It Takes a Tribe: Building the Tough Mudder Movement


Will Dean - 2017
    My gut feeling was--plenty of people. Will Dean, founder of extreme obstacle course Tough Mudder, shares the thrilling inside story of how a scrappy startup grew into a movement whose millions of members feel like co-owners. He shows how other companies can embrace the Tough Mudder playbook by nurturing tribes of passionate fans while constantly experimenting with new risks. After five years as a British counterterrorism officer and two years at Harvard Business School, Dean was determined not to follow his classmates to Wall Street or Silicon Valley. Instead, he pursued his unique vision for an extreme obstacle course--a ten- to twelve-mile gauntlet pushing participants to their limits and helping them surpass those limits together. Instead of cutthroat competition, Tough Mudder would be about continual self-improvement and collective energy.It would be about the power of a tribe.Dean and his small team launched the first Tough Mudder event in May 2010, hosting 5,000 pioneers at a deserted ski resort in Pennsylvania. Just seven years later, more than 3 million people on four continents have participated at least once, and hundreds of thousands have done so repeatedly. More than 20,000 are so committed that they sport a Tough Mudder tattoo. Mudders prove the power of fierce and unshakable loyalty to one another and the challenge itself. Proudly sport-ing orange headbands and team uniforms, they'll run through mud, climb steep walls, face elec-tric shocks, and slide down the side of a moun-tain. The tougher the experience, the greater the satisfaction.It Takes a Tribe shows you how to embody the Tough Mudder spirit and capture the same magic. As a Tough Mudder slogan says, "When was the last time you did something for the first time?"

Breakaway: Clan of the Ice Mountains


C.S. Bills - 2012
    The Warming is coming. The ocean ice they have lived and hunted on for generations is melting, and they must flee to the safety of an unknown land before they all drown. In this powerful tale of survival at the end of an Ice Age, the young hunter, Attu, must choose between saving his clan or saving Rika, the golden-eyed healer he is forbidden to love.Show more Show less --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A Pilgrim for Freedom


Michael B. Novakovic - 2016
    It is one part the account of a refugee family who barely survived explosions and hunger while seeking safety during World War II, and includes vivid descriptions of the hardships Mike, his siblings, and parents endured. It is another part the story of an immigrant family who came to the United States (by way of Argentina) after the war and with great ingenuity and industry worked their way up to levels of success that had been unimaginable during the darkest days of war. Finally, it is also the chronicle of a loyal and valiant soldier who sought to pay back his debts to the United States for defeating fascism and communism through distinguished service in the U.S. Air Force's intelligence operations. In sum, it is a riches-to-rags-to-riches story that testifies both to the resilience of one man and to the ideals of the nation that inspired him.

The Hiding Girl


Dorian Box - 2020
    Engaged me from the first page.” — Feathered Quill Medal Winner in Mystery/Suspense"[A] great, suspenseful read." — Readers' Favorite Award for SuspenseTwelve-year-old Emily Calby was a good girl from a religious family in rural Georgia. She loved softball, her little sister and looking up words to get her allowance. Then two men came and murdered her family. Only the killers know she survived.On the run, surviving by wits and animal instinct, she makes an unlikely ally in an ex-gang member who lost his own family to violence. He takes her in and trains her in “self-defense” before more tragedy launches her on a terrifying journey for justice. Nothing will stop her—not cops or creeps, not even her own splintering mind. Through it all, Emily fights to hold onto hope and the girl she once knew, kept buried deep inside.Dark and gritty, but filled with heart and hope, The Hiding Girl is a twisty, fast-paced thriller and a testament to the boundless limits of human love, sacrifice and the will to survive.Praise for The Hiding Girl“In Emily, Author Dorian Box has created a rarity—a teenage protagonist that is at once sympathetic, vulnerable and largely fearless. … This sharp characterization within a fast-paced work of suspense makes The Hiding Girl one of the year’s most exciting series openers.” — BestThrillers.com (Best Psychological Thriller of 2021)"Dark and gritty … an exceptional, heart-pounding story full of raw emotion, deep-seated fear, and an undercurrent of hope and innocence. Deeply atmospheric … without peer in contemporary mysteries/thrillers.” — Publishers Weekly BookLife Prize Semifinalist“The story that author Dorian Box has created for Emily Calby is nothing short of thrilling, but it’s The Hiding Girl's masterful interplay of character, setting, and theme, along with its fast-pace and high emotional stakes that makes it a real page-turner.” — 2021 IndieReader Discovery Award in Fiction“[A] unique mix of hope, shattered innocence, pain, fear, and vulnerability … a great, suspenseful read.” — Readers' Favorite Award in Suspense Fiction“You root for the lead, Emily, and stick with her throughout. Engaged me from the first page. Excellent story. Dark and grisly, yet a lot of hope comes with this one.” — Feathered Quill Medal Winner in Mystery/Suspense“[S]tunning, captivating, heartbreaking but also heartwarming. … [T]he characters were so alive, believable, with heart and warmth, humor and love. … This book is certainly on my ‘best ever books’ list.” — NetGalley“A fantastic book that completely demolished my expectations. … This novel is fast-paced and action-packed but it has a profound human element that sets it apart from other novels in its genre.” — BookishFirst

