Convicted of a crime he did not commit, Jonathan Renn is sentenced to life in the Swamp, a prison planet death row in a distant galaxy. Renn only has two choices, escape the Swamp or die in the process. Defending himself from attacks by deadly, native monster and his fellow convicts, Renn is obsessed with escaping the planet and getting his revenge on the people who set him up. Marla Marie Mendez is even more down on her luck. Trapped inside a cybernetic dog and dropped defenseless into the Swamp, Marla can only rely on Renn and her claws to save her from the unfriendly elements. They must find a way out of the Swamp and quick before their life sentence is cut short.

From Publishers WeeklyCalisher's "kissing cousin"part of her family in every respect except bloodwas spunky Katie Pyle, the girl with "brown teacup eyes." When the author, a cheerfully arrogant 15-year-old born to a Southern Jewish family, had trouble coping in tough New York City, Katie, 15 years her senior, was there to give moral support. Through the decades their friendship served as a wellspring that preserved the pristine spontaneity of their shared childhoods. Calisher brings to this slim, brave, deeply affecting memoir the gift for sharply drawn characters and gimlet wit that mark her novels ( False Entry , The New Yorkers ) and short stories. "My family went down like the Lusitania ," she writes after her mother died. Katie helped her weather the storm. Skipping from Port Washington, N.Y., to Port Charlotte, Fla., and following Katie in her metamorphosis from mother-sister figure to wartime nurse to elegant old lady, Calisher keeps the flame of memory and friendship burning bright in a splendid performance. Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

"I'm a guide, not a nanny, sweetheart:"Aidan Sawyer was the quintessential jungle guide, and being in his company was akin to cornering a panther. Courtney realized quickly that jaguars and river bandits were not the only dangers on the Amazon.Since day one of their river trek, to find her missionary parents, Aidan had tested and teased Courtney with every manipulative macho trick in the book.Her only hope for temporary relief from Aidan's relentless mischief was to find the mission--and fast. Surely there her parents' presence would protect her from this too-talented rogue!

Read this classic romance by New York Times bestselling author Penny Jordan, now available for the first time in e-book! Originally published as Special Treatment in 1988. At the tycoon's command... Susannah is proud of her successful career as a magazine writer. But the new boss—dynamic Hazard Maine—is convinced she's cheating her way to the top. The last thing Susannah needs is this burning longing for her devilishly charming, and terribly arrogant boss. She'll do anything to distract herself from the attraction she feels—even allow him to believe the worst! But now that she's got Hazard's attention, this powerful tycoon isn't going to let Susannah out of his sight—not until they act on the undeniable chemistry between them!

Life imitates art in The Lady in the Van, the story of the itinerant Miss Shepherd, who lived in a van in Alan Bennett's driveway from the early1970s until her death in 1989. It is doubtful that Bennett could have made up the eccentric Miss Shepherd if he tried, but his poignant, funny but unsentimental account of their strange relationship is akin to his best fictional screen writing.Bennett concedes that "One seldom was able to do her a good turn without some thoughts of strangulation", but as the plastic bags build up, the years pass by and Miss Shepherd moves into Bennett's driveway, a relationship is established which defines a certain moment in late 20th-century London life which has probably gone forever. The dissenting, liberal, middle-class world of Bennett and his peers comes into hilarious but also telling collision with the world of Miss Shepherd: "there was a gap between our social position and our social obligations. It was in this gap that Miss Shepherd (in her van) was able to live". Bennett recounts Miss Shepherd's bizarre escapades in his inimitable style, from her letter to the Argentinean Embassy at the height of the Falklands War, to her attempts to stand for Parliament and wangle an electric wheelchair out of the Social Services. Beautifully observed, The Lady in the Van is as notable for Bennett's attempts to uncover the enigmatic history of Miss Shepherd, as it is for its amusing account of her eccentric escapades. --Jerry Brotton

Bharati Mukherjee's work illuminates a new world of people in migration that has transformed the meaning of "America." Now in a Grove paperback edition, The Middleman and Other Stories is a dazzling display of the vision of this important modern writer. An aristocratic Filipina negotiates a new life for herself with an Atlanta investment banker. A Vietnam vet returns to Florida, a place now more foreign than the Asia of his war experience. And in the title story, an Iraqi Jew whose travels have ended in Queens suddenly finds himself an unwitting guerrilla in a South American jungle. Passionate, comic, violent, and tender, these stories draw us into the center of a cultural fusion in the midst of its birth pangs, yet glowing with the energy and exuberance of a society remaking itself.

A tough-guy mystery to please even the most bloodthirsty of fans!

Imagine life in an ironically magical world where 144,000 doors separate fiction from reality. A place that can hypnotize even the most grounded philosophy major and deliver a fantastical rhyme to his reason. A place where a best buddy resembles a shaggy carpet, and adventures surpass a boy's dreams… welcome to Castle Perilous.

