The soft-cover Volant Notebooks come packed in sets of two
- with one book a slightly lighter shade of colour that the other. The
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When Carl sells a box of slimming pills to his close friend Stacey, inadvertently causing her death, he sets in train a sequence of catastrophic events which begin with subterfuge, extend to lies, & culminate in murder. In Rendell`s dark & atmospheric tale of psychological suspense, we encounter mistaken identity, kidnap, blackmail, & a cast of characters who are so real that we come to know them better than we know ourselves. Infused with her distinctive blend of wry humour, acute observation & deep humanity, this is Rendell at her most memorable & best. ...

Intrigue, prestige, debauchery: Dark Diversions by acclaimed author John Ralston Saul is a black comedy of international proportions. From aristocrats & the privileged circles of New York & Paris to military dictators & the political infighting, double-dealing & corruption or their regimes in Morocco & Haiti, welcome to the world where money & power reside. Through a series of encounters with its inhabitants, at once beguiling & grotesque, our investigative narrator uncovers bizarrre & disturbing stories of secret lovers, exiled princesses, religious heresies & murder. But as he becomes further enmeshed in this savage realm, his ambiguous status becomes increasingly unsettling: is he the impartial observer of priviliged foibles & fundamental inequity he appears to be? Or is he, perhaps, an embodiment of the dark diversions he chronicles? Laced with scathing wit, Dark Diversions is a novel that inveigles its reader on a picaresque journey of depravity. ”A delightful novel, invigoratingly wicked”. (Le Monde). ” Saul has the eye, the aloofness, the killer turn of phrase of a Truman Capote”. (Le Figaro). John Ralston Saul is Canada`s leading public intellectual. Declared a `prophet` by Time magazine, Saul has received many awards & prizes, including Chile`s Pablo Neruda Medal. He is president of PEN International, & his thirteen works have been translated into twenty-two languages in thirty countries. Dark Diversions is his sixth novel. ...

It is 1540 & the hottest summer of the sixteenth century. Matthew Shardlake, believing himself out of favour with Thomas Cromwell, is busy trying to maintain his legal practice & keep a low profile. But his involvement with a murder case, defending a girl accused of brutally murdering her young cousin, brings him once again into contact with the king's chief minister
- & a new assignment... The secret of Greek Fire, the legendary substance with which the Byzantines destroyed the Arab navies, has been lost for centuries. Now, an official of the Court of Augmentations has discovered the formula in the library of a dissolved London monastery. When Shardlake is sent to recover it, he finds the official & his alchemist brother brutally murdered
- the formula has disappeared. Now, Shardlake must follow the trail of Greek Fire across Tudor London, while trying at the same time to prove his young client's innocence. But very soon he discovers nothing is as it seems.

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Patagonia is one of the `final frontiers` on our planet: remote, untamed & much of it inaccessible except on horseback. Though travelled before & sporadically settled, it remains remarkably resistant to human trampling. Divided unequally between Argentina & Chile, Patagonia remains a land of mystery today. The history of those who settled in the nineteenth & twentieth centuries along its Andean frontier is even less known. They are the `dark horses` of this book. Jon Burrough rode with his gaucho guide for 1, 500 kilometres through this land of savage beauty. Dark Horses at the Patagonian Frontier evokes the rawness of the region using extracts from diaries, personal interviews, tales told or recorded, myths & legends--all wound round the narrative thread. Part travel record of a `third-ager` on horseback (who was to discover he had cancer ten days out) & part history of this truly wild region, the book explores the landscapes & legacy of a pioneer culture. Illustrated with the author`s own photographs, it also contains several detailed route & location maps to ensure the reader does not get lost. Dark Horses at the Patagonian Frontier is a tale both of the author`s epic journey & of the remarkable pioneers he met & who showed him a hospitality & friendliness which seemed to have no limit. ...

