Following the success of the first Great Scientists title in the ‘Junior Classics’ range, this collection features the lives of nine more remarkable scientists, with descriptions of their discoveries. From the astronomy of Copernicus and Halley to the natural science of Linnaeus and Humboldt, and from the discoveries of Pascal, Davy, Volta and Babbage to the harnessing of atomic power by Julius Oppenheimer, it explores the contributions made by these great scientists, and their impact on o...

Sumo is a fresh and funny introduction to the fascinating world of sumo, Japan's national sport. Author David Benjamin peels away the veneer of sumo as a cultural treasure and reveals it as an action-packed sport populated by superb athletes who employ numerous strategies and techniques to overcome their gargantuan opponents. Sumo provides an engaging, witty, behind-the-scenes look at sumo today.

Something is rotten at Hercules High School. Student Heather Sundergard has been caught cheating on the state's most prestigious scholarship exam. One of Heather's teachers, Carol Demeter, has been implicated—and fired by the school board. But Carol happens to be police chief Jim Otis. fiancée. Otis sees the fine hand in this scam of teenage femme fatale Josie Dobbs. But Josie's "back east," in college.Or is she?Jim Otis' struggle to exonerate Carol sends him into ...

What happens in Vegas ends in Paris. Chip, Bud and Rudy, three nerdy conventioneers who meet annually at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas become so consumed by sexual fantasy in their annual pilgrimage to a North Vegas strip club that they hatch a plot to rid themselves of their wives. They lure their unsatisfactory spouses to the City of Light where they wine them, dine them and and kill all three on the same bloody night. They ve committed the perfect crime... except... Well, t...

Josie Dobbs, sweet sixteen and beautiful, is everybody's angel. Or is she?Police chief Jim Otis, fired from the Chicago Police after an affair with an underage hooker, is a lost cause. Or is he?Josie has secrets nobody in little Hercules, Wisconsin, wants to uncover. Nobody but Jim Otis.In his last month on the job, the lame-duck chief must unravel the dark side of Josie Dobbs, or a young Marine could go to jail — and innocent people might die. Otis wades into a swamp ...

David Benjamin pays homage to the exuberance of countless untamed boys who grew up in Middle America at mid-century.Whether he's stalking snakes in the bogs of Wisconsin, playing four-kid baseball with his bothersome little brother and two favorite cousins, leaping garbage cans for a beautiful little redheaded girl, or joining Chucky Dutcher for a movie marathon at the Erwin Theater, Benjamin is the kind of precocious ironist who would have found a sidekick in Huck Finn.His...

Saint Paul, Private Eye!It is written, in Matthew, that Jesus, on the cross, cried out, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"Was this all Jesus said? Who was present to hear him say anything at all? His disciples had fled in fear. Roman soldiers surrounded him. Was there a secret revealed at the Crucifixion — lost forever because there was no one to bear witness?Paul, the "saint" who for ten years tormented the followers of Jesus, suffers visions of the Cruci...

Steve and Mie are a pair of globetrotting journalists, based in Paris, who make up fanciful stories about strangers they see at nearby tables in bistros, bars and brasseries. When they start spinning yarns about a waitress, Mireille, and a down-and-out American novelist named Cavendish, they find themselves peeking into a pair of tempestuous love triangles.One love storm—among Mireille, her possessive lover Serge, and Cavendish—takes place in present-day Paris. The other ill-starre...

Where the hell is Carrie Crowfoot? Jim Otis, police chief of Hercules, Wis., doesn't know. But he suspects that the disappearance of the popular high-school cheerleader connects somehow to his nemesis, teenage femme fatale, Josie Dobbs. But Josie has left town for college in Philadelphia. How does a scheming seductress in Philly pull off an abduction a thousand miles away? Meanwhile, how can Jim Otis — who does NOT understand women — cope with all the other women in his life? His "trouble"...

Is GiGi—Biggy's grandmother—a living repository of all past human adventures, or is she a liar? And will she keep shrinking until she disappears forever from the wonderful book-smelling room in her house on Lake StreetGiGi has told Biggy that she's a thousand years old and that she went through the looking glass with Alice. She was a Spanish princess captured off a galleon by Blackbeard and she was a G.I. at the liberation of Auschwitz. She knew the Brothers Grimm and she was with ...

The rarest lost book in history has been found, and stolen all over again, in Paris. Its pursuers include the most diabolical literary criminal in the world, Krisko Krillkin. The man who re-lost the masterpiece, bookseller Chester Quinn, is hopelessly overmatched. Luckily, into his life floats Circe Evans, granddaughter of Paris' most renowned and complacent detective, Homer Evans. Circe assembles a motley, fiercely loyal crew and leads a breakneck dash, strewn with murders, near-murders, ...

Burning crosses on lawns and swastikas on Jewish graves?These are outrages wildly out of place in neighborly Hercules, Wis. But when a rash of hate crimes strikes, villagers turn to ex-police chief Jim Otis for help. Trouble is, after a scandal over a high-school cheerleader, Jim's no longer a cop. The crimes spiral beyond the new police chief's control. Suspicion focuses on Norman Klinghofer, who lives quietly in a historic family compound atop Bastard's Bluff. When Norman is fing...