“S’cuse me.”

A mit­tened hand rapped on the counter. A sec­ond laid a heavy book flat, beside.

Across, a brown mouse in tweed and thick glass­es looked from his cross­word, beheld a scruffy woman in stained cut­ter’s leathers. She squint­ed, odd­ly, in an awk­ward smile, wrapped in snow-crust­ed scarves and the clean scent of cold air.

“Yes?” said the mouse, sur­vey­ing the book she’d put down.

“I’d like te return this,” said the cut­ter-woman.

“Oh.” His ears twitched, dis­con­cert­ed. Care­ful, he set down his pen­cil, leaned to drag the book over oak­en counter. Lessig’s Guide to North­ern Beasts, it read. A blotch and smear of some­thing brown-red and slight­ly sticky marred the gold-leaf. A chunk was miss­ing from one cor­ner, evi­dent­ly chewed off.

“Uh,” squeaked the mouse, sniff­ing the stain. “Why are you return­ing this?” 

“Done with i’,” shrugged the cut­ter.

“You can­not return an item so dam­aged, I’m afraid.”

The cut­ter raised an eye­brow. “So, I jus’ get te keep it?”

“Of course,” said the mouse. “You bought it, after all.” His ears flinched back moment­ly. “You did buy it, did­n’t you?”

“Hah, wot?” said the cut­ter.

“You did­n’t buy it,” stat­ed the mouse, ears peeled.

“Wha’ kind o’ lib’ary makes ye buy th’ books?”

They blinked at each oth­er a moment. Prim mouse and scruffy cut­ter. “This…” began the mouse, speak­ing high and tremu­lous. “Is a book shop…” he said, loud­er, paws curled. “Not a pub­lic library.”

“Oi, my mis­take.” Mit­tens scooped up the book. Hob­nailed boots stomped over the floor. The door jin­gled. 

“Come back here!”

Naught remained of the cut­ter but snowflakes.

For over four cen­turies has the Coast known the mechan­i­cal mar­vel that is the print­ing press.

Invent­ed by mech­a­nist and black­smith Lilas Soder­heim, of Den­seig, the type­set­ting machine has made fine and replic­a­ble print avail­able to the mass­es. In the time since its con­cep­tion, lit­er­a­cy has become per­va­sive in the mid­dle stratas of Coastal soci­ety and above. Folk of var­ied sorts enjoy a wide selec­tion of fine­ly pro­duced, if expen­sive, books. A selec­tion of such books is list­ed below.

