Books about Overlook from Amazon.com

In his first case since he left the LAPD's Open Unsolved Unit for the prestigious Homicide Special squad, Harry Bosch is called out to investigate a murder that may have chilling consequences for national security. A doctor with access to a dangerous radioactive substance is found murdered in the trunk of his car. Retracing his steps, Harry learns that a large quantity of radioactive cesium was stolen shortly before the doctor's death. With the cesium in unknown hands, Harry fears the murder could be part of a terrorist plot to poison a major American city.
Soon, Bosch is in a race against time, not only against the culprits, but also against the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI (in the form of Harry's one-time lover Rachel Walling), who are convinced that this case is too important for the likes of the LAPD. It is Bosch's job to prove all of them wrong..
Price: $2.44 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Charles Portis may be the sneakiest comedian in American letters, not to mention one of the funniest And there's no better specimen of his double-edged art than The Dog of the South, which Overlook Press has recently rescued from a long, cruel, out-of-print limbo. As usual, the narrator is a down-at-the-heels Southerner with an eye for the homely detail and a mission to accomplish. What Ray Midge means to do is track down his significant other: "My wife Norma had run off with Guy Dupree and I was waiting around for the credit card billings to come in so I could see where they had gone." In another author's hands, this opening sentence might lead straight to a bloody, noir-ish denouement. Here it's merely the excuse for a meandering, semi-pointless quest, during which the fussbudget protagonist is assailed by tropical storms, grifters, hippies, car trouble, and even an assortment of airborne trash: "I had to keep the Buick speed below what I took to be about sixty because at that point the wind came up through the floor hole in such a way that the Heath wrappers were suspended behind my head in a noisy brown vortex."

Hapless, rhetorically challenged Ray Midge would more than fulfill any novel's quota for comic creation. But Portis pairs him with another indelible nutter, Dr. Reo Symes. A font of dubious financial schemes, Symes attaches himself to Ray like a peevish, passive-aggressive Pancho Sanza, and his non-sequitur-studded riffs must be heard to be believed:

I always tried to help Leon and you see the thanks I got. I hired him to drive for me right after his rat died. He was with the Murrell Brothers Shows at that time, exhibiting a fifty-pound rat from the sewers of Paris, France. Of course it didn't really weigh fifty pounds and it wasn't your true rat and it wasn't from Paris, France, either. It was some kind of animal from South America. Anyway, the thing died and I hired Leon to drive for me. I was selling birthstone rings and vibrating jowl straps from door to door and he would let me out at one end of the block and wait on me at the other end.

The vibrating jowl straps are the kicker here, of course. But it's the overall futility of the enterprise that gives Symes his comic potency, and makes him Ray's natural companion in arms. Neither of these guys is going to accomplish anything: they're Beckett clowns in Sansabelt trousers, too enervated by the heat even to agonize. Still, you won't find a more delicious (or less reliable) narrator in contemporary fiction, and Charles Portis's genius for inventing all-American eccentrics is anything but futile. --James Marcus.
Price: $9.98 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Pop culture---and the advertising that surrounds it---teaches young girls and boys five myths about sex and sexuality:

-Girls don't choose boys, boys choose girls--but only sexy girls
-There's only one kind of sexy--slender, curvy, white beauty
-Girls should work to be that type of sexy
-The younger a girl is, the sexier she is
-Sexual violence can be hot

Together, these five myths make up the Lolita Effect, the mass media trends that work to undermine girls' self-confidence, that condone female objectification, and that tacitly foster sex crimes. But identifying these myths and breaking them down can help girls learn to recognize progressive and healthy sexuality and protect themselves from degrading media ideas and sexual vulnerability. In The Lolita Effect, Dr. M. Gigi Durham offers breakthrough strategies for empowering girls to make healthy decisions about their own sexuality..
Price: $15.28 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Can wrong ever become right? Does the end justify the means? For Celia Lytton, there are no easy answers to these questions Strong-willed, tough, and courageous, she moves through life making difficult and often dangerous decisions both for herself and for others, with the most far reaching consequences for everyone . . .

