Around midnight, early October 1944. Riga. A Latvian father and his six-year-old son flee their home and the land of their birth for an uncertain future. The world is at war and their journey will be perilous. Life throws the dice – and for Martins Saldais the toss was unlucky. Yet one thing sustained him: his promise to his young wife on her deathbed that he would always look after Juris, their baby son. Six years later, facing deportation or worse, Martins and Juris fled their homeland. Their refugee journey was often horrifying. Constantly anxious and at times starving, they travelled some 800 kilometres through war-torn Europe – around half of that on foot – to reach the safety of the British zone in Germany. In mid 1949, after a four-year wait in Displaced Persons camps, they were heading for Australia. Despite the trauma of their refugee experience, their persistent poverty, and the difficulties they faced in adjusting to a new country, a new language and a new way of life, Juris (George) became everything his father could have hoped for. His success was enabled by his father’s sacrifice and unconditional love. And by a promise made long ago. A memoir that is at times harrowing, confronting and sad, but ultimately redemptive. It is a testament to what love can enable in the face of relentless hardship.

In the grand manner of Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice's new novel moves across time and the continents, from nineteenth-century Vienna to a St. Charles Greek Revival mansion in present-day New Orleans to dazzling capitals of the modern-day world, telling a story of two charismatic figures bound to each other by a passionate commitment to music as a means of rapture, seduction, and liberation.

Includes music.

HOW CHINA'S MOST CELEBRATED VIOLIN PRODIGY BECAME AN ENEMY OF STATE. The King of Violins is the heartbreaking story of China's most celebrated violin prodigy, Ma Sicong, who composed his first concerto at the age of 12. During his career, this gentle, dignified man composed 57 of the world's best-known symphonies and concertos and performed in front of hundreds of sold-out audiences across the globe. Chairman Mao Zedong declared Ma Sicong "a national treasure" and nicknamed him The King of Violins. Soon, Chairman Mao's brutal Cultural Revolution distorted the truth of Ma's life and work. He is forced to wear a dunce cap, and is publicly humiliated and physically abused by cadres of Red Guards as "a vile product of bourgeois thinking." Ma and his family make a breath-taking escape in the darkness to America. After Chairman Mao died in 1976, the real circumstances of Ma's poignant, bittersweet life were buried in the pages of history by an embarrassed Chinese government. Eleven years later, Ma died at the age of 76 in Philadelphia. The King of Violins, written in cooperation with all of Ma's remaining family members, and is the first politically balanced life story about this generous, conflicted musical genius. (Contains 89 rare vintage photographs).