d100 books

1. A Bridge Once Crossed. This book’s title ref­er­ences an omi­nous Firl­ish say­ing: “A bridge once crossed may nev­er be retread.” It is a proverb uttered in regard to crit­i­cal life choic­es, but orig­i­nal­ly ref­er­ences the Oth­er­world and its hid­den gates. A Bridge is a trea­tise on the use of magi­cian’s com­pass­es: Strange and many-dialed instru­ments meant to detect that and oth­er realms’ per­ilous gates, as well as oth­er invis­i­ble phe­nom­e­na, by an art known as dows­ing. Lore: Aar­time­try 4
2. A Dearth of Rea­son. A pecu­liar­ly dull, true tale. It describes the estab­lish­ment of the Occultism Depart­ment of Fir­lund’s Roy­al Acad­e­my. For a rec­count­ing involv­ing so many tru­ly eccen­tric, inter­est­ing peo­ple, includ­ing experts in absu­tu­ra­tion, xeno­man­tia, and prae­cant­ian his­to­ry, A Dearth of Rea­son fails incred­i­bly to be enter­tain­ing. Some read­ers believe this dull­ness is pur­pose­ful, meant to dis­suade inter­est in the notably-dan­ger­ous and obscure Depart­ment. Despite this, it remains a read of schol­ar­ly repute. Lore: Occultism 4
3. A Hand­book to Ser­pents. A short guide to iden­ti­fy­ing and exter­mi­nat­ing small ser­pents Should they be found in the gar­den, the chick­en coop, or the cra­dle, this book will guide a per­son in han­dling and dis­patch­ing the smok­ing, hun­gry neonates before they can gob­ble any­thing up, or, worse, grow large and overt­ly-mon­strous. Advis­es behead­ing and piece­meal sep­a­ra­tion with a spade or axe, for most species. Lore: Ser­pents 3
4. A Harsh Mis­tress. A nov­el con­cern­ing the keep­er of a cursed light­house: An ex-sail­er enam­oured with the sea but hor­ri­fied to again ven­ture over her rolling expanse. The book describes his first years at the light; how he set­tled in, kept it up, and came to live in lone­some­ness, for none gave him com­pa­ny in that cursed post. Name­ly, it con­cerns how he came to lis­ten to the sea at night. Lis­ten for the songs which lilt­ed from the rocks below. Even­tu­al­ly, he dis­cov­ers a lame siren dwelling there, lone­ly as he, but still mon­strous. At this, the plot tru­ly begins. Lore: Sirens 5
5. A His­to­ry of Tea. As its title pro­claims, this is a com­pre­hen­sive his­to­ry of tea, a plant first dis­cov­ered and cul­ti­vat­ed in the North­ern land of Awn, where it remains most pop­u­lar. A His­to­ry of Tea denotes the con­flicts, agri­cul­tur­al devel­op­ments, and serv­ing pref­er­ences sur­round­ing tea over the last two mil­len­nia. Help­ful­ly, the book con­tains a list of all herbs and barks capa­ble of being steeped in addi­tion to black tea. It is a hearty ref­er­ence doc­u­ment for trav­el­ers and cut­ters in need of a hot brew, regard­less of its ori­gin or qual­i­ty. +1 to Scrounge tea ingre­di­ents
6. A Hun­dred-One Can­dles. Orig­i­nal­ly, this short book was a police report, one com­piled by an offi­cer of the Forten­shire Watch gift­ed with unusu­al­ly sharp lit­er­ary skills. Per­mis­sion was lat­er giv­en to the offi­cer to pub­lish her work under a pseu­do­nym. It is a record­ing of the con­tents of and inves­tiga­tive pro­ceed­ings sur­round­ing a home in the ancient canal-quar­ter of Sorelle, one sus­pect­ed of hous­ing a so-called “war­lock.” It begins with eye­wit­ness reports of the strange com­ings and goings from that house­’s door at mid­night, the lights inside, the ter­ri­ble cries from its attic. It ends with a recount­ing of the build­ing’s inte­ri­or fol­low­ing the obtain­ment of a raid war­rant. Ter­ri­ble sights were found inside. Most notably: A body sur­round­ed by a hun­dred and one red can­dles, its pores filled com­plete­ly with the ges­tat­ing chrysalis­es of strange moths. Stocks of the book sell out imme­di­ate­ly. Lore: Neosor­cery 3 
7. A Life With­out Pain. The tale of the short, curi­ous life of a Belvirin­ian girl born to a blighted moth­er. The child, made appar­ent­ly immune to pain by her moth­er’s con­di­tion, lived as a freak and an odd­i­ty; an attrac­tion in cir­cus sideshows, where she endured blows and gouts of boil­ing water for crowds’ fas­ci­nat­ed amuse­ment. Only at the end of her life did the girl find solace, dis­cov­ered, pro­tect­ed, and gen­tly stud­ied by a good doc­tor at the Roy­al Acad­e­my of Fir­lund. The book con­tains insight regard­ing typ­i­cal blight, as well as the girl’s unusu­al con­di­tion. Lore: Blight 4
8. A Mechan­i­cal His­to­ry. An exceed­ing­ly dry, well-dia­grammed work con­tain­ing con­cise, if bor­ing expla­na­tions of the his­to­ry and work­ings of the Coast’s most for­ma­tive mech­a­nisms, such as the steam engine, the pock­et­watch, the gun­spring, and the auto­mat­ic guil­lo­tine. Edit­ed by the great grand­daugh­ter of Doc­tor Guil­lo­tine her­self, the elder of whom invent­ed the two lat­er, dead­ly machines. Per­mits train­ing in Mech­a­nisms or Bal­lis­tics up to lev­el 3. 
9. A Thou­sand Gold­en Teeth. A book rarely seen in print due to its per­verse sub­ject mat­ter. Writ­ten by the chief tech­ni­cian of a ven­tur­ing town cre­ma­to­ry, who in the course of five years kept a metic­u­lous jour­nal of every care­ful­ly-squir­reled pre­cious item he uncov­ered in the course of prep­ping corpses for burn­ing. This is his jour­nal, accom­pa­nied by descrip­tions and brief sto­ries of all the secret­ly-dec­o­rat­ed dead. +1 to scrounge loot from human bod­ies.
10. A Vision in a Dream. This, thought to be the great­est work of art­ful fan­cy ever devised in lit­er­a­ture, describes a mad dream; one in which the author lives an entire life with­in a fan­tas­ti­cal world of antiq­ui­ty and wild col­or. Some sup­pose it to be a vision of the Oth­er­world. Oth­ers, of heav­en. It is, in truth, the mus­ing of a mind affect­ed crit­i­cal­ly by the blood of the lion pop­py: Coqueli­cot. Grants 30 XP and 2 Dis­tress to those under the influ­ence of coqueli­cot. 
11. All About the Quell­flower. A guide to the queer and odd­ly-detailed ways of romance prac­ticed by Emper­oussin aris­to­crats, boiled down and made sen­sa­tion­al for con­sump­tion by the mass­es. Its wild pages detail flo­ri­og­ra­phy, gift-giv­ing, eti­quette, and, most inter­est­ing­ly of all, the per­verse and plea­sure­some pains enjoyed by those masked nobles. Eti­quette 4
12. All Along the Board­walk. A lengthy and good-sell­ing nov­el. It tells of a squad of Ward Rangers set to defend a length of board­walk a league long on the Moors so Sere: The expanse of marshy, dead­ly no-man’s-land sep­a­rat­ing North­east Fir­lund from the hor­rid wilder­ness. It describes in equal part the drea­ri­ness of the moors, the dead­li­ness, but also the mad bore­dom of defend­ing use­less ground. The book becomes inter­est­ing by its recount­ing of the insane and dan­ger­ous raids which the guard-Rangers enact­ed on neigh­bor­ing rag­wretch dens, so bored were they by guard duty. In the end, by their relief, each Ranger was simul­ta­ne­ous­ly rep­ri­mand­ed and dec­o­rat­ed for courage and good ser­vice. Lore: Moor­lands 5
13. Amidst the Ker­chiefeers. A recount­ing by Firl­ish anthro­pol­o­gist Kale­ston of Since of his year-long stay with roam­ing rag­man gyp­sies; known as ker­chiefeers. A sin­gu­lar work, one which lists in care­ful detail the art of a peo­ple both insu­lar, mis­trust­ed, and apt to spurn out­siders. Recent edi­tions con­tain detailed pat­terns for the ker­chiefeers’ intri­cate and unique trap­pings. Craft: Weav­ing 5.
14. An Arbiter’s Log. The anno­tat­ed records of a mem­ber of the Arbiter’s Guild: the non­par­ti­san body which ref­er­ees offi­cial duels. The Arbiter in ques­tion, one Frali­na Daili­na Tai­lor Livii, from Empere­oux, gov­erned 221 duels over a career of 60 years in six coun­tries. Her records, put down with both atten­tion to detail and bit­ing wit, serve as a remark­able recent his­to­ry of duel­ing. Lore: Duel­ing 7
