NCW Libraries

"In a United States not so unlike our own, the Department of Balance has adopted a radical new form of law enforcement: rather than incarceration, wrongdoers are given a second (and sometimes, third, fourth, and fifth) shadow as a reminder of their crime--and a warning to those they encounter. Within the Department, corruption and prejudice run rampant, giving rise to an underclass of so-called Shadesters who are disenfranchised, publicly shamed,...

"Set in the tumultuous year of 1968 in southern Virginia, a racially-charged murder case sets a duo of white and Black lawyers against a deeply unfair system as they work to defend their wrongfully-accused Black defendants When two wealthy white landowners are found dead, the whole country immediately thinks it must be Jerome Washington, the hired help, who killed them. He was standing over the bodies when the police responded to an anonymous call...

History of the punishments and tortures administered to offenders in all periods for which records exist. They include the peculiar punishments known as the ducking stool, the Scottish maiden, the pillory, the drunkard's cloak and the scold's bridle, and unsavoury punishments such as death by pressing, being hanged, drawn and quartered, and death by boiling.

The Punisher walks through the same world we all know, a world darkened by war, by crime, by cruelty, and by injustice. He has no superpowers to battle the evil he sees all around him. He only has his fierce intelligence, his years of combat experience and, above all, his ironclad determination to avenge those wronged by society's villains, including those who killed his family.

"A young royal from the far north, is sent south for a political marriage in an empire reminiscent of imperial China. Her brothers are dead, her armies and their war mammoths long defeated and caged behind their borders. Alone and sometimes reviled, she must choose her allies carefully. Rabbit, a handmaiden, sold by her parents to the palace for the lack of five baskets of dye, befriends the emperor's lonely new wife and gets more than she bargained...

Ace reporter Steve Grey digs up the dirt, pieces together jigsaws of crime, outs killers, and writes the stories that scoop rival newshounds and sell newspapers. His newest investigation helps land a shady financier on Death Row. But is there something about this story that Grey isn't revealing?

In this sharp new comedy-drama, an unlikely group of lawbreakers is forced together in a community payback project. When seven strangers are thrown together in a community service scheme, they realize they couldn't be more different. Having broken the law, in their hometown of Bristol, is the one thing they have in common. As new friendships emerge, dark secrets are revealed. And when the group gets drawn into dangerous criminal activity, they must...

Gods should never meddle in the affairs of mortals, but Xie Lan is not one to follow the rules when lives are at risk. He spits in the face of heaven and its laws and descends in a fury to save his country from drought and civil war. Yet this golden child gets a harsh dose of reality when he discovers just how little one individual--even a god--can do to save a crumbling nation. As the people reject and betray him, one young soldier stands by Xie...

Getting into trouble after feeding his dinner to the dog again, Ben embarks on a period of "solitary confinement" in his room, where he passes the time by eating hidden snacks, liberating his caged pets, and honing his slingshot skills.

Dive into the macabre history of England and Old Europe in this pendium of historical punishments. The pages of Medieval Punishments are punishments from a less enlightened period, creating a thoroughly researched historical document that sheds light on the evolution of society and how humans have maintained social order and addressed crime. In a town called Newcastle-on-Tyne, a drunkard cloak was a barrel that offenders were made to wear. In Anglo-Saxon...