Frank Carlson Library

No outsiders are ever admitted to the monastery of Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups, hidden deep in the wilderness of Quebec, where two dozen cloistered monks live in peace and prayer. They grow vegetables, they tend chickens, they make chocolate. And they sing. Ironically, for a community that has taken a vow of silence, the monks have become world famous for their glorious voices, raised in ancient chants whose effect on both singer and listener is...

"A Prayer for the Crown-Shy is a story of kindness and love from one of the foremost practitioners of hopeful SF. After touring the rural areas of Panga, Sibling Dex (a Tea Monk of some renown) and Mosscap (a robot sent on a quest to determine what humanity really needs) turn their attention to the villages and cities of the little moon they call home. They hope to find the answers they seek, while making new friends, learning new concepts, and experiencing...

“Bodies and red herrings pile up in a satisfying way” in the Silver Dagger Award–winning medieval mystery series starring Brother Cadfael (Library Journal).
The year is 1142, and England is in the grip of civil war. Within the cloisters of the Benedictine Abbey of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, there begins a chain of events no less momentous than the upheavals of the outside world.
 
It starts with...

In this gripping thriller, a scientific expedition in Antarctica stops for a live news feed. As the CNN journalist Gracie Logan begins her report, a massive, shimmering sphere of light suddenly appears in the sky, enveloping the ship in luminous white light before disappearing as mysteriously as it arrived--the entire event witnessed by an incredulous world audience. Meanwhile, a monk in Egypt experiences visions that seemed connected, and back in...

A Canticle for Leibowitz opens 600 years after 20th century civilization has been destroyed by a global nuclear war, known as the "Flame Deluge." As a result of the war, there was a violent backlash against the culture of advanced knowledge and technology that had led to the development of nuclear weapons. During this backlash, called the "Simplification," anyone of learning, and eventually anyone who could even read, was likely to be killed by rampaging...

Scotland, 1373, The Hebrides: Crispinus, the head of Oronsay Priory, is found strangled in the middle of the tidal strand separating the holy island of Oronsay from the larger island of Colonsay. The Lord of the Isles assigns the task of finding the killer to Muirteach, the Prior's son. Crispinus leaves behind a mistress and several other children, in addition to his embittered eldest son, who is thankful he will never hear the words, "My bastard...

When her mother sells the family home in the big city, crime reporter Jimm Juree is forced to follow her eccentric family to a rural village on the coast of southern Thailand. She's convinced her career - maybe her life - is over. But that changes with the murder of a local abbot and the unearthing of a van containing the skeletal remains of two hippies. Now Jimm's life seems a bit more exciting, a bit more promising - and a lot more deadly.

The winter of 1139 will disrupt Brother Cadfael's tranquil life in Shrewsbury, as raging civil war has sent refugees fleeing north from Worcester. Among them are two young orphans from a noble family and their companion, a young Benedictine nun. The trio, never reaching Shrewsbury, have disappeared somewhere in the wild countryside. Cadfael feels afraid for these three lost lambs, but another call for help sends him to the Church of Saint Mary. A...

Taking Constance on an international tour to expose her to a world she has never experienced, FBI agent Pendergast visits the Tibetan monastery where he received martial arts training, only to learn that a rare and dangerous artifact has been stolen.

"Indrajit and Fix are the founding partners of the Protagonists, a jobber company in Kish. Since the seven great families of Kish farm out all tasks they and the city need doing, a jobber might one day unblock a well, the next man a tollgate for the fair, and on the third hunt down a murderer on the loose, all in a corrupt old city that isn't so much governed as kept barely in bounds. Indrajit is a poet of a dying race, looking for his successor....