Sophie Katz's relationship with the irresistible and occasionally insufferable P.I. Anatoly Darinsky is on the fritz when a friend recruits Sophie's investigation skills to decode her possibly two-timing husband's strange behavior. When Sophie shows up in a short, red cocktail dress and her friend's hubby winds up dead, the loveable would-be sleuth can't help but take on the job. Suddenly plunged into a crazy world of campaign mudslinging, dirt-digging and cover-ups, Sophie begins to uncover some pretty dirty secrets indeed–involving a conservative congressional hopeful's involvement in the Furry community, a group of people who dress up in mascot-size stuffed animal costumes. Sex and politics, wouldn't you know? Way in over her head as usual, Sophie reluctantly–or not-so-reluctantly–enlists the help of her two-time sidekick and ex–Anatoly. Together they set out to determine who killed Eugene and why, and in the process can't resist falling for each other–again?

Twenty-three-year-old Jersey girl Eve Vitali is on the verge of something… whether it be a relationship, the fabulous life that she reads about in the Styles section of the New York Times or a nervous breakdown. Despite her Jackie O. suit, Eve works as an unappreciated assistant for–of all things–a bicycle magazine. Everyone keeps telling her that she's got her foot in the door, but the rest of her is surfing the Net and schlepping around with Tabitha, an Amazonian sex goddess. Between glam parties, obligatory visits home and myriad men, Eve is realizing that it takes a lot of work to get beyond the verge and on to the next big thing…. It seems everyone has advice on how to get there: Eve (on keeping her "foot in the door"): "Develop artificial cheeriness. Answer all requests with 'great.' Hypothetical: Person of dubious authority: 'Eve, why don't you count all of the paper clips in the entire department and then divide them into seven equal piles?' Me: 'Great. I'll get right on it. That'll be great.'" Tabitha (prefers foreign men, gets entree to the coolest parties, buys lots of underwear): "Remove unsightly hairs before all dates." Roseanne (Eve's roommate who works in–gasp!–finance): "Whatever you do, don't be predictable."

Veterinarian Carter Phillips wants answers. The scandal surrounding his employer's prizewinning horse has left Carter unable to clear Quest Stables' name…or his own. But then Carter spies an exquisite painting of an unknown horse that could finally lead him to the truth…. Artist Gillian Cameron knows exactly who the horse is: he's her family's Thoroughbred, Picture of Perfection. But Carter's suspicions compromise the horse's future and that of her family. She knows she can't trust Carter's agenda…so why does she find herself wanting to trust him with a mystery of her own?

Leverage Scala and Machine Learning to study and construct systems that can learn from data About This Book ? Explore a broad variety of data processing, machine learning, and genetic algorithms through diagrams, mathematical formulation, and updated source code in Scala ? Take your expertise in Scala programming to the next level by creating and customizing AI applications ? Experiment with different techniques and evaluate their benefits and limitations using real-world applications in a tutorial style Who This Book Is For If you’re a data scientist or a data analyst with a fundamental knowledge of Scala who wants to learn and implement various Machine learning techniques, this book is for you. All you need is a good understanding of the Scala programming language, a basic knowledge of statistics, a keen interest in Big Data processing, and this book! What You Will Learn ? Build dynamic workflows for scientific computing ? Leverage open source libraries to extract patterns from time series ? Write your own classification, clustering, or evolutionary algorithm ? Perform relative performance tuning and evaluation of Spark ? Master probabilistic models for sequential data ? Experiment with advanced techniques such as regularization and kernelization ? Dive into neural networks and some deep learning architecture ? Apply some basic multiarm-bandit algorithms ? Solve big data problems with Scala parallel collections, Akka actors, and Apache Spark clusters ? Apply key learning strategies to a technical analysis of financial markets In Detail The discovery of information through data clustering and classification is becoming a key differentiator for competitive organizations. Machine learning applications are everywhere, from self-driving cars, engineering design, logistics, manufacturing, and trading strategies, to detection of genetic anomalies. The book is your one stop guide that introduces you to the functional capabilities of the Scala programming language that are critical to the creation of machine learning algorithms such as dependency injection and implicits. You start by learning data preprocessing and filtering techniques. Following this, you'll move on to unsupervised learning techniques such as clustering and dimension reduction, followed by probabilistic graphical models such as Na?ve Bayes, hidden Markov models and Monte Carlo inference. Further, it covers the discriminative algorithms such as linear, logistic regression with regularization, kernelization, support vector machines, neural networks, and deep learning. You’ll move on to evolutionary computing, multibandit algorithms, and reinforcement learning. Finally, the book includes a comprehensive overview of parallel computing in Scala and Akka followed by a de*ion of Apache Spark and its ML library. With updated codes based on the latest version of Scala and comprehensive examples, this book will ensure that you have more than just a solid fundamental knowledge in machine learning with Scala. Style and approach This book is designed as a tutorial with hands-on exercises using technical analysis of financial markets and corporate data. The approach of each chapter is such that it allows you to understand key concepts easily.

