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"The true secret in being a hero lies in knowing the order of things...Things must happen when it is time for them to happen. Quests may not simply be abandoned; prophecies may not be left to rot like unpicked fruit; unicorns may go unrescued for a very long time, but not forever. The happy ending cannot come in the middle of the story." ~ from Peter S. Beagle's The Last Unicorn
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New and Recently Released!
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Voices from Beyond
by Simon R. Green
"Meet the operatives of the Carnacki Institute--JC Chance: the team leader, brave, charming, and almost unbearably arrogant; Melody Chambers: the science geek who keeps the antisupernatural equipment running; and Happy Jack Palmer: the terminally gloomy telepath. Their mission: Do Something About Ghosts. Lay them to rest, send them packing, or just kick their nasty ectoplasmic arses..."
In a quiet London suburb, four university students participating in an experiment inside a reputed haunted house hold a seance that goes terribly wrong. What--or who--ever they summoned has taken their minds away, leaving them empty shells. Enter the Ghost Finders, ready to confront an enraged poltergeist for the students' very souls.
All in a day's work--except the team doesn't know that in another part of the city, a different entity has also breached the threshold between worlds. And this time what is at stake is not four lives--but the very existence of all humanity.
Ghost Finders Novel #5
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Board stiff
by Piers Anthony
Be careful what you wish for . . ."I'm actually a smart girl who would make any man an excellent wife. But no man sees that. No man is interested in my mind or personality, just my whatevers. So here is my wish: I'm board stiff. I want Adventure, Excitement, and Romance."
So begins Piers Anthony's thirty-eighth Xanth novel, in which Irrelevant Candy looks at her reflection in the water of the shallow well and sees luxuriant midnight-black hair reaching down to her breathtakingly slender waist, matching the dark eyes in her lovely face. A torso that comes close to absolute perfection. She is man's desire. That is part of the problem. In the shallow magic of the well, she asks that her wish be granted. Something happens. A sudden whirlwind surrounds her, lifting her up and ripping off her clothing. She is changing somehow. Then she falls flat on the ground. Literally. She has been transformed into a flat, stiff board with two knotholes for eyes.
Xanth #38
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The magician's land : a novel
by Lev Grossman
Quentin Coldwater has lost everything. He has been cast out of Fillory, the secret magical land of his childhood dreams that he once ruled. Everything he had fought so hard for, not to mention his closest friends, is sealed away in a land Quentin may never again visit. With nothing left to lose he returns to where his story began, the Brakebills Preparatory College of Magic. But he can't hide from his past, and it's not long before it comes looking for him. Meanwhile, the magical barriers that keep Fillory safe are failing, and barbarians from the north have invaded. Eliot and Janet, the rulers of Fillory, embark on a final quest to save their beloved world, only to discover a situation far more complex--and far more dire--than anyone had envisioned.
Along with Plum, a brilliant young magician with a dark secret of her own, Quentin sets out on a crooked path through a magical demimonde of gray magic and desperate characters. His new life takes him back to old haunts, like Antarctica and the Neitherlands, and old friends he thought were lost forever. He uncovers buried secrets and hidden evils and ultimately the key to a sorcerous masterwork, a spell that could create a magical utopia. But all roads lead back to Fillory, where Quentin must face his fears and put things right or die trying.
"The Magician's Land" is an intricate and fantastical thriller, and an epic of love and redemption that brings the Magicians trilogy to a magnificent conclusion, confirming it as one of the great achievements in modern fantasy. It's the story of a boy becoming a man, an apprentice becoming a master, and a broken land finally becoming whole.
Magicians #3
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Visions : A Cainsville Novel
by Kelley Armstrong
"Omens," the first installment in Kelley Armstrong's exciting new series, introduced Olivia Taylor-Jones, daughter of notorious serial killers, and Gabriel Walsh, the self-serving, morally ambiguous lawyer who became her unlikely ally. Together, they chased down a devious killer and partially cleared her parents of their horrifying crimes.
Their success, however, is short-lived. While Olivia takes refuge in the old, secluded town of Cainsville, Gabriel's past mistakes have come to light, creating a rift between the pair just when she needs his help the most. Olivia finds a dead woman in her car, dressed to look like her, but the body vanishes before anyone else sees it. Olivia's convinced it's another omen, a sign of impending danger. But then she learns that a troubled young woman went missing just days ago--the same woman Olivia found dead in her car. Someone has gone to great lengths to kill and leave this young woman as a warning. But why? And what role has her new home played in this disturbing murder?
Olivia's effort to uncover the truth places her in the crosshairs of old and powerful forces, forces that have their own agenda, and closely guarded secrets they don't want revealed.
