Showing results by narrator "John Lee" in All Categories

The turn of the 2020s will mark an extremely rare convergence of low points for multiple political, economic, and demographic cycles. The result will be a major financial crash and global upheaval that will dwarf the Great Recession of the 2000s - and maybe even the Great Depression of the 1930s. We're facing the onset of what Dent calls "Economic Winter". In Zero Hour, he and Andrew Pancholi explain all of these cycles, which influence everything from currency valuations to election returns, from economic growth rates in Asia to birthrates in Europe.

The fantasy worlds of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass come to life in these audio theatre presentations with music and sound effects.

After the dot-com bubble burst, Dan Porter is laid off from his job and must decide what is truly important. His wife of twenty years, Jackie, a beautiful and successful managing director at a clothing designer shop, no longer connects with him. His teenagers, Josh, Nina, and Millie, are distant and confusing. Jackie is tempted by the attentions of a younger man at her office, and thanks to an opportunity suggested by a magazine article, Dan finds himself contemplating a drastic change in his life.

The warriors comprising the House of Ten begin their training under punishing mentors and a drink-loving taskmaster. Within the city of Sunja, Borchus works to establish a network of spies to aid the newly formed house’s cause. Meanwhile, a vengeful Halm hunts down Skulljigger for bloody retribution, house master Goll realizes one of his pit fighters possesses potential beyond everyone’s wildest expectations, and shadowy elements conspire to make the Ten’s opening matches on the sands their last.

This acclaimed story of World War II is rich in suspense, characterization, plot, and spiritual truth. Every element of occupied Holland is united in a story of courage and hope: a hidden Jewish child, an underdiver, a downed RAF pilot, an imaginative, daring underground hero, and the small things of family life which surprisingly carry on in the midst of oppression.

Kerovan of Ulmsdale has long borne the curse of his ancestors’ depredations. After pillaging a sanctum of the Old Ones, his bloodline has been forever marred by painful sickness and death. Kerovan was born strong and hardy, but he walks on hooves instead of human feet and sees through eyes of amber - just as the Old Ones had. Bound in marriage to the beautiful Joisan of Ithkrypt, Kerovan seeks to claim his rightful place as lord-heir of Ulmsdale. But first, the couple - separated by distance, yet linked in spirit - must unlock the powers held within a mystical necklace Joisan wears.

In the 17th century, a young man sailing from Venice to Naples is taken prisoner by pirates and delivered to the Ottoman Empire in Constantinople. There he is forced into slavery and left in the custody of a brilliant Turkish inventor known as Hoja - 'master' - a man who is his exact double. In the years that follow, the slave instructs his master in Western science and technology, from medicine to pyrotechnics.

Struggling for supplies and battling the elements, the true nature of people shows through as they face adversity like they have never known before. Nevin, as charmed and untouchable as his toxic existence has been, finds a niche in his new home; still not enough for him, though, as he plans to become more comfortable at the expense of others. But is tangling with Johnson a confrontation he can come back from?

In this new edition, Steve Bruce discusses the continuing arguments for social egalitarianism, considering issues such as gay marriage, women in combat roles, and the 2010 Equality Act to debunk contemporary arguments against parity. As gender divisions are increasingly questioned, he looks ahead to the likely consequences of this for society.

King Richard is dead, and John is king, a ruler ever-ready for more money in his treasury whether it comes there honestly or not. When the Baron Eric mysteriously disappears, the moody Sir Basil, distant relative and heir, has taken over the castle - and would not be pleased if Eric should ever return. In an unguarded moment of genuine gratitude, Sir Basil invites young Martin to come to the castle as a page and squire. Martin is swiftly drawn into Rosamund's troubles and into a few of his own before the tale reaches its dramatic climax.  

Data is everywhere, coming at us in a never-ceasing, ever-rising river that threatens to overwhelm us. Igor Tulchinsky, the trader behind global quantitative investment management firm WorldQuant, reveals, how natural patterns underlie data patterns that may dictate life or death, success, or failure. This book demonstrates how to exercise real intelligence by discerning the patterns that surround us every day and how to leverage this information into success in the workplace and beyond.

What accounts for the rise of the state, the creation of the first global system, and the dominance of the West? The conventional answer asserts that superior technology, tactics, and institutions forged by Darwinian military competition gave Europeans a decisive advantage in war from 1500 onward. Empires of the Weak argues that Europeans had no general military superiority in the early modern era. Sharman shows instead that European expansion is better explained by deference to strong Asian and African polities, disease in the Americas, and maritime supremacy earned by default.

Berlin in 1933 is in upheaval. Eleven-year-old Carla von Ulrich struggles to understand the tensions disrupting her family as Hitler strengthens his grip on Germany. Into this turmoil step her mother’s formidable friend and former British MP, Ethel Leckwith, and her student son, Lloyd, who soon learns for himself the brutal reality of Nazism. He also encounters a group of Germans resolved to oppose Hitler - but are they willing to go so far as to betray their country?

In this ground-breaking book, Ben Ramalingam shows that the linear, mechanistic models and assumptions on which foreign aid is built would be more at home in early-20th-century factory floors than in the dynamic, complex world we face today. All around us, we can see the costs and limitations of dealing economies and societies as if they are analogous to machines. The reality is that such social systems have far more in common with ecosystems: They are complex, dynamic, diverse, and unpredictable.

Chiliad consists of two interrelated stories, stories filtered through the melancholy imagination of a narrator perched on the banks of a river that flows backward and forward through time. The first movement, "Men and Sin", takes place in the millennial year of 1000 AD. The second, "A Moment at the River's Heart", occurs exactly 1000 years - the length of a "chiliad" - later, as the new millennium approaches.

Euripides (c. 480-406 B.C.E.) is the author of eighteen extant plays and many more only surviving in fragments. He is the youngest of the three great Athenian tragedians with Aeschylus and Sophocles. Hippolytus, bastard son of Theseus and the Amazon Hippolyta, has sworn chaste allegiance to the goddess Artemis, thus severely offending the goddess Aphrodite by failing to revere her. Aphrodite swears revenge and promises that he will die before the day is done, taking with him Queen Phaedra, wife of Theseus.

Set on a planet in a parallel universe where magic is a reality, these three high fantasy novels from the Witch World series transport you to the eastern continent of Estcarp, illustrating why prolific author Andre Norton was named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. Contains Trey of Swords, Ware Hawk, and The Gate of the Cat.

The classical Greek intellectual tradition pervades nearly every aspect of our modern Western civilization. Our logic and science, our philosophy, politics, literature, architecture, and art are all indebted to the ancient inhabitants of the small mountainous Mediterranean country. And the powerful myths of the Greeks, refined by Homer, Hesiod, Herodotus, and the great Greek dramatists, still resonate at the core of our culture.

It is perilous to be a Catholic in the Ireland of 1735, and it's almost more than can be borne for 15-year-old Padraic Fitzbrian. Nearly 100 years before, Lord Protector Cromwell of England had put down the Irish rebellion confiscating lands, killing priests, outlawing the Mass, and prohibiting education of any kind for Irish Catholics. Padraic and his two friends, Liam and Rose, are in their last year as scholars in the forbidden and risky all-weathers classroom under the hedgerow.

On November 1, 2006, Alexander Litvinenko sipped tea in London's Millennium Hotel. Hours later, the Russian émigré and former intelligence officer, who was sharply critical of Russian president Vladimir Putin, fell ill and within days was rushed to the hospital. Fatally poisoned by a rare radioactive isotope slipped into his drink, Litvinenko issued a dramatic deathbed statement accusing Putin himself of engineering his murder.