The author of The Age #1 bestselling novel The Memory Cathedral returns to Renaissance Italy with a transcendent vision of the ultimate battle between good and evil. In Shadows in the Stone Jack Dann creates a fully-realized, living, breathing universe, a universe where the Vatican is in Venice, Jehovah is really a lesser god known as the Demiurge, and the magus John Dee's experiments with angels are true and repeatable. Here you'll discover a nun who has the expertise and agility of a Ninja warrior, the reincarnated snake goddess known as the Daughter of Light, the famed Florentine magician Pico Della Mirandola, a young magus who is part stone, the Knights Templar of the Crimson Cross, the sapphire tablet: the most secret of the Dead Sea scrolls, and a 15th Century dirigible kept aloft by imprisoned souls. Here you'll find wild adventure and Machiavellian subtlety, treason and heroism, love and carnality, joy and loss, magic, machines, the cosmic machinations of angels, demons, gods, and half-gods; and the absolutely breathtaking vistas that are their battle grounds. New York Times bestselling author Kim Stanley Robinson has compared Shadows in the Stone with Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, calling it "such a complete world that Italian history no longer seems comprehensible without Dann's] cosmic battle of spiritual entities behind and within every historical actor and event." Join Jack Dann's protagonists--Louisa Morgan and Lucian Ben-Hananiah--and the fellowship of The Dark Companions in their apocalyptic battle against the Demiurge--described in the forbidden Gnostic texts as the demon god Yaldabaoth... and known to us as Jehovah.

For fans of Dan Brown's Robert Langdon novels, a riveting archaeological mystery. World-renowned scientist Anlon Cully is unexpectedly swept into the thick of a suspense-riddled adventure when his archaeologist uncle, Devlin Wilson, dies under suspicious circumstances. Prior to his "accidental" fall off a New Hampshire mountain trail, Devlin made the discovery of a lifetime - unearthing undeniable proof that a technologically advanced society thrived on Earth long before archaeologists thought possible! The key to this shocking evidence lies in a set of mysterious stones forged by a long forgotten race of ancient mariners. Instilled with formidable powers to build, communicate, fight and heal, the stones draw the ruthless attention of villainous thieves hell bent on their acquisition by any means possible...including murder. Aided by friend Pebbles McCarver and police detective Jennifer Stevens, Anlon follows traces of bewildering clues left by his uncle in a dangerous chase to unravel the stones' secrets before the killer strikes again and escapes with the priceless artifacts. Peppered with the thought provoking intrigue of a Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child thriller, Shadows of the Stone Benders leaves readers questioning the technological prowess of modern man and the belief that Neolithic humans were nothing more than unsophisticated cave dwellers.

Experience New York Times best-selling author Richard Baker’s classic novel set in the high fantasy world of the Forgotten Realms. Accosted by bullies on a forest trail, Aeron had no way of knowing that the confrontation would change his life forever. Accused of a crime for which he bears no blame, he is pursued deep into the forests of the Maerchwood. First rescued, and then tutored, by the mysterious Storm Walker, he discovers a previously undreamed-of talent for magic, and his life is swept up in the study of the arcane arts, until the very principles of magic, and indeed the future of Faerûn, come under attack from the unspeakably evil influences of the Shadow Stone.

What do the pyramids of Egypt really represent? What could have driven so many to so great, and often so dangerous, an effort? Was the motivation religious or practical? Illustrated with more than 300 photographs and drawings, this book presents an original approach to the subject of pyramid building. It reveals the connection between devices that served both a practical need for survival and a spiritual belief in gods and goddesses. It examines Egyptian technologies and techniques from the origins of pyramid development to the step-by-step details of how the ground was leveled, how the site was oriented, and how the stone was raised and placed to meet at a distant point in the sky. Here the author also asks and answers questions virtually ignored for the last century. He discloses, for example, the ancient use of shadows, now denigrated to the ornamental back-yard sundial, but once an important tool for telling the height of an object, geographical directions, the seasons of the year, and the time of day. He also reinterprets the ancient "stretching of the cord" ceremony, which once was thought to have only religious significance but here is shown as the means of establishing the sides of a pyramid.

When incidents around the world hint at the reemergence of an ancient evil known as Nyugo, the Sonzai-a clan of modern-day Japanese warriors equipped with supernatural abilities-are called into action. Their youthful commander Tsumisu knows little of the powers he possesses, but he wields them fiercely. Akari, his katana, is a blade that no human could have forged, and he is a swordsman of unmatched skill. As he searches for clues into Nyugo's return, Tsumisu, his trusted friend Shujin, and the Sonzai warriors soon realize that the spiritual balance of the world may be in danger. When their investigation turns up an ancient artifact, Tsumisu and Shujin quickly find themselves caught in the midst of a struggle between Devonians and Ordovicians-extraterrestrial beings whose eight-hundred-year-old search for the Chosen One has brought them to Earth. As dimensions are crossed and battles are waged, Tsumisu draws the attention of Nataliya Artemis, an Ordovician who holds the key to a magnificent power and the knowledge of a stunning truth about Shujin. In the first volume in the Journey of the Shadow saga, Stone Abdullah weaves a fantastical tale of good versus evil in a modern world of supernatural power.

A recreation of the world of Renaissance Italy, following Leonardo as he sets out on a mythic journey to a destiny - and an adventure - that might have been.