15. And Still She Keeps Silent. Trag­ic cog­i­ta­tions of faith and priest­ly devo­tion in the after­math of Parou­sia, writ­ten by a Silent Sis­ter-priest of Bansa Abbey. Less a sto­ry than a pro­tract­ed and detailed inter­nal con­ver­sa­tion, one draw­ing upon high­ly-edu­cat­ed ref­er­ence to his­tor­i­cal, artis­tic, and reli­gious mate­ri­als. Its pri­ma­ry focus: The remain­ing silence of Aveth fol­low­ing her evi­dent return to the world of Man. It is regard­ed as the most impor­tant lit­er­ary con­sid­er­a­tion of faith in recent time. Lore: Parou­sia 6
16. Ars Opti­ca. An oph­thalmic guide. Trea­sured by magi­cians, who read its dull and tech­ni­cal pages not for pur­pos­es of spec­ta­cle man­u­fac­tur­er, but for the con­struc­tion of res­o­nance spheres: Pres­sur­ized, lensed devices used in the con­tact of alien realms. Lore: Xeno­man­tia 4
17. Bones. A book of mad­ness. It tells, from a bro­ken first-per­son nar­ra­tive, of a lone mouse’s strug­gle to sur­vive in an evil, sub­ter­ranean land. He does even­tu­al­ly emerge from the depths, but he leaves his san­i­ty behind. Lore: Under­world 5
18. Bound by Iron. The most notable finan­cial guide, includ­ing bor­row­ing, invest­ing, and sav­ing advice; expe­ri­enced mar­ket the­o­ry; and a his­to­ry of the iron­bound gold­en pound of Fir­lund; to have ever been pro­duced. Most espe­cial­ly, it con­cerns how to best deal with fick­le Coastal banks. While they own this book, a char­ac­ter receives bet­ter inter­est rates.
19. Brob­son’s Guide to Decoys. A games­mans’ guide, devot­ed to fish­ing flies, wood­en ducks, and oth­er such beast lures. Writ­ten in unceas­ing­ly-ener­getic con­fi­dence about their use, his­to­ry, com­po­si­tion, and con­struc­tion. A book trea­sured by hunters of prey both mun­dane and mon­strous, as it con­tains details for lur­ing both plant-eaters and preda­tors of var­ied size. Many a fish­er­man has thanked Brob­son for his wooly bug­ger lure, as have count­less cut­ters for his pat­tern for false goats, which is much cheap­er than buy­ing an actu­al goat. Craft: Decoys 5
20. Bur­den Dis­trib­uted. A squar­ish brown book pro­duced by the Team­sters Union. Extreme­ly plain, unen­ter­tain­ing, but filled with unri­valed wis­dom on the pack­ing and tack­ling of beasts of bur­den. The book itself has lug-rings built into its spine, pre­sum­ably for ease of car­riage. Stowage 4
21. Cat­a­comb Lost. The chill­ing, true tale of the epony­mous Cat­a­comb Lost, a group of four teenage explor­ers who went miss­ing in the cat­a­combs neath the Holy City Quar­ter of Alagór’s cap­i­tal, San Car­ro. An ossuary-maze of untold expanse, only part­ly mapped, extant since Aveth’s First Cru­sade: the titan­ic war whose dead those pas­sages were first dug to house. A for­bid­den place, if ever there was one; filled with the stacked bones of a holy war three thou­sand years passed, and the dead of two ensu­ing mil­len­nia. As this book would have it, the tun­nels house three new corpses. Only one sur­vived to tell this tale. Her obser­va­tions are night-unhear­able, but hold sur­pris­ing insight into nav­i­ga­tion in arti­fi­cial sub­ter­ranea. +1 Nav­i­ga­tion in Sub­ter­ranean spaces
22. Cav­er­num. A recent­ly restored and trans­lat­ed text, orig­i­nal­ly com­posed some thou­sand years ago by a name­less explor­er from what is now Alagór. Cav­er­num is thought to be the first record­ed exam­ple of clas­si­cal under­world explo­ration. Name­ly, the dis­patch of some dozen par­ties of explor­ers into giv­en cav­ern on unfath­omable depth, all sent in hope of find­ing a sain­t’s tomb with­in. Few returned. Those who did appeared far away, far lat­er. Their reports com­pose much of this work. They are chill­ing, in the least. Lore: Under­world 5
23. Con­ver­sa­tions with a Dead Magi­cian. A book thought to be untrue, despite its pre­ten­sions oth­er­wise. The pub­lish­er will not reveal which is the case. Con­ver­sa­tions with a Dead Magi­cian tells of the author’s time spent research­ing and con­vers­ing with an incun­able, report­ed­ly among the last of its kind to be absu­tu­rat­ed, found buried in an estate auc­tion. It tells first of his orig­i­nal fas­ci­na­tion with the blood-fed tome, his time spent recov­er­ing it from its unused ages of mad­ness by hours of con­ver­sa­tion. Only lat­er does it describe how he even­tu­al­ly came to hate the stodgy and quar­rel­some mind with­in the book, how he dear­ly wished to shut it for­ev­er. How he would, if not for some sense of respon­si­bil­i­ty to that cap­tured mind, a respon­si­bil­i­ty he’d not dare share with any oth­er read­er. Despite its unver­i­fi­able nature, the book con­tains use­ful­ly-true notes on the nature and use of incunab­u­la. Lore: Incunab­u­la 4
24. Crust and Crumb. A tra­di­tion­al bak­er’s guide. Copies are thin, bound in white linen, and rarely found used with­out copi­ous jam stains. Con­tains recipes, pri­mar­i­ly for breads of a com­mon vari­ety, but also for bis­cuits, scones, and cakes. Craft: Bak­ing 5 
25. Cul­to delle fate nel Nord. An obscure Mapoli­tan text, pub­lished only in that tongue, which pro­vides an analy­sis of the super­sti­tions or “älf-wor­ship” of the Awnish, the most-North­ern folk of Fir­lund. It describes their offer­ings, their year-walk­ing, and their estab­lish­ment of appar­ent famil­ial links with the fairies of a giv­en land for pur­pos­es of mutu­al peace and pro­tec­tion. Lore: Fairies 5
26. Curi­ous Predilec­tion. A short and remark­able study of the phys­i­ol­o­gy and behav­ior of rag­folk and their mon­strous cousins, rag­wretch­es. No work has before record­ed such a com­pre­hen­sive under­stand­ing of their wonts and med­ical nature. Includes case stud­ies of indi­vid­ual wretch­es and rag­men, the col­lect­ed data from which form an effec­tive time­line for the species’ beast­ly trans­for­ma­tion in reac­tion to anthrophagy. Read and kept by doc­tors and intro­spec­tive rag­men alike, Curi­ous Predilec­tion has brought a deal of health­ful insight to the increas­ing­ly-mul­ti­species Coast. Lore: Rag­men 7
27. Death’s Head. An anthro­b­ot­anist’s con­sid­er­a­tion of the man­drake, that motile and aural­ly-dead­ly creep­er in the night. A tuber of dead­ly wont, fond of plant­i­ng itself in the skulls of dead men. The writer finds it a fas­ci­nat­ing study, spends near two hun­dred pages detail­ing its ways, its intel­lect, and the dif­fi­cul­ties of its cul­ti­va­tion for med­ical pur­pos­es. Lore: Man­drakes 9
28. Eat­ing Well off North­ern Soil. A descrip­tion col­lec­tion of the edi­ble flo­ra and fau­na find­able in Fir­lund and sur­round­ing states. Peatchokes, rab­bits, moss, giant grouse eggs, bark, and odd chard are all includ­ed and list­ed with their favored meth­ods of prepa­ra­tion, usu­al­ly involv­ing copi­ous mea­sures of salt and but­ter. +1 to scrounge food in the North.
29. El Las­ti­mador del Valle. A short work, made for enthu­si­ast enter­tain­ment, detail­ing all known reports of the Lash­er of the Val­ley, a ser­pent-turned-ser­i­al killer once feared in the fer­tile winelands sur­round­ing Car­ralay. The Lash­er, once thought to be a beast of sin­gu­lar, tor­tur­ous wont, was known for leav­ing vic­tims with great, streak­ing cuts. Not deep, but plen­ti­ful. Life-threat­en­ing, but not effi­cient in their dis­patch. Vic­tims report­ed being toyed with by a low and skulk­ing mon­ster which leapt from the vine­yards. Only after its even­tu­al slay­ing by a knight errant was the Lash­er revealed. It was a wretched, deter­mined thing. A ser­pent hatched with a queer defor­mi­ty of its joints that pre­vent­ed it killing quick­ly or crawl­ing aright. Despite its mutant sta­tus, the Lash­er was a beast of sin­gu­lar willpow­er: It took three dozen folk before its demise. Lore: Ser­pents 5
