Steel, Blood & Fire

Steel, Blood & Fire
Author: Allan Batchelder
Publisher: Crossroad Press
Total Pages: 529
Release: 2018-12-15
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:

TARMUN VYKERS His awestruck opponents call him The Reaper, an iron-willed man with no memory of his past, a ruthless champion who has risen to the level of death incarnate. But The Reaper has collected a legion of enemies as he cut a bloody swath through the greatest of heroes and villains. And these dogs have finally had their day, exacting a revenge both cruel and creative. Wandering lost, horribly disfigured and unable to fight, Vykers stumbles across the bones of a half-buried skeleton that can transform his ruined body in an inconceivable way. But first he must make a devil’s pact with… ARUNE A secretive, ghostly sorceress with ambitions of her own. If Vykers wants to wield a sword again, he must surrender to Arune that which he holds most dear. But can he trust this ethereal enchantress to hold up her end of their dangerous bargain? Vykers has few good choices, and he must make them quickly, for an impossibly talented and savage wizard has arisen to threaten all of humanity… THE END OF ALL THINGS Once an autistic boy hardly able to speak, The End has evolved into a supernatural terror bent on extinguishing all life. A fearsome and unequaled tactician, The End is the only person who doesn’t fear “The Reaper.” To have any hope of defeating this bloodthirsty mage, Vykers must gather the strangest, most dangerous cohort of killers ever assembled. Then he must seek out the only weapon that can defeat this terrible adversary… THE EPIC BATTLE Behold the greatest clash of men, monsters, and Fey that the kingdom has ever known. Vykers, at the head of his outnumbered contingent, launches a desperate attack against The End, with the fate of the world hanging in the balance. But The End is a creature worthy of his name. He has forged a secret weapon, a wicked and terrible instrument that will break through Vykers’ defenses and exact a devastating toll. Only one thing is certain, this extraordinary battle will end in a way that no one could have predicted!

Fire & Blood

Fire & Blood
Author: George R. R. Martin
Publisher: Bantam
Total Pages: 754
Release: 2020-08-04
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1524796301

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The thrilling history of the Targaryens comes to life in this masterly work, the inspiration for HBO’s Game of Thrones prequel series House of the Dragon “The thrill of Fire & Blood is the thrill of all Martin’s fantasy work: familiar myths debunked, the whole trope table flipped.”—Entertainment Weekly Centuries before the events of A Game of Thrones, House Targaryen—the only family of dragonlords to survive the Doom of Valyria—took up residence on Dragonstone. Fire & Blood begins their tale with the legendary Aegon the Conqueror, creator of the Iron Throne, and goes on to recount the generations of Targaryens who fought to hold that iconic seat, all the way up to the civil war that nearly tore their dynasty apart. What really happened during the Dance of the Dragons? Why was it so deadly to visit Valyria after the Doom? What were Maegor the Cruel’s worst crimes? What was it like in Westeros when dragons ruled the skies? These are but a few of the questions answered in this essential chronicle, as related by a learned maester of the Citadel and featuring more than eighty-five black-and-white illustrations by artist Doug Wheatley—including five illustrations exclusive to the trade paperback edition. Readers have glimpsed small parts of this narrative in such volumes as The World of Ice & Fire, but now, for the first time, the full tapestry of Targaryen history is revealed. With all the scope and grandeur of Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Fire & Blood is the first volume of the definitive two-part history of the Targaryens, giving readers a whole new appreciation for the dynamic, often bloody, and always fascinating history of Westeros. Praise for Fire & Blood “A masterpiece of popular historical fiction.”—The Sunday Times “The saga is a rich and dark one, full of both the title’s promised elements. . . . It’s hard not to thrill to the descriptions of dragons engaging in airborne combat, or the dilemma of whether defeated rulers should ‘bend the knee,’ ‘take the black’ and join the Night’s Watch, or simply meet an inventive and horrible end.”—The Guardian

Petrodor

Petrodor
Author: Joel Shepherd
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
Total Pages: 442
Release: 2011-02-24
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1459612019

Petrodor is a city of alleys and shadows, where life is cheap and the only respected currency is blood. Sasha, the wilful yet talented heroine of Sasha, returns to battle in Joel Shepherd's stunning second volume of A Trial of Blood & Steel.Away from the hills of her Lenayin homeland, she is fighting a new battle in the dark alleys and wealthy houses of Petrodor. An influential trading centre, Petrodor holds the key to preventing the coming war between Lenayin and the mighty Bacosh. Together with her mentor Kessligh, Sasha attempts to navigate the political intrigues of the port city and find a way to stop the war.It is the serrin, the beautiful but dangerous people from beyond the Bacosh, who will be the pivot in this struggle. How much can Sasha trust her old serrin friend Errollyn? And how much can she trust herself?

