Most Popular Books by Barbara Hambly

A lush and haunting novel of a city steeped in decadent pleasures . . . and of a man, proud and defiant, caught in a web of murder and betrayal. It is 1833. In the midst of Mardi Gras, Benjamin January, a Creole physician and music teacher, is playing piano at the Salle d''Orleans when the evenings festivities are interrupted—by murder. Ravishing Angelique Crozat, a notorious octoroon who travels in the city''s finest company, has been strangled to death. With the authorities reluctant to become involved, Ben begins his own inquiry, which will take him through the seamy haunts of riverboatmen and into the huts of voodoo-worshipping slaves. But soon the eyes of suspicion turn toward Ben—for, black as the slave who fathered him, this free man of color is still the perfect scapegoat. . . . Praise for A Free Man of Color “A smashing debut. Rich and exciting with both substance and spice.”—Star Tribune, Minneapolis “A sparkling gem.”—King Features Syndicate “An astonishing tour de force.”—Margaret Maron “Superb.”—Drood Review of Mystery “A darned good murder mystery.”—USA Today

An idealistic young prince convinces an aging warrior and a struggling witch to help him kill the dragon that is terrorizing his kingdom As a vicious dragon stalks the Southlands, Crown Prince Gareth ventures to the forbidding North in search of the only man who can kill it. He is Lord Aversin, the Dragonsbane, whose dragon-slaying days have won him renown across the land. But when Gareth finds Lord Aversin, he discovers the mighty hero is squat and bespectacled, the ruler of a mud-village who admits that he killed the dragon not with a lance, but with ignoble poison. Still, he''ll have to do. Gareth and Aversin set off in company with Jenny Waynest, a witch with great ambitions but disappointingly puny powers—a ragtag crew destined to become legendary, or die in the attempt. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Barbara Hambly, including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author''s personal collection.

From a New York Times–Bestselling author: An apprentice wizard must fight to escape a world he doesn''t understand: 1940 Germany. When the wizard Jaldis heard the cry from beyond the Void, telling of a world where magic was dead and begging for his aid, he and his apprentice, Rhion, went to help. Crossing the Void takes all of their strength, and when Rhion awakes on the other side, he learns that the task is beyond them. Jaldis is dead, and the portal home gone with him. Now he is trapped in a place called Earth, in a nation beset from all sides by its enemies. The men who called him here need a wizard to save them, and though Rhion is but a novice, he will have to do. He may even find a way home, but only if he can find a way to serve this mysterious empire that they call the Third Reich. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Barbara Hambly, including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author''s personal collection.

A California medieval scholar is pulled into a far-off magical world—and a fight to save mankind—in this novel by a New York Times–bestselling author. As a student of medieval history, Gil Patterson is a woman familiar with dark stories. She knows well the Crusades, the Black Death, and the other horrors of the Middle Ages, but it is another kind of atrocity that has begun to haunt her dreams. She sees forces of evil assaulting a beleaguered kingdom, whose kind people are on the brink of annihilation, and awakes each morning in a cold sweat. Gil dismisses the dreams until a wizard appears in her apartment. He has crossed into her dimension, passing through the fraying fabric of the universe, to ask her help. For mankind to survive he must protect an infant prince, whom he plans to hide in Gil''s world. The student of history is about to get much closer to evil than she ever imagined. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Barbara Hambly, including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author''s personal collection.

A "tense and nerve-wracking" adventure in the epic fantasy trilogy from the New York Times–bestselling author of The Time of the Dark (Tor.com). Once upon a time, Gil and Rudy lived simple lives. Until they met Ingold, she was an ordinary PhD candidate and he was a drifter, whiling away his life riding motorcycles under the California sun. But wizards have a way of complicating things. Ingold brought them across the Void, where an evil known as the Dark threatened to devour civilization whole. Civilization''s hopes rested on an infant prince, and to protect him Gil and Rudy had to draw on newfound powers—she as a warrior, and he as a wizard. With Ingold''s help they escaped the Dark, and led a hardy band of survivors to a far-away keep, where humanity could be safe for a time. But now that time is past, and there is nowhere to hide from the Dark. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Barbara Hambly, including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author''s personal collection.

It''s 1911. War is coming, and according to one of the vampires of St. Petersburg, the Kaiser is trying to recruit vampires. James Asher, Oxford don and formerly on His Majesty''s Secret Service, is forced to team up again with his vampire partner Don Simon Ysidro for a journey to the subarctic Russian capital. Are they on the trail of a rogue vampire with a plan to achieve the power to walk in daylight? Asher wonders. Or is Ysidro''s real agenda to seek the woman he once loved? . . .

