John Vir owns a newsagent in Southampton - the only shop that still stocks packets of petrified celery soup, drosophila-studded fruit and boxes of henna. Lucy and Paul are his favourite customers - they live across the road above Snooke's Electrical Stores, soon to become the Bluebird Café. Stencilling blue doves below the picture rails and buying stripped-pine chairs from the Oxfam furniture store Lucy works in the newly opened café whilst Paul spends his time at the Badger Centre as a volunteer. Meanwhile John Vir thinks of little else but Lucy and invites her to the cash 'n' carry, hoping of course, that it will be a prelude to something more exciting, for them both ... Views: 37
Plymouth, July 1801: Richard Bolitho's small squadron, still repairing the scars of battle earned in heavy action at Copenhagen, has been months away from the sea. After eight years of war with France, Britain must make a gesture that will show strength and determination—and one which will dramatically weaken the French cause. Rear-Admiral Bolitho must follow his flag's tradition of victory, even though—for the first time in his life—he is torn between the demands of public duty and personal need.Review"Impeccable naval detail and plenty of action." -- Sunday Telegraph"One of our foremost writers of Naval Fiction." -- Sunday TimesAbout the AuthorAlexander Kent, pen name of Douglas Edward Reeman, joined the British Navy at 16, serving on destroyers and small craft during World War II, and eventually rising to the rank of lieutenant. He has taught navigation to yachtsmen and has served as a script adviser for television and films. His books have been translated into nearly two dozen languages. Views: 37
In 2006, the Wall Street pioneer and philanthropist Ray Chambers flicked through some holiday snapshots taken by his friend, development economist Jeff Sachs, and remarked on the placid beauty of a group of sleeping Malawian children. "They're not sleeping," Sachs told him. "They're in malarial comas. A few days later, they were all dead." Chambers had long avoided the public eye, but this moment sparked his determination to coordinate an unprecedented, worldwide effort to eradicate a disease that has haunted humanity since before the advent of medicine.Award-winning journalist Alex Perry obtained unique access to Chambers, now the UN Special Envoy for Malaria. In this book, Perry weaves together science and history with on-the-ground reporting and a riveting exposé of the workings of humanitarian aid to document Chambers' campaign. By replacing traditional ideas of assistance with business acumen and hustle, Chambers saved millions of lives, and upturned current... Views: 37
A good cop. A bad choice. Let history be the judge.In 1943, in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Sam Miller is a cop supporting a family and trying to stay on the right side of his boss, the law, and his conscience. Then a body is found by the railroad tracks, a number tattooed on the victim’s wrist. It is a case Sam could walk away from. It is a case he will be ordered to drop. And it is case that leads him into a lethal vortex of politics, espionage, rebellion, and international intrigue.As war rages in Europe, a new power rises in America. And the people Sam thinks he knows best—his wife, his brother, his colleagues—reveal new identities. In a formerly close-knit city by the sea, where no one is above suspicion and no one is safe, a global summit is about to take place. On that day, history will be changed. And millions of people will live or die, all because Sam Miller has been a very good cop—faced with a very bad choice.From the Paperback edition. Views: 37
The long-awaited sequel to The Runes of the Earth returns readers to the Land-and opens with the reunion of Linden Avery and Thomas Covenant!
Linden Avery, who loved Thomas Covenant and watched him die, has returned to the Land in search of her kidnapped son, Jeremiah. As Fatal Revenant begins, Linden watches from the battlements of Revelstone when the impossible happens- riding ahead of the hordes attacking Revelstone are Jeremiah and Covenant himself, apparently very much alive.
Here in the Land, Jeremiah is healed of the mental condition that had kept him mute and unresponsive for so many years. He is full of life, and devoted to Covenant. But Covenant is strangely changed. Sarcastic and bragging, he no longer seems like the man whom Linden adored. And yet he says he has a plan: he will take her and Jeremiah to a place where they can find a pure source of Earthpower and, after he has achieved his own purposes, Linden will be free to use that great power to go home, to take Jeremiah home, or to do anything else she sees fit. Even though she distrusts the seemingly different man he has now become, how can she make any choice except to follow him?
