Althalus - burglar, armed robber and occasional murderer - is commissioned to steal a book by a mysterious cloaked stranger named Ghend. Althalus sets off to the House at the End of the World where the book is kept - after stealing Ghends cloak; after all, winter is coming on. At the House at the End of the World. in the same room as the book Ghend described, he finds a talking cat. What he can't find once he's in the house is the door by which he entered...
Aided by the goddess Aphrael, the Pandion Knight Sparhawk and his band of companions have recovered the magical jewel Bhelliom - the sapphire rose - from the cave of Ghwerig. Now they have the power to cure Ehlana, the young queen of Elenia. This is the third volume of "The Elenium" trilogy.
Ehlana, queen of Elenia, clings to life by a thread, preserved within a diamond-like block of crystal conjured by a sorceress with the aid of a dozen Pandion knights. For a year, their lives will save hers. However there is a lost jewel which will save her life, if it can be found.
Sparhawk, Pandion Knight and Queen's Champion returns from a long spell of exile to find his native land overrun with evil, intrigue and his young queen grievously ill. Ehlana lies magically entombed within a block of crystal, doomed to die unless a cure can be found within the year.
There is September 11 and then there are the days after, and finally the years.
Falling Man is a magnificent, essential novel about the event that defines turn-of-the-century America. It begins in the smoke and ash of the burning towers and tracks the aftermath of this global tremor in the intimate lives of a few people.