到日本自助旅行，不会日文怎么办？讲英文会让听不懂的日本人手忙脚乱，比手划脚又毫无效率？别担心，只要手上有这本就万事OK！精选出旅途的各种场合下好用的一句话，附上MP3正确发音，让您旅行中遇到什么情况都不怕，轻松畅游日本。? 《自助旅行日语》为了满足现代人喜欢出国观光、享受自由、顺利畅游我们这个地球村的需要，作者归纳整理了在国外旅游、生活、洽商时有可能发生的情景，内容涵盖面极广，包括搭机、住宿、租车、生病、遗失物品、遭窃、谈生意等等各种状况，让你的自由行轻松自在无烦恼！

風──創作路，多風暴；風眼中，看平靜。 花──風旅中，遇花海；學種花，孕新生。 雪──花落時，雪堵路；寒道裡，享甘薯。 月──雪告別，前路明；月照下，見新遊。 作者在書中以自然之景──風、花、雪、月為幹，既說一己的創作歷程，又細說對人世間的萬事萬物的觀察，體現作者的觀點與視覺。 綣綣塵世間，我們會遇到風雨，但風雨過後，得享霎時平靜，柳暗花明，未至絕路。碰到寒雪堵路，調整心境，實是享甘薯的好時光。人生有高有低，或臨絕處卻又逢生。作者欲藉文、圖道出的，正是此理。 此作以清新的繪圖為主，配以精簡的文字，感悟各式各樣人生小道理，讓讀者在閱讀之時，享受一刻的清泉，澄明身心。 內文範例： 同生同等。 兒時，我無聊跳高伸手蜻蜓，但牠總會飛高來欺負我； 當時我還無知地認為長高後，牠就難逃我的魔掌。 今天，牠就在我身邊飛過，當然人大了， 我沒伸出那頑皮手來捉牠。 因我明白，不是現在我的高度足以捉到牠， 而是牠因快下雨而低飛。 我早就不應跟牠比較高低，即使現在我能力比牠高，亦不等於我就要向牠施展魔爪， 因從沒有誰想打倒誰，而是本身就是應該共存。

本書從提高小學生寫字能力的角度出發，以香港教育局課程發展處中國語文教育組編訂的《香港小學學習字詞表》為基礎，參考衆多小學語文教材，精選350個小學階段使用頻率、構字構詞能力強的漢字，從偏旁、筆畫、筆順等方面對漢字逐一解構，幫助小學生掌握正確的漢字書寫規則。

本書精選小學生8種常用修辭法，包括：比喻、擬人、排比、反復、設問、反問、誇張、對偶等，提供3百多條測試題目，輔以淺白的文字加以解說，幫助學生讀者把握運用有關修辭的用法。為增添閱讀趣味，本書加入了生動的故事，幽默的漫畫和形式豐富的遊戲，務求做到「學」與「樂」統一。

重點探討慢性腎病中西治療比較及配合，並清楚列出容易產生的併發症，慢性腎衰竭的狀況，提供實用診治和個人調養方法。提供中藥藥饍、食療、生活方式調護，並輔以簡易的菜餚、湯水等食譜，讀者可以自行烹調食用。

香港中文大歷史系成立於1963年，至2013年已經歷了五十年。在這五十年的歲月中，歷史系的前賢和師輩奠下了嚴肅的學術風氣與扎實的研究根基。莘莘學子，遂得以承傳錢穆、牟潤孫、全漢昇、嚴耕望、王德昭、孫國棟等眾多史學名宿的治學精神。 為了慶祝歷史系踏入金禧之年，我們邀請校友撰文論述前輩老師的個人風骨、學術成就、治史理念、研究心得及教學旨趣等，編成此書以總結五十年來歷史系前賢的開創、耕耘之功及治史業績，好讓後輩繼往開來，延續並發展創系以來的理念和精神。

