The conclusion to the bestselling Heroes of Phlan series: The son of Shal and Tarl sets off on a quest for the missing Warhammer of Tyr The holy hammer of the Church of Tyr was captured by the evil god Bane and his dark minion, Hammerwarder, two decades ago. When Bane was destroyed, the relic vanished. The legacy of recovering the lost item was granted to a young paladin just before his birth: Kern Desanea, the son of Phlan’s two great heroes and spellcasters, Shal and Tarl. Now, the young warrior must fulfill his destiny, find the Warhammer, and return it to the forces of good in the land of the Moonsea. Danger, deception, and loyal friends will accompany him on his fateful journey—a journey that will lead him to the ultimate pool.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • "How did our democracy go wrong? This extraordinary document ... is Applebaum's answer." —Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny The Pulitzer Prize–winning historian explains, with electrifying clarity, why elites in democracies around the world are turning toward nationalism and authoritarianism. From the United States and Britain to continental Europe and beyond, liberal democracy is under siege, while authoritarianism is on the rise. In Twilight of Democracy, Anne Applebaum, an award-winning historian of Soviet atrocities who was one of the first American journalists to raise an alarm about antidemocratic trends in the West, explains the lure of nationalism and autocracy. In this captivating essay, she contends that political systems with radically simple beliefs are inherently appealing, especially when they benefit the loyal to the exclusion of everyone else. Elegantly written and urgently argued, Twilight of Democracy is a brilliant dissection of a world-shaking shift and a stirring glimpse of the road back to democratic values.

The supernatural suspense of Death Watch and KillJoy together for the first time! Death Watch begins with a serial killer who escapes from Death Row and vanishes without a trace. Years later another killer begins to stalk the LA suburbs-or is it the original killer resurfacing? Beautiful young McKenzie Smith is caught up in this deadly legacy of fear and bloodshed, when she's targeted as the perfect victim by a mastermind of evil. In Killjoy, Brand knew too much about the world beyond the outer edges of sanity. Given experimental VR treatments by a psychologist with a deadly obsession of her own, Brand has fallen victim to her madness, and must fight a constant battle against the persona of the serial killer implanted in his brain and the unstoppable force of evil called Killjoy...

Having a bad life? Read about one that's worse: liebestod, deep depression, mental illness, suicide, death, and miraculous resurrection (the ultimate happy ending). Feel better? The Ward at Twilight: Goth Poems skillfully blends two distinct literary traditions (stylish contemporary poetry and the vintage Gothic in American and British literature) for the blackest witch's brew of insightful reading pleasure.

A debut thriller of personal transformation: By the time Matilde Anselm, an American physician in Paris to help with a heart transplant, begins to fear she may instead be a party to murder, she's also fallen in love, inherited a mysterious Paris apartment, and discovered she's not who she thought she was.

To which is prefixed a concise history of English and American Short horns, compiled from the best authorities.

The book investigates Meyer's popular Twilight saga from a feminist point of view, focusing on the development of Bella's character and her quest for identity in a rigidly patriarchal world. Bella's life is entirely determined by the two central male characters who form a polarized axis which slowly tears her apart. Bella's low self-esteem and her strong attachment to the over-idealized Edward Cullen are read as symptoms of her placelessness in a world that does not grant her space to develop as an autonomous subject. Bella's wish to become a vampire can be equalled with a woman's desire to gain access to a higher social realm via her husband and thereby escape her marginalisation in patriarchal culture. In order to live eternally in the idealized, capitalist, patriarchal and overly religious world that Edward represents, Bella has to make a series of sacrifices. Leaving her mother behind, she moves into a male dominated world which is divided into morally idealized vampires and racially devalued werewolves. She is forced to give up her friendship with Jacob Black, who represents her autonomous self, in order to find her patriarchal pre-defined destiny as mother and wife. Similar patterns of stereotypical representations of femininity can be found in various characters of the saga. A more controversial note is brought in by Bella's half-vampire child who can be seen as a destabilizing factor of the saga's rigid dichotomy. Taking all this into consideration, we have to ask whether it is desirable that millions of young women worldwide admire Bella and set her up as their role model.