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Lying with the Enemy: A Novel
Tim Binding Manufacturer: Amazon Remainders Account ProductGroup: Book Binding: Paperback Similar Items:
ASIN: B000GG4GEE |
Amazon.com
In Lying with the Enemy, Tim Binding has written a novel that is part war story, part murder mystery, and wholly compelling. Set on Guernsey during the final years of World War II, the story traces the impact of German occupation in the British Channel Islands on both conquerors and conquered alike. Binding makes it clear that the Nazi presence on Guernsey was a fairly civilized affair from the get-go; aside from an abortive raid shortly after the Germans invaded in 1940, the British surrendered the Channel Islands to the enemy, leaving their residents to forge an uneasy accommodation with their new masters. By 1943, when Binding's novel begins, the Germans have been on Guernsey for three years and an inevitable degree of fraternization has become the norm. This is especially apparent in the complicated relationship between Major Lentsch, his island-born lover, Isobel van Dielen, and her former flame (and Guernsey's current chief constable) Ned Luscombe. When Isobel is murdered early on in the proceedings, it is up to Ned to solve the crime--a task that throws him into a reluctant liaison with his rival. As he and Lentsch join forces, their investigation leads them into the back-street world of twisted passions and unholy alliances among islanders and occupiers alike. Meanwhile, the professional association between a world-weary cop and a Nazi-hating German officer turns gradually into a fast though unlikely friendship. Lying with the Enemy is both fine historical fiction and a remarkably acute study of the troubling choices essentially good people make when trapped in morally ambiguous circumstances. --Sheila BrightBook Description
In 1943, 145,000 Germans had been slaughtered in Stalingrad. The tide of the war was beginning to turn.But not on the quiet, idyllic island of Guernsey, the only British territory to be occupied by German troops in the Second World War. Here Nazi officers still party with local girls, love affairs blossom, and the amateur dramatic society continues to stage its theatricals, if with suspiciously jackbooted pirates in Peter Pan. Then the body of a young woman, her nose and mouth filled with cement, turns up, and the comedy of manners played out by the collaborators and their captors turns sour. Food becomes scarce, facades of civility crack, the skies over Guernsey darken, and the search for a killer unearths horrors shared by the islanders and the enemy alike in this novel that Antonia Fraser names "the most stimulating and also the most exciting I read this year. A novel of rewarding subtlety and insight into the best and worst of human nature" (The Times--London)
Customer Reviews:
Peyton Place with Nazis.......2007-03-04
Surviving under occupation.......2005-10-05
Good summer read, though a bit sad...........2004-09-06
Excellent.......2004-02-09
Murder most curious.......2004-01-28
Germany has occupied this and the other Channel Islands for several years at the time this novel opens, and there is an uneasy peace between the island's inhabitants and their temporary German masters. Then the daughter of one of the island's most influential families is found murdered, beginning a chain of events that threatens to literally blow the lid off of the fragile truce.
Aside from the exploration and investigation of the murder, there is a fascinating interplay between the Germans and the islanders. Not all of the Germans view themselves as conquerors, the so-called "Master Race" - and not all of the islanders view themselves as conquered. Indeed, some are quite ready to live with the current situation - but not all.
I was also fascinated by the fact that Hitler is not mentioned by name from the German point of view for most of the book. Instead, the German characters refer to him in the Biblical sense - that is, when they think of Hitler at all they refer to him as Him or He, with a capital H. From my own point of view that is, admittedly, quite repellent, but looking at it from their standpoint it was quite understandable.
This is definitely not a book for everyone. But if you're willing to take the time to get into it you won't be disappointed.