For her husband, Oliver, head of the great family publishing house of Lyttons; for Sylvia Miller, whose life of relentless poverty is transformed by Celia's intrusion; for Oliver's daunting elder sister, who is not all she appears to be; and for author Sebastian Brooke, for whom Celia makes the most dangerous decision of all..
Price: $4.50 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Celia Lytton broke the rules when she demanded a job in her husband Oliver's young and eager publishing company. This was the belle époque of Edwardian England, when women were expected to look lovely and bear children but nothing more. With the help of her stern sister-in-law LM, Celia proved she could do that and more, becoming invaluable in the success of Lyttons. Now the company is safe and flourishing, and a new generation of Lyttons is growing up to inherit it. But the future they are also going to inherit looks dark. As the delightful glamour of the twenties passes away, fearful shadows of war begin to gather and threaten the happiness and very lives of the family. Strong-willed and stubborn, Celia Lytton has survived much in her time - now she must guide her family through the brooding danger of the thirties and the terror and spirit of wartime until peace is finally declared..
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Into Temptation, the third book of the Lytton family trilogy, shifts the focus to New York City and Barty Miller. Rescued from the slums as a baby by Celia Lytton and now living in New York, Barty heads more than half of the Lytton publishing house. Falling on bad times, the family is worried that Barty will make a business decision that would be devastating to them. But will she? As events unfold, long-buried secrets concerning the whole family are revealed, shaking the very foundations of the Lytton's world.

An enthralling epic of the glamorous life in the mid-20th century with scenery that extends from New York to London, Into Temptation gives apt and telling insights into the world of the British aristocracy and their literary legacy. Readers have come to depend on Vincenzi for her enchanting prose style and the epic scope of her dramas: like the Lytton family sagas that precede it, Into Temptation does not disappoint..
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In the 1960s we were warned that the population explosion would lead to mass global starvation In the 1970s we were warned that the planet was running out of natural resources and that world economic growth would grind to a halt within our lifetimes When the planet's temperature, which had been gently rising for some 400 years, appeared to be falling again, scientists warned us that we were facing the disaster of a new ice age. In the past year, sensational warnings about climate change have dominated the headlines as we are told that global warming will have disastrous consequences in the very near future unless we take drastic measures now.

In this cautious and reasoned treatise on an issue that effects each and every one of us, former Energy Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Margaret Thatcher government years, Nigel Lawson, argues that it is time to take a cooler look at global warming. Lawson, father of famed cookbook author, looks at the facts behind the headlines and explains that science is only part of the story. For governments to make informed decisions about the path ahead they must listen to economists as well as scientists, utilizing economic forecasting to assess the likely evolution of the world economy, and even more urgently, economic analysis: what is the most cost-effective way of tackling this issue? We also need an understanding of exactly what measures are politically realistic on a global scale.

At a time when politicians and the media are stirring up public and political hysteria on the subject of climate change, Lawson has written a timely disquisition urging us to take into account all the facts in order to deal with the threat of global warming.

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Mervyn Peake's gothic masterpiece, the Gormenghast trilogy, begins with the superlative Titus Groan, a darkly humorous, stunningly complex tale of the first two years in the life of the heir to an ancient, rambling castle. The trilogy continues with the novels Gormenghast and Titus Alone, and all three books are bound together in this single-volume edition.

The Gormenghast royal family, the castle's decidedly eccentric staff, and the peasant artisans living around the dreary, crumbling structure make up the cast of characters in these engrossing stories. Peake's command of language and unique style set the tone and shape of an intricate, slow-moving world of ritual and stasis:

"The walls of the vast room which were streaming with calid moisture, were built with gray slabs of stone and were the personal concern of a company of eighteen men known as the 'Grey Scrubbers'.... On every day of the year from three hours before daybreak until about eleven o'clock, when the scaffolding and ladders became a hindrance to the cooks, the Grey Scrubbers fulfilled their hereditary calling."

Peake has been compared to Dickens, Tolkien, and Peacock, but the Gormenghast trilogy is truly unique. Unforgettable characters with names like Steerpike and Prunesquallor make their way through an architecturally stifling world, with lots of dark corners around to dampen any whimsy that might arise. This true classic is a feast of words unlike anything else in the world of fantasy. Those who explore Gormenghast castle will be richly rewarded. --Therese Littleton.
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In Almost a Crime, Vincenzi exposes the cracks in a British power marriage Tom and Octavia Fleming glitter among the chattering classes of London in the late 1990's. Tom, a brilliant political strategist, and Octavia, an equally talented charity consultant, appear to have it all--good looks, money, success, and three pretty children--everything but precious time together. When Octavia realizes that Tom is having an affair, she plots her revenge against her husband. But nothing prepares Octavia for the identity of Tom's mistress, and her misdemeanors hardly compare to the revenge enacted by the other woman after Tom calls it off.

Described by Dominick Dunne as a writer "with verve and heart, immersing the reader in a world of engrossing and unforgettable glamour and passion," and praised by Barbara Taylor Bradford as "marvelously engrossing," Penny Vincenzi has been captivating European and American audiences ever since the publication of her Spoils of Time trilogy. Packed with twists and trysts, Almost a Crime continues the tradition of the thrilling Vincenzi bestseller..
Price: $8.45 [Notify me when price goes down.]