The End Of Forever A Cassiopeia Vitt Adventure

Tragedy has found Cassiopeia Vitt. The woman she admires most, Esmerelda Fontana, has been brutally murdered. Then Cassiopeia’s castle rebuilding project is viciously attacked and people are hurt. Are the two incidents related? The answer comes when her old friend, Nicodème L’Etoile, is threatened and she finds herself drawn into a tangled web of revenge that leads straight to the person she loves the most. Cotton Malone. And his life will depend on what she does next. From the rocky coasts of northern Spain, to a medieval building site in France, and finally into Italy and the oldest surviving republic in the world, Cassiopeia must confront a devil from her past, a man obsessed with her destruction. The choices she has to make will be the toughest she’s ever faced. Life and death decisions that force her—to the end of forever.

**Best Books of August ~ Apple Books** “Coauthors Steve Berry and M.J. Rose take lots of hairpin turns, making for an intense, suspenseful, and action-packed read. The Lake of Learning is the kind of page-turner that makes you crave a big bowl of popcorn—we just wanted it to keep on going.”~ Apple Books For over a decade Cassiopeia Vitt has been building an authentic French castle, using only materials and techniques from the 13th century. But when a treasure is unearthed at the construction site—an ancient Book of Hours—a multitude of questions are raised, all pointing to an ancient and forgotten religious sect. Once the Cathars existed all across southern France, challenging Rome and attracting the faithful by the tens of thousands. Eventually, in 1208, the Pope declared them heretics and ordered a crusade—the first where Christians killed Christians—and thousands were slaughtered, the Cathars all but exterminated. Now a piece of that past has re-emerged, one that holds the key to the hiding place of the most precious object the Cathars possessed. And when more than one person becomes interested in that secret, in particular a thief and a billionaire, the race is on. From the medieval walled city of Carcassonne, to the crest of mysterious Montségur, to a forgotten cavern beneath the Pyrenees, Cassiopeia is drawn deeper and deeper into a civil war between two people obsessed with revenge and murder.

The time has come for Cassiopeia Vitt to sell her ancestral home. It sits on a Spanish bluff by the Mediterranean Sea, and bears the name Casa de Hace Mucho Tiempo, House of Long Ago. Trapped inside its walls are memories from a time when Cassiopeia was growing from a rebellious adolescent into a thoughtful young woman-regretful times when she often found herself estranged from her parents. Also inside are fifteen paintings, each one a masterpiece, together representing an investment in the tens of millions of euros-her father's private art collection-which she intends to donate to museums. But when an art expert declares all fifteen paintings fake, and suggests that her father may have been involved with something illegal, she embarks on a quest to find answers.From a secret repository in Andorra, to a mysterious yacht in the Mediterranean, then finally onto the streets of Paris and a horrific reminder from World War II, Cassiopeia must battle every step of the way to stay alive-a fight that will finally bring her face to face with the truth about the House of Long Ago.

As a favor to enigmatic billionaire Henrik Thorvaldsen, Cassiopeia Vitt treks into Bulgaria's Rila mountains in search of a buried stash of exceedingly rare artifacts from a bygone civilization: the ancient tomb of a Thracian king. But when her presence is discovered by a shadowy group of Russians secretly mining the area, she needs a way out. Who to trust becomes the question, and her life depends on choosing the right option.

