The year is 1348. Thomas, a disgraced knight, has found a young girl alone in a dead Norman village. An orphan of the Black Death, and an almost unnerving picture of innocence, she tells Thomas that plague is only part of a larger cataclysm—that the fallen angels under Lucifer are rising in a second war on heaven, and that the world of men has fallen behind the lines of conflict. Is it delirium or is it faith? She believes she has seen the angels of God. She believes the righteous dead speak to her in dreams. And now she has convinced the faithless Thomas to shepherd her across a depraved landscape to Avignon. There, she tells Thomas, she will fulfill her mission to confront the evil that has devastated the earth, and to restore to this betrayed, murderous knight the nobility and hope of salvation he long abandoned. As hell unleashes its wrath, and as the true nature of the girl is revealed, Thomas will find himself on a macabre battleground of angels and demons, saints, and the risen dead, and in the midst of a desperate struggle for nothing less than the soul of man.

If on a Winter's Night a Traveler is a marvel of ingenuity, an experimental text that looks longingly back to the great age of narration—"when time no longer seemed stopped and did not yet seem to have exploded." Italo Calvino's novel is in one sense a comedy in which the two protagonists, the Reader and the Other Reader, ultimately end up married, having almost finished If on a Winter's Night a Traveler. In another, it is a tragedy, a reflection on the difficulties of writing and the solitary nature of reading. The Reader buys a fashionable new book, which opens with an exhortation: "Relax. Concentrate. Dispel every other thought. Let the world around you fade." Alas, after 30 or so pages, he discovers that his copy is corrupted, and consists of nothing but the first section, over and over. Returning to the bookshop, he discovers the volume, which he thought was by Calvino, is actually by the Polish writer Bazakbal. Given the choice between the two, he goes for the Pole, as does the Other Reader, Ludmilla. But this copy turns out to be by yet another writer, as does the next, and the next. The real Calvino intersperses 10 different pastiches—stories of menace, spies, mystery, premonition—with explorations of how and why we choose to read, make meanings, and get our bearings or fail to. Meanwhile the Reader and Ludmilla try to reach, and read, each other. If on a Winter's Night is dazzling, vertiginous, and deeply romantic. "What makes lovemaking and reading resemble each other most is that within both of them times and spaces open, different from measurable time and space."

An acclaimed bestseller and international sensation, Patrick Suskind's classic novel provokes a terrifying examination of what happens when one man's indulgence in his greatest passion—his sense of smell—leads to murder. In the slums of eighteenth-century France, the infant Jean-Baptiste Grenouille is born with one sublime gift—an absolute sense of smell. As a boy, he lives to decipher the odors of Paris, and apprentices himself to a prominent perfumer who teaches him the ancient art of mixing precious oils and herbs. But Grenouille's genius is such that he is not satisfied to stop there, and he becomes obsessed with capturing the smells of objects such as brass doorknobs and fresh-cut wood. Then one day he catches a hint of a scent that will drive him on an ever-more-terrifying quest to create the "ultimate perfume"—the scent of a beautiful young virgin. Told with dazzling narrative brilliance, Perfume is a hauntingly powerful tale of murder and sensual depravity.

Nothing brings people together like a common enemy, and witches were the greatest enemy of all. Scotland, 1563: Crops failed. People starved. And the Devil's influence was stronger than ever—at least, that's what everyone believed. If you were a woman living in Scotland during this turbulent time, there was a very good chance that you, or someone you knew, would be tried as a witch. During the chaos of the Reformation, violence against women was codified for the first time in the Witchcraft Act—a tool of theocratic control with one chilling to root out witches and rid the land of evil. What followed was a dark and misogynistic chapter in history that fanned the flames of witch hunts across the globe, including in the United States and beyond. In How to Kill a Witch, Zoe Venditozzi and Claire Mitchell, hosts of the popular Witches of Scotland podcast, unravel the grim yet absurdly bureaucratic process of identifying, accusing, trying, and executing women as witches. With sharp wit and keen feminist insight, they reveal the inner workings of a patriarchal system designed to weaponize fear and oppress women. This captivating (and often infuriating) account, which weaves a rich tapestry of trial transcripts, witness accounts, and the documents that set the legal grounds for the witch hunts, exposes how this violent period of history mirrors today's struggles for justice and equality. How to Kill a Witch is a powerful, darkly humorous reminder of the dangers of superstition, bias, and ignorance, and a warning to never forget the past… while raising the question of whether it could ever happen again.

