Most Popular Books by Mary Gentle

What is an orc? An orc is an 18 stone fighting machine, made of muscle, hide, talon and tusk, with a villainous disposition and a mean sense of humour. And, of course, an orc is a poor dumb grunt - the much abused foot soldier of the Evil Horde of Darkness. The usual last battle of Good against Evil is about to begin. Orc Captain Ashnak and his war-band know exactly what they can expect. The forces of Light are outnumbered, full of headstrong heroes devoid of tactics - but the Light''s still going to win. Orcs - the sword fodder in the front line - will die by the thousands. Life''s a bitch.

For the beautiful young woman Ash, life has always been arquebuses and artillery, swords and armour and the true horrors of hand-to-hand combat. War is her job. She has fought her way to the command of a mercenary company, and on her unlikely shoulders lies the destiny of a Europe threatened by the depredations of an Infidel army more terrible than any nightmare. Winner of the BSFA Award for best novel, 2000

Mary Gentle is one of Britain''s most outstanding writers of imaginative fiction, able to move seamlessly from science fiction to fantasy within the same story. Following on from the success of ASH, 1610: A SUNDIAL IN A GRAVE and the omnibus volumes WHITE CROW and ORTHE, comes CARTOMANCY, the definitive collection of Mary Gentle''s short fiction. CARTOMANCY includes the stories from SOLDIERS AND SCHOLARS as well as a number of tales previously unpublished in book form, all with new afterwords and topped and tailed with a specially revised version of her split story ''Cartomancy''.

It is a nameless city somewhere between past and future, a mythic realm at the "heart of the world," where wicked Rat Lords have reduced all humankind to slaves, and god-daemons make the decision to end all existence. This energizes a compelling quest for survival, and prompts the powerful White Crow to order an uprising against this chaotic strike that threatens them all. Among those who respond to her are the defiant Prince Lucas of Candover, a student at the University of Crime, and no mans''s slave; and Zari, the young Katayan woman who is destined to become the living Memory of all that follows. And others rally to join them in one final desperate revolt, hoping to create a magic powerful enough to reshape the very nature of how they live.

Teenaged Holly finds a strange coin which leads her and her friend Chris into strange adventures with the magical people of the Hollow Hills.

Orthe - half-civilized, half-barbaric, home to human-like beings who live and die by the code of the sword. Earth envoy Lynne Christie has been sent here to establish contact and to determine whether this is a world worth developing. But first Christie must come to understand that human-like is not and never can be human, and that not even Orthe''s leaders can stop the spread of rumors about her, dark whisperings that could cost Christie her life.And on a goodwill tour to the outlying provinces, these evil rumors turn to deadly accusations. Christie is no offworlder, Church officials charge: she is a treacherous and cunning descendant of Orthe''s legendary Golden Witchbreed - the cruel, ruthless race that once enslaved the whole planet. Suddenly, Christie finds herself a hunted fugitive on an alien world, where friend and foe alike may prove her executioners. And her only chance of survival lies in saving Orthe from a menace older than time...

Mercenaries in lace and steel roam the countryside and the heads of criminals are impaled on London Bridge. The characters'' relationships are played out in the shadow of the hangman''s rope. Sequel to Rats and Gargoyles.

The year is 1610. Continental Europe is briefly at peace after years of war, but Henri IV of France is planning to invade the German principalities. In England, only five years earlier, conspirators nearly succeeded in blowing up King James I and his Parliament. The seeds of the English Civil War and the Thirty Years War are visibly being sown, and the possibility for both enlightenment and disaster abounds. But Valentin Rochefort, duelist and spy for France''s powerful financial minister, could not care less. Until he is drawn into the glittering palaces, bawdy back streets, and stunning theatrics of Renaissance France and Shakespearean London in a deadly plot both to kill King James I and to save him. For this swordsman without a conscience is about to find himself caught between loyalty, love, and blackmail, between kings, queens, politicians, and Rosicrucians, and the woman he has, unknowingly, crossed land and sea to meet.

This gracefully written sequel to Golden Witchbreed powerfully depicts the impact of a high-technology civilization on a decaying planet. Ten years after having served as Earth''s first envoy to Orthe, which is struggling to survive after a planetwide holocaust millennia ago, Lynne de Lisle Christie returns there as an advisor to PanOceania, one of Earth''s giant multinational companies, which is seeking to discover the technological secrets of the Goldens, the ruling race that had destroyed itself while almost obliterating Orthe. Christie seeks to help the native people, some of whom have been her friends, some her enemies, but all closely bound in her memories and loyalties. Instigated by the last of the Golden, a madwoman seeking domination, war between the poor and starving hiyeks of the Desert Coast and the land-loving telestres of the north is aggravated by smuggled high-tech weapons. Christie, while holding a dreadful secret from the Orthe''s past, attempts to mediate. Gentle creates moving, different, yet recognizable societies and people that catch the reader''s emotions as they struggle to save themselves.

