Phoenix Pick’s free eBook for December is L. Neil Smith’s The Venus Belt. The Coupon code for December (good from now through December 31) is 9991305 and the book is available in their online catalogue at www.PPickings.com or click here to enter the coupon code and download.

Book Description

More than a 150,000 women have been kidnapped without a trace or any ransom demand in the ‘normal’ world run by the Federalists and the bureaucracy. But that is not the only problem, because the freedom loving population in the ‘alternate’ reality of the North American Confederacy are facing their own crises.

People are disappearing across the Probability Broach, including Win Bear’s closest friend, Featherstone-Haugh (who heads the Confederacy), and even Win’s wife and assistant.

Ill (and deadly) winds are blowing and threatening to destroy the Probability Broach as we know it. Win Bear, keeping one step ahead of lethal assassins and fighting incredible odds, must solve multiple apparantly disparate cases that all seem to lead to the end of freedom.

“Custerology: The Enduring Legacy of the Indian Wars and George Armstrong Custer”, by Michael A. Elliott, is the free eBook of the month from University of Chicago Press. Get it from here.

Book Description

On a hot summer day in 1876, George Armstrong Custer led the Seventh Cavalry to the most famous defeat in U.S. military history. Outnumbered and exhausted, the Seventh Cavalry lost more than half of its 400 men, and every soldier under Custer’s direct command was killed.

It’s easy to understand why this tremendous defeat shocked the American public at the time. But with Custerology, Michael A. Elliott tackles the far more complicated question of why the battle still haunts the American imagination today. Weaving vivid historical accounts of Custer at Little Bighorn with contemporary commemorations that range from battle reenactments to the unfinished Crazy Horse memorial, Elliott reveals a Custer and a West whose legacies are still vigorously contested. He takes readers to each of the important places of Custer’s life, from his Civil War home in Michigan to the site of his famous demise, and introduces us to Native American activists, Park Service rangers, and devoted history buffs along the way. Elliott shows how Custer and the Indian Wars continue to be both a powerful symbol of America’s bloody past and a crucial key to understanding the nation’s multicultural present.

By Charles River Editors / Genre: Religion & Spirituality, History / Rating: -

In the years leading up to 2012, there has been much interest in the Maya calendar. Largely, this is because the calendar will complete its 5,200-year cycle on December 21, 2012, and this auspicious event has been misinterpreted as signaling the end of the world. For the Maya, the endings of calendar period of all lengths (cycles ranged from 20 days to centuries in length) were very important and required various types of rituals and offerings to be properly recognized. Often, the best acceptable “offering” was human blood, and Maya elites engaged in autosacrificial bloodletting to appease the deity presiding over the transition in question. Combined with the detailed Maya knowledge of astronomy, the calendar system functioned as a way for Maya priests and elites to know which particular god in their crowded pantheon was ruling at a particular moment. The Maya believed that each interval of time, embedded in units like the day, the night, the solar year, the k’atun (20 year cycle), the lunar cycle, and Venus’s cycle, was governed by a certain deity. Such knowledge was considered vital in Maya cosmology and allowed the elites to maintain and consolidate power, effect political change, and lend religious veracity to monumental building projects. The blending of technologies and religion extended to writing for the Maya, who used a writing system to codify and standardize religio-political beliefs.

Religions of the World: The Religion of the Maya examines the history and evolution of the Mayan religion, including its main tenets, the similarities it shares with other religions and the differences that make it unique. Along with pictures of important figures and places, you’ll learn about the Maya religion like never before.

Free as of 11/30/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

Unseen

By John Michael Hileman / Genre: Mystery & Thrillers, Romance / Rating: 4.1 out of 5 stars

Life for Jake Paris is stable and ordinary–until a mysterious old woman pays him a visit and he begins to have encounters with unruly children everywhere he goes—children only he can see.

When Jake’s estranged sister, Holly, finds herself the target of a national serial killer who has chosen her son as his next victim, Jake begins to wonder if there is a connection. Could these children be the ghosts of the killer’s victims?

As the kidnapper’s plan unfolds, Jake uncovers a startling secret about the unseen children that will change his life forever–and Holly discovers just how far she is willing to go to save her son. Unseen is a riveting story of rescue, restoration, and romance that will leave you thinking long after the last page has been turned.

Free as of 11/06/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

In Name Only

By Ellen Gable / Genre: Drama, Romance / Rating: 4.1 out of 5 stars

Caroline Martin’s life has finally taken a turn for the better. After years of hard work, she has met a virtuous and wealthy man whose love seems to promise the kind of life realized only within the comforting novels she keeps on her night table. Tragedy, however, will teach Caroline of the complexity with which God Himself authors the lives of those who turn towards Him.

