These funny stories all contain favourite characters such as Posy Bates, Dilly the Dinosaur, flying dogs and dancing cows.

40 affordable projects featuring the newest bead styles and fashions. Crafters will learn basic beading and jewelry making with the help of over 250 color photographs for a wealth of ideas.

The cat's pajamas, the bee's knees, and the whole nine yards rolled into one, this true feast for wordlovers delightfully skewers commonly accepted word origin myths and etymological folk tales. The real story of a world or phrase's origin and evolution is often much stranger — and much more humorous — than the commonly accepted one; the many entries will certainly leave you happy as a clam. Happy as a clam? Really — what's so happy about being a clam? The saying makes much more sense when it's paired with its missing second half: at high water. Now a clam at high water is a safe clam, and thus a happy clam. The confusion surrounding the word kangaroo caused so much trouble that the Aborigines thought this English word meant any edible animal; they asked whether the cattle being unloaded from ships were kangaroos. From the bawdy to the sublime, Quinion's explanations and delightful asides truly prove that the proof is in the pudding.

«In a particularly insightful examination of the spirituality and ethics of Middle-earth in «The Lord of the Rings», Curry argues that Tolkien found a way to provide something close to Spirit in a secular age, and focuses on three main aspects of this monumental work of literature.»

Denis Stone, a naive young poet, is invited to stay at Crome, a country house renowned for its gatherings of 'bright young things'. Crome's hosts, the world-weary Henry Wimbush and his exotic wife Pricilla are joined by a party of colourful guests whose intrigues and opinions ensure Denis' stay is a memorable one. In the course of the weekend Henry tells his guests fantastical stories from the history of the house, Mr. Barbeque-Smith invents inspirational aphorisms conceived in trances, Mary dispenses with her virginity on the roof, the local vicar prophesies the Apocolypes, the annual Crome Fair takes place and Denis tries to capture it all in poetry and has his heart broken.

The Atlantic, the Red Sea, the Caribbean, the South Pacific-here are all the oceans in all colors and aspects: clear, tropical waters; turbulent open seas; immense plains of water seen from space; magical icy polar oceans; and delicate and frothy photographs from inside powerful waves. The Sea's camera eye emerges from underwater-from the multicolored coral reefs and underwater wrecks and washes on to sandy beaches, coral reefs, cliffs, and volcanic islands to observe the life of coastal villages, ports, and on ships at sea. Another chapter deals with sea creatures: predators and prey, the brightly hued, the powerful, and the delicate life of our oceans.

Who Killed The Dead Sea? Where was the Garden of Eden? What's So Bad About the Badlands? Get on board as Kenneth C. Davis, author of the acclaimed national bestseller Don't Know Much About(R) History, takes us on a fascinating, breathtaking, and hilarious grand tour of the planet Earth — opening our eyes and imaginations to a wide, wild, and wonderful world we never knew.

Written by scholars for a general audience, each title in the 'Masters of Art' series has illustrations accompanied by commentaries discussing each individual work.

«In this long-awaited first volume of a planned trilogy, the most acclaimed and revered living Nobel laureate begins to tell us the story of his life. Like all his work, «Living to Tell the Tale» is a magnificent piece of writing. It spans Gabriel Garcia Marquez's life from his birth in 1927 through the start of his career as a writer to the moment in the 1950s when he proposed to the woman who would become his wife. It has the shape, the quality, and the vividness of a conversation with the reader--a tale of people, places, and events as they occur to him: the colorful stories of his eccentric family members; the great influence of his mother and maternal grandfather; his consuming career in journalism, and the friends and mentors who encouraged him; the myths and mysteries of his beloved Colombia; personal details, undisclosed until now, that would appear later, transmuted and transposed, in his fiction; and, above all, his fervent desire to become a writer. And, as in his fiction, the narrator here is an inspired observer of the physical world, able to make clear the emotions and passions that lie at the heart of a life--in this instance, his own. «Living to Tell the Tale» is a radiant, powerful, and beguiling memoir that gives us the formation of Gabriel Garcia Marquez as a writer and as a man.»

Illustrated survey with expert on Tiffany glass as its guide. Topics include traditional and stained glass items; Tiffany revival; varieties of glass and tools; soldering; cutting glass; design; window ornaments; lead cane lampshades; copper foil techniques. For crafters at every level of experience. 252 black-and-white illustrations. 8 full-color illustrations. Bibliography. Index.

The Master of Ballantrae features some of Robert Louis Stevenson's best writing. The tale opens in the old Scottish castle of Durrisdeer, the ancestral home of the Durrie clan, and then moves to India, France, and the American Adirondacks. The Master of Ballantrae draws readers into a fast-paced adventure that encompasses sea voyages and encounters with pirates. Unabridged republication of a standard edition.

«Becky is back in her third Shopaholic adventure, a hilarious tale of mothers and daughters, mothers and sons, and one blushing bride who can't say no to saying «I do.» Life has been good for Becky Bloomwood — she's become the top personal shopper at Barneys; she and Luke are living happily in Manhattan's West Village; and her new neighbor is a fashion designer. When Luke proposes, bridal registries dance in Becky's head. The problem is, Becky's overjoyed mother has been waiting forever to host a backyard wedding, with the bride resplendent in Mum's frilly old gown, while Luke's high-society mother is insisting on a glamorous, all-expenses-paid affair at the Plaza.»

