Connecting Readers and Writers
Honoré de Balzac (20 May 1799 – 18 August 1850) was a French novelist and playwright. His great project, La Comédie humaine, is a sequence of nearly a hundred novels, stories and studies presenting a panorama of French society in the years after the fall of Napoleon.
The saying goes that the pen is mightier than the sword, and authorities throughout history seem to have agreed. The banning of words is older than printed books. In what is now the United States, the first known book banning took place in 1637, more than a century before the country existed, when Thomas Morton's satire of the Puritans, New English Canaan, was suppressed in Massachusetts.
Whether you play every week or only enjoy the atmosphere of a casino from a comfortable armchair, there is a long and brilliant shelf of books about gambling. This is our curated list: classics, thrillers, Las Vegas stories and the best non-fiction about poker and luck.
1870. Paris is a city under siege, literally and figuratively. The Franco-Prussian War is under way, and as the city waits for the Prussian army, its citizens throw themselves into every imaginable indulgence.
Continue reading Featured Book: Baudelaire's Revenge, by Bob Van Laerhoven
Anthony Greer's The Raven of Dusk: Transcendence uses multiple viewpoints and the distinct voices of its characters to tell the story of the planet Noreis and its descent into chaos and persecution.
Continue reading The Raven of Dusk: Transcendence, by Anthony Greer
Los Angeles is no stranger to violence. Sheriff's Homicide Detective Jim O'Brian and FBI profiler Special Agent Steve Hoffman know the city's dark history well, but something has changed: a serial killer is preying on other serial killers, some known to the police and some never even suspected.
Continue reading Book Review: Rise of The Iron Eagle by Roy A. Teel Jr.
Casino scenes are irresistible to novelists. A card table gives you hidden information, rising stakes and a moment of truth, all in one room. But readers who gamble will spot a fake game instantly, and one wrong detail can break the spell. Here is how to research, write and pace a casino scene that rings true.
Some final sentences tie a ribbon round a story and hand it to the reader as a satisfying gift. Others turn the whole book upside down and make you rethink everything you have just read.