The bestselling author''s epic fantasy trilogy comes to a dramatic end. The "cold, tense, creeping dread lasts right up until the final confrontation" (Tor.com). Since the Dark Ones returned, the world has been laid to waste. The land''s wizards have been slaughtered, its cities destroyed, and its people scattered in terror, and few have witnessed more of the destruction than Rudy and Gil—two ordinary Californians who found their way across the Void, and took up arms in defense of a strange and magical world. She learned the ways of war, while he found within himself the powers of a great wizard. Both of them will need all their strength to survive this final challenge. Ingold, the master wizard, has devised a spell to hide the user from the deathly stare of the Dark, and he intends to use it to strike at their very heart. Finally, Rudy, Gil, and the rest of mankind''s survivors will take the offensive, bringing an end to this terrible war, for better or for worse. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Barbara Hambly, including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author''s personal collection.

An aging wizard and his apprentice venture into a world where magic has died, hoping to save it before the same fate befalls their own Jaldis does not believe it at first. When the old wizard—blind, tongueless, able to see and speak through magic alone—peers into the Void between dimensions, he sees something terrible: a world where magic is dead, and whose inhabitants scream for someone to rescue them. Such a place must be studied, for if it is possible to kill magic, then that terrible fate could threaten his own world, too. With the help of his apprentice, Rhion, the wizard prepares for the treacherous crossing. To make the journey, they must withstand the hatred that their own world has for magic—a powerful force that the ignorant would wipe out if they could. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Barbara Hambly, including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author''s personal collection.

In book two of this acclaimed fantasy series, a female Sun Mage must answer a distant call for help—and tend to a mysterious threat at home. Once, men had the magical ability to keep civilization together. Women existed only to serve them. Now the powers to heal the sick and bring fertility to the land have mysteriously transferred to women—and the men are not adjusting easily. Raeshaldis, the first female Sun Mage in training, must grapple with the efforts of her own family to re-enslave her. Meanwhile, she receives a psychic plea for help from a fellow Crafty woman. But while she ventures out to answer the call, a magic plague descends upon the Yellow City, threatening frined and foe alike.

From a New York Times–bestselling author: A wizard must return from his Earthly exile when his lover, a computer programmer, is kidnapped by an otherworldly evil. Joanna Sheraton is in love with a wizard. Once an ordinary Californian computer programmer, her life was upended when she was first taken across the Void to a world of magic, where an evil mage threatened to destroy that world and ours. With the help of Antryg, a brilliant wizard who quickly stole her heart, she learned to navigate that strange other land and saved the universe from destruction. When the sinister king sentenced Joanna and her lover to death, they fled back to Earth, to live quietly under the California sun. But their troubles have followed them. A stranger dressed in wizard''s garb kidnaps Joanna, and Antryg gives pursuit back across the Void. What he finds is a world once again in peril, and he must give aid to the Wizard''s Council that condemned him if he is ever to see his love again. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Barbara Hambly, including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author''s personal collection.

Benjamin January made his debut in bestselling author Barbara Hambly''s A Free Man of Color, a haunting mélange of history and mystery. Now he returns in another novel of greed, madness, and murder amid the dark shadows and dazzling society of old New Orleans, named a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times. The summer of 1833 has been one of brazen heat and brutal pestilence, as the city is stalked by Bronze John—the popular name for the deadly yellow fever epidemic that tests the healing skills of doctor and voodoo alike. Even as Benjamin January tends the dying at Charity Hospital during the steaming nights, he continues his work as a music teacher during the day. When he is asked to pass a message from a runaway slave to the servant of one of his students, January finds himself swept into a tempest of lies, greed, and murder that rivals the storms battering New Orleans. And to find the truth he must risk his freedom...and his very life.

Those who loved Cold Mountain or Geraldine Brooks’s March will embrace and long remember this spellbinding novel of two remarkable women torn apart by conflict, sustained by literature and art, united by friendship and hope. As brother turns against brother in the bloodbath of the Civil War, two young women sacrifice everything but their friendship. Susanna Ashford is the Southerner, living on a plantation surrounded by scarred and blood-soaked battlefields. Cora Poole is the Northerner, on an isolated Maine island, her beloved husband fighting for the Confederacy. Through the letters the two women exchange, they speak of the ordeal of a familiar world torn apart by tragedy. And yet their unique friendship will help mend the fabric of a ravaged nation. The two women write about books and art, about loss and longing, about their future and the future of their country. About love. About being a woman in nineteenth-century America. About the triumphant resilience of the human spirit. Their voices and their stories are delineated in indomitable prose by an award-winning writer who captures in intimate detail a singular moment in time. In Homeland, Barbara Hambly takes readers on a unique odyssey across a landscape treacherous with hardship and hatred. She paints a passionate masterpiece of a friendship that not only transforms our understanding of the most heart-wrenching era of American history but celebrates the power of women to change their world.

New York Times –bestselling author: After a premonition of death, a young wizard-in-training attempts to stop her sister''s wedding. It''s normal for a young girl to be jealous of her sister''s impending wedding, and Kyra is jealous indeed. A plain looking young magic student whose incipient wizardly abilities have done nothing to attract the attentions of the boys of her town, she is not surprised to learn that her sister has caught the eye of one of the city''s wealthiest merchants. But she is alarmed by some of the signs that are coming up in her prognostication lessons. Water turns to blood, the death card haunts her tarot practice, and finally she has a specific vision: that her sister will die the day she takes her vows. Using every trick in her small magic arsenal, Kyra attempts to disrupt the wedding, going up against a force more powerful than any magic: an impatient bride. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Barbara Hambly, including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author''s personal collection.

