"For a long time, Chester, we... that is, Auntie and I and William, and well, a whole lot of people, well, we only sort of felt that something might be happening around us, something we weren't really sure what it was..."

When Chester visits his Uncle William's stuffy house, he's only trying to avoid cleaning the hall bathroom. But a single clue written on a gum wrapper will send them all on a frantic journey - across many cities and through places unknown to society. At every step along the way, they may even meet new and interesting people. They may need a few cases of bubblegum toothpaste. And they may be tossed into a terrible war between unimaginable forces, a battle that no one even knows about...

This collection of essays explores the development of electronic sound recording in Japanese cinema, radio, and popular music to illuminate the interrelationship of aesthetics, technology, and cultural modernity in prewar Japan. Putting the cinema at the center of a 'culture of the sound image', it restores complexity to a media transition that is often described simply as slow and reluctant. In that vibrant sound culture, the talkie was introduced on the radio before it could be heard in the cinema, and pop music adaptations substituted for musicals even as cinema musicians and live narrators resisted the introduction of recorded sound. Taken together, the essays show that the development of sound technology shaped the economic structure of the film industry and its labour practices, the intermedial relation between cinema, radio, and popular music, as well as the architecture of cinemas and the visual style of individual Japanese films and filmmakers.

Set during the reign of Henry I of England, a noble Saxon family struggles to co-exist with their Norman conquerors, treated by them as inferior in a land where once they held power. The Little Saxon is the youngest son in a family that had strong ties to the Saxon Kings. Younger sons, even in the great Norman families, could expect very little unless they married an heiress or rose in the ranks of the Church. This resulted in the ruthless pursuit of self-advancement with all the treachery and intrigue that it required. Even murder is not ruled out where advantage can be gained. Treasonous plots are hatched and foiled in which the Little Saxon has a part to play. He is not only skilled in the use of weapons, but has taken advantage of a monastic education to gain advancement in a world where learning among the ruling classes is a rarity. Interwoven with all the harshness of such turbulent times is a story in the tradition of Romeo and Juliet - tender, romantic, and ultimately tragic.

These three murder mysteries deal, as the titles suggest, with the world of opera, ballet, and drama, where not only artistic reputations can be murdered. Two of the novellas re-introduce the character of Detective Superintendent Ralph Hurstbourne, assisted by his wife Lady Letty, who just can't help getting involved. As usual, Hurstbourne's method is to find motives for murder to point to his suspects-- not always easy to determine. The characters are richly eccentric and theatrical as you would expect when dealing with people whose whole life is steeped in fantasy rather than reality.

Flora, a young ballet dancer, offered a job at a prestigious private opera house in the grounds of a ducal palace, finds herself surrounded by bitchiness and rivalries both professional and amorous. When an attempted murder occurs, an aristocratic detective is assigned to the case because of its high profile. His impartiality is threatened by his own connections to the ducal family. The case seems to get more and more complicated as further murders happen. Understandably, there are a great many suspects, cross-examination of whom is made difficult by their poor command of the English language. It is the interference of another of the dancers, a busy-body who hears and relays all the gossip, that eventually assists the police to solve the case.

All About Us is supposedly written by Aline Deal, a lively and precocious girl of eleven, nearly twelve. She describes her eccentric family and the lodgers who live at the top of their large house in the suburbs of London as well as all the various pets around the place. The family always seem to be short of money so that many of her exploits are concerned with finding ways to get some. Her narrative is sometimes perceptive, often funny and, when she deals with the break up of her parents relationship, touching. As Aline herself says : " I hope you enjoy reading my book and tell all your friends about it." If you like something wacky, you won't be disappointed.

After a freak storm, a long buried body is discovered in the grounds of a Jacobean mansion run by the National Trust. Detective Inspector Hambley needs to find out the identity of the deceased as well as the manner of his death. Progress in the case is not helped by the un-cooperative attitude of the aristocratic family who once owned Chelford Manor. It is only when a murder takes place in a London flat that links another member of the family, a world famous violinist, to this case, that Hambley begins to unravel the first mystery. He puts his career on the line by involving himself in the second case even though it is not in his area. He is greatly assisted by a fiercely feminist, ambitious, and astute female detective constable whose intuitions lead to the linking of the two cases and an eventual solution.

"For a long time, Chester, we... that is, Auntie and I and William, and well, a whole lot of people, well, we only sort of felt that something might be happening around us, something we weren't really sure what it was..."

When Chester visits his Uncle William's stuffy house, he's only trying to avoid cleaning the hall bathroom. But a single clue written on a gum wrapper will send them all on a frantic journey - across many cities and through places unknown to society. At every step along the way, they may even meet new and interesting people. They may need a few cases of bubblegum toothpaste. And they may be tossed into a terrible war between unimaginable forces, a battle that no one even knows about...

The old man bent down beside him, a wry grin in the corner of his mouth... "Are the stories real, you say? Now that is a fine question. Life can seem like a broken story, wandering, pointless, and without end..." Wendell's life has always been difficult and hopeless as wanders about the dusty streets of the city. Stealing rolls from the baker and getting hired to chase crows away, the only comfort he finds is in listening to the old stories and songs of the passing storytellers. Yet one day after he visits the royal painter, he will have to decide whether the stories are true enough to believe in... and to risk everything for. But there may be secrets to the stories which no one remembers anymore, that he will have to face... alone.

Like teas? Like Victoriana? This is the poetry book for you! For here you will find a collection of the poetic works of Karen Michelle Raines, from the philosophical to the frivolous, covering everything from September 11 to teas, with love poems and personal reflections mixed in. Each is composed in a lyrical style that is at times engaging, somber and descriptive, without being overly introspective. A delightful odyssey of poetry to enjoy and relive, time and again.