Best of
Survival

2007

Ma, He Sold Me for a Few Cigarettes


Martha Long - 2007
    An I wanted te cry inside meself. I wasn't dead any more, I was lifted away, far away. I can do anythin. I can be somebody, I can be beautiful, I can be gentle, I can be rich, I can smell good. The world is waitin fer me. I can be what I want. Then it ended. An I was back in the room. I opened me eyes slowly an took in everythin aroun me. One day I'll be able te stop this. Nobody will keep me down. I'll work hard, an I'll be at the top, cos I don't want anyone lookin down on me.'Born a bastard to a teenage mother in the slums of 1950s Dublin, Martha has to be a fighter from the very start.As her mother moves from man to man, and more children follow, they live hand-to-mouth in squalid, freezing tenements, clothed in rags and forced to beg for food. But just when it seems things can't get any worse, her mother meets Jackser.Despite her trials, Martha is a child with an irrepressible spirit and a wit beyond her years. She tells the story of her early life without an ounce of self-pity and manages to recreate a lost era in which the shadow of the Catholic Church loomed large and if you didn't work, you didn't eat.Martha never stops believing she is worth more than the hand she has been dealt, and her remarkable voice will remain with you long after you've finished the last line.

Back to Basics: A Complete Guide to Traditional Skills


Abigail R. Gehring - 2007
    Created to both inspire and instruct, it returns readers to an era before power saws and fast food restaurants so they can rediscover the pleasures and challenges of a more self-sufficient, economical, and healthy lifestyle. Packed with hundreds of projects, step-by-step sequences, charts, tables, diagrams, and illustrations, it explains how to dye your own wool with plant pigments, graft trees for propagation, raise chickens, create a hutch table with hand tools, and make treats such as blueberry peach jam and cheddar cheese. The truly ambitious will learn how to build a log cabin or an adobe brick homestead.

Survival Wisdom & Know How: Everything You Need to Know to Thrive in the Wilderness


Amy Rost - 2007
    Culled from dozens of respected books from Stackpole, the industry's leader in outdoor adventure, this massive collection of wilderness know-how leaves absolutely nothing to chance when it comes to surviving and thriving in the wilderness—and appreciating every minute of it. Topics include Building Outdoor Shelter, Tracking Animals, Winter Camping, Tying Knots, Orienteering, Reading the Weather, Identifying Edible Plants and Berries, Surviving in the Desert, Bird Watching, Fishing and Ice Fishing, Hunting and Trapping, Canoeing, Kayaking, and White Water Rafting, First Aid, Wild Animals, Cookery, and much more. Useful illustrations and photos throughout make it easy to browse and use. With contributions by the experts at the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) as well as the editors of Stackpole's Discover Nature series, Survival Wisdom & Know-How is the definitive, must-have reference for the great outdoors.

Left For Dead: 30 Years On - The Race is Finally Over


Nick Ward - 2007
    The 1979 race began in perfect conditions, but was soon engulfed by the deadliest storm in the history of modern sailing. By the time it passed, the havoc caused was immeasurable, and fifteen sailors had lost their lives.It had been Nick Ward’s childhood ambition to sail in the Fastnet Race, and being asked to join the crew of the 30-foot yacht Grimalkin was a dream come true. But then the storm hit. Grimalkin was capsized again and again. With the skipper lost overboard, after hours of struggle three of the crew decided to abandon the boat for the liferaft. Nick and another crewmember, both unconscious, were left on the beleaguered yacht in the middle of the Irish Sea. Both were presumed dead. Gerry died a few hours later, and Nick was left to face the storm alone.

Off the Wall: Death in Yosemite


Michael P. Ghiglieri - 2007
    Gripping accounts of all known fatal mishaps in America's first protected land of scenic wonders

Island of the Lost: Shipwrecked at the Edge of the World


Joan Druett - 2007
    Battered by year-round freezing rain and constant winds, it is one of the most inhospitable places on earth. To be shipwrecked there means almost certain death.Incredibly, at the same time on the opposite end of the island, another ship runs aground during a storm. Separated by only twenty miles and the island’s treacherous, impassable cliffs, the crews of the Grafton and the Invercauld face the same fate. And yet where the Invercauld’s crew turns inward on itself, fighting, starving, and even turning to cannibalism, Musgrave’s crew bands together to build a cabin and a forge—and eventually, to find a way to escape. Using the survivors’ journals and historical records, maritime historian Joan Druett brings to life this untold story about leadership and the fine line between order and chaos.

