Showing results by narrator "Nicholas Guy Smith" in All Categories

The Great Merlini waits impatiently at the door of the Hotel Astor. Inspector Church is late for his meeting with the famed magician, with whom he consults when homicide cases venture outside the realm of the possible. A ventriloquist has attempted suicide in the wake of his wife’s mysterious strangulation. Among the suspects are a snake charmer, a nine-foot giant, a tattooed man, and a gaggle of crap players - and this is one of Merlini’s simple cases.

Since 9/11, more than 300 Americans - born and raised in Minnesota, Alabama, New Jersey, and elsewhere - have been indicted or convicted of terrorism charges. Some have taken the fight abroad: An American was among those who planned the attacks in Mumbai, and more than 80 US citizens have been charged with ISIS-related crimes. Others have acted on American soil, as with the attacks at Fort Hood, at the Boston Marathon, and in San Bernardino. What motivates them, how are they trained, and what do we sacrifice in our efforts to track them?

The Fourth Industrial Revolution is changing everything - from the way we relate to each other to the work we do, the way our economies work and what it means to be human. We cannot let the brave new world that technology is currently creating simply emerge. All of us need to help shape the future we want to live in. But what do we need to know and do to achieve this? In Shaping the Future of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, Klaus Schwab explores how people from all backgrounds and sectors can influence the way that technology transforms our world.

It is a simple fact that no president in American history brought less foreign policy experience to the White House than Donald J. Trump. The real estate developer from Queens promised to bring his brash, zero-sum swagger to bear to cut through America's most complex national security issues, and he did. If the cost of his "America First" agenda was bulldozing the edifice of foreign alliances that had been carefully tended by every president from Truman to Obama, then so be it.

The year is 2113. In Jenna Strong’s world, ACID - the most brutal controlling police force in history - rule supreme. No throwaway comment or whispered dissent goes unnoticed - or unpunished. And it was ACID agents who locked Jenna away for life, for a horrendous crime she struggles to remember. But Jenna’s violent prison time has taught her how to survive by any means necessary. When a mysterious rebel group breaks her out, she must use her strength, speed, and skill to stay one step ahead of ACID and try to uncover the truth about what really happened.

An ongoing, episodic "prose comic" from which the pictures are summoned by the magic of words, Goon Squad is set in an alternate version of modern-day Manchester. Its biggest divergence from the real city is that it - along with most other large urban centers - has a team of superheroes to protect it against unusual threats with which the conventional forces of law and order would have problems. Goon Squad: Year One offers three action-packed volumes in a single collection.

As fog descends, obscuring the gas lamps of Victorian London, werewolves prowl the shadows of back alleys. But they have infiltrated the inner circles of upper-crust society as well. Only a handful of specially gifted practitioners are equipped to battle the beasts.

Mr. Mani is a deeply affecting six-generation family saga, extending from 19th-century Greece and Poland to British-occupied Palestine to German-occupied Crete and ultimately to modern Israel. The narrative moves through time and is told in five conversations about the Mani family. It ends in Athens in 1848 with Avraham Mani's powerful tale about the death of his young son in Jerusalem. A profoundly human novel, rich in drama, irony, and wit.

2113. In Jenna Strong’s world, ACID - the most brutal, controlling police force in history - rule supreme. No throwaway comment or muttered dissent goes unnoticed - or unpunished. And it was ACID agents who locked Jenna away for life, for a bloody crime she struggles to remember. The only female inmate in a violent high-security prison, Jenna has learned to survive by any means necessary.

The Crown and Key Society face their most terrifying villain yet: Gaios, a deranged demigod with the power to destroy Britain. To avenge a centuries-old betrayal, Gaios is hell-bent on summoning the elemental forces of the earth to level London and bury Britain. The Crown and Key Society, a secret league consisting of a magician, an alchemist, and a monster-hunter, is the realm’s only hope—and to stop Gaios, they must gather their full strength and come together as a team, or the world will fall apart.

When monster-hunter Malcolm MacFarlane comes across the gruesome aftermath of a ritual murder in a London church, he enlists the help of magician-scribe Simon Archer and alchemist extraordinaire Kate Anstruther. Studying the macabre scene, they struggle to understand obscure clues in the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics carved into the victim’s heart—as well as bizarre mystical allusions to the romantic poetry of William Blake. One thing is clear: Some very potent black magic is at work.

In Elizabethan London, young Emilia Bassano is a ward of English aristocrats. Her education has endowed her with a sharp wit and a gift for storytelling, but still she is allowed no voice of her own. Forced to become a mistress to the Lord Chamberlain, who oversees the theatre, Emilia discovers the power of stories to beguile audiences. Secretly, she forms a plan to bring a play of her own to the stage – by paying an actor named William Shakespeare to front her work.

Goon Squad, Volume 2: Without Sin is composed of "A Star in Strange Ways", "Holy Fool", "Dead Man Tells Tale", "A Brief History of the Goon Squad", "Tale of Terror", and "Pomona Island", as well as an introduction read by the author.

Though much of his early life remains a mystery, Blackbeard most likely began his life as Edward Teach in the sailing port of Bristol, England. He began his career as a hired British sailor during Queen Anne's War. He eventually settled in the Bahamas under Captain Benjamin Hornigold who taught the young sailor to go "a-pirating." Soon enough, Blackbeard was commanding his own fleet and stealing ships around the Caribbean and up and down the Eastern seaboard. The legend of Blackbeard has influenced pirate legend and lore for more than 300 years.

Whether sailing across the ocean, hiking through the jungle, or climbing the highest volcanic peaks, everywhere Alexander went, he observed the land, animals, and culture. And where others saw differences, Alexander spotted connections.

It’s 1942 in Nazi-occupied Paris. Mori Rothstein, an art dealer and expert in master paintings from Rococo to Realism, has been sought after for his expertise, by every major museum in the world. Also seeking his knowledge is Reichmarshall Hermann Goering. As his friends and fellow Jews disappear one by one, Mori struggles to protect his family by cooperating with the Germans to catalog stolen paintings for the Fuhrer’s museum.