Showing results by narrator "Richard Ferrone" in All Categories

Gilbert Gilbertson, an inept magic clown whose biggest gigs are kids' birthday parties, suddenly develops skills in sleight-of-hand and stage illusions that confound expert magicians. He also begins affecting people in strange ways, as well as winning staggering amounts of money in Las Vegas, which he donates to the Catholic Church. Enter a far-right fringe group within the Catholic Church, convinced that Gilbert is working legitimate miracles - miracles they believe will convince Catholics to return to more conservative ways.

Texas rancher Ben Langham left his sprawling inheritance to the man he trusted most: Luke Starbuck. Once Starbuck had dreamed of having land of his own. Now he dreams of finding the man who gunned down Langham - and bringing him to justice. With the Cattlemen's Association behind him, Starbuck has all the authority he needs to ride into New Mexico on the path of a murderous band of thieves.

Detective Lt. Dan Malone has seen it all in two decades with the NYPD. Even the horribly violated, decomposing body of Sara Eisinger seems like just another standard murder case - until a little gold key leads to an after-hours sex club and some phone numbers in Sara’s address book connect her to the CIA.

The author of nearly two dozen best sellers, including Orchid Beach and Swimming to Catalina, Stuart Woods unfailingly entertains legions of fans with his suspenseful novels. Fifth in the series featuring the dashing, sophisticated Stone Barrington, this pause-resister offers nonstop action. Stone and his ex-partner, Dino, are facing every policeman's worst fear. The people close to them are being murdered, probably by someone the two of them sent to prison in the past.

Recently named the #1 piece of 20th century literature, The Lord of the Rings trilogy is more than a great story. It's a much-needed reminder that, like J.R.R. Tolkien's hobbits, Christians are all on an epic quest. In examining the Christian themes in the trilogy, authors Kurt Bruner and Jim Ware find that truth and fiction are not as far apart as they seem.

Milwaukee, 1995. In a city still reeling from the crimes of Jeffrey Dahmer, a woman’s body is found with the lungs removed. Local cops think a Dahmer copycat is on the loose. But Patrick Bowers, working as a homicide detective for the Milwaukee Police Department, sees from the timing and location of the crime that this is not a copycat at all. It's a killer with an entirely different agenda....

Sprawling beneath the statue of William Penn, Philadelphia is a city of downtrodden crack houses and upscale brownstones. Somewhere in this concrete crazy quilt, one teenage Catholic girl is writing in her diary, another is pouring her heart out to a friend, and yet another is praying. And somewhere in this city is a man who wants these young women to make his macabre fantasy become reality. In a passion play of his own, he will take the girls–and a whole city–over the edge.

When young Jarret Pekoe aims to bring a band of violent border-jumpers to justice, his sister hires rifleman Lem Beauchamp to scare some sense into him. But when trouble arrives, they must work together to defeat the outlaws once and for all. Jarrett Pekoe cares about two things: his ranch and his family. So when rustlers kill his kin and burn his land to the ground, Jarrett won't rest until the men responsible have their necks caught in the hangman's rope.

Frederick Law Olmsted is arguably the most important historical figure that the average American knows the least about. Best remembered for his landscape architecture, from New York's Central Park to Boston's Emerald Necklace to Stanford University's campus, Olmsted was also an influential journalist, early voice for the environment, and abolitionist credited with helping dissuade England from joining the South in the Civil War. This momentous career was shadowed by a tragic personal life, also fully portrayed here.

After killing his wife and her lover, an unhinged and heavily armed Chicago cop named Bernie Shepard barricades himself at the top of a high-rise apartment building and sends a message to the police: Meet his demands, or he'll detonate enough explosives to blow the whole block sky high. If it's a choice between chewing the fat at his brother Maish's deli or hunting down armed lunatics, world-weary veteran cop Abe Lieberman knows where he stands. But no one's giving him a choice.

