Word: arcana
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Whether English-speaking readers adopt the Khazars with equal fervor remains to be seen. The runaway success of Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose (1983) may be a precedent, since both novels offer murders mixed with medieval arcana. But Pavic does not convey anything resembling the suspense generated by Eco's relentlessly straightforward, deductive progress toward the darkness at the heart of an obscure monastery. Instead, in the "Preliminary Notes" to this presumptive dictionary, readers are advised to proceed in any manner or order they choose: "No chronology will be observed here, nor is one necessary...
...through college and law school and into local politics. Elected to the state assembly in 1964, he became known as a radical who applauded the Watts riots and demanded more state spending for the poor. But he also developed a reputation for mastery of legislative rules and budget arcana. Brown sometimes crossed the legendary speaker Jess Unruh, who nonetheless knew talent when he saw it. After an early speech by Brown, Unruh muttered, "It's a good thing you aren't white." Why? Brown asked. "Because you'd own the place," Unruh replied...
...that disproportionate passions demand of their victims. If you thought you learned more than you needed to know about the creation of the perfect noodle soup in Tampopo, you may now feel you are finding out more than you require about tax law and outlawry in contemporary Japan. But arcana have their own peculiar charms -- and their special usefulness in Itami's larger design. When his single-minded characters are thwarted in the pursuit of their hearts' odd desires, they have a tendency to burst into sudden, angry flame. And to elicit hysterical responses from bystanders astounded when a quiet...
...agreed that Andrus would threaten to cut funding for a major water project dear to powerful economic interests in Arizona unless the state managed its groundwater better. "I went home and called him an overreaching federal hypocrite," Babbitt recalls with a grin. Then, having immersed himself in the arcana of water management, Babbitt mediated eight months of talks among farmers, miners, developers, municipalities and environmentalists, emerging with a plan that the legislature accepted unchanged...
Agents of Innocence contains all the detailed local color and technical arcana that the thriller genre demands. Ignatius can convey the terror even an experienced spy feels when approaching isolated border crossings and potentially murderous guards. He can explain how to construct a remote-control detonator and how to gauge the damage of a terrorist blast by sight alone: "White smoke meant a very large explosion. A bomb that detonated so powerfully and quickly that it sucked the oxygen out of the air, leaving a white plume of smoke." The author also occasionally strains a little too hard to keep...