David Forbes: 32 books

America’s Favorite Holidays explores how five of America’s culturally important holidays—Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Easter, Halloween, and Thanksgiving—came to be what they are today, seasonal and religious celebrations heavily influenced by modern popular culture. Deftly distilling information...

Written for everyone who loves and is simultaneously driven crazy by the holiday season, Christmas: A Candid History provides an enlightening, entertaining perspective on how the annual Yuletide celebration got to be what it is today. In a fascinating, concise tour through history, the book tells...

Gerin, King of Khedesh, has long since accepted the mantle of Amber Wizard—the first in a millennium—with all the terrible responsibility that accompanies it. He has prevented the dread wizard-king, Asankaru, from attaining the all-powerful Words of Making, but the enemy grows stronger by the...

For a thousand years, there have been no great wizards in the world -- and even longer since a wizard-king reigned. Now all must welcome and fear the coming of The Amber Wizard As Gerin Atreyano takes his place as the Crown Prince of Khedesh after his father ascends to the throne,...

"I saw the dream. I saw your face." The words of a lone shipwrecked survivor chill the blood of Gerin Atreyano, Crown Prince of Khedesh, for they warn of an approaching armada. The savage, unconquered and unconquerable Havalqa are coming, driven by visions of a power beyond comprehension....

Fifteen-year-old Dan Kerlin’s life is pretty ordinary: hanging out with his buddy Brian, putting up with the losers his friend Maddie dates, and avoiding the school bully. He’s haunted by nightmares about a demon hunting him in the dark, but he’s had nightmares since his mom died a year ago,...

John Simmons is pretty happy with his life. He runs a successful company doing work for a secret branch of Homeland Security that deals with unwanted incursions from Celestial beings—demons, spirits, ghosts, and the like. John has powers of his own that he builds into his systems using complex spells...

Between 1866 and 1868 the celebrated Japanese artist Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, in collaboration with his colleague Utagawa Yoshiiku, produced a series of images of graphic horror and cruelty entitled '28 Famous Murders with Verse'. The series of 28 ukiyo-e woodblock prints shocked, horrified and...

Suzuki Harunobu was a celebrated 18th century Japanese ukiyo-e artist who produced thousands of exquisite woodblock prints illustrating aspects of life and society in old Edo - today's Tokyo. His subjects extended from Kabuki actors and courtesans to landscapes, explicit eroticism and street...

An illustrated version of Okakura Kakuzo’s classic ‘The Book of Tea’ with an introductory biography of Okakura and a chapter on ‘Tea - The Serviceable Herb’. 22,000 words, 75 images Perhaps the most universal of all drinks but water, tea enjoys a unique popularity around the globe....

There can be few people in the world that do not know the name, location and recent history of Vietnam. Yet beyond the period of US involvement in what Americans call the 'Vietnam War' how much is really known? Almost no Vietnamese bear a grudge against the USA, but this is less true for China,...

The biggest brains—and bank accounts—in business share their secrets of the trade in probing, wide-ranging and provocative interviews that first appeared in Playboy magazine. From media titans Ted Turner and Barry Diller to technology visionaries Bill Gates and Steve Jobs to board-room barons T....

The photographs in this coffee table e-book colourfully reveal the glamorous world of Thai transvestite cabaret. 4,000 words, 86 full colour images In Thailand practically every town or village has several openly transsexual boys or men who dress as women and are born with feminine characteristics....

Sun Tzu’s Art of War has been read and appreciated by a host of military men and philosophers down through the ages. More recently, it has become popular as a manual for business success and guide to boardroom battles, seen by many as a lodestar in achieving success in the ruthless world of competitive...