King Athan has been happy in his little kingdom, a hundred leagues north and east of the great city-states of Athens and Sparta. It was true he had stolen the kingdom of Dassaria, but it was his now, and he meant to make it a good place to live for his subjects. Blessed with a magical amulet, he has stopped aging and so believes he has all the time in the world. Athan, however, is learning that being a king is a lot harder and much more dangerous than he ever imagined. He and his men must face challenges ranging from the mundane to the desperate. His little kingdom must fight to survive against foes near and farin particular, the mighty Archimedean Empire, who are out to conquer whole region. Turning back the forces of the empire is just one of King Athans problems. Dassaria is once again threatened by an upstart would-be tyrant, and the king must mobilize his small army and find a way to eliminate this menace. Meanwhile, Athan finds loveand soon discovers the downside of his agelessness. In this fantasy novel, the third in a series, an ageless king faces threats to his kingdom, discovers true love, and learns that change is inevitable, even for the seemingly immortal.

Deep within the castle walls, Darj, a young squire, and Ona, a beautiful lady in waiting, are fraught with anxiety over the fate of their friend, Simjim. The old king is dead, the mourning period has ended, and the crowning of a new ruler rapidly approaches. What are the intentions of the apparent crown prince, Morgalt, as the day of coronation approaches? Why is he prolonging his ascension to the throne? The Old King Is Dead, by Dr. Joe D. Dillsaver, chronicles the attempts of the three friends to free themselves from the tangled web of mystery surrounding Morgalt. Darj, Ona, and Simjim find themselves in a race against time to find the ancient book containing the laws of Parlum. Can they find the answers before Morgalt takes the crown? Danger lurks around every turn, and no one is safe now that The Old King Is Dead.

A major study of the major and minor fiction, poetry, and children's books of SF and fantasy writer Ursula K. Le Guin. As Le Guin herself writes, "It is written in English, not academese, and will be of interest to a wide spectrum of students, scholars, and interested readers."

The fourth volume of The New Cambridge Medieval History covers the eleventh and twelfth centuries, which comprised perhaps the most dynamic period in the European middle ages. This is a history of Europe, but the continent is interpreted widely to include the Near East and North Africa. The volume is divided into two parts of which this, the second, deals with the course of events - ecclesiastical and secular - and major developments in an age marked by the transformation of the position of the papacy in a process fuelled by a radical reformation of the church, the decline of the western and eastern empires, the rise of western kingdoms and Italian elites, and the development of governmental structures, the beginnings of the recovery of Spain from the Moors and the establishment of western settlements in the eastern Mediterranean region in the wake of the crusades.