Free as of 11/06/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

Suburban Task Force

By Addison Towne / Genre: Action & Adventure, Comic Fiction / Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars

Suburban Task Force is a humor filled, high octane, action-comedy. It follows Jade Lydell, who at thirty one finds herself living the surreal life of a married suburbanite. Her simple, and now materialistic days are busy with shopping, drinking and playing with couples that live the same high-end lifestyle.

It takes a home invasion scare and a co-workers brutal mugging to wake Jade from her suburban slumber. The adventure begins when she and her two best friends forgo an uplifting spa retreat for an intense tactical, gun and self defense weekend, all without their husbands’ knowledge.

Free as of 11/06/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

Two Scoops of Grace with Chuckles on Top

By Jeanette Levellie / Genre: Humor / Rating: 4.9 out of 5 stars

What do drive-by diaper stores and God have in common? When is blabbing an acceptable habit? Why should you beware of moths and slugs?
In her entertaining, uplifting style, award-winning author and humorist Jeanette Levellie weaves 72 amusing stories with affirming biblical truths that will help you:
* Laugh when you find cow patties in your field instead of daisies
* Discover the bottomless heart of God
* Grow in your acceptance of yourself and others

Free as of 11/06/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

When You Come Home

By Nancy Pitts / Genre: History, Romance / Rating: 4.8 out of 5 stars

Taking its title from a poem newlywed Daphne sent her soldier husband during World War II, When You Come Home tells of their young love in the heartland at the brink of war, and of the crushing uncertainty and fear as they find themselves a world apart. And when the poem comes back to Daphne – blood-stained by Raymond’s mortal wounds – When You Come Home shares the extraordinary event that restores the grieving young widow’s faith in the transcendent power of love.

Free as of 11/06/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

The Apothecary’s Daughter

By Julie Klassen / Genre: Religious Fiction / Rating: 4.2 out of 5 stars

Lillian Haswell, brilliant daughter of the local apothecary, yearns for more adventure and experience than life in her father’s shop and their small village provides. She also longs to know the truth behind her mother’s disappearance, which villagers whisper about but her father refuses to discuss. Opportunity comes when a distant aunt offers to educate her as a lady in London. Exposed to fashionable society and romance–as well as clues about her mother–Lilly is torn when she is summoned back to her ailing father’s bedside. Women are forbidden to work as apothecaries, so to save the family legacy, Lilly will have to make it appear as if her father is still making all the diagnoses and decisions. But the suspicious eyes of a scholarly physician and a competing apothecary are upon her. As they vie for village prominence, three men also vie for Lilly’s heart.

Free as of 11/01/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

A Larger Universe

By James Gillaspy / Genre: Science Fiction / Rating: 4.6 out of 5 stars

The broadcast interview of a young computer prodigy attracts the attention of aliens aboard an interstellar trading ship. The kidnapping of Tommy (and his cat) begins an adventure among the stars, a coming of age story entangled with computers, faster-than-light travel, a dying civilization, and an ancient evil.

On board the five-thousand-meter starship, he meets a crew of humans, descended from peasants, priests, and soldiers taken from Earth a thousand years before. He soon learns that all are slaves to the seldom-seen aliens inhabiting the upper third of the ship. His first months are spent in mindless work that he later learns is meant to domesticate his “feral” nature.

Free as of 11/01/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

Scared: A Novel on the Edge of the World

By Tom Davis / Genre: Fiction / Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars

Stuart Daniels has hit bottom. Once a celebrated and award-winning photojournalist, he is reeling from debt, a broken marriage, and crippling depression. The source of Stuart’s grief is his most famous photo, a snapshot of brutality in the dangerous Congo. A haunting image that indicts him as a passive witness to gross injustice.

Stuart is given a one last chance to redeem his career: A make-or-break assignment covering the AIDS crisis in a small African country. It is here that Stuart meets Adanna, a young orphan fighting for survival in a community ravaged by tragedy and disease. But in the face of overwhelming odds, Adanna finds hope in a special dream, where she is visited by an illuminated man and given a precious gift.

Free as of 11/01/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

A Distant Eden

By Lloyd Tackitt / Genre: Action & Adventure, Mystery & Thrillers / Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars

December 2012, a massive solar storm knocks out the power grid. Three hundred million Americans are suddenly faced with a survival situation. They have no water, electricity or fuel. Food rapidly disappears from the store shelves, not to be replaced. Only three percent will survive. Those three percent will have much in common. What does it take to be one of them?