Abandoned and alone, the fosterling Ilario grows up as the King''s Freak, surrounded by all the pomp, intrigue, and danger of the Iberian court. Fleeing a failed treacherous attack, Ilario crosses the sea to Carthage, where the mysterious Penitence shrouds the sky in darkness. There, a strange and awful destiny awaits the would-be painter, one that spans continents and kingdoms.

Presents a collection of four novellas that explore alternate history, including "The Daimon," in which Sokrates leads his soldiers to victory over the Spartans, and "The Last Ride of German Freddie," in which Nietzsche finds himself in Tombstone, Arizona, in works by Harry Turtledove, S. M. Stirling, Mary Gentle, and Walter Jon Williams. Reprint.

Naples, the 19th Century. In the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, holy music has power. Under the auspices of the Church, the Sung Mass can bring about actual miracles like healing the sick or raising the dead. But some believe that the musicodramma of grand opera can also work magic by channeling powerful emotions into something sublime. Now the Prince''s Men, a secret society, hope to stage their own black opera to empower the Devil himself - and change Creation for the better! Conrad Scalese is a struggling librettist whose latest opera has landed him in trouble with the Holy Office of the Inquisition. Rescued by King Ferdinand II, Conrad finds himself recruited to write and stage a counter opera that will, hopefully, cancel out the apocalyptic threat of the black opera, provided the Prince''s Men, and their spies and saboteurs, don''t get to him first. And he only has six weeks to do it.

Abandoned and alone, the fosterling Ilario grows up as the King''s Freak, surrounded by all the pomp, intrigue, and danger of the Iberian court. Fleeing a failed treacherous attack, Ilario crosses the sea to Carthage, where the mysterious Penitence shrouds the sky in darkness. There, a strange and awful destiny awaits the would-be painter, one that spans continents and kingdoms. Filled with intrigue, sex, and mystery, Ilario: The Lion''s Eye is a stunning tale of secret histories and self-discovery. The adventure continues in Book Two: The Stone Golem.

"First-rate speculative fiction from a very talented writer and a fascinating evocation of a turbulent, deeply significant moment in European history. ” — Washington Post Book World A sweeping, picaresque historical novel about two dueling swordsmen and the plot to kill a king in Renaissance Europe, A Sundial in a Grave is Shakespeare in Love meets The Three Musketeers, with a distinct edge 1610: Continental Europe is briefly at peace after years of war, but Henri IV of France is planning to invade the German principalities. In England, only 5 years earlier, conspirators nearly succeeded in blowing up King James I and his Parliament. The seeds of the English Civil War and the Thirty Years War are visibly being sown, and the possibility for both enlightenment and disaster abounds. But Valentin Rochefort, duellist, down-at-heels aristocrat and spy for the Duc de Sully, France’s powerful finance minister, could care less. Until he is drawn into the glittering palaces, bawdy back streets and stunning theatrics of Renaissance France and Shakespearian London in a deadly plot to both kill King James I and to save him. Determined to save his liege Sully, Rochefort’s journey will take him as far away as the distant Nippons, and as close as the truths of his own heart. This swordsman without a conscience is about to find himself caught between loyalty, love, and blackmail, between kings, queens, politicians and Rosicrucians—and the woman he has, unknowingly, crossed land and sea to meet.

This is the first story collection by the fantasy author of Golden Witchbread. The collection includes two previously unpublished novellas - Beggars in Satin and The Knot Garden.

There is more than one history of the world . . . In the mid-fifteenth century there was Burgundy, the jewel of Europe-opulent and powerful, the undisputed center of an uncivilized world. In an epoch of war and madness there was Ash. A girl born in mud and dung, she slew her first men while only eight. Scarred and ravaged, but still beautiful, she rose up to lead a great mercenary army before the age of twenty--and followed a sacred voice wise in the bloody ways of battle to a pinnacle unattainable to even the most potent of legends. In a time when empires and alliances shifted like sand--when Mithras the bull was worshipped freely alongside the Christ--a great cloud arose out of Africa to darken the sun. The Visigoths came with their terrible machines-powered by magic or a science unknown to this day--and aimed their irresistible might toward the rich Burgundian prize, wrenching the wheel of civilization in an unknown and unexpected direction. And with their coming, one incomparable warrior raised on Destiny''s ash heap became more that anyone thought one woman could ever be.