Their journey will cover unimaginable distances through the Land-even through time itself-and will test Linden's courage again and again. In the end, fulfilling her destiny will call for a terrible leap of faith: Can she give up everything she thought had been restored to her, for the sake of the Land? Views: 37
In just six days, the United States Strategic Air Forces changed the course of military offense in World War II. During those six days, they launched the largest bombing campaign of the war, dropping roughly 10,000 tons of bombs in a rain of destruction that would take the skies back from the Nazis... The Allies knew that if they were to invade Hitler's Fortress Europe, they would have to wrest air superiority from the mighty Luftwaffe. The plan of the Unites States Strategic Air Forces was risky. During the week of February 20th, 1944--and joined by the RAF Bomber Command--the USAAF Eighth and Fifteenth Air Force bombers took on this vital and extremely risky mission. They ran the gauntlet of the most heavily defended air space in the world to deal a death blow to Germany's aircraft industry, and made them pay with the planes already in the air. In the coming months, this Big Week would prove a deciding factor in the war. Both sides were dealt losses, and whereas the Allies could recover, damage to the Luftwaffe was irreparable. Thus Big Week became one of the most important episodes of World War II, and coincidentally, one of the most overlooked--until now. INCLUDES PHOTOS Views: 37
From the author of the internationally bestselling Art of Hearing Heartbeats series, a charming collection of folktales that offer a window into Burma's fascinating history and culture.Since 1995 Jan-Philipp Sendker has visited Myanmar (Burma) dozens of times, and while doing research for his novels The Art of Hearing Heartbeats and A Well-Tempered Heart, he encountered numerous fairy tales and fables. These moving stories speak to the rich mythology of the diverse peoples of Burma, the spirituality of humankind, and the profound social impact Buddhist thinking has had over centuries. Some are so strange he couldn't classify them or identify a familiar moral, while others reminded him of the fairy tales of his childhood, except that here monkeys, tigers, elephants, and crocodiles inhabited the fantastic lands instead of hedgehogs, donkeys, or geese. The teachings they convey resemble those of the Brothers Grimm or Hans Christian Andersen,... Views: 37
The young Robert Louis Stevenson, living in a boarding house in San Francisco while waiting for his beloved's divorce from her feckless husband, dreamed of writing a soaring novel about his landlady's adventurous and globe-trotting husband—but he never got around to it. And very soon thereafter he was married, headed home to Scotland, and on his way to becoming the most famous novelist in the world, after writing such classics as Treasure Island, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Kidnapped.But now Brian Doyle brings Stevenson's untold tale to life, braiding the adventures of seaman John Carson with those of a young Stevenson, wandering the streets of San Francisco, gathering material for his fiction, and yearning for his beloved across the bay. An adventure tale, an elegy to one of the greatest writers of our language, a time-traveling plunge into The City by the Bay during its own energetic youth, The Adventures of John Carson in... Views: 37
'Thought provoking.' Richard Morrison, The TimesWithin forty-eight hours in the autumn of 2014, buyers in the Sotheby's and Christie's New York auction houses spent $1.7 billion on contemporary art. In The Orange Balloon Dog, economist and bestselling author Don Thompson cites this and other fascinating examples to explore the sometimes baffling activities of the high-end contemporary art market. He examines what is at play in the exchange of vast amounts of money and what nudges buyers, even on the subconscious level, to imbue a creation with such high commercial value. Thompson analyses the behaviours of buyers and sellers and delves into the competitions that define and alter the value of art in today's international market, from New York to London, Singapore to Beijing. Take heed if your fortunes are tied up in stainless steel balloon dogs – Thompson also warns of a looming bust of the contemporary art price balloon. Views: 37
For almost a century, New York City's Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has presided over the dead. Over the years, the OCME has endured everything-political upheavals, ghastly murders, bloody gang wars, the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and non-stop battles for power and influence-and remains the final authority in cases of sudden, unexplained, or violent death. Founded in 1918, the OCME has evolved over decades of technological triumphs and all-too human failure to its modern-day incarnation as the foremost forensics lab in the world, investigating an average caseload of over 15,000 suspicious deaths a year. This is the behind-the-scenes chronicle of public service and private vendettas, of blood in the streets and back-room bloodbaths, and of the criminal cases that made history and headlines. Views: 37
