DescriptionEveryone is to some degree their own schizophrenic. Brendan feels it is his job in life as a committed schizophrenic to pass on his experiences in coping with this 'disease'. Brendan feels he has a lot to offer his readers because of his success in dealing with life's problems. This book is a mixture of autobiography and fantasy. Basically a 'send up' of UK psychiatry, Roman Catholicism and the mixed up world of human relationships that we all inhabit. The many characters appear under one name in one section but will then appear in another section as someone slightly different. Brendan deals with his characters in this way in order to present them as characters in their own right but also as fragments of his own self. Despite the serious subject matter of this book, there is much laughter. The book is an emotional roller-coaster, leaving the reader not knowing whether to be sad or happy - but always laughing.About the Author Brendan Reason is 54 and lives alone in Ipswich. Brendan has suffered from a form of schizophrenia since 1976 but has never let this prevent him from living life to the full. Since 1987 he has worked as a volunteer at the Ipswich Disabled Advice Bureau - giving advice and help to people who are disabled. He also regularly sings and plays guitar at the Bureau's AGM. Brendan has an Honours degree in Social Administration and a post-graduate certificate in Education. Brendan believes he was much happier as a student than he is in the world of work and because of his mental health problems the longest he has held down a paid job is two and a half years.Brendan has always written poetry and prose and, in the mid nineties, a small but well regarded publisher called 'Envoi Poets' published a book of his poetry called 'Fragments of Eve and Other Poetry'. Another of his creative interests has been amateur dramatics both as a budding actor and script writer. In 1987 The Wolsey Theatre in Ipswich performed several of Brendan's scenes and sketches in a lunchtime performance given over to local writing talent. Brendan says that he ""feels privileged that life has given me something to write about and that means so much to me.""

"Pick it up, but only if you can afford to lose a night's sleep, because you won't be able to put it down." —Steve Martini, author of the Paul Madriani novels Several years have passed since we last saw stunning, savvy attorney Rachel Gold. Now she is a mother, a widow, and a reluctant participant in a lost cause: the Frankenstein Case. She represents a blue-collar neighborhood fighting a developer intent on bulldozing their homes to erect a gated community. Rachel's strategy will be based on the wacky judge on the case, known to the St. Louis Bar as "The Flinch Factor." Then Rachel gains a new client: Susannah, sister of Nick Moran, local heartthrob. Nick has been murdered, found slumped on the front seat of his pickup along an isolated lane known as Gay Way. His female groupies are, to say the least, stunned. His sister smells foul play. A skeptical Rachel agrees to check it out and turns up facts suggesting that Nick's death was not an accident. Are Nick's death and her Frankenstein case somehow related? Can Rachel uncover the truth before more lives are lost?

A portrait of one of Australia's longest-serving prime ministers, this biography goes behind the public image to find neither the strong-willed man of principle his supporters like to imagine nor the cunning opportunist painted by his foes. The discussion covers Howard's suburban middle-class upbringing and his success at implementing his polices, concluding that although the image of the ordinary bloke has helped his enduring popularity, heandmdash;like George Bushandmdash;possesses a number of uncommon strengths that have made him one of the most formidable leaders in Australian political history.

The veteran presidential campaign manager recounts his many adventures, travesties, triumphs, and lessons from more than forty years on the trail. Over his long and legendary career, campaign strategist Rick Ridder has been at the center of everything from presidential death matches to the legalization of marijuana. In this lively memoir, he recounts his life on the trail from the McGovern campaign to more recent candidates and causes. Along the way, he reveals his “twenty-two rules of campaign management”―each one illustrated by entertaining, instructive, and mostly true stories from his own experiences. Rick offers an unsparing, often hilarious self-portrait of the political guru as a young man, criss-crossing the country from one drafty campaign headquarters to the next, making mistakes and pulling rabbits out of hats, wrangling temperamental celebrities, winning some elections and losing others. Through his stories, you’ll meet the state legislature candidate who said he’d win thanks to his reputation as a judge in cat competitions; the US Senate candidate who told the Southern press, “I hate southern accents”; a young Senator Al Gore who campaigned for President in 1988 by eating his way through New York City alongside Mayor Koch; Leonard Nimoy, good-naturedly trekking through rural Wisconsin in Rick’s own Jeep because Rick was too young to rent a more appropriate vehicle; and many other colorful characters.

