A Wink from the Universe
Martin Flanagan - 2018
They were the rank underdogs and they swept to victory on an unprecedented tide of goodwill that washed over the nation. Only Martin Flanagan could bring to life this particular miracle. The club's two guiding spirits - captain Bob Murphy and coach Luke Beveridge - welcomed him in, Beveridge making available his match diaries, pre-match notes and video highlights. Flanagan interviewed every player, watched every match, talked with the trainers, the women in the football department, the fans who never miss a training session, the cheer squad.What Flanagan shows is that the Bulldogs found a new way to play partly because they found a new way to be a team - a new way to support each other, even a new way to be. A Wink from the Universe takes us into the heart of the community Luke Beveridge and Bob Murphy dreamt into being with the support of the Bulldog people around them. This is a classic of sportswriting - a book for fans of the club, and of the game, but also a book for anyone who wants to know how a group of people can will a miracle to happen.
Tornado Valley: Huntsville's Havoc
Shelly Van Meter Miller - 2012
Touchdown could mean that we've just won another football National Championship or it could indicate that a tornado is on the ground. I could never be a storm chaser. I'm the one the storm chases. Funnels circle around me like shark fins as I bow my head in a school hallway, kneel down in a convent, or give birth to a newborn baby wailing in unison with the tornado sirens. I huddle with toddlers in showers and beg for shelter in a McDonald's freezer. I remain a sitting duck in a second-floor apartment, and find myself in the wrong place at the wrong time while in the emergency room with storm victims.Life in the Rocket City is a thrill ride which is not for the faint of heart, this I know. So brace yourself for a front row seat on a ride through Tornado Valley! Alabama is the home of the world's deadliest twisters, and Huntsville is in the heart of the arena. Our space history is out of this world, but our tornado history will blow you away.Take a rollercoaster ride through the history of Alabama tornadoes before plunging into the gripping story of the Day of Devastation. Witness the stars falling on Alabama in 1833. Then get ready for the sky to fall! The plot twists as Huntsville's torrid tornado past comes alive in the 1974 Super Tornado Outbreak. The rollercoaster corkscrews as it encounters an unexpected twister in 1989 that slingshots the reader into the angry vortex on Airport Road. The ride cruises before taking another gut-wrenching dive that catapults its riders into an inverted twist from yet another Anderson Hills tornado in 1995. The town turns upside-down but Huntsville survives, revives, and thrives. But the worst is yet to come. Another tornado season is just around the corner. Beware of the month of April, especially on a Wednesday.The warning sirens wail, we're bombarded by softball-sized hail, and an EF3 tornado slams into the jail. It's just another day in Alabama, but the countdown clock is ticking. The next tornado warning could be "the one." Our voice drops to a whisper when we mention an EF5. We realize life is too short. The coaster accelerates. Can you feel the torque? We have no idea what's around the next bend. Suddenly, the nightmare comes true as the ride zooms out of control, this time in a free-fall on April 27, 2011. Alabama is bombarded by a record 62 tornadoes in one day. Abruptly, the ride comes to a screeching halt. The adrenaline rush subsides. You've just experienced Huntsville's Havoc. Immediately the passengers ask one another, "Do you want to ride again?" Some will and some swear, never again.
Why I Write (Great Ideas #020)
George Orwell - 1946
Whether puncturing the lies of politicians, wittily dissecting the English character or telling unpalatable truths about war, Orwell's timeless, uncompromising essays are more relevant, entertaining and essential than ever in today's era of spin.Contents:"Why I Write", first published 1946"The Lion and the Unicorn", first published 1940"A Hanging", first published 1931"Politics and the English Language", first published 1946
Dear F*cking Lunatic: 101 Obscenely Rude Letters to Donald Trump
Aldous J. Pennyfarthing - 2018
With acid tongue planted firmly in cheek, author Aldous J. Pennyfarthing takes on the president’s unsurpassed ignorance, rampant racism, shocking pettiness, vertiginous dishonesty, and more. Based on the viral Daily Kos post of the same name. Approximately 345 pages.
Over There: War Scenes on the Western Front (Collected Works of Arnold Bennett)
Arnold Bennett - 1915
You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
Clinton Bush and CIA Conspiracies: From The Boys on the Tracks to Jeffrey Epstein (War On Drugs Book 4)
Shaun Attwood - 2019
Governor Bill Clinton’s Arkansas state police provided security for the drug drops. For assisting the CIA, the Clinton Crime Family was awarded the White House. The #clintonbodycount continues to this day, with the deceased including Jeffrey Epstein. This book features harrowing true stories that reveal the insanity of the drug war. A mother receives the worst news about her son. A journalist gets a tip that endangers his life. An unemployed man becomes California’s biggest crack dealer. A DEA agent in Mexico is sacrificed for going after the big players. The lives of Linda Ives, Gary Webb, Freeway Rick Ross and Kiki Camarena are shattered by brutal experiences. Not all of them will survive.
