Buck Sellers couldn't remember when he had not been a part of the fishing industry on Florida's southwest coast. He knew these waters like the back of his hand. When offered the chance to make some extra money by simply steering a shrimp boat for an inexperienced captain through the Placida Channel at night, he agreed. This proved to be a decision that would destroy his family and ruin his life. Hiding on a shell mound island outside Boca Grande, Buck began plotting his revenge. As he dug one evening during a rainstorm to even out the sand under his makeshift tent, his fingers felt a strange object--a gold cross with seven green emeralds in it. Buck had never been a religious man, but he took this as a sign from God. He tied the cross on a fishing line and hung it around his neck. For the first time in his life, Buck prayed and asked for God's help. As he sought justice for his family from the waters of south Florida to the night clubs in Miami, north to the mountains of Georgia, and back to the farmlands of Homestead, Florida, the story of the cross Buck found on that shell mound and how it protected him from all who would do him harm spread, creating The Legend of the Emerald Cross.

This fascinating study reconstructs the tradition of the Legend of the True Cross in text and image, from its tentative beginnings in 4th-century Jerusalem to the culminating expression of its multi-layered cosmic content in 14th and 15th-century monumental cycles in Germany and Italy.

ON THE EXOTIC ISLAND OF ST. ANN, NANCY SEARCHES FOR SECRETS BURIED IN THE PAST! Swimming, sailing, and snorkeling are all that Nancy, Bess, and Ned expect when they visit old friends at their nineteenth-century plantation, Sugar Moon. But when a strange man appears, brandishing a cutlass, and Nancy discovers traces of intruders, her curiosity is aroused. Soon she comes across a faded love letter with clues to the hiding place of a long-dead pirate's precious gift -- a fabulous emerald necklace. Many colorful island characters have a serious stake in finding the treasure, and Nancy barely escapes from their traps, on land and at sea. Then, just as Nancy locates the necklace, it's about to slip from her grasp forever!

This is the first major study to bring together for examination all of Conrad's Malay fiction: the early novels, Almayer's Folly , An Outcast of the Islands , and Lord Jim ; the two later novels, Victory and The Rescue ; and various short stories, such as The Lagoon and Karain . The volume focuses on cross-cultural encounters, cultural identity and cultural dislocation, paying particular attention to issues of race and gender. He also situates Conrad's fiction in relation to earlier English accounts of South-East Asia.

Many years ago in the land of the Iroquois a brave sets out on a quest for understanding. He meets strange and interesting people, has many adventures.

Teacher Conci DAmato McVey finds herself embroiled in yet another mystery as she discovers a fabulous fifteen-carat emerald in an unlikely place, and the race is on as many factions are in close pursuit to obtain the emerald and to find the remaining two pieces of the Pheramengo Cross, worth over twenty million dollars intact. In her fourth novel, The Mystery of the Pheramengo Cross, Gloria DAlessandro has spun an intricate web of murder and mystery. As Conci searches for the answers with her Auntie, Sister Mary Concetta Rose, they find out than the answer to The Mystery of the Pheramengo Cross lies a little too close to homeliterally!