The dramatic conclusion to Ilario: The Lion''s Eye! Fleeing a surprise treacherous murder attempt, the former King''s Freak and would-be painter Ilario has run to Carthage, the city-state under perpetual darkness, in search of freedom. But strange plots are afoot, and a tenuous, complicated alliance with a bookseller-turned-spy will lead Ilario from the shrouded land into tense negotiations and intrigues in seductive, mercurial Venice, from a fraught return to Iberia to a final confrontation with family . . . and destiny.

The White Crow, one-time Soldier-Scholar of the Invisible College and a practioner of Hermetic science and magic, and Baltazar Casaubon, architect and lover, a man not too particular about his personal hygiene, are two of Mary Gentle¿s finest creations. The worlds they stride across range from the Renaissance city where aristocratic rats rule the human servant class, to a near-future London where chaos is come again. They are two of the most powerful players in the games of magic and politics, and the most colourful. This volume brings together three brilliantly imaginative, powerful and disturbing tales - Rats and Gargoyles, The Architecture of Desire and Left to His Own Devices - and the linked short fiction and confirms Mary Gentle as one of the foremost writers of dark and visionary fantasy.

The distant world of Orthe is littered with spectacular remnants of the Golden Empire, an ancient and technologically advanced civilisation extinct for two thousand years. Now their Orthean descendants have turned away from the technology which nearly destroyed them, and from their ancestors, the Golden Witchbreed. Then Earth envoy Lynne de Lisle Christie arrives and, all too quickly, finds herself the victim of intrigue and conspiracy, embroiled in a conflict that threatens to explode into war ¿ and which puts her own life in deadly peril . . .

Hay más de una historia del mundo? En una era brutal de derramamiento de sangre y milagros donde la oscura hechicería ha extinguido el sol, el destino de Europa Occidental, África y quizá el mundo entero, descansa en las manos de una mujer guerrera llamada Ash. Las invictas legiones del ejército de Cartago campan a sus anchas por los reinos de Europa. Bajo un cielo sin sol, Borgoña se encuentra sola en el camino de la hora visigoda y su legendario esclavo-general, el Faris. En el corazón del territorio enemigo se encuentra un ídolo de piedra viviente con un poder pavoroso que debe ser destruido si alguien quiere sobrevivir, un ser que murmura al alma de Ash, que la ha guiado en todas sus campañas militares, que sólo ella y su enemigo, su gemelo, pueden oír.

As the armies of the Visigoths plunder and ravage Europe, Duke Charles of Burgundy holds out in Dijon, a city under siege by the brutal Faris, Ash''s dark twin. Original.

Hay más de una historia del mundo... Dijon, una vez orgullosa capital de Borgoña, ha sido llevada casi a la sumisión. Los despiadados soldados del Imperio Visigodo campan a sus puertas dirigidos por la bella y letal Faris, convertida en el instrumento de una inteligencia mecánica que busca acabar con la humanidad. Ash también ha escuchado la llamada de las Máquinas, pero al contrario que Faris, ella no será su herramienta. Todavía queda una oportunidad de salvación: dentro de los muros de Dijon se encuentra la persona que porta en su sangre real la habilidad para mantener alejadas a las Máquinas.

Los ejércitos del Imperio Visigodo han aplastado el poderío de Europa, sumiendo las tierras conquistadas en una noche antinatural. Solo Borgoña resiste, maltrecha pero invicta, aún bajo el cálido abrazo del sol. Es el corazón del continente, superior en cultura y en la fuerza de las armas. Pero el destino último del acosado ducado descansa en las manos de su legítimo gobernante, el duque Carlos, atrapado tras las murallas de Dijon, una ciudad sitiada por brutales soldados. Recién salida de los horrores de Cartago, Ash debe decidir si guiará a su ejército a levantar el asedio de Dijon donde la espera una muerte casi segura.

Un historiador estudia unos extraños manuscritos que relatan un periodo de la edad media que parece inverosímil, pero que podría haber sido real. Europa dominada por el reino de Borgoña; Cartago bajo el yugo de los visigodos; ejércitos que cuentan con gólems entre sus filas. En aquella época de guerras y locura, nos encontramos a Ash, una guerrera temible, la capitana de un invencible grupo de mercenarios, poseída por una extraña voz que le murmura tácticas imbatibles al oído. Una voz que la llevó a una cima que no podrían alcanzar ni las leyendas más poderosas. ¿Hay más de una historia del mundo, y nos la han querido ocultar?