The Irish Slaves
Rhetta Akamatsu - 2010
They were helpless. It sounds like a familiar story, but these people were not African. They were Irish, and they were slaves before African slavery became widespread. This is their story.
What America Was Really Like in 1776
Thomas Fleming - 2012
New York Times bestselling historian and novelist Thomas Fleming takes us back to the days of the founders, detailing the surprising facts of American life in 1776 - including its resemblance to today.
Confessions Subprime Lender
Richard Bitner - 2008
In Confessions of a Subprime Lender: An Insider's Tale of Greed, Fraud, and Ignorance, he reveals the truth about how the subprime lending business spiraled out of control, pushed home prices to unsustainable levels, and turned unqualified applicants into qualified borrowers through creative financing. Learn about the ways the mortgage industry can be fixed with his twenty suggestions for critical change.
The Pentagon Papers: Making History at the Washington Post (A Vintage Short)
Katharine Graham - 2017
After inheriting the Post from her father, and assuming its leadership in 1963 after the death of her husband, Graham found herself unexpectedly playing a role in history. Here she recounts the riveting episodes that transformed a shy widow into a newspaper legend, as she defied the government to publish the Pentagon Papers’ secrets about the Vietnam War and then led the way in exposing the Watergate scandal. Graham gives us an intimate behind-the-scenes view of the tense debates and high stakes she and her editors faced, and concludes with a powerful argument for the freedom of the press as a bulwark against abuses of power. An ebook short.
Three Years in Hell: The Brexit Chronicles
Fintan O'Toole - 2020
In 2011 Queen Elizabeth made her first ever state visit to the Irish Republic. It was a great, moving occasion. 'In settling once and for all its relationship with Ireland,' Fintan O'Toole writes, 'Britain was also settling its relationship with the rest of the world taking its place as a normal, equal democracy.'
It was not to last.
Three Years in Hell is the fiercely intelligent, funny and sorrowful record of a slow-motion catastrophe. At its heart is the enigma of English nationalism. On the morning after the 2016 referendum O'Toole wrote:
'It is a question the English used to ask about their subject peoples: are they ready for self-government? But it is now one that has to be asked about the English themselves... England seems to be stumbling towards a national independence it has scarcely even discussed, let alone prepared for. It is on the brink of one of history's strangest nationalist revolutions.'
The story culminates in the election of Boris Johnson, running against a weak, accidental Labour leader who promised to remain 'neutral' on the most important question of our time.
The Early History of the Airplane
Orville Wright - 1922
You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
It Can't Happen Here
Sinclair Lewis - 1935
Written during the Great Depression when America was largely oblivious to Hitler's aggression, it juxtaposes sharp political satire with the chillingly realistic rise of a President who becomes a dictator to "save the nation." Now finally back in print, It Can't Happen Here remains uniquely important, a shockingly prescient novel that's as fresh and contemporary as today's news.
Autobiography of Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson - 1821
But ultimately, this great and talented man — an accomplished architect, naturalist, and linguist — wished to be remembered primarily as the author of the Declaration of Independence.In his autobiography, begun in 1821 at the age of 77, Jefferson presents a detailed account of his young life and the period during which he wrote the Declaration. A first draft of the document is included in this edition, as are his comments on the Articles of Confederation, his experiences as a wartime governor of Virginia, minister to France and observations during the French Revolution. Also featured here are rich remembrances and insights as Jefferson recalls his roles as Washington's secretary of state and vice president under John Adams, and his life in retirement.Fascinating as a trove of firsthand recollections by a pillar of American democracy, this highly recommended volume will be welcomed by students, scholars, and any reader interested in American history.
Acid Dreams: The CIA, LSD and the Sixties Rebellion
Martin A. LeeKen Kesey - 1985
Martin Lee and Bruce Shlain's exhaustively researched and astonishing account—part of it gleaned from secret government files—tells how the CIA became obsessed with LSD as an espionage weapon during the early 1950s and launched a massive covert research program, in which countless unwitting citizens were used as guinea pigs. Though the CIA was intent on keeping the drug to itself, it ultimately couldn't prevent it from spreading into the popular culture; here LSD had a profound impact and helped spawn a political and social upheaval that changed the face of America. From the clandestine operations of the government to the escapades of Timothy Leary, Abbie Hoffman, Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters, Allen Ginsberg, and many others, Acid Dreams provides an important and entertaining account that goes to the heart of a turbulent period in our history.Also called: Acid Dreams. The Complete Social History of LSD: The CIA, The Sixties, and Beyond