The representatives of the thirteen colonies who approved the Declaration of Independence in 1776 charted a collision course, aware of the obstacles in their path and the risks they were taking. The events that led to their decision took place over a period of nearly 300 years. Looking back, the wonder is that it culminated so quickly. For a century after its discovery, the New World was little more than a lode to be mined by adventurers seeking profits. It wasn't until the end of the sixteenth century that serious efforts were made to establish permanent colonies. Even then, the perils of the journey and threats of starvation inhibited settlement. But settlers gradually came, spurred, in part, by the fear of religious persecution, but above all, drawn by the hope of owning land. They were a mixed lot: English Separatists from Leiden, French Huguenots, Dutch burghers, Mennonite peasants from the Rhine Valley, and a few gentleman Anglicans. But they shared a quality of toughness. Here is their story from award-winning historian Louis B. Wright.

    Though most of us will board an aircraft at some point in our lives, we know little about how they work and the procedures surrounding their operation. It is that mystery that makes these losses, such as the vanishing of Malaysia Airlines flight 370, so terrifying. Without a Trace explores the most interesting of these disappearances: mysteries that have baffled investigators for years. Occasionally tragic, frequently amusing, Without a Trace is unerringly accurate and informative. The two Without a Trace volumes span 150 years and explore mysteries from around the world. This is volume one, beginning just before the golden age of aviation with a manned balloon swept over the English Channel, and ending with a top-secret spy plane disappearing at the height of the cold war. Each case is laid out in rich detail and presented chronologically, highlighting the historical context, official accident reports and contemporary news surrounding each mystery. Where did they go? Sylvia Wrigley introduces the crews, innocent bystanders and rescuers in this collection of true stories. Documenting the popular theories from each case, she uses her knowledge and experience as a pilot and an aviation journalist to demystify aviation jargon and narrow down each disappearance to the most likely explanations. This collection takes a hard look at the human failings of great aviators, explorers and celebrities who have pushed the limits of flight and ended up at the heart of a mystery. The stories encompass airships, military jets and commercial airlines - all of which have vanished without a trace.

    Przemysl, Poland. No one has explained to three-year-old Renatka what war is. She knows her Tatus, a doctor, is away with the Polish Army, that her beautiful Mamusia is no longer allowed to work at the university, and that their frequent visitors-among them Great Aunt Zuzia and Uncle Julek with their gifts of melon and clothes-have stopped appearing. One morning Mamusia comes home with little yellow six-pointed stars for them to wear. Renatka thinks they will keep her family safe.In June of 1942, soldiers in gray-green uniforms take Renata, Mamusia, and grandmother Babcia to the Ghetto where they are crammed into one room with other frightened families. The adults are forced to work long hours at the factory and to survive on next to no food. One day Mamusia and Babcia do not return from their shifts. Six years old and utterly alone, Renata is passed from place to place and survives through the willingness of ordinary people to take the most deadly risks. Her unlikely blonde hair and blue eyes and other twists of fate save her life but stories become her salvation. Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales transport her to an enchanted world; David Copperfield helps her cope on her own; and she longs for the family in Swallows and Amazons. A chronicle of the horrors of war, Let Me Tell You a Story is a powerful and moving memoir of growing up in a disturbing world, and of the magical discovery of books.

    And then the accident happened. The Present Day: Left blind and without her family, Amy feels she needs to get away. On a trip along the Camino, she is accompanied by the mysterious and troubled Luke. Having been set up to help Amy by a mutual friend, Luke finds he is also running from his past…1314: A Templar Knight, Luc, is also running. He meets the wife of a former comrade, now blinded in a terrifying attack: Aimee. Taking her under his wing, they must journey together through a dangerous world. As they travel through the stunning scenery of Northern Spain, this couple, so very like Luke and Amy, emerge from the shadows of time carrying a treasure of inestimable value. Chasing Shadows is an enchanting novel about the search for happiness, fulfilment… and love. Praise for T. A. Williams ‘T. A. Williams has that gorgeous way of writing a feel good story and something which will easily make you smile… he’s absolutely backed up that men can write chick-lit.’ Reviewed The Book‘Fantastic story by an entertaining author!’ Gilbster‘A superbly crafted, heartwarming tale’ Splashes into Books‘I had my doubts as to whether a ‘bloke’ would get it! To get beneath the skin of a woman and process how she'd feel in various scenarios. Let's just say I don't have any longer – you nailed it.’ Crooksonbooks

