English Mythology

Mining information from mythology, folklore, religious texts, and fairy tales from around the world, a foremost expert on symbols explains word origins and their meanings. The ultimate symbols are the letters and words in language as Bayley moves beyond mere pictures to understand the vital messages that have been ignored or lost across the centuries.

Growing up with his mom on the island Crete, Zeus learns that families can be just plain strange, no matter if you're a god or a mortal. Listeners will thrill to accounts of Zeus battling Titans and other monsters while fulfilling his destiny to become the god of gods.

The human mind needs monsters. In every culture and in every epoch in human history, from ancient Egypt to modern Hollywood, imaginary beings have haunted dreams and fantasies, provoking in young and old shivers of delight, thrills of terror, and endless fascination. In Monsters: Evil Beings, Mythical Beasts, and All Manner of Imaginary Terrors, anthropologist David D. Gilmore explores what human traits monsters represent and why they are so ubiquitous in people's imaginations and share so many features across different cultures.

ANN IS CONVINCED SHE IS A GOOD MOTHER until her teenage daughter admits to suicidal thoughts. In a desperate attempt to rescue her child, she gathers wisdom from therapy, the 12 Steps, and Buddhist teachings, yet she finds her greatest solace from an unlikely source: the Greek myth of Demeter and Persephone.

“I’ve always felt that the term fairy tale doesn’t quite capture the essence of these stories,” writes Emily Urquhart. “I prefer the term wonder tale, which is Irish in origin, for its suggestion of awe coupled with narrative. In a way, this is most of our stories.” In this startlingly original essay collection, Urquhart reveals the truths that underlie our imaginings: what we see in our heads when we read, how the sight of a ghost can heal, how the entrance to the underworld can be glimpsed in an oil painting or a winter storm—or the onset of a loved one’s dementia.

Treasure and her mother lost everything when Treasure’s father died. Haggling for scraps in the market, Treasure meets a man who promises to change their fortunes, but his feet are hovering just a few inches above the ground. He’s a spirit, and he says he can bring Treasure’s beloved father back to life if she’ll do one terrible thing for him first.

Amazons - fierce warrior women dwelling on the fringes of the known world - were the mythic archenemies of the ancient Greeks. Heracles and Achilles displayed their valor in duels with Amazon queens, and the Athenians reveled in their victory over a powerful Amazon army. In historical times, Cyrus of Persia, Alexander the Great, and the Roman general Pompey tangled with Amazons.

Historically, Celtic cultures differ from their English and French neighbors in a number of ways, including social organization, language, values and economic systems, but one of the most captivating of these has always been their myths. Celtic Myths, which can be understood in translation without needing special training in grammar, are more accessible than the Celtic languages, and unlike the other distinctive features that have faded over the centuries, myths still have their immediacy and power when heard today.

Do you know that the Sumerians believed that: The moon was actually a god child conceived unintentionally by the God Enlil and a maid? Or that humans were first created to do the chores on earth for the Gods and Goddesses? The ancient Sumerians lived a difficult life, and this is reflected in their myths. However, also reflected in their stories is their love for justice and the values which they most supported, among them beauty, honor, and truthfulness.

Ever since Pippa lost the winged horse race of the ancient gods and was banned from the slopes of Mount Olympus, she and her beloved horse, Zephyr, have tried to adjust to living a normal life on the ground. But when Pippa rescues a lost winged colt, she knows she must return him to the land of the gods and goddesses - even though she was warned never to return.

Are we alone or are there intelligent life-forms out there? Or are they already amongst us? Can we even know the truth? Exploring the myths, stories, history, and facts of documented encounters, mysterious experiences, and unexplained visitors, Real Visitors, Voices from Beyond, and Parallel Dimensions by Brad Steiger and Sherry Hansen Steiger examines the “other” forms, entitie,s and beings inhabiting our Universe.

Ancient Iran: Cosmology, Mythology, History presents Iran's pre-Islamic history within the context of both its complex cosmology and rich mythology. The audiobook uses the concept of farr to show how authority, finding guidance in the cosmic realm, organized the lives of Iran's hero-saints in the mythic realm. It also discusses how historical monarchs organized their hierarchical societies according to the dictates of Ahura Mazda.

It began as a witch-hunt. But the Master Inquisitor's plans to eliminate all traces of female power in the world have expanded to crushing the Sylvalan barons who oppose him—and to destroying the wellspring of magic in the Mother's Hills.

Nahoko Uehashi's The Beast Player is an epic YA fantasy about a girl with a special power to communicate with magical beasts and the warring kingdom only she can save.

Fenrir the wolf howls. Bifrost beckons. And Wes answers. The enigmatic Australian SAS commando awakens into a maelstrom of death and destruction, his memory in tatters, and his former friend and companion dead. In his hunt for answers, Wes uncovers much more than he was searching for, and enters a war which could see the entire planet destroyed as beasts of ice and perils from outside our realm of reality threaten humanity's very existence.

The first robot to walk the earth was a bronze giant called Talos. This wondrous machine was created not by MIT Robotics Lab, but by Hephaestus, the Greek god of invention, more than 2,500 years ago. In this groundbreaking account of the earliest expressions of the timeless impulse to create artificial life, Adrienne Mayor tells the fascinating story of how ancient Greek, Roman, Indian, and Chinese myths envisioned artificial life, automata, self-moving devices, and human enhancements - and how these visions relate to and reflect the ancient invention of real animated machines.

Like uncovering a sexy diamond in the rough, Legends of Lust reveals the fiery passions lying dormant behind your favorite mythological stories. This adults-only, debut collection of 14 steamy, erotic short stories by Autumn Bardot is an explosion of sexy, nasty, and romantic retellings that will take your love of myths to a whole new level.

Star-Touched Stories by Roshani Chokshi combines three lush and adventurous stories in the Star-Touched World. Death and Night - He was Lord of Death, cursed never to love. She was Night incarnate, destined to stay alone. After a meeting, they wonder if, perhaps, they could be meant for more. Poison and Gold - Now that her wish for a choice has come true, Aasha struggles to control her powers. Rose and Sword - There is a tale whispered in the dark of the Empire of Bharat-Jain. A tale of a bride who loses her bridegroom on the eve of her wedding.

In 1587, 115 men, women, and children arrived at Roanoke Island on the coast of North Carolina to establish the first English settlement in the New World. But when the new colony's leader returned to Roanoke from a resupply mission, his settlers had vanished, leaving behind only a single clue - a "secret token" etched into a tree. What happened to the Lost Colony of Roanoke? That question has consumed historians, archeologists, and amateur sleuths for 400 years. In The Secret Token, Andrew Lawler sets out on a quest to determine the fate of the settlers.

From stories of resurrected mummies and thousand-year-old curses to powerful pharaohs and the coveted treasures of the Great Pyramids, ancient Egypt has had an unfaltering grip on the modern imagination. Now, in Egyptian Mythology, Geraldine Pinch offers a comprehensive introduction that untangles the mystery of Egyptian Myth.