The Wonky Donkey

About the Author Craig Smith is the recipient of the 2008 APRA Children's Song of the Year for The Wonky Donkey . When not writing, Craig works as a musician and entertainer. Visit him at craigsmith.co.nz.  Katz Cowley is an illustrator and teacher who leads workshops in drawing, creative journaling, and self-expression.

Humans of New York : Stories

Review "I ended up reading Stories cover-to-cover in one sitting. The powerful storytelling Stanton does on his blog translates seamlessly into book form." ―Elise De Los Santos, Chicago Tribune “As the quotes grew longer, and the interviews deeper, Stanton developed a signature storytelling style―one that blends the lure of urban voyeurism with an eye for the extraordinary detail in seemingly ordinary subjects. What makes these photographs compelling is their sincerity, their air of authenticity. All are taken on the spot of first contact.” ― The Economist “A wondrous mix of races, ages, genders, and social classes, and on virtually every page is a surprise.” ― Kirkus Reviews, starred review “Some street photographers hide behind phone booths like paparazzi so their subject won't be aware of their presence, but for Stanton it's precisely that awkward interaction, the tearing down of the wall between strangers, that he covets.” ― The Huffington Post “There's no judgment, just observation and in many cases reverence, making for an inspiring reading and visual experience.” ― Publisher’s Weekly About the Author BRANDON STANTON is the creator of the #1 New York Times bestselling books Humans, Humans of New York, and Humans of New York: Stories as well as the children's book, Little Humans. His photography and storytelling blog is followed by a global audience of over thirty million people across several social media platforms. In addition to sharing thousands of stories from around the world, the blog has raised over $30 million for featured individuals and nonprofits. Stanton is a graduate of the University of Georgia and lives in New York City.

