‘The author tells an evocative story that is both illuminating and engrossing at the same time.’ Allie Burns, author of The Lido Girls ‘Lush and evocative.’ Rosemary Smith ‘The writing elevates this beyond many historical novels.’ Joseph Morgan Vienna 1907 Wally Neuzil must find a way to feed her family. Having failed in many vocations, Wally has one last shot: esteemed artist Gustav Klimt needs a muse, and Wally could be the girl he’s been waiting for. But Wally soon discovers that there is much more to her role than just sitting looking pretty. And while she had hoped to establish herself as an emerging lady, the upper classes see her as no more than a prostitute. With her society dreams dashed Wally finds herself at rock bottom. So when young artist, Egon Schiele, shows her how different life can be Wally grabs hold of the new start she’s been desperately seeking. As a passionate love affair ensues will he be the making of her or her undoing? Praise for The Artist’s Muse ‘Richly entertaining, wry and funny, and at the same time dark, thoughtful and allusive, I shall look forward to reading this one again, and any more that come from this writer.’ Kate Jackson ‘A richly layered read, that delivers on many levels.’ Joseph Morgan ‘Postle has taken me into a world full of characters that jump off the page with life, who inhabit a Vienna oozing with culture and modernity yet bursting at the seams at the height of empire and all the inequalities that go with it.’ Rebecca Barton ‘This novel evokes a time and a place with such power. Wally Neuzil , so brave, yet so tragic, speaks with a voice to break your heart.’ Pam Dennis

Are you willing to gamble with your life? Some debts can’t be repaid. The Gambler’s Den lies in ruins, its staff scattered across the Sand Sea, all but a memory of the minds of its past patrons. But when the Morning Star appears, ruled by a mysterious figure known only as the Hare, the comparisons can’t be helped. Who is this larger-than-life character? Why do the showgirls wear masks? What are they hiding? The answer…they should be dead. Franco and Misu were safe only in their anonymity, but with Franco gone Misu must find him – jeopardising all they have built. In order to save the man she trusts Misu must put her faith in the villain. Wilheim does not forget disobedience lightly, and Misu’s was a great betrayal, so now he will call in his debt, and his revenge on the staff of the Morning Star. Who will win? Who will survive? Who will the odds favour?

Make web applications run faster by using advanced PHP, SQL and JavaScript techniques About This Book ? Use a customized PHP stack to create efficient data-driven web applications ? Ensure seamless implementation of a JavaScript & HTML 5 CSS based frontend and PHP based backend. ? Learn about problem identification, best strategies, and UI design patterns as well to build a clean, fast web application Who This Book Is For The audience for this book would be PHP developers who have some basic knowledge of PHP programming and Web technologies. JavaScript programming knowledge is not necessary. What You Will Learn ? Install, confgure, and use profling and benchmarking testing tools ? Understand how to recognize optimizable data structures and functions to effectively optimize a PHP7 application ? Diagnose bad SQL query performance and discover ways to optimize it ? Grasp modern SQL techniques to optimize complex SQL queries ? Identify and simplify overly complex JavaScript code ? Explore and implement UI design principles that effectively enhance the performance ? Combine web technologies to boost web server performance In Detail This book will get you started with the latest benchmarking, profiling and monitoring tools for PHP, MySQL and JavaScript using Docker-based technologies. From optimizing PHP 7 code to learning asynchronous programming, from implementing Modern SQL solutions to discovering Functional JavaScript techniques, this book covers all the latest developments in Faster Web technologies. You will not only learn to determine the best optimization strategies, but also how to implement them. Along the way, you will learn how to profile your PHP scripts with Blackfire.io, monitor your Web applications, measure database performance, optimize SQL queries, explore Functional JavaScript, boost Web server performance in general and optimize applications when there is nothing left to optimize by going beyond performance. After reading this book, you will know how to boost the performance of any Web application and make it part of what has come to be known as the Faster Web. Style and approach The book has a step by step practical approach to developing highly efficient Web applications, with many practical and useful code snippets.

