Nel corso della sua esistenza Ashraf Bey ha interpretato molti ruoli, parecchi dei quali illegali. Ora, dopo aver dato le dimissioni da ispettore capo di El Iskandryia, si rende conto di non avere ottenuto poi molto dalla vita: ha un'amante con cui non ha mai fatto l'amore, una nipote che tutti ritengono poco sveglia e debiti che continuano ad accumularsi. Come se non bastasse, in tutto il Nord Africa tira aria di rivolta e il mondo intero sembra congiurargli contro. L'ultima cosa di cui ha bisogno è il padre che non ha mai conosciuto. Ma quando il capo della sicurezza del vecchio emiro di Tunisi chiede a Raf di tornare in pista per indagare sul tentativo di omicidio di Sua Eccellenza, l'incontro sarà inevitabile. In fuga da un presente scomodo, Raf scoprirà sulla sua pelle un passato di cui non aveva idea... e stavolta uscirne vivo sarà difficile. Il terzo arabesco di Jon Courtenay Grimwood riporta in primo piano la storia di Ashraf Bey, costringendo il suo protagonista a confrontarsi con un misterioso passato nel tentativo di tracciare una nuova rotta per la sua esistenza futura.

Nella metropoli nordafricana di El Iskandryia, paralizzata da una serie di esplosioni, le infrastrutture locali si stanno sgretolando e le strade sono nel caos, mentre Ashraf Bey, appena nominato procuratore capo, è alle prese con il suo primo caso: l'uomo più ricco della città è accusato di un crimine tanto orrendo che nemmeno il suo status potrà proteggerlo. Mescolando fantascienza e noir, Jon Courtenay Grimwood immerge il lettore in un mondo e in una città simili ai nostri, eppure diversi. Un mondo dove un esercito di bambini è pronto a bruciare quel che resta della civiltà, e una città in cui una serie di omicidi rituali rischia di risvegliare una storia che nessuno vuole ricordare. Muovendosi come in un gioco di specchi, tra corruzione e segreti, Ashraf Bey dovrà arrivare al cuore di un mistero rimasto sepolto per decenni, e dovrà farlo cercando di non perdere tutto ciò a cui tiene di più.

Al confine tra oriente e occidente, El Iskandryia, l'antica Alessandria d'Egitto, è un crocevia di culture e ambizioni: libera città dell'impero ottomano, luogo di intrighi e potere, dove i soldi si mescolano alla tradizione e il valore di un uomo si giudica dal suo status sociale. Collocata in un prossimo futuro ucronico in cui le due guerre mondiali non ci sono mai state, El Iskandryia è lo straordinario scenario in cui si muovono i protagonisti di "Pashazade". Ashraf giunge in città in fuga da un passato misterioso per affrontare un futuro ignoto: promesso sposo di una ragazza che non ha mai conosciuto, sospettato dell'omicidio di una donna scomoda, alle prese con una nipote che non pensava nemmeno esistesse. Ashraf si ritroverà a muoversi in precario equilibrio tra i poteri che governano la città, con una voce in testa che non smette di dargli opinioni non richieste. "Pashazade" è il racconto di un uomo costretto a fare i conti con la propria storia e a sciogliere i nodi della propria esistenza, cercando nel frattempo di sopravvivere in una città che prospera su inganni e segreti.

Snow shrouds Venice in cold darkness, ice fills the canals, and a thousand ghosts pluck at the shadow's edge.

As the Byzantine and German emperors plot war, the future of Venice rests with three unwilling people, including an ex-slave and trained assassin; a spoiled, but grieving noblewoman; and a pauper girl who escapes after being buried alive. Simultaneous. Book available.

In a fantasy city reminiscent of 15th-century Venice, a boy vampire captures the attention of Duke Alonzo's chief assassin, Marco, who aims to make the supernatural marvel his apprentice. By the author of End of the World Blues. Simultaneous. Book available.

€ 73,90

Venice in the early fifteenth century is at the height of its power. In theory Duke Marco commands. But Marco is a simpleton so his aunt and uncle rule in his stead. Within the Serene Republic, their word is law, but for all their influence, Venice's fate still lies in other hands . . .

Lady Giulietta is the Duke's cousin. She enjoys greater privilege than many can even dream of, but her status will demand a terrible price.

Atilo Il Mauros is head of the Assassini, the shadow army that enforces Venice's will - both at home and abroad.

