In Invisible Cities Marco Polo conjures up cities of magical times for his host, the Chinese ruler Kublai Khan, but gradually it becomes clear that he is actually describing one city: Venice. As Gore Vidal wrote ` Of all tasks, describing the contents of a book is the most difficult & in the case of a marvellous invention like Invisible Cities, perfectly irrelevant.` ...

Ellison`s blistering & impassioned first novel, winner of the prestigious American National Book Award, tells the extraordinary story of a man who is invisible `simply because people refuse to see me`. Yet his powerfully depicted adventures
- from a terrifying Harlem race riot to his expulsion from a Southern college
- go far beyond the story of one man. The lives of countless millions are evoked in this superb portrait of a generation of black Americans.

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Award-winning translator & author Ken Liu presents a collection of short speculative fiction from China. Some stories have won awards; some have been included in various ` Year`s Best` anthologies; some have been well reviewed by critics & readers; & some are simply Ken`s personal favorites. Many of the authors collected here (with the obvious exception of Liu Cixin) belong to the younger generation of `rising stars`. In addition, three essays at the end of the book explore Chinese science fiction. Liu Cixin`s essay, The Worst of All Possible Universes & The Best of All Possible Earths, gives a historical overview of SF in China & situates his own rise to prominence as the premier Chinese author within that context. Chen Qiufan`s The Torn Generation gives the view of a younger generation of authors trying to come to terms with the tumultuous transformations around them. Finally, Xia Jia, who holds the first Ph.D. issued for the study of Chinese SF, asks What Makes Chinese Science Fiction Chinese?. ...

A highly amusing memoir from a newly published author, Invisible Pleasures beautifully & vividly describes his life from the first tremors of his imagination as a child, through his early memories in the War, to the wild youthful Rabelaisian excitement of the 60s in London & his subsequent working in Borneo & Malaya as an architect. It is an unrequited love story & a travelogue through parts of the `pre-globalised world` where many places on the map then, before mass tourism had sucked them dry of mystery, were yet to be visited. & it asks the question of what we are & where we come from in either God`s World or the Universe of Science. This exciting memoir of love affairs & overseas adventures will appeal to those with an interest in the arts & foreign travel. ...

This book brings Rome's invisible inhabitants to life. Robert Knapp seeks out the tradespeople, innkeepers, housewives, priests, prostitutes, freedmen, slaves, soldiers & gladiators who formed the fabric of everyday life in ancient Rome & the outlaws & pirates who lay beyond it. Robert Knapp brings invisible inhabitants of Rome & its vast empire to life. He seeks out the ordinary men, housewives, prostitutes, freedmen, slaves, soldiers, & gladiators, who formed the fabric of everyday life in the ancient Roman world, & the outlaws & pirates who lay beyond it. He finds their own words preserved in literature, letters, inscriptions & graffiti & their traces in the nooks & crannies of the histories, treatises, plays & poetry created by members of the elite. He tracks down & pieces together these & other tell-tale bits of evidence cast off by the visible mass of Roman history & culture, & in doing so recreates a world lost from view for two millennia. We see how everyday Romans sought to survive & thrive under the afflictions of disease, war, & violence, & to control their fates before powers that variously oppressed & ignored them. Chapters on each of the main groups reveal how their worlds were linked in need, dependence, exploitation, hope & fear. Slaves & ex-soldiers merge into the world of the outlaw; slaves become freedmen; the sons of freedmen enlist as soldiers; &, the concerns of women transcend every boundary. We see them all at last in the tumult of a great empire that shaped their worlds as it reshaped the wider world around them. ...

Sara, a therapist, always thought her husband Mike died in Afghanistan
- but when she learns he was actually killed in India,
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Joel Burns has always believed his father is still alive. His mother Jackie has long been glad to know Gilberto is dead. When a sighting on a news report from Rio de Janeiro suggests Joel might be right, he travels to Brazil determined to find his long-lost father. Nelson, a down-&-out musician guided by the spirits of Jesus, Yemanja & his late Aunt Zila, helps Joel retrace his childhood steps
- & face up to the contrast between his rosy memories of Gilberto & his mother`s accounts of the man`s cruelty. Back at home in Brighton, Joel`s trip stirs up Jackie`s own recollections of her life in Rio
- from the beautiful early years, when Gilberto was trying to make it in the Bossa Nova scene, to the violent times following his arrest & imprisonment by the military authorities. Invisibles spans two cities by the sea & four decades of music, torture & romance. From the streets of Brighton to the bars of Rio, Ed Siegle weaves the rhythms of Brazil & the troubles of his characters into an absorbing story of identity, love & loss. At once familiar & foreign, this sweet, sad & compulsively readable first novel throngs with visceral memory & unbreakable ordinary heroes.

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A nine-year-old boy is found murdered at the bottom of a well near a popular beach resort in southern Italy. In what looks like a hopeless case for Guido Guerrieri, counsel for the defence, a Senegalese peddler is accused of the crime. Faced with small-town racism fuelled by the recent immigration from Africa, Guido attempts to exploit the esoteric workings of the Italian courts. More than a perfectly paced legal thriller, this relentless suspense novel transcends the genre. A powerful attack on racism, & a fascinating insight into the Italian judicial process, it is also an affectionate portrait of a deeply humane hero. ...

Exceptionally detailed & informative topographic map at 1:100, 000 of the Inylchek area in the Tien Shan Mountains in Kyrgyzstan, prepared by the German Alpine Club using data from the Kyrgyz national survey organization plus satellite imagery. Topography is shown by contours at 50m intervals with relief shading, plus numerous spot heights & peak names. Colouring & graphics indicate different types of vegetation (woods, meadows, swampy grassl&, etc.) & soil cover (rocky outcrops, individual isolated rocks with height, caves, moraine, glaciers, etc.). Passes are classified according to the difficulty of traverse. Rivers & creeks indicate their width. The map shows local roads (paved, country lanes, dirt roads & forest tracks) & footpaths, as well as settlements & isolated buildings, bridges passable by vehicles or on foot, fuel & water tanks, etc. Assent & descent routes, base camp & possible camp sites are highlighted. The map has a UTM grid with latitude & longitude margin ticks at 5` intervals. Map legend is in English, German & Russian. Also included are tri-lingual notes on using this map with GPS units. ...

Ioannina Province
- Ioannina Street Plan in a series of detailed road maps of provinces, some with street plans of their administrative
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