Showing results by author "Walter" in All Categories

What caused the extinction of the dinosaurs? Walter Alvarez, one of the Berkeley scientists who discovered evidence of the impact, tells the story behind the development of the initially controversial theory. It is a saga of high adventure in remote locations, of arduous data collection and intellectual struggle, of long periods of frustration ended by sudden breakthroughs, of friendships made and lost, and of the exhilaration of discovery that forever altered our understanding of Earth's geological history.

Based on thousands of pages from Leonardo's astonishing notebooks and new discoveries about his life and work, Walter Isaacson weaves a narrative that connects his art to his science. He shows how Leonardo's genius was based on skills we can improve in ourselves, such as passionate curiosity, careful observation, and an imagination so playful that it flirted with fantasy.

In 2012, Nobel Prize winning scientist Jennifer Doudna hit upon an invention that will transform the future of the human race: an easy-to-use tool that can edit DNA. Known as CRISPR, it opened a brave new world of medical miracles and moral questions. It has already been deployed to cure deadly diseases, fight the coronavirus pandemic of 2020 and make inheritable changes in the genes of babies. But what does that mean for humanity?

It's anything but Grimm when the Tell 'Em Steve Dave crew gives their hilarious takes on some of the best and least known fairy tales. Join Bryan Johnson, Brian Quinn and Walt Flanagan with special guest Sunday Jeff as they create a magical world of fantasy and wonder, trolls, living plants, and sinful dwarves. It doesn't get any better than this...or funnier.

To Fast Eddie Felsen, a young pool hustler, there was only one thing that mattered: to make the big time and the big money in the world of pool by beating the best in the country. Hustling suckers in small towns for good stake money was practice for his goal, and when he felt ready he went to Bennington's pool hall in Chicago to find Minnesota Fats. Eddie and Fats pit nerve against skill in a fantastic match over an unbroken 36 hours.

Meet the three women whose lives are about to change forever: Abbie has fled London and the humiliation of not being able to make rent after being made redundant. Her sister, Louise, unlucky in love, has thrown herself into her career at the local hospital. And Eszter, who has travelled from Hungary with her daughter Zoe, hoping to fulfil her husband's dying wish...to reunite his family.

It’s been seven years since the end of the Naxid War. Sidelined for their unorthodox tactics by a rigid, tradition-bound military establishment, Captain Gareth Martinez and Captain Lady Sula are stewing in exile, frustrated and impatient to exercise the effective and lethal skills they were born to use in fighting the enemy. Yet after the ramshackle empire left by the Shaa conquerors is shaken by a series of hammer blows that threaten the foundations of the commonwealth, the result is a war no one planned, no one expected, and no one knows how to end.

When an overnight camping trip in the woods on Halloween night goes wrong, and a girl ends up dead with what looks like animal wounds, the whole neighbourhood is shocked. How did it happen? And more importantly what was it that killed her?

The police don't show up on Easy Rawlins's doorstep until the third girl dies. It's Los Angeles, 1956, and it takes more than one murdered black girl before the cops get interested. Now they need Easy. As he says: "I was worth a precinct full of detectives when the cops needed the word in the ghetto." But Easy turns them down. He's married now, a father -- and his detective days are over.

Walter Moers' Bestseller: Wolpertinger Rumo auf großer Fahrt durch Zamonien. Rumo, der junge Wolpertinger aus "Die 13 ½ Leben des Käpt'n Blaubär", macht sich selbstständig und geht seinen Weg durch den gefährlichen Kontinent Zamonien. Er folgt einer Geruchsspur, die nur er wittern kann. Auf seiner abenteuerlichen Reise durch Oben- und Untenwelt verschlägt es ihn in den geheimnisvollen Nurnenwald und in das Theater der Schönen Tode. Er begegnet Teufelszyklopen und Mondlichtschatten, den Kupfernen Kerlen und den Toten Yetis - und endlich findet Rumo zu Rala, die ihm die Wunder im Dunkeln zeigt.

