'I'll tell you what happened because it will be a good way to introduce my brother. His name's Simon. I think you're going to like him. I really do. But in a couple of pages he'll be dead. & he was never the same after that.' There are books you can't stop reading which keep you up all night. There are books which let us into the hidden parts of life & make them vividly real. There are books which because of the sheer skill with which every word is chosen linger in your mind for days. The Shock of the Fall is all of these books. The Shock of the Fall is an extraordinary portrait of one man's descent into mental illness. It is a brave & groundbreaking novel from one of the most exciting new voices in fiction. ...

This authoritative lively book based on the BBC Time-Life" television series provides a comprehensive survey of the birth & development of modern art & an updated discussion of the European & American art movements in the 70s & 80s including minimalist & public art 70s American painting German Neo-Expressionism art by women & environmental art. " The Future that Was " the final chapter is completely rewritten & updated. 75 per cent of the 275 illustrations in the revised edition are in 4-color." ...

A mysterious plague in the Antarctic. A diamond empire run by an evil genius. A devastating new technology that threatens to annihilate millions. Tasman Sea 1856. A British clipper ship bound for Australia's penal colony is crushed in a raging typhoon. A few pitiful survivors wash up on a deserted isl&. Among them are Betsy Fletcher & Jess Dorsett who discover an immense supply of exquisite diamonds... Seymour Island Antarctica 2000. Dirk Pitt rescues Maeve Fletcher a descendant of Betsy & Jess after an unknouwn cataclysm kills thousands of marine animals & nearly two hundred people aboard a cruise ship. Pitt traces the carnage to the global diamond operations of Maeve's father Arthur Dorsett & her callous sisters. From a chilling escape at a high-security Canadian mine to a tiny boat adrift on lonely shark-infested seas the ingenious Pitt is racing to thwart Dorsett's ruthless plans
- before an unthinkable disaster claims millions of innocent lives.
...

Bad news.. .for anyone who thought Carrie Fisher had finally stopped talking about herself. This time the electro-convulsive shock therapy shes been undergoing is threatening to wipe out (whats left of) her memory. But get ready for a shock of your own. Not only doesnt she mind paying the second electric bill she loves the high-voltage treatments. But before she can truly commit herself to it shed better get some of those more nagging memories of hers on paper. Its been a roller coaster of a few years for Carrie since her Tony- & Emmy-nominated one-woman Broadway show & New York Times bestselling book Wishful Drinking. She not only lost her beloved father but also her once-upon-a-very-brief-time stepmother Elizabeth Tayloras well as over forty pounds of unwanted flesh all the while staying sober & sane-ish. & she wants to tell you dear reader all about it. She wants you to someday be able to remind her how Elizabeth Taylor settles a score how she & Michael Jackson became friends or how she ended up sparring with Ted Kennedy on a dinner date. & she especially wants to preserve her memories of Eddie Fisher. Yes of course Shockaholic is laugh-out-loud funny acerbic & witty as hell. But it also reveals a new side of Carrie Fisher that may even bring a pleasant shock your way: it is contemplative vulnerable & ultimately quite tender. ...

There once was a baby who hid in a shoe & had learnt how to say ' How do you do?' In a shoe you might think there is not much to do but this very same baby went to sea in that shoe! & so the baby's journey continues... But where are his parents? Could they be the two giants looking for a baby & a shoe? ...

This is a st&-alone thriller by an acclaimed writer on The Wire": now a Serpents Tail Classic. Constantine is a drifter with a lot of miles behind him a lot more ahead & plenty of jobs in between that never showed up on anyones books. Back in his home town he hitches a ride on a bright spring morning with a little man named Polk. Theres one stop Polk needs to make & it changes Constantines life forever. Like the kind of cars they dont make anymore & the kind of songs they dont sing " Shoedog" has the style rhythm & muscle of a classic." ...

The book that inspired the movie Field of Dreams. The voice of a baseball announcer tells the Iowa farmer Ray Kinsella: If you build it he will come." " He" is Shoeless Joe Jackson Ray's hero. " It" is a baseball stadium which Ray carves out of his cornfield. Like the movie FIELD OF DREAMS that was made from this novel SHOELESS JOE is about baseball. But it's also about love & the power of dreams to make people come alive..." ...