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Lord Prestimion (Prestimion Trilogy (Paperback))
Robert Silverberg Manufacturer: Eos ProductGroup: Book Binding: Mass Market Paperback Similar Items:
ASIN: 0061058106 |
Amazon.com
Robert Silverberg has been one of SF's most prolific and popular writers since the mid-1950s. His science-fantasy stories set on the huge, exotic world called Majipoor began with Lord Valentine's Castle (1980), which the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction calls "polished but rather languid." In Lord Prestimion, the hero Prestimion takes the throne as Coronal, coruler of Majipoor, a millennium before Lord Valentine's reign. His crowning follows the long, ruinous civil war to overthrow a usurping Coronal, a war now literally forgotten: Prestimion's sorcerers have imposed amnesia on the people of Majipoor in hope of preventing any further uprising. Such a memory wipe reeks of wrongness and seems to have caused the infectious plague of insanity. Meanwhile, one very bad man, who is a leading rebel and warmonger, recovers his memories and escapes to make new mischief. After various colorful, almost dream-like travelogues, the situation is saved--a little too easily?--by telepathic gadgetry. (The device in question and several crossover characters appear in the 1982 story-cycle Majipoor Chronicles.) Smoothly written but somewhat short on real suspense, even in the swashbuckling comic sequence when Prestimion's Regent fights and kills at least 21 would-be assassins during one morning's office paperwork. It's just another day in the life of a Majipoor civil servant. --David Langford, Amazon.co.ukBook Description
Prestimion should be jubilant. As the new Coronal Lord of Majipoor, the Starburst Crown is his at lost. But the victorious lord is burdened with a great secret: he gained the throne through a bloody civil war -- a war no one remembers! With the aid of a phalanx of sorcerers, Prestimion dropped the awesome Spell of Oblivion over his people to heal his war-torn land. Forgotten now are the betrayals, the intrigues, and the slaughter. Only Prestimion and two of his surviving comrades-in-arms know anything happened at all.
Yet Prestimion must still account for his world's devastation and do the impossible: bring to justice the kinsman who languishes in the dungeon because no one can recall his unforgivable crime. And in his hour of triumph, Prestimion will face a threat to his kingdom for more insidious than war -- a twisted madness that cannot be controlled....
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Prestimion should be jubilant. As the new Coronal Lord of Majipoor, the Starburst Crown is his at last. But the victorious lord is burdened with a great secret: he gained the throne through a bloody civil war -- a war no one remembers! With the aid of a phalanx of sorcerers, Prestimion dropped the awesome Spell of Oblivion over his people to heal his war-torn land. Forgotten now are the betrayals, the intrigues, and the slaughter. Only Prestimion and two of his surviving comrades-in-arms know that anything happened at all. Yet Prestimion must still account for his world's devastation and do the impossible: bring to justice the kinsman who languishes in the dungeon because no one can recall his unforgivable crime. And in his hour of triumph, Prestimion will face a threat to his kingdom far more insidious than war -- a twisted madness that cannot be controlled....Customer Reviews:
Lord - Please give Prestimiom some character!.......2005-09-16
YAWN... Very boring.. the worst of the series thus far........2004-09-08
Colorful, beautifully-written but thin planetary romance........2004-01-20
This is Silverberg's sixth Majipoor book, and it's a bit thin.
I've read and liked the previous five -- this is Jack Vance "Big
Planet" country: big, colorful landscapes, strange flora & fauna,
teeming cities, richly-caparisoned nobility, exotic aliens, bits of
higher-tech in a metal-poor, basically nineteenth-century
civilisation. Good thick light escape-reading, which is just what I
was in the mood for. I noticed the Vancian rodomontade more this
time, because there's very little plot here, maybe a novella's worth:
Prestimion is crowned as Coronal after winning a disastrous civil
war (in Sorcerors of Majipoor). He's decided to heal the scars of war
by -- removing (by sorcery, offstage) all memories of the war.
Naturally, this has unforeseen consequences, not the least of which
is one of the rebel leaders trying to start a new civil war. And he
meets a girl and makes her his Queen. Well, that's about it until
Prestimion #3.
Mind you, this is by no means a bad book, but, thinking back, I found
Sorcerers to be the weakest Majipoor book up until now, so I suspect
the well is running dry. Unless you're a diehard Majipoor fan, I'd
wait for the paperback or a library copy. And I believe I'll let
someone else be the guinea-pig for Prestimion #3.
