Following the fall of Baghdad, two Iraqi boys stumble upon armed men looting the city zoo. The floodgates have been opened for the smuggling of hundreds of exotic birds, mammals, and reptiles to Western nations, but this crime hides a deeper secret. Amid a hail of bullets, a concealed underground weapons lab is ransacked and something even more horrific is set free. Seven years later, Louisiana state veterinarian Lorna Polk stumbles upon a fishing...

The Fountainhead has become an enduring piece of literature, more popular now than when published in 1943. On the surface, it is a story of one man, Howard Roark, and his struggles as an architect in the face of a successful rival, Peter Keating, and a newspaper columnist, Ellsworth Toohey. But the book addresses a number of universal themes: the strength of the individual, the tug between good and evil, the threat of fascism. The confrontation of...

"Orphaned at thirteen, Grace Silva clawed her way out of poverty and violence to become one of the most respected judges on the federal bench. Grace believes in the rule of law - lives it, breathes it. She has always been buttoned up and buttoned down. Except once." "Until a friend dies trying to kill him. Now Faroe is out of the business. Retired. He's through trying to save a world that doesn't want to be saved. Then Grace comes to him, past and...

"CHANGE OR DIE. What if you were given that choice? We're talking actual life and death now. Your own life and death. What if a well-informed, trusted authority figure said you had to make difficult and enduring changes in the way you think, feel, and act? If you didn't, your time would end soon-a lot sooner than it had to. Could you change when change mattered most?" This is the question Alan Deutschman poses in Change or Die, which began as a sensational...

Precious Ramotswe, owner and operator of the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency in contemporary Botswana, accepts a job searching for a missing American man, while also dealing with her impending marriage, and her fiance's resentful maid.

When the call comes in on the radio, Joe Pickett can hardly believe his ears: game wardens have found a hunter dead at a camp in the mountains, strung up, gutted, and flayed, as if he were the elk he'd been pursuing. A spent cartridge and an old poker chip lie next to his body. Suddenly, two previous suspicious hunting accidents are viewed in a new light.

The Dunnes have set off on a ten day boat trip, a trip that hopefully will bring them closer together, despite the fact that the father, Stuart is staying behind on land. But only an hour into the trip they're already falling apart. The teenage daughter plans to drown herself, and the teenage boy is high on drugs. Ten-year-old Ernie is near catatonic. But their mother Anne, with the help of her brother-in-law Jeff, is insistent on pulling everyone...

"One of the most viewed paintings in American history, Custer's Last Fight--copied and distributed by Anheuser-Busch at a rate of over two million copies a year--was destroyed in a fire at the 7th Cavalry Headquarters in Fort Bliss, Texas, in 1946. Or was it? When Charley Lee Stillwater dies of an apparent heart attack at the Wyoming Home for Soldiers & Sailors, Walt Longmire is called in to try and make sense of a piece of [the] painting and a Florsheim...

In stories of wonders great and small, the author reintroduces many old friends like Mrs. Pumphrey, his partner Liegfried Farnon, and his wife Helen. But there are wonderful new faces, too, expecially his children, Rosie and Jimmy, and his latest assistant, Calum Buchanan.The author offers a collection of memoirs, describing the family and friends who share his life on the Yorkshire dales.

A leading authority on British portraiture and expert for the BBC's Antiques Roadshow shares favorite stories from his career while imparting professional insights into detecting and restoring valuable art