The Bloodline Feud, Paperback

The Bloodline Feud: an omnibus edition of the first two novels in Charles Stross's The Merchant Princes series

The six families of the Clan rule the kingdom of Gruinmarkt from behind the scenes. They are a mixture of nobility and criminal conspirators whose power to walk between their world and ours makes them rich in both.

Miriam, a hip tech journalist from Boston, discovers her alternate-world relatives with explosive results that shake three worlds. Now, as the prodigal Countess Helge Thorold-Hjorth, she finds herself ensnared in schemes and plots centuries in the making. She is surrounded by unlikely allies, lethal contraband, and--most dangerous of all--her family.

To avoid a slippery slope down to an unmarked grave, Miriam must build a power base of her own--with unexpected consequences for three different time lines, including the quasi-Victorian one exploited by the hidden family.

About the Author:

CHARLES STROSS was born in Leeds, England, in 1964. He is the author of the Merchant Prince series, including The Trade of Queens, The Revolution Business and The Merchant's War, and has worked as a pharmacist, software engineer, and freelance journalist, but now writes full-time. To date, Stross has won two Hugo Awards and been nominated twelve times. He has also won the Locus Award for Best Novel, the Locus Award for Best Novella, and has been shortlisted for the Arthur C. Clarke and Nebula Awards. In addition, his fiction has been translated into around a dozen languages. Stross lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, with his wife Feorag, a couple of cats, several thousand books, and an ever-changing herd of obsolescent computers.