Past and present collide when Claire finds an engagement ring that had been missing for 50 years and her Jewish roommate is targeted by Neo-Nazis in this Agatha- and Anthony-nominated series.

What would Tim Diamond, the world's worst private detective, dowithout his quick-thinking brother Nick? The bumbling detective and his kid brother are at it again in these three hilarious, fast-paced mysteries. Whether it's finding out who flattened a philanthropist with a steamroller in The Blurred Man, outsmarting Parisian drug smugglers on a vacation gone miserably wrong in The French Confection, or catching the murderer behind a deadly class reunion in I Know What You Did Last Wednesday, there's never a dull moment with this crimesolving duo around. Find out if Nick can get to the bottom of these mysteries before Tim messes everything up, or worse, gets them both killed.

Have you ever wondered why you are here? "Diamond Life" approaches the way you look at God, yourself and others. A diamond is surfaced from deep in the earth, cut and polished. Our lives seem to have similar processes. Sometimes we're being polished and other times facets are being carefully cut, resulting in our lives shining out the brilliance God has designed us for. God has put His radiance in you. When He created you in His image, God put His stamp of approval in you. We may look around our country and our world and wonder where His radiance is. It's out there, but oftentimes it's hidden under hurt, pain, sin, loneliness, criticism and disappointment. No matter what is hiding God's radiance in you, there is one fact that will never change - You are a diamond meant to reflect God's radiance. Find out where you are in your process of living a diamond life.

Sequestered within the heart of a cosmopolitan city is an exotic world—a place where diamonds, astronomically priced, are bought and sold on the strength of a handshake, and business disputes are resolved according to ancient Jewish principles of arbitration. Yet it is also a modern industry facing the same fundamental global changes affecting all businesses today.In Diamond Stories, Renée Rose Shield leads us into the unexamined realm of wholesale diamond traders in New York. Related to several well-respected traders, she had unprecedented access to a society normally closed to outside inquiry. Here she deftly blends her personal relationship and her anthropological training to provide an insightful exploration of this tradition-bound industry, the new challenges it faces, and the ways both industry and individuals adapt to and endure change.Shield begins with a fascinating history of diamond mining, combining the story of the De Beers cartel, the role of Jews in the trade, and the part diamonds have played both in war and liberation. Throughout, she incorporates commentary by current diamond traders. Succeeding chapters explore the evolving nature of both the global trade and the New York diamond district. Shield takes a close look at the increasingly complex ethnic makeup of the district, illuminates the rarely documented work done by women, chronicles the resilient system of arbitration, and reveals the ways in which many traders work well into their eighties and nineties. Their long lives of work, cushioned by the trade's social environment, offer hints for successful aging in general.

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“Unforgettable. . . . An outstanding adventure in its lyrical, utterly compelling, and heartbreaking investigations of the world of diamond smuggling.” —Aimee Nezhukumatathil For nearly eighty years, a huge portion of coastal South Africa was closed off to the public. With many of its pits now deemed “overmined” and abandoned, American journalist Matthew Gavin Frank sets out across the infamous Diamond Coast to investigate an illicit trade that supplies a global market. Immediately, he became intrigued by the ingenious methods used in facilitating smuggling particularly, the illegal act of sneaking carrier pigeons onto mine property, affixing diamonds to their feet, and sending them into the air. Entering Die Sperrgebiet (“The Forbidden Zone”) is like entering an eerie ghost town, but Frank is surprised by the number of people willing—even eager—to talk with him. Soon he meets Msizi, a young diamond digger, and his pigeon, Bartholomew, who helps him steal diamonds. It’s a deadly game: pigeons are shot on sight by mine security, and Msizi knows of smugglers who have disappeared because of their crimes. For this, Msizi blames “Mr. Lester,” an evil tall-tale figure of mythic proportions. From the mining towns of Alexander Bay and Port Nolloth, through the “halfway” desert, to Kleinzee’s shores littered with shipwrecks, Frank investigates a long overlooked story. Weaving interviews with local diamond miners who raise pigeons in secret with harrowing anecdotes from former heads of security, environmental managers, and vigilante pigeon hunters, Frank reveals how these feathered bandits became outlaws in every mining town. Interwoven throughout this obsessive quest are epic legends in which pigeons and diamonds intersect, such as that of Krishna’s famed diamond Koh-i-Noor, the Mountain of Light, and that of the Cherokee serpent Uktena. In these strange connections, where truth forever tangles with the lore of centuries past, Frank is able to contextualize the personal grief that sent him, with his wife Louisa in the passenger seat, on this enlightening journey across parched lands. Blending elements of reportage, memoir, and incantation, Flight of the Diamond Smugglers is a rare and remarkable portrait of exploitation and greed in one of the most dangerous areas of coastal South Africa. With his sovereign prose and insatiable curiosity, Matthew Gavin Frank “reminds us that the world is a place of wonder if only we look” (Toby Muse).

The first book in a brand-new series by the Queen of Crime Drama, Lynda La Plante. Millions of stolen, untraceable bank notes lie untouched in an old Victorian cottage, the hidden legacy of the Dolly Rawlins and her widows. But the millions are not forgotten. Released from prison, Esther Freeman is determined to retrieve the money. And so too is Mike Withey, Shirley Miller's brother and Audrey's son. When a fire breaks out at the derelict cottage, with a badly charred body inside along with what looks like thousands of burnt bank notes, it attracts the attention of the police and one young detective in particular, Jack Warr. Jack's investigation into the fire, and the burnt body inside, coincide with an investigation into his own past. Adopted at birth, Jack discovers his birth father may have been none other than Harry Rawlins, a renowned criminal. As he finds out the truth about his own identity, Jack finds himself becoming increasingly aggressive, stopping at nothing to find the truth - including breaking the law himself.

An action-packed thriller of family, business and betrayal – perfect for fans of Succession – by international bestselling author, Wilbur Smith. Some people will never have enough . . . Johnny Lance was taken in by the Van Der Byls when he was an orphaned boy, and his life has been dedicated to making his adoptive father proud. But his efforts have been in vain, his father loathes him and, in his dying breath, makes one final demand of his biological son, the jealous and vengeful Benedict: to destroy his half-brother. After being tricked into giving his entire fortune to the Van Der Byls Diamond company, Johnny realizes he only needs two things in life, and one of them is Benedict’s sister, the smart and beautiful Tracey. But the obsessive Benedict has been shaped at his father's hand and will stop at nothing to finish what he started. Even if it means destroying everything . . .

Diamond's supreme properties can be realized by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) of diamond films with many applications, such as cutting tools, tweeter diaphragms, deep ultraviolet light-emitting diodes, radomes, CPU transistors, quantum computer, and MEMs. This volume provides extensive reviews on various CVD methods with examples. Meanwhile, there are other forms of carbon coatings, including diamond-like carbon, carbon nanotubes, and graphene. These carbon coatings possess properties derived from diamond. For example, graphene is actually flattened diamond’s (111) face with superb electrical and thermal conductivities. For the first time, this book reveals a catalytic method to grow single-crystal graphene, whose applications are expected in heat spreaders, battery electrodes, interconnected circuits, and 6G antennae.