Showing results by publisher "Phoenix Books" in Genre Fiction

Many kids write stories, but only a few of them grow up to be successful authors. Before there was Carrie, there was "Johnathan and the Witchs." And before there was Rabbit Angstrom, Toyota dealer, there was Manuel Cirarro, famous detective. Could we have seen the seeds of success in Stephen King's and John Updike's juvenilia? These young writers are the same people who dominated the best seller lists and occupy the most celebrated spots on bookshelves in our stores, libraries, and homes.

Rich with unforgettable characters and history, intricately plotted and utterly absorbing, City of Dreams is a stirring saga of early Manhattan and the beginnings of medical science told by a master storyteller.

Surrounded by his children, who all seem to be going through life crises, and his wife, who is wrestling with her own demons, small-town Texas local Duane Moore can't seem to make sense of his life anymore. To the perplexity of his family and friends, he ditches his pickup, starts walking everywhere, and moves to a crude shack six miles out of town. But his attempts to go off the grid are far from successful, and he struggles with increasing depression.

Robert Littell creates a multigenerational, wickedly nostalgic saga of the ClA - "The Company" to insiders. The fictional and historical characters of Robert Littell's novel reveal much of the nearly 50 years of this complex and powerful organization. At the heart is a mole hunt involving the CIA, M16, KGB, and Mossad, a stunningly conceived trip down the rabbit hole to the labyrinthine Alice-in-Wonderland world of espionage, a "world where things have no names".

This timeless saga traces the intertwined lives of a group of prosperous Jewish Holocaust survivors in New York City after World War II. A chain of events disrupts the close-knit community as each refugee struggles to reconcile the horrific past with the difficult present and explores both the nature of faith and the nature of love. Marriages and affairs fall apart; age and death take their toll; the wisdom of the scripture and kabbalah and the precepts of the great philosophers and avatars of modern science are passionately debated in extended conversations that seethe with drama.

The United States is under siege by a terrorist vowing revenge for the abuse he suffered at the hands of Air Force MPs as a youth. The supervillain launches a full-on attack to destroy the country by blowing up airports and threatening the Capitol.

In the year 2008, a Malamute arrives in New York City, followed by a pack of German Shepherds, Dobermans, and Great Danes, all dressed in grand old Prussian style. They become the toast of Manhattan - Monster Dogs. But who, or what, are they really? Outfitted with voice boxes and prosthetic arms, the dogs are the result of an experiment begun years ago in a tiny Canadian village. But their creators did not anticipate that these decadent dogs would be threatened by a strange, incurable illness.

This is the classic story of the young Theseus - Prince of Troizen, King of Eleusis and Athens, slayer of the Minotaur. Mary Renault's powerful novel captures the modern imagination by weaving myth, legend, history, and fiction into the story of a young hero's search for his destiny, or moira. If you like The King Must Die, try The Bull from the Sea.

Gilly Ramsey's lonely childhood was brightened only by visits to her godmother until her death, when the grown-up Gilly inherits the family cottage, “Thornyhold.” Set deep in a wild wood, with its magical and peaceful strength and its sovereign defenses against evil, Thornyhold is like something out of a fairy tale. The old house strikes an end to Gilly's bleak future, offering more than just a new home. It presents a chance to start over—despite its reputation for magic, history of witchcraft, and a resident black cat.

Sita Dulip has missed her flight out of Chicago. But instead of listening to garbled announcements in the airport, she discovers a method of bypassing the crowds at the desks, a nasty lunch, whimpering children, their punitive parents, and the blue plastic chairs bolted to the floor: she changes planes—literally. Sita discovers entire planes of existence and visits societies not found on Earth—bizarre societies that share similarities with Earth's cultures and sometimes open doors into the alien.

In 1920s China, the Peking opera was luxurious entertainment for the privileged class—but only children from the poorest families were sent to opera schools to train as actors. Xiao Douzi is brought to an opera school—and abandoned there by his mother, a prostitute who can no longer care for him. With seeds of bitterness sown in his soul, the nine-year-old boy endures hardships and misery to learn and perfect his craft. The novel focuses on the all-consuming love Xiao Douzi holds for the boy he befriends, and the beautiful female courtesan who comes between them.