Build applications and infrastructures that leverage Function-as-a-Service and Docker About This Book ? Implement containerization in Serverless/FaaS environments ? Utilize Docker as a functional unit of work for Serverless/FaaS platforms ? Use Docker as a portable infrastructure for Serverless Applications Who This Book Is For If you are a Developer, a Docker Engineer, a DevOps Engineer, or any stakeholder interested in learning the use of Docker on Serverless environments then this book is for you. What You Will Learn ? Learn what Serverless and FaaS applications are ? Get acquainted with the architectures of three major serverless systems ? Explore how Docker technologies can help develop Serverless applications ? Create and maintain FaaS infrastructures ? Set up Docker infrastructures to serve as on-premises FaaS infrastructures ? Define functions for Serverless applications with Docker containers In Detail Serverless applications have gained a lot of popularity among developers and are currently the buzzwords in the tech market. Docker and serverless are two terms that go hand-in-hand. This book will start by explaining serverless and Function-as-a-Service (FaaS) concepts, and why they are important. Then, it will introduce the concepts of containerization and how Docker fits into the Serverless ideology. It will explore the architectures and components of three major Docker-based FaaS platforms, how to deploy and how to use their CLI. Then, this book will discuss how to set up and operate a production-grade Docker cluster. We will cover all concepts of FaaS frameworks with practical use cases, followed by deploying and orchestrating these serverless systems using Docker. Finally, we will also explore advanced topics and prototypes for FaaS architectures in the last chapter. By the end of this book, you will be in a position to build and deploy your own FaaS platform using Docker. Style and approach A practical guide that offers a simple way to easily understand Serverless Applications utilizing Docker as the development environment.

Learn the most powerful and primary programming language for writing smart contracts and find out how to write, deploy, and test smart contracts in Ethereum. About This Book ? Get you up and running with Solidity Programming language ? Build Ethereum Smart Contracts with Solidity as your scripting language ? Learn to test and deploy the smart contract to your private Blockchain Who This Book Is For This book is for anyone who would like to get started with Solidity Programming for developing an Ethereum smart contract. No prior knowledge of EVM is required. What You Will Learn ? Learn the basics and foundational concepts of Solidity and Ethereum ? Explore the Solidity language and its uniqueness in depth ? Create new accounts and submit transactions to blockchain ? Get to know the complete language in detail to write smart contracts ? Learn about major tools to develop and deploy smart contracts ? Write defensive code using exception handling and error checking ? Understand Truffle basics and the debugging process In Detail Solidity is a contract-oriented language whose syntax is highly influenced by JavaScript, and is designed to compile code for the Ethereum Virtual Machine. Solidity Programming Essentials will be your guide to understanding Solidity programming to build smart contracts for Ethereum and blockchain from ground-up. We begin with a brief run-through of blockchain, Ethereum, and their most important concepts or components. You will learn how to install all the necessary tools to write, test, and debug Solidity contracts on Ethereum. Then, you will explore the layout of a Solidity source file and work with the different data types. The next set of recipes will help you work with operators, control structures, and data structures while building your smart contracts. We take you through function calls, return types, function modifers, and recipes in object-oriented programming with Solidity. Learn all you can on event logging and exception handling, as well as testing and debugging smart contracts. By the end of this book, you will be able to write, deploy, and test smart contracts in Ethereum. This book will bring forth the essence of writing contracts using Solidity and also help you develop Solidity skills in no time. Style and approach Solidity is a high-level programming language best understood using examples. After covering basic concepts of Ethereum and Solidity, programming constructs will be explained with help of examples. As chapters progress, deployment, usage and testing of contacts will form major aspect of the book. Troubleshooting and unit testing is an important exercise and skill to master this language will also be covered in this book.