Eternal

Review "An accomplished historical novel that is both steeped in period detail and full of relatable characters.... Scottoline is a master at ramping up the suspense."-- Washington Post "In this book of her heart, Lisa Scottoline delivers what her readers expect and so much more, fast-paced intrigue, but also an authentic, tender coming of age tale of three best friends navigating the complexities of fascism, war, political and family strife and romantic competition."-- Lisa Wingate, author of Before We Were Yours and The Book Of Lost Friends "Eternal feels so real you can almost taste the cappelletti, as you get lost in the pages on your glorious and heart-wrenching trip to Italy."-- Martha Hall Kelly, author of Lilac Girls and Sunflower Sisters “Powerful and absorbing…at the heart of the novel is an enduring message, that what’s perhaps most heroic in any life is to love fiercely and completely, in spite of loss and betrayal, and even beyond death.”-- Paula McLain, author of The Paris Wife and When the Stars Go Dark “With characters who change and grow and enough twists and turns to keep you guessing, Eternal is a blockbuster with cinematic intensity.”-- Christina Baker Kline, author of Orphan Train and The Exiles "Make a plate of fettuccine, pour a glass of red wine, and settle in with this captivating tale. You will cry tears of sadness and joy. Scottoline’s Italian heritage combined with all her diligent research will keep this story in readers’ hearts." - -Library Journal (starred review) “A beautiful, heartbreaking, wrenching love story set in the Second World War. It’s alive with characters I cared about deeply - including the remarkable city of Rome, itself - and their courage in the face of Fascism.”-- Chris Bohjalian, author of Midwive s and The Flight Attendant "This nuanced take on WWII Italy offers a variety of perspectives, but at its heart, this is a love story, with heroes lost being warmly remembered and love conquering all….Best-selling crime writer Scottoline successfully changes course in a coming-of-age WWII love story that will entrance fans and newcomers alike."-- Booklist “Scottoline’s admirable foray into historical fiction…expertly brings historical events to life. Fans of WWII fiction will be drawn to this immersive, emotional novel.”-- Publishers Weekly “Quite a change from Scottoline’s bestselling contemporary thrillers: an ambitious, deeply researched historical account of three Roman families caught in the meltdown of Fascist Italy...Heartfelt.” -- Kirkus Reviews “A powerfully moving story of loss, loyalty, family and love.”-- Woman's World “As Americans go through huge growing pains (hopefully leading to something positive) in terms of their own racist pasts, Eternal offers us hope. Somehow love really can save the day--romantic love, brotherhood, spiritual love, love for a good nation and the democratic process. May the scholarship and literary invention of this extraordinary novel find a home in the hearts of readers everywhere.”-- Bookreporter.com "I absolutely loved this page-turning novel. The writing is superb, and the historical research is outstanding. Eternal is an important book about the Holocaust and fascist Italy, and tells a story that needs to be told. As a Holocaust educator and a Child Refugee Survivor of the Holocaust, I strongly recommend everyone read this book."-- Dr. Miriam Klein Kassenoff, Director, The Holocaust Teacher Institute, University of Miami " Eternal is remarkable historical fiction that brings to life Rome in the years leading up to and during WWII on the shoulders of unforgettable characters caught up on all sides of terrible events spinning beyond their control. Scottoline’s research is impeccable, her storytelling is propulsive, and the emotional times she describes are deep, moving, and yes, eternal." -- Mark Sullivan, bestselling author of Beneath a Scarlet Sky "The master storyteller Lisa Scottoline is at the height of her powers with Eternal. This magnificent epic is the story of  three childhood friends who come of age during World War II Italy. You are with them in the worst of times as they navigate their lost dreams. You will root for their survival as they find redemption in a post-war world they must build with hope. Love. Faith. Friendship. Courage. It's all here and it is essential reading." --Adriana Trigiani, bestselling author of Lucia, Lucia and The Shoemaker's Wife "In Eternal , Lisa Scottoline expands her formidable talents to World War II Italy and the heartwarming tale of three families whose intersecting worlds are torn apart. Scottoline captures the tragic beauty of wartime Rome through the eyes of unforgettable characters with whom readers will hope and mourn and cheer. A passionate story of friendship, loyalty, and unbridled heroism."-- Pam Jenoff, bestselling author of The Lost Girls of Paris “ Eternal is a gripping story of suffering and survival.  It unspools at a heart-stopping pace,  yet each page resonates with emotions: fear, hope, sorrow, yearning, love, empathy, sympathy, and, ultimately, joy.  The book lives up to its title.  It will echo in the minds of readers for a long time.”- -Sandra Brown "What Elena Ferrante did with her Neapolitan Quartet, Scottoline does for war-time Rome: brings it to life as the city is ripped apart by men in power and barely held together by the courage and decency of those who stand against them. Eternal is a must read." --Lorenzo Carcaterra “At its heart, Eterna l is a beautiful, heartbreaking, yet ultimately uplifting love story. Meticulously researched, this riveting World War II-era novel explores what happens when beautiful Elisabetta must choose between lifelong best friends Sandro and Marco. As they get caught up in the madness that overtakes Italy when it becomes a satellite of Hitler and the Third Reich, each must make a gut-wrenching choice that determines the course of the rest of their lives. Action-packed and haunting, Eternal will stay with you for a long time after you finish reading it. I loved this book!”-- Karen Robards, author of The Black Swan of Paris "Lisa Scottoline is a magnificent storyteller. Eternal is a triangular story of first love, told against the backdrop of WWII in Rome, that is both terrifying and magical; three young people at one of the worst times in history are filled with love, hate, fear, rage, and at the end, survival and hope. Eternal is brilliantly written. Scottoline hits new heights in this spellbinding tale of decades-old family secrets and rips apart the fragility of first loves. I was pulled in from the first page by the lives of Scottoline’s characters as they tried to make their way through events beyond their control in this richly detailed story that makes you feel like you’re right alongside them." - -Andrew Mayne, author of The Naturalist and The Girl Beneath the Sea About the Author Lisa Scottoline is the New York Times -bestselling author of thirty-two novels. She has thirty million copies of her books in print in the United States and has been published in thirty-five countries. Scottoline also writes a weekly column with her daughter for The Philadelphia Inquirer . Lisa has served as President of Mystery Writers of America and has taught a course she developed, "Justice in Fiction" at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, her alma mater. She lives in the Philadelphia area. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Elisabetta May 1937 Elisabetta made up her mind. Marco Terrizzi would be her first kiss. She watched him doing bicycle tricks by the river, riding on his back tire, his head thrown back in laughter, his teeth white against his tanned face. His thick, dark hair shone with pomade in the sun, and his legs were knotted with muscles inside the baggy shorts of his uniform. He rode with joy and athleticism, achieving a masculine grace. Marco Terrizzi had sprezzatura, a rare and effortless charm that made him irresistible. Elisabetta couldn't take her eyes from him, and neither could the others. They had grown up together, but somewhere along the line, he had gone from boyhood to manhood, from Marco to Marco. That he was terribly handsome there could be no doubt. He had large, walnut-brown eyes, a strong nose, a square jaw, and a broad neck marked by a prominent Adam's apple. He was the most popular boy in their class, and everything about him seemed more vivid than everyone else. Even now, the sun drenched him in gold, as if Nature herself gilded him. Elisabetta wondered what it would be like to kiss him. She guessed it would be exciting, even delicious, like biting into a ripe tomato and letting its juices run down her chin. She had never kissed a boy, though she was already fifteen years old, and at night she practiced kissing on her pillow. Her tabbycat, Rico, with whom she slept, had grown accustomed to her routine, as cats endure the silliness of young girls. Elisabetta had no idea how to make Marco think of her as more than a friend. She usually achieved what she set her mind to, getting good grades and such, but this was different. She was too blunt to flirt. She lacked feminine wiles. She had been a maschiaccio, a tomboy, when she was little, which was how she had grown close with Marco. She was trying to become more womanly, but she still didn't wear a brassiere. Her mother said she didn't need one, but the other girls made fun of her, talking behind their hands. "Elisabetta, help, I'll drown!" Marco raced toward the river, and she was about to call to him, but stopped herself. She had read in a female advice column that denying men the attention they craved drove them mad with desire, so she ignored him, while the other girls responded. "Marco, no!" Livia called back. "Marco, be careful!" Angela gasped. The boys waited to see if calamity befell Marco, but he cranked the handlebars, veering away from the river's edge. They laughed and returned to their textbooks, spread out on the grass. They were doing homework, having come from their Balilla meeting, the party's compulsory youth group. They all wore their uniforms, the boys in their black shirts and gray shorts, and the girls in white muslin shirts and black skirts. This quiet spot on the riverbank, just north of the Ponte Palatino, had become a hangout of her classmates after school, though Elisabetta typically sat with Marco or Sandro, apart from the other girls. Somehow she had missed her chance to become their girlfriend, and it was too late now, for they rebuffed her overtures. Perhaps they had judged her as preferring the boys, which wasn't true, and she would have loved to have had a good girlfriend. Whatever the reason, Angela and the other girls kept her at a distance, and she tried not to let it bother her. "Look, Betta!" Marco called again, using her childhood nickname. "Use my proper name!" Elisabetta called back, from behind her newspaper. She did prefer her full name, as she hoped to become a journalist someday. She practiced her byline at night, too. By Elisabetta D'Orfeo. "Elisabetta!" Marco rode over, sliding to a stop on the grass. "Hop on my handlebars. Let's go for a ride." "No, I'm