Man vs. Wild: Survival Techniques from the Most Dangerous Places on Earth


Bear Grylls - 2007
    Wild, Bear Grylls demonstrates all manner of survival techniques when faced with nature's extremes--from crossing piranha-infested rivers to fighting off grizzly bears. He shows us how, armed with the correct know-how and a determination to stay alive, all of us have the potential to beat the elements in even the bleakest of situations. Bear Grylls is the ultimate modern-day adventurer. He spent three years with the British Special Forces (21 SAS), only leaving when a near-fatal parachuting accident broke his back in three places. Just two years later, Grylls followed his childhood dream and became one of the youngest climbers ever to reach the summit of Mount Everest. He is the host of the Discovery Channel series Man vs. Wild, where viewers tune in to watch Grylls show what it takes to find your way out of the most inhospitable places on earth with little more than the clothes on your back. Now, in his book, he shows his millions of fans worldwide how to do what he does in an utterly entertaining crash course in surviving every kind of hard ecosystem--mountain, sub-zero terrain, jungle, desert, and the sea. Grylls takes readers on a journey to the corners of the earth and recreates disaster scenarios such as being stranded on a desert island or lost in the snowy Arctic. Perfect for armchair adventurers and extreme sports buffs alike, Man vs. Wild is destined to become a classic in adventure literature.Prepare to learn how to ... snack on maggots, dig yourself a shelter from the snow, suck the fluid from fish eyeballs, skin a snake and eat it, use your own urine to cool yourself down, live without your cell phone "When disaster strikes and we find ourselves alone in an unknown and hostile environment, why do some people survive and others perish Almost all of the most extraordinary tales of survival seem to involve an indefinable Ingredient X, which can only be understood as having its source in that mysterious entity, the 'human spirit.'"--Bear Grylls, Man vs. Wild

Hell's Guest


Glenn D. Frazier - 2007
    Five months later, an underage U.S. Army volunteer, he found himself thrust into a war of an unimaginable brutality and became a hero of the defense of Bataan, a survivor of the brutal Death March and of three harrowing years in a Japanese prisoner or war camp. This is his story.

A Land So Strange: The Epic Journey of Cabeza de Vaca


Andrés Reséndez - 2007
    But the expedition went horribly wrong: Delayed by a hurricane, knocked off course by a colossal error of navigation, and ultimately doomed by a disastrous decision to separate the men from their ships, the mission quickly became a desperate journey of survival. Of the four hundred men who had embarked on the voyage, only four survived-three Spaniards and an African slave. This tiny band endured a horrific march through Florida, a harrowing raft passage across the Louisiana coast, and years of enslavement in the American Southwest. They journeyed for almost ten years in search of the Pacific Ocean that would guide them home, and they were forever changed by their experience. The men lived with a variety of nomadic Indians and learned several indigenous languages. They saw lands, peoples, plants, and animals that no outsider had ever before seen. In this enthralling tale of four castaways wandering in an unknown land, Andres Resendez brings to life the vast, dynamic world of North America just a few years before European settlers would transform it forever.

Complete Krav Maga: The Ultimate Guide to Over 230 Self-Defense and Combative Techniques


Darren Levine - 2007
    Whether you are big or small, male or female, young or old, you can use Krav Maga to protect yourself by exploiting an assailant’s vulnerabilities. Learning Krav Maga will give you the fitness, skills and confidence to feel safer and more secure every day.All the moves in Complete Krav Maga—from beginner Yellow Belt to advanced Brown Belt—are described in depth and illustrated with step-by-step photos:•BeginnerPunches, kicks, knee strikes and basic defense movements•IntermediateFurther self-defense moves, counterattacks, and defenses against knives, guns and sticks•AdvancedAll weapon defenses, groundfighting techniques and advanced strikes