Building efficient Python applications at minimal cost by adopting serverless architectures About This Book ? Design and set up a data flow between cloud services and custom business logic ? Make your applications efficient and reliable using serverless architecture ? Build and deploy scalable serverless Python APIs Who This Book Is For This book is for Python developers who would like to learn about serverless architecture. Python programming knowledge is assumed. What You Will Learn ? Understand how AWS Lambda and Microsoft Azure Functions work and use them to create an application ? Explore various triggers and how to select them, based on the problem statement ? Build deployment packages for Lambda functions ? Master the finer details about building Lambda functions and versioning ? Log and monitor serverless applications ? Learn about security in AWS and Lambda functions ? Scale up serverless applications to handle huge workloads and serverless distributed systems in production ? Understand SAM model deployment in AWS Lambda In Detail Serverless architectures allow you to build and run applications and services without having to manage the infrastructure. Many companies have adopted this architecture to save cost and improve scalability. This book will help you design serverless architectures for your applications with AWS and Python. The book is divided into three modules. The first module explains the fundamentals of serverless architecture and how AWS lambda functions work. In the next module, you will learn to build, release, and deploy your application to production. You will also learn to log and test your application. In the third module, we will take you through advanced topics such as building a serverless API for your application. You will also learn to troubleshoot and monitor your app and master AWS lambda programming concepts with API references. Moving on, you will also learn how to scale up serverless applications and handle distributed serverless systems in production. By the end of the book, you will be equipped with the knowledge required to build scalable and cost-efficient Python applications with a serverless framework. Style and approach The book takes a pragmatic approach, using a real-world example to demonstrate building efficient, secure, and scalable serverless applications.

Improve the speed of your code and optimize the performance of your apps About This Book ? Understand the common performance pitfalls and improve your application’s performance ? Get to grips with multi-threaded and asynchronous programming in C# ? Develop highly performant applications on .NET Core using microservice architecture Who This Book Is For This book is for .NET developers looking at improving the speed of their code or simply wanting to take their skills to the next level. Basic C# knowledge is assumed. What You Will Learn ? Measure application performance using BenchmarkDotNet ? Explore the techniques to write multithreaded applications ? Leverage TPL and PLinq libraries to perform asynchronous operations ? Get familiar with data structures to write optimized code ? Understand design techniques to increase your application’s performance ? Learn about memory management techniques in .NET Core ? Develop a containerized application based on microservices architecture ? Learn tools and techniques to monitor application performance In Detail While writing an application, performance is paramount. Performance tuning for realworld applications often involves activities geared toward fnding bottlenecks; however, this cannot solve the dreaded problem of slower code. If you want to improve the speed of your code and optimize an application's performance, then this book is for you. C# 7 and .NET Core 2.0 High Performance begins with an introduction to the new features of what?explaining how they help in improving an application's performance. Learn to identify the bottlenecks in writing programs and highlight common performance pitfalls, and learn strategies to detect and resolve these issues early. You will explore multithreading and asynchronous programming with .NET Core and learn the importance and effcient use of data structures. This is followed with memory management techniques and design guidelines to increase an application’s performance. Gradually, the book will show you the importance of microservices architecture for building highly performant applications and implementing resiliency and security in .NET Core. After reading this book, you will learn how to structure and build scalable, optimized, and robust applications in C#7 and .NET. Style and approach This book will be a step by step easy to follow guide with focused examples to increase performance of applications and provide optimization techniques.

Enhance your software deployment workflow using containers About This Book ? Get up-and-running with basic to advanced concepts of Docker ? Get acquainted with concepts such as Docker containers, Docker images, orchestrators and so on. ? Practical test-based approach to learning a prominent containerization tool Who This Book Is For This book is targeted at system administrators, operations engineers, DevOps engineers, and developers or stakeholders who are interested in getting started with Docker from scratch. No prior experience with Docker Containers is required. What You Will Learn ? Containerize your traditional or microservice-based application ? Share or ship your application as an immutable container image ? Build a Docker swarm and a Kubernetes cluster in the cloud ? Run a highly distributed application using Docker Swarm or Kubernetes ? Update or rollback a distributed application with zero downtime ? Secure your applications via encapsulation, networks, and secrets ? Know your options when deploying your containerized app into the cloud In Detail Docker containers have revolutionized the software supply chain in small and big enterprises. Never before has a new technology so rapidly penetrated the top 500 enterprises worldwide. Companies that embrace containers and containerize their traditional mission-critical applications have reported savings of at least 50% in total maintenance cost and a reduction of 90% (or more) of the time required to deploy new versions of those applications. Furthermore they are benefitting from increased security just by using containers as opposed to running applications outside containers. This book starts from scratch, introducing you to Docker fundamentals and setting up an environment to work with it. Then we delve into concepts such as Docker containers, Docker images, Docker Compose, and so on. We will also cover the concepts of deployment, orchestration, networking, and security. Furthermore, we explain Docker functionalities on public clouds such as AWS. By the end of this book, you will have hands-on experience working with Docker containers and orchestrators such as SwarmKit and Kubernetes. Style and approach The simple end-to-end guide will help you learn everything about how to containerize, ship, and run both a traditional application and a modern microservice-based application on-premise or in the cloud.