My Midnight Sun


John Shors - 2020
    But when tragedy strikes during his honeymoon in Thailand, the future he'd hoped for is shattered.After time with his family and friends in America does little to ease his pain, Owen returns to Asia to try to make peace with his past. A chance encounter unites him with Suchin, a young Thai woman battling her own demons. Inspired by their unexpected connection, the unlikely pair of traveling companions journeys to Nepal, soon embarking on an extraordinary trek through the Himalayas. Facing their own doubts, as well as everything from bandits to mudslides to illness, Owen and Suchin climb higher, their bond strengthening with each step.But the shadows of their pasts continue to loom large. And while both seek rebirth within a beautiful yet unforgiving land, neither knows if they will reach a legendary summit. The climb could break them-or save them.

Corkscrew: The highly improbable, but occasionally true, tale of a professional wine buyer


Peter Stafford-Bow - 2016
    Thanks to a positive mental attitude, he is soon forging a promising career, his sensual adventures taking him to the vineyards of Italy, South Africa, Bulgaria and Kent. His path to the summit is littered with obstacles, however. Petty office politics, psychotic managers and the British Board of Wine & Liquor prove challenging enough. But when Felix negotiates the world’s biggest Asti Spumante deal, he bites off more than he can chew and is plunged into a terrifying world of Mafiosi, people smuggling and ruthless multinationals.Part thriller, part self-help manual and part drinking companion, Corkscrew is a coruscating critique of neo-liberal capitalism, religious intolerance and the perils of blind tasting.

Success Is the Only Option: The Art of Coaching Extreme Talent


John Calipari - 2016
    It is a promise he makes to them: "Fully invest in the present—and each other—and I guarantee it will serve your future."Here, for the first time, he distills his team-building methods in ways that apply to CEOs, business owners, coaches, teachers and leaders of all kinds—lessons for anyone seeking to inspire talented individuals to reach for their best selves and contribute to a greater good.A basketball team is an intimate workplace, in which blend is everything and character matters. As such, it is a window into the nature of successful leadership. Calipari views each new team like a startup business—one composed of new players, new relationships, and new challenges. Each season is a series of discoveries as he learns how to unleash the extreme talent in each of his players and mold them into championship material as college basketball comes to a crescendo every spring. While he can’t control everything, he is responsible for everything—just like a CEO.An enlightening look at leadership, management, and team building, Success Is the Only Option offers the keys to winning, on and off the court.

One Good Friend Deserves Another


Lisa Verge Higgins - 2012
    Choose Your Own Man2. Make Sure Your Friends Approve3. No One-Night Stands4. Trust Your Instincts5. Never Make the Same Mistake Twice6. After a Break-Up, Wait Six Months Before Dating Again.Dhara, Kelly, Marta, and Wendy have been the closest of friends since college. So close, that after a series of romantic disasters, they bond together to create Rules of Relationships to keep their hearts safe.Years later, the rules seem to have worked . . . until Marta discovers that her hot boyfriend is married, Kelly begins a risky love affair, Wendy inches closer to a pre-marital infidelity, and, most shocking of all, Indian-American Dhara suddenly agrees to an arranged marriage.Hearts are about to be broken and the bonds of friendship are tested. Is it possible to find true love, when you're breaking all the rules?

I Quit! Now What?


Zarreen Khan - 2017
    Of endless weekdays, working weekends, making presentations, working with complicated Excel sheets, handling a boss with time-management issues and the general politics of the workplace. Sigh! After eight years of this life, her only personal insight is that she's terribly unambitious and constantly struggling to be an average performer in the competitive corporate world. When a colleague flashes the glint of a golden sabbatical she catapults into it headfirst. After all, one has to find one's calling at some point in one's life. So will the sabbatical miraculously change her life forever? Or will she go rushing back to her pocket money-generating job?

