The Shining Ones A were members of an advanced culture that was almost lost; but their wisdom & their power survived. They preserved the secrets of their advanced knowledge in mythology & legend; they embedded their secret codes in symbolism in art architecture the mystery traditions & literary works
- including the Bible. The authors have found traces of the influence of The Shining Ones A" in all the major religions with roots in the ancient world. Gardiner & Osborn have discovered that their secrets & rituals have been hidden & preserved through the centuries by the Knights Templar the Rosicrucians & the Freemasons to the present day. Furthermore they believe that the evolution of civilization has been manipulated by a secret & powerful group of initiates descended from The Shining Ones A". They can identify their influence behind science religion mysticism & philosophy
- & of course in the arena of powerful politics. This is an extraordinary story of intrigue & power play at a very human & political level. But it is also the revelation that the A" Shining Ones A" had knowledge of the deep spiritual truth that lies at the heart of mankinds yearning for an understanding of the meaning of life & to achieve salvation."

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Little Marcus Fallbrook was kidnapped in 1976 & when he never returned home his grieving family assumed the worst. Then thirty years later teenage singing star Leah Wakefield disappears & DI Wesley Peterson has reason to suspect that the same kidnapper is responsible. & another abductor is at work in the area
- a man who tricks blonde women into a bogus taxi & cuts off their hair. Has Leah fallen prey to the man the newspapers call ' The Barber' or has she suffered a more sinister fate? But then Marcus Fallbrook returns from the dead. & when DNA evidence confirms his identity the investigation takes a new twist. Meanwhile archaeologist Neil Watson's gruesome task of exhuming the dead from a local churchyard yields a mystery of its own when a coffin is found to contain one corpse too many
- a corpse that may be linked to a strange religious sect dating back to Regency times. Wesley has his hands full elsewhere
- slowly Marcus Fallbrook begins to recover memories that Wesley hopes will lead him to cunning & dangerous murderer. But he is about to discover that the past can be a very dangerous place indeed.


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Seventeenth-century Tokyo is the setting for Rowlands first book in a murder mystery series featuring Sano Ichiro the Senior Police Commander in the district of Edo. Ichiro is a samurai whose academic background puts him at odds with most of his peers. When beautiful wealthy Yukiko & low-born artist Noriyoshi are found drowned together in what seems to be a shinju or ritual double suicide everyone believes the cause was their forbidden love. Everyone that is but Sano Ichiro. Despite the official verdict & being warned off by his superiors the shoguns Most Honourable Investigator of Events Situations & People suspects this double death was not only a tragedy
- it was murder. Risking his familys good name & his own life Sano will search for the killer across every level of society determined to find answers to a mystery no one else seems to want solved...
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After her years in domestic service Winifred Foley married & started a family. But while scraping a living as a charwoman in a rundown north London tenement she continued to long for her home in the Forest of Dean & the cherished relatives she had left behind. Determined to give their children the rural upbringing she had enjoyed the young couple moved to an isolated crumbling cottage not far from the Forest. But even in the 1950s they lacked heating or running water & money was tight. Food was begged borrowed or home-grown & their clothes were h&-me-downs. It was a primitive life of hard work on the land struggling to make ends meet & finding strength in the embrace of a loving family. ...

An extraordinary account of one womans single-minded campaign to restore a Victorian steamship to her former glory & make her an Andean attraction Here is a vivid account of Meriel Larkens incredible quest to restore the Yavari" steamship against the odds--a ship that is now celebrating its 150 year anniversary in 2012. In 1862 the English-built " Yavari" was taken to bits & shipped to South America. In an epic logistical feat it was carried in thousands of pieces by mule up the Andes to Lake Titicaca 12 500 feet above sea level the worlds highest navigable waterway. She was reconstructed & for more than a century plied her trade up & down the lake but by 1985 she was a sad rotting hulk--until she was found by Larken who led the quest to project to restore & preserve the ship. The oldest single screw iron passenger ship in the world this nautical & engineering jewel is now a major Peruvian tourist attraction." ...