The Golden Bowl, Henry James' last completed novel, is a story of the union of European class and American money. American millionaire and widower Adam Verver lives with his daughter Maggie in Europe, where they spend their time collecting object d'art and enjoying each other's company. Maggie becomes engaged to the aristocratic but penniless Amerigo, ignorant of the fact that Amerigo had previously had an affair with her best friend Charlotte. Through the continuing machinations of Fanny Assingham, Maggie's father marries Charlotte, and the stage is set for the ensuing drama to unfold. With Maggie and her father spending a great deal of time together after both are married, it is not long before the spouses have rekindled their previous affair. It is the ugliness of deceit that wounds more than the adultery itself, and as the plot proceeds, we watch as the various characters gradually suspect, then become convinced of the truth.

May, Christine, Heed, Junior, Vida — even L: all women obsessed with Bill Cosey. The wealthy owner of the famous Cosey’s Hotel and Resort, he shapes their yearnings for father, husband, lover, guardian, and friend, yearnings that dominate the lives of these women long after his death. Yet while he is either the void in, or the center of, their stories, he himself is driven by secret forces — a troubled past and a spellbinding woman named Celestial. This audacious exploration into the nature of love — its appetite, its sublime possession, its dread — is rich in characters, striking scenes, and a profound understanding of how alive the past can be. A major addition to the canon of one of the world’s literary masters.

This exhibition of 64 exquisite drawings and watercolors is comprised of works by Victorian artists, primarily from England, and examines methods and motivations behind drawings and paintings of this era. Victorian Visions reflects the wide range of styles found in this collection. Some of the pieces are careful portraits of recognizable individuals, while others are fleeting sensory images or idealized impressions of people and landscapes. The exhibition includes a unique combination of works that were completed for sale, and studies for larger oil paintings. Artists in this exhibition include Sir Edward Burne-Jones, Sir William Morris, William Burges, Dante Gabriel Rosetti, and Sir Edward Poynter. Victorian Visions has been shown in Cardiff (Wales) and Finlands Helsinki City Art Museum.

Georgian and Regency architecture spans the years from 1714 until 1830, a period that bequeathed a rich heritage of buildings to the British landscape. From great country houses and churches to the formal city squares of Edinburgh and the graceful crescents of Bath, Georgian structures are distinguished by the elegance and harmony of their design. Georgian and Regency Architecture contains over two hundred illustrations, a chapter on the development of the concept of town planning, and biographical details of the outstanding architects of the time — from Adam and Hawkesmoor to Palladio and Wyatville. This title is part of a trilogy of books published by Chaucer press, lavishly portraying three hundred years of architecture, from the Georgian and Regency period through the Victorian and Edwardian era to the modern day.

From the biggest notions of carefully styled rooms to the smallest comforts and delights of accessorizing a home with your favorite things, Inside Log Homes offers suggestions, understanding, and inspiration regarding the intensely personal and expressive world of log-cabin living. Author Cindy Thiede peeks through doors into hundreds of uniquely styled and personally appointed spaces. Sometimes comfortably familiar, other times surprising and unexpected, each room may plant the seed of possibility for your own emerging vision of home and hearth. Cindy Thiede has spent twenty years photographing and writing about log-home architecture in the United States. Additional titles by Ms. Thiede include Hands-On Log Homes: Cabins Built on Dreams, The Log Home Book: Design, Past and Present, American Log Homes.

Kenzie and Gennaro are private investigators in the blue-collar neighborhoods and ghettos of South Boston-they know it as only natives can. Working out of an old church belfry, Kenzie and Gennaro take on a seemingly simple assignment for a prominent politician: to uncover the whereabouts of Jenna Angeline, a black cleaning woman who has allegedly stolen confidential state documents. Finding Jenna, however, is easy compared to staying alive once they've got her. The investigation escalates, implicating members of Jenna's family and rival gang leaders while uncovering extortion, assassination, and child prostitution extending from bombed-out ghetto streets to the highest levels of government. A Drink Before the War, the first in Lehane's acclaimed series with Boston detectives Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro, is a remarkable debut that is at once a pulsating crime thriller and a mirror of our world, one in which the worst human horrors are found closest to home, and the most vicious obscenities are committed in the name of love.

A collection of some of the best, wittiest and most unusual excerpts from 16th- and 17th-century writing. Shakespeare's England brings to life the variety, the energy and the harsh reality of England at this time. Providing a portrait of the age, it includes extracts from a wide variety of writers, taken from books, plays, poems, letters, diaries and pamphlets by and about Shakespeare's contemporaries. These include: William Harrison and Fynes Moryson (providing descriptions of England), Nicholas Breton (on country life), Isabella Whitney and Thomas Dekker (on London life), Nashe (on struggling writers), Stubbes (with a Puritan view of Elizabethan enjoyments), Harsnet and Burton (on witches and spirits), John Donne (meditations on prayer and death), King James I (on tobacco) and Shakespeare himself.