Ancient Holidays

NATIONAL BESTSELLER Timeless insights into what it takes to lead a meaningful life—still profoundly relevant nearly two thousand years later. Now featuring a brand-new foreword from Ryan Holiday, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Obstacle Is the Way! “Meditations offers a...

The Snow Globe has been shaken. Now they have to survive what lands when the flakes settle. Nora planned the perfect escape: a luxury cabin perched on a high ridge in Norway. It was supposed to be a week of wine, fireplaces, and disconnection from the digital world. It was supposed to be a cure for the past year. But the "Blue Hour" brings more than just darkness to the valley. When a massive blizzard buries the access road and severs the power lines, the isolation turns from peaceful to predatory. The group discovers they are not alone on the mountain. Something ancient is circling the ...

It’s the winter season of 1746, and the Highlands are snowy. In the village of Calvine, north of Tay Forest along a road that leads straight into Inverness, the only tavern in town is packed to the rafters with travelers. Eight months after the disastrous defeat at Culloden, the people haven’t recovered, nor has the land, and it’s a bad winter. When James de Lohr, Earl of Worcester, shows up looking for clues to his brother’s fate on the Culloden Moor, he gets more than he bargained for.

The Ancient Origins of Modern Holidays draws from the Bible and Jewish sources on what has always been defined as paganism and idolatry. In this book, we learn which holiday practices are forbidden and which ones are not. The Dead Sea Scrolls record the origins of the festivals celebrated on the equinoxes and solstices and reveal why they are important for Christians today. Using these sources, Christians can easily draw the line on practices and celebrations. We learn how to nullify paganism and take back what God gave us, so we can be obedient to His commands.

He’s the clan’s quiet blacksmith—seven feet of scarred muscle, one blind eye, tusks that never grew in, and thirty-eight years of untouched nights. They call him broken. He calls the forge home, because fire never judged him. She’s the city’s most sought-after jewelry designer—a widowed human who learned long ago how to turn loneliness into diamonds. One trip to the North Pole to deliver custom rings, one laugh in a tiny bakery, and the ancient mistletoe arch decides enough is enough. Green fire. One sky-shattering MINE. One very public claiming that leaves half a billion ...

This book is your portal into the magic of Norse Pagan holidays and festivals, and it’ll take you by the hand into a world that is deeply entwined with the power of nature, with countless blessings of Norse gods and goddesses.

The Duanwu Festival is just around the corner, and Mulan's favorite part is the Dragon Boat Race. Listen along as Mulan's village enters the race for the first time!

The life and thought of Diogenes the Cynic, an iconoclastic philosopher who pioneered a brash and free-thinking vision of life that inspired the philosophy of Stoicism—“a rich, engaging portrait of intellectual fearlessness” (Stacy Schiff, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Cleopatra) In...

From the number-one New York Times best-selling author and creator of The Daily Stoic, Ryan Holiday comes one of the most incredible stories in all of history. A young boy, out of nowhere, is chosen to be the emperor of most of the known world. What he learns, what he does, who he is, will echo in eternity.

A practical guide to the ancient Japanese art of manifesting and pre-celebration, full of wise guidance on how to slow down, tune into the rhythms of the universe, and fulfill your destiny. During a particularly tough season of life, a Buddhist monk told Azumi Uchitani that the most beautiful...

Pine Hollow isn’t praying for a savior. It’s just trying not to get stepped on. For generations, the town has sold fear to tourists. The annual festival is a monetization of folklore—plastic horns, paid actors, and expensive hot chocolate. Deputy Harper Perry hates the hustle, but she respects the revenue. Then the lights go out. When a local teenager vanishes and a massacre is discovered behind the hardware store, Harper realizes the blood in the snow isn’t corn syrup. The monster stalking the festival isn’t a man in a suit. It is ancient, it is hungry, and it wields chains of ...

FAIRACRES PUBLICATIONS 140 Observance of the festival of the birth of Jesus Christ has changed over time, and sometimes we may wonder if something of the meaning of Christmas has been lost. Yet reflecting on the Biblical accounts of the birth of Jesus, and on the pagan origins of celebration in mid-winter, can give us fresh perspectives for our present-day keeping of Christmas. Kenneth Mason, born in 1931, was ordained priest in 1959. After eleven years in parish ministry in the Diocese of York, he moved to Canterbury, where he was engaged from 1969 to 1989 in ministerial training and ...