A Place to Call Home Lawman Joe Sheehan is desperate to bond with the daughter he’s just discovered he has. But as a virtual stranger to twelve-year-old Amelia, the task seems impossible. Until Claire Conley moves to town. A social worker renovating a mansion into a foster home, Claire is the first person to get through to Amelia. Falling for the single dad was not on Claire’s to do list. But with Joe and Amelia around, the house finally starts to feel like home. Claire’s ready to fight to convince Joe that together they’ve done more than fix a house…they’ve built a family.

Rancher Daddy Morgan Walsh will do just about anything to connect with the son who continues to keep him at arm’s length. Even ask a favor of ex-fiancé Tabitha Rennie. And what young Nathan desperately wants is for Tabitha to train his late mother’s horse. But Tabitha is also determined to keep her distance. As soon as she’s paid off her father’s debts, she’ll leave town and the painful memories of the real reason she abruptly left Morgan all those years ago. Yet spending time together with Morgan and his son is sparking dreams they can’t deny: of family, fresh starts, and first loves that last a lifetime.

The Cowboy’s New Family All veterinarian Darcy Leighton wants is a good life for her daughter. But when the vet practice she hopes to inherit is bought out from under her by newcomer Logan Maxwell, she stands to lose her position completely. Recovering from a bad breakup, the handsome cowboy wants a fresh start—one that doesn’t include working with a woman he’s undeniably attracted to. No stranger to heartbreak, Darcy has reservations of her own, but she can’t walk away from this job. She’ll just have to convince Logan to take a chance on her…and believe that what they have together is strong enough to last.

Small-Town Reunion Claire Atwood is about to make all her dreams come true. With her newly adopted son, Claire's back in Goose Harbor, running for mayor and going toe-to-toe with Evan Daniels—the man who left her at the altar twelve years ago. But she refuses to let their history get in the way of her future. Evan's come a long way from the poor teenager Claire’s powerful father intimidated. And he can't help noticing Claire's grown into a beautiful woman and caring mother. A month from now, when the ballots are counted, Evan could be Mr. Mayor, but what he really wants is another title: daddy and husband.

DEADLY CONSPIRACY Talia Morello moved to Rome for a fresh start—but instead finds herself at the center of a deadly art smuggling ring with everything to lose, including her life. Someone’s dead set on retrieving three priceless paintings believed to have been stolen by Talia’s late husband. And when his unsolved murder is linked to the bullet that killed FBI agent Joe Bryant’s brother during a museum heist, Joe is determined to find out all of Talia’s secrets. When she denies any involvement, Joe’s gut and heart tell him to trust her. But with the target on Talia’s back only growing, there may not be time to uncover the whole truth and save the woman he’s falling for…

CAUGHT IN THE CROSSHAIRS A dog-sitting favor for a friend takes a terrifying twist when the police-dog-in-training runs off and leads Alexis Thompson into the middle of a drug drop. Only the quick thinking of a passing stranger gets them both out alive. Veterinarian Nick Kendrick, who’s running for mayor, knows the race for survival is just beginning. As moving targets, he and Alexis must work together to learn the identity of the drug ring’s murderous mastermind. But having killers on their tail isn’t the only problem they face. Alexis’s past as a disbarred lawyer could jeopardize Nick’s political future. Only by putting their dreams and their safety on the line can they eliminate the threat to their town, and find a way forward together…