reading." Elisabetta hid her smile behind the newspaper. Angela rose, brushing grass from her skirt. "Marco, I'll go, take me!" "Okay!" Marco extended his hand, Angela clambered onto his handlebars, and the two rode off together. Elisabetta lowered her newspaper, wondering if the female advice column had been wrong. If she wanted Marco, she would have to attract him another way. She sensed she was pretty enough, now that she had grown into her features, according to her mother. Her large, round eyes were greenish-brown, and her shoulder-length hair was a rich brunette, wavy and abundant. Her nose was strong, but proportional to her prominent cheekbones, and her lips were full. Her problem was her bocca grande, big mouth, which proved a disadvantage when it came to boys, her Latin teacher, and that old bitch at the newsstand. Elisabetta leaned back on her elbows, breathing in the odors of the Tiber, its water a milky jade with wavelets topped with ivory foam. Swallows skimmed the surface for a drink, cicadas rasped, and dragonflies droned. Pink oleander bushes, umbrella pines, and palm trees lined the riverbank, and the natural oasis was shielded from the hustle-bustle of the city by gray stone walls. Elisabetta's gaze found the Ponte Rotto in the middle of the river, a bizarre sight. Centuries ago, the stone bridge had connected the riverbanks, but time had reduced it to only a single arch rising from the water, leading nowhere. Romans called it the broken bridge, but she thought that it was a survivor, standing despite the elements and the Tiber itself, which sent blackish-green vines up its sides, as if trying to pull it underwater. Beyond the Ponte Rotto was Tiber Island, the only island in the river, barely large enough to contain the Basilica di San Bartolomeo all'Isola with its faded-brick belfry, the Church of San Giovanni Calibita, and the hospital, Ospedale Fatebenefratelli, with its rows of green-shuttered windows. Across from the hospital was Bar GiroSport, which Marco's family owned and lived above. Elisabetta lived only a few blocks away from him in Trastevere, the bohemian neighborhood that she and her father loved. Unfortunately, her mother had ceased loving anything. It was then that Elisabetta spotted Sandro Simone striding toward her and the others. Sandro was her other best friend, and Marco's, too, as the three of them had been a trio since childhood. Sandro walked with his characteristically lanky stride, and his light brown curls blew back from his long, lean face. He was handsome in his own way, his features more refined than Marco's and his build like a sharpened pencil, slim but strong, the way a wire cable supports a modern bridge. "Ciao, Elisabetta!" Sandro reached her, smiling and taking off his fez. He wiped the sweat from his brow, slid off his backpack, and sat down. His eyes, a brilliant azure color with long eyelashes like awnings, narrowed against the sunlight. His nose was long and aquiline, and his lips finely etched into his face. Sandro lived on the east side of the river in the Jewish quarter, called the Ghetto, and throughout their childhood, Elisabetta, Sandro, and Marco had traveled back and forth on an axis from Trastevere to Tiber Island and the Ghetto, riding bikes, playing football, and generally acting as if Rome were their private playground. "Ciao, Sandro." Elisabetta smiled, happy to see him. "I stopped to get us a snack. Have one." Sandro produced a paper bag from his backpack and opened its top, releasing the delicious aroma of suppl“, rice croquettes with tomato sauce and mozzarella. "Grazie!" Elisabetta picked up a suppl“ and took a bite. The breading was light, the tomato sauce perfectly salty, and the mozzarella hot enough to melt on her tongue. "Where's Marco? I brought some for him, too." "Off with Angela." "Too bad." Sandro chewed a suppl“ and glanced at her newspaper. "What are you reading?" "Nothing." Elisabetta used to love reading the newspaper, but her favorite columnists were gone, and she suspected they had been fired. Benito Mussolini and the Fascists had been in power for fifteen years, and censorship had become the order of the day. "All the articles are the same, about how great the government is, or they reproduce ridiculous posters like this one." "Let me see." Sandro wiped his hands on a napkin. "Here." Elisabetta showed him a picture of an Italian peasant woman in traditional dress, holding babies in each arm. She read him the caption. "'The ideal Fascist woman is to bear children, knit, and sew, while men work or go to war.' It's propaganda, not news, and anyway, not all women are the same." "Of course they aren't. The newspaper isn't always right." "No, it's not." Elisabetta thought of the female advice column. Marco and Angela still weren't back. "Don't let it bother you." "But it does." Elisabetta disagreed with the Fascists, though she didn't discuss it with anyone other than Sandro and Marco. Those who spoke against the government could be arrested and sent into confino, exile, far from their homes. Informers abounded in Rome, even in Trastevere, and though Elisabetta's family wasn't committed to any particular political party, as artists they were congenitally leftist. "You don't like being told what to do." "Who does? Do you?" "No, but I don't take it so much to heart as you." Sandro leaned over. "Guess what, I have amazing news. I was accepted to an internship with Professor Levi-Civita at La Sapienza." "Davvero?" Elisabetta asked, astonished. "You, a high school student? At the university?" "Yes, it will be an independent study." Sandro beamed with pride. "Congratulations!" Elisabetta felt delighted for him. He was a mathematical prodigy, and his preternatural talent had been plain since primary school, so she shouldn't have been surprised that he would be at La Sapienza, the city campus of the University of Rome. "And this professor is the one you always talk about, right? Levi-Civita?" "Yes, and I can't wait to meet him. He's one of the greatest mathematicians of our time. He developed tensor calculus, which Einstein used in his theory of relativity. In fact, he just got back from seeing him in America." "How wonderful. How did this come about, anyway? For you?" "Professoressa Longhi recommended me, and I've been waiting to hear. I just stopped by the hospital to tell my mother." "She must be so proud." Elisabetta admired Sandro's mother, who was one of the few female doctors she had ever heard of, an obstetrician at Ospedale Fatebenefratelli. "She was, but she was surprised I hadn't told her I was being considered." "I am, too. Why didn't you tell us?" Elisabetta meant her and Marco. "I didn't want you to know if I failed." "Oh, Sandro." Elisabetta felt a rush of affection for him. "You never fail, and Levi-Civita is lucky to have you. You'll be a famous mathematician someday." Sandro grinned. "And you'll be a famous journalist." "Ha!" Elisabetta didn't know what Marco would become, but dismissed the thought. "How can you read in the sunlight?" Sandro squinted at her newspaper. "It's so bright." "It is, I know." "Allow me." Sandro slid the newspaper page from her hand and stood up. "No, give me that back." Elisabetta rose, reaching, but Sandro turned away, doing something with the newspaper. "It's only the obituaries." "I like the obituaries." Elisabetta always read the obituaries, as each one was a wonderful life story, except for the endings. "Ecco." Sandro held out a hat of folded newspaper, then popped it on her head. "This will keep the sun from your eyes." "Grazie." Elisabetta smiled, delighted, and all of a sudden, Sandro kissed her. She found herself kissing him back, tasting warm tomato sauce on his lips until he pulled away, smiling down at her, with a new shine in his eyes that confused her. She had just decided that Marco would be her first kiss. "Sandro, why did you do that?" Elisabetta glanced around, wondering if the others had seen. Her classmates were bent over their homework, and though Marco was approaching with Angela on his handlebars, he was too far away. Sandro grinned. "Isn't it obvious why?" "But you never kissed me before." "I never kissed anybody before." Elisabetta felt touched. "So why me? Why now?" Sandro laughed. "Who asks such questions? Only you!" "But I thought we were just friends." "Are we? I-" Sandro started to say, but Marco interrupted them, shouting from a distance. "Ciao, Sandro!" "Ciao, Marco!" Sandro called back, waving. Elisabetta blinked, and the moment between her and Sandro vanished, so quickly that she wondered if it had happened at all. Chapter Two Marco May 1937 Marco pedaled home from the river on the Lungotevere dei Pierleoni, the wide boulevard that ran along its east side. The sun had dipped behind the trees, shooting burnished rays through the city, which had come to boisterous life as the workday ended. Cars honked, drivers cursed, and exhaust fogged the air. The sidewalks thronged with people, and businessmen hustled to catch trams. Marco accelerated, preoccupied with Elisabetta. He was in love with her, but she treated him as a pal, the way she always did. She hadn't even cared when he had taken Angela on his bike. He felt stumped, which never happened to him with girls. He could have his pick, but he wanted Elisabetta. She was beautiful, which was reason enough alone, but he loved her passion, her strength, her fire. She had thoughts about everything, and though her intelligence was superior, she treated him as if he were equally intelligent. Marco would stop at nothing to win her over. He was love's captive. He flashed on seeing Sandro by the river today, standing oddly close to her, as if they had been having a great discussion or even sharing a secret. Anxiety gnawed at Marco, and he experienced a flicker of envy at the bond that Sandro and Elisabetta shared, for they were always talking about books or the like. But Marco knew that Sandro and Elisabetta were only friends, and Sandro had no female experience whatsoever. Marco turned onto the Ponte Fabricio, his tires bobbling on the worn travertine. The footbridge was the oldest in Rome, walled on both sides-and since it connected to Tiber Island, it was essentially the street on which he lived. He dodged businessmen and veered smoothly around a cat that darted in front of him. He reached the top of the gentle span and saw that his father, Beppe, wasn't standing outside his family's bar, Bar GiroSport, as he usually did. It meant that Marco was late to dinner. He sped to the foot of the bridge, passed the bar, and steered around to its side entrance on Piazza San Bartolomeo all'Isola. He jumped off his bicycle, slid it into the rack, then flew inside the crowded bar. He scooted upstairs, dropped his backpack, and entered a kitchen so small that one pot of boiling water could fill it with steam. On the wall hung framed photos of his father in the Giro d'Italia and a calendar featuring Learco Guerra, the great Italian bicycle racer. A small shelf held a framed photo of Pope Pius XI, a crucifix of dried palm, and a plaster statue of the Virgin. Marco's mother worshipped Christ; his father worshipped cycling. Read more

