Nobel Prize winner Elfriede Jelinek is known as a writer who works in response to contemporary crises and cultural phenomena. Perhaps none of her works display that quality as clearly as On the Royal Road. Three weeks after Donald Trump's election, Jelinek mailed her German editor the first draft of this monologue, which turns out to be a stunningly prescient response to Trump and what he represents. In this drama we discover that a 'king', blinded by himself, who has made a fortune with real estate, golf courses and casinos, suddenly rules the United States, and the rest of the people of the world rub their eyes in disbelief until no one sees anything anymore. On the Royal Road brings into focus the phenomenon of right-wing populism. Carefully perched somewhere between tragedy and grotesque, high-pitched and squeamish, Jelinek in this work questions her own position and forms of resistance. 'Ms. Jelinek's play is a screed of outrage at the political, economic and cultural forces that have brought us to an unprecedented — and for many, unimaginable — moment of crisis for modern democracy. Mr. Trump is never mentioned by name, but the narration sketches an undisciplined, uncouth monarch who has been propped up by obscene wealth, a nonstop media circus and a remarkable talent for self-aggrandizing...[On the Royal Road] is neither a polemic nor a historical dramatization but an of-the-moment allegory for our deeply troubling political, social and economic reality.' — A. J. Goldmann, New York Times 'Jelinek's work is brave, adventurous, witty, antagonistic and devastatingly right about the sorriness of human existence, and her contempt is expressed with surprising chirpiness: it's a wild ride.' — The Guardian

Nick Klein's grandfather was the Rocket. For three decades, the Rocket and his team were the Heroes League-a team of superheroes who fought criminals in the years after World War II. But Nick and his friends have inherited more than their grandparents' costumes and underground headquarters... they've inherited the League's enemies and unfinished business. In the 1960's, Red Lightning betrayed everyone, creating an army of supervillains and years of chaos. The League never found out why. Now, Nick and the New Heroes League will have no choice but to confront their past.

Waking up chained in a dark cellar, Ariane must struggle to survive and escape the strange fortress she finds herself in. All those around her play by rules she does not understand, and there is also this strange thirst that water cannot sate...

For over a century, and across five generations, the Veitch family pioneered the introduction of hundreds of new plants into gardens, conservatories and houses and were amongst the foremost European cultivators and hybridisers of their day. The story begins in 1768 when a Scotsman called John Veitch came to England to find his fortune, starting out as a gardener for the aristocracy. Realising that horticultural mania had begun to spread throughout the social classes, John's son, James, opened a nursery in Exeter and began to send some of the first commercial plant collectors into the Americas, Australia, India, Japan, China and the South Seas. By the beginning of the twentieth century, the Veitch's had become key figures within the gardening establishment, involved with the Royal Horticultural Society from its beginnings and the great Chelsea Flower Show. Combining an historian's eye for detail with a flair for storytelling, Shephard charts the fortunes of one family and through them tells the fascinating story of the modern English garden.