Evolving from a patrician domus, the emperor's residence on the Palatine became the centre of the state administration. Elaborate ceremonial regulated access to the imperial family, creating a system of privilege which strengthened the centralised power. Constantine followed the same model in his new capital, under a Christian veneer. The divine attributes of the imperial office were refashioned, with the emperor as God's representative. The palace was an imitation of heaven. Following the loss of the empire in the West and the Near East, the Palace in Constantinople was preserved - subject to the transition from Late Antique to Mediaeval conditions - until the Fourth Crusade, attracting the attention of Visgothic, Lombard, Merovingian, Carolingian, Norman and Muslim rulers. Renaissance princes later drew inspiration for their residences directly from ancient ruins and Roman literature, but there was also contact with the Late Byzantine court. Finally, in the age of Absolutism the palace became again an instrument of power in vast centralised states, with renewed interest in Roman and Byzantine ceremonial. Spanning the broadest chronological and geographical limits of the Roman imperial tradition, from the Principate to the Ottoman empire, the papers in the volume treat various aspects of palace architecture, art and ceremonial.

Private detective-cum-bartender Mike Breza is called upon by his old friend, Anjo Denovo, to travel to Brazil to help investigate a series of grisly murders in the city of Salvador in the northeastern state of Bahia. A surprise family connection turns the Denovo/Breza investigative team into a threesome contending with linguistic and cultural ignorance, imported evil, home-grown physical violence, and lethal bureaucracy to resolve questions whose answers might be better left unspoken. MIracles are in short supply, even in The Bay of All Saints.

"Anchorage private eye Mark Osborn hasn't had a drink for years, but a missing persons case in Fairbanks could change all that. Redheads, park rangers, federal agents and low-life thugs are only some of the dangers that make up the gauntlet Mark must run to solve the case and put his own private demons to rest."