And the Rat Laughed is a unique book. Unlike other Holocaust-related books that focus on the historical horrific events, this novel deals with the act of remembering them. It resembles a relay race in which the characters transfer memory from one another, while travelling on the axis of time. The book begins in the last day of 1999, when a survivor Grandmother in Tel Aviv shares her tragic life story as a hidden child in a pit, with only a rat for company with her granddaughter. The day after – 2000 already – the granddaughter tells the legend of "Girl and Rat" to her teacher and in 2009 those who heard it through her classmates establish an internet website with poems. From now on this memory is spread all over the world and becomes a myth. In 2099 a future anthropologist discovers it and tries to uncover its mysterious roots. In her research, she reveals the first man who created this myth in the past. Father Stanislaw, a Catholic priest, saved that little Jewish girl (who later became the Grandmother in Tel Aviv) and returned her after the war to her Jewish people. In his personal journal he documented everything, to make sure the world will never forget. The chain of remembearers, therefore, moves from the present to the future and back to the past. The novel is written in 5 genres: story, legend, poems, science fiction and diary, creating a cycle of 150 years. And the Rat Laughed got acclaim for its use of unconventional and original literary devices and became a ground breaker for exploring the act of memory itself. How do we tell our painful story? Does it change while we recall it? How will our next recipient recall it in his own individual way? Is Art the only corridor to transfer emotional memory?

Meet Edinburgh Detective Inspector Liz Kavanaugh, head of the Innovative Crimes Investigation Unit, otherwise known as the Rule 34 Squad. They monitor the Internet for potential criminal activity, analyzing trends in the extreme fringes of explicit content. And occasionally, even more disturbing patterns arise… Three ex-cons have been murdered in Germany, Italy, and Scotland. The only things they had in common were arrests for spamming—and a taste for unorthodox entertainment. As the first officer on the scene of the most recent death, Liz finds herself sucked into an international investigation that isn’t so much asking who the killer is, but what—and if she doesn't find the answer soon, the homicides could go viral.

Joseph Levy leads a quiet life in rural Wheaton Arizona. Retired from a long career in psychiatric research and practice, he reads, writes, and walks in the mountains and hills near the Native reservation. His quiet life ends, however, when a dental crown replacement causes trouble just before meeting an internet date in California. Thus begins a year of back-to-back nightmare infections, a drug overdose, and two failed relationships. At every step, Levy is confronted by matters of life and death, love and hate, faith and doubt, trust and betrayal. Most of all, he faces what it means to be sick and to be healthy. He prays to his God, relies on his friends, examines his dreams, and entrusts his psyche to a new therapist. Joseph Levy Escapes Death is a tale of perseverance in the face of adversity. Strassman uses several lenses to view Levy's life: medical, psychoanalytic, and religious--both Buddhist and Jewish. Pathos and humor fill the tale, while enlightening detours examine the Holocaust, cardiovascular physiology and microbiology, and Jewish-Christian relations.

What would you do first if you were elected President of the United States? Hope is the story of Alexander Hope, a young American who comes back from Vietnam, falls in love with a bright, beautiful girl, and with her starts a pioneering computer business. Thirty years later he's a billionaire, and alone in life. He decides to leave behind everything he created to write books and teach history at a private college. A handful of admiring students half-jokingly enlist him as a candidate for a third party Presidential nomination. In an astonishing but plausible scenario, Hope wins the Presidency, and commences an ambitious program of enforcing the Constitution and Bill of Rights as they were written. Enemies arise from all sides aiming to obstruct, discredit, impeach, and even assassinate him. It's a story of one man's love for his country -- and for the principles that brought it into being -- for his family, for his friends, and especially for the lovely and brilliant young Internet reporter who believes in him. 440 pages.

Despite the notion of female solidarity, almost every office has its feud--usually between two women. In The Feud, a work friendship goes bad. Very bad. During the mid-nineties, the Internet was new and cell phones were rare. Nikki and Roberta employ these emerging technologies as they engage in a war of betrayals that threatens one with the loss of her boyfriend and reputation and the other with the loss of her home and family. Roberta drinks wine, Nikki smokes weed; they each have their little helpers--but can anything really help them achieve peace? Picture a mid-'90s, suburban New York office full of saleswomen, each successful, attractive, and competitive in her own way. Add boyfriends and sex, booze and drugs...and a spat between two of the women that soon becomes a knock-down, drag-out war. Welcome to Catherine Hiller's latest, a light, lively romp of a read that will have you turning pages faster than you can say flip phone or World Wide Web. --Cathi Hanauer, New York Times bestselling author of Gone and The Bitch is Back Roberta and Nikki begin as office friends, but the relationship soon curdles, turning the two into rivals and finally bitter enemies. Shrewd-eyed, sharp and stylish, The Feud exposes the dark secrets of women in the workplace with assurance, intelligence and wit. --Yona Zeldis McDonough, author of The House on Primrose Pond and fiction editor, Lilith Catherine Hiller weaves a story of intrigue and revenge and shows us how women can cause each other piercing pain when they attack from behind. The Feud delivers emotional intensity and a realistic portrayal of the darkest side of female relationships. --Kathi Elster, Co-Author of Mean Girls at Work and Working With You Is Killing Me Catherine Hiller takes on an ancient theme--the feud between women--with humor, grace and verve. --Roxana Robinson, author of Cost and Sparta and former Authors Guild President

Alex Issacson's life has never been normal. His mother got into bed the day his father left, and never got back out again. Hugely over-weight, she is known to the viewing public as Starbright the phone-in-psychic. Although she spends her time consulting the stars and offering advice to others, she won't answer the questions that consume Alex. Why did his father leave, and where is he now? So Alex has turned his search to the internet. When he starts receiving strange emails riddled with bad puns, Alex thinks he might be on the right track -- but what on earth do they mean? More clues come when a "saxophone incident" leads Alex on a dangerous cross-country adventure. After dodging the barrel of a hermit's shotgun, hooking up with a band on tour, and hitching a ride with a weak-bladdered truck driver, Alex may have found out more than he ever wanted to know. And the truth may just leave him seeing stars. Shortlisted for CLA Book of the Year for Children Award 2002 Shortlisted for The Arthur Ellis Award (Juvenile) 2002 Canadian Children's Book Centre, 2002 Our Choice Starred Selection

Purchase one of 1st World Library's Classic Books and help support our free internet library of downloadable eBooks. Visit us online at www.1stWorldLibrary.ORG - - Because Edith had not been feeling very well, that seemed no reason why she should be the centre of interest; and Bruce, with that jealousy of the privileges of the invalid and in that curious spirit of rivalry which his wife had so often observed, had started, with enterprise, an indisposition of his own, as if to divert public attention. While he was at Carlsbad he heard the news. Then he received a letter from Edith, speaking with deference and solicitude of Bruce's rheumatism, entreating him to do the cure thoroughly, and suggesting that they should call the little girl Matilda, after a rich and sainted - though still living - aunt of Edith's. It might be an advantage to the child's future (in every sense) to have a godmother so wealthy and so religious. It appeared from the detailed description that the new daughter had, as a matter of course (and at two days old), long golden hair, far below her waist, sweeping lashes and pencilled brows, a rosebud mouth, an intellectual forehead, chiselled features and a tall, elegant figure. She was a magnificent, regal-looking creature and was a superb beauty of the classic type, and yet with it she was dainty and winsome. She had great talent for music. This, it appeared, was shown by the breadth between the eyes and the timbre of her voice.