Cainsville novels #2
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Downfall : A Cal Leandros Novel
by Rob Thurman
"I let it go--all of it. Everything I'd been saving up all my life, building and growing inside me, too much to hold in one half-human body. It pushed and fought to be free with a force that turned me into a bomb with a timer vibrating on zero. I was free.
But so was everything I'd fought so hard not to be.... "
Brothers Cal and Niko Leandros know trouble when they see it--and then proceed to wipe the floor with it. But now it seems their whole world is falling to pieces. Cal's nightmarish monster side is growing ever stronger, changing Cal physically as well as mentally. Which is exactly what Grimm--Cal's savage doppelganger--wants. And when a covert supernatural organization decides that it's time to put Cal down before he threatens pretty much everything else in existence, the brothers find themselves in a fight they actually might lose. But the dark temptations Cal has denied all his life may prove to be exactly what can save them. Even if he must fall forever...
Cal and Niko #9
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Under the Final Moon
by Hannah Jayne
It's not the end of the world--until it is.
Sophie Lawson may be a mere human with no special abilities except a strong immunity to magic. But the havoc she's wreaked on the supernaturals who come up against the Underworld Detection Agency have earned her plenty of enemies. Still, a girl can't freak out every time a horribly barbecued corpse is found with her business card in its hand. Or see a sudden glut of earthquakes, wildfires and three-headed dogs as just another day in California. But Alex Grace, her favorite fallen angel, is concerned--or saying he is to see more of her. Getting Sophie to see all the signs of the Apocalypse is an interesting way to heat things up. Or maybe what's making everyone hot under the collar is the fact that all Hell is about to break loose. . .
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Black ice
by Susan Krinard
Centuries ago, all was lost in the Last Battle when the Norse gods and goddesses went to war. The elves, the giants, and the gods and goddesses themselves were all destroyed, leaving the Valkyrie known as Mist one of the only survivors. Or so she thought.
The trickster god Loki has reappeared in San Francisco, and he has big plans for modern-day Earth. With few allies and fewer resources--but the eyes of the gods and goddesses of an old world upon her--it's up to Mist to stop him before history repeats itself.
Midgard #2
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The broken eye
by Brent Weeks
As the old gods awaken and satrapies splinter, the Chromeria races to find the only man who can still end a civil war before it engulfs the known world. But Gavin Guile has been captured by an old enemy and enslaved on a pirate galley. Worse still, Gavin has lost more than his powers as Prism--he can't use magic at all.
Without the protection of his father, Kip Guile will face a master of shadows as his grandfather moves to choose a new Prism and put himself in power. With Teia and Karris, Kip will have to use all his wits to survive a secret war between noble houses, religious factions, rebels, and an ascendant order of hidden assassins called The Broken Eye.
Lightbringer #3
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Cursed Moon
by Jaye Wells
MAGIC IS A DRUG. IT'LL COST MORE THAN YOU CAN PAY. . .
When a rare Blue Moon upsets the magical balance in the city, Detective Kate Prospero and her Magic Enforcement colleagues pitch in to help Babylon PD keep the peace. Between potions going haywire and emotions running high, every cop in the city is on edge. But the moon's impact is especially strong for Kate, who's wrestling with guilt over her use of illegal magic.
When a rogue wizard steals dangerous potions from a local coven, Kate's team must find the thief's hideout before the vengeful coven catches him. But the investigation uncovers the rogue's dangerous plot to unleash chaotic magic on the city. Once the Blue Moon rises no-one's secrets will be safe. Not even Kate's.
Prospero's war #2
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Revenant : A Greywalker Novel
by Kat Richardson
"Harper Blaine was your average small-time PI until she died--for two minutes. Now Harper is a Greywalker, treading the thin line between the living world and the paranormal realm. And these abilities are landing her all sorts of "strange" cases.... "
Turmoil, sickness, and destruction are sweeping through Europe--and its effects are being felt all the way across the world in Seattle. Harper Blaine and her lover, Quinton, suspect that Quinton's father, James Purlis--and his terrifying Ghost Division--are involved.
Following a dark trail of grotesque crimes and black magic across the Old World, the pair slowly draws closer to their quarry. But finding and dismantling the Ghost Division won't be enough to stop the horror that Purlis has unwittingly set in motion.
An ancient and forgotten cult has allied with Quinton's mad father. And their goals are far more nightmarish than Harper and Quinton--or even Purlis--could ever imagine.
The pursuit leads to Portugal, where the desecrated tomb of a sleeping king and a temple built of bones recall Harper's very first paranormal case and hold clues to the cult's true intentions. Harper and Quinton will need all the help they can get to avert a necromantic cataclysm that could lay waste to Europe and drag the rest of the world to the brink of war.