Shadow Children Boxed Set: Among the Hidden, Among the Impostors, Among the Betrayed, and Among the Barons

Review Booklist Among the Betrayed Plenty of suspense...lots of thrilling twists and turns. School Library Journal Among the Barons Haddix is a superb storyteller and her view of a future world...is both scary and plausible. About the Author Margaret Peterson Haddix is the author of many critically and popularly acclaimed YA and middle grade novels, including the Children of Exile series, The Missing series, the Under Their Skin series, and the Shadow Children series. A graduate of Miami University (of Ohio), she worked for several years as a reporter for The Indianapolis News . She also taught at the Danville (Illinois) Area Community College. She lives with her family in Columbus, Ohio. Visit her at HaddixBooks.com.

Giraffes Can't Dance (Board Book)

Review "Andreae's rhyming text has a jaunty rhythm that's likely to spark interest in the read-aloud crowd." -Publishers Weekly About the Author Giles Andreae is the author of the international bestseller Giraffes Can't Dance , as well as many other books for children. Giles lives with his wife, Victoria, and their four children in the United Kingdom.  Guy Parker-Rees is one of today's bestselling children's book illustrators. He is the illustrator of the international bestseller Giraffes Can't Dance , as well as Dinosaurumpus! , both written by Giles Andreae. Guy lives in the United Kingdom with his wife and three sons. Visit him online at guyparkerrees.com.

The Pout-Pout Fish

Review "Younger kids will love the repetition of the verses in this tale of a pout-pout fish." --"TIME "magazine, from its Top 10 Childrens' Books of 2008 List"Winning artwork...Hanna's cartoonish undersea world swims with hilarious bug-eyed creatures that ooze personality" --"Kirkus Reviews""" "Appealing...the cartoon illustrations of undersea life are bright and clean and the protagonist's exaggerated expressions are entertaining." "--School Library Journal""" "Diesen's clever rhymes are playful and fun and are sure to keep children's imaginations swimming from page to page." "--Times Record News" “Younger kids will love the repetition of the verses in this tale of a pout-pout fish.” —"TIME "magazine, from its Top 10 Childrens’ Books of 2008 List"Winning artwork...Hanna’s cartoonish undersea world swims with hilarious bug-eyed creatures that ooze personality" —"Kirkus Reviews""" "Appealing...the cartoon illustrations of undersea life are bright and clean and the protagonist's exaggerated expressions are entertaining." "—School Library Journal""" "Diesen's clever rhymes are playful and fun and are sure to keep children's imaginations swimming from page to page." "—Times Record News""Younger kids will love the repetition of the verses in this tale of a pout-pout fish." --"TIME "magazine, from its Top 10 Childrens' Books of 2008 List"Winning artwork...Hanna's cartoonish undersea world swims with hilarious bug-eyed creatures that ooze personality" --"Kirkus Reviews""" "Appealing...the cartoon illustrations of undersea life are bright and clean and the protagonist's exaggerated expressions are entertaining." "--School Library Journal""" "Diesen's clever rhymes are playful and fun and are sure to keep children's imaginations swimming from page to page." "--Times Record News""Winning artwork...Hanna's cartoonish undersea world swims with hilarious bug-eyed creatures that ooze personality" --"Kirkus Reviews""" "Appealing...the cartoon illustrations of undersea life are bright and clean and the protagonist's exaggerated expressions are entertaining." "--School Library Journal""" "Diesen's clever rhymes are playful and fun and are sure to keep children's imaginations swimming from page to page." "--Times Record News" About the Author Deborah Diesen has worked as a bookseller, bookkeeper, and reference librarian. Her first book, The Pout-Pout Fish , was a New York Times bestseller and one of Time magazine’s Top 10 Children’s Books of the Year. She lives in Michigan with her family. Dan Hanna has over ten years’ experience in the animation industry, and his work has appeared on BBC America and the Cartoon Network. He lives in Oxnard, California.