30. Fer­ring’s Last March. This short jour­nal was writ­ten 200 years ago by a North­ern field-com­man­der. Though it is poor­ly trans­lat­ed from Old Awnish, it recounts, in sim­ple accu­ra­cy, the lay and ways of the North­lands as they were and yet remain. +1 Nav­i­ga­tion in the North
31. Fla­vor and Con­se­quence. A record of the brief Spice Wars fought some fifty years ago between Baramec­can cul­ti­va­tor-fiefs to meet ever-more-extreme demand for rare spices by Alagór, a coun­try end­less­ly fond of fla­vor. By the war’s end, sev­er­al hun­dred farm-guard had been slain midst the cin­na­mon-groves, and some five mil­lion pese­tas of spice had been stolen, re-stolen repeat­ed­ly, and final­ly sold at a pre­mi­um due to months-long ship­ment delays to the Penin­su­la. Includes, as an aside, sev­er­al recipes beloved by spice traders. Allows cre­ation of rare papri­ka cakes and cin­na­mon roasts.
32. For­ev­er, Clear­ly. A short and grim work on the low­ly and con­cealed prac­tice of ban­ish­ment. Though it may seem oth­er­wise, folk are yet cast out from civ­i­liza­tion, usu­al­ly by small com­mu­ni­ties insu­lat­ed from the world, and set to wan­der the wilder­ness for the rest of their days. A ter­ri­ble fate, oft-cul­mi­nat­ed in star­va­tion or gob­bling by some mon­ster. It is a pun­ish­ment few rec­og­nize still exists, whether they know of its truth or not. The book’s end details the sur­vival­ist ways used by a few inter­viewed ban­ishees. Lore: Wilder­ness 6, Match­smithy 3
33. Forte­cam­p’s Dic­tio­nary of Phrase and Fable. A cat­a­logue of Coastal lan­guage and relat­ed folk knowl­edge, from aarteme­try to zuc­chet­to. Writ­ten in Firl­ish, but per­ti­nent to all the Coast. An expen­sive tome, for it is both large, fine­ly bound, and meant for sale to schol­ars only. All lore skills 1. Does not give more than two sen­tences descrip­tion of any­thing.
34. Gold­en Slum­bers. The tale of Sil­liam Tare, the most renowned thief of Forten­shire, Fir­lund’s sprawl­ing cap­i­tal city. A night-break­er and a bur­glar known for rob­bing the sleep­ing rich. Best known for his final, cli­mac­tic escape from police by boat through the canals of Sorelle: the city’s largest bor­ough. He is rumored to have left a trail of gold­en lucre all the way, seed­ing the deep canals with slum­ber­ing gold. Lock­smithy 4
35. Gras. Titled sim­ply “Fat” in its orig­i­nal Emper­oussin, this is the defin­i­tive cook­book of the Sov­er­eign Isles, a land known for its cre­ation and embrace­ment of fat-fry­ing and but­tered every­thing. Crois­sant, steak chips, liv­er, cheeses, oily fish: All served with bread and wine and defined by their but­tery rich­ness. Cook­ing 6
36. Half Again Around. The mem­oir of an elite guard with­in the Office of Small Mat­ters. His sta­tion: the remote, freez­ing Keep at Doornea­gle; a great, cir­cu­lar wall built about the lip of a sink­hole of seem­ing­ly-bot­tom­less depth. He recounts his days spent end­less­ly walk­ing that round patrol, star­ing and won­der­ing down at the black he and com­rades were told to watch. Nev­er were they told what was with­in. Nev­er did they find out. The book does not say, either. What it does describe is the ways of folk left in weird soli­tude. Their behav­iors and rit­u­als, seem­ing­ly mad to out­siders, made up and prac­ticed on shifts long as 48 hours. Strange walk­ing pat­terns round the walls, main­ly. Half around, a quar­ter around, all the way about and back again: All in incre­ments like a clock. Rit­u­als enact­ed to stave off the com­pul­sions of para­noia and sleep­less­ness, bloomed like the cold wind from that unknow­able sink­hole. +2 to stay awake dur­ing watch. +2 to Night­mares next sleep.
37. Hel­macht. The his­to­ry of link­enden, a name dubbed in Lothrsprech, also known as link-chil­dren or torch­bear­ers. Once, before the advent of street­lamps, theirs was a sim­ple job: Accept a far­thing to guide pedes­tri­ans at night, torch or can­de­labra in hand. Now, it is the most junior and dread­ed job cre­at­ed by the ven­tur­ing econ­o­my: The link­end, or link­er. A cut­ter of so lit­tle might or skill as to be rel­e­gat­ed as lantern-bear­er for stronger par­ties. As link­enden tra­di­tion­al­ly walk first in march­ing order, they ful­fill a sec­ondary, unspo­ken role: To trig­ger traps and bear the brunt of ambush­ing mon­ster’s depre­da­tions. They are often the first in dan­ger, the first to per­ish, and the last to be paid. This book con­tains, by way of describ­ing the link­end’s evo­lu­tion, the his­to­ry of ven­tur­ing. It is often read for that pur­pose. Lore: Ven­tur­ing 5
38. Hostelpoft the Wan­der­er. A work by not­ed Lothrheimer nov­el­ist Gres­tle Sei­der­berg. It described the jour­neys of the epony­mous Hostelpoft, a mouse trav­eller renowned for his thick dialect and red bindle, who jour­neyed all across the king­dom in search of for­tune. He found not rich­es, in the end, but knowl­edge and friends along the way. The book describes major land­marks, cities, and, most notably, pubs and hos­tels vis­it­ed by Hostelpoft in exceed­ing­ly clear detail. +1 to Nav­i­gate in Lothrheim.
39. In Search of the Crafts­men. An ethno­g­ra­pher’s delve into the deep vales of the Gorathi­an Range, lured by rumors of the mole-like crafts­men who dwell with­in: hobben. The researcher in ques­tion, one Maris­toltz Holt, of Peri­pam, vis­it­ed dozens of Gorathi­an vil­lages, most of which she described as “rife with bes­tial folk of wild eye and unclad feet.” In each, she col­lect­ed reports of the hobben, who came to those human set­tle­ments only to buy white liquor and sell hard­ware. Despite two years of research and track­ing, Holt final­ly met a band of hobben only at ran­dom: on the Foothills Road, lug­ging a stage of vod­ka kegs. By some nego­ti­a­tion in bro­ken Lothrsprech, she entreat­ed a vis­it to their cav­ernous halls, col­lect­ed there a wealth of cul­tur­al data. Lore: Hobben 4
40. Iron­clad. Field-mem­oirs by a knight under ser­vice to the Firl­ish Crown. A Ser Estle of Ker­now, attached with her ret­inue of keep­ers to a heavy infantry bat­tal­ion on the North­ern Moors. Iron­clad fea­tures, among mus­ing about poet­ry, patri­o­tism, and the mean­ing of ser­vice, enlight­en­ing details about the ways of glut­ted rag­men, many of whom fell neath Estle’s titan­ic blade. It also pro­vides insight into the ways and tac­tics of North­ern knights. Lore: Rag­wretch­es 7; Lore: Knights 5
41. La Nome, il Nome, the Name. A recent cat­a­logue of Coastal names, tak­en from cen­sus­es, mil­i­tary ros­ters, and inter­views col­lect­ed in three coun­tries. All are list­ed by com­mon­al­i­ty, mean­ing, and pop­u­lar­i­ty. Mere­ly a lin­guist’s text­book, to be cer­tain, but a use­ful one. Lin­guis­tics 6
42. Leif­son’s Fairy­tales. A recent col­la­tion of tra­di­tion­al North­ern fairy sto­ries by Leif­son, a schol­ar of applied folk­lore.  Includ­ing Askel and the Knock­ers, Wee Tom fid­dle, and The Ser­pen­t’s Bow, this tome col­lec­tects the tales in all their ter­ror and odd pow­er. Curi­ous­ly illus­trat­ed with depic­tions of fairies deemed scan­dalous­ly fright­en­ing for chil­dren, and filled with ancient proverbs and super­sti­tious, the books con­tents are dis­turb­ing, fas­ci­nat­ing, and strange­ly applic­a­ble in their lessons. Lore: Oth­er­world 3
43. Lessig’s Guide to North­ern Beasts. Field Sergeant Artr Lessig, of Pyle, dis­tin­guished as the Ward Rangers’ most senior active offi­cer, has over four decades of rang­ing seen nigh-every ani­mal and mon­ster to roam the moors, forests, and moun­tain­ous fjord­lands of the North. Lessig recalls in its sketch-illus­trat­ed pages encoun­ters mun­dane and incred­i­ble, includ­ing with­in such beasts as stryge and pool-nymphs. All of these he escaped, often bare­ly, unscathed. His abil­i­ty to sur­vive the mon­strous is rivaled only by his luck in encoun­ter­ing it. 5 Lore: North­ern Mon­sters
