Let us start with the obvious. Living matter, having once emerged from obscure beginnings on this planet Earth - the home selected for it in the Universe - has continued to exist in countless different forms right to the present time. As a means to cope with the enormous diversity involved, natural scientists have created a comprehensive classification system. This enables one to get a grasp of the complexities of the chronological and biological relationships that all forms of life bear t...

William Pearson is a retired design engineer who for much of his life has been an amateur historian and archaeologist. Articles by him on these subjects have appeared in the journals of various societies in the north-east of England. He is a former Member of the Institute of Linguists and currently a member of the English Place-Name Society, the Cleveland and Teesside Local History Society and the Teesside Archaeological Society, having served as Chairman of the last. Decades ago, friendsh...

The epic poem "Beowulf" has been explored by many scholars, but personal acquaintance revealed that some important aspects always seem to have been overlooked. This book's intention was to correct such omissions, but discrepancy turned out to be widespread. Rather than being solely a contribution to Scandinavia's history, the material mainly illustrates aspects of English origins as viewed by one of their own kind. A post-Roman doomed culture arose in eastern England. Largely ignored in En...

These poems range from the nonsensical, through reflections on personal experiences, to comments on the state of the planet upon which we all live. During a long lifetime, diverse interests or specific events—either in the author’s personal life or in the wider world—have led to an emotional artistic outlet being sought in the composition of poetry. The work leads off with a limerick. This is exemplary of the style usually followed, namely one based on rhyme and rhythm. The bulk of the wor...

Erik Bloodaxe and Egil Skallagrimsson came to the fore, both for their narrative possibilities and examples of how events of the Viking period have come to be distorted and misunderstood. The eventual result is this book. The life of Erik begins with his background and career in Norway followed by his overseas adventures. After seizing power in northern England, he met a violent death there. Also covered is much of the life of the Icelander Egil Skallagrimsson, who tried his best to be a t...

In 'The Superstitions of Witchcraft,' Howard Williams embarks on a meticulous exploration of the intricate tapestry of beliefs and practices associated with witchcraft, drawing upon a vast array of historical sources and anthropological insights. Williams employs a scholarly yet accessible literary style, integrating folkloric narratives with sociopolitical contexts that have shaped societal perceptions of witchcraft throughout the ages. The book serves as both an academic inquiry and a cu...

First published in 1991, The Many Lives of the Batman is a serious academic exploration of the cultural phenomenon called Batman. Marketing savvy alone did not build the Batman’s extraordinary success; it encompasses a variety of audiences who have embraced the hero through a collage of different media manifestations during his long history. Batman’s overlapping lives are illuminated in this critical anthology, which analyses the contexts of the character’s production and receptio...

How do you see love? Do you believe that you are worthy of the love of another and deserve it? Or do you see it as something that happens to someone else?It is unlikely that many of us have never experienced any form of love in our lives. As human beings, we are naturally loving and caring. Of course, there are those few individuals who seem to have no love to show or share, but even the worst of us have had someone we cared about. In the latest in his series of books, A Journey of...

Los Angeles, 1948. World War II may be over, but a new war is on the horizon. People are seeing monsters—not on Hollywood’s silver screens but in real life—and the authorities are trying to keep it under wraps.In Scott Pearson’s novella The Big Dark, private detective Henry Shaw is in trouble with his former partner on the police force, Bob Neville. Shaw has a knack for run-ins with these horrific creatures, and he’s making it hard for the police to keep their presence fro...

Steven "Steel" Trapp has been placed in an East Coast boarding school for gifted kids by his FBI agent father. He soon discovers that there's a clubby element of the faculty and upper classmen that is very secretive and protective. To his surprise, his friend Kaileigh arrives at the school, and it isn't long before the two realize that this is not your normal boarding school. It seems a select few students are recruited, while still minors, to serve as special "translators" for the US Gove...

Since the first incidents shortly after World War II (as told in The Big Dark & Meet John Doe: Tales of the Weird World War, Volume 1), encounters with monsters in human form have grown increasingly common—and increasingly difficult for the authorities to keep under wraps. Governments around the world are struggling to decide on a response to the growing threat, even as they try to discover the monsters' obscure motives.Tokyo, 1954. In William Leisner's Project G,...

The Many Lives of the Batman (1991) was a pioneer within cultural and comic book scholarship. This fresh new sequel retains the best of the original chapters but also includes images, new chapters and new contributions from the Batman writers and editors. Spanning 75 years and multiple incarnations, this is the definitive history of Batman.