New York Times bestselling author T. Kingfisher returns to the cozy fantasy world of Swordheart in this deliciously charming sequel. Four hundred years ago, three warriors were trapped inside enchanted swords, cursed to be immortal servants of whoever wielded the blade. One of them is the Dervish, a restless, fiery soul who hates his captivity and hates his wielders even more, but has never found a way to escape the sword’s magic. Then one day, a disillusioned scholar named Learned Edmund is tasked with delivering the sword to a distant city, and, in the greatest of peril, draws the blade. The Dervish finds himself bound to a sweet, brilliant, and above all kind young man. And while he may be able to protect Edmund from bandits, cultists, dragons, and strange inhuman diplomats, he may find it much harder to protect his own heart.

Fair and long-legged, independent and articulate, Janie Crawford sets out to be her own person—no mean feat for a black woman in the '30s. Janie's quest for identity takes her through three marriages and into a journey back to her roots.

Go Tell It On The Mountain, first published in 1953, is Baldwin's first major work, a semi-autobiographical novel that has established itself as an American classic. With lyrical precision, psychological directness, resonating symbolic power, and a rage that is at once unrelenting and compassionate, Baldwin chronicles a fourteen-year-old boy's discovery of the terms of his identity as the stepson of the minister of a storefront Pentecostal church in Harlem one Saturday in March of 1935. Baldwin's rendering of his protagonist's spiritual, sexual, and moral struggle of self-invention opened new possibilities in the American language and in the way Americans understand themselves.

In his journal, Nobel Prize winner John Steinbeck called East of Eden “the first book,” and indeed it has the primordial power and simplicity of myth. Set in the rich farmland of California’s Salinas Valley, this sprawling and often brutal novel follows the intertwined destinies of two families—the Trasks and the Hamiltons—whose generations helplessly reenact the fall of Adam and Eve and the poisonous rivalry of Cain and Abel. Adam Trask came to California from the East to farm and raise his family on the new rich land. But the birth of his twins, Cal and Aaron, brings his wife to the brink of madness, and Adam is left alone to raise his boys to manhood. One boy thrives nurtured by the love of all those around him; the other grows up in loneliness enveloped by a mysterious darkness. First published in 1952, East of Eden is the work in which Steinbeck created his most mesmerizing characters and explored his most enduring themes: the mystery of identity, the inexplicability of love, and the murderous consequences of love's absence. A masterpiece of Steinbeck's later years, East of Eden is a powerful and vastly ambitious novel that is at once a family saga and a modern retelling of the Book of Genesis.

The tragedy of the Compson family features some of the most memorable characters in literature: beautiful, rebellious Caddy; the manchild Benjy; haunted, neurotic Quentin; Jason, the brutal cynic; and Dilsey, their black servant. Their lives fragmented and harrowed by history and legacy, the character’s voices and actions mesh to create what is arguably Faulkner’s masterpiece and one of the greatest novels of the twentieth century.

New York Times bestselling author T. Kingfisher returns to the cozy fantasy world of Swordheart in this deliciously charming sequel. Four hundred years ago, three warriors were trapped inside enchanted swords, cursed to be immortal servants of whoever wielded the blade. One of them is the Dervish, a restless, fiery soul who hates his captivity and hates his wielders even more, but has never found a way to escape the sword’s magic. Then one day, a disillusioned scholar named Learned Edmund is tasked with delivering the sword to a distant city, and, in the greatest of peril, draws the blade. The Dervish finds himself bound to a sweet, brilliant, and above all kind young man. And while he may be able to protect Edmund from bandits, cultists, dragons, and strange inhuman diplomats, he may find it much harder to protect his own heart.

The ruling Asharites of Al-Rassan have come from the desert sands, but over centuries, seduced by the sensuous pleasures of their new land, their stern piety has eroded. The Asharite empire has splintered into decadent city-states led by warring petty kings. King Almalik of Cartada is on the ascendancy, aided always by his friend and advisor, the notorious Ammar ibn Khairan — poet, diplomat, soldier — until a summer afternoon of savage brutality changes their relationship forever. Meanwhile, in the north, the conquered Jaddites' most celebrated — and feared — military leader, Rodrigo Belmonte, driven into exile, leads his mercenary company south. In the dangerous lands of Al-Rassan, these two men from different worlds meet and serve — for a time — the same master. Sharing their interwoven fate — and increasingly torn by her feelings — is Jehane, the accomplished court physician, whose own skills play an increasing role as Al-Rassan is swept to the brink of holy war, and beyond. Hauntingly evocative of medieval Spain, The Lions of Al-Rassan is both a brilliant adventure and a deeply compelling story of love, divided loyalties, and what happens to men and women when hardening beliefs begin to remake — or destroy — a world.