44. Lit­tle Remains. The fore­most work on the cul­ture of the Ancient Nôr. An iron­ic, but insight­ful, book, as much of the Nôr, such as their let­ters, their sci­ence, their math­e­mat­ics, still has every­day place in the world, and it not at all for­got. What has been for­got­ten, though, is its deca­dent cul­ture. What expans­es of com­plex lux­u­ry unfold­ed with­in with gold and mar­ble-detailed ruins of old, few can say, but this book haz­ards an edu­cat­ed guess. Lore: Ancient Nôr 7
45. L’Oc­c­i­talte. A tale of the Occ­i­talte: the itin­er­ant wag­oneers of Maples. Writ­ten by an Emper­oussin edi­tor flee­ing a life of bore­dom, L’Oc­c­i­talte recounts a troupe’s tra­ver­sal through the coun­try­side into Maple’s wild, forest­ed moun­tain crags; a harsh and mossy land­scape known for its prox­im­i­ty to the Oth­er. It is a tale of a dull man’s jour­ney from the usu­al, to the strange, to nigh-make­be­lieve. Its descrip­tions, penned in increas­ing­ly inspired prose, tell of for­bid­den forests and their mon­strous ilk with high­ly infor­ma­tive detail. Lore: For­bid­den Forests 5
46. Lorn’s Peer­age, Barone­tage & Knigh­tage. A genealog­i­cal record of the North. It con­cerns and lists the ances­try and her­aldry of the peer­age, barone­tage, knigh­tage and land­ed gen­try of Fir­lund and all its asso­ci­at­ed lands. Alpha­bet­ized and record­ed by fam­i­ly name. Any impor­tant per­son­age to have lived in the last cen­tu­ry will have his or her name in Lorn’s most recent edi­tion. Lore: Ances­try 10
47. Match­es. A pop­u­lar book amongst cut­ters. Match­es describes how to catch near­ly any­thing on fire, giv­en a light and enough tin­der. Many a chilly ven­tur­ing team has thanked this thin folio for its tips on how to start a blaze in rain, wind, or mea­ger lands. Many an arson­ist has, as well. +1 to Match­smithy rolls
48. Mease, Yeast, and Cul­ture. A tome con­tain­ing the com­plex bio­log­i­cal wis­dom of a bak­er, brew­er, and spore-mag­is­ter, all of whom con­tribute fas­ci­nat­ing­ly to form a trea­tise both his­tor­i­cal and prac­ti­cal on fun­gus’ use and role in soci­ety. Describes with minute mea­sures the required pro­ce­dure for pro­duc­ing loaves, mease por­ridge, and beers alike. +1 to Brew­ing, Bak­ing rolls
49. My Liege. Both the most pop­u­lar and the most reviled entry in the bud­ding genre of romance to have ever been sold on the Coast. My Liege describes the hid­den, scan­dal-wor­thy affair lead by two Lit­toran queens; char­ac­ters mod­eled none-too-sub­tly on actu­al, pop­u­lar young roy­als of Firl­ish and Alagóran domain. It is pulpy, nigh-unbe­liev­able, and fly­ing off the shelves. No redeem­ing val­ue save enter­tain­ment.
50. My Sis­ter Wears Hob­nails. A slice-of-life account by a mun­dane florist of his elder sis­ter: An expe­ri­enced and cease­less­ly-cheery, despite the nature of her pro­fes­sion, cut­ter. My Sis­ter Wears Hob­nails, is, above all, an enter­tain­ment piece, more full of tales of amus­ing­ly awk­ward returns by the scarred ven­tur­er to fam­i­ly din­ners and wed­dings than real accounts of the hor­rors of ven­tur­ing. Many blame claim this book as a foul influ­ence, as the rea­son for many a son or daugh­ter’s fool­ish trav­el to fron­tier towns in search of fame and for­tune. Few know the sis­ter in ques­tion went miss­ing in action mere months after the book’s pub­li­ca­tion, dis­ap­peared on a raid sent to clear a Nauss­ian tomb. No truth­ful impres­sions of ven­tur­ing may be found with­in.
51. On Salt and Wel­fare. An old med­ical text, still well-read, known for being both the first and most com­pre­hen­sive­ly sourced analy­sis griso­date’s effect on and use in human phys­i­ol­o­gy and med­i­cine. Wide­ly accept­ed for its well-rea­soned, reg­u­lar pre­scrip­tions of salt for many pur­pos­es, such as wound cleans­ing, plague pre­ven­tion, and fer­til­i­ty man­age­ment. Lore: Plague 6
52. Par­ti­zan. A pop­u­lar, recent release writ­ten by a sol­dier active in and injured on the front lines of the Lothrheim/Belvirine bor­der con­flict. It pro­vides an unpar­al­leled look at the nov­el and ter­ri­ble thing that is mod­ern war. Descrip­tions of gun­spring fusil­lades, grenades used to pul­ver­iz­ing effect, and the tac­ti­cal advent that the sniper are giv­en in hor­rid­ly fas­ci­nat­ing detail. Due to its release so ear­ly in the war, the book is sup­posed by some to be at least par­tial­ly fic­tion; padded on all cor­ners by make believe. Despite, its view of mod­ern con­flict remains unpar­al­leled in its clar­i­ty.Lore: Recent Wars 8
53. Pep­per, Shook. A roar­ing­ly-pop­u­lar romance nov­el of Belvirin­ian orig­i­nal. It fol­lows the love affair between Pep­per, an aris­to­crat’s daugh­ter, and Louis, a dash­ing gen­tle­man thief, who togeth­er embark upon many dar­ing heists. Though the book is meant pure­ly as escapist read­ing, it does con­tain sev­er­al uncan­ny descrip­tions of locks, descrip­tions that are quite help­ful when iden­ti­fy­ing such mech­a­nisms. Lock­smithy 4
54. Pic­tures from the Rock of Lorn. Writ­ings by a pho­tog­ra­ph­er attached to a car­to­graph­i­cal par­ty under the employ of Tiber and Fel­lowes. Name­ly: His jour­ney to scout the Rock of Lorn, a siren rook­ery off the Gate of Sloe. It con­tains many apt descrip­tions of sirens and their behav­ior, includ­ing how their pres­ence and song affect mankind. Lore: Sirens 6
55. Pied­mon­t’s Guide to Mon­sters. The Coast’s pre­miere guide to mon­stros­i­ty, beast, and fiend, col­lat­ed by none oth­er than its most esteemed explor­er and car­tog­ra­ph­er: Pro­fes­sor Wal­lace Pied­mont. Though now sad­ly out of date and no longer updat­ed in its edi­tions, due to the Pro­fes­sor’s dis­ap­pear­ance, the book con­tains unri­valed descrip­tions, both ver­bal and visu­al, of the ways, habi­tats, and omens of mon­sters large and small. Lore: Mon­sters 9
56. Prince, Poi­son­er, Pari­ah. A biog­ra­phy of Price Alvon the Ter­ri­ble, of Adaleu­tia. An utter­ly mad monarch, twist­ed in form and mind by cen­turies of roy­al inbreed­ing, who clev­er­ly exe­cut­ed his entire court by trick­ing them into kiss­ing poi­soned rings. For this, the mad Prince was sent to exile, lat­er found him­self a mere mur­der­er-odd­i­ty, a refugee, in the Emper­oussin Court. +1 to cre­ate con­tact poi­sons
57. Pseodomonar­chaea Dae­mon­um. This book, author unknown, is cur­rent­ly banned in all South­ern coastal coun­tries. It depicts, with dubi­ous accu­ra­cy, the pow­er struc­ture and sup­posed hier­ar­chies of the viral enti­ties known as hemorae, or, as the South­ern­ers know them: demons. Xeno­man­tia 6
58. Ruis­lip the Whistler. The old biog­ra­phy of Ruis­lip of Lis­sp, a min­strel of yore who deliv­ered cod­ed mes­sages by the notes of his pen­ny whis­tle and bag­pipes. Ruis­lip played in courts all the Coast wide and was nev­er once caught in his dis­pen­sa­tion and col­lec­tion of secrets to and from embed­ded spies. Only in his final days, pre­ced­ing retire­ment, did Ruis­lip sub­mit a expose to all those he’d betrayed as per­former and as a dou­ble or even triple agent. The book con­tains exam­ples of his cod­ed song, and the fin­ger­ings required to trans­mit it. Lan­guage: The Secret Tongue of Pipes 10
59. Sachet’s Guide to Pix­ie Fan­cy. The most-com­mon house­hold guide to the fan­cy and cul­ti­va­tion of flow­ers for their pix­ies. Includes 100 of the most com­mon vari­eties of gar­den pix­ie, arrange­ment options, cli­mate guides, and advice for keep­ing cer­tain species from offend­ing your neigh­bors. Lore: Pix­ies 8
