Kevin Costner

Jon Baird

"Set against the backdrop of World War I, with Western Civilization on the edge of calamity, the first installment in "The Explorers Guild" series, "A Passage to Shambhala," concerns the Guild's quest to find the golden city of Buddhist myth. The search will take them from the Polar North to the Mongolian deserts, through the underground canals of Asia to deep inside the Himalayas, before the fabled city finally divulges its secrets and the globe-spanning journey plays out to its startling conclusion."--Provided by publisher.

Volume One: A Passage to Shambhala

The Explorers Guild

In the dark overlap between music and industry, there dwells a group of people whose lives and dealings are every bit as commonplace and fantastic, as high-flung and ridiculous, as noble and sordid as the stories they inspire. Don, Ross, and Chavez comprise Seventeen; Neil, Mika, Darcy, and Darren make up Limna. One is a hard-working club band committed to a music-first agenda and convinced by wily manager Deedee Vanian that this is indeed the road they're on. The other is an unapologetically commercial construct, pieced together and driven into the market by professional hitmakers and by manager Annika Guttkuhn, herself a "discovery" and protegee of Deedee's. Competing for the same recording contract, the two acts are combined on a single bill and booked for a string of appearances from New England to Florida. But who has orchestrated the ill-fated trip, and why? How far can Annika push her act, armed with nothing but an imaginary following and her trumped-up press releases? And why should Don fro Seventeen be her chief coconspirator? Songs from Nowhere Near the Heart presents an unforgettable and richly textured cast of characters, each trying to outwit and outflank the others, for reasons and with results that won't become entirely clear before a final, hilarious sequence of events in rural Florida.

Songs from Nowhere Near the Heart

Return to the golden age of adventure with this gorgeously wrought, action-packed, globetrotting tale that combines the bravura storytelling of Kipling with the irresistible, illustrative style of Hergé’s Adventures of Tintin. Behind the staid public rooms of an old world gentlemen’s club operates a more mysterious organization: The Explorers Guild, a clandestine group of adventurers who bravely journey to those places in which light gives way to shadow and reason is usurped by myth. The secrets they seek are hidden in mountain ranges and lost in deserts, buried in the ocean floor and lodged deep in polar ice. The aim of The Explorers Guild: to discover the mysteries that lie beyond the boundaries of the known world. This beautifully produced combination graphic novel and adventure tale, set against the backdrop of World War I, concerns the Guild’s quest to find the golden city of Buddhist myth. The search will take them from the Polar North to the Mongolian deserts, through the underground canals of Asia to deep inside the Himalayas, before the fabled city finally divulges its secrets and the globe-spanning journey plays out to its startling conclusion. “With its colorful cast, exotic locales, and intertwined fates, the book slowly addicts. A rousing throwback whose spinning plates never stop, even at the end,” (Kirkus Reviews), The Explorers Guild is perfect for fans of the adventures of J.J. Abrams and C.S. Lewis.

Jon Baird

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