NYPD Red 2

Review "In the case of NYPD RED, there is simply too much fun --- in the form of inventive murder, sex, chemistry, investigation, more murder, more sex, and the like. Potboiler? Yes. Wonderfully told? Indeed."― bookreporter.com PRAISE FOR JAMES PATTERSON:"The prolific Patterson seems unstoppable."― USA Today "James Patterson knows how to sell thrills and suspense in clean, unwavering prose."― People "Patterson's novels are sleek entertainment machines, the Porsches of commercial fiction, expertly engineered and lightning fast."― Publishers Weekly --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. About the Author James Patterson has had more New York Times bestsellers than any other writer, ever, according to Guinness World Records . Since his first novel won the Edgar Award in 1977 James Patterson's books have sold more than 300 million copies. He is the author of the Alex Cross novels , the most popular detective series of the past twenty-five years, including Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider . He writes full-time and lives in Florida with his family. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Tropical Trauma

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume I: 180 A.D. -- 395 A.D.

Review (in full The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire) Historical work by Edward Gibbon, published in six volumes between 1776 and 1788. A continuous narrative from the 2nd century AD to the fall of Constantinople in 1453, it is distinguished by its rigorous scholarship, its historical perspective, and its incomparable literary style. The Decline and Fall is divided into two parts, equal in bulk but different in treatment. The first half covers about 300 years to the end of the empire in the West, about 480 AD; in the second half nearly 1,000 years are compressed. Gibbon viewed the Roman Empire as a single entity in undeviating decline from the ideals of political and intellectual freedom that had characterized the classical literature he had read. For him, the material decay of Rome was the effect and symbol of moral decadence. -- The Merriam-Webster Encyclopedia of Literature


Conrad Stargard: The Radiant Warrior

Lisa's Counter Culture : Pickles and Other Well Bred Foods

Conrad's Lady (The Conrad Stargard)

About the Author Leo Frankowski is widely known for the popular "Cross-Time Engineer" series, which has gone through six novels to date, with translated editions in Italy, Spain, and Poland. Frankowski was nominated for the John W. Campbell award for best new writer. He has held more than a hundred different positions, ranging from scientist in an electro-optical research lab to chief engineer to company president. His work in chemical and optical instrumentation has earned him several patents. Currently a writer and consulting engineer, he lives with his new Russian wife and teenage daughter in Tver, Russia.

Conrad Stargard: The Radiant Warrior

Conrad's Lady (The Conrad Stargard)

The Monocle Travel Guide to San Francisco: The Monocle Travel Guide Series (Monocle Travel Guide, 26)

Meditation Chants of Hildegard Von Bingen

Becoming Elisabeth Elliot

Review "In this striking biography, Vaughn ( Time Peace ) sets out to discover the heart and soul of missionary and author Elisabeth Elliot (1926–2015). In the 1950s, Elliot served as a missionary to the Waodani tribe of Ecuador after her husband, Jim Elliot, and four others were killed by the tribe while trying to make contact. Vaughn recounts that story, bringing to light the deep desires, anguish, and imperfect life of Elliot, including her tense relationship with Rachel Saint, sister to another one of the missionaries who had died, who isolated herself from other missionaries among the Waodani. A deep thinker and lover of poetry who wanted nothing more than to do God’s will, Elliot eventually found her calling in ministry to Christians rather than to those outside the faith.  The biography’s second half largely deals with challenges of navigating a life of biblical faith at odds with cultural Christianity: Elliot 'chafed at the disparity between what she saw in the gospel and what she saw in the organized church,' Vaughn writes. 'She was quick to pick up the scent of hypocrisy and legalism, but she always applied such analysis to herself first.' Even those well-acquainted with Elliot’s works will find fresh perspective and revealing insights here." - Publisher's Weekly Review About the Author Ellen Vaughn is a New York Times bestselling author and speaker who has written or co-written 23 books.  Former vice president of executive communications at Prison Fellowship, she collaborated with the late Chuck Colson on a number of his seminal works.  She speaks at conferences, often travels to interview Christ-followers in hostile parts of the world, and serves on the board of directors for ICM, the global church developer.  With degrees from Georgetown University and the University of Richmond, Ellen lives in northern Virginia with husband Lee, a regional pastor for McLean Bible Church, a daughter and two grandchildren, and one clueless dog. She enjoys reading, hiking, drinking coffee, and staring pensively at the ocean.


One Special Day: A Story for Big Brothers and Sisters (A Story for Big Brothers and Sisters, 1)

Review Praise for One Special Day : An ALA Notable Children's Book Bank Street Best Books of the Year CCBC Choices Chicago Public Library Best of the Best Books for Kids About the Author LOLA M. SCHAEFER (www.lolaschaefer.com) is the author of more than 200 books for children. Her book Frankie Stein was awarded the Children's Choice Book Award and the Mockingbird Award. Lola lives with her husband, Ted, in the mountains of north Georgia. JESSICA MESERVE (www.www.jessicameserve.com) is the author-illustrator of Small Sister and Can Anybody Hear Me? She was born in Maine, studiedillustration in Scotland, and worked in publishing as achildren's book designer before pursuing a career as an illustrator. Her two young children helpedinspire her artwork in this book.

Finding Nemo Big Golden Book (Disney/Pixar Finding Nemo)

Octonauts and the Colossal Squid

About the Author Grosset & Dunlap creates high-quality books for young readers of any level. Focused on books for ages 0–12, Grosset offers a wide range of original fiction series, nonfiction titles, leveled readers, and licensed tie-ins to captivate every reader.

Squid and Octopus: Friends for Always

About the Author Tao Nyeu is the creator of Wonder Bear , which won the Founder's Award from the Society of Illustrators and a Marion Vannett Ridgway Award Honor; and Bunny Days , which won the Ezra Jack Keats Award and a Golden Kite Award Honor. Tao was born in Ohio and grew up in New York. She earned a BFA from Cornell University and an MFA from the School of Visual Arts. She now lives in Southern California.

The Snail and the Whale

Review "Along with providing a resonant environmental message, the story lightly demonstrates that friendships come in all shapes and sizes.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review About the Author Julia Donaldson is the internationally bestselling author of many popular books for children. Her Smarties Prize-winning modern classic, The Gruffalo , has sold more than 13.5 million copies worldwide, and the Halloween favorite Room on the Broom is a perennial best seller. In addition to children's books, she has written many children's plays and songs and runs regular storytelling workshops. She was the Waterstones Children's Laureate from 2011-2013. Axel Scheffler is an award-winning, internationally-acclaimed illustrator of some of the most well-loved children’s books, including Julia Donaldson’s best-selling modern classic The Gruffalo, which has sold millions of copies worldwide. He lives in London.

