Epic Classics

The Iliad of Homer is the earliest work of European literature that we have. Created in the eighth century BC it has continued to arouse interest for over 2000 years. The author intended it to be heard, as delivered by a bard or rhapsode who had made the presentation of Greek epic poetry his profession, and who had command of the vocal resources and the dramatic power to move his audience.

Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns driven time and again off course, once he had plundered the hallowed heights of Troy. So begins Robert Fagles' magnificent translation of the Odyssey, which Jasper Griffin in The New York Times Review of Books hails as "a distinguished achievement." If the Iliad is the world's greatest war epic, then the Odyssey is literature's grandest evocation of everyman's journey though life.

Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, a collection of narratives written between 1387 and 1400, tells of a group of 30 people from all layers of society who pass the time along their pilgrimage to Canterbury by telling stories to one another, their interaction mediated (at times) by the affable host - Chaucer himself. Naxos AudioBooks’ third volume presents the tales of six people, here in an unabridged modern verse translation (by Frank Ernest Hill, 1935).

Be a hero in the ultimate game. Are you a top-rated gamer? Then you might have the skills to play the Game...where players are sponsored by actual demon lords, gods and goddesses, or Lovecraftian nightmares. Enter Thera, a real kingdom at the crossroads of many other worlds, but with all the augmented-reality interfaces, character progression, and game mechanics that players know and love.

Luma is a half-elven druid who can read city streets like a book. Together, she and her siblings form one of Magnimar's most infamous mercenary companies, solving problems for the city's elite. Yet when a job gone wrong lands Luma in the fearsome prison called the Hells, it's only the start of Luma's problems. For a new web of bloody power politics is growing in Magnimar...

As an Ender, one of my father's Elite guards, it's my job to do as I'm told. When my older sister is sent as an ambassador to the realm of the water elementals - the Deep - I have no choice but to accompany her as her bodyguard. There are only a few things I know for sure. The ocean may be beautiful, but lurking in its depths are monsters to fear, the water I tread is teaming with danger and I am on my own. With no one to help, and no one to trust, I have to find a way to keep my sister safe, and stop a civil war.

A few years have passed since the conquering of the Mein, and Queen Corinn is firmly in control of the Known World---perhaps too firmly. With plans to expand her empire, she sends her brother, Daniel, on an exploratory mission to the Other Lands. There Daniel discovers a lush, exotic mainland ruled by an alliance of tribes that poses a grave danger to the stability of the Known World. Is Queen Corinn strong enough to face this new challenge?

In the gaslit streets of Victorian London, phantoms rule the night, demons dance till dawn, and one supernatural detective dares to be seduced by the greatest power of all…He's the man with the magic touch. A master of deduction, seduction, and other midnight maneuvers, Phaeton Black is Scotland Yard's secret weapon against things that go bump in the night. His prodigious gifts as a paranormal investigator are as legendary as his skills as a lover, his weakness for wicked women as notorious as his affection for absinthe.

In the final inning, Abraham must shut the enemy out or die. The invasion begins with an enemy the likes the people of Titanuus have never imagined. Armed with modern weaponry, diabolical forces muster at the Kingsland border wall, while savage barbarian forces called the Gond secretly lay siege upon the House of Steel. With the Crown of Stones incomplete and the king slipping into madness, more treachery bears fruit as former alliances are broken and old enemies rise again. Outgunned and overmatched, Abraham Jenkins must use his wits and sword to bring the enemy down.

You know, sometimes it would be nice to catch a break. Devon, a professional gamer, has a settlement to grow into a city, a character she'd love to focus on leveling, and some kitchen cabinets that really need restocking. Unfortunately, the fate of the Relic Online game world is at stake, torn asunder by battling creator AIs. Demons rise through planar rifts, rampaging across the physical realm. The ancient city of Ishildar holds power that might turn the tide. If only Devon, the brave heroine chosen as the city's champion, could finish her epic quest line to gain control of the place.

Step up to the gates. After years in the wilds, Lenk and his companions have come to the city that serves as the world's beating heart. The great charnel house where men die surer than any wilderness. They've come to claim payment for creatures slain, blood spilled at the behest of a powerful holy man. And Lenk has come to lay down his sword for good. But this is no place to escape demons.

Conryu's life was supposed to be peaceful after the fall of Morgana. Two months living on the floating island and working on bikes have been among the best of his life. But that all changes when Jemma St. Simmons, Director of the Ministry of Magic in London, contacts him looking for help. Conryu is forced once more to get involved in a dangerous magical situation. Now faced with an enemy that negates his greatest strength, can Conryu find a way to defeat a long-forgotten foe before it's too late?

Martha Macnamara knows that her daughter, Elizabeth, is in trouble; she just doesn't know what kind. Mysterious phone calls from San Francisco at odd hours of the night are the only contact she has had with Elizabeth for years. Now, Elizabeth has sent her a plane ticket and reserved a room for her at San Francisco's most luxurious hotel. Yet she has not tried to contact Martha since she arrived, leaving her lonely, confused, and a little bit worried. Into the story steps Mayland Long, a distinguished-looking and wealthy Chinese man who lives at the hotel and is drawn to Martha's good nature and ability to pinpoint the truth of a matter.

This novel focuses on a sorcereress with the hellish magic of a blood magus at her command and a mounting ambition for territory and domination in her heart, and a ghostwalker’s attempts to defend a village from her seemingly inevitable success.

Davie is a normal girl trying to live a normal life. Except that she can see the future and has visions that make her seem crazy. When she meets a man who immediately seems too perfect to be real, her quest for a normal life quickly ends. She soon learns the world is full of mythical creatures including shape-shifting dragons, dwarves, and mystical oracles. Can Davie adapt to the new world that has dropped her into the middle of a mythical war that could tear the world apart?

Forty years after the God Wars, Dresediel Lex bears the scars of liberation - especially in the Skittersill, a poor district still bound by the fallen gods' decaying edicts. As long as the gods' wards last, they strangle development; when they fail, demons will be loosed upon the city. The King in Red hires Elayne Kevarian of the Craft firm Kelethres, Albrecht, and Ao to fix the wards, but the Skittersill's people have their own ideas. A protest rises against Elayne's work, led by Temoc, a warrior-priest turned community organizer....

Gideon Gull leads a double life: one as a talented young bard at the Rhapsodic College, the other as a student of the Shadow School, where Taldor's infamous lion blades are trained to be master spies and assassins. When a magical fog starts turning ordinary people into murderous mobs along the border between Taldor and Gideon's home nation of Andoran, it's up to him and a crew of daring performers to solve the mystery before both nations fall to madness and slaughter.

Rhiow, Urruah, and Arhu, the wizard cats who saved New York City in "The Book of Night with Moon", are summoned to London to deal with a crisis which affects the very fabric of time.

Torius Vin is perfectly happy with his life as a pirate captain, sailing the Inner Sea in search of plunder with a bold crew of buccaneers and Celeste, his snake-bodied navigator and one true love. Yet when he's invited into a network of spies working against the slave trade, can Torius continue to choose the path of piracy? Or will he sign on as an abolitionist privateer, bringing freedom to others at the price of his own?

Just yesterday, Sergeant Gil MacDonald and his APC crew had been fending off an ambush in a Viet Nam jungle. In the middle of the firefight, some kind of magic spell had transported them to this Fantasy Land complete with flying dragons, wizards, crazy castles, and dispossessed princes. They would stay trapped here forever unless they could rescue the sorceress Gabrielle. Master magician Amon held her captive in his palace; and to reach her, Gil and his men would have to infiltrate Hell itself!