January 1937. Clouds of war are gathering over a fogbound London. Twenty-eight year old Jack is poor, lonely & desperate to change his life. So when he's offered the chance to be the wireless operator on an Arctic expedition, he jumps at it. Spirits are high as the ship leaves Norway: five men & eight huskies, crossing the Barents Sea by the light of the midnight sun. At last they reach the remote, uninhabited bay where they will camp for the next year. Gruhuken. But the Arctic summer is brief. As night returns to claim the l&, Jack feels a creeping unease. One by one, his companions are forced to leave. He faces a stark choice. Stay or go. Soon he will see the last of the sun, as the polar night engulfs the camp in months of darkness. Soon he will reach the point of no return
- when the sea will freeze, making escape impossible. & Gruhuken is not uninhabited. Jack is not alone. Something walks there in the dark.
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66 million years ago, a ten-mile-wide object from outer space hurtled into the Earth at incredible speed & destroyed the dinosaurs, along with three-quarters of the other species on the planet. Where did it come from, & why? & how is this connected to dark matter
- the most mysterious, elusive stuff in the universe, that interacts with gravity like ordinary matter but doesn`t emit or absorb light. Astronomers know it`s there but it is literally invisible. Dark Matter & the Dinosaurs tells the story of Big Bang theory, cosmological inflation, the makeup of the universe & our solar system`s place in it; it`s about mass extinctions through the ages, what we know has hit the Earth & what might hit us in the future. & it explores the radical idea that dark matter might ultimately have been responsible for the dinosaurs` extinction. This is a horizon-expanding tour of the cosmos that blends what we know about the universe with new thinking, Dark Matter & the Dinosaurs is a book full of wonders, from a gifted scientist & writer.
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Barton Gellman`s informant called himself ` Verax`
- the truth-teller. It was only later that Verax unmasked himself as Edward
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Dark Peak at 1:25, 000 on a waterproof & tear-resistant, GPS compatible map from Harvey Map Services in their Superwalker series covering popular hiking areas of Great Britain & Irel&, annotated with additional information for walkers. The maps have contours at 15m intervals, with additional graphics for various types of terrain (crags, large boulders, scattered rocks) & colouring for different kinds of land use or vegetation (pastures, bogs, forests or woodl&, etc). The maps show local hiking paths, indicating, where appropriate, long-distance routes & boundaries of national parks or other protected areas. Scottish titles also indicate Munro, Corbett & Graham hills. Some maps in addition highlight local cycle routes.A range of symbols mark various facilities for walkers including youth or independent hostels, campsites & caravan sites, information points, etc. Each map has a 1-km with British or Irish national grid. ...

Waterproof mountain map of Dark Peak from Harvey at 1:40, 000, with a geological map of the region on the reverse, an enlargement of the Kinder plateau, & advice on navigating the region safely.*MAIN MAP:* Topography is shown through clear altitude shading, spot heights, contours at 15m intervals, & index contours at 75m intervals. A variety of symbols are used to show terrain detail, such as caves/mines, major & climbing crags, shafts, sinkholes, cairns, & large boulders. The map is GPS compatible, with the National Grid overprinted on the cartography. Rights of way shown include tracks, long distance & intermittent paths. Road detail

Includes:: minor, residential & forest roads; railway lines & stops are marked, as are chairlifts & ski tows. Points of interest & facilities such as campsites, information points, & mountain rescue post are prominently highlighted.*ENLARGEMENTS:* The Kinder plateau is shown at 1:20, 000, in the same cartographic style as the main map but with more clarity.*GEOLOGICAL MAP:* The reverse shows a geological map of the region from the British Geological Survey, with detailed relief shading & colours used to denote different types of rock. There is additional written geological information, as well as a geological timeline of the region.*ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:* There is also information on mountain incident & first aid, navigating the region safely, & useful contact numbers are provided. There are also lists of local climbing venues, mountaineering club huts, & mountain bothies. Printed on tough, hard-wearing polyethylene, the map is waterproof, tear-resistant, & comes in a clear plastic wallet.

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