Hooking Up

Amazon.com Review Tom Wolfe's name is now so well known that the cover of his new collection bears just that: Tom Wolfe's name. No title, no picture, just the name, with an elegant design twining through it. Flip the thing on its side and you'll find that its title, Hooking Up , gives little idea of its function. But investigation soon reveals an oleo of reportage, fiction, and acrimonious name-calling. The latter, of course, makes for the best reading. In "My Three Stooges," Wolfe reviles the three big men of American letters--Updike, Mailer, and Irving--who cast aspersions on his second novel. Apparently, "the allergens for jealousy were present. Both Updike and Mailer had books out at the same time as A Man in Full , and theirs had sunk without a bubble. With Irving there was the Dickens factor." Wolfe gets in a lot of figures about what a big hit his book was with the reading public, and a few gentle reminders about other writers who were big hits of their times--little guys like Twain and Tolstoy. Equally bitter fun are his two famous 1965 satires from the New York Herald Tribune . As always, Wolfe's titles lead you a good way into the actual stories: "Tiny Mummies! The True Story of the Ruler of 43rd Street's Land of the Walking Dead!" and "Lost in the Whichy Thickets: The New Yorker ." Wolfe, clotheshorse of note, gets off some of his best cracks at the expense of New Yorker editor William Shawn's fashion sense: "He always seems to have on about twenty layers of clothes, about three button-up sweaters, four vests, a couple of shirts, two ties, it looks that way, a dark shapeless suit over the whole ensemble, and white cotton socks." The rest of the reported pieces are unexceptional, and while the novella Ambush at Fort Bragg makes the most of its setting--a Dateline -like newsmagazine--it lacks the irresistible momentum required to drag most readers into a novella. Still, it's fun to watch the author reprise his lifelong role of unlikely underdog: between his sniping at the literary elite and his mocking of the precious New Yorker set, Tom Wolfe makes like a defender of the common man. --Claire Dederer From Publishers Weekly Arch, vengeful and incisive as ever, the standard bearer for the chattering classes is back, this time with a collection of nine previously published essays, one new one and a reprinted novella. Ranging from the spectacular innovations of neuroscience to the preposterous horrors of the contemporary art world to a bare-knuckled assessment of the critical reception to his novel A Man in Full (an essay that appears for the first time in this collection, and that will set tongues wagging), the pieces run the gamut of Wolfe's signature obsessions. Fans of his character sketches will relish "Two Young Men Who Went West," a revelatory profile of Robert Noyce, a key innovator of the microchip who founded Intel in 1968, where the midwestern Congregationalist values he shared with his former mentor, William Shockley (founder of the original Silicon Valley startup, Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory), grew into a business philosophy that's now so pervasive it's practically in the ether. Also included are Wolfe's infamous, irreverent profiles of New Yorker editors Harold Ross and William Shawn, originally published in 1968. Lopped off of Wolfe's most recent fiction opus, the novella "Ambush in Fort Bragg" concerns a "TV sting" run amok, and sits easily next to his journalism. However, Wolfe's meticulous eye for detail shows signs of jaundice in his hectoring anti-Communist tirades and in the title essay, which turns a snide backward glance on the turn of the millennium. Still, his fans will find plenty of evidence that Wolfe remains willing to plunge into "the raw, raucous, lust-soaked rout that throbs with amped-up octophonic typanum all around [him]" and thatDespecially in his nonfictionDhe can still grab the brass ring. Agent, Janklow & Nesbitt Associates. (Oct..--" and thatDespecially in his nonfictionDhe can still grab the brass ring. Agent, Janklow & Nesbitt Associates. (Oct.) Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Booklist Wolfe-man steps up to bat again, this time with a collection of essays. Although these essays are not as fully provocative as his novels, they are still quite demonstrative of his feistiness. One of the most inciting is "My Three Stooges," in which Wolfe discusses the writing of and critical and popular response to his novel A Man in Full. Wolfe takes out after three eminent novelists--John Updike, Norman Mailer, and John Irving--who had bad things to say about this particular work. He refers to them as his three stooges, a stooge being "literally a straight man who feeds lines to the lead actor in a play. My three stooges were so upset by A Man in Full , they were feeding me lines I couldn't have dreamed up if they had asked me to write the script for them." In another essay, "Hooking Up," Wolfe ponders America's obsession with youth and American youth's sexual precocity. The early part of the Silicon Valley story is told in "Two Young Men Who Went West." These and other essays are not simply brief exercises but well-developed, factual, and informative narratives on a wide range of cultural topics. Appearing here, too, is a novella, "Ambush at Fort Bragg," about a military gay-bashing incident and how a TV show is investigating it; the novella is not any less pungent a piece of writing than the essays. Expect demand for this book by a very popular or at least much-talked-about author. Brad Hooper Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved Review “At heart he is and always will be a terrific reporter. Hooking Up provides a great introduction to Wolfe the nonfiction stylist: the peerless portraitist, the contrarian social critic and the literary bomb thrower. The book's title is a sexual metaphor, but in Wolfe's hands, it means making connections among the culture's disparate corners. And nobody hooks up better than he does.” ― Malcolm Jones, Newsweek “The rich retrospective of one of America's finest writers.” ― Michael Pakenham, Baltimore Sun “The publication of Hooking Up , Wolfe's first book of short pieces in 20 years, is reason enough for celebration . . . Delicious.” ― Benjamin Svetkey, Entertainment Weekly “Turn to the three essays grouped under the title "The Human Beast," and you will be in Wolfe heaven. The first of these--is an exuberant history of the birth of Silicon Valley...'Digibabble, Fairy Dust, and the Human Anthill' moves from the semiconductor industry to the Internet and then, by a kind of intuitive leap, to neuroscience and sociobiology. 'Sorry, but Your Soul Just Died' delves into brain imaging and the genetic determination of character. Jesuit priest Piere Teilhard de Chardin, closet Catholic Marshall McLuhan, and scientist Edmund O. Wilson are the pivotal figures of these two essays.” ― Michael Upchurch, Seattle Times “I love Tom Wolfe 'Whenever some big bizarro thing happens' I want the man in the white suit to do his usual exhausting reporting, turn the labels inside out and the hypocrites upside down . . .and tell me what's what in one of those jittering, dazzling riffs of his.” ― Maureen Dowd, The New York Times “His fans will find plenty of evidence that Wolfe remains willing to plunge into 'the raw, raucous, lust-soaked rout that throbs with amped-up octophonic typanum all around [him]' and that--especially in his nonfiction--he can still grab the brass ring.” ― Publishers Weekly (starred) About the Author Tom Wolfe (1930-2018) was one of the founders of the New Journalism movement and the author of such contemporary classics as The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test , The Right Stuff , and Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers , as well as the novels The Bonfire of the Vanities , A Man in Full , and I Am Charlotte Simmons . As a reporter, he wrote articles for The Washington Post , the New York Herald Tribune , Esquire , and New York magazine, and is credited with coining the term, “The Me Decade.” Among his many honors, Tom was awarded the National Book Award, the John Dos Passos Award, the Washington Irving Medal for Literary Excellence, the National Humanities Medal, and National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. A native of Richmond, Virginia, he earned his B.A. at Washington and Lee University, graduating cum laude, and a Ph.D. in American studies at Yale. He lived in New York City. Read more

American Husband (OSU JOURNAL AWARD POETRY)

About the Author Kary Wayson, winner of the Pushcart Prize for “I Turn My Silence Over,” lives and writes in Seattle, Washington.

Robert Ruark's Africa

About the Author Robert Ruark is a writer and African hunter who specialized in stories about the African wilderness.


The Heart Tarot

About the Author Maria Di Stefano is an artist based in New York. Lo Scarabeo's Tarot decks have been acclaimed all over the world for originality and quality. With the best Italian and international artists, each Lo Scarabeo deck is an exceptional artistic value. Committed to developing innovative new decks while preserving the rich tradition of Tarot, Lo Scarabeo continues to be a favorite among collectors and readers. Llewellyn is the exclusive distributor of Lo Scarabeo products in North America.

Tarot Spreads: Layouts & Techniques to Empower Your Readings

About the Author Barbara Moore (Saint Paul, MN) has studied and read tarot since the early 1990s. She wrote the bestselling Tarot for Beginners and more than a dozen other books, and she has contributed to many bestselling tarot kits, including Mystical Manga Tarot and Shadowscapes Tarot . Barbara also works with clients and leads retreats and workshops all over the world.

Tarot Illuminati Kit

About the Author Kim Huggens has been studying Tarot since the age of 9, and is the co-author of Sol Invictus: The God Tarot (Schiffer Publications, 2007) and in-progress companion deck Pistis Sophia: The Goddess Tarot. She lives in Cardiff, UK, where she works as a veterinary receptionist part-time to fund her university studies in Ancient History. She moved to Cardiff in 2002 for her undergraduate degree in Philosophy, and also graduated with an MA in Religion in Late Antiquity from Cardiff University in 2007. Kim has given numerous talks and workshops on the subject of Tarot, divination, Paganism and mythology in the UK, and regularly runs Tarot courses. She is a practicing Vodouisante and Thelemite, and a member of the OTO. She lives with her partner and cat, and in her spare time plays Call of Cthulhu, Dungeons and Dragons, writes short fiction, goes for walks in graveyards and wishes she could translate Sumerian. Erik C. Dunne is an artist who works on commisioned projects. He's traveled extensively, retracing the footsteps of legendary kings and queens, riding camels across the dunes of Persia, and galloping heavy steeds across fields of gold. A classically trained artist, his medium of choice is digital, where he has allowed his passion for costume design and his roots in the theater to lend their resounding voices to each and every card he creates.

Bugs (Sticker Stories)

About the Author Sonja Lamut is an award-winning painter, printmaker, illustrator, and author of children’s books. Her writing credits include Too Noisy! and Christmas Rhyme Time , and her illustrating credits include Thanksgiving Is for Giving Thanks! , a #1 New York Times children’s books bestseller. Lamut teaches illustration at the Fashion Institute of Technology and lives in New York City with her family.

Illuminati Satin Bag

About the Author Lo Scarabeo's Tarot decks have been acclaimed all over the world for originality and quality. With the best Italian and international artists, each Lo Scarabeo deck is an exceptional artistic value. Committed to developing innovative new decks while preserving the rich tradition of Tarot, Lo Scarabeo continues to be a favorite among collectors and readers. Llewellyn is the exclusive distributor of Lo Scarabeo products in North America.

