Amanda Hughes (born Amanda Hermann, January 28, 1955 in Minneapolis, Minnesota) is an American writer of historical novels.
Biography
Amanda Hermann was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is a graduate of the University of Minnesota (1977), was married in 1985 and changed her name to Amanda Hughes. She has three children, Madeline (b. 1987), Lou (b.1989) and Bailey (b. 1990). Amanda divorced in 2003.
Her first novel, Beyond the Cliffs of Kerry was published by Adventure Book Publishers in Calgary, Canada in 2000. She has since published two more historical novels, The Pride of the King and The Sword of the Banshee.
She currently resides in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Bibliography
* Beyond the Cliffs of Kerry(2000)
* The Pride of the King(2011)
* The Sword of the Banshee(2013)
References and sources
*[http://abcnewspapers.com/2012/02/01/local-author-brings-history-to-life/ Johnson, Kelly (February 1st, 2012). "Local Author Brings History to Life" ABC Newspapers, Anoka, MN]
*KSTP-Writers at the Irish Fair of Minnesota
*Amanda Hughes "Historical Fiction About the Irish", The Irish Gazette, August 2012, Volume 26, Number 5
Biography
Amanda Hermann was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is a graduate of the University of Minnesota (1977), was married in 1985 and changed her name to Amanda Hughes. She has three children, Madeline (b. 1987), Lou (b.1989) and Bailey (b. 1990). Amanda divorced in 2003.
Her first novel, Beyond the Cliffs of Kerry was published by Adventure Book Publishers in Calgary, Canada in 2000. She has since published two more historical novels, The Pride of the King and The Sword of the Banshee.
She currently resides in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Bibliography
* Beyond the Cliffs of Kerry(2000)
* The Pride of the King(2011)
* The Sword of the Banshee(2013)
References and sources
*[http://abcnewspapers.com/2012/02/01/local-author-brings-history-to-life/ Johnson, Kelly (February 1st, 2012). "Local Author Brings History to Life" ABC Newspapers, Anoka, MN]
*KSTP-Writers at the Irish Fair of Minnesota
*Amanda Hughes "Historical Fiction About the Irish", The Irish Gazette, August 2012, Volume 26, Number 5
Deception IV: Blood Ties, known in Japan as , is an upcoming game for the PlayStation Vita and PlayStation 3 by Tecmo Koei, and sequel to Kagero II: Dark Illusion within the ' series.
Development
The game was announced at the SCEJ Press Conference in September 2013 prior to the Tokyo Game Show, and is due for a 2014 release in Japan, North America and Europe.<ref name=bloodties/>
Gameplay
The game is a revisit of Tecmo's 1996 PlayStation game Devil's Deception. As a game focused on strategy, the player aims to defeat enemies by luring them into a wide variety of traps.<ref name=bloodties/>
Development
The game was announced at the SCEJ Press Conference in September 2013 prior to the Tokyo Game Show, and is due for a 2014 release in Japan, North America and Europe.<ref name=bloodties/>
Gameplay
The game is a revisit of Tecmo's 1996 PlayStation game Devil's Deception. As a game focused on strategy, the player aims to defeat enemies by luring them into a wide variety of traps.<ref name=bloodties/>
In Magic: The Gathering, the Thran were a utopian culture of humans whose technology level was much more advanced than any other Dominarians. Their artifact devices ran on powerstones which had stable artificial planes in them. They were introduced in the Urza's Saga set, with such cards as Thran Quarry and Thran Dynamo amongst others.
The Thran Empire, centered in their capital city of Halcyon, encompassed much of the main planet of the plane of Dominaria. Their culture was idyllic and pacifistic, and the Thran people lived very lush and comfortable lives. This all changed when a group of rebellious Untouchables, people who had been exiled from Halcyon to live and die in the Caves of the Damned, for one reason or another, attacked the city's mana rig, or power source, effectively, situated in a volcanic crevice above the Caves of the Damned and below the City of Halcyon. The Genius of Halcyon, a man named Glacian, was hurt in the raid on the mana rig, and contracted a disease which none of the city's healers were able to cure; their arcane healing magic only worsened the disease.
The Thran began to suffer from this disease known as Phthisis, which an ex-Thran healer named Yawgmoth determined was caused by the powerstones which the city ran on. The disease changed the way the Thran Empire worked; it spread like the Plague and Yawgmoth had the only known cure—a serum consisting of metal components in solution which blocked the flow of mana (natural energy) through the body, a process called phyresis. Yawgmoth became the hero of Halcyon for discovering a way to fight the new disease and gained political power from it. Yawgmoth, driven primarily by a desire for power, used his campaign against the Phthisis to manipulate things in his favor and eventually gain control of the Thran capital city of Halcyon. During his quest for power, he took control of a plane he named Phyrexia for his term phyresis which meant regeneration.