Prince Leopold zum Bas Friedland is the bastard son of the German emperor and leader of the krieghund - the only force in Venice more feared than Atilo's assassins.

And then there is Atilo's angel-faced apprentice. Only a boy, Tycho is already stronger and faster than any man has a right to be. He can see in the dark, but sunlight burns him. It is said that he drinks blood.

Award-winning author Jon Courtenay Grimwood seamlessly blends history, politics and dark fantasy in a compelling vision of a Venice that might have been.

From Jon Courtenay Grimwood, author of the celebrated Arabesk series, comes a stunningly inventive novel of futuristic noir set in a world of shifting realities. Here a man is drawn into a gritty postmodern subculture and a secret kingdom of otherworldly beings to find what he lost long ago: a reason to live.

Kit Nouveau figured he'd already come to the end of the world. An Iraqi war veteran, expatriate, and part owner of Pirate Mary's, the best Irish bar in Tokyo, Kit had settled down to await the inevitable with barely a whimper. It wasn't exactly how Kit thought he'd end up, and he was right.

It's going to end up a lot worse.

A teenage runaway with fifteen million dollars in stolen cash and a taste for cosplay is about to save Kit's life in a lethal swirl of scarlet and bridal lace. Lady Neku, a.k.a. Countess of High Strange, has her own dangerous destiny to fulfill and it's mysteriously connected to Kit's ravaged past. Now Kit's only hope for redemption is to save an ex-girlfriend he tragically failed once before. But everyone says it's already too late. And she's left behind only one ominous clue: her suicide note.

Sergeant Bobby Zha of the SFPD is desperate to find out who murdered him. But he also needs the answers to some other questions. Like, why is he in another man's body? Why is someone trying to kill him, again... And why is he being haunted by a nine-tailed Celestial fox? From the shell-shattered ruins of Stalingrad in 1942 to the present-day politics of San Francisco's Chinatown, 9Tail Fox is evocative of place and crystal-clear in its depiction of character.

From acclaimed author Jon Courtenay Grimwood comes an exotic new novel that defies expectation at every turn. A mystery, a thriller, and a cutting-edge sci-fi adventure all in one, Stamping Butterflies bends time, genre, and consciousness itself to tell the spellbinding story of two worlds, three lives, one future–and the question upon which everything depends: who is dreaming whom....

From Marrakech to China's Forbidden City, from a doomed starship carrying a cryogenically preserved crew to an island prison camp, the fate of the world is being played out in the minds of two dreamers. One, a would-be assassin obsessed with enigmatic equations, has set out to kill the U.S. President. The other is a young Chinese emperor ruling thousands of years in the future. Each believes he is dreaming the other. One must change the future; one must change the past. And time is running out for both.

Caught in the maelstrom is a motley cast of characters, each an unwitting key to the ultimate fate of both worlds: Moz, a resourceful young Marrakech street punk, and his half-German girlfriend, Malika; Jake Razor, a self-exiled rock star; and psychiatrist Katie Petrov, who finds herself racing against a looming death sentence to pry free the secret of her condemned patient–a secret with the power to restore hope to the future...or stamp it out forever.

Part mystery, part speculative fiction, and wholly unforgettable, Jon Courtenay Grimwood's celebrated Arabesk series portrays the dark, hard-boiled story of a man out to prove his innocence in an alternate world where the facts aren't always the same as the truth . . . and murder isn't the worst that can happen.

It's a twenty-first century hauntingly familiar—and yet startlingly different from our own. Here the United States brokered a deal that ended World War I, and the Ottoman Empire never collapsed. And lording it over all sits the complex, seductive, and bloodthirsty North African metropolis of El Iskandryia. Almost nothing is what it seems to be in El Isk, and Ashraf Bey is no exception.

Neither the rich Ottoman aristocrat everyone thinks he is, nor the minor street criminal once shipped off to prison when he fell foul of his Chinese Triad employers–the fact is that Raf has as little idea who he is as anyone else.

With few clues and no money, all Raf has is a surname hinting at noble heritage and an arranged marriage to a woman who hates him. But nothing Ashraf al Mansur learns about himself is as unexpected—or as terrifying—as the brutal murder he's accused of committing. Now, as a hunted man with the welfare of a precocious young girl in his irresponsible hands, Raf must race after a killer through an unforgiving city as foreign to him as the truth he'll uncover about himself.