Three Weeks in October

From Publishers Weekly During the first three weeks of October 2002, 14 random people were gunned down in the suburbs outside Washington, D.C., setting off the largest manhunt in American history. Through it all, Montgomery County Police Chief Moose was the face America watched. He was comfortingly there, on television, before people went to work in the morning and when they got home at night. But as soon as the snipers were no longer generating news, Chief Moose began making news himself. And when he decided to write a book about those three notorious weeks, a full-scale controversy erupted over the propriety of "exploiting" these events for financial gain. Eventually, he decided to resign from the police department. Written in short, awkward sentences, his book lacks polish, but its raw honesty and idiosyncratic charm more than compensate for the hurried prose. Despite the title, Moose adds very little to the story of the shootings he lets you know what he did and how he felt about it, but there are no sizzling revelations. Most of the book tells his own remarkable story in a gutsy, endearing, no-nonsense way, from growing up in an all-black neighborhood in North Carolina in the 19TKs to his unlikely entry into law enforcement and his even more unlikely rise to the top of the profession. Moose writes unapologetically about his mistakes and personal hardships, his views on leadership and his struggles with racial prejudice, and about his loving wife and how he keeps his uniform looking so sharp. Moose also takes up his own defense, cutting through all the hubbub to show that behind the provocative headlines was little more than a simple, heartfelt man just trying to do the best job he could. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. About the Author Charles A. Moose is the chief of police in Montgomery County. Charles Fleming is the author of the national bestseller High Concept and the New York Times bestseller The Goomba's Guide to Life . Fleming has worked as a staff reporter for Variety and Newsweek , and has been a frequent contributor to Vanity Fair, TV Guide, Entertainment Weekly, Premiere, Playboy, Time , the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times , and other publications.

The Beautiful Bee Book (Beautiful Bug)

Five Little Ducks (Floaties)

Forest of Enchantment Tarot

Review "Inspired by trees, birds, witches, elves, fairies, and flower blossoms, this beautiful deck will enchant you and entice you into it's world. This is a Rider-Waite-Smith based deck, entwined with magic, and will suit a beginner or more seasoned reader."― Esotoracle About the Author Lunaea Weatherstone (Portland, Oregon) has been working with the tarot for nearly half a century. She is the author of Mystical Cats Tarot , Victorian Fairy Tarot , and Tending Brigid's Flame , as well as her own Full Moon Dreams Tarot collage deck, a favorite among collectors. Lunaea is a priestess, teacher, writer, and jewelsmith. Meraylah Allwood (Suffolk, UK) has worked professionally as an artist since1996 when she painted the popular jacket artwork for Tree Wisdom by Jacqueline Memory Paterson. She has since worked with many authors and publishers in the U.K., Germany, and the U.S., illustrating books on subjects such as natural history, healing, ancient landscapes, folklore and fantasy, and Celtic, Druidic, and Wiccan traditions. Meraylah is an Associate Member of the Royal Miniature Society, and exhibits her paintings at their annual exhibition in London. The original paintings for this tarot deck are only slightly bigger than the cards themselves.

Five Stars

Devil of Dublin: A Dark Irish Mafia Romance

Review ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "This has taken a spot at the top of my favorite books EVER!" - Jules Reads Romance ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "One of the best books I have ever read. Legendary!" - Jill Silva ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "10/10 would sell my soul to Kellen Donovan." - Jamie Shaw, International Bestselling Author ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "This is my favorite and top read of 2022 by far!" - Paniolo Books⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "This is the kind of fated devotion I'm here for. I loved this book!" - Merced Alaida, Reviewer ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "Definitely one of my favorite books of the year. Thank you BB Easton for taking me on such an incredible journey." - Brittney, Goodreads Reviewer ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "I would have given this book 10 stars if I could have." - Nicole Collins ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "Absolutely AMAZING! My favorite this year!" - Frances, Goodreads Reviewer ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "I tried to savor every word of this story. Forcing myself to stop after every chapter....until I couldn't. The emotions in this story are so well written, they're almost tangible. The goosebumps that riddled my body during scenes, the quickness of my heart near the end, the tears that pricked my eyes. I just can't even put into words how magical this is. Gah! I feel like each page was sprinkled in fairy dust. Maith sibh, BB Easton, Maith sibh!" - Panic at the Book Nook About the Author BB Easton is the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of 44 CHAPTERS ABOUT 4 MEN, the hilarious, steamy, tell-all memoir that inspired the Netflix Original Series, SEX/LIFE. Within the first month, SEX/LIFE was viewed by 67 million households worldwide, making it the 3rd Most-Watched Netflix Original Series of all time. BB was a stressed-out school psychologist and mother of two when the inspiration to write 44 CHAPTERS ABOUT 4 MEN struck. Through that process, she rediscovered her passion for writing, became dangerously sleep-deprived, and finally mustered enough courage to quit her job and become a full-time author. BB went on to publish four more wickedly funny, shockingly steamy, and heartwarmingly autobiographical books in the 44 CHAPTERS series: SKIN, SPEED, STAR, and SUIT. Since then, she's been hard at work writing fictional stories that appeal to her love for us-against-the-world romance, including a dystopian trilogy (PRAYING FOR RAIN), a psychologist-client romantic comedy (GROUP THERAPY), and a dark mafia romance (DEVIL OF DUBLIN). Please visit artbyeaston.com for more info.

Critical Error

Review " Controversial - hell yeah - Enjoyable - absolutely! A fast paced exciting story that will certainly leave you thinking what if..."-"Just could not put this down; wonderful political thriller! "-"Murray McDonald never lets the fast pace of this book slack off. It's right up there with Ludlum, Baldacci, and Vince Flynn for surprising twists and turns that holds the interest right up to the last page."-"I stumbled across this title and based on the good reviews, decided to buy it. I'm a huge fan of this genre, and I wasn't disappointed in the least . Interesting characters and nonstop action help the plot move along smoothly."-" such a great read. its fast moving whilst maintaining twists within the plot you wont see coming. highly recommend it ."-"Couldn't put it down, I just had to keep reading, to find out what happened. Fast paced page turner." -"What can I say? One of those books that you can't put down!!! "-"From the explosive start to the shocking ending, I couldn't put this book down. "-"Its real thrilling! I can recommend the book tó anyone loving Clancy et al ."