Greywalker #9
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Severed souls
by Terry Goodkind
From the far reaches of the D'Haran Empire, Bishop Hannis Arc and the ancient Emperor Sulachan lead a vast horde of Shun-Tuk and other depraved "half-people" into the Empire's heart, raising an army of the dead in order to threaten the world of the living. Meanwhile, far from home, Richard Rahl and Kahlan Amnell must defend themselves and their followers from a series of terrifying threats, despite a magical sickness that depletes their strength and which, if not cured, will take their lives...sooner rather than later.
"Richard saw the point of a sword blade sticking out from between the man's shoulder blades. He spun back toward Richard after throwing the woman out of the opening, ready to attack. It seemed impossible, but the man looked unaffected by the blade that had impaled him through the chest.
It was then, in the weak light from the fire pit off to the side, that Richard got his first good look at the killer.
Three knives were buried up to their brass cross-guards in the man's chest. Only the handles were showing. Richard saw, too, the broken end of a sword blade jutting out from the center of the man's chest. The point of that same blade stuck out from the man's back.
Richard recognized the knife handles. All three were the style carried by the men of the First File.
He looked from those blades that should have killed the big man, up into his face. That was when he realized the true horror of the situation, and the reason for the unbearable stench of death."
Richard and Kahlen #3
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The house of the four winds
by Mercedes Lackey
The rulers of tiny, impoverished Swansgaard have twelve daughters and one son. While the prince's future is assured, his twelve sisters must find their own fortunes.
Disguising herself as Clarence, a sailor, Princess Clarice intends to work her way to the New World. When the crew rebels, Clarice/Clarence, an expert with rapier and dagger, sides with the handsome navigator, Dominick, and kills the cruel captain.
Dominick leads the now-outlawed crew in search of treasure in the secret pirate haven known as The House of Four Winds. They encounter the sorceress Shamal, who claims Dominick for her own--but Clarice has fallen hard for Dominick and won't give him up without a fight.
One Dozen Daughters #1
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Fool's assassin : Book One of the Fitz and the Fool Trilogy
by Robin Hobb
FitzChivalry--royal bastard and former king's assassin--has left his life of intrigue behind. As far as the rest of the world knows, FitzChivalry Farseer is dead and buried. Masquerading as Tom Badgerlock, Fitz is now married to his childhood sweetheart, Molly, and leading the quiet life of a country squire.
Though Fitz is haunted by the disappearance of the Fool, who did so much to shape Fitz into the man he has become, such private hurts are put aside in the business of daily life, at least until the appearance of menacing, pale-skinned strangers casts a sinister shadow over Fitz's past . . . and his future.
Now, to protect his new life, the former assassin must once again take up his old one. . . .
Fitz and the Fool #1
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| The Secret History of Fantasy by Peter S. Beagle (editor)Short Stories. Edited by Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Award-winning author Peter S. Beagle, this anthology of 17 short stories includes contributions from an all-star roster of writers including Neil Gaiman, Susanna Clarke, Stephen King, Francesca Lia Block, Robert Holdstock, Patricia A. McKillip, and the late Octavia Butler (to name just a few). And, for additional insight into the fantasy genre -- past, present, and future -- be sure to check out this book's appendix, which features two essays, writer Ursula K. Le Guin's "The Critics, The Monsters, and the Fantasists," and scholar David Hartwell's "The Making of the American Fantasy Genre." |
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| At the Mouth of the River of the Bees: Stories by Kij JohnsonShort Stories. The 18 stories comprising At the Mouth of the River of Bees showcase the impressive variety of author Kij Johnson's work, which covers "strange, beautiful, and occasionally disturbing territory" (Publishers Weekly) ranging from classic folktale retellings to modern-day magical realism. Settings include ancient Japan, contemporary Seattle, and wholly invented, timeless worlds. Don't miss this diverse collection by the Nebula, Sturgeon, World Fantasy, and Hugo Award-winning author of The Fox Woman. |
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| Wonders of the Invisible World by Patricia A. McKillipShort Stories. Wonders of the Invisible World presents 16 enchanting tales by acclaimed author Patricia A. McKillip. From her macabre twist on the Grimm Brothers' fairy tale "The Twelve Dancing Princesses" to her poignant exploration of Celtic legends in "The Kelpie," McKillip demonstrates her mastery of folklore traditions, while simultaneously surprising readers with inventive scenarios, such as that of the title story, which involves angels, time travel, and Cotton Mather. Fantasy readers won't want to miss this collection by a modern master of the genre, whom fellow author Charles de Lint once praised as "one of the few writers I've read who hasn't written a bad book." |
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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Prince George's County Memorial Library System 6532 Adelphi Rd. Hyattsville, Maryland 20782 301-699-3500http://www.pgcmls.info/ |
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