Celebrity confers burdens as well as blessings on those it touches, but often the two are indistinguishable. The trappings of celebrity - the relentless exposure, vast wealth, devoted admirers, a license to outrage - can have a dark side, providing a fertile ground for the obsessions, greed, and envy that sometimes drag the famous, and those around them, down to murder. In each case, the powerful magnet of celebrity drew the players together as if on a stage; in the last act, violence shattered their seemingly privileged. lives, and tragedy unfolded.

A unique behind-the-scenes look at the groundbreaking methodology that today's most in-demand innovation factory uses to create some of the boldest products and successfully bring them to market. Today, innovation is seen by business leaders and the media alike as the key to growth, a burning issue in every company, from startups to the Fortune 500. And in that space, Fahrenheit 212 is viewed as a high-performance innovation SWAT team, able to solve the most complex, mission-critical challenges. Under Mark Payne, the firm's president and head of Idea Development, Fahrenheit 212, since its inception a decade ago, has worked with such giants of industry as Coca-Cola, Samsung, Hershey's, Campbell's Soup, LG, Starbucks, Mattel, Office Depot, Citibank, P&G, American Express, Nutrisystem, GE, and Goldman Sachs, to name but a few. It has been praised as a hotspot for innovation in publications like Fortune, Esquire, Businessweek, and FastCompany. What Drives Fahrenheit 212's success is its unique methodology, combining what it calls Magic--the creative side of innovation--with Money, the business side. They explore every potential idea with the end goal in mind--bringing an innovative product to market in a way that will transform a company's business and growth. In How to Kill a Unicorn, Mark Payne pulls back the curtain on how the company is able to bring more innovative products and ideas successfully to market than any other firm and offers blow by blow inside accounts of how they grapple with and solved their biggest challenges.

With the bravura storytelling and pungent authenticity of detail she brought to her acclaimed Lymond Chronicles, Dorothy Dunnett, grande dame of the historical novel, presents The House of Niccolo series. The time is the 15th century, when intrepid merchants became the new knighthood of Europe. Among them, none is bolder or more cunning than Nicholas vander Poele of Bruges, the good-natured dyer's apprentice who schemes and swashbuckles his way to the helm of a mercantile empire. Scotland, 1468: a nation at the edge of Europe, a civilization on the threshold of the Modern Age. Merchants, musicians, politicians, and pageantry fill the court of King James III. In its midst, Nicholas seeks to avenge his bride's claim that she carries the bastard of his archenemy, Simon St. Pol. When she flees before Nicholas can determine whether or not the rumored child is his own—or exists at all—Nicholas gives chase. So begins the deadly game of cat and mouse that will lead him from the infested cisterns of Cairo to the misted canals of Venice at carnival. Breathlessly paced, sparkling with wit. The Unicorn Hunt confirms Dorothy Dunnett as the genre's finest practitioner.

Forget everything you ever knew about unicorns. The fluffy, sparkly, friendly “horses” so popular the world over don’t exist. Real unicorns are killers. Beasts the size of elephants, with cloven hooves that shake the earth, hides impervious to bullets, and horns that contain a deadly poison, unicorns can outrun a sports car and smell a human from a mile away. And they can only be killed by virgin warriors descended from Alexander the Great. Sixteen-year-old Astrid Llewelyn has grown up with her mom Lilith’s tall tales about unicorns and their exalted family heritage, but figures her mom’s crazy. But the scary stories her mom told her about the monsters in her formative years left her with a firm phobia about unicorns, even the cutesy kind popular with young girls. But when one of the monsters attacks her boyfriend in the woods—thereby ruining any chance of him taking her to prom—Astrid finds herself headed to Rome to train as a unicorn hunter. “As swift and sure-footed as a killer unicorn, Rampant weaves a vibrant new mythology from venerable threads.”—Scott Westerfeld, bestselling author of the Uglies series

In this start to a hilarious middle-grade fantasy trilogy, Max Spencer discovers that a killer unicorn is hunting him. Stuck in another world and with a carnivorous unicorn on his trail, Max must find the courage to save himself, his friends, and the entire human race.

While spending the summer with their grandparents, on a remote farm in South Carolina, Ben Alderman and his sister Casey uncover a hidden world of magic; a world their grandmother is secretly visiting. It is a world where elves and dwarves are locked in mortal combat against a witch who is trying to free the last surviving wizard from exile. The witch has been defeated once before, but with the combined power of the wizard, no one will be able to stand against them. Much to Ben's dismay, he learns that he is the one foretold in the ancient elfin prophecies to bring about the downfall of the witch and save this exciting new world from destruction.

A misfit crew race across the galaxy to prevent the genocide of magical creatures, in this unique science fiction debut. Having magical powers makes you less than human, a resource to be exploited. Half-unicorn Gary Cobalt is sick of slavery, captivity, and his horn being ground down to power faster-than-light travel. When he's finally free, all he wants is to run away in his ancestors' stone ship. Instead, Captain Jenny Perata steals the ship out from under him, so she can make an urgent delivery. But Jenny held him captive for a decade, and then Gary murdered her best friend... who was also the wife of her co-pilot, Cowboy Jim. What could possibly go right? File Under: Science Fiction [ Rocks in Space | Stand Up to Reason | The Human Experiment | Last Unicorn ]

The enchanting Unicorn Quest series reaches its thrilling conclusion as two sisters fight to save a magical land from destruction. * "Those who love Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time . . . [or] Neil Gaiman's Coraline, can't miss this debut.” - Booklist, starred review, on The Unicorn Quest "An adventure-quest brimming with magic and heart." - Roshani Chokshi, New York Times bestselling author, on The Unicorn Quest After a lifetime of being the younger sister--of letting Sophie fight her battles, of following her on countless Experiences and through a fireplace into a magical land--it's finally Claire Martinson's turn to lead. And she'll do anything to keep her big sister safe: resist the wraiths' cold shadows, experiment with new and dangerous magic, become a thief in disguise. When Claire discovers that "only a queen can defeat a queen," she knows she must steal and reforge the ancient Crown of Arden to stand a chance against the darkness that threatens the world and her family. Because Queen Estelle d'Astora, desperate to reclaim her power, will stop at nothing to gain the support of the four guilds--even if it means killing the last unicorn. Claire will need every friend she's made to help her as the fate of Arden hangs in the balance . . . But the secrets of the unicorns are deeper than anyone could have ever imagined. Does Claire have what it takes to ignite the long-buried magic of this world and wake the fire in the stars? Or will the true salvation of Arden rest on one final and heartbreaking sacrifice?