From the celebrated author of "The Palace Thief "and "Emperor of the Air," comes this stunning novel about the relationship between two very different men. Orno Tarcher travels from a small town in Missouri to New York City to attend Columbia University, where he begins a new life feeling unsophisticated and insecure. He soon strikes up a friendship with Marshall Emerson, a seductive and brilliant New Yorker whose sophistication dazzles Orno. As time passes, Marshall is revealed to be bent on destruction, and Orno's involvment with Marshall's worldly sister further complicates their friendship. Carefully crafted and skillfully informed by the works of Fitzgerald and Waugh, "For Kings and Planets" is a remarkable novel. A "New York Times," "Los Angeles Times," "Boston Globe," "San Francisco Chronicle," and "Minneapolis StarTribune" bestseller, and a "Publishers Weekly" Best Book of 1998.