Steel and Blood

Steel and Blood
Author: Ha Mai Viet
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
Total Pages: 482
Release: 2008-10-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1612514332

When South Vietnam was abandoned by its American allies and consequently defeated by the North Vietnamese in 1975, all its military records were lost to the enemy. This has led to a paucity of factually based analyses of the war by South Vietnamese authors. In a project lasting some ten years, and financed by his own hard-earned resources, Colonel Viet has researched, documented, and analyzed the Vietnam War from the perspective of South Vietnamese armor forces, elements in which he himself played an important role as leader, teacher, and innovator. His travels to interview hundreds of people with first-hand knowledge of these matters took him back and forth across the United States (and to Canada, France and Australia) and enabled him to piece together the story as recalled by virtually every senior South Vietnamese who was involved, along with many of lesser rank but important experience, and many Americans as well. The result is a unique and invaluable work, one recounting from the early days of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam its organization and development, its combat operations, and its interaction with American advisors and then later with deployed American units. Viet tells this story as an historian would, not glossing over the shortcomings and failures of his fellow Vietnamese soldiers (or of the Americans), but also providing definitive accounts of their successes, their innovations, their courage and determination, and the hardships experienced and survived in the course of a long, difficult, and ultimately unsuccessful struggle. In Colonel Viet's words: "In order to give the truth back to history, we did not hide anything, whether it be victory or defeat." Finally, in a very touching portion of the work, Colonel Viet memorializes his fallen comrades of the armored force and commemorates the service of all the American advisors to the armored force he was able to identify.

Haven

Haven
Author: Joel Shepherd
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
Total Pages: 422
Release: 2011-06-30
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1459623630

The page-turning conclusion and final instalment of the Trial of Blood & Steel Quartet. The Army of the Regent Arrosh advances on the forces loyal to Saalshen, homeland of the serrin people, as the serrin's friends are in full retreat. Their only hope is to reach the city of Jahnd - the serrin word for Haven - across the River Ipshaal, the only human city in Saalshen itself.

Fire and Blood

Fire and Blood
Author: Ernst Jünger
Publisher: Independently Published
Total Pages: 106
Release: 2021-04-09
Genre:
ISBN:

Originally published in 1925, Fire and Blood (Feuer und Blut) is Ernst Jünger's fourth book, where he further elaborates on his experiences in the First World War. In Fire and Blood, Jünger expands on the chapter The Great Battle from his first book, In Storms of Steel (In Stahlgewittern), where he leads a company of assault troops during the Spring Offensive in 1918, which was Germany's last attempt to defeat the British and French armies on the Western Front. Fire and Blood is over four times the size of The Great Battle, resulting in stylistic changes, as well as more detailed descriptions of the event. This is an English translation of Feuer und Blut, published by Stahlhelm-Verlag, Magdeburg, Germany, 1925.

Blood and Steel

Blood and Steel
Author: Palmer Blackstock
Publisher:
Total Pages: 264
Release: 2019-09
Genre:
ISBN: 9781089217589

Death is a fickle thing. For most, it's a force of nature, but Agil Novan sees the reaper in a different light. As the greatest swordsman of all time, he cherishes life more than most, and he's lived one full of both struggle and success. After all of his accomplishments, he too must face the reaper and its scythe. When challenged, however, the swordsman is not one to go without a fight. After parrying it once and then impressing the reaper with a show of the blade, he is offered something more. A second chance at life--one that he's all but forced to accept. Now, stranded in an unfamiliar land with an unfamiliar body and far too many questions, Agil has his life threatened at every turn. Still, he is determined to survive. He knows what the reaper did to him. And he has never been one to let vengeance go unfulfilled.

Sasha

Sasha
Author: Joel Shepherd
Publisher: Prometheus Books
Total Pages: 552
Release: 2011-01-27
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1615926321

Spurning her royal heritage to be raised by the great warrior, Kessligh, her exquisite swordplay astonishes all who witness it. But Sasha is still young, untested in battle and often led by her rash temper. In the complex world of Lenayin loyalties, her defiant wilfulness is attracting the wrong kind of attention. Lenayin is a land almost divided by its two faiths: the Verenthane of the ruling classes and the pagan Goeren-yai, amongst whom Sasha now lives. The Goeren-yai worship swordplay and honour and begin to see Sasha as the great spirit—the Synnich—who will unite them. But Sasha is still searching for what she believes and must choose her side carefully. When the Udalyn people—the symbol of Goeren-yai pride and courage—are attacked, Sasha will face her moment of testing. How will she act? Is she ready to lead? Can she be the saviour they need her to be?

The End of All Things

The End of All Things
Author: Allan Batchelder
Publisher: Crossroad Press
Total Pages: 536
Release: 2019-10-31
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:

Tarmun Vykers, the Reaper, has battled his way across time and two continents, toppling kingdoms and empires alike and killing untold thousands in the process. And he has never really known why. But he’s about to find out. And with this new knowledge must come a reckoning—with the Queen, who has manipulated Vykers every step of the way, with the Emperor, who would take what is rightfully the Reaper’s, and even with the gods themselves. It is time for the Reaper to do what he does best.