Matsuyama Kaze is a ronin, or masterless samurai. Kaze must travel across Japan until he fulfills a promise made to his dying Lord and Lady -- to find their nine-year-old daughter.

When hotshot litigator Aaron Anders’ wife, Suzanne, goes looking for a divorce attorney, every lawyer in town turns her down. Except one. What was Camelia Belmont thinking? Desperate to make partner, Camelia takes Suzanne’s case, despite Aaron’s notorious scorched earth tactics. But when another high profile client kills himself, and her chances of making partner fizzle, Camelia barely manages to hold her anxiety and the vodka bottle at bay. To complicate matters, Suzanne’s health is failing, and all she wants is to die divorced. But the Paradise Valley socialite’s life gets complicated when sexy senior associate Kaitlyn Fischer is killed on her way to a midnight tryst ... in Suzanne’s car. Was Suzanne’s car used as a murder weapon? And was Suzanne the real target? Camelia’s boss, criminal defense attorney Byron McCaffrey, doesn’t want any part of it, but when she discovers a link to a product liability case Anders won on appeal, Camelia is convinced the “accident” was intended for Suzanne. But she’ll have to come up with more than circumstantial evidence against Aaron Anders, especially since the cops and the prosecutor’s office decide the case was accidental. Camelia can’t help but defy Byron’s demand to leave the criminal investigation alone, even if it means getting fired.. All Suzanne wants is a divorce, but her clock is ticking. Finally, Camelia gets a break from an unlikely ally, but is it too late? Can she discover what really happened or will someone get away with murder? Death At The Crossroads is the second book in the suspenseful Camelia Belmont Murder Mystery series. If you like soft-boiled whodunnits with a smart female sleuth, true-to-life characters, and dark insights into the legal profession, you’ll love PJ Donison’s second literary mystery in the series.

For more than a thousand years, Buddhism has dominated Japanese death rituals and concepts of the afterlife. The nine essays in this volume, ranging chronologically from the tenth century to the present, bring to light both continuity and change in death practices over time. They also explore the interrelated issues of how Buddhist death rites have addressed individual concerns about the afterlife while also filling social and institutional needs and how Buddhist death-related practices have assimilated and refigured elements from other traditions, bringing together disparate, even conflicting, ideas about the dead, their postmortem fate, and what constitutes normative Buddhist practice. The idea that death, ritually managed, can mediate an escape from deluded rebirth is treated in the first two essays. Sarah Horton traces the development in Heian Japan (794–1185) of images depicting the Buddha Amida descending to welcome devotees at the moment of death, while Jacqueline Stone analyzes the crucial role of monks who attended the dying as religious guides. Even while stressing themes of impermanence and non-attachment, Buddhist death rites worked to encourage the maintenance of emotional bonds with the deceased and, in so doing, helped structure the social world of the living. This theme is explored in the next four essays. Brian Ruppert examines the roles of relic worship in strengthening family lineage and political power; Mark Blum investigates the controversial issue of religious suicide to rejoin one’s teacher in the Pure Land; and Hank Glassman analyzes how late medieval rites for women who died in pregnancy and childbirth both reflected and helped shape changing gender norms. The rise of standardized funerals in Japan’s early modern period forms the subject of the chapter by Duncan Williams, who shows how the Soto Zen sect took the lead in establishing itself in rural communities by incorporating local religious culture into its death rites. The final three chapters deal with contemporary funerary and mortuary practices and the controversies surrounding them. Mariko Walter uncovers a "deep structure" informing Japanese Buddhist funerals across sectarian lines—a structure whose meaning, she argues, persists despite competition from a thriving secular funeral industry. Stephen Covell examines debates over the practice of conferring posthumous Buddhist names on the deceased and the threat posed to traditional Buddhist temples by changing ideas about funerals and the afterlife. Finally, George Tanabe shows how contemporary Buddhist sectarian intellectuals attempt to resolve conflicts between normative doctrine and on-the-ground funerary practice, and concludes that human affection for the deceased will always win out over the demands of orthodoxy. Death and the Afterlife in Japanese Buddhism constitutes a major step toward understanding how Buddhism in Japan has forged and retained its hold on death-related thought and practice, providing one of the most detailed and comprehensive accounts of the topic to date. Contributors: Mark L. Blum, Stephen G. Covell, Hank Glassman, Sarah Johanna Horton, Brian O. Ruppert, Jacqueline I. Stone, George J. Tanabe, Jr., Mariko Namba Walter, Duncan Ryuken Williams.

NOW A MAJOR ITV DRAMA A new translation of Georges Simenon's sensational tale of deceit and back-stabbing in an isolated community, book six in the new Penguin Maigret series. 'She came forward, the outlines of her figure blurred in the half-light. She came forward like a film star, or rather like the ideal woman in an adolescent's dream. 'I gather you wish to talk to me, Inspector . . . but first of all please sit down . . .' Her accent was more pronounced than Carl's. Her voice sang, dropping on the last syllable of the longer words.' Maigret has been interrogating Carl Andersen for seventeen hours without a confession. He's either innocent or a very good liar. So why was the body of a diamond merchant found at his isolated mansion? Why is his sister always shut away in her room? And why does everyone at Three Widows Crossroads have something to hide? Penguin is publishing the entire series of Maigret novels in new translations. This novel has been published in previous translations as Maigret at the Crossroads and The Crossroad Murders. 'Compelling, remorseless, brilliant' John Gray 'One of the greatest writers of the twentieth century . . . Simenon was unequalled at making us look inside, though the ability was masked by his brilliance at absorbing us obsessively in his stories' Guardian 'A supreme writer . . . unforgettable vividness' Independent

Perfect for Halloween! From the New York Times bestselling author of Escape From Mr. Lemoncello's Library and coauthor of I Funny and Treasure Hunters, comes a series of spine-tingling mysteries to keep you up long after the lights go out. Zack, his dad, and new stepmother have just moved back to his father’s hometown, not knowing that their new house has a dark history. Fifty years ago, a crazed killer caused an accident at the nearby crossroads that took 40 innocent lives. He died when his car hit a tree in a fiery crash, and his malevolent spirit has inhabited the tree ever since. During a huge storm, lightning hits the tree, releasing the spirit, who decides his evil spree isn’t over . . . and Zack is directly in his sights. Award-winning thriller author Chris Grabenstein fills his first book for younger readers with the same humorous and spine-tingling storytelling that has made him a fast favorite with adults. ★ “A rip-roaring ghost story.”—Booklist, Starred

An array of leading Democrats, Republicans, and independent thinkers provide a road map for America's political future. America is at a turning point. For the first time in history, the United States is the world's lone superpower--in Andrew Cuomo's words, "both the tamer and target of an unstable world." New technology and the omnipresent media have transformed the way we do everything, from amassing wealth to practicing politics. Simultaneously, the U.S. economy is in a shambles, with the largest federal budget deficit in our history. The coming octogenarian boom promises to put the greatest strain on federal government resources the United States has ever known, and America is faced with new security threats and diplomatic crises daily. The success of our nation in the coming decades will depend on how our elected leaders respond to these challenges. Can the Democrats, divided and ineffectual since well before the crushing defeats of 2002, revitalize their agenda, forge a meaningful message, and end the Republican stranglehold on the federal government? Can Republicans, fresh from new victories, build on their successes? And how will a younger generation, largely alienated from both parties but often intensely political, articulate its desires in the years ahead? The writers invited by Andrew Cuomo to contribute to this landmark book, a who's who of American leadership, address these and other pressing questions of our political life. At once a diagnosis and a call to arms, Crossroads will set the terms of political debate as America moves forward.