Sir Adam de Ware is on a mission as a spy for King Edward III. He is sent to Cavendish Castle to investigate some odd behavior from the earl. If he succeeds to get answers for the king, he will be rewarded when the mission is completed. Wanting to get close to the earl's daughter, the cold-hearted Lady Eva, to find out more, Adam decides to seduce her. But the only way to seduce a woman like this is to appeal to what she most desires, and that is sumptuous food! Adam uses his unique skill of being able to cook delectable holiday dishes to lure the woman closer.

A RENEGADE EXORCIST. A POSSESSED MERCEDES. AND THE ULTIMATE WAR FOR CHRISTMAS. From the author of The Bones of the Mother comes a high-octane holiday thriller that breaks every rule in the Vatican rulebook. Father Thomas O’Neill is not a typical priest. He smokes Turkish Royals to hide the scent of sulfur, drives a 1979 Mercedes-Benz 450SEL 6.9 fueled by the Wrath of God, and shares his body with Hanbi, a sarcastic Sumerian Archdevil. Thomas doesn't do "Peace on Earth." He does exorcisms. But when a Code Alpha threat triggers the Vatican’s early warning systems deep within the Arctic ...

How did things progress from that story in the Bible, with a Jewish girl giving birth to the Messiah of Israel in a manager in the city of Bethlehem, to the modern colossus that is the Christmas holiday? How did Santa Claus, the Christmas tree, the snow sleighs, the presents, and family reunions become the distinctive features of the holiday if none of them were there at the beginning? The answers can be attributed to a chain of events, characters, oral traditions, artistic works, and an assimilation of local folklore.

Thank you for reading! If you enjoyed this story, you can help me more than you know. A short review — even just a sentence — makes a huge difference and helps new readers discover the book. It only takes 10 seconds: ✔ Click “Write a review” ✔ Say what you liked ✔ Submit Your support keeps me writing. Thank you — Ted A Short Story...by Ted Lazaris Enter the world of Elderwood Hall, where Christmas is not just a festive season but a gateway to enchantment and timeless mysteries. "The Enchanted Eve at Elderwood Hall," penned by the imaginative Ted Lazaris, takes readers on a ...

I believe in science one hundred percent, yet a werewolf shows up out of nowhere and says I'm his mate, who do I call in this situation? I was just like you, sick of credit card bills, rent and damn jobs and praying before bed that the end of the world would be tomorrow. The universe suddenly decided to be merciful, and the apocalypse arrived unannounced. I found myself facing one crisis after another, with death and conspiracy hot on my heels. The mechanical buzzing of insects signaled the prelude to a conspiracy, followed closely by the attacks of furry werewolves—fanatics who were ...

Lord Etienne de Beynac, the youngest of six boys, has managed to disgrace his family with his wild ways. When his father and brothers disown him, he has no choice but to agree to his father's terms. He joins a monastery as a novice across the channel, in England. Etienne gets one last chance for redemption before he finalizes his vows to live the rest of his life as a monk. As a favor to his brother, he goes to Grimsthorpe Castle to spy on his brother's betrothed, Lady Philippa.

Rose has always fancied the handsome but unkempt Rag, since their teenage, sixties, skinny-dipping days, and knows that with them both suddenly single, it is up to her to gain the confidence to knit them both together. It should be easy for a liberated woman in the nineteen-seventies. Love has to eventually win. Daphne is in finishing school while her father is a Pharmacist, serving in the first world war. Her only aim in life is to meet a rich man and to move upwards, socially. Being wooed by Bertie she is swept off her feet and life sees them both move socially upwards, higher than either...

Shortlisted for the Edward Stanford Travel Book of the Year 2025 A Financial Times best summer travel book of 2024 Travel Book of the Year at the Inspire Global Media Awards 'A powerfully delicate book of love, loss and discovery, along paths of emotional understanding and physical wonder.'...