Missives of a Maddened Monk

Missives of a Maddened Monk
Author: W.D. Phillips
Publisher: Fulton Books, Inc.
Total Pages: 194
Release: 2023-08-10
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:

After numerous adventures with the dark elf sorcerer and observing the darkening presence stirring within him, the monk returned to Hryn, the coastal city. Within the tower that overlooked the sea, he ruminates over what could have gone wrong. What misstep led this ambitious youth toward heinous acts of violence and murder after his first taste of the magic? Did its allure pull him ever toward shadowed reaches of his soul? Did it promise greater possibilities that his mind did not yet understand? His disappearance provided much anxiety for the monk. Did he overcome its invading negative presence or succumb to its empty promises?

Rasputin

Rasputin
Author: Douglas Smith
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Total Pages: 849
Release: 2016-11-22
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0374711232

On the centenary of the death of Rasputin comes a definitive biography that will dramatically change our understanding of this fascinating figure A hundred years after his murder, Rasputin continues to excite the popular imagination as the personification of evil. Numerous biographies, novels, and films recount his mysterious rise to power as Nicholas and Alexandra's confidant and the guardian of the sickly heir to the Russian throne. His debauchery and sinister political influence are the stuff of legend, and the downfall of the Romanov dynasty was laid at his feet. But as the prizewinning historian Douglas Smith shows, the true story of Rasputin's life and death has remained shrouded in myth. A major new work that combines probing scholarship and powerful storytelling, Rasputin separates fact from fiction to reveal the real life of one of history's most alluring figures. Drawing on a wealth of forgotten documents from archives in seven countries, Smith presents Rasputin in all his complexity--man of God, voice of peace, loyal subject, adulterer, drunkard. Rasputin is not just a definitive biography of an extraordinary and legendary man but a fascinating portrait of the twilight of imperial Russia as it lurched toward catastrophe.

The Loved One

The Loved One
Author: Evelyn Waugh
Publisher: Hachette+ORM
Total Pages: 111
Release: 2012-12-11
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0316216488

"A work of art as rich and subtle and unnerving as anything its author has ever done" (New Yorker), The Loved One is Evelyn Waugh's cutting satire of 1940s California and the Anglo-American cultural divide. Following the death of a friend, the poet and pets' mortician Dennis Barlow finds himself entering the artificial Hollywood paradise of the Whispering Glades Memorial Park. Within its golden gates, death, American-style, is wrapped up and sold like a package holiday--and Dennis gets drawn into a bizarre love triangle with Aimée Thanatogenos, a naïve Californian corpse beautician, and Mr. Joyboy, a master of the embalmer's art. Waugh's dark and savage satire depicts a world where reputation, love, and death cost a very great deal.

The Everything Store

The Everything Store
Author: Brad Stone
Publisher: Little, Brown
Total Pages: 387
Release: 2013-10-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0316219258

The authoritative account of the rise of Amazon and its intensely driven founder, Jeff Bezos, praised by the Seattle Times as "the definitive account of how a tech icon came to life." Amazon.com started off delivering books through the mail. But its visionary founder, Jeff Bezos, wasn't content with being a bookseller. He wanted Amazon to become the everything store, offering limitless selection and seductive convenience at disruptively low prices. To do so, he developed a corporate culture of relentless ambition and secrecy that's never been cracked. Until now. Brad Stone enjoyed unprecedented access to current and former Amazon employees and Bezos family members, giving readers the first in-depth, fly-on-the-wall account of life at Amazon. Compared to tech's other elite innovators -- Jobs, Gates, Zuckerberg -- Bezos is a private man. But he stands out for his restless pursuit of new markets, leading Amazon into risky new ventures like the Kindle and cloud computing, and transforming retail in the same way Henry Ford revolutionized manufacturing. The Everything Store is the revealing, definitive biography of the company that placed one of the first and largest bets on the Internet and forever changed the way we shop and read.

Dominion

Dominion
Author: Tom Holland
Publisher: Basic Books
Total Pages: 624
Release: 2019-10-29
Genre: History
ISBN: 0465093523

A "marvelous" (Economist) account of how the Christian Revolution forged the Western imagination. Crucifixion, the Romans believed, was the worst fate imaginable, a punishment reserved for slaves. How astonishing it was, then, that people should have come to believe that one particular victim of crucifixion-an obscure provincial by the name of Jesus-was to be worshipped as a god. Dominion explores the implications of this shocking conviction as they have reverberated throughout history. Today, the West remains utterly saturated by Christian assumptions. As Tom Holland demonstrates, our morals and ethics are not universal but are instead the fruits of a very distinctive civilization. Concepts such as secularism, liberalism, science, and homosexuality are deeply rooted in a Christian seedbed. From Babylon to the Beatles, Saint Michael to #MeToo, Dominion tells the story of how Christianity transformed the modern world.