The plot spans from 1912 to 1944. For more than half a century the book has been loved by children and adults alike. The novel has undergone more than 100 printings, including translations into other languages. Based on its story, plays have been staged and an opera has been written. The plot of the book also became the basis of two movies of the same title in 1955 and 1976. In 1995 in Pskov, the home town of the author, a monument was erected to the characters of the book and a "Two Captains" museum was opened.The real prototype for Captain Tatarinov was Lieutenant Georgii Brusilov, who in 1912 organized a privately funded expedition seeking a west-to-east Northern sea route. The steamship "St. Anna," specially built for the expedition, left Petersburg on 28 July 1912. Near the shores of Yamal peninsula it was seized by ice and carried in the ice drift to the north of the Kara Sea. The expedition survived two hard winters. Of the 14 people who left the stranded steamship in 1914, only two made it to one of the islands of Frants-Joseph Land and were spotted and taken aboard "St. Foka," the ship of the expedition of G. Y. Sedov. The ship log they had kept with them contained the most important of the scientific data, after the study of which Sedov's expedition found the previously unknown island in the Kara Sea, Vize Island. The ultimate fate of "St.Anna" and its remaining crew is still unknown. Veniamin Kaverin (1902-1989) wrote novels, short stories, fairy tales, memoirs, and biographies. In the early 1920s, Veniamin Kaverin was a member of experimental literary group "Serapionovi bratya." In 1946 his novelTwo Captains became the winner of the USSR State Literature Award.

    Brought up on a hill-station in north-west India, he killed his first leopard before he was nine and wenton to achieve a legendary reputation as a hunter.Corbett was also an author of great renown. His books on the man-eating tigers he once tracked are not only established classics, but have by themselves created almost a separate literary genre. Man Eaters of Kumaon is the best known of Corbett's books, one which offers ten fascinating andspine-tingling tales of pursuing and shooting tigers in the Indian Himalayas during the early years of this century. The stories also offer first-hand information about the exotic flora, fauna, and village life in this obscure and treacherous region of India, making it as interesting a travelogueas it is a compelling look at a bygone era of big-game hunting.

    Raised in the Nazi ideology, Tony has by chance tumbled

    A classic story of survival and adventure from the author of The Little Grey Men.

    A holiday visit to Poland. But before enojoying the sights and sounds of this fascinating new place, happiness took a violent turn and became a nightmare of terror...when suddenly you're mistaken for a Nazi spy, and to save your life, you have to prove you are innocent.

     But they're not prepared for the dangerous adventure that awaits them in the abandoned copper mines and secret tunnels beneath the sea.

    Dooley was dean of a close knit group, & everything else took second place as the men came into headquarters, & set out again to find him. An unknown lake--beyond unknown mountains--a time schedule--& faith--such alone they had to go on, hampered by Army red tape, lack of radio contact, navigation rules upset by the frozen north. The story shifts from Dooley's experiences, with the five men who counted on him, to the men who sought him. Starkly told--another segment of understanding of total war.--Kirkus

