, perversity can result from adolescent curiosity, and sheer evil might be the solution to unbearable loneliness.

As their holiday unfolds, Colin and Maria are locked into their own intimacy. They groom themselves meticulously, as though there waits someone who cares deeply about how they appear. Then, they meet a man with a disturbing story to tell and become drawn into a fantasy of violence and obsession.