Nestled high in the Italian Alps lies Vilminore home to Ciro a strapping mountain boy. Close by lives Enza a practical girl who longs only for a happy life for her family. When the two meet as teenagers it seems it could be the start of a life together... Then Ciro catches the local priest in a scandal & is sent to America as an apprentice to a shoemaker in Little Italy leaving behind a bereft Enza. Her family faces disaster & she too is forced to flee to America with her father to secure their future. Unbeknownst to one another Ciro & Enza build fledgling lives in New York. Ciro masters shoemaking & Enza takes a factory job until fate intervenes & reunites them. But it is too late: Ciro has volunteered to serve in World War I & Enza must learn to forge a life without him. From the stately mansions of New Yorks Upper East Side to the cobblestone streets of Little Italy over the perilous cliffs of northern Italy to the white-capped lakes of northern Minnesota these star-crossed lovers meet & separate until finally the power of their love changes both of their lives forever... See Judys Review See Richards Review Download A Sample Chapter Of The Shoemakers Wife Read about the Author Exclusive Bonus Content Write a Review for The Shoemakers Wife Judys Review I love Adriana Trigianis books. They are full of Italian exuberance detailing with charming warmth the family stories of northern Italians who emigrated to the USA in the early 20th C & with much hardship forged successful lives there. Trigianis own ancestors are often the subjects of her novels & I first came across them when I read her Big Stone Gap series; the sense of community & Italian family values translated to the US & thriving in that country despite the vast culture gap was & is immensely seductive. & she continues this Italian sensibility in The Shoemakers Wife a novel crammed with love disappointment warmth & seasoned with delicious Italian food. Thats a beguiling mixture & its hard to resist. The Shoemakers Wife begins with an adventure at once sad & yet filled with exciting possibility. Two small boys aged five & eight are left by their mother at a convent in the Italian Alps. She is a recent widow devastated by the death of her husband in faraway pre-Great War America where like so many of his compatriots he had travelled in the hope of making his fortune working in the productive mines of New Jersey. His death in a mining accident causes his wife to have a nervous breakdown. Hence her abandonment of her two young sons; she consigns them into the care of the nuns on this Italian mountainside telling them she will come back for them within months. She doesnt. Ciro & his older brother Eduardo are left at the convent for ten years at th" ...

Nestled high in the Italian Alps lies Vilminore home to Ciro a strapping mountain boy. Close by lives Enza a practical girl who longs only for a happy life for her family. When the two meet as teenagers it seems it could be the start of a life together... Then Ciro catches the local priest in a scandal & is sent to America as an apprentice to a shoemaker in Little Italy leaving behind a bereft Enza. Her family faces disaster & she too is forced to flee to America with her father to secure their future. Unbeknownst to one another Ciro & Enza build fledgling lives in New York. Ciro masters shoemaking & Enza takes a factory job until fate intervenes & reunites them. But it is too late: Ciro has volunteered to serve in World War I & Enza must learn to forge a life without him. From the stately mansions of New York's Upper East Side to the cobblestone streets of Little Italy over the perilous cliffs of northern Italy to the white-capped lakes of northern Minnesota these star-crossed lovers meet & separate until finally the power of their love changes both of their lives forever... ...

Nestled high in the Italian Alps lies Vilminore home to Ciro a strapping mountain boy. Close by lives Enza a practical girl who longs only for a happy life for her family. When the two meet as teenagers it seems it could be the start of a life together... Then Ciro catches the local priest in a scandal & is sent to America as an apprentice to a shoemaker in Little Italy leaving behind a bereft Enza. Her family faces disaster & she too is forced to flee to America with her father to secure their future. Unbeknownst to one another Ciro & Enza build fledgling lives in New York. Ciro masters shoemaking & Enza takes a factory job until fate intervenes & reunites them. But it is too late: Ciro has volunteered to serve in World War I & Enza must learn to forge a life without him. From the stately mansions of New York's Upper East Side to the cobblestone streets of Little Italy over the perilous cliffs of northern Italy to the white-capped lakes of northern Minnesota these star-crossed lovers meet & separate until finally the power of their love changes both of their lives forever... ...