    Setting sail from Washington, D.C., on a schooner named the Pearl, the fugitives began a daring 225-mile journey to freedom in the North. Mary Kay Ricks's unforgettable chronicle brings to life the Underground Railroad's largest escape attempt, the seemingly immutable politics of slavery, and the individuals who struggled to end it. All the while, Ricks focuses her narrative on the intimate story of two young sisters who were onboard the Pearl, and sets their struggle for liberation against the powerful historical forces that would nearly tear the country apart.After a terrifyingly calm night, the wind came up as the sun rose the next morning, and the small schooner shot off down the Potomac River. Hours later, stunned owners—including a former first lady, a shipping magnate, a former congressman, a federal marshal, and a Baptist minister—raised the alarm. Authorities quickly formed a posse that chased the fugitives down the river. But with a head start and a robust wind that filled their sails, the Pearl raced ahead—unaware that a violent squall was moving into their path and would halt their bid for freedom.Escape on the Pearl reveals the incredible odyssey of those who were onboard, including the remarkable lives of fugitives Mary and Emily Edmonson, the two sisters at the heart of the story, who would trade servitude in elite Washington homes for slave pens in three states. Through the efforts of the sisters' father and the northern "conductor" who had helped organize the escape, an abolitionist outcry arose in the North, calling for the two girls to be rescued. Ultimately, Mary and Emily would go on to stand shoulder to shoulder with such abolitionist luminaries as Frederick Douglass and attend Oberlin College under the sponsorship of Harriet Beecher Stowe.A story of courage and determination, Escape on the Pearl revives one of the most poignant chapters of U.S. history. The Edmonsons, the other fugitives of the Pearl, and those who helped them can now take their rightful place as American heroes.

    Eleven were hanged. In New Haven, William Meeker was accused of cutting off and burning his pig's ears and tail as he cast a bewitching spell. After the hanging of Fairfield's Goody Knapp, magistrates cut down and searched her body for the marks of the devil. Through newspaper clippings, court records, letters and diaries, author Cynthia Wolfe Boynton uncovers the dark history of the Connecticut witch trials.

    As one of the disaster's survivors, she took it upon herself to write an account of what happened in the event's aftermath. Women of the Titanic Disaster details Sylvia Caldwell's journey immediately following the sinking of the Titanic, and it gives us a fresh perspective on this historic event. With a foreword by Julie Hedgepeth Williams, author of A Rare Titanic Family: The Caldwells' Story of Survival, a biography of Sylvia Caldwell and her family.

    She’s about to marry her boss despite all the advice about office romance.Giulia is a champion multitasker. The Church is on her back to find the thief. Her all-natural co-worker is insisting she walk down the aisle to the soundtrack for The Sound of Music. Her fiancé’s relatives are overwhelming her with plans and advice and excitement. Piece of cake.She can find the clue that unmasks the thief. She can keep an eye on the music. All she needs is a wedding gown for her own wedding. In four days. What could possibly go wrong? Books in the Giulia Driscoll Humorous Mystery Series: CHANGING HABITS (Short Story prequel to NUN TOO SOON) NUN TOO SOON (#1) SECOND TO NUN (#2) Fall 2015 Part of the Henery Press Mystery Series Collection, if you like one, you'll probably like them all...