I Speak For The Silent Prisoners Of The Soviets


Vladimir V. Tchernavin - 2007
     This was the beginning of two years of persecution, punishment and imprisonment for Tchernavin and his family. Although a penniless scientist who was aiding the U.S.S.R. with research in fishing he was persecuted by the state because his family were Russian nobility, which to the Soviet Government meant that he was a class enemy. Tchernavin’s fascinating story takes the reader into the heart of the Soviet Union of the 1930s as it was desperately trying to industrialise, no matter what the cost was in human lives. Accused of counter-revolutionary activities and not assisting in the industrial drive that Stalin had implemented he was imprisoned in 1931 and sentenced to five years in the Gulags. Tchernavin’s account vividly depicts the persecution that he and his fellow prisoners suffered at the hands of the U.S.S.R., how many buckled under the torturous conditions, confessing to crimes they had never committed and even indicting others in the process. Along with his wife and son Tchernavin was one of the lucky ones who was able to escape across the border to Finland and later live in England. “Professor Tchernavin has an important story to tell and tells it well and convincingly.” William Henry Chamberlain, Pacific Affairs “The story reveals the life and organization of the prisons, the treatment meted out to those dealing with the Communists.” Kirkus Reviews Vladimir Tchernavin was a Russian scientist, who specialized in studying fish. He was one of the first and very few prisoners of the Gulag system to escape. His work I Speak for the Silent Prisoners of the Soviets was first published in 1934 and he died in 1949. This work was translated by Nicholas Oushakoff who had left the U.S.S.R. in the 1920s to settle in Massachusetts. He died in 1973.

Together on Top of the World: The Remarkable Story of the First Couple to Climb the Fabled Seven Summits


Phil Ershler - 2007
    It is the tale of two people who came together to change each other's lives, about things that should never have happened but did, and about the dreams that come true as a result.

Roman's Journey


Roman Halter - 2007
    'Survivor' is the story of impossible misfortune and improbable good luck - the compelling and uplifting account of the boy who made it out of the ghetto, survived Auschwitz and Stutthof and endured the Dresden bombing, before escaping to England.

God Said Yes


Heather Hornback-Bland - 2007
    When she was just a child, Heather's life was altered by an accident that completely destroyed many of her internal organs. The doctors gave her no chance of survival-but with God's grace, she proved them wrong. When they said she would never walk, she defied them again. And though they insisted she could never have children, she gave birth to two. When others said no...God said yes. More than a story of suffering and survival, Heather's life is a testament to the power of faith. From the first decisive moments after the accident, Heather and her mother put their trust in God, and let Him work in their lives. With her husband DeWayne and her daughter Mackenzie-the two greatest miracles in her life-Heather has found great joy, and many reasons to give praise. This is her amazing story-offering hope and inspiration to all.

The Airmen and the Headhunters: A True Story of Lost Soldiers, Heroic Tribesmen and the Unlikeliest Rescue of World War II


Judith M. Heimann - 2007
    Instead they found themselves unexpectedly facing a Japanese fleet—and were shot down. When they cut themselves loose from their parachutes, they were scattered across the island’s mountainous interior. Then a group of loincloth-wearing natives silently materialized out of the jungle. Would these Dayak tribesmen turn the starving airmen over to the hostile Japanese occupiers? Or would the Dayaks risk vicious reprisals to get the airmen safely home? The tribal leaders’ unprecedented decision led to a desperate game of hide-and-seek, and, ultimately, the return of a long-renounced ritual: head-hunting. A cinematic survival story that features a bamboo airstrip built on a rice paddy, a mad British major, and a blowpipe-wielding army that helped destroy one of the last Japanese strongholds, The Airmen and the Headhunters is a gripping, you-are-there journey into the remote world and forgotten heroism of the Dayaks.

The Bipolar Teen: What You Can Do to Help Your Child and Your Family


David J. Miklowitz - 2007
    David Miklowitz can help. The bestselling author of The Bipolar Disorder Survival Guide has tailored his proven treatment approach to meet the specific needs of teens and their families. The Bipolar Teen provides practical tools you can use to make home life manageable again. You’ll learn to spot the differences between normal teenage behavior and the telltale symptoms of mania and depression. Together with your child’s doctors, you’ll be able to strike a healthy balance between medication and psychotherapy, recognize and respond to the early warning signs of an oncoming episode, and collaborate effectively with school personnel. Like no other resource available, this powerful book delivers ways to manage chaos and relieve stress so everyone in your family--including siblings--can find stability, support, and peace of mind.