The Golden Age of Japanese Okimono

The Golden Age of Japanese Okimono

The Hare with Amber Eyes (Illustrated Edition): A Hidden Inheritance

Review “ Enthralling . . . Belongs on the same shelf with Vladimir Nabokov's Speak, Memory .” ― Michael Dirda, The Washington Post “ Absorbing . . . In this book about people who defined themselves by the objects they owned, de Waal demonstrates that human stories are more powerful than even the greatest works of art.” ― Adam Kirsch, The New Republic “At one level [Edmund de Waal] writes in vivid detail of how the fortunes were used to establish the Ephrussis' lavish lives and high positions . . . And, as Jews, of their vulnerability: the Paris family shaken by turn-of-the-century anti-Semitism surging out of the Dreyfus affair; the Vienna branch utterly destroyed in Hitler's 1937 Anschluss . . . At a deeper level, though, Hare is about something more, just as Marcel Proust's masterpiece was about something more than the trappings of high society. As with Remembrance of Things Past , it uses the grandeur to light up interior matters: aspirations, passions, their passing; all in a duel, and a duet, of elegy and irony.” ― Richard Eder, The Boston Sunday Globe “To be handed a story as durable and exquisitely crafted as this is a rare pleasure . . . You have in your hands a masterpiece .” ― Frances Wilson, The Sunday Times (London) “A family memoir written with a grace and modesty that almost belie the sweep of its contents: Proust, Rilke, Japanese art, the rue de Monceau, Vienna during the Second World War. The most enchanting history lesson imaginable .” ― Claudia Roth Pierpont, The New Yorker “ The book not only of the year, but of the decade .” ― Michael Howard, The Times Literary Supplement “ Elegant. Modest. Tragic. Homeric .” ― Stephen Frears, The Guardian “As full of beauty and whimsy as a netsuke from the hands of a master carver. Buy two copies of his book; keep one and give the other to your closest bookish friend .” ― The Economist “Wise, strange, and gripping.” ― A.S. Byatt, The Guardian About the Author Edmund de Waal is an artist who has exhibited in museums and galleries around the world. His bestselling memoir, The Hare with Amber Eyes , has won many prizes and has been translated into twenty-nine languages. The White Road , a journey into the history of porcelain, was published in 2015. He lives in London with his family. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. The Hare with Amber Eyes (Illustrated Edition) A Hidden Inheritance By Edmund de Waal Farrar, Straus and Giroux Copyright © 2012 Edmund de WaalAll right reserved. ISBN: 9780374168285 The Hare with Amber Eyes 1. LE WEST END One sunny April day I set out to find Charles. Rue de Monceau is a long Parisian street bisected by the grand boulevard Malesherbes that charges off towards the boulevard Pereire. It is a hill of golden stone houses, a series of hotels playing discreetly on neoclassical themes, each a minor Florentine palace with heavily rusticated ground floors and an array of heads, caryatids and cartouches. Number 81 rue de Monceau, the Hôtel Ephrussi, where my netsuke start their journey, is near the top of the hill. I pass the headquarters of Christian Lacroix and then, next door, there it is. It is now, rather crushingly, an office for medical insurance. It is utterly beautiful. As a boy I used to draw buildings like this, spending afternoons carefully inking in shadows so that you could see the rise and fall of the depth of the windows and pillars. There is something musical in this kind of elevation. You take classical elements and try to bring them into rhythmic life: four Corinthian pilasters rising up to pace the façade, four massive stone urns on the parapet, five storeys high, eight windows wide. The street level is made up of great blocks of stone worked to look as if they have been weathered. I walk past a couple of times and, on the third, notice that there is the double back-to-back E of the Ephrussi family incorporated into the metal grilles over the street windows, the tendrils of the letters reaching into the spaces of the oval. It is barely there. I try to work out this rectitude and what it says about their confidence. I duck through the passageway to a courtyard, then through another arch to a stable block of red brick with servants’ quarters above; a pleasing diminuendo of materials and textures. A delivery man carries boxes of Speedy-Go Pizza into the medical insurers. The door into the entrance hall is open. I walk into the hall, its staircase curling up like a coil of smoke through the whole house, black cast iron and gold filigree stretching up to a lantern at the top. There is a marble urn in a deep niche, chequerboard marble tiles. Executives are coming down the stairs, heels hard on marble, and I retreat in embarrassment. How can I start to explain this idiotic quest? I stand in the street and watch the house and take some photographs, apologetic Parisians ducking past me. House-watching is an art. You have to develop a way of seeing how a building sits in its landscape or streetscape. You have to discover how much room it takes up in the world, how much of the world it displaces. Number 81, for instance, is a house that cannily disappears into its neighbours: there are other houses that are grander, some are plainer, but few are more discreet. I look up at the second-floor windows where Charles had his suite of rooms, some of which looked across the street to the more robustly classical house opposite, some across the courtyard into a busy roofscape of urns and gables and chimneypots. He had an antechamber, two salons – one of which he turned into his study – a dining-room, two bedrooms and a ‘petite’. I try to work it out; he and his older brother Ignace must have had neighbouring apartments on this floor, their elder brother Jules and their widowed mother Mina below, with the higher ceilings and grander windows and the balconies on which, on this April morning, there are now some rather leggy red geraniums in plastic pots. The courtyard of the house was glazed, according to the city records, though all that glass is long gone. And there were five horses and three carriages in these stables which are now a perfect bijou house. I wonder if that number of horses was appropriate for a large and social family wanting to make the right kind of impression. It is a huge house, but the three brothers must have met every day on those black-and-gold winding stairs, or heard each other as the noise of the carriage being readied in the courtyard echoed from the glazed canopy. Or encountered friends going past their door on the way up to an apartment above. They must have developed a way of not seeing each other, and not hearing each other, too: to live so close to your family takes some doing, I think, reflecting on my own brothers. They must have got on well. Perhaps they had no choice in the matter. Paris was work, after all. The Hôtel Ephrussi was a family house, but it was also the Parisian headquarters of a family in its ascendancy. It had its counterpart in Vienna, the vast Palais Ephrussi on the Ringstrasse. Both the Parisian and Viennese buildings share a sense of drama, of a public face to the world. They were both built in 1871 in new and fashionable areas: the rue de Monceau and the Ringstrasse were so of-the-minute that they were unfinished, untidy, loud and dusty building sites. They were still spaces that were inventing themselves, competitive with the older parts of town with their narrower streets, and spikily arriviste. If this particular house in this particular streetscape seems a little stagey, it is because it is a staging of intent. These houses in Paris and Vienna were part of a family plan: the Ephrussi family was ‘doing a Rothschild’. Just as the Rothschilds had sent their sons and daughters out from Frankfurt at the start of the nineteenth century to colonise European capital cities, so the Abraham of my family, Charles Joachim Ephrussi, had masterminded this expansion from Odessa in the 1850s. A true patriarch, he had two sons from his first marriage, Ignace and Léon. And then when he remarried at fifty he had continued producing children: two more sons, Michel and Maurice, and two daughters, Thérèse and Marie. All of these six children were to be deployed as financiers or married into suitable Jewish dynasties. Odessa was a city within the Pale of Settlement, the area on the western borders of imperial Russia in which Jews were allowed to live. It was famous for its rabbinical schools and synagogues, rich in literature and music, a magnet for the impoverished Jewish shtetls of Galicia. It was also a city that doubled its population of Jews and Greeks and Russians every decade, a polyglot city full of speculation and traders, the docks full of intrigues and spies, a city on the make. Charles Joachim Ephrussi had transformed a small grain-trading business into a huge enterprise by cornering the market in buying wheat. He bought the grain from the middlemen who transported it on carts along the heavily rutted roads from the rich black soil of the Ukrainian wheat fields, the greatest wheat fields in the world, into the port of Odessa. Here the grain was stored in his warehouses before being exported across the Black Sea, up the Danube, across the Mediterranean. By 1860 the family had become the greatest grain-exporters in the world. In Paris, James de Rothschild was known as the le Roi des Juifs, the King of the Jews. The Ephrussi were les Rois de Blé, the Kings of Grain. They were Jews with their own coat of arms: an ear of corn and a heraldic boat with three masts and full sails. Their motto, Quod honestum, unfurled below the ship: We are above reproach. You can trust us. The masterplan was to build on this network of contacts and finance huge capital projects: bridges across the Danube, railways across Russia and across France, docks and canals. Ephrussi et Cie would change from being a very successful commodity trading house into an international finance house. It would become a bank. And each helpful deal struck with a government, each venture with an impoverished archduke, each client drawn into serious obligation with the family would be a step towards even greater respectability, a step further from those wagons of wheat creaking in from the Ukraine. In 1857 the two elder sons and their families were sent out from Odessa to Vienna, the capital city of the sprawling Hapsburg Empire. They bought a huge house in the city centre, and for ten years this was home to a shifting population of grandparents, children and grandchildren as the family moved backwards and forwards between the two cities. One of the sons, my great-great-grandfather Ignace, was tasked with handling Ephrussi business in the Austro-Hungarian Empire from this Vienna base. Paris came next: Léon, the older son, was tasked with establishing the family and business here. I’m standing outside Léon’s outpost on a honey-coloured hill in the 8th arrondissement. Actually I am leaning against the house opposite and thinking of that fiercely hot summer of 1871 when they arrived from Vienna to this newly built, golden mansion. It was a city still in trauma. The siege by the Prussian army had only ended a few months before with the defeat of France and the declaration of the German Empire in the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles. The new Third Republic was shaky, assailed by communards on the street and by factionalism in government. The Hôtel Ephrussi in the rue de Monceau Their house may have been finished, but all the neighbouring buildings were still under construction. The plasterers had only just left, the gilders were lying uncomfortably on the shallow stairs burnishing the finials on the handrail. Furniture, pictures, crates of crockery are shifted slowly up to their apartments. There is noise inside and noise outside, and all the windows are open onto the street. Léon is unwell with a heart complaint. And the family have a terrible start to their life in this beautiful street. Betty, the youngest of Léon and Mina’s four children, married to a young Jewish banker of unimpeachable suitability, dies within weeks of giving birth to a daughter, Fanny. They have to build a family tomb in the Jewish section of the cemetery in Montmartre in their newly adopted city. It is Gothic, large enough for the whole clan, a way of making it clear that they are staying here, whatever is going to happen. I finally find it. The gates are gone and it has caught drifts of autumn’s chestnut leaves. This hill was the perfect setting for the Ephrussi family. Just as the Ringstrasse in Vienna, where the other half of the family lives, was acerbically known as ‘Zionstrasse’, so Jewish money was a key denominator of life here in the rue de Monceau. The area was developed in the 1860s by Isaac and Emile Pereire, two Sephardic brothers who had made their fortunes as financiers, railroad-builders and property magnates, creating colossal developments of hotels and department stores. They acquired the plaine Monceau, a large nondescript area that was originally beyond the city limits, and set to work developing houses for the burgeoning financial and commercial elite, an appropriate landscape for the newly arrived Jewish families from Russia and the Levant. These streets became a virtual colony, a complex of intermarriage, obligation and religious sympathy. The Pereires relandscaped the existing eighteenth-century park in order to improve the views of the new houses around it. New cast-iron gates with gilded emblems of the Pereires’ activities now led into it. There was an attempt to call the area around the parc Monceau Le West End. If you are asked where the boulevard Malesherbes leads, a contemporary journalist wrote, ‘answer boldly: to Le West End…One could give it a French name, but that would be vulgar; an English name was far more fashionable.’ This was the park in which, according to a waspish journalist, you could watch ‘the great dames of the noble Faubourg…the female “illustrations” of “La Haute Finance” and “La Haute Colonie Israélite” promenade’. The park had sinuous paths and flowerbeds in the new English style with displays of colourful annuals that had to be constantly renewed, far removed from the grey, clipped formalities of the Tuileries. As I walk down the hill from the Hôtel Ephrussi at what I consider to be a good flaneurial pace, slower than usual, weaving from one side of the road to the other to check on details of the mouldings of windows, I’m conscious that many of the houses I pass have these stories of reinvention embedded in them. Almost everyone who built them started somewhere else. Ten houses down from the Ephrussi household, at number 61, is the house of Abraham de Camondo, with his brother Nissim at 63 and their sister Rebecca over the street at number 60. The Camondos, Jewish financiers like the Ephrussi, had come to Paris from Constantinople by way of Venice. The banker Henri Cernuschi, a plutocratic supporter of the Paris Commune, had come to Paris from Italy and lived in chilly magnificence with his Japanese treasures on the edge of the park. At number 55 is the Hôtel Cattaui, home to a family of Jewish bankers from Egypt. At number 43 is the palace of Adolphe de Rothschild, acquired from Eugène Pereire and rebuilt with a glass-roofed exhibition room for his Renaissance art collection. But nothing compares to the mansion built by the chocolate magnate Émile-Justin Menier. It was a building so splendidly excessive, so eclectic in its garnished decorations, glimpsed above its high walls, that Zola’s description of it as ‘an opulent bastard of every style’ still seems about right. In his dark novel of 1872, La curée, Saccard – a rapacious Jewish property magnate – lives here on the rue de Monceau. You feel this street as the family move in: it is a street of Jews, a street full of people on display in their lavish golden houses. Monceau is slang in Paris for nouveau riche, newly arrived. This is the world in which my netsuke first settled. On this street down the hill I feel this play between discretion and opulence, a sort of breathing-in and breathing-out of invisibility and visibility. Charles Ephrussi was twenty-one when he came to live here. Paris was being planted with trees, and wide pavements were taking the place of the cramped interstices of the old city. There had been fifteen years of constant demolition and rebuilding under the direction of Baron Haussmann, the civic planner. He had razed medieval streets and created new parks and new boulevards. Vistas were opened up with extraordinary velocity. If you want to taste this moment, taste the dust sweeping along the newly paved avenues and across the bridges, look at two paintings of Gustave Caillebotte. Caillebotte, a few months older than Charles, lived around the corner from the Ephrussi family in another grand hotel. You see in his Le pont de l’Europe a young man, well dressed in his grey overcoat and black top hat, maybe the artist, walking over the bridge along the generous pavement. He is two steps ahead of a young woman in a dress of sedate frills carrying a parasol. The sun is out. There is the glare of newly dressed stone. A dog passes by. A workman leans over the bridge. It is like the start of the world: a litany of perfect movements and shadows. Everyone, including the dog, knows what they are doing. Gustave Caillebotte, Le pont de l’Europe, 1876 The streets of Paris have a calmness to them: clean stone façades, rhythmic detailing of balconies, newly planted lime trees appear in his painting Jeune homme à sa fenêtre, shown in the second Impressionist exhibition in 1876. Here Caillebotte’s brother stands at the open window of their family apartment looking out onto the intersection of the rue de Monceau’s neighbouring streets. He stands with his hands in his pockets, well dressed and self-assured, with his life before him and a plush armchair behind him. Everything is possible. This could be the young Charles. He was born in Odessa and spends the first ten years of his life in a yellow-stuccoed palais on the edge of a dusty square fringed with chestnut trees. If he climbs to the attics of the house he can see all the way across the masts of the ships in the port to the sea. His grandfather occupies a whole floor and all the space. The bank is next door. He cannot move along the promenade without someone stopping his grandfather or father or uncles to ask them for information, a favour, a kopek, something. He learns, without knowing it, that to move in public means a series of encounters and avoidances; how to give money to beggars and pedlars, how to greet acquaintances without stopping. Then Charles moves to Vienna, living there for the next decade with his parents, his siblings, his uncle Ignace and glacial aunt Émilie, and his three cousins – Stefan (haughty), Anna (acerbic) and the little boy Viktor. A tutor comes each morning. They learn their languages: Latin, Greek, German and English. They are always to speak French at home, and are allowed to use Russian amongst themselves, but must not be caught speaking the Yiddish that they picked up in the courtyards in Odessa. All these cousins can start a sentence in one language and finish it in another. They need these languages, as the family travels to Odessa, to St Petersburg, to Berlin and Frankfurt and Paris. They also need these languages as they are denominators of class. With languages, you can move from one social situation to another. With languages, you are at home anywhere. They visit Breughel’s Hunters in the Snow with its patchwork of dogs busy on the ridge. They open the cabinets of drawings in the Albertina, the watercolours by Dürer of the trembling hare, the outstretched wing of a lapidary bird. They learn to ride in the Prater. The boys are taught to fence and all the cousins take dance lessons. All the cousins dance well. Charles, at eighteen, has a family nickname, le Polonais, the Pole, the waltzing boy. It is in Vienna that the oldest boys, Jules, Ignace and Stefan, are taken to the offices off the Ringstrasse on the Schottenbastei. It is a forbidding building. This is where the Ephrussi conduct business. The boys are told to sit quietly as shipments of grain are discussed and percentages on stock are queried. There are new possibilities in oil in Baku and gold near Lake Baikal. Clerks scurry. This is where they are blooded in the sheer scale of what will be theirs, taught the catechism of profit from the endless columns in the ledgers. This is when Charles sits with his youngest cousin Viktor and draws Laocoön and the snakes, the statue he loved in Odessa, making the coils extra specially tight around muscly shoulders to impress the boy. It takes a long time to draw each of those snakes well. He sketches what he has seen in the Albertina. He sketches the servants. And he talks to his parents’ friends about their pictures. It is always pleasing to have your paintings discussed by such a knowledgeable young man. And then at last there is the long-planned move to Paris. Charles is good-looking, slightly built with a neatly trimmed dark beard, which has a haze of red in particular lights. He has an Ephrussi nose, large and beaked, and the high forehead of all the cousins. His eyes are dark grey and alive, and he is charming. You see how well dressed he is, with his cravat beautifully folded, and then you hear him talk: he is as good a talker as a dancer. Charles is free to do what he wants. I want to think this is because he was the youngest son and the third son and, as in all good children’s stories, it is always the third son who gets to leave home and go adventuring – pure projection, as I am a third son. But I suspect that the family know this boy is not cut out for the life of the Bourse. His uncles Michel and Maurice have moved to Paris: perhaps there were enough sons for the offices of Ephrussi et Cie at 45 rue de l’Arcade not to miss this pleasant bookish one, with his habit of withdrawing when money comes up and that aptitude for losing himself in conversation. Charles has his new apartment in the family house, gilded and clean, and empty. He has somewhere to come back to, a new house on a newly paved Parisian hill. He has languages, he has money and he has time. So now he sets off wandering. Like a well-brought-up young man, Charles goes south. He goes to Italy. Copyright © 2010 by Edmund de WaalAll rights reservedOriginally published in 2010 by Chatto & Windus, Great Britain,as The Hare with Amber Eyes: A Hidden InheritancePublished in the United States by Farrar, Straus and Giroux Continues... Excerpted from The Hare with Amber Eyes (Illustrated Edition) by Edmund de Waal Copyright © 2012 by Edmund de Waal. Excerpted by permission. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site. Read more

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