From the time that the Nets sold Julius Erving to the Philadelphia 76ers upon entering the NBA in 1976, until the point when they acquired Jason Kidd from the Phoenix Suns in a trade in 2001, the Nets were plagued by a series of events that were by turns tragic, ill-timed, unfortunate or just plain self-destructive.At least, until 2002, when so many of the ghosts of a quarter-century of misfortune (and occasional mismanagement) were virtually exorcized.These are the Nets. Their history is like that of no other sports organization in America. So lace up your old nylon Chuck Taylor Converse sneakers, inflate that old red, white and blue basketball you've got sitting in the garage and come join us for a long, strange trip back through Nets lore.

Jason Bond is a regular guy, working two jobs and trying to get his life back on track after caring for and losing his mother and two of his sisters to illness in a short few years. Working in retail during the day and as a security guard at night, Jason was trying to work his way to finally achieving his long-held dream: returning to college and getting his degree.But on a night at his security job, while a major snowstorm bore down upon the southern foothills of North Carolina, Jason Bond was suddenly pulled five hundred years into the future and into a world very different from his own.Gone was the small Southern towns of Forest City, Spindale and Rutherfordton, replaced by a massive sprawling metropolis known as Rutherford City, running over both North and South Carolina and home to over a billion humans and aliens.

Jason is a scriptwriter working on a film about Masada--the fortress where a thousand Jews killed themselves rather than be taken prisoner by the Romans in A. D. 73. He doubts that a film both honest and popular on such a subject can be made, and, while en route to the production site (Jason, producers and stars in first class--his wife and child in tourist), a dispute about the film and a crisis aboard the plane forces Jason to look at his life, his art, and the world around him in several different ways at once.

Sir Walter Scott defined the parameters of the historical novel and illustrated his concept of the genre by writing a long series of novels dealing with medieval times, the Elizabethan Age and the 18th Century. Later novels written by his contemporaries and successors attracted smaller audiences. When Robert Louis Stevenson, in the early 1880s, enthusiastically expanded the boundaries of romantic fiction, he became a standard-bearer and an inspiration to many of his fellow-novelists: Walter Besant, Richard Doddridge Blackmore, Arthur Quiller-Couch, Arthur Conan Doyle, Stanley John Weyman, Anthony Hope, Henry Rider Haggard, and Rafael Sabatini.

The slasher film genre got its start in the early 1960s when acclaimed filmmakers such as Alfred Hitchcock and Michael Powell made provocative mainstream film such as Psycho and Peeping Tom, but it is most associated with the late 1970s and the releases of Halloween and Friday the 13th. They have been frightening and thrilling audiences ever since with their bloody scenes and crazed killers. Over 250 slasher films are presented in this work. Entries provide major cast and production credits, a plot synopsis, and a short critique; interesting production notes are often provided. Some of the films covered include Alice, Sweet Alice, American Psycho, The Burning, Cherry Falls, Curtains, Deep Red, Frenzy, Hide and Go Shriek, Maniac, Prom Night, Scream, Sleepaway Camp, Slumber Party Massacre, and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Filmographies are provided for slasher directors, actors, writers, and composers.

Fate stepped in… Letitia Marsden had decided that men were not to be trusted. Then she met Dr. Jason Mourik van Nie, and he changed her mind. Learning to trust again wasn’t easy for either of them. This time, Letitia vowed, there would be a happy ending. But then Jason got the wrong idea about one of her male friends…. Could a chance meeting set it right? Surely fate wasn’t going to let a simple misapprehension stand in the way of true love?

Sisters Bernie and Libby Simmons are used to catering lip-smacking treats to an artsy group of book lovers—until fiction spills into reality . . . If anything can be said about endearingly predictable Margo Hemsley, it’s that she always serves elaborate desserts at her mystery book club meetings. That’s why everyone fears the worst after she doesn’t pick up her order from Bernie and Libby and skips out on the monthly gathering. The Simmons sisters can’t imagine their acquaintance vanishing like a character from one of her favorite novels, at least not willingly. When the search ends with the discovery of a dead body, Bernie and Libby agree to help the nine remaining book club members prove their friend was murdered. But a speed read through Margo’s background reveals there was more to the victim than harmless hobbies and frumpy cardigans would suggest. As the sleuthing sisters unearth scandalous secrets about the book club members, they’ll have to determine who was connected to Margo’s shady dealings—and who sent her to an early grave . . .