    What became of so many of those veterans - Union and Confederate alike - fifty years after the end of that terrible war?GETTYSBURG, 1913: THE COMPLETE NOVEL OF THE GREAT REUNION (originally published as a 3-part serialized novel; now available in one complete volume) July 1-3, 1863: The famed Battle of Gettysburg turns the tide of the Civil War, but not before approximately 50,000 soldiers from both sides become casualties during those three terrible days of carnage.June 29-July 4, 1913: To commemorate the 50th anniversary of The Battle of Gettysburg, more than 50,000 Civil War Veterans ranging in age from 61 to more than 100 years old converge on the scene of that titanic battle half a century earlier in an occasion of healing that was known as The Great Reunion.Abraham Lincoln had incorrectly surmised in his famed Gettysburg Address that "the world will little note nor long remember what we say here" four months after the battle itself, but those very words could well be said about The Great Reunion that occurred half a century later. Though at the time the 1913 gathering was a widely anticipated, momentous commemoration with 50,000 spectators joining the 50,000 veterans, the grandest of all gatherings of Civil War veterans has been all but forgotten in the nearly 100 years since that occasion.Until now.GETTYSBURG, 1913: THE COMPLETE NOVEL OF THE GREAT REUNION_______Travel back in time to spend the Great Reunion in the company of these unforgettable characters (and others) in this meticulously researched tale:Doctor Samuel Chambers, a young unmarried Philadelphia physician thrust into great responsibility as Pennsylvania's chief planner of medical and aid facilities for more than 50,000 Civil War veterans, averaging 70 years of age...all of whom will be spending the duration of The Great Reunion encamped in outdoor tents under temperatures expected to approach or even exceed 100 degrees.Louisa May Sterling, a Gettysburg nurse and the young widow of a West Point-educated Army officer whose untimely death from typhoid left her alone with only her son Randall for companionship...but for whom The Great Reunion opens up an unexpected second chance at happiness when she meets Samuel Chambers.Angus Findlay, now just past his 85th birthday but during the Battle of Gettysburg a dashing cavalry officer serving with the Army of Northern Virginia directly under the legendary J.E.B. Stuart...and who became a leading figure in Virginia politics during Reconstruction.Chester Morrison, a classic Gilded Age Titan of Industry (and recent widower) from Philadelphia who decades earlier had been a green private facing battle for the first time at Gettysburg.Edgar and Johnny Sullivan, brothers from Illinois who had been members of the Union Cavalry Division that arrived at Gettysburg the day before the battle began. Years later, the Sullivans became allies of the Earp brothers in Tombstone and were first-hand witnesses to the evolution of Arizona from Old West to the early 20th century.Ned Tomlinson, a Confederate veteran from Norfolk, Virginia who lost his left leg during the ill-fated assault known ever since as Pickett's Charge before being taken prisoner by the Yankees.John K. Tener, the real-life Governor of Pennsylvania - born in County Tyrone, Ireland, only weeks after the Battle of Gettysburg - who was a former Major League baseball player and under whose leadership The Great Reunion was planned and held.

    But it's only recently that scientists have pieced together the elusive, compelling saga of that epic migration. And the more we learn about them, the more we must marvel at the courage, adaptability, enterprise, and enduring resilience of the First Americans. Most of us know little about the early Americans and the wonders they achieved. Some of them learned to hunt forty-ton whales from dugout canoes; others built a vast system of canals that irrigated crops on tens of thousands of acres. Fully a thousand years before the pyramids at Giza went up, people on the Mississippi River were constructing even larger pyramidal earthworks, and later, a thousand miles to the north, others built a city that would remain the largest in North America until after the Revolutionary War. In the cradle of civilization that evolved in Central America, the Olmecs, Mayans, and Aztecs built complex cultures and dazzling cities whose monumental structures and works of art still have the power to awe and inspire. This book describes the peopling of North and Central America and examine their amazing societies - the farmers and cliff-dwellers of the Southwest United States, the mound-builders of the Midwest, the Northwest Coast whale-hunters with their potlatches and totem poles, and the mighty, gods-driven cultures of Mesoamerica. It is a saga as breathtaking as it is surprising.