A dark, seductive Rumpelstiltskin retelling. She was promised to the realm. He took her for himself. Harlowe Peace between Valoren and Pyrithia was always an illusion — a truce balanced on a knife’s edge. So when Pyrithia’s infamous dragon riders cross our borders uninvited, I’m ready to fight to my last breath. What I wasn’t ready for... was him. Despite my mistrust, I can’t help feeling drawn to the enigmatic, sexy-as-sin General of the Cathal. Silas can be summarized in three words: Dangerous. Deadly. Deceitful. I know better than to trust a man whose smile is as sharp as the blade he keeps hidden. Yet the pull between us is undeniable. Trust is lethal — but desire might just be worse. Silas She’s a pawn in a game she doesn’t understand. And yet, I want to possess her... to own her... to make her mine. But I’m not the only one hunting her. The realm hangs in the balance, but not everything is as it seems. Attacks are coming from all sides and Harlowe must decide how far she is willing to go to reclaim the life that was stolen from her. Dragons guard the skies. Lies rot the throne. And a love like theirs could burn it all down. Fans of dark fantasy romance and fairy tale retellings will devour this tale of love, betrayal, and deceit. This story contains topics that may be triggering for some readers. It is recommended for mature (18+) audiences only. Reader discretion is advised.

For generations Blackwood Bay, a quaint village in northern England, has been famous only for the smuggling that occurred along its coastline centuries ago, but then two local girls disappear bringing the town a fresh and dark notoriety. When Alex, an ambitious documentary filmmaker, arrives in Blackwood Bay, she intends to have the residents record their own stories as her next project. But instead of a quaint community, Alex finds a village blighted by economic downturn and haunted by a tragedy that overshadows every corner. Alex pushes on with her work, but secrets old and new rise to the surface, raising tensions and suspicions in a town already on edge. Alex’s work takes her to dark places and uncomfortable truths which threaten to lead to a deadly unravelling.

The stories in this collection span characters, towns, decades, even centuries, but Florida—its landscape, climate, history, and state of mind—becomes its gravitational center: an energy, a mood, as much as a place of residence. Groff transports the reader, then jolts us alert with a crackle of wit, a wave of sadness, a flash of cruelty, as she writes about loneliness, rage, family, and the passage of time. With shocking accuracy and effect, she pinpoints the moments and decisions and connections behind human pleasure and pain, hope and despair, love and fury—the moments that make us alive.

A dark, seductive Rumpelstiltskin retelling. She was promised to the realm. He took her for himself. Harlowe Peace between Valoren and Pyrithia was always an illusion — a truce balanced on a knife’s edge. So when Pyrithia’s infamous dragon riders cross our borders uninvited, I’m ready to fight to my last breath. What I wasn’t ready for... was him. Despite my mistrust, I can’t help feeling drawn to the enigmatic, sexy-as-sin General of the Cathal. Silas can be summarized in three words: Dangerous. Deadly. Deceitful. I know better than to trust a man whose smile is as sharp as the blade he keeps hidden. Yet the pull between us is undeniable. Trust is lethal — but desire might just be worse. Silas She’s a pawn in a game she doesn’t understand. And yet, I want to possess her... to own her... to make her mine. But I’m not the only one hunting her. The realm hangs in the balance, but not everything is as it seems. Attacks are coming from all sides and Harlowe must decide how far she is willing to go to reclaim the life that was stolen from her. Dragons guard the skies. Lies rot the throne. And a love like theirs could burn it all down. Fans of dark fantasy romance and fairy tale retellings will devour this tale of love, betrayal, and deceit. This story contains topics that may be triggering for some readers. It is recommended for mature (18+) audiences only. Reader discretion is advised.

THE discourse on "Evolution and Ethics," reprinted in the first half of the present volume, was delivered before the University of Oxford, as the second of the annual lectures founded by Mr. Romanes: whose name I may not write without deploring the untimely death, in the flower of his age, of a friend endeared to me.