Urien's Voyage is an allegorical account of a sea voyage. From the stagnant, teeming waters of the Sargasso to the frozen Arctic, Gide charts in prose the fantastic journey of the Orion and the sexual and moral transformations of those aboard. The temptations, suffering, and surroundings of Urien and his companions are described with an extraordinary profusion of detail, yet the pilgrims can never be sure of the reality of their experiences. The eponymous Urien is, we now know, the young Andre Gide himself. Written under the spell of the great French Symbolist poet Mallarme, the novel is an illustration of both the techniques and the aesthetic credo of the Symbolist movement. Although written early in the career of this key French thinker and Nobel Prize-Winner, Urien's Voyage is now regarded as a significant work, articulating the powerful tension between sexuality and morality that would preoccupy Gide in his better-known later novels. Views: 559
Running - The Alien in the Mirror can be considered the prequel to the military scifi Iron Series but might also be the prequel to other science fiction thriller series. Ishmael Bodd 'wakes up' for the first time, a billion years in the future. He is a Citizen of Supercity, a city with no crime. But he suddenly feels compelled to commit a crime and goes on the run. He can never stop running. Views: 559
Spain is an immemorial land like no other, one that James A. Michener, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author and celebrated citizen of the world, came to love as his own. Iberia is Michener’s enduring nonfiction tribute to his cherished second home. In the fresh and vivid prose that is his trademark, he not only reveals the celebrated history of bullfighters and warrior kings, painters and processions, cathedrals and olive orchards, he also shares the intimate, often hidden country he came to know, where the congeniality of living souls is thrust against the dark weight of history. Wild, contradictory, passionately beautiful, this is Spain as experienced by a master writer.
BONUS: This edition includes an excerpt from James A. Michener's Hawaii.
Praise for *Iberia
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“From the glories of the Prado to the loneliest stone villages, here is Spain, castle of old dreams and new realities.”—The New York Times
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“Massive, beautiful . . . unquestionably some of the best writing on Spain [and] the best that Mr. Michener has ever done on any subject.”—*The Wall Street Journal
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“A dazzling panorama . . . one of the richest and most satisfying books about Spain in living memory.”—Saturday Review
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“Kaleidoscopic . . . This book will make you fall in love with Spain.”—*The Houston Post* Views: 558
Howard Zinn tells the story of one of the most important political groups in American history. SNCC: The New Abolitionists influenced a generation of activists struggling for civil rights and seeking to learn from the successes and failures of those who built the fantastically influential Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. It is considered an indispensable study of the organization, of the 1960s, and of the process of social change. Includes a new introduction by the author. Views: 558
A Twisted Tale of burkers and anatomists and how Victorian law was changed to bridle Victorian science."There was something about Mr Stapleton. Something different. No doubt about it, Mr Edward Stapleton was a man apart."Having first seen Her Majesty's Inspector of Anatomy in Westminster Hall, Tumbley comes face to face with him twenty years later when he, Tumbley, is a successful barrister on the verge of taking silk and Stapleton is surprisingly unchanged. It's the first rule of cross-examination: Never ask a question you don't know the answer to. After an evening with the singular Mr Stapleton Tumbley thinks that should be amended slightly. Never ask a question you'd rather not know the answer to. Views: 558
What a train wreck this Presidency has become. Unemployment, true unemployment, is off the charts, race relations are in the tank, the economy is at best struggling, inflation is soaring, the debt accumulated will never be paid off in this life time or our children’s or grandchildren’s life time.Presidential Leadership comes into play when governing not in the politics of campaigning. And therein lays the problem with Barak Obama: a non-President. He has no leadership abilities and he does not govern. He has said “I am not a dictator…” but if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck… it’s a duck. The policies that have come from Obama have come in the form of political (read campaign) pronouncements. The policies that flow from these pronouncements are designed by hard core Leftists in his administration and Congress. There is no debate allowed and consensus is defined by acceptance with no compromise; the ‘my war or the highway mentality Views: 557
A short story following a man as he hurries home to his family on Christmas Eve.Cats have a way of smiling at us. We always know what they are saying when they are looking affectionately at us. They have big grins that display something special to only their owners. If you'ever had a cat like Ebony, then you know what a kitty smile is like! Views: 557
The classic account of the final offensive against Hitler's Third Reich.
The Battle for Berlin was the culminating struggle of World War II in the European theater, the last offensive against Hitler's Third Reich, which devastated one of Europe's historic capitals and marked the final defeat of Nazi Germany. It was also one of the war's bloodiest and most pivotal battles, whose outcome would shape international politics for decades to come.