A Hollywood diva. A Chinese curse. A suspense-filled fantasy from the New York Times–bestselling author "who can write well in any genre" (Charlaine Harris). It is 1923, and silent film reigns in Hollywood. Of all the starlets, none is more beloved than Chrysanda Flamande, a diva as brilliant as she is difficult to manage. Handling her falls to Norah, widow of Chrysanda''s dead brother. She has always done her job well, but she was never equipped to deal with murder. When a violent killing shocks Chrysanda''s entourage, and other weird happenings swiftly follow, Norah begins to suspect that some strange power is stalking the star. In Chinatown she receives warning that a curse has been placed on the actress as vengeance for wearing a sacred amulet in one of her films—and this curse could mean death for all who surround her. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Barbara Hambly, including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author''s personal collection.

Five years after defeating the Dark Ones, the embattled inhabitants of the once-great Keep of Dare face a yet more deadly foe. An icy-cold force was spreading across the northlands, spawning strange creatures that killed everything in their grisly path . . . Archmage Ingold Inglorion believed the source of this monstrous evil lay in the decadent lands to the south. With him traveled Gil Patterson, the scholar-warrior from Earth who had forsaken her own universe for love of the mage. Determined to aid him in his quest, she was cursed to become the instrument of his death. Ingold''s apprentice Rudy Solis was left behind, the sole wizard standing between the Keep of Dare and the nightmare creatures besieging it. Rudy struggled tirelessly with wavering magic to ward off the virulent attacks of the ice mage''s minions. But when someone attacked the widowed queen--the woman he loved--Rudy was forced to plumb the ultimate secret locked in the black crystal heart of the Keep of Dare . . . and so decide the fate of the world.

New York Times bestselling author Barbara Hambly returns to the Star Wars(r) universe to tell a breathtaking tale of a mysterious world where the battle between the New Republic and the Empire takes a shocking new twist.... Nam Chorios is a barren backwater world--once a dreaded prison colony, now home to a fanatic religious cult. It is here that Princess Leia has been taken captive by a ruthless and charismatic warlord bent on destroying the New Republic. Meanwhile, Luke lands on a mysterious planet in search of his lost love, Callista, only to discover the Force is his own worst enemy. But worst of all, as Han, Chewie, and Lando leave Coruscant on a desperate rescue mission, a strange life-form, unlike any the galaxy has ever seen, awakens...a life-form so malevolent it will destroy everything--both Empire and New Republic--on its path to domination.

Benjamin January investigates the murder of a ‘conductor’ of the Underground Railway, helping slaves to freedom. Benjamin January is called up to Vicksburg, deep in cotton-plantation country, to help a wounded “conductor” of the Underground Railroad – the secret network of safe-houses that guide escaping slaves to freedom. When the chief “conductor” of the “station” is found murdered, Jubal Cain – the coordinator of the whole Railroad system in Mississippi – is accused of the crime. Since Cain can’t expose the nature of his involvement in the railroad, January has to step in and find the true killer, before their covers are blown. As January probes into the murky labyrinth of slaves, slave-holders, the fugitives who follow the “drinking gourd” north to freedom and those who help them on their way, he discovers that there is more to the situation than meets the eye, and that sometimes there are no easy answers.

A fresh take on Bram Stoker''s Dracula focuses on the obsessive devotion of Renfield to his vampire master, embarking on a personal mission to hunt down Van Helsing and his companions that sets the stage for the ultimate confrontation between the living and the undead and takes him from Dracula''s castle into the horrific darkness of his own mind. Reprint.

The novels of New York Times bestselling author Barbara Hambly have broken new ground in the realm of fantasy. With a sweeping cast of characters whose powers are both awesome and heartachingly limited, the Dragon series is built around the touching relationship between a husband and wife separated by a flood of violence and chaos. Condemned to die for consorting with demons, dragonslayer Lord John Aversin sits in a dank prison cell and calculates the odds of escape, while smelling the smoke of the executioners’ pyres. In Winterlands, Jenny Waynest pays a heavy price for choosing to be human, mourning the loss of her husband, Lord John, and the dangers that engulf her family. But in a season of the Dragon Star, strange miracles are about to transpire. As a pitched battle between the Hellspawn and the human rages, Jenny and John will be reunited in a city under siege. And there, they will have one last chance to understand all that has happened to them and why, who their true enemies and true allies are, and most of all, for what magical purpose each has been chosen. A vast adventure and a powerful mystery teeming with demons and witches, gnomes and dragons, Dragonstar explores profound issues of faith, fate, and technology–while obscuring long held boundaries between good and evil, love and hate, what is human and what is fantastic. With this glorious finale to a breathtaking series, Barbara Hambly establishes herself as one of the most visionary and inventive storytellers in the field of fantasy fiction today.