Hidden Husband


Shikha Kaul - 2015
    Her love for Raghav is true. But hailing from two very different cultures is the basis of their continued friction. Aisha is a Punjabi girl from Gurgaon and Raghav a Bihari from Ranchi. Raghav's family will certainly not accept a girl from outside their community. And yet, he continues giving her false hopes through his efforts and promises. And then they take a step which entangles her life further. Will she manage to come out of this quandary or must she continue to live in her self-created web? Explore her journey that makes her realise the atrocities being committed on women in the Indian society and the tough decisions she must take, keeping her most loved ones oblivious to everything happening in her life.

The Wisdom Of Secrets: The Templar Covenant


Ami Noone - 2014
    Although they have been mentioned in the bible and traces of their existence are scattered throughout the globe, Peter Madeloy had always presumed that the myths of the possible existence of an ancient brotherhood, living on Earth for milennia, was nothing more than that, a myth. Until one day his father is brutally murdered and his mother is kidnapped. In exchange for his mother’s safe return, Peter must enter his father’s secret world, uncover the truth about his mother’s kidnappers and find the ancient artefact his father had dedicated his life to protecting. Peter enlists the help of his uncle, Daniel O'Brien, a professor of Philology and avid researcher of veiled organisations and his wife, Emily, a geneticist, to unravel a series of clues his father has left him. Together they embark on a journey that thrusts them into the centre of an ancient battle for supremacy that uncovers a truth that for them, will change the history and future of humanity simultaneously. With the enemy watching their every move Peter, Daniel and Emily must figure out his father's clues in time to save his mother and ultimately protect the world from the true secret that was unearthed from beneath King Solomon's Temple all those centuries ago.

Leave Society


Tao Lin - 2021
    A VINTAGE ORIGINAL.In 2014, a novelist named Li leaves Manhattan to visit his parents in Taipei for ten weeks. He doesn't know it yet, but his life will begin to deepen and complexify on this trip. As he flies between these two worlds—year by year, over four years—he will flit in and out of optimism, despair, loneliness, sanity, bouts of chronic pain, and drafts of a new book. He will incite and temper arguments, uncover secrets about nature and history, and try to understand how to live a meaningful life as an artist and a son. But how to fit these pieces of his life together? Where to begin? Or should he leave society altogether?In his most recent work, Tao Lin delivers an engrossing and hopeful novel about life, fiction, and where the two blur together that builds toward a stunning, if unexpected, romance. Exploring everyday events and scenes—waiting rooms, dog walks, family meals—while investigatively venturing to the edges of society, where culture dissolves into mystery, Lin spins the ordinary into something monumental, and shows what it is to write a novel in real time. Illuminating and deeply felt, Leave Society is a masterly story about life and art at the end of history.

Silent Approach


Bobby Cole - 2017
    When he accepts a position with the Mississippi Choctaw Nation as their cultural liaison, he is tasked with one job: to track down and reclaim the tribe’s stolen artifacts dug up from sacred ground and sold on the black market.John Allen’s investigation leads him to crooked publisher Winston Walker, who’s using these priceless antiquities to prop himself up after a wealth-wasting divorce. Racing against time, John Allen finds a cache of treasures stolen thirty years ago that may hold the key to an unsolved murder and mysterious disappearance. Along the way, he teams up with FBI agent Emma Haden, who is also investigating Walker and who stirs unexpected feelings in John Allen.But the desperate Walker won’t go quietly, and the closer John Allen gets to the truth and the proof that will put Walker away, the closer he may come to being buried himself.

The Sign for Drowning


Rachel Stolzman - 2008
    In the life she constructs as a barrier against the emotional wreckage of her family tragedy, Anna settles comfortably into a career as a teacher of deaf children. But a challenge arrives—in the form of a young girl. Adrea’s disarming vulnerability and obvious need for love offer Anna the possibility of reconnecting with the world around her—if she has the courage to open her heart. In this debut novel, Rachel Stolzman has crafted a moving and poetic witness to love’s power to transcend grief, pain, and the constraints of human language. The Sign for Drowning is a poignant story of loss and the unexpected occasions of grace that enable us to heal from it and grow beyond it.

Planetfall


L.E. Howel - 2014
    That had always been understood, so when Major Thomas Birch and his bedraggled crew limped back hundreds of years later it was clear that something had gone wrong. Stumbling from a failed past into an uncertain future the crew of the Hypnos III find that sometimes the only thing worse than what you run from is the thing you run to.