Walking the Gobi: A 1,600-Mile Trek Across a Desert of Hope and Despair


Helen Thayer - 2007
    Accompanied by her 74-year-old husband Bill and two camels, Tom and Jerry, Thayer walked 1600 miles in 126-degree temperatures, battling fierce sandstorms, dehydration, dangerous drug smugglers, and ubiquitous scorpions. For more than 60 days Helen struggled to keep moving through this inhospitable terrain despite a severe leg injury. Without sponsors, a support team, or radio contact, hers is a journey of pure discovery and adventure. Walking the Gobi takes readers on a trip through a little-known landscape and introduces them to the culture of the nomadic people whose ancestors have eked out an existence in the Gobi for thousands of years. Thayer's respect and admiration for the culture of Gobi and her gentle weaving of natural history shine throughout this remarkable story. The author proves that Baby Boomers don't have to take life lying down-their adventures have just begun.

The Ultimate Guide to U.S. Army Survival Skills, Tactics, and Techniques


Jay Mccullough - 2007
    Army's official fieldmanuals, editor Jay McCullough has culled a thousand pages of the mostuseful and curious tidbits for the would-be soldier, historian,movie-maker, writer, or survivalist—including techniques on first aid;survival in the hottest or coldest of climates; finding or buildinglife-saving shelters; surviving nuclear, biological, and chemicalattacks; physical and mental fitness, and how to find food and wateranywhere, anytime. With hundreds of photographs and illustrationsshowing everything from edible plants to rare skin diseases of thejungle, every page reveals how useful Army knowledge can be.

Lights Out


HalfFast - 2007
    When an EMP attack across most of America puts the "Lights Out" completely, he has to make a major shift in the way he and his family live. The book begins right away with the EMP, and follows Mark, his family, and his friends through the tough process of survival.

Getting Air


Dan Gutman - 2007
    It's summer, school's out, and they are on their way to California, where they will be able to do some major skating. But on the plane, the unthinkable happens: They are hijacked by terrorists. As frightened as they may be, they take action and they succeed. Sort of. They may have beaten the terrorists, but now their plane has crashed in the middle of nowhere and all of a sudden, their summer vacation is about finding food, shelter, and a rescue. Can three normal twelve-year-old boys find a way to get by without fast food and skate parks?

The Boys' Book of Survival: How to Survive Anything, Anywhere


Guy Campbell - 2007
    Find out how to survive a school dance, a shopping trip with your mom, a pop quiz, and a shark attack!

The Unknown Black Book: The Holocaust in the German-Occupied Soviet Territories


Joshua Rubenstein - 2007
    These documents are first-hand accounts by survivors of work camps, ghettos, forced marches, beatings, starvation, and disease. Collected under the direction of two renowned Soviet Jewish journalists, Ilya Ehrenburg and Vasily Grossman, they tell of Jews who lived in pits, walled-off corners of apartments, attics, and basement dugouts, unable to emerge due to fear that their neighbors would betray them, as often happened.

Logic's End: A Novel about the Origin of Life in the Universe


Keith A. Robinson - 2007
    Rebecca Evans, a staunch evolutionary scientist, is one of the people chosen to visit the planet. After arriving on the surface, she is kidnapped and finds herself caught in the middle of an ongoing planetary war between alien clans. In an effort to escape, she makes a deal with one of the clans to exchange precious technology for her freedom. She soon finds out that on Kaesh, you cannot trust anyone. For on this planet, survival of the fittest is played out to its logical end. Her journey of discovery turns into a search for truth as she begins to question the very foundations of all that she believes about the origin of life. Keith Robinson has a Bachelor of Arts and Masters degree. Keith is from Kenosha, WI.

Survival: The Ultimate Practical Guide to Camping and Wilderness Skills: Wilderness skills * campcraft * navigation * knots * first aid * hiking * risk ... How to survive on land, water and in the air


Anthonio Akkermans - 2007
    Essential guidance on the skills needed to experience the great outdoors safely; how to survive disasters of all types on land, at sea, and in the air; and how to be streetwise and preserve personal and family safety in the urban jungle

The Sky Singer


Brandy Golden - 2007
    She is determined to avenge her father and locate the missing diamonds, all while taking care of her younger sister, Cassie. Nothing will stand in her way, and what Sydney wants, she usually gets. Little does she know, her father made arrangements behind her back to make sure she obeys his last request to sell Camaroo Air Cargo, in order to give her and Cassie a new start in life. American photographer, Ryan Ramsey, agrees to his father's request to help him honor Sydney's father's last wishes, by going to Australia to see that Sydney obeys what her father wanted. Unfortunately, obey is not a word in Sydney's vocabulary. Sparks fly in this contemporary romance where obstinate meets implacable, as Ryan insists that Sydney will comply with her father's request, even if he has to discipline her to do it! Publisher's Note: A sweet romantic suspense story with mild love scenes and the discipline of stubborn women. If this type of reading material offends you, please do not purchase.