An elderly woman is found dead, her death peaceful but unexpected. Days later, a middle aged former television journalist dies in a similar manner. Both deaths prove to be murder, but with no obvious links between the two victims. When a former neurologist is also found murdered, it appears that DCI Kenny Murrain is dealing with a random multiple killer.

Since 1946, more than 250 armed conflicts have broken out around the world, a number that continues to rise. Major civil wars are now being fought in countries including Iraq, Syria and Libya. Smaller civil wars are being fought in Ukraine, India and Malaysia. Even countries we thought could never experience another civil war are showing signs of unrest. Acclaimed expert Barbara F. Walter, who has advised on political violence everywhere from the CIA to the US Senate to the United Nations, explains the rise of civil war and the conditions that create it.

Detective Easy Rawlins returns in a mystery set in 1961 Los Angeles as Easy accepts a job searching for a beautiful woman nicknamed Black Betty who works as a housekeeper in Beverly Hills.

Seventeen-year-old Raine Cooper has enough on her plate dealing with her father's disappearance, her mother's erratic behavior, and the possibility of her boyfriend relocating. The last thing she needs is Torin St. James - a mysterious new neighbor with a wicked smile and uncanny way of reading her. Raine is drawn to Torin's dark sexiness against her better judgment, until he saves her life with weird marks, and she realizes he is different. But by healing her, Torin changes something inside Raine.

Walter M. Miller, Jr., is best remembered as the author of A Canticle for Leibowitz, which has been universally recognized as one of the greatest novels of modern science fiction. But he also produced many shorter works of fiction of stunning originality and power. His profound interest in religion and his innate literary gifts combined perfectly in the production of such works as The Darfstellar, for which he won a Hugo in 1955, Conditionally Human, "I, Dreamer", and "The Big Hunger", all of which are included in this brilliant and essential collection.

The Dark Grace is dead. Feared and despised for the sinister power in her veins, Alyce has spent 100 years wreaking her revenge on the kingdom that made her an outcast. Once a realm of decadence and beauty, Briar is now wholly Alyce's wicked domain. No one escapes the consequences of her wrath. Not even the one person who holds her heart. Princess Aurora saw through Alyce's thorny facade, earning a love that promised the dawn of a new age. But that love came with a heavy price

One winter's night, a lone figure arrives on foot in a remote Pennine village. The next morning, as the first heavy snow begins to fall, a man's body is discovered in the village churchyard. Anne Tilston, one of three sisters living in a brooding run-down house in the shadow of the church, realises that the dead man is her father, a disgraced former senior police officer long estranged from his family.

Acid Row. The name the beleaguered inhabitants give to their 'sink' estate. A no-man's land of single mothers and fatherless children—where angry, alienated youth controls the streets. Into this battleground comes Sophie Morrison, a young doctor visiting a patient in Acid Row. Little does she know that she is entering the home of a known pedophile . . . and with reports circulating that a tormented child called Amy has disappeared, the vigilantes are out in force

The Praxis, the empire of now extinct Shaa, has again fallen into civil war, with desperate and outnumbered humans battling alien species for survival. Leading the human forces are star-crossed lovers Gareth Martinez and Caroline Sula, who must find a way to overcome their own personal history to defeat the aliens and assure humanity’s survival. But even if the human fleet is victorious, the divisions fracturing the empire may be too wide to repair, as battles between politicians, the military, and fanatics who want to kill every alien threaten to further tear the empire apart.

Scott's thrilling Gothic tale of romance, mystery, adventure and heroism is replete with hidden treasure, cliffhangers, eerie ruined abbeys and down-to-earth characters. It's centered around the figure of an antiquary - an amateur historian and archaeologist - who provides a brilliantly witty commentary on the unfolding adventures. Just as accessible and enjoyable today as it would have been when first published almost two hundred years ago, the novel still enjoys huge popularity throughout the world.