In the past thirty years the world of model kits has undergone a veritable revolution. New techniques in injection moulding have enhanced the scale accuracy & surface detail of the humble plastic kit while many specialist companies now produce finest top quality resin models vastly broadening the range of subjects on the market. However the really radical change has been the advent of photo-etched brass fret which allows the finest detail to be reproduced to scale. In ship modelling this has resulted in a new form of the hobby mid-way between traditional build-from-the-box simplicity & the time-consuming demands of fabricating everything from scratch. These new materials have prompted innovative techniques which are comprehensively demonstrated in this new manual. Designed for those wishing to achieve the best results from their ship kits in the 1:700 to 1:350 range of scales it uses step by step photographs to take the reader through the building of two models one in plastic & one in resin from basic construction fittings & detailing to painting finishing & display. Written by a highly experienced award-winning ship modeller the book is a showcase for the contemporary approach to the hobby. ...

An amazing voyage around the beautiful Greek islands becomes an exciting quest to find the lost treasure of the Andra! Philip Dinah Lucy-Ann & Jack are plunged into a search for hidden riches -- with some ruthless villains hot on their trail! Will they find the treasure before it's too late? ...

From the bestselling author of Me Before You & two-time winner of the RNA Novel of the Year award. Australia 1946. 650 brides are departing for England to meet the men they married in wartime. But instead of the luxury liner they were expecting they find themselves aboard an aircraft carrier alongside a thousand men. On the sun-baked decks old loves & past promises become distant memories & tensions are stretched to the limit as brides & husbands change their minds. & for Frances Mackenzie one bride in particular it soon becomes clear that sometimes the journey is more important than the destination. ...

The triumphant conclusion to the magnificent Liveship Traders series. The dragon Tintaglia has been released from her wizardwood coffin only to find that the glories of her kingdom have passed into ancient memory. Meanwhile Malta Vestrit navigates the acid flow of the Rain Wild River in a decomposing boat accompanied by the Satrap Cosgo & his Companion Kekki. Against hope a ship appears in the alien waters but does it mean rescue or a further nightmare for Malta? In ruined Bingtown the citizens are at war If the city is to survive Ronica Vestrit must unite all its peoples
- both Trader & Tattooed
- & liberate the city once & for all. Althea & Brashen are finally at sea together sailing the liveship Paragon into pirate waters in a last-ditch effort to rescue the Vestrit family liveship Vivacia stolen by the Pirate king Kennit; but there is mutiny brewing in their rag-tag crew; & in the mind of the mad ship itself... Majestic & sweeping Ship of Destiny concludes the tale of the Vestrit family & their part in the history of The Liveship Traders with a soaring & unforgettable finale to this unique series of epic fantasy.

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From the author of the classic Farseer trilogy Ship of Magic is the first part of the Liveship Traders. Set in a land bordering the Six Duchies Robin Hobb begins her epic of pirates talking ships magic sea serpents slave revolts dashing heroes & bloody battles. Wizardwood a sentient wood. The most precious commodity in the world. Like many legendary wares it comes only from the Rain River Wilds. But how can one trade with the Rain Wilders when only a liveship fashioned from wizardwood can negotiate the perilous waters of the Rain River? Rare & valuable a liveship will quicken only when three members from successive generations have died on board. The liveship Vivacia is about to undergo her quickening as Althea Vestrits father is carried on deck in his death-throes. Althea waits for the ship that she loves more than anything else in the world to awaken. Only to discover that the Vivacia has been signed away in her fathers will to her brutal brother-in-law Kyle Haven... Others plot to win or steal a liveship. The Paragon known by many as the Pariah went mad turned turtle & drowned his crew. Now he lies blind lonely & broken on a deserted beach. But greedy men have designs to restore him to sail the waters of the Rain Wild River once more. ...