60. Sav­ages. A his­to­ry of ven­tur­ing’s ear­ly years, as told by a strange­ly age­less nar­ra­tor. Pri­mar­i­ly, a tale of the banks Tiber and Fel­lowes and Peri­dot Firm, then known by dif­fer­ent names, who first began the prac­tice of scout­ing ancient texts and grounds for signs of buried gold. These prog­en­i­tor-banks hired the first cut­ters, rude mer­ce­nar­ies, who the author described in that time as “mere sav­ages, with­out couth.” The details with­in these pages sug­gest hid­den process­es with­in the Coast’s great banks that still exist today. Beau­ro­c­ra­cy 8
61.  Sea­r­ess. The biog­ra­phy of Amile Firense Opal Clereau, the Emper­oussin bal­lis­ti­cian notable for refin­ing orig­i­nal gun­spring pat­terns into more reli­able, dead­ly irons of war under the instruc­tion of arm­smith Even­tine Muni­tions. Both a schol­ar of arma­ments and a philoso­pher of life, Clereau was con­tin­u­al­ly wracked by con­sci­en­tious pre­mo­ni­tions of what her devel­op­ments would wreak upon humankind. The bal­lis­ti­cian pre­dict­ed that in the decade fol­low­ing the release of her gun­spring pat­terns, sev­er­al spe­cif­ic instances of sec­tar­i­an vio­lence, includ­ing strikes by the Holy Inqui­si­tion, would flare, Coast-wide. She pre­dict­ed each, and watched as each, aid­ed by her prod­uct, enact­ed fresh vio­lence over long-stir­ring ten­sions. The book pro­vides, along with its mis­er­able sup­po­si­tion, the orig­i­nal, true notes Clereau made in her improve­ment of the gun­spring. Gun­smithy 8
62. Silence Embold­ened. A recent work. High­ly con­tro­ver­sial. It con­cerns the days fol­low­ing Parou­sia, and the spate of Inqui­si­tion­al ter­ror which ensued fol­low­ing that now-ter­ror­ist orga­ni­za­tion’s relat­ed dis­band­ing. In that time, the Inqui­si­tion, fear­ing its end, enact­ed a series of heinous pun­ish­ments against those it deemed most urgent­ly apos­tate. In par­tic­u­lar: The removal of three holy sis­ters’ tongues by way of acid. The book describes the actions these sis­ters took to so incite the Inqui­si­tion, and the lat­er, vicious strikes they took against it; embold­ened in their silence. Unavail­able in the South. Lore: Parou­sia 6
63. Some­one’s Died. An account of plague and its his­to­ry writ­ten for new audi­ences. In sen­sa­tion­al, sim­ple form, it describes the process­es and mat­u­ra­tion of plague with­in the lungs and bone mar­row, as well as the ways of cre­ma­tion, and, briefly, bur­ial cus­toms in the South. Pri­mar­i­ly, though, Some­one’s Died devotes much of its page count to thriller-wor­thy accounts of recent out­breaks. Name­ly: Bone-chill­ing, if base, descrip­tions of grues and their abil­i­ty to sew car­nage and fear. To many, espe­cial­ly the elder­ly, the occur­rence of this book is a fear­ful thing: A sign that new gen­er­a­tions hold so lit­tle fear for plague that they may be enter­tained by its reminder. A sign they’ve for­got­ten the real and omnipresent ter­ror it is; that they’ve put too much faith in their access to pre­cious salt. Lore: Plague 5
64. Spar­row’s End. A nov­el, which depicts in detail both painful and sen­su­ous the life and demise of Eliv­abet Ellimere Adele Sido­va, a duelist and renowned lover also known by a flighty nick­name: The Spar­row. The bas­tard child of an Emper­oussin cour­te­san and Adaleut­ian lord, she led a vio­lent, lust­ful, and sen­sa­tion­al­ly short life in all the high aris­tos­pheres of the Coast before meet­ing an exces­sive­ly ugly end orches­trat­ed by a union of her ene­mies. Lore: Aris­tos­phere 6
65. State of Exur­gency. A much-derid­ed trea­tise by schol­ar Lee­lander of Sortz on obser­va­tions of the Oth­er’s expan­sion in realms aban­doned by mankind. Exten­sive, but unclear and main­ly ridicu­lous, as Lee­lander was a not­ed lau­danum addict; apt to dream an encounter with sprig­gans more often than actu­al­ly observe one. Still, the book inad­ver­tent­ly serves as a handy guide to the main­te­nance of a coqueli­cot-prod­uct addic­tion for as long as one may before going utter­ly mad. +2 to For­ti­tude rolls to resist coqueli­cot addic­tion. 
66. The Abat­toir at Ilkreat. A hor­ror nov­el based on true events. Name­ly, on the dis­cov­ery of chill­ing graves under the slaugh­ter­house on the isle of Ilkreat, a remote and rocky place used to raise hordes of swine for con­sup­tion. Neath that bloody place were dis­cov­ered dozens, scores of twist­ed skele­tons: young, human frames with the rot­ted heads of swine. What occurred at Ilkreat, in real­i­ty, was nev­er dis­cov­ered. This nov­el puts a twist of sup­po­si­tion on the evi­dence, spins a tale of mod­ern sor­cery and hor­rid pig­men. Lore: Pig­men 6
67. The Bay of Grey: A His­to­ry. A nar­ra­tive of that crit­i­cal North­ern ter­ri­to­ry, the first and only to pro­duce pre­cious griso­date salt from its aquat­ic depths. A recount­ing of both his­tor­i­cal and sociopo­lit­i­cal sig­nif­i­cance, for Grey cements Fir­lund as the Coast’s most insur­mount­able pow­er: The only state capa­ble of pro­duc­ing and trad­ing the panacea which is grey salt. Any to chal­lenge her would be faced with a war wracked by dis­ease and ram­pant plague. Thus, nation­al pol­i­tics remain rel­a­tive­ly frozen, cold as the fog­gy waters of the salt-laden Bay itself. Lore: Bay of Grey 9
68. The Black Hand­book. The reg­u­la­tion guide­book car­ried by all licensed coro­ners of the Coast. Advis­es how to address and med­icate any giv­en sit­u­a­tion involv­ing corpses, plague, or grues. A civil­ian ver­sion is avail­able at a slight­ly marked-up price. Lore: Plague 9
69. The Book of Knives. Writ­ten by an enthu­si­ast of dan­ger­ous pen­chant, this book cat­a­logues the blades of the Coast. Stilet­tos, soap knives, messers; all are account­ed for and described in form, his­to­ry, and pur­pose. Craft: Cut­lery 6
70. The Bow­els of the Earth: A Case Study. The pub­lished log, rarely avail­able out­side of acad­e­mia, of a series of exper­i­ments car­ried out by the Uni­ver­si­ty of Leah on an out­growth of the shim­mel­ing: The titan­ic fun­gus of the under­world. Said exper­i­ments were oppor­tunis­tic, as the shim­mel­ing, ever unpre­dictable, hap­pened to reach a slow, prob­ing mouth-ten­ta­cle through the boot-cel­lar of the Uni­ver­si­ty’s botany build­ing. Through this bleach-scent­ed mouth of ooze, a dozen and more short expe­di­tions were sent, clad in pro­tec­tive gear, into the world of the world-pen­e­trat­ing fun­gus’s guts. Said expe­di­tions only ceased when the shim­mel­ing, prob­a­bly tired of being probed, with­drew its greasy stalk of prob­ing mold, caus­ing the botany build­ing to col­lapse. Despite this, the study yield­ing a bulk of infor­ma­tive find­ings. Lore: The Shim­mel­ing 7
71. The Call to Ave­li­er. Sto­ries of count­less failed jour­neys to the myth­i­cal holy city of Ave­li­er, lost some­where with­in the ser­pent-rid­den plain known as the Long Grass. A ver­i­ta­ble sea, where green stalks qua­ver as three-meter waves midst ungu­lates large as roam­ing, tree-topped islands of fur and thew. A col­lec­tion of won­ders, but most­ly of dis­ap­point­ment and fear. In the end, it is a cau­tion­ary tale. To a rare and fool­ish few, though, it is an invi­ta­tion. Lore: Lost City of Ave­li­er 6 
72. The Cant of the Errant Brick­man. An expen­sive­ly assem­bled col­lec­tion of wood­cuts and def­i­n­i­tions describ­ing the sys­tem of marks left by drift­bricks, itin­er­ant labor­ers, in com­mu­ni­ca­tion with each oth­er. These marks denote such con­cepts as dan­ger, direc­tion, or the gen­eros­i­ty of near­by folk to wan­der­ers. Lan­guage: Secret Lan­guage of Bricks 7
73. The Casque of Life. A now-debunked phreno­log­i­cal guide. Once, used by crack­pots in an attempt to attest the men­tal and spir­i­tu­al fac­ul­ties of a giv­en being by the shape of their skull. Now, a cut­ter’s odd­i­ty. The Casque of Life is use­ful now only for the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of skulls. Glean addi­tion­al info from skele­tal remains. 
