From the time he was able to body slam a pillow, Michael dreamed of becoming a professional wrestler, vanquishing imaginary enemies and nagging self-doubt with every drop kick he landed. As his buddies hit the books, Michael got hit. When they left for college, he enrolled in Shane Stratford's Wrestling Academy, where cash -- and a particularly punishing "audition" -- afforded him a first look into a world part circus, part sport, and all spectacle. From penny-ante matches to national notoriety, Michael rises through the ranks of professional wrestling. Hopped up on speed, pumped up on steroids, and fueled by a frustration he can't quite name, he adopts and discards identities in a bid to find the "gimmick" that will make him complete. His search will bring him in contact with people weird and wonderful: athletes and actors, crazy fans and crooked managers, the full rich range of folks who revel in the ring. Combining elements of sports narrative a la "North Dallas 40, " the behind-the-scenes authenticity of "Pumping Iron, " and a flair for the bizarre that recalls John Irving, "Living the Gimmick" is a novel not soon forgotten.

“Stunning” short stories by the National Book Award–winning author of The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution).  In this bestselling volume of stories, National Book Award winner Sherman Alexie challenges readers to see Native American Indians as the complex, modern, real people they are. The tender and tenacious tales of The Toughest Indian in the World introduce us to the one-hundred-eighteen-year-old Etta Joseph, former co-star and lover of John Wayne, and to the unnamed narrator of the title story, a young Indian journalist searching for togetherness one hitchhiker at a time. Countless other brilliant creations leap from Alexie’s mind in these nine stories. Upwardly mobile Indians yearn for a more authentic life, married Indian couples push apart while still cleaving together, and ordinary, everyday Indians hunt for meaning in their lives. The Toughest Indian in the World combines anger, humor, and beauty into radiant fictions, fiercely imagined, from one of America’s greatest writers. This ebook features an illustrated biography including rare photos from the author’s personal collection.

This is one bad boy who's fit to print. A notorious jock tackles life—and love—after football with a type-A journalist in this sexy bad-boy romcom. As a former pro football star, Barrett Fox is used to playing the field. After injuries cut his NFL career short, his second act as a broadcaster ended when a hot mic moment got him cancelled. But this latest publicity stunt might just land him back on top—much to the chagrin of Catarina Everhart, the uptight, beautiful journalist who's been assigned to date a "bad boy" and tell the tale. She swears he'll never touch her, let alone kiss her, which is exactly the kind of challenge Barrett is up for... The cocky egomaniac assigned to partner with Catarina on this project seems to be doing everything in his power to make her hate him. Barrett is infamous for his bad behavior, and now, thanks to her boss's harebrained schemes, he's apparently Catarina's problem. But as one fake date...

Three great vampires--two Lords and a Lady--arrive on an unsuspecting Earth that teems with defenseless humans, easy prey for the marauding vampires. But humanity has defenders. Though the necroscope is gone, the psychically gifted men and women of E-Branch move swiftly against the vampire infestation. Jake Cutter is running for his life through the streets of Turin when he vanishes, appearing moments later inside the triply locked "Harry\'s room" in E-Branch\'s London HQ. Jake\'s dreams are very strange, filled with the voices of the dead--the Great majority, the Necroscope, Harry Keogh, even a dead vampire. He hears them all, but he doesn\'t truly understand. If Jake is the new Necroscope, he has to learn--fast!--how to control his powers and speak to the dead. E-Branch, with the reluctant Jake along for the ride, is about to go head-to-head with Malinari the Mind, a vampire Lord who psychic abilities are second to none. But the dead don\'t trust Jake, not like they trusted Harry. Jake\'s got personal revenge on his mind, and he\'s spending too much time talking that dead vampire. He\'s got to start thinking about the future--or he won\'t have one!

Three months after returning to England, Christopher Burton, receives a phone-call at the reception desk of the Rembrandt Hotel, Knightsbridge that informs him of his son's suicide. But why on receiving this terrible news, does Burton immediately decide that he must leave his Italian wife of thirty years standing? Why does he find it so difficult to focus on his grief for his son? Intensely dramatic, dark and, against all odds, hilariously funny, Destiny is a satisfying story and a profound meditation on marriage and identity. Parks gives us a frightening experience of what it means to tread the narrow line between sanity and psychosis.