Cornelius Ryan's compelling account of this final battle is a story of brutal extremes, of stunning military triumph alongside the stark conditions that the civilians of Berlin experienced in the face of the Allied assault. As always, Ryan delves beneath the military and political forces that were dictating events to explore the more immediate imperatives of survival, where, as the author describes it, “to eat had become more important than to love, to burrow more dignified than to fight, to exist more militarily correct than to win.”
It is the story of ordinary people, both soldiers and civilians, caught up in the despair, frustration, and terror of defeat. It is history at its best, a masterful illumination of the effects of war on the lives of individuals, and one of the enduring works on World War II. Views: 556
From the bestselling author of STRIKE BACK, Chris Ryan returns with a new action-packed series.Tough enough? Smart enough? Max will require all his skills just to stay alive as a Special Forces Cadet...The Falkland Islands, South Atlantic Ocean. Intelligence has been received that Argentina is plotting to invade, but is it reliable?The Special Forces Cadets are sent in to investigate, disguised as nature watchers, but when they split up to conduct essential research, two of them are captured and imprisoned. Their lives are in grave danger, but with the main operation at a crucial stage, the others are under orders to leave their friends to their fate.Can the cadets prevent a war and make it out alive? Views: 555
The Rayner-Slade Amalgamation by J. S. Fletcher Views: 554
James A. Michener, the acclaimed author of sweeping historical blockbusters, chronicles his personal involvement in one of the most dramatic elections of the twentieth century: the presidential race between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon. A relative newcomer to politics, Michener served as the Democratic chairman in his native Bucks County, Pennsylvania, in a rural battleground precinct where the major controversies of the day—notably Kennedy’s Catholicism—brought cultural divides to the forefront. First published shortly after the 1960 election, Report of the County Chairman remains an intimate, gripping account of the power of grassroots political involvement.
BONUS: This edition includes an excerpt from James A. Michener's Hawaii.
Praise for *Report of the County Chairman
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“A candid account of the Kennedy/Nixon campaign.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer
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“Fascinating . . . The personalities are vividly and vigorously sketched—the workers, the volunteers, the hatchet men, the pros and . . . key figures on the barnstorming tour.”—Kirkus Reviews
“Instructive . . . Anti-Catholicism was not just a Southern problem. In Pennsylvania, accounts of increasing anti-Catholicism were widespread. No one documented this sentiment more clearly than famed Pennsylvania novelist James Michener.”—The Morning Call* (Allentown, Pennsylvania) Views: 553
A collection of Antonia Fraser's compelling stories exploring the dark hearts and lethal secrets of criminals. This collection features the tale of the jealous wife who engineers revenge for the lovers who wronged her. Views: 553
Summer Season records several anxious days in the life of Kenneth Crane, unemployed graduate. Crane has taken a temporary post as tutor to the young son of a luminary in a small seaside town. Crane finds life difficult enough, but almost intolerably so when he finds himself number-one suspect on a possible murder charge. For the delectable Kitty du Chair, by even contemporary standards a remarkably advanced teen-ager, disappears. She has been seen consorting with Crane. The police close in and Crane's behaviour becomes more erratic (and hilarious). Summer Season is like a Jacques Tati film, having the same dream-like, almost surrealist quality. The humour is infectious and will be caught by very many readers Views: 552
Following a magical encounter, a group of girls are empowered with amazing abilities to fight evil. Sound familiar? Unfortunately, these girls are being stalked by a relentless killer who won't stop until all of them are dead.A young man lands himself in jail in an unfamiliar town only to find himself incarcerated with a mysterious woman and a whole lot of destiny. Views: 552
The prizewinning historian and bestselling author of D-Day and Stalingrad reconstructs the Battle of the Bulge in World War II, in this riveting new account
On December 16, 1944, Hitler launched his ‘last gamble’ in the snow-covered forests and gorges of the Ardennes in Belgium, believing he could split the Allies by driving all the way to Antwerp and forcing the Canadians and the British out of the war. Although his generals were doubtful of success, younger officers and NCOs were desperate to believe that their homes and families could be saved from the vengeful Red Army approaching from the east. Many were exultant at the prospect of striking back.
The allies, taken by surprise, found themselves fighting two panzer armies. Belgian civilians abandoned their homes, justifiably afraid of German revenge. Panic spread even to Paris. While some American soldiers, overwhelmed by the German onslaught, fled or surrendered, others held on heroically, creating breakwaters which slowed the German advance.
The harsh winter conditions and the savagery of the battle became comparable to the Eastern Front. In fact the Ardennes became the Western Front’s counterpart to Stalingrad. There was terrible ferocity on both sides, driven by desperation and revenge, in which the normal rules of combat were breached. The Ardennes—involving more than a million men—would prove to be the battle which finally broke the back of the Wehrmacht.
In this deeply researched work, with striking insights into the major players on both sides, Antony Beevor gives us the definitive account of the Ardennes offensive which was to become the greatest battle of World War II. Views: 550