Free as of 11/01/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

The Accidental Anarchist

By Bryna Kranzler / Genre: Biographies & Memoirs, History / Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars

By the time he was twenty-five years old, Jacob Marateck had been a Jewish officer in the notoriously anti-Semitic Russian army during the Russo-Japanese War, a revolutionary who sought to overthrow the Czar, and sentenced to death three times. After avoiding the firing squad for the final, unlikely time, he escaped from a Siberian forced labor camp with Warsaw’s colorful “King of Thieves.” Together, the two struggled to survive and obtain false papers to travel home while avoiding the Secret Police. Told from Marateck’s uniquely humorous perspective, The Accidental Anarchist is the remarkable, true story of an ordinary man made extraordinary by participating in the history-making events of the 1900s in Russia and Poland. Throughout all the hardships he endured, he never lost his optimism, which was key to his survival.

Free as of 11/01/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

Savage Sky: Life and Death on a Bomber over Germany in 1944

By George Webster / Genre: History / Rating: 4.7 out of 5 stars

“For anyone interested in WW2, this is a must read.”

Gives the reader a firsthand look at war from inside a B-17 bomber in World War II. Focuses on the 92nd Bomb Group, 8th Air Force and includes missions to the Schweinfurt ball-bearing plant and Berlin. One of the first accounts of being shot down over Sweden.

The Savage Sky is as close as you can get to experiencing aerial combat while still staying firmly planted on the ground. The writing is vivid and intimate, describing the bitter cold at high altitudes, gut-wrenching fear, lethal shrapnel from flak, and German fighters darting through the bomber formation like feeding sharks.

Free as of 9/28/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

Ghosts of Rosewood Asylum

By Stephen Prosapio / Genre: Horror, Mystery & Thrillers / Rating: 4.6 out of 5 stars

“I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who enjoys ghost stories or the horror genre.”

Zach Kalusky, host of Sci-D TV’s Xavier Paranormal Investigators, is ecstatic when he’s given the opportunity to explore the most haunted site in Chicago for a Halloween Special: Rosewood Asylum, a place long made off-limits by the local government, plagued by decades of mysterious fires and unexplained events. It’s Zach’s dream investigation- but there’s a catch: the network forces Xavier Paranormal Investigators to partner with the more dramatic-but less ethical-Demon Hunters. Now, Zach must fight for both his show’s integrity and his team’s loyalty while trying to protect his own secret: that he, himself, is possessed.

Free as of 9/28/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

The Dragon and the Unicorn

By A. A. Attanasio / Genre: Fantasy / Rating: 4.1 out of 5 stars

“An enchanted tale of epic scope.”

A dragon’s dreamsong, a hunt for the unicorn’s horn, and the ceaseless wars of angels and demons begin this bold retelling of the Arthurian cycle. Here is magic. And dark romance. Here is Merlin’s most dangerous sorcery: the supernatural love story of Uther Pendragon and Ygrane queen of the Celts.

Old as the Big Bang, the demon Lailoken assumes human form in Roman Britain as Celts battle Saxons for mastery. The druid-queen he serves calls him Myrddin and sends him to find her true love—to fulfill an ancient prophecy at the frontier of life and death for her people.

In this first volume of Attanasio’s Arthurian saga, all the core elements appear: chronicling Vortigern’s defeat of the Saxons, the ascendancy of Theodosius Ambrosius (Uther Pendragon), the birth of Arthur and eventually Merlin’s lodging the sword in the stone.

Free as of 9/28/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

Tinseltown Fairytale

By Kenneth Rosenberg / Genre: Romance / Rating: 4.3 out of 5 stars

“This is a very readable story, with heartfelt images and great characters.”

Warren August is down and out in Hollywood, flat broke and living on the streets. When he stumbles onto a movie set in search of food, he sets in motion a chain of events that could finally turn his life around. He might even win back his beloved Ophelia. Sweet, sweet Ophelia, who broke his heart three years before. But can he hold it together long enough to redeem himself? And will she ever take him back?

Free as of 9/28/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

The Law of Attraction Made Simple – Magnetize Your Heartfelt Desires

By Jonathan Manske / Genre: Religion & Spirituality / Rating: 4.7 out of 5 stars

“This is a simple, easy to read book that reads more like a manual on how to effectively put the Law of Attraction to use!”

Do you want to attract greater happiness, success and fulfillment?

Finally, an eye-opening book packed with powerful and easy to use tips, tools and techniques to activate the Law of Attraction in your life. Become a magnet for more of what you want in your personal and professional life. Get the results you deserve. You will be amazed at how simple it is.

This book puts Jonathan’s magical methods in your hands for immediate use.

Today’s thoughts, attitudes and non-conscious programming create tomorrow’s results.

Free as of 9/28/2012 for Kindle. Click here to find out if this book is still FREE.

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