Keladry of Mindalen, the first girl to train as a knight since Alanna, is officially a page now, but she's got three more years before she'll be a squire. And those three years are not going to be easy. Kel has to stand up against bullying boys, cruel older sisters, and, as always, the training master, Lord Wyldon! From the Hardcover edition.

A definitive anthology of fiction by W. Somerset Maugham includes the complete texts of three novels--The Moon and Sixpence, The Painted Veil, and The Magician--as well as five short stories--Rain, The Letter, Alien Corn, The Pool, and Mackintosh. Original.

In Dressing Up for the Carnival, Carol Shields distills her characteristic wisdom, elegance, and insouciant humor in twenty-two luminous stories. A wealth of surprises and contrasts, this collection ranges from the lyricism of "Weather," in which a couple's life is thrown into chaos when the National Association of Meteorologists goes on strike, to the swampy sexuality of "Eros," in which a room in a Parisian hotel on the verge of ruin is the catalyst for passion, to the brave confidence of "A Scarf"-new for this collection-which chronicles the realities of a fledging author's book tour. Playful, graceful, acutely observed, and generous of spirit, these stories will delight her devoted fans and win her new converts as well.

The fight to survive is all in the mind. There is nothing exceptional about Greg Summers, until the day he returns home to discover that his wife no longer recognises him and is married to a stranger using his name. Perhaps it is an elaborate hoax, yet that wouldn't explain his vivid flashbacks to childhood, or the violent eruptions of blood that accompany them. Nor does it explain the stray memories that seem to belong to an entirely separate man called Richard Jameson. One of these men is a lie, and neither wishes it to be he. On the run from a creature that cannot exist, his comfortable truths shattered, Greg finds his whole knowledge of the world questionable. If he does not know himself, what can he trust himself to know? "A plot as wild as this could have easily spun out of control, but Wright holds the reins tight. His dexterity is dazzling." - Hellnotes

Known as the "American Agatha Christie," author Mary Roberts Rinehart produced a vast array of top-notch mysteries over the course of her career, with occasional incursions into other genres. The After House is a gripping whodunit that revolves around a series of grisly axe murders. Set on board a ship, this murder mystery is sure to leave you on the edge of your seat.