Incluye las novelas: Ash la historia secreta (9788490186107), Cartago triunfante (9788490186114), Las máquinas salvajes (9788490184684) y Borgaña perdida (9788490185322).

La Europa continental disfruta de una breve paz después de años de guerra, pero Enrique IV de Francia planea invadir los principados alemanes. En Inglaterra, solo cinco años antes, los conspiradores han estado a punto de conseguir volar por los aires al rey Jaime I y su Parlamento. Las semillas de la guerra civil inglesa y la guerra de los Treinta Años se están plantando a la vista de todos. Pero a Valentin Rochefort, duelista y espía al servicio del poderoso ministro de finanzas francés, le importa poco..., hasta que se ve arrastrado a los palacios resplandecientes, los callejones obscenos y los teatralismos asombrosos de la Francia renacentista y el Londres shakespeariano en una conjura mortal para matar al rey Jaime I. Este espadachín sin conciencia se verá atrapado entre la lealtad, el amor y el chantaje, entre reyes, reinas, políticos y rosacruces... y la mujer por la que, sin saberlo, ha cruzado tierras y mares.

This is a landmark anthology of four original novellas by the reigning masters of alternate history. Set in different eras, different places, and different times, these forays into "what might have been" showcases the stunning breadth and far-reaching possibilities the genre represents.

THE LAWS OF PHYSICS ARE MEANT TO BE OBEYED. Aeris Warren-Finch is NASA''s Acting Director of the New Earth Object Lab, overseeing the transit of a large unidentified object past Earth''s orbit. She''s trained and worked all her life for this. She couldn''t be more ready. But the object changes trajectory. What was one object becomes three, seven, nineteen. Nineteen different modules land across the planet. When the nearest module creates a dome and leaves Aeris stranded within its confines, she''s left to wander in search of safety. But things are stranger than she could have guessed, and she soon discovers she''s not the only one wandering the alien landscapes under the domes. Alongside her 105-year-old great-grandmother, a displaced imam, the President of the United States and her bodyguard, Aeris must find a way home before they run out of water, food and ideas. The question is: when every direction reveals new and strange geographies, which way is the right way to go? A breathtaking work of science fiction. Fans of Contact, The Three Body Problem and The Last Astronaut will find something to love within its pages.

When the ebullient genius, Baltazar Casaubon, re-enters her life, Valentine knows that it doesn''t bode well. It is only when he reveals that he has invented a program that can transfer a person''s memory directly to a computer, that she realizes just how much trouble he''s in.

1476. Gênes est à feu et à sang. Les Carthaginois et leurs golems maléfiques ont envahi le sud de l''Europe afin de détruire l''empire de Frédéric de Habsbourg. Une nuit éternelle les accompagne. Rien ni personne ne semble en mesure de les arrêter. Pourtant, une femme de dix-neuf ans, capitaine d''une troupe de mercenaires, va se dresser sur la route de l''envahisseur. L''histoire a oublié cette guerrière au visage couturé et aux cheveux trop blonds. Elle s''appelait Cendres, et la légende dit qu''elle était plus farouche que le lion et guidée par la voix d''un saint. Avec les quatre volumes du Livre de Cendres, récompensé par le British Science Fiction Award et le Sidewise Award, Mary Gentle nous invite à découvrir une Europe médiévale transformée en un gigantesque champ de bataille. Cette fresque brutale, mais aussi d''une grande sensualité, est d''ores et déjà considérée en Angleterre et aux États-Unis comme un des classiques du genre.

Cendres a réussi à échapper au roi-calife de Carthage et aux Machines sauvages. Malgré tout, la menace pèse toujours sur elle, sur la Bourgogne et sur le reste de la Chrétienté. D''autant qu''à Dijon, la rumeur prétend que le duc Charles est au plus mal. Les Wisigoths, menés par la Faris, vont bientôt venir à bout des remparts de la ville, et la fuite semble à Cendres la seule issue possible. Pourtant, une question continue de hanter la jeune mercenaire : pourquoi la Bourgogne ? Oeuvre monumentale, fantasy uchronique sensuelle et brutale, Le livre de Cendres, dont Les Machines sauvages est le troisième volume, a été récompensé par le British Science Fiction Award, le Sidewise Award et les prix Bob Morane et Julia Verlanger.