74. The Cheese­mon­ger’s Guide. A book owned by every grand­moth­er to keep a tub of squirm­ing feta under the cup­board or dairy­man to raise his own ched­dar vats. The Cheese­mon­ger’s Guide puts the safe and deli­cious rear­ing and dis­patch of cheeses in sim­ple and fool­proof terms. Also includes recipes for notable cheese dish­es Coast­wide. +1 to any task relat­ing chiefly to cheese
75. The Clever Folk. An old and out-of-print col­lec­tion of orig­i­nal chil­dren’s tales, all of which con­cern the fear­ful and enig­mat­ic crea­ture that is the black-eyed sprig­gan. Its pub­lish­er ceased all pro­duc­tion after cer­tain alle­ga­tions of actu­al Oth­er com­mu­nion emerged con­cern­ing the author, who report­ed­ly lived in a cot­tage sur­round­ed by strange charms and lit­tle-toed foot­prints. It remains a desired book, not by chil­dren, but by magi­cians and cut­ters: Prac­ti­tion­ers inter­est­ed in the ways of the Oth­er’s fur­ry ser­vants. Lore: Sprig­gans 7
76. The Col­lect­ed Works of Mer­rill. Mer­rill was an antique poet of mys­te­ri­ous ori­gin. Who­ev­er he or she was, they wrote a sub­stan­tial body, most­ly pas­toral, sweet­ly rhymed, and fin­ished by flat, dis­turb­ing notes. Schol­ars have observed many of Mer­ril­l’s works ref­er­ence Oth­er­world phe­nom­e­na: a field of study that is fear­ful and poor­ly-under­stood, at best. As a result, to those who care for such a thing, Mer­ril­l’s Col­lect­ed Works have become a use­ful, if vague, ref­er­ence in under­stand­ing the Oth­er­world and its black-eyed denizens. Lore: The Oth­er 8
77. The Deduc­tive Trea­tis­es. A series by Maxwellian Hora­cio. Hora­cio’s trea­tis­es are, in high­er schol­ar­ly cir­cles, regard­ed as hog­wash. The series is com­posed of sev­er­al tomes, each of which cov­ers an excit­ing and fan­tas­ti­cal sub­ject, such as ser­pents, älves, and giant land­worms. They are use­ful only for their enter­tain­ment val­ue, as the infor­ma­tion with­in is com­plete sup­po­si­tion and arm­chair-phi­los­o­phy. -2 to any Lore roll made using a Deduc­tive Trea­tise
78. The Drunk­en Whaler. Tales from aboard the Drunk­en Whaler, one of the first hunt­ing ves­sels to ven­ture beyond the Gate of Sloe and spear cachalots for their paraf­fin head-oil. The writer, a har­poon­er, divulges in a sim­ple and tongue-in-cheek style the var­i­ous mar­vels, amuse­ments, and ter­rors of his pro­fes­sion. Sea-rocks high as the clouds, swathed in clouds of bats. A boozy giant employed from the Dark Con­ti­nent. Cachalots, ancient as time, seen split­ting fel­low ves­sels from keel to deck­boards. An infor­ma­tive read on mod­ern whal­ing. Lore: Whal­ing 8
79. The Ency­clopae­dia Arcani­ca. A 27-book col­lec­tion. Pro­hib­i­tive­ly expen­sive, and among the most prized items of col­lect­ed knowl­edge a schol­ar may hope to own. It describes in excel­lent detail the most mys­te­ri­ous and eso­teric sub­jects of the known world; begin­ning with Aathelfern and end­ing with Zytothuri­an. Lore: Arcana 10, Lore: Sor­cery 8
80. The Four-legged Owl. The sto­ry of House Oldaren, of its dis­trust of owls, and of its heraldic beast: The tow­er­ing, beaked stryge. While the tale of the House itself takes short telling, this book’s word on the four-legged, feath­ered mon­ster itself take some time. Much of the work is devot­ed to dis­cus­sion of the habi­tat, behav­ior, and anato­my of the fero­cious stryge. Lore: Stryge 6
81. The Gilder. A biog­ra­phy of the late Lance Veer­chance Delavince Sevreaux, the Rue de Cou­ture’s most influ­en­tial design­er. Once a mere milliner’s assis­tant, young Sevreaux drew notice for the com­ple­men­tary pat­terns he would attach inside hats sold to notable mod­els and aris­to influ­encers. Pat­terns for wardrobes of clean and cut­ting design, rife with sil­ver, steel, and gold; at once more ele­gant and more inspired than any­thing else those days worn. At the notice of sev­er­al wealthy patrons, Sevreaux was peti­tioned to enact some of these pat­terns, and by their suc­cess soon swelled in rep­u­ta­tion to become the Coast’s most haute cloth­ier. Sevreaux’s biog­ra­phy, while a tale of high suc­cess, is also a tragedy. The end of his life was marked by mad­ness, dis­tress, and even­tu­al sui­cide by poi­son. He had for his whole career uti­lized a niter of mer­cury in his hat-craft­ing and fire-gild­ing, a gnaw­ing sub­stance which slow­ly put insid­i­ous holes in his bril­liant mind. His influ­ence lives on, today. +1 Style
82. The Lim­it of Man. An inflam­ma­to­ry jour­nal­is­tic expose reveal­ing the tra­di­tions, lies, and cru­el trans­for­ma­tive process­es, and of holy Alagóran knight broth­er­hoods. It describes, in no lack of grue­some detail, the ways in which these total insti­tu­tions break down a young human reassem­ble them, body and mind, into a dubi­ous paragon of “human­i­ty.” Unavail­able in its sub­ject-coun­try, this short book has thrown the meth­ods and ethics of knight-orders Coast-wide into ques­tion. Lore: Knights 7
83. The Los Karki­nos Let­ters. Cor­re­spon­dence between two Alagóran states­men on one of the most frac­tious issues of the last cen­tu­ry: The restruc­ture of gov­ern­ment hous­es and agen­cies fol­low­ing Parou­sia. Regard­ed as a mas­ter­class in diplo­ma­cy in the face of seem­ing­ly insur­mount­able par­ti­san ten­sions, but also reviled as a prime exam­ple of sys­temic cor­rup­tion with­in the Alagóran state, whether relat­ed to the Church or the Prin­ci­pal­i­ty. Lore: Recent Alagóran His­to­ry 10
84. The Mers­dotr Med­ical Man­u­al. A small, red book stur­di­ly bound. Favored by cut­ters, who swear by its sim­ple, reli­able advice in times of ill­ness and injury. Many a life has been saved by its perusal, by lit­tle pages turned under bloody fin­gers and fran­tic eyes. Med­i­cine 4
85. The Ode of Salu­tiene. A wind­ing yarn of an epic poem bare­ly dis­cernible by com­mon folk, either in trans­la­tions or in its orig­i­nal Emper­oussin. Up until the very cul­mi­na­tion of its mean­der­ing plot, which involves a fic­tion­al sea com­man­der from the last cen­tu­ry, the work makes lit­tle sense, stab­bing with vague pur­pose at intan­gi­ble points regard­ing life and the nature of the world. Only at its end does the Ode come togeth­er in a rev­e­la­to­ry and epic con­clu­sion. Requires lan­guage skill of 7 or high­er to read suc­cess­ful­ly. Bestows 80XP.
86. The Preda­tor. A rare and insight­ful work pub­lished by renowned anthro­pol­o­gist and nat­ur­al philoso­pher Dr. Wal­lace Pied­mont, of Las­treshire short­ly before his dis­ap­pear­ance on the Dark Con­ti­nent. A trea­tise com­pil­ing all his research and case mate­r­i­al on the Oth­er­world, a realm he clas­si­fies as a “dom­i­nant and preda­to­ry ecosys­tem” and fre­quent­ly refers to as sim­ply “the Preda­tor.” A world nat­u­ral­ly bent on influ­en­tial expan­sion, com­posed of a net­work of species both famil­iar and alien, all of which, even the sen­tient ones, exist in unnat­ur­al sym­bio­sis. Pied­mont, sup­port­ed by evi­dence retrieved on his many expe­di­tions to the ends of the World, dia­grams the biol­o­gy of the Oth­er in detail nev­er before seen, includ­ing detailed analy­ses of its sen­tient species, includ­ing älves, trollen, and sprig­gans; top­ics fear­ful, for­bid­den, and folk­loric in their mys­tery, broached with can­dor and method not before attempt­ed. His book is banned in Alagór. It is uncom­mon­ly avail­able in oth­er coun­tries, and it is very expen­sive. Lore: Oth­er­world 10
87. The Red­wa­ter Jour­nal. This col­lec­tion of notes has recent­ly become pop­u­lar read­ing in port cities. The notes, now reprint­ed and bound in red linen, were found two decades ago on the water­logged corpse of a sailor, who was spot­ted, float­ing, on open water midst the Track­less Isles. His notes tell of the fear­ful last days of the whal­ing ship Spine­back. They describe how its course became lost in a fog bank, how its first hand was first to go mad from whis­per­ing song. How its crew were even­tu­al­ly stolen from the rails as they stared, trans­fixed, at the red­dened water below. Lore: Sea Mon­sters 5