In 323 B.C.E, having conquered Persia, Alexander the Great set his sights on Arabia, then suddenly succumbed to a strange fever. Locating his final resting place-unknown to this day-remains a tantalizing goal for both archaeologists and treasure hunters. Now the quest for this coveted prize is about to heat up. And Cotton Malone-former U.S. Justice Department agent turned rare-book dealer-will be drawn into an intense geopolitical chess game. After narrowly escaping incineration in a devastating fire that consumes a Danish museum, Cotton learns from his friend, the beguiling adventurer Cassiopeia Vitt, that the blaze was neither an accident nor an isolated incident. As part of campaign of arson intended to mask a far more diabolical design, buildings across Europe are being devoured by infernos of unnatural strength. And from the ashes of the U.S.S.R., a new nation has arisen: Former Soviet republics have consolidated into the Central Asian Federation. At its helm is Supreme Minister Irina Zovastina, a cunning despot with a talent for politics, a taste for blood sport, and the single-minded desire to surpass Alexander the Great as history's ultimate conqueror. Backed by a secret cabal of powerbrokers, the Federation has amassed a harrowing arsenal of biological weapons. Equipped with the hellish power to decimate other nations at will, only one thing keeps Zovastina from setting in motion her death march of domination: a miraculous healing serum, kept secret by an ancient puzzle and buried with the mummified remains of Alexander the Great-in a tomb lost to the ages for more than 1,500 years. Together, Cotton and Cassiopeia must outrun and outthink the forces alliedagainst them. Their perilous quest will take them to the shores of Denmark, deep into the venerated monuments of Venice, and finally high inside the desolate Pamir mountains of Central Asia to unravel a riddle whose solution could destroy or save millions of people-depending on who finds the lost tomb first. From the Hardcover edition.

American President Cotton Malone tackles the secrets of Mormonism, a U.S. Senator's stealthy secession plan, and a history-shaping letter that was handed down through the chief executive line.

From the New York Times bestselling author, an ambitious and explosive international thriller with an unexpected historical twist A hidden treasure. A forgotten truth. Cotton Malone is in trouble. His son has been kidnapped and his bookshop in Copenhagen attacked, all because he is the only man alive who knows the whereabouts of the Alexandria link - the means of locating the most important cache of ancient knowledge ever assembled: the legendary Library of Alexandria, which vanished without trace fifteen hundred years ago. Now, Malone is forced to join the search for a forgotten truth hidden within that vast literary treasure - a truth that, if revealed, will have grave consequences, not only for Malone, but for the balance of world power . . .

In this masterfully written and brilliantly informed work, Dr. Rhorne, the Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics at Caltech, leads readers through an elegant, always human, tapestry of interlocking themes, answering the great question: what principles control our universe and why do physicists think they know what they know? Features an introduction by Stephen Hawking.

Tandia sat waiting anxiously for the fight to begin between the man she loved the most and the man she hated the most in the world. Tandia is a child of Africa: half Indian, half African, beautiful and intelligent, she is only sixteen when she is first brutalised by the police. Her fear of the white man leads her to join the black resistance movement, where she trains as a terrorist. With her in the fight for justice is the one white man Tandia can trust, the welterweight champion of the world, Peekay. Now he must fight their common enemy in order to save both their lives. 'This is a marvellous book . first and foremost it is a momentous story, for Bryce Courtenay is a glorious storyteller.' The Advertiser 'Nine hundred pages of sheer blockbuster pleasure.' Sunday Age brycecourtenay.com facebook.com/BryceCourtenay

In bestselling author Steve Berry's stunning novel, former Justice Department agent Cotton Malone encounters information from a secret World War II dossier that, if proven true, would not only rewrite history - it could change the political landscape of Europe forever. Two candidates are vying to become Chancellor of Germany. One is a patriot who has served for many years, the other a usurper, stoking the flames of nationalistic hate. Both harbour secrets, but only one knows the truth about the other. Everything turns on the events of one fateful day - April 30, 1945 - and what happened deep beneath Berlin in the Führerbunker. Did Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun die there? Did Martin Bormann, Hitler's close confidant, manage to escape? And possibly even more important, where did billions in Nazi wealth disappear to in the waning days of the war? The answers to these questions will determine who becomes the next Chancellor. Racing from Chile to South Africa, and finally the secret vaults of Switzerland, former Justice Department agent Cotton Malone must uncover the truth about the fates of Hitler, Braun, and Bormann - revelations that could not only transform Europe, but finally expose a mystery known as the Kaiser's Web.