    Written with ideas on The White Goddess as a cultural/anthropological backdrop to the ancient Greek tale. What the Golden Fleece really was—a cloak tossed to earth by a drunken Zeus, a sheepskin book of alchemic secrets or the gilded epidermis of a young human sacrifice named Mr. Ram—nobody knows. But Graves is quite sure that, whatever the Golden Fleece was, the voyage of Jason & his Argonauts really happened. His story shows the legendary cruise as one of the bawdiest, bloodiest, most boisterous expeditions of all time. In I, Claudius & its Claudius the God sequel, Graves brought the teeming life of Claudian Rome so vividly alive that they became bestsellers. In the not-so-successful Wife to Mr. Milton, his blend of imagination & scholarship projected his readers into 17th-Century England & the bedchamber temper tantrums of the blind poet-politician. With Hercules & shipmates, Graves becomes an ancient Greek, moving among demigods & goddesses, myths & monsters with an easy familiarity & a wealth of erudite detail. Both sometimes seem too much of a good thing. Atomic-age readers, ill-attuned to the leisurely, formal talk of myth-age Greeks, may find themselves skipping some of the longer speeches. Most of the Argo's 50-oar crew were princes, each with a special talent & gift of the gods. The only woman aboard was a princess: Atalanta of Calydon, a virgin huntress who could outrun any man in Greece. Argus, who built the Argo, was the world's finest shipwright. Castor & Pollux, sons of Leda & Zeus-as-swan, were champion prizefighters. Nauplius, Poseidon's son, was an unrivaled navigator. Orpheus could make sticks & stones dance to his lyre. Hercules of Tiryns was the world's strongest man. He would've captained the Argonauts were it not that in moments of insanity he murdered friend & foe alike. Captaincy devolved on Jason of lolcos—a man nobody liked or trusted, but who had a power denied to all the others: women instantly fell in love with him. Even surly Hercules agreed it a quality worth all the rest. Backed by divine blessings & equinoctal winds, the Argonauts set sail. On the Island of Lemnos, peopled solely by women, they generously stopped off to help out with spring sowing. Nine months later, 200 children were born, of whom no less than 60 were said to be the spitting image of Hercules. On Samothrace, they were initiated into the sacred mysteries. The Goddess of All Being mated with the Serpent Priapus to be delivered of a bull. Then the sacred nymphs leapt on them & scratched & bit until even Hercules passed out. Thereafter, the Argonauts glowed with "a faint nimbus of light." The Argonauts boldly pushed on thru the dread Hellespont & entered the Black Sea. To their dismay, Hercules deserted, summoned home to perform another of his mighty labors. "Holy Serpents!" he growled. "Tell me what this time?" The job—cleaning the Augean Stables—didn't take long. He stayed around afterwards with the Lydian high priestess—who in due time bore male triplets. In gratitude, she taught him to spin, tying up his hair in blue braids. He was crazy about it, admitting confidentially he'd always wanted to be a woman. The Argonauts went on without Hercules. Reaching Colchis, Aphrodite won the Fleece for them. She made her son Eros wait behind a pillar with his bow until handsome Jason strode into the King of Colchis' palace. Eros shot Medea thru the heart, & the smitten princess helped to get the Fleece from her father's temple. Mythology's most famous voyage had reached its goal, but Graves takes 150 more pages to wind things up.

    In 1940, fourteen-year-old Petra Engeland and her older brother Martin join with other Norwegians in resisting the Nazis who have invaded their country.

    One such man was Lt.-Colonel William Edwin ‘Ed’ Dyess, he and his unit of the 21st Pursuit squadron flew their obsolete P-40 Warhawks against the superior Japanese fighters until no more planes remained. Undaunted he fought on as an infantryman refusing to be evacuated and leave his men, despite the hopeless situation after the battle of Bataan. Before his eventual capture by the Japanese his deeds of selfless bravery were legendary, including giving his own plane to a fellow aviator so he could fly to safety and ensuring that the future president of the United Nations General Assembly, Colonel Carlos Romulo could escape. Dyess and his brave men deserved a better fate than that which awaited them at the hands of their Japanese captors on the infamous Bataan Death March. Driven north from Bataan, the American and Philippino prisoners were beaten, starved and prodded at the tip of the bayonet toward prison camps that had been callously unprovided with the basic means of existence. Dyess and his fellows swore that they would not submit to this regime and die like many had along the roads and decided on a plan of escape. In the only successful mass prison escape, Dyess along with his men broke out of their prison camp and made contact with resistance groups. After a time waging further Guerilla operations, Dyess and two other American servicemen were evacuated by submarine to Australia. As Dyess recuperated the American Government knowing the effect that the truth of the atrocities committed by the Japanese would galvanize public opinion allowed the release of his story via the Chicago Tribune. The story created a huge storm of outrage directed at the Japanese and of respect and admiration for Dyess and his fellow soldiers who had endured so much on their behalf. Dyess returned to active service as soon as was possible but tragically died in an airplane accident in 1943, a hero to his men and country.A tragically vivid and gruelling account of one of the most heroic escape stories yet told.

    Falsely accused of murder, he must leave the Raven Mountains forever. If he ever returns, he will be put to death by those he once called friends and family. Tok's only hope is to reclaim his honor by completing a quest. Long ago, the ravens lived in partnership with the Grey Lords. Can Tok reunite his kind with these legendary hunters? The quest will take him on a perilous journey into dangers he cannot even imagine...

    A play about the fatal expedition by Robert Scott and his team in the Antarctic to reach the South Pole.Foreword by the author.With appendix