Bad Ground: Inside the Beaconsfield Mine Rescue


Tony Wright - 2007
    The blast and rock fall which occurred one kilometre underground on Anzac Day, 25 April 2006, killed their fellow worker, Larry Knight, leaving their shift manager certain they were dead. Tony Wright's enthralling, often spine-chilling narrative begins with a masterfully rendered portrait of the small Tasmanian mining township where the drama unfolded, a township that revealed its deepest secrets to him. Full of portent, Bad Ground reads like a psychological thriller as it follows the many intriguing and moving developments surrounding its central characters and their families, above ground and deep below. Russell and Webb, who were wary colleagues before becoming trapped in a cramped and crushed cage, share explicit details of their gruelling 14-day ordeal. They give an uncensored account of the darkest first five days during which little hope was held finding them, dead or alive, and the profoundly changed world they re-joined when rescued via the tunnel that served as their lifeline for nine agonisingly slow days. Bad Ground sets a new standard for this genre. Beautifully crafted, complex and, in parts, explosive, in the finest storytelling tradition, Tony Wright has written a compelling yarn that will stay with you long after the event itself has been forgotten.

UTM Using your GPS with the Universal Transverse Mercator Coordinate System


John Carnes - 2007
    With lots of illustrations and step by step instructions, readers will be converting between map locations and UTM coordinates in no time! Inexpensive GPS receivers have brought the ability to determine accurate geographic positioning to both professionals and recreational users. To relate the GPS reading to a map, the user needs to understand how to use geographic coordinate systems. Many new GPS users are discovering what military and rescue forces have known for years. UTM coordinates are much easier to work with than latitude longitude coordinates. Includes a 1:24,000 scale, 1km, pocket sized, UTM Grid Tool for use with 7.5 minute USGS topographic maps.

The Essential Food Storage Cookbook: Combining Food Storage with Everyday Ingredients for Delicious Food


Tami Girsberger - 2007
    Find a use for the unusable food in your basement by implementing it into your everyday meals!

Leepike Ridge


N.D. Wilson - 2007
    D. Wilson delighted readers with his first unforgettable action-adventure story of survival. . . .  Thomas Hammond has always lived next to Leepike Ridge, but he never imagined he might end up lost beneath it! The night Tom’s schoolteacher comes to dinner and asks Tom’s mother to marry him, Tom slips out of the house and escapes down a nearby stream on a floating slab of packing foam. The night and stars lull Tom to sleep, and when he wakes, he has ridden his foam raft all the way to the ridge, where the stream dives underground. Flung over rapids and tossed through chasms, Tom finally hits shore, sore but alive. What Tom finds under Leepike Ridge—a dog, a flashlight, a castaway, a tomb, and buried treasure—will answer questions he hadn’t known to ask, and change his life forever. Now, if only he can find his way home again. . . .

Left for Dead: The Untold Story of the Greatest Disaster in Modern Sailing History


Nick Ward - 2007
    Within 48 hours, the deadliest storm in the history of modern sailing had blasted through the Irish Sea. By the time it had passed, it had thrown one of the world's most prestigious races into bedlam and taken the lives of fifteen sailors. Ward's boat, Grimalkin, was capsized again and again, and the skipper lost overboard; after hours of struggle, three of the crew fled the boat for the liferaft. Nick and his crewmate Gerry, both injured, unconscious, and presumed dead, were abandoned on the beleaguered yacht. Gerry died a few hours later, and Nick was left alone to face down a storm that has become legendary among sailors and racing fans alike. "Left for Dead" is Nick Ward's harrowing and inspirational memoir of how he survived that dreadful night. After his dramatic rescue, Ward was overwhelmed by media and decided in 1980 not to speak of the incident again. It wasn't until this book's coauthor, Sinead O'Brien, approached him about the story that he began the personal writings that became this book. Here at last is the untold true story of an accident that has intrigued lovers of the sea for almost thirty years.

The Courage to Survive


Dennis Kucinich - 2007
    It is a book that sets the tone for the national debate as we choose new leadership in a time of great crisis and great opportunity.