全書包含幾個英語語法範疇：易混淆詞、單複數、量詞、數目詞彙、同音異義詞、短語動詞、慣用語、明喻和隱喻等 內容選自余黎青萍於報章撰寫的專欄文章，談及英語學習不同的重要範疇，作者從日常生活、工作、傳媒報導等搜集實例，從反方面指出措辭不當、似是而非的毛病，也從正面說明如何學好英語，如何活用 phrasal verbs 及 idioms，幫助讀者明白英語如何可表達得傳神。

本書從鍛鍊體魄的好處開始，仔細講解跑步前的風險評估，按個人體能和目標設計的多種長跑訓練計劃和訓練方法，如長距離跑、節奏跑及間歇跑的要點，還詳述如何預防受傷、處理傷患、配合飲食營養，加強鍛鍊效果。

「極短篇」，又有人稱之為「小小說」或「掌上小說」。寫「極短篇」，極不容易，在如此小的篇幅內說故事，從頭到尾，一眼望盡，瑕瑜立見，無可隱藏，其實「難度」相當高。 但本書作者卻是寫「極短篇」的高手，書中精選了她的三十篇佳作，當中的故事，既有愛情的，也有人情的，甚至奇幻的，題材豐富，異彩紛呈，情節引人入勝，結局又出人意表。每個故事讀後，相信讀者或會會心微笑，或會擊節驚歎，又或會領悟到一點點人生的道理。

Prima Ballerina Darcey Bussell takes you on a captivating journey to a faraway land of ballet and magic, the wonderful world of Enchantia! The first of a sparkly new series for all young girls who dream of being a ballerina, or simply love to dance… Delphie’s greatest dream is to become a ballerina, and she can't quite believe it when she is invited to join the new ballet school. But there's more to Madame Zarakova's than it at first seems and with the help of some very special ballet shoes, Delphie finds herself spinning into a whole new world…

When friendship becomes love, two people must face their greatest fear – being hurt again…The powerful bestseller from the country’s number one storyteller. Luke Hammond: handsome, rich, charismatic, cursed by private tragedy. Amy Atkinson: humble and kind with a good – but wounded – heart. When they meet by chance, a spark of love takes hold of their hearts. But neither are sure that they can dare to love again. And what of Luke's public life, hidden from Amy? The owner of a large factory, he is a pillar of the community, married – though in name only. Amy is torn between her head and her heart, but her sense of honour is paramount – and when she discovers his true identity, she is thrown into even greater turmoil. Then disaster strikes and the future looks troubled indeed ….

Another page-turning story of tragedy and triumph from the No.1 bestselling author of The Loner and The Journey. In the sleepy Lancashire village of Salmesbury, childhood sweethearts Emily and John are secretly planning a life together when they are cruelly forced apart. Already abandoned by her father, and unhappy at home, Emily is heartbroken when John leaves the village. Her life takes a devastating turn for the worse when she gives birth to a child. She dare not reveal the identity of the child's father or there will be a terrible price to pay. Many miles away, John is trying to forget Emily and forge a new life. Having carried her in his heart for years, a chance encounter leads him to believe she has forgotten him. Emily has never been able to banish thoughts of John. But when it looks as though history is about to repeat itself, Emily must put the past – and John – behind her and safeguard her daughter. But can she forget him?

This bestseller from the country’s number one storyteller is a deeply moving and powerful tale of love and courage and a sacrifice no man should be asked to make. Three strangers are thrown together by chance. It’s an encounter which is destined to change all of their lives for ever. When Ben Morris comes to the aid of Lucy Baker and her daughter Mary, he is intrigued by the story behind their frequent visits to the local graveyard. Later, invited into their home, an old Edwardian place suffused with secrets of the past, Ben hears Lucy’s remarkable tale – one she must tell before it’s too late. The story of Barney Davidson, his family and the part Lucy played in his extraordinary life, is one of a deep, abiding love and an incredible sacrifice.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of ‘The Hours’ and new novel ‘The Snow Queen’, time, technology and love are the central concerns of a provocative novel that calls to mind David Mitchell’s ‘Cloud Atlas’. Lucas, Catherine, Simon: three characters meet time and again in the three linked narratives that form ‘Specimen Days’. The first, a science fiction of the past, tells of a boy whose brother was ‘devoured’ by the machine he operated. The second is a noirish thriller set in our century, as a police psychologist attempts to track down a group of terrorists. And the third and final strand accompanies two strange beings into the future. A novel of connecting and reconnecting, inspired by the writings of the great visionary poet Walt Whitman, ‘Specimen Days’ is a genre-bending, haunting ode to life itself – a work of surpassing power and beauty by one of the most original and daring writers at work today.