According to Maya legend, December 21, 2012, will mark the end of the world as we know it. Is it myth...or will their prediction become reality? Archaeologist Lina Taylor has devoted her life to studying ancient Maya artifacts, splitting her time between digs in South America and the classroom teaching college students. But the professor's structured, academic life is about to spin out of control. Some extremely valuable and important Maya artifacts have gone missing. Are the culprits fanatics determined to create chaos and usher in annihilation?

Billy Wayne Sinclair was only 21 when he heard the Louisiana judge pronounce these words: "I hereby sentence you to death in the electric chair." It was the culmination of a botched holdup committed the year before in which Billy had accidentally shot and killed a man. Billy spent the next 40 years in Angola Prison - one of the country’s worst - six of those years on death row. When in 1972 the Supreme Court struck down the death penalty as arbitrary and capricious, Billy was re-sentenced to life without parole.

What do you get when you take one stagecoach out of Denver, add a thousand-or-so bullets whizzing past your head, while sitting next to two headless corpses caught in the crossfire? If your name is Lou Prophet, you get revenge. Raucous, rowdy, ruthless revenge. Next question?

The fiction and reportage included in The Last Carousel, one of the final collections published during Nelson Algren’s lifetime, was written on ships and in ports of call around the world, and includes accounts of brothels in Vietnam and Mexico, stories of the boxing ring, and reminiscences of Algren’s beloved Chicago White Sox, among other subjects. In this collection, not just Algren’s intensity but his diversity are revealed and celebrated.

Patrick Bowers has pursued the nation's fiercest serial killers - and now one elusive foe is back for revenge. Settling into a new post at the FBI academy, Patrick and his fiancée, Lien-hua Jiang, are planning their future together with his stepdaughter, Tessa. But just when his life seems normal, a demon from the past returns to draw him down a dark road he hoped had closed forever.

Modern libertarianism began with Friedrich Hayek’s admirable corrective to the Depression-era vogue for central economic planning. It resisted oppressive state power. It showed how capitalism could improve life for everyone. Yet today, it’s a toxic blend of anarchism, disdain for the weak, and rationalization for environmental catastrophe. Andrew Koppelman’s book traces libertarianism’s evolution from Hayek’s moderate pro-market ideas to the romantic fabulism of Murray Rothbard, Robert Nozick, and Ayn Rand, and Charles Koch’s promotion of climate change denial.

In a place called No Man's Land, Texas rancher Ben Langham hired Luke Starbuck for his loyalty and toughness gained by riding with Rip Ford's Texas volunteers. But when Langham sent Starbuck after a band of horse thieves, a loyal man left behind the only home he had ever known - and met the stranger in himself.

Young Jim Curry's father is killed unjustly by an enraged mob, and the boy barely escapes the same fate. He shoots two pursuers and assumes they are dead, and in desperation becomes a most unusual outlaw, the Red Devil. He never kills, takes only ill-gained money, secretly returns it to the rightful owners, and escapes every pursuit on his remarkable horse, Meg. Spoiled Charlie Mark has left home to seek thrills and easy money. He vows to find the Red Devil and discover why he is so merciful and so particular about his victims.

The telephone rings. You just pick it up without thinking. It could be anyone. But this time it’s a killer and the killer’s got a name - and a victim. When Andy Zadinski picked up the phone that evening, he was cool. Just keep him talking. But when he called the police, they didn’t believe him. In fact, no one believed him, not even his father. After all, the whole thing was too weird to believe. Even Andy began to have doubts, until the killer started stalking him.

Flint, Wren, and Ace, along with Charles, are now members of the Eureka, a state-of-the-art vessel heading for a world in the far reaches of a new galaxy. Sixty years ago a colony ship was sent there, along with someone close to their benefactor. But when they arrive, they find getting to the surface isn’t as easy as they thought. With a crash-landing, and news that shocks the entire crew, they must collectively find a way to get the Pilgrim off-planet and into the fight against the Watchers.