Glasgow 1893. Wilton Hunt, a student, and Tam Foley, a laudanum-addicted pharmacist, are pursuing extra-curricular careers as body snatchers, or ‘resurrection men’, under cover of darkness. They exhume a girl’s corpse, only for it to disappear while their backs are turned. Confused and in need of the money the body would have earnt them, they investigate the corpse’s disappearance. They discover that bodies have started to turn up in the area with ripped-out throats and severe loss of blood, although not the one they lost. The police are being encouraged by powerful people to look the other way, and the deaths are going unreported by the press. As Hunt and Foley delve beneath the veneer of respectable society, they find themselves entangled in a dangerous underworld that is protected from scrutiny by the rich and powerful members of the elite but secretive Sooty Feathers Club. Meanwhile, a mysterious circus arrives in the middle of the night, summoned as allies to help avenge a betrayal two centuries old… Resurrection Men is the first book in David Craig’s Sooty Feathers series, a masterful gothic tale about a supernatural war for control of the Second City of the British Empire, and the struggle of flawed characters of uncertain virtue who try to avert it. It is set in a late 19th century Glasgow ruled by undead – from the private clubs, town houses and country manors of the privileged to the dung-choked wynds and overcrowded slums of the poor. Undead unrest, a fallen angel, and religious zealots intent on driving out the forces of evil, set the stage for a diabolical conflict of biblical proportions.

The last stop on the road to Hell… Highway patrolman Scott Alders sits in a roadside diner along a desolate stretch of Arizona highway. He doesn’t remember how he arrived. Neither do the other patrons, although their waitress tells them a bus is coming. It will take them the rest of the way to a destination of unspeakable horrors. The group of strangers unite with a common goal—escape. Each of them feels the weight of their own dark secrets. But personal demons are no match for a crimson-eyed bus driver with a schedule to keep. Larken’s first novel is still one of his most terrifying. Winner of the Epic Award for Best Horror, Pit-Stop now comes with a mini-sequel that spurs the story in a whole new direction. So sit back, have a cup of joe, and soak in the calming, deadly atmosphere of the Pit-Stop Grill—the last attraction on Route 66 you’ll ever want to visit.

The brand new read-in-one-sitting mystery from the author of unforgettable bestseller The Goldfish Boy. Eleven-year-old Maxwell is always, always in trouble. Roaming the town with his beloved pet dog Monster (who he rescued as a puppy from being run over) as a way to escape his parents' constant sniping at home, he's a menace to the neighbours and teachers at school. While visiting an elderly neighbour, Maxwell comes across a mysterious cabinet of curiosities and suddenly finds himself erased from his life: it's as if he's never existed. Able to walk around anonymously might be great at first - finally, no-one is yelling at him! - but he soon realises that he misses his old life and, crucially, if he had never existed, then he wouldn't have swooped in and stopped Monster the dog from being hit by that car... Maxwell needs to find a way to reverse his erasure, with the help of his best friend Charlie and his sister Bex, who need a whole heap of persuading that this weird kid they've never clapped eyes on is actually super close to them in his former life...

St Louis lawyer Rachel Gold deals with many a family drama, mostly of the dysfunctional variety. Divorce. Paternity. And death. Occasionally, all three combine into a "dead hand" trifecta, where the deceased seeks to control the living—and especially his descendants—from beyond the grave. Rachel calls them "zombies." The legal term for such inheritance plans is "the dead hand," the English translation of the Old French term "mortmain." The term refers to the attempt by wealthy individuals to exert perpetual ownership over property (and future generations) through legal documents prepared before they die. But not even the most obsessed tycoon or his skilled attorneys can foresee every future contingency. To quote the old Yiddish maxim, "Man plans, and God laughs." And angry descendants sue. It's so true. Rachel suddenly finds herself representing two women—one a young widow, one an older divorcee—in a pair of nasty zombie cases where the outcome of each hinges upon a clause in a contested estate plan. Client Cyndi Mulligan is the trophy widow of the late Bert Mulligan, a billionaire entrepreneur whose last will and testament left his estate to Cyndi's unborn daughter. The challenge comes from Bert's angry first wife and her angrier only son. Their claim: Cyndi's daughter—born eleven months after Bert's death—cannot possibly be Bert's child. In the other case, Rachel represents Marsha Knight, the first wife of the wealthy founder of a women's lingerie manufacturer. Marsha has been sued by his young widow, who seeks to invalidate Marsha's divorce settlement and, in the process, impoverish her through invocation of the ancient and nearly inscrutable Rule Against Perpetuities. As the trial date approaches in each lawsuit, the threats to Rachel and her two clients begin to escalate. Zombies, as Rachel discovers, are hard to kill. And even worse, they can still kill—and where least expected. The Dead Hand is written with the verve, humor, and legal smarts that are trademark Michael Kahn.