Here are thirteen deadly tales, all set within the dramatic turmoil of medieval Europe. Murder mystery fans and history buffs alike will be riveted by the selections offered by master anthologist Martin H. Greenberg and Nebula Award-winner John Helfers. You'll meet Peter Tremayne's seventh-century Celtic detective, Sister Fidelma, in "Like a Dog Returning;" discover Clayton Emery's take on Robin Hood in "Plucking a Mandrake;" learn about Brother Cadfael, soldier-turned-sleuthing-monk, from the wicked pen of Ellis Peters; and many others—all in the service of investigating crime in the Middle Ages, from the misdeeds of commoners to the felonies of kings.ContentsPeter Tremayne's Like a Dog Returning is a dip into Sister Fidelma's travels in which she detects the true murderer of a much-beloved nun murdered 20 years earlier bringing justice to the memory of a monk wrongfully lynched. I have no idea as to what the title refers.The bio at the back claims this story was first published after Spider's Web, #5.Doug Allyn's Country of the Blind is a sweet, odd tale of the past, present, and future life of a young blind girl with the sweetest singing voice. Life begun in a convent, lost when the convent is fired, and retrieved for a life on the road as a minstrel with Bard Owain Phyfe. My only peeve was Allyn's constant use of the phrase Country of the Blind.Lillian Stewart Carl's Cold as Fire finds Geoffrey caught between a rock and a hard place when a sheriff arrests one of Thomas Becket's priests for the murder of Johanna Frelonde of Estursete and he has to inform the archbishop. The evidence is against Father Baldwin, but circumstance and gossip require further digging.Gillian Linscott's A Horse for My Kingdom is another case of greed for power and wealth when a plot is hatched to prevent peace before the battle at Mortimer's Cross. And a gift makes the future bright for a man.Margaret Frazer's Simple Logic of It All is both bitter and funny as Frazer exposes us to the machinations of court with the verbose use of logic destroying a plot to make the Duke of York appear treasonous.Clayton Emery's Plucking a Mandrake drops us into a difficult time in Robin Hood and Marian's life when they are consulting a healer about their difficulty in conceiving a child. From bystanders to active participants, they expose the corruption in a small village caused by its mad priest.Edward Marston's A Gift from God is an underhanded plot to satisfy a spoiled brat of a man who thinks he can take what he likes only to come up against a couple who consider each other A Gift from God.Tony Geraghty's Queen's Chastity is an odd and confusing one. It tells of a bit of gossip about Queen Eleanor and a supposed infidelity interspersed with a modern email correspondence between rival theorists. I didn't really see the point of it.Kathy Lynn Emerson's Reiving of Bonville Keep was a nice treat after the previous story and read more like a romance as Sir Gavin Dunnett rescues his young daughter and a young maiden from certain death at the hands of a conniving slut.Michael Jecks' For the Love of Old Bones throws a number of red herrings into the plot before the murder of Abbot Bertrand de Surgères, the former Sir Bertrand de Toulouse, is solved. Admittedly, his errand to Launceston was one of greed as his abbey in France intended to take the saint's bones away for their own profit.Brendan DuBois' Wizard of Lindsay Woods is just plain sad to see how a brother would treat another. It begins and ends with greed when Lord Henry gains ownership of Lindsay Woods but a wizard is preventing his use of it. A wizard who kills from a distance!There's a bit of a time-travel feel to this. You'll appreciate the ending!Kristine Kathryn Rusch's Improvements truly is an improvement at least for this manor when the widowed Maude takes a firm hand in the treatment of whores. Go Maudie!Ellis Peters' A Light on the Road to Woodstock explains Cadfael's actions just before he enters the monastery when he is returning to England from war in Normandy with Sir Roger Mauduit and agrees to stay on through a court dispute Sir Roger has with the abbey of Shrewsbury.

The incomparable Jack Higgins returns to the bestseller lists, launching undercover enforcer Sean Dillon into his most spectacular adventure yet - a no-holds-barred battle with a Mafia don. It's all action and suspense as Sean Dillon and his secret intelligence colleagues seek to help American White House security insider Blake Johnson avenge the death of his ex-wife, a reporter murdered for getting too close to a Mafia story. In London, Beirut and Ireland, the daredevil friends are prepared to risk everything as they combine to thwart the ever more desperate ambition of Mafia frontman Jack Fox. Here in his eighth adventure, former IRA terrorist turned British Government enforcer Sean Dillon is established as one of the most popular characters in modern fiction, while Jack Higgins has an unrivalled position as the biggest name in thriller writing around the world. Widely hailed as an outstanding return to form, Day of Reckoning raced straight into the top ten of the Sunday Times bestseller list in hardbackReview'Another page-turner from the master... one of the fastest-moving thrillers Higgins has penned for some time. It isn't just Higgins at his best, it is him at his most inventive and impressive.' Oxford Times 'Dillon makes his 8th appearance in this return-to-form thriller. As in the best of his earlier work, Higgins shifts the action with practised ease between London, Beirut and Ireland... this is Higgins as we like him to be.' Good Book Guide About the AuthorJack Higgins was a soldier and then a teacher before becoming a full-time writer. The Eagle Has Landed turned him into an international bestselling author and his novels have since sold over 250 million copies and been translated into fifty-five languages. Many of them have also been made into successful films. The 9th novel in the Sean Dillon series, Edge of Danger, will be published by HarperCollins in Spring 2001. 'HIGGINS IS THE MASTER' Tom Clancy

Sera had been devastated when Keir Sutherlands became more interested in his career than in their wedding plans. Convinced he didn't love her any more, Sera knew she had to let Keir go....Sera tried to make a new life for herself, but was thrown into turmoil when Keir returned and seemed determined to marry her after all. But did Keir love her, or was he simply driven by revenge?