If boredom were a potion, Aspen Wilde would be a master alchemist. Aspen risks a “jailbreak” to snag herbs for her witchy arsenal and collides with her high school crush, the gorgeous Lucky Lorenzo. Problem is, he's a black warlock, enemy of her coven. Talk about a forbidden fruit cocktail! Before she can savor the thought, a brutal attack shatters her security. His denial of innate magic is thinner than spider silk. Aspen was Lucky’s high school kryptonite. He might not trust witches, but he can't resist her allure. Burying his secrets, he whisks her away, plunging them into a cauldron of trouble. A second chance, or their ultimate end? Trust is a fragile herb in this situation, but Aspen's drawn to Lucky's mysterious charm. As they navigate their rekindled feelings, a garden of evil sprouts on the covenstead, targeting Aspen. The coven, clueless about the source of the twisted magic, faces escalating attacks. Is Lucky's chivalry a smokescreen, or is something more sinister at play? Aspen races to untangle the truth before the dark magic takes root and spawns a deadly showdown.

A formidable and coveted witch. Coven leader Sage Wilde’s ready to commit to sexy warlock Rafael Reyes… until powerful black warlock Ethan Ravenwood offers an enticing alliance. When threats to both covens end their peaceful existence, Sage must consider Ravenwood’s indecent proposal… despite Rafael’s threat to walk. Two power-hungry, desirable warlocks. Rafael yearns to use all Sage’s magic, but she dribbles it to him, typical of modern witches ruling powerless warlocks. He figures if they marry, she’ll open the floodgates to her magic. But when supposedly extinct black warlocks, who possess their own magic, upend their life, all bets are off, especially when Ravenwood craves Sage as his own. The cost extracted from Sage and Rafael may end them. The Wilde Coven is attacked, and Sage needs the Ravenwoods to prevent another witches and warlocks war. When the unthinkable happens, Sage’s life flips upside down, and fierce new magic emerges. Is it enough magic to prevent a war and put Ravenwood’s offer on ice? Will Sage and Rafael have a future together when they pick up the pieces… if Rafael lives?

Books about the global history of alcohol almost never give attention to India. But a wide range of texts provide plenty of evidence that there was a thriving culture of drinking in ancient and medieval India, from public carousing at the brewery and drinking house to imbibing at festivals andweddings. There was also an elite drinking culture depicted in poetic texts (often in an erotic mode), and medical texts explain how to balance drink and health. Not everyone drank, however, and there were sophisticated religious arguments for abstinence.The first book on alcohol in pre-modern India, An Unholy Brew: Alcohol in Indian Religion and History uses a wide range of sources from the Vedas to the Kamasutra to explore drinks and styles of drinking, as well as rationales for abstinence from the earliest Sanskrit written records through thesecond millennium CE. McHugh begins by surveying the intoxicating drinks that were available, including grain beers, palm toddy, and imported wine, detailing the ways people used grains, sugars, fruits, and herbs over the centuries to produce an impressive array of liquors. He outlines myths andepics that explain how drink came into being and how it was assigned the ritual and legal status it has in our time. The book also explores Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain moral and legal texts on drink and abstinence, as well as how drink is used in some Tantric rituals, and translates in full a detaileddescription of the goddess Liquor, Sura, Cannabis, betel, soma, and opium are also considered. Finally, McHugh investigates what has happened to these drinks, stories, and theories in the last few centuries.An Unholy Brew brings to life the overlooked, complex world of brewing, drinking, and abstaining in pre-modern India, and offers illuminating case studies on topics such as law and medicine, even providing recipes for some drinks.

Ofelia Archer is living the dream ... or as close as seemingly possible.She owns her own business, her father seems to be on an even keel, and her new relationship with Detective Zacharias Sully is cruising right along. Everything changes in an instant, though, when screams from the street lead to zombies running amok through the French Quarter.Ofelia is a tough witch who takes no guff but even she is at a loss. Who is creating the zombies? Where are they coming from? They're not rising from the dead as much as being bumped off and used as an invading army.Sully wants to take control of the investigation but the higher-ups in the New Orleans Police Department assign the case to a new detective, much to his chagrin. That detective is keen to find answers. Unfortunately, he's looking hard at Ofelia to find them.Sully and Ofelia are going to have to work together to find answers. Their adventure will lead them from the French Quarter to the Garden District and beyond. Even then, when things start coalescing, gnashing teeth won't be the worst of their problems.Months ago they were two factions working on their own. Now they're together, and stronger for it.Not all the magic in the Big Easy is good. Some is evil ... and the two sides are about to collide.

When the clumsy young witch Cassie Black inherits a sentient coffeehouse in a small town, she finds herself in a hot cauldron of trouble. Her new home is a haven for supernaturals and the primal forces of good and evil battle on her turf for domination. If the darkness wins, it will spread further into the earthen world. It is up to her to stop it. Cassie wonders why she couldn’t inherit a moth-eaten, old grimoire like other witches. All she had wanted to do was impress her family by handling the final affairs of her aunt. She planned to sign a few papers and be done. But fate had other ideas. A rogue warlock, blue-eyed human cop, and dead-sexy vampire offer their assistance, but the forces of evil are strong and it’s questionable whether her little band of warriors can hold them off. Will Cassie survive her inheritance and protect the town? This is the first trilogy in The Mystic Keep Box Sets Collection. They are urban fantasy stories about powerful women. Witches, warlocks, wizards, and vampires fill the pages with adventure, love, and magic.

Return to the magical world of the Retrievers and the Cosa Nostradamus, in book 2 of this popular series by Laura Anne Gilman. Once more Wren Valere’s game plan has taken an unexpected direction. She made a bargain with a supersecret magic-watching outfit to protect her and her partner on their last job, but now the Silence is trying to wedge them apart. And ever since she and Sergei began to talk about their "relationship," things have been tricky. Still…they’re a team, and a force to be reckoned with when danger is near. So now they are off to Italy in search of a missing artifact, without any information other than that it’s very old, very dangerous and everyone who gets too close disappears. Compared with what’s going on at home (lonejacks banding together, a jealous demon, tracking bugs needing fumigation…) maybe disappearing wouldn’t be so bad! Originally published in 2005