Akron Public Library

Demelza sees a horseman riding down the valley and senses disruption to the domestic contentment she has fought so hard to achieve. For Ross has little option but to accept the summons - and travel to Paris with his family, as an "observer" of the French armed forces. Parisian life begins well with an exhilarating round of balls and parties. But the return of Napoleon brings separation, distrust and danger to the Poldarks ... and always for Demelza,...

Thackeray's best-loved work, "Vanity Fair, is a satire of epic proportions, and proves that deep-seated cynicism and heartfelt morality don't have to get in the way of a good story. Filled with exceptionally drawn characters, biting social humor, and Thackeray's own illustrations, "Vanity Fair is not only one of the great English novels of the nineteenth century, its title has become synonymous with the follies of high society. Nicholas Dames is Assistant...

"The classic first novel of the epic Aubrey/Maturin series, widely considered "the best historical novels ever written" (Richard Snow, New York Times). Ardent, gregarious British naval officer Jack Aubrey is elated to be given his first appointment as commander: the fourteen-gun ship HMS Sophie. Meanwhile-after a heated first encounter that nearly comes to a duel-Aubrey and a brilliant but down-on-his-luck physician, Stephen Maturin, strike up an...

For as long as she can remember, Lady Adriana Sutton has adored Colton Wyndham, to whom she has been promised by an agreement of courtship and betrothal since childhood. The years have been immensely kind to Lady Adriana. No longer the plain, thin tomboy Colton had spurned, she has blossomed into an uncommon beauty desired by nearly every eligible bachelor in the land. To demonstrate his belief that love cannot be forced, Colton agrees to court Lady...

When the HMS Reliant captures a French ship and its priceless cargo, an unhatched dragon egg, Captain Will Laurence is swept into an unexpected kinship with an extraordinary creature and joins the elite Aerial Corps as a master of the dragon Temaraire, in which role he must match wits with the powerful dragon-borne forces of Napoleon Bonaparte.

"A desperate sea battle; a fortune risked on the turn of a card; a duel at dawn with the loser ... Patrick O'Brian meets James Bond. The year is 1803, and the British Secret Service is contending with a belligerent France under Napoleon. The service suffers a blow in the loss of a prime agent, Thomas Grey, who-despondent at his wife's untimely death-resigns from British Intelligence and departs England for Boston, where he intends to become a lumber...

Capt. Will Laurence is serving with honor in the British Navy when his ship captures a French frigate harboring a most unusual cargo--an incalculably valuable dragon egg. When the egg hatches, Laurence unexpectedly becomes the master of the young dragon Temeraire and finds himself on an extraordinary journey that will shatter his orderly, respectable life and alter the course of his nation's history.

In 1808 Ghent, eighteen-year-old Constance runs away from an arranged marriage to a much older man by stealing his clothes, sneaking out of the house disguised as a man, and joining Napoleon's army.