Harlan Ellison is undoubtedly one of the most audacious, infuriating, brazen characters on the planet. Which may help explain why he is also one of the most brilliant, innovative, and eloquent writers on earth. Slippage simply presents recent, typical Ellison. In a word, masterful. The 21 stories in this 1997 collection, which is encased in black boxes, show Ellison at the height of his powers, with several of the stories (no surprise here) major award-winners. Highlights include a black mind reader who pays a visit to a white serial killer, a husband who falls prey to a vampiric personal computer, and a love affair between a young man and a woman who may be more undead than alive. Perhaps even more fascinating are the painfully candid snapshots of autobiography running throughout the volume. Even if Ellison's unsettling fictions are not enough to dazzle you, his often bizarre life experiences as an author will still keep you compulsively turning the page like a polite voyeur. --Stanley Wiater Contents:The Man Who Rowed Christopher Columbus Ashore (1992)Anywhere but Here, with Anybody but You (1996)Crazy as a Soup Sandwich (1989)Darkness upon the Face of the Deep (1991)The Pale Silver Dollar of the Moon Pays Its Way and Makes Change: Version 1 (1997)The Pale Silver Dollar of the Moon Pays Its Way and Makes Change: Version 2 (1994)The Lingering Scent of Woodsmoke (1996)The Museum on Cyclops Avenue (1995)Go toward the Light (1996)Mefisto in Onyx (1993)Where I Shall Dwell in the Next World (1992)Chatting with Anubis (1995)The Few, the Proud (1989)The Deadly "Nackles" Affair (1987) essayNackles (1964)Nackles (1987)Sensible City (1994)The Dragon on the Bookshelf (1995) with Robert SilverbergKeyboard (1995)Jane Doe #112 (1990)The Dreams a Nightmare Dreams (1997)Pulling Hard Time (1995)Scartaris, June 28th (1990)She's a Young Thing and Cannot Leave Her Mother (1988)Midnight in the Sunken Cathedral (1995)

When Ricky Reyes dares Jeffrey to get a bloody dagger out of the old McGyver house on Halloween night, Jeffrey is counting on Max, his ghostly friend, to help him.

Barbary Coast pirates—the Saraceni—are capturing slaves and terrorizing fishing villages along the coast of Sicily. Ramage and his crew are sent to track them down before they can devastate another town.

From Publishers WeeklyGay attorney Henry Rios, hero of Nava's previous The Little Death, appears here for the first time in hardcover, venturing from the Bay Area to Los Angeles to solve a series of grisly murders in a fast-paced novel that is as troubling as it is entertaining. When a gay teenager is arrested for the murder of a co-worker, who threatened to expose his homosexuality, Rios is called to L.A. by Larry Ross, a close friend and fellow lawyer who is dying of AIDS; too ill to rise to the boy's defense himself, Ross asks Rios to "balance the accounts" by preserving the accused murderer's life in exchange for Ross's own. Both, he explains, are afflicted by the same diseasethe bigotry that "shows itself in letting people die of AIDS, making it so difficult for them to come out that it's easier to murder." Nava's palpable anger at that prejudiceand its tragic consequencescomes through with an urgency that transcends the central detective story. Despite a shamelessly sentimental ending, it is the many rough edges of Goldenboy that linger in the reader's mind long after the breathless conclusion. Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Library JournalAsked to defend a young homosexual accused of murder, well-known criminal lawyer Henry Rios ( The Little Death ) hesitates. With the trial date a mere two days away, and with overwhelming evidence against the man, Rios needs time to prepare. As series protagonist and narrator, Henry not only voices the theme of heterosexual bigotry against gays, but also denigrates the exploitation of gays by other homosexuals. Unfortunately, Nava subordinates these themes and solution of the mystery itself to a rather precipitous love affair between Rios and a prosecution witness. A notch or two above Joseph Hansen in quality, this is, overall, well-written and interesting. REKCopyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Three chilling works, "The Guardians," "The Odor of Violets," and "Horrorshow," take the reader from ancient Babylon to the supernatural power of reincarnated gods.  KIRKUS REVIEW Two new yams--an occult short story and a psycho, killer novella--and one golden oldie--an out-of-print thriller novel, The Guardians, first published in 1964--make up this hodgepodge entry from grand guignol master Farris (Son of the Endless Night, 1984; Wildwood, 1986; etc.). The story, "The Odor of Violets," about the haunting of an author by the muse of the writer whose work he stole, lacks originality or punch. On the other hand, the novella, "Horrorshow," in which a madman stalks a southern town, kicks in at full throttle and never lets go. Of The Guardians, Kirkus in 1964 said: ""Corruption (moral not political) in high places . . . Bulldog grip to the lurid aspects here." In all, not a bad bet for Farris fans.