We Rubies Four traverses continents and historic eras through Claire Ray Harper's vivid memoirs of life in the Inayat Khan family. With ancestral roots in both the East and the West, this remarkable family endured through World War I, the Great Depression, the traumatic events of World War II, and the postwar years, all the while cultivating a unique heritage of music and poetry, mysticism and heroism. Born Khairunisa Inayat Khan, Claire was the youngest child of American Ora Ray Baker and Indian Hazrat Inayat Khan. Ora Ray spent her young adult years in the household of her half-brother Pierre Bernard, who introduced yoga to the United States; and there she studied the vina under the tutelage of her future husband. Hazrat Inayat Khan belonged to a family of respected classical musicians and Sufi mystics. Traveling from his native India to Europe and the United States, Inayat Khan introduced new audiences to Eastern music and established the first school of Sufism in the West. After the marriage of Ora Ray and Hazrat Inayat Khan, their family lived in Russia and England before finding a more permanent home in France. Claire's older sister, Noorunisa Inayat Khan was a harpist and a poet, a student of child psychology and a published author of children's stories. During World War II, Noorunisa joined Great Britain's secret service to work undercover in occupied Paris under the code name Madeleine. Captured and tortured by the Nazis, she was executed at Dachau. To honor her courage and sacrifice, Noorunisa was posthumously awarded Great Britain's George Cross, and France's Croix de Guerre with Gold Star. The oldest brother Vilayat was a cellist and a student of philosophy and psychology who served as an officer on a British minesweeper in the D-Day invasion of Normandy. Following postwar careers as a journalist and a diplomat, Pir Vilayat later traveled extensively, teaching meditation, writing and speaking on Sufism as the head of the Sufi Order International. Hidayat was Claires second brother; he continued the family musical and mystical traditions" as a violinist and a professor of music, a conductor and a composer, and as Representative-General of the International Sufi Movement. Claire trained as a pianist and a nurse, and during World War II she worked in British hospitals and in Dr. Heatley's pencillin laboratory. Following the war, Claire moved between the United States and Europe while working and raising her son David. David's own account carries the family history into the next generation. Book jacket.

In the dynamic follow-up to The Lost Property Office, Jack and Gwen are framed for the theft of a historic crown jewel--the Black Prince's Ruby, one of three cursed rubies said to bring knowledge, loyalty, and the command of nations to whomever wields them all. 5 1/2 x 7.

Twelve contributors portray Inayat Khan's family life, musical career and profound spiritual message.

Noor Inayat Khan (1914-1944) was SOE's first woman wireless transmitter in German Occupied Paris during World War II. Posthumously awarded the George Cross MBE and Croix de Guerre with Gold Star for her outstanding wartime service and heroism on behalf of the Allied cause, Noor's remarkable and inspiring life have been commemorated in numerous war memorials, WWII histories, and several films. Born in 1914 to an American mother, Ora Ray Baker, and an Indian Sufi father, Hazrat Inayat Khan, Noor was raised in France, studying musical composition, piano, and harp under Nadia Boulanger at the Ecole Normale de Musique, and child psychology at the Sorbonne. Her stories for children appeared in Le Figaro and were broadcast over Radiodiffusion Francaise, and her first book Twenty Jataka Tales was published in London. Her career as a writer was interrupted by the German invasion of France in 1940. The Inayat Khan family sought refuge in England, and Noor enlisted in the WAAF where she trained as a wireless transmitter. Her Parisian background and wireless skills led to her recruitment by the SOE (Special Operations Executive). After further training, in June, 1943, she was secretly flown back to France where she began her undercover work for the Allied cause under the code name "Madeleine." Constantly on the move between multiple locations and using false identities, Noor transmitted messages for the SOE's French and RF (R publique Fran aise) sections, and for De Gaulle's Free French network. Betrayed by an acquaintance, she was captured by the Gestapo in October, 1943, and held for prolonged interrogation at the Sicherheitsdienst headquarters in Paris. After repeated escape attempts, she was considered to be a dangerous prisoner and was transferred to Pforzheim prison in Germany, where she was held in maximum security and solitary confinement. As the war drew to an end in the fall of 1944, Noor was transported to Dachau. Her last word before execution was "Libert " This new edition of Noor-un-nisa Inayat Khan: Madeleine includes previously unpublished material including a retrospective by Noor's brother, Vilayat Inayat Khan, the friendship of Noor and the author, and further research on Noor's life and the SOE.

The prophet Nehemiah's cousin can speak numerous languages, keep complex accounts, write on rolls of parchment and tablets of clay, and solve great mysteries. There is only one problem: she's a woman in a man's court. In her early childhood years, Sarah experienced the death of her mother and her father's subsequent emotional distance, and she came to two conclusions: God does not care about me, and my accomplishments are the measure of my worth. Catapulted into the center of the Persian court, Sarah is working too many hours, rubbing elbows with royalty, and solving intrigues for the Queen. Ironically, it isn't failure—but success—that causes Sarah to lose her only source of external validation. Sarah soon learns that she has something of worth to offer beyond her ability with languages and sums; her very being proves to be a blessing to others, particularly the aristocrat Darius, whom she is given to in marriage. Sarah and Darius' story continues in Harvest of Gold. Darius may be able to learn to love his wife, but can he ever learn to trust Sarah and her Lord?

Spiritual biography of Inayat Khan who came to the West with a message of love, harmony and beauty that was both quintessence of Sufi teachings and a revolutionary approach to the harmonising of Western and Eastern spirituality.

Mother and Father Duck have five eggs in their nest. Father Duck is worried about Ruby - she is slow to hatch and the last to eat and swim. But Mother Duck knows that Ruby will flourish in her own time, and sure enough, when her turn comes to fly, she is the strongest duck in the sky.