She's got nowhere left to run After a year of searching, ex-marine turned private eye Tack Reeves has finally located Cate Allen. She’s traded in her high heels for flip-flops but Tack would recognize the stunning beauty anywhere. He just needs proof. Posing as a tourist at her Caribbean resort is the perfect cover. Except that the closer Tack gets to Cate the less his case makes sense…and their intense attraction is only fueling the confusion. When he learns that the mom and her four-year-old son are hiding from her abusive ex, he vows to protect them. But Cate may not let him when she learns why he's on the island…

She swore never to trust him… Hardworking single mom Andrea Taylor thought she knew everything about her teenaged daughter. She doesn't. Her teen is being bullied, and the school has brought in Jake Polegato to help. But the charming psychologist is the last man Andrea wants meddling in her family affairs. Andrea has good reason to despise Jake, but her daughter comes first. Yet as Andrea and Jake work together, she begins to see the man he really is. As tensions turn into undeniable attraction, Andrea finds herself in dangerously unfamiliar territory. Because now she doesn't just need Jake's help… she needs him.

Carol Marinelli was born in England to Scottish parents, then emigrated to Australia, where there are loads of Scottish and English people who did exactly the same, so she's very at home there. She lives in the outer suburbs of Melbourne—pretty much in her car, driving her three children to their various commitments. In her life, Carol has been a typist, a nurse, a fruit-picker, a backpacker, and has also applied to be a policewoman and to study midwifery, psychology…the list goes on. They all appealed – just not enough. Since the age of eighteen she’s dabbled with writing, but it was a rather sporadic effort at first – then finally she decided to take it more seriously. The biggest thrill in Carol’s writing life (and it still is to this day) was typing, for the first time, the words “The End”. For so many years there had been chapters and outlines and endless stop-starts, but having a full story, from start to middle to end, gave her a rush she had never expected. Of course it was rejected, but she’d got the bug and kept going till she was accepted.

Carol Marinelli recently filled in a form asking for her job title. Thrilled to be able to put down her answer, she put writer. Then it asked what Carol did for relaxation and she put down the truth - writing. The third question asked for her hobbies. Well, not wanting to look obsessed she crossed the fingers on her hand and answered swimming but, given that the chlorine in the pool does terrible things to her highlights – I’m sure you can guess the real answer.

A Family for the Officer Officer Bryce Camden never expected his two-week stint in Comfort Creek, Colorado would mean diaper duty. But that’s exactly what happens when he stays at the local bed and breakfast where Lily Ellison is fostering an abandoned baby girl. Bryce is drawn to the lovely B&B owner, but being a dad is not part of his plans. His troubled past has shown him that he’s not the nurturing type. But he soon finds himself wishing he didn’t have to leave. Because Lily and the baby have taken root in his heart and made him think that maybe he could be a family man after all… Comfort Creek Lawmen: Men in blue with hearts of gold

The Rancher Next Door Single mom Carly Wagner is surprised to learn she’ll have to share ownership of the home she’s inherited with first love—and first heartbreak—Andrew Stephens. The man who fled their tiny western town is back and standing in the way of her dreams to expand her B and B. Now a successful businessman, Andrew has eight weeks to buy Carly out. But Carly's too stubborn to persuade—and too beautiful to ignore. When fire ravages her inn and she and her daughter move in to their shared property, Andrew's in over his head. Time is running out and Andrew must decide: leave and chase another deal…or stay and chase Carly's heart. Rocky Mountain Heroes: Brothers raised by faith, ready for love

His Family of Convenience For widower and ex-doctor Trace Warren a fresh start in Whisper Creek comes with a catch: to save his home and apothecary shop, Trace must remarry. While making Katherine Fleming his wife is simple enough, he refuses to fall in love again. But keeping his distance from the kind, beautiful woman and the infant she brings with her is dangerously difficult… Katherine promised to protect the baby left in her care, and a marriage of convenience to Trace is the only way to do that. But all too soon, Trace possesses Katherine’s heart, even as he still carefully guards his own. With hopes of turning their arrangement into a true love match, can Katherine convince Trace to forgive himself for his past mistakes and embrace his new family? Stand-In Brides: Mail-order mix-ups turn into happy marriages in a new Wyoming town