The Thran-Phyrexian War began when Yawgmoth returned to conquer the Thran and the plane of Dominaria. Yawgmoth, in control of the city of Halcyon and its elite guard, along with his new army of Phyrexians, waged war against the Thran coalitions that opposed him. During this battle, Yawgmoth took control of the Null Moon, a giant, movable structure which could control all the artifacts in the Thran Empire, and used it to cripple the Thran Coalition's effort. Yawgmoth used the Null Moon to drop powerstone chargers, great dooms-day weapons which sucked energy off the land and everything on it or around it to charge a single powerstone. Yawgmoth was finally defeated when he and his followers were sealed in Phyrexia by a portal-device powered by a powerstone after the Null Moon's controllers caused it to be launched into space, turning it into one of Dominaria's satellite 'moons'. For the Thran, the victory was pyrrhic. Their civilization had been damaged too greatly to recover, and soon collapsed.
Thousands of years later, all that was left of the Thran was their advanced artifacts, which were scavenged by later civilizations for study. Two such salvagers, the brothers Urza and Mishra, researched these remnants and during a visit to the Cave of Koilos, the powerstone powering the device sealing Phyrexia was broken. Each brother received one half of the powerstone (named the Mightstone and Weakstone), and their greed for both halves of the stone and their animosity for each other eventually led to The Brothers' War. Much later, the opening of the gate to Phyrexia would lead another Phyrexian invasion of Dominaria.
The Thran Empire, centered in their capital city of Halcyon, encompassed much of the main planet of the plane of Dominaria. Their culture was idyllic and pacifistic, and the Thran people lived very lush and comfortable lives. This all changed when a group of rebellious Untouchables, people who had been exiled from Halcyon to live and die in the Caves of the Damned, for one reason or another, attacked the city's mana rig, or power source, effectively, situated in a volcanic crevice above the Caves of the Damned and below the City of Halcyon. The Genius of Halcyon, a man named Glacian, was hurt in the raid on the mana rig, and contracted a disease which none of the city's healers were able to cure; their arcane healing magic only worsened the disease.
The Thran began to suffer from this disease known as Phthisis, which an ex-Thran healer named Yawgmoth determined was caused by the powerstones which the city ran on. The disease changed the way the Thran Empire worked; it spread like the Plague and Yawgmoth had the only known cure—a serum consisting of metal components in solution which blocked the flow of mana (natural energy) through the body, a process called phyresis. Yawgmoth became the hero of Halcyon for discovering a way to fight the new disease and gained political power from it. Yawgmoth, driven primarily by a desire for power, used his campaign against the Phthisis to manipulate things in his favor and eventually gain control of the Thran capital city of Halcyon. During his quest for power, he took control of a plane he named Phyrexia for his term phyresis which meant regeneration.
The Thran-Phyrexian War began when Yawgmoth returned to conquer the Thran and the plane of Dominaria. Yawgmoth, in control of the city of Halcyon and its elite guard, along with his new army of Phyrexians, waged war against the Thran coalitions that opposed him. During this battle, Yawgmoth took control of the Null Moon, a giant, movable structure which could control all the artifacts in the Thran Empire, and used it to cripple the Thran Coalition's effort. Yawgmoth used the Null Moon to drop powerstone chargers, great dooms-day weapons which sucked energy off the land and everything on it or around it to charge a single powerstone. Yawgmoth was finally defeated when he and his followers were sealed in Phyrexia by a portal-device powered by a powerstone after the Null Moon's controllers caused it to be launched into space, turning it into one of Dominaria's satellite 'moons'. For the Thran, the victory was pyrrhic. Their civilization had been damaged too greatly to recover, and soon collapsed.
Thousands of years later, all that was left of the Thran was their advanced artifacts, which were scavenged by later civilizations for study. Two such salvagers, the brothers Urza and Mishra, researched these remnants and during a visit to the Cave of Koilos, the powerstone powering the device sealing Phyrexia was broken. Each brother received one half of the powerstone (named the Mightstone and Weakstone), and their greed for both halves of the stone and their animosity for each other eventually led to The Brothers' War. Much later, the opening of the gate to Phyrexia would lead another Phyrexian invasion of Dominaria.
Loudflower was a Christian alternative rock band from Atlanta, Georgia. Loudflower was noted for being one of the few non-ska bands in the 1990s to feature a horn line, leading to their sound being described as "The Clash meets Earth, Wind and Fire". The band was formed in 1994 by vocalist Rob Groover as a three-piece band, but later expanded the lineup to include horns. The expanded lineup also added Drivin N Cryin guitarist Malcolm "Mac" Carter, who had previously played with Groover in The Shadow Puppets. and released an EP and a sampler album later that year, with their only full-length album, entitled Happy Now, coming in 1997. The band sued their label, Grey Dot Records, in 1997, and the subsequent two years of litigation led to the band breaking up without recording any additional albums.
Members
*Rob Groover (vocals, bass)
*Malcolm Carter (guitar, keyboards)
*Derrick Lee (trumpet)
*Dan McGraw (trumpet)
*Loren Haefler (trombone)
*Mason Brazelle (drums)
Discography
*...same three chords (1996) (sampler - two songs)
*Christmas Killed Us (1996) (EP)
*Happy Now? (1997)
Members
*Rob Groover (vocals, bass)
*Malcolm Carter (guitar, keyboards)
*Derrick Lee (trumpet)
*Dan McGraw (trumpet)
*Loren Haefler (trombone)
*Mason Brazelle (drums)
Discography
*...same three chords (1996) (sampler - two songs)
*Christmas Killed Us (1996) (EP)
*Happy Now? (1997)