    By the eighteenth century, only Great Britain and France remained as rivals for the heart of the continent. Three times, beginning in 1690, warfare arose between New France and New England. Settlements were destroyed, and armies clashed, yet nothing was settled. Each country regarded the Ohio Valley as its own. A small skirmish in 1754 touched off a war that spread to Europe, then to Africa, Asia, and even to islands in the Atlantic and Pacific. The fate of North America hung in the balance. This conflict, the Great War for the Empire, may well be called the first of the world wars. Here, award-winning historian Francis Russell brings to life the vast panorama that formed the background for this struggle in which the English redcoats fought side by side with American colonists against French soldiers and their Indian allies.

    One fateful day, Paul’s life is spared by a compassionate German soldier with eyes as blue as the sea. When Paul’s village is liberated, an angry mob turns against their occupiers. The German soldier, near death, asks Paul to promise him one thing: find his daughter and tell her that her father loved her.As Paul becomes a man, he fulfills his childhood dream of sailing the world, even as twists of fate steer his life in unexpected directions. But through it all, Paul never forgets his promise.Beautifully moving and deeply profound, Seasons of the Moon evokes a sense of wonder at the mystery of human connection and the powerful ripple effects of kindness.

    A large man with big appetites - his nickname Kubu means hippo in the Setswana language. He is happily married and lives in the capital, Gaborone.Twenty-first century Botswana is a country with real issues and real murders. In this collection of stories - one never previously published - Kubu investigates three mysterious deaths. A man is stabbed outside a bar. Is it just a jealous fight or is there something much more sinister behind it? A man suffers a gruesome death in a country town. Is it the result of witchcraft, or could there be another cause? A policeman is shot dead at close range in his own home. Is it the colleagues of a man he killed who was resisting arrest? And what of his wife's alibi?In the last story of the collection, The Haunting, a very unusual detective in South Africa solves a strange disappearance and fraud in a most unconventional way.Finally, author Michael Stanley interviews Detective Kubu himself in Gaborone until Kubu amusingly turns the tables!This entertaining collection of Kubu's shorter adventures is not to be missed by his many fans. And if you haven't met Kubu yet, then a treat is in store for you.Michael Stanley is the pen name of two South Africans - Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip - who write fiction together. Their novels - all featuring Detective Kubu - are A CARRION DEATH, THE SECOND DEATH OF GOODLUCK TINUBU (A DEADY TRADE in the UK), DEATH OF THE MANTIS, and DEADLY HARVEST. The books have been shortlisted for a variety of awards, and DEATH OF THE MANTIS won the BARRY AWARD for best paperback original in 2012.

    From island bases near the deltas of major rivers, they used the waterways to scour the countryside, looting and burning towns, plundering merchant shipments, and stripping churches and monasteries of their gold, silver, and jeweled treasures.The Norsemen eventually penetrated all of England and Scotland, founded cities in Ireland, gained a powerful province in France, controlled Frisia and the modern Netherlands, and raided lands around Spain, passing into the Mediterranean to attack Italy and North Africa. They established the first Russian kingdom, challenged Constantinople, and provided a personal guard for the Byzantine emperor. They settled Iceland, where they developed Europe's first republic, founded two colonies on Greenland, and explored parts of North America five centuries before Christopher Columbus landed in the Americas. Then, like the abrupt end of a summer thunderstorm, their adventures ceased.Here is their dramatic story.

    Deford joined Sports Illustrated in 1962, fresh, and fresh out of Princeton. In 1990, he was Editor-in-Chief of The National Sports Daily, one of the most ambitious--and ill-fated--projects in the history of American print journalism. But then, he's endured: writing ten novels, winning an Emmy (not to mention being a fabled Lite Beer All-Star), and last week he read something like his fourteen-hundredth commentary on NPR's "Morning Edition."From the Mad Men-like days of SI in the '60s, and the "bush" years of the early NBA, to Deford's visit to apartheid South Africa with Arthur Ashe, and his friend's brave and tragic death, Over Time is packed with intriguing people and stories. Interwoven through his personal history, Deford lovingly traces the entire arc of American sportswriting from the lurid early days of the Police Gazette, through Grantland Rice and Red Smith and on up to ESPN. This is a wonderful, inspired book--equal parts funny and touching--a treasure for sports fans. Just like Frank Deford.