A romance-filled page-turner for any Austen fanatic who’s ever dreamt of spending a weekend with Mr Darcy… Katherine Roberts is fed up with men. As a lecturer specialising in the works of Jane Austen, she knows that the ideal man only exists within the pages of Pride & Prejudice and that in real life there is no such thing. Determined to go it alone, she finds all the comfort she needs reading her guilty pleasure – regency romances from the pen of Lorna Warwick – with whom she has now struck up an intimate correspondence. Austen fanatic, Robyn Love, is blessed with a name full of romance, but her love life is far from perfect. Stuck in a rut with a bonehead boyfriend, Jace, and a job she can do with her eyes shut – her life has hit a dead end. Robyn would love to escape from it all but wouldn't know where to start. They both decide to attend the annual Jane Austen Conference at sumptuous Purley Hall, overseen by the actress and national treasure, Dame Pamela Harcourt. Robyn is hoping to escape from Jace for the weekend and indulge in her passion for all things Austen. Katherine is hoping that Lorna Warwick will be in attendance and is desperate to meet her new best friend in the flesh. But nothing goes according to plan and Robyn is aghast when Jace insists on accompanying her, whilst Katherine is disappointed to learn that Lorna won't be coming. However, an Austen weekend wouldn't be the same without a little intrigue, and Robyn and Katherine are about to get much more than they bargained for. Because where Jane Austen is concerned, romance is never very far away…

A tremendously vivid, page-turning and plausible novel that depicts the rise and fall of Anne Boleyn, the most spirited, independent and courageous of Henry’s queens, as viewed from both the bedrooms and the kitchens of the Tudor court. Everyone knows the story of Anne Boleyn. Henry VIII divorced his longstanding, long-suffering, older, Spanish wife for a young, black-eyed English beauty, and, in doing so, severed England from Rome and indeed from the rest of the western world. Then, when Henry had what he wanted, he managed a mere three years of marriage before beheading his wife for alleged adultery with several men, among them his own best friend and her own brother. This is the context for Suzannah Dunn's wonderful new novel, which is about – and told by – two women: Anne Boleyn, king's mistress and fated queen; and Lucy Cornwallis, the king's confectioner, an employee of the very highest status, who made the centrepiece of each of the feasts to mark the important occasions in Anne's ascent. There's another link between them, though: the lovely Mark Smeaton, wunderkind musician, the innocent on whom, ultimately, Anne's downfall hinged… Suzannah Dunn has all the equipment needed for literary-commercial success: wit, a mastery of dialogue, brilliant characterization, lack of pretence, and good humour. The Queen of Subtleties adds to that mix a wonderfully balanced, strong story; Dunn has plumped for a fascinating retelling of one of the most often-told, most compelling stories of our islands' history. In doing so, she's turning from contemporary stories to historical fiction. The result is sensational.

David Beckham is one of the world's foremost media icons, his popularity transcending sport and cultural divides. This is his own in-depth account of his career to date, for Manchester United and England, and of his childhood, family and personal life. This is Beckham's fascinating life story in his own words. His rise through the ranks at the biggest club side in the world. His complex relationship with United boss Alex Ferguson. The England story, from being vilified by the nation before returning as the prodigal son to eventually captaining his country. His acrimonious falling-out with his manager and departure from Old Trafford in June 2003. And starting a new chapter of his life on foreign soil in the glare of the world’s press. Now from Beckham himself, we gain a vivid and eye-opening insight into the family man behind the famous footballer, the international model and fashion leader. He describes how he first met and then married ex-Spice girl Victoria Adams, and the upbringing of their two children Brooklyn and Romeo. How his family's every step is monitored by a posse of newshounds and paparazzi. Also, the influence of his parents, growing up as a shy youngster in the family home, and how their subsequent split affected him. Intimate and soul-searching, this is the real David Beckham like we have never seen before.