Cheers -- Pete Tillman
Not too good... but not too bad either........2001-08-18
Just a travelogue..........2000-11-19
Fundamentally, Majipoor makes no sense. The larger a planet, the less unified it would be and the more unstable the politics. On Majipoor, we are asked to believe, not only is there one language and culture but the same political system has existed without change for thousands of years. With a sufficiently vigorous plot, one can overlook this and suspend one's disbelief, but there's not enough going on here to distract you from the man behind the curtain (so to speak).
Jack Vance's Big Planet, by contrast, depicts a giant-size world as it probably would be --- a thousand contentious cultures, no central political control of any kind, technology limited only by the lack of metals. Surely Silverberg is familiar with this venerable work (in many ways, one of Vance's best); but Majipoor is fantasy, not SF. Still, we know Silverberg can do much better.
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Die Legenden von Majipoor 02. Lord Prestimion.
Robert Silverberg Manufacturer: Heyne ProductGroup: Book Binding: Paperback ASIN: 345386171X |
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Lord Prestimion (The Majipoor Cycle)
Robert Silverberg Manufacturer: Voyager ProductGroup: Book Binding: Hardcover ASIN: B000OIRXN0 |
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Lord Prestimion (Prestimion Trilogy (Paperback))
Robert Silverberg Manufacturer: Eos ProductGroup: Book Binding: Paperback ASIN: B000OEYQ02 |
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Lord Prestimion - Book Two of the Prestimion Trilogy at the Heart of the Majipoor Cycle
Manufacturer: Harperprism ProductGroup: Book Binding: Hardcover ASIN: B000HK4BSK |
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Lord Prestimion : The Majipoor Cycle Continues
Robert Silverberg Manufacturer: Harpercollins ProductGroup: Book Binding: Paperback ASIN: B000OFIXJG |
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Deathstalker War Episode 1: The Taking of Mistworld (Deathstalker War Series)
Simon R. Green Manufacturer: Listen & Live Audio ProductGroup: Book Binding: Audio Cassette Similar Items: ASIN: 193195349X |
Book Description
Fate had made Owen Deathstalker a rebel hero in an empire choked by tyranny. He stoked the flames of revolution, gathering the forces that, one day, must strike against Imperial authority. That day has come. Owen and the rebel forces must now bring the uprising to a fiery conclusion. But the desperate cause will need more than an army of courageous fighters to succeed - for the cunning Empress Lionstone has evil surprises to unleash
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Mistworld's Last Stand (Deathstalker War, Episode 2) (Deathstalker War Episode 2)
Simon R. Green Manufacturer: Defiance Audio ProductGroup: Book Binding: Audio Cassette Similar Items:
ASIN: 1931953503 |
Book Description
The day of reckoning has come to Mistworld. Together with young Jack Random, Jenny Psycho and Topaz, Owen Deathstalker and Hazel D'ark must rally the ragged defenses of Mistport in a desperate effort to repel the relentless onslaught. In the process, they will more fully embrace the adaptations the Madness Maze has bestowed on them, along with the price those powers demand.
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Mistworld
Simon R. Green Manufacturer: Ace ProductGroup: Book Binding: Paperback Similar Items:
ASIN: 0441535062 |
Customer Reviews:
Nightside & Owen Deathstalker.......2006-06-13
Complex Plot --- Lots of Death.......2003-11-20
This story takes place on Mistworld in the city of Mistport. Mistworld is a rebel world and has been fending off the Empire for several hundred years. But now things are starting to get out of control.
Mistworld is a harsh world and the Empire's blockade has reduced most of the society to almost medieval levels. But there is high-tech and psionics. We meet thieves, con men, agents, investigators, council members and businessmen; a huge cast of characters for a 218-page book.
A lot of people die in this book but the death is not graphic. It is not a happy tale but it is well written and you will remember it. It is also quite different from the others in the series in tone and style.
This is a must-read for anyone familiar with Green's Empire novels but it also stands alone very well.