If the Watergate scandal was a national nightmare, then maybe the Clinton scandal was a national wet dream, and who better to narrate it than the screenwriter Joe Eszterhas? In American Rhapsody, Eszterhas, whose credits include Basic Instinct and Showgirls, takes us through the events that threatened to topple a president. From scandalmongers Matt Drudge and Ken Starr, to his final, unimpeachable witness, Willard - none other than President Clinton's talking penis - Eszterhas gives us the goods.

At the age of 48, film critic David Denby returned to his alma mater, Columbia University, to re-experience the core humanities courses he had taken as a freshman 30 years before. Facing the question of what he really knows, Denby re-examines the besieged Western classics, ranging from Homer, Sappho, and Sophocles to Dante, Nietzsche, and Woolf. What relevance do the writers and thinkers of the past have to our current life? The answer surprised Denby and will surprise and enlighten his listeners.

Rear Admiral Jake Grafton, the hero of Flight of the Intruder, returns as the United States and Cuba engage in a terrifying game of brinkmanship, a gamble that could break the last military taboo and destroy both countries. In Cuba, an ailing Fidel Castro lies dying. Across the Straits of Florida, an anxious U.S. awaits the inevitable power struggle, determined to have a say in who controls this strategically invaluable island.

In vignettes both comic and sexy, the owner of a coffee shop recalls the day his first wife seemed to achieve a moment of simple perfection, while she remembers the women's softball game during which she was stricken by the beauty of the shortstop. A young couple spends hours at the coffee shop fueling the idea of their fierce love. A professor of philosophy, stopping by for a cup of coffee, makes a valiant attempt to explain what he knows to be the inexplicable workings of the human heart.

The Fall of the Sparrow is the story of a family's struggle to heal itself after the violent death of its oldest daughter. At the heart is Alan "Woody" Woodhall, a classics professor at a small mid-western college, whose beloved oldest daughter, Cookie, is killed during a terrorist bombing. Woody finds himself standing in the cemetery where Cookie is buried, convinced that life has taught him all the lessons he has to learn.

It is 1947 when Joseph Burke, ex-Marine, ex-husband, ex-somebody–is hired as a bodyguard to protect Lauren Roach, 25 and spoiled rotten. The unlikely duo becomes entangled with Burke’s boyhood hero, color-barrier breaking baseball player Jackie Robinson, in a story that is both thrilling and engaging. It is in the historical character Jackie Robinson that Mr. Parker finds inspiration and Joseph Burke may find his redemption. This is a work of fiction about a real man. Most of what I’ve written I’ve made up. I have, however, attempted to render Jackie Robinson accurately. As he was, or as I imagined him to be, in 1947, when I was turning 15, and he was changing the world. The rest is altogether fiction. It may be more Burke’s story then Jackie’s story. But, without Jackie, Burke would have had no story. And neither would I. Robert B Parker.

Paul Madriani was once a promising associate with a prestigious law firm, cofounded by his mentor, Ben Potter. But after a scandalous affair with Ben's wife, Paul left the firm to begin a brilliant career as a criminal defense attorney. Meanwhile, Ben's impeccable reputation has made him a leading candidate for the Supreme Court, until he is found dead on the eve of the nomination. As the evidence against Ben' s wife snowballs, Talia hires her former lover to defend her against the ruthless chief prosecutor, who wants to send her to the gas chamber.

They were called the Class from Hell - 34 inner-city sophomores she inherited from a teacher who'd been "pushed over the edge". She was told "those kids have tasted blood. They're dangerous." But Louanne Johnson had a different idea. Where the school system saw 34 unreachable kids, she saw young men and women with intelligence and dreams.

At the young age of 16, Andy Adams left his San Antonio home to follow his dream of becoming a cowboy. Going on long drives with some of the 19th century's hardiest cowboys, he learned his trade through many adventurous years of trial and error. This account of his true experiences includes dusty cattle drives, brandings, stampedes, dangerous river crossings, and remarkable encounters with the Blackfoot, Oglala, and Platte Indian tribes.