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Rocket Boys (The Coalwood Series #1)
Inspired by Werner von Braun and his Cape Canaveral team, 14-year-old Homer Hickam decided in 1957 to build his own rockets They were his ticket out of Coalwood, West Virginia, a mining town that everyone knew was dying--everyone except Sonny's father, the mine superintendent and a company man so dedicated that his family rarely saw him. Hickam's smart, iconoclastic mother wanted her son to become something more than a miner and, along with a female science teacher, encouraged the efforts of his grandiosely named Big Creek Missile Agency. He grew up to be a NASA engineer and his memoir of the bumpy ride toward a gold medal at the National Science Fair in 1960--an unprecedented honor for a miner's kid--is rich in humor as well as warm sentiment. Hickam vividly evokes a world of close communal ties in which a storekeeper who sold him saltpeter warned, "Listen, rocket boy. This stuff can blow you to kingdom come." Hickam is candid about the deep disagreements and tensions in his parents' marriage, even as he movingly depicts their quiet loyalty to each other. The portrait of his ultimately successful campaign to win his aloof father's respect is equally affecting. --Wendy Smith.
Price: $5.95
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October Song
From newlyweds Katie and Dan living in the shadow of the shunning, to Rachel and Philip embracing parenthood even as he acclimates to Amish life as an outsider⦠From the courtship of Lydia Cottrell and her betrothed, Levi King, to Sarah Cain, now a wife and mother struggling to bridge her own life with that of the People⦠October Song is overflowing with the simpler things of life that make a Lewis novel an unforgettable journey into the depths of the human heart..
Price: $2.43
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The Hunt for Red October (Jack Ryan Novels)
Somewhere under the Atlantic, a Soviet sub commander has just made a fateful decision: the Red October is heading west. The Americans want her. The Russians want her back. And the most incredible chase in history is on.... The Hunt for Red October is the runaway bestseller that launched Tom Clancy's phenomenal career. A military thriller so accurate and convincing that the author was rumored to have been debriefed by the White House. Its theme: the greatest espionage coup in history. Its story: the chase for a runaway top secret Russian missile sub..
Price: $2.07
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Sharpe's Trafalgar: Richard Sharpe & the Battle of Trafalgar, October 21, 1805 (Richard Sharpe's Adventure Series #4)
For military-history buffs, Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe novels are the literary equivalent of potato chips: you can't read just one. And in this case, why would you want to? Blending meticulous research and old-fashioned entertainment, the series follows the roguish adventurer Richard Sharpe as he swashbuckles his way through the Napoleonic Wars. In Sharpe's Trafalgar, the author ventures into Patrick O'Brian's maritime territory. Anchors aweigh, lads, and bring on the detailed descriptions of the ship's guns and their firing mechanisms! In the beginning of the book, our hero sets sail for England after five months of service in India. The plot revolves around a disguised diplomat, a marauding French warship, and an improbable love affair with a comely English aristocrat. But make no mistake, the real draw here is combat. The battle scenes crackle with energy, and we can practically feel the chop of the waves and smell the reek of gunpowder. (We can also smell 600 unwashed men in close quarters with rats, sewage, and bilge rot, but that's another matter entirely.) The last hundred pages fly by at a furious clip, cannons pounding and cutlasses hacking, as Cornwell re-creates the naval battle of Trafalgar. These days, of course, we know that war is bloody and brutal, not honorable or fair. We like even our most appealing warriors to have some passing acquaintance with their dark side, and Sharpe does take a decidedly antiheroic stance on the experience of hand-to-hand combat: He was ashamed when he remembered the joy of it, but there was a joy there. It was the happiness of being released to the slaughter, of having every bond of civilization removed. It was also what Richard Sharpe was good at. It was why he wore an officer's sash instead of a private's belt, because in almost every battle the moment came when the disciplined ranks dissolved and a man simply had to claw and scratch and kill like a beast. Beast or no beast, Sharpe is far more interesting and complex than the musket-wielding action figure he might first appear. And it's nearly impossible not to take some pleasure at his bloody exploits. Sharpe's Trafalgar is a superb example of the ripping good yarn--it confirms our secret conviction