88. The Well of Catosene. An epis­to­lary report by a fic­tion­al co-leader on a ven­ture to the epony­mous Well of Catosene. Despite its pre­tens­es at being fic­tion, it is rumored that the work is actu­al­ly fact, and the details with­in, all hor­ri­ble, trapped, and gild­ed, make up a very real account of a typ­i­cal Ancient Nôr ruin. Lore: Ancient Nôr 6
89. The Writ of Aveth. This sev­en-hun­dred- and sev­en­ty-sev­en-page tome is regard­ed as the unal­tered and final rev­e­la­tion of Aveth, Lord of Human­i­ty. Whether this can be truth­ful­ly said or not, as the book has been high­ly edit­ed over the mil­len­nia, the Writ remains, as a nec­es­sary part of faith, the best sell­ing print­ed book of all time. Allows a char­ac­ter to take the trait Avethan.
90. This Much was True. The sto­ry of not­ed let­ter-forg­er Wil­helmi­na Alslin­do­va de Since, a dan­ger­ous woman of high skill and uncer­tain nation­al ori­gin. What became quite cer­tain after her even­tu­al arrest was her incred­i­ble skill at recre­at­ing both the hand­writ­ing and qual­i­ty of speech of any giv­en writer. Dur­ing her tri­al, Alslin­do­va recount­ed the cre­ation of over 700 let­ters in the style of some 105 peo­ple, many of whom were high offi­cials. For all, she was paid gen­er­ous­ly by anony­mous buy­ers who dic­tat­ed the false­hoods writ­ten with­in. The forg­er’s art is dis­cussed in usable detail in said trail pro­ceed­ings. +1 Forgery
91. Three Deaths at Las­ti­morny House. A fic­tion­al thriller con­cern­ing detec­tive Leel­i­gan Cyrl, of Kempt, called to great Las­ti­morny House to inves­ti­gate three deaths dur­ing a long and debauch­er­ous soirée. Her inves­ti­ga­tion fea­tures amus­ing, shock­ing inter­views with numer­ous char­ac­ters scan­dalous­ly based on real aris­tos sus­pect­ed of hold­ing spe­cial fan­cies or odd desires. The cul­prit, in the end, it revealed to be a covert mem­ber of the Holy Inqui­si­tion, sent to put an end to a glut of per­ceived sin. All three mur­ders were car­ried out using some man­ner of poi­son, the author’s descrip­tions of which are strange­ly accu­rate. +1 to rolls made to man­u­fac­ture Poi­son
92. Time Lies. The posthu­mous mem­oir of horol­o­gist Jac­cob Jar­rows of Leant. He was a mak­er of clocks. A pro­fes­sion­al shroud­ed in the super­sti­tion and mys­tique of his art. Folk all the Coast over believed him and prac­ti­tion­ers like him, those with pow­er over time, to be mighty indeed. Jar­rows, a man who held no ounce of per­son­al spir­i­tu­al­i­ty nor super­sti­tion, recounts in this mem­oir sto­ries of oth­ers’ belief in his sup­posed pow­er. At the start, he tells of how he dis­re­gard­ed their belief, their requests for mag­i­cal aid. He resist­ed the mys­tique for years, kept to the sim­ple, hon­est art of clock­work. By the end, though, he describes how he humored them, gift­ed odd­ly-func­tion­al place­bos in the form of altered watch­es and illu­sions of twist­ed time. Lies, but mag­ic all the same. Lore: Horol­o­gy 6
93. To Cap­ture the Eye. A detailed guide to pho­to­typ­ic the­o­ry, his­to­ry, and appli­ca­tion. Begins with the cre­ation of long-expo­sure sil­ver-plates by the renowned Doc­tor Bastil­lion and end­ing with mod­ern accor­dion-hood cam­eras. Pho­togravure 4
94. Trou­ble and Squeak. A high­ly-con­tro­ver­sial piece, pub­lished anony­mous­ly by a ped­dler of con­spir­a­cy and sen­sa­tion­al pulp. A flim­sy card of a book, lit­tle more than a pam­phlet wrapped in brown paper. It pro­pos­es fringe ideas con­strued for a broad audi­ence: That mice, the mild and indus­tri­ous small­folk of soci­ety, are in fact all par­tic­i­pants in the broad­est con­spir­a­cy of mon­e­tary and soci­etal con­trol ever engen­dered. It begins by explain­ing how mice sup­pos­ed­ly own the banks and finan­cial sys­tems of the Coast, and ends with a humon­gous, sup­posed-exposé claim­ing that the fur­ry folk invad­ed from neath the roots of elms hun­dreds of years ago, bear­ing plague as a bio­log­i­cal weapon designed to slow­ly sub­due and replace human­i­ty. No mer­it. 
95. Twen­ty to a Hun­dred Boots. A telling of one of the most hideous­ly-cat­a­stroph­ic mil­i­tary deba­cles of the last three cen­turies. A tale, in times when cross­bows were still preva­lent, of a scout gone lost in the dry, brown hills of south­ern Alagór, then inhab­it­ed by bands of rebels against that penin­su­lar pow­er. A mis­sion was mount­ed to save him. A sec­ond scout was sent to recon­noi­ter it and came back report­ing the ene­mies hold­ing the first num­bered twen­ty to a hun­dred boots. Sim­ply put, this was a ter­ri­ble under­state­ment. The actions based on this bad intel began scat­tered fight­ing and con­fused routs all the coun­try­side over. The orig­i­nal scout was nev­er found. Lore: Mil­i­tary Strat­e­gy 8
96. Two Cen­turies of Tragedy. Two hun­dred years of the stage’s most calami­tous tales, as seen in this curat­ed folio of its great­est play­wrights’ works. Begin­ning with the met­ri­cal trage­di­ans of antique vogue, and end­ing with the very-real hor­ror that befell the Roy­al Opera in 3.445. Read entire­ly, this great brick of a book pro­vides a com­pre­hen­sive stan­dard to the cri­tique of grim the­ater, as well as an impend­ing, melan­choly sense of doom. Abil­i­ty to gain trait Over­sus­pi­cious
97. Waist­ley’s Care and Train­ing of Cob­hounds. A famous breed­er’s guide to cob­hounds: The fur­ry and eas­i­ly-riled eight-legged beasts so com­mon among Lothrhe­mer and Emper­oussin gen­try and guard forces. Bred from dread­ed wolf spi­ders, cob­hounds, or spin­nen­hunde, are iras­ci­ble, bit­ing, and far more dan­ger­ous than prop­er hounds. They are also high-step­ping­ly ele­gant, exot­ic, and make excel­lent guard-dogs. This guide, though its advice is rarei­fied, makes a rea­son­ably safe attempt at their main­te­nance and instruc­tion. Hounds­man­ship 6
98. What I Saw on the HMS Lear­bat­ton. The tale of a jour­nal­ist attached to the epony­mous Lear­bat­ton, a bat­tle­ship which went miss­ing for three weeks midst the misty Track­less Isles: A sea of rocks, loom­ing moun­tain isles, and grab­bing sar­gas­so feared and rarely escaped. Only by the luck of a rite called the Dorn­dal­low method did the ship return at all to port. When she did, she came to rest in Belvirine, a half-Coast away from her port of exit. When arrived, her crew learned she’d been away six months, not the three weeks they’d per­ceived. This recount­ing is the most mod­ern of tales to dare speak of what occurs in the vast and track­less sea. Lore: Lost Waters 6
99. What Lies Below. The true nov­el­iza­tion of an alco­holic cut­ter’s time in Elas­tor Bay: A wet and shal­low inlet-town lit­tered with sea cave-mouths and palls of end­less fog. It describes his sign­ing with a band of spe­cial­ized delvers under the seal of Lagão Trea­sury, of his ven­tures with them into the pelag­ic reach­es of sea caves. Sea caves, lit­tered with rich­es untouched, save by the squelch­ing caress of lemures and oth­er, worse pelag­ic night­mares. Lore: Lemures 5
100. Who Yet Remain: Ban­shees in the 34th Cen­tu­ry. A med­ical trea­tise on the remain­ing cas­es of ban­sheeism, a hor­rid, mis­un­der­stood dis­ease known for pro­tract­ing the lives of its vic­tims, on the Coast. It cov­ers exam­i­na­tion by research teams, backed by hired cut­ters, to ban­shee asy­lums to mea­sure what quan­ti­ty of suf­fer­ers yet remain alive. The answer: Near­ly all; mind-bro­ken and hud­dling in ema­ci­at­ed, howl­ing afflic­tion. The trea­tise draws no con­clu­sion on what to do with these ban­shees, for it is not yet clear whether they can ever be cured. Lore: Ban­shees 7