10 people head out on a backpacking trip, but the first night 11 set up camp. Everyone remembers everyone else. Who's the extra?THE EXTRA is the debut dark sci-fi novella by Annie Neugebauer.

Inheriting your uncle's supervillain business is more complicated than you might think. Particularly when you discover who's running the place. Charlie's life is going nowhere fast. A divorced substitute teacher living with his cat in a house his siblings want to sell, all he wants is to open a pub downtown, if only the bank will approve his loan. Then his long-lost uncle Jake dies and leaves his supervillain business (complete with island volcano lair) to Charlie. But becoming a supervillain isn't all giant laser death rays and lava pits. Jake had enemies, and now they're coming after Charlie. His uncle might have been a stand-up, old-fashioned kind of villain, but these are the real thing: rich, soulless predators backed by multinational corporations and venture capital. It's up to Charlie to win the war his uncle started against a league of supervillains. But with unionized dolphins, hyperintelligent talking spy cats, and a terrifying henchperson at his side, going bad is starting to look pretty good. In a dog-eat-dog world...be a cat.

Based on a real-life seventeenth century Danish witch trial, The Wax Child tells in vivid prose the story of Christenze Kruckow, a noblewoman long pursued by a scandal of sorcery. People whisper that in her wake one finds illness, death, and unsettling behaviour by pigs and cats. Some even say she once fashioned out of wax a child, an instrument of the most sinister magic. Christenze will flee the rumours to Aalborg, that great city of seawater and mist. But even there suspicion and fear rule, and once a rumour of witchcraft has taken hold, it can prove hard to shake…

Based on a real-life seventeenth century Danish witch trial, The Wax Child tells in vivid prose the story of Christenze Kruckow, a noblewoman long pursued by a scandal of sorcery. People whisper that in her wake one finds illness, death, and unsettling behaviour by pigs and cats. Some even say she once fashioned out of wax a child, an instrument of the most sinister magic. Christenze will flee the rumours to Aalborg, that great city of seawater and mist. But even there suspicion and fear rule, and once a rumour of witchcraft has taken hold, it can prove hard to shake…

Introduced by Jeff VanderMeer, welcome to a luxury hotel at the end of the world in this post-apocalyptic 1967 dystopia ... The day we came up from the shelters four people were found dead on the steps of the hotel. Welcome to Termush: a luxury coastal resort like no other. All the wealthy guests are survivors: preppers who reserved rooms long before the Disaster. Inside, they embrace exclusive radiation shelters, ambient music and lavish provisions; outside, radioactive dust falls on the sculpture park, security men step over dead birds, and a reconnaissance party embarks. Despite weathering a nuclear apocalypse, their problems are only just beginning. Soon, the Management begins censoring news; disruptive guests are sedated; initial generosity towards Strangers ceases as fears of contamination and limited resources grow. But as the numbers - and desperation - of external survivors increase, they must decide what it means to forge a new moral code at the end (or beginning?) of the world ...

Introduced by Jeff VanderMeer, welcome to a luxury hotel at the end of the world in this post-apocalyptic 1967 dystopia ... The day we came up from the shelters four people were found dead on the steps of the hotel. Welcome to Termush: a luxury coastal resort like no other. All the wealthy guests are survivors: preppers who reserved rooms long before the Disaster. Inside, they embrace exclusive radiation shelters, ambient music and lavish provisions; outside, radioactive dust falls on the sculpture park, security men step over dead birds, and a reconnaissance party embarks. Despite weathering a nuclear apocalypse, their problems are only just beginning. Soon, the Management begins censoring news; disruptive guests are sedated; initial generosity towards Strangers ceases as fears of contamination and limited resources grow. But as the numbers - and desperation - of external survivors increase, they must decide what it means to forge a new moral code at the end (or beginning?) of the world ...