Not a bad start.......1999-01-09
Simon R. Green is a legend!.......1997-08-23
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Mistworld: The Matushka's Story Continues
Nina M. Osier Manufacturer: Writers Club Press ProductGroup: Book Binding: Paperback ASIN: 0595232965 |
Book Description
She thought her three sons were dead, killed in battle under her command. But thanks to a planet called Mistworld, retired Fleet Admiral Catherine Romanova has them back—years after she forged an unlikely peace with the mysterious beings who caused their deaths. Now the legendary Matushka and her part-Morthan husband, forced into exile by the brutal Terran occupation of her native Narsai, must unlock Mistworld’s secrets if they’re to have any hope of seeing home again. Or the thirteen-year-old daughter they’ve been tricked into leaving behind, by relatives who believe that Catherine’s heir holds the key to Narsai’s freedom.
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The Taking of Mistworld, Mistworld's Last Stand, Innocence Lost (Deathstalker War Abridged, Volumes 1, 2, 3)
Simon R. Green Manufacturer: Defiance Audio ProductGroup: Book Binding: Audio Cassette ASIN: B000TOJU58 |
Product Description
The Taking of Mistworld: Fate had made Owen Deathstalker a rebel hero in an empire choked by tyranny. He stoked the flames of revolution, gathering the forces that, one day, must strike against Imperial authority. That day has come. Owen and the rebel forces must now bring the uprising to a fiery conclusion. But the desperate cause will need more than an army of courageous fighters to succeed-for the cunning Empress Lionstone has evil surprised to unleash. Mistworld's Last Stand: The day of reckoning has come to Mistworld. Together with young Jack Random, Jenny Psycho and Topaz, Owen Deathstalker and Hazel D'ark must rally the ragged defenses of Mistport in a desperate effort tp repel the relentless onslaught. In the process, they will more fully embrace the adaptations the Madness Maze has bestowed on them, along with the price those powers demand. Innocence Lost: They called it Shannon's World, a pleasure planet where fantasies and dreams became real, and even the weariest could find rest and comfort. And then the awful thing happened. Afterward, Shannon's world cut itself off from the empire. Visitors were destroyed while still in orbit, no matter whom they represented, and the Empress put the planet under quarantine. So things remained, until the most important strategist in the Empire, Vincent Harker crash-landed on the planet. The Empress sent down a company of her elite battle troops to recover him. They never came back.
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Deathstalker War Collection: Episodes 1-5
Simon R. Green Manufacturer: audible.com ProductGroup: Book Binding: Audio Download ASIN: B00029DI5S |
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RAW in Ten Minutes
Bryan Au Manufacturer: Trafford Publishing POD ProductGroup: Book Binding: Paperback Similar Items:
ASIN: 1412050189 Release Date: 2006-07-06 |
Book Description
Over 150 pages and 80 Raw Organic Living Recipes that are all under 10 minutes and $10. Totally innovative, new recipes That are all unique, fast, easy, modeled to look and taste just like all of your favorite "cooked""baked""deep fried" comfort and junk foods but it is Raw Living Organic Bliss! It only looks and tastes like your favorite comfort and junk foods but is an adventure into "Super Foods", high vibrational cuisine that will amplify your Yoga, Creativity, Beauty, Anti-Age You Naturally and Rejuvenate You! The all natural Fountain of Youth, to ignite your Spirit and Re-energize your Soul! Fast, quick, easy, fun all RAW IN TEN MINUTES! Health is your ultimate Wealth so share the gift of health with your friends, family and loved ones with RAW IN TEN MINUTES, with up to the minute information about nutrition, health and more!Customer Reviews:
Raw inTen Minutes.......2007-10-10
We live by this book.......2007-07-10
Not as good as had hoped.......2007-06-05
Creative, delicious raw food with variety.......2007-05-25
Quickies.......2007-05-13
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Raw in Ten Minutes
Bryan Au Manufacturer: Trafford Publishing ProductGroup: Book Binding: Paperback ASIN: B000N6ZSY4 |
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