After five hundred years of colonial suppression & a brutal civil war, the Maya in Guatemala finally have a chance to live in peace. Latin America`s longest civil war ended on December 29, 1996, with a peace accord between the conservative government of President Arzu & the Marxist guerrilla group URNG. Now the Maya are searching the killing fields for their dead, rediscovering their own magnificent culture & history, & are finally free to practice their ancient religion at remote altars on mountaintops, in caves & ravines, or near waterfalls, & to begin to heal their souls. Magnum photographer Thomas Hoepker has visited Guatemala six times since 1991. He has captured many aspects of this remarkable period of transition in an array of astonishing, full-color shots that will disturb, enchant, & ultimately instruct. ...

Proud, passionate Eustacia Vye marries Clym Yeobright in the hope that he will help her escape her cramped rural existence. But when their relationship falters Eustacia turns to her old lover Damon Wildeve, leading to a disastrous climax on the brooding wilds of Egdon Heath. ...

Perfect for fans of STAR WARS or comic-book fiction such as CAPTAIN UNDERPANTS. Story & illustration are combined within this fun graphic novel. After surviving his first year at Jedi Academy, Roan thought his second year would be a breeze. He couldn`t have been more wrong. Roan feels like he`s drifting apart from his friends, & it`s only made worse when Roan discovers he`s not the amazing pilot he thought he`d be. When the school bullies take him under their wing, he decides they aren`t so bad after all
- or are they?
...

Ronald Blythe`s 1969 book ” Akenfield”
- a moving portrait of English country life told in the voices of the farmers & villagers
...

By 1910, the Antarctic was the last place on earth that had never been explored, & British naval officer Robert Scott was obsessed that an Englishman
- specifically himself
- should conquer the pole. Despite being under-funded, under-equipped & unprepared, Scott sailed south in the antiquated whaling ship, Terra Nova, in what everyone assumed would be a cracking good adventure. The expedition was made up entirely of British adventurers, gadabouts & scientists, the exception being one Canadian, Charles Seymour (Silas) Wright. Born 1887 in Toronto, Charles Wright was studying physics in Cambridge when he heard Scott was looking for a physicist to join the expedition to the pole. By the time Wright inquired, Scott had chosen a physicist for the team but was short a glaciologist. Who else but a Canadian would know about glaciers? Wright became the expedition`s glaciologist. Halfway through the rough passage to the Antarctic, Scott got word that a rival explorer, Norwegian Roald Amundsen, was also making a run for the pole & was close on their heels. What started out as a stroll to the South Pole became a race between two very determined & different men. Arriving at their base camp on Cape Evans in January 1911, Scott`s team soon discovered they were unprepared for the Antarctic, while equipment failures & food shortages compounded the hardship. For the final race to the pole, Scott stripped the team down to four men, & Wright did not make the cut. Scott reached the geographic South Pole only to find that Amundsen had beaten them by days. Bitterly disappointed, Scott & his companions returned to base camp, but were caught in a fierce Antarctic blizzard that raged for days. Too weak to pull their sleds & out of food & fuel, they froze to death. Ironically, as if to underscore the litany of errors that dogged the expedition, they perished only a few miles from a cache of food & fuel. Next spring Wright led a search party to look for the remains of Scott & his party, & it was the sharp-eyed Wright who spotted a small patch of green on a snowy landscape
- the tent containing Scott & his companions` frozen bodies. Wright returned to England & went on to do even more extraordinary things, including inventing trench wireless in WWI, & working closely with Winston Churchill, developing the technology to assist in the allied invasion of Europe in WWII which included developing the first radar installations & inventing the technology that neutralized German magnetic sea mines After a stint as naval attache to Washington, D.C., & Director of Scripps Oceanographic institute in La Jolla, California, he retired to Salt Spring Isl&, BC, passing away in 1975. Typically Canadian, Wright was modest about his accomplishments, with few Canadians aware of his amazing life & the extraordinary impact he had on the 20th century.


...

In 1990, Henry Swain sailed his 34-foot yacht Callisto to Murmansk. He had been there once before, 45 years earlier, on a Royal Navy warship escorting American merchant vessels supplying vital aid to the Soviets. U-boats lay in wait off the Russian coast & the Luftwaffe threatened attacks from bases in Norway. The Arctic offered another hazard-ice. ...

Return to the Dark Valley tells the stories of four immigrants united by their need to return to their place of origin & exact vengeance in some form. Manuela Beltrán, haunted by a troubled childhood she tries to escape through books & poetry; Tertuliano, an Argentine preacher who claims to be the Pope`s son, ready to resort to extreme methods to create a harmonious society; Ferdinand Palacios, a Colombian priest with a dark paramilitary past now confronted with his guilt; Juana & the consul, central characters in Gamboa`s Night Prayers, who are united in a relationship based equally on hurt & need. & Rimbaud, the precocious, brilliant poet whose life was incessant exploration. These characters animate Gamboa`s richly imagined portrait of a turbulent world where liberation is found in perpetual movement & determined exploration. ...

Over eighty years since Winnie-the-Pooh first delighted readers, David Benedictus takes us back to the Hundred Acre Wood for more adventures with A. A. Milne`s Winnie-the-Pooh. The rumours are true
- Christopher Robin is back in the Hundred Acre Wood. From the excitement of Christopher Robin`s return to the curious business of learning to play cricket, Return to the Hundred Acre Wood allows readers to spend a few more treasured hours with the Best Bear in All the World. David Benedictus`s authorized sequel to A. A. Milne`s original Winnie-the-Pooh stories are splendidly illustrated by Mark Burgess in the style of the original E. H. Shepard artwork. All of the old friends are in attendance
- from Pooh, to Piglet, Eeyore to Owl & Tigger to Eeyore. Enjoy the sights, sounds & smells of the Hundred Acre Wood 80 years after since it was first discovered. There`s still plenty of fun to be had in this forest.

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Six women forever joined by a little cafe in Kabul Sunny, former proprietor of the Little Coffee Shop & new owner of the Screaming Peacock vineyard. Can she handle the challenges of life on her own? Yasmina, the young mother who now runs the cafe, until a terrifying event strikes at the heart of her family & business... Layla & Kat Afghan teenagers in America, struggling to make sense of their place in the world... Zara, about to be forced into a marriage which will have devastating consequences... These women are about to learn what Halajan, Yazmina`s rebellious mother-in-law, has known all along: when the world as you know it disappears, you find a new way to live. Reuniting us with the much-loved cast of the international bestseller, The Little Coffee Shop of Kabul. Deborah Rodriguez tells an inspiring story of women`s strength & courage in a changing world. ...

After sixteen months of travelling round the Mediterranean in search of the ancient secrets of the olive tree, Carol returns to her beloved olive farm in the south of France, to her husband Michel & his burgeoning family. However, the homecoming celebrations are overshadowed by disturbing discoveries. The plight of the honey bee has become an international crisis & Carol is faced with unsettling news about the hives on her own olive farm. While the multinational companies are pushing for `bigger, better, bumper` crops, a small band of farmers & ecologists are calling for a halt to many of the modern farming malpractices that are endangering the planet. Carol is amongst them. But it puts her own farm, her idyll, under threat. At what point do you turn your back on all that you believe in & all that you have been fighting for? This is the story of how Carol & Michel struggle with some difficult choices, & how they decide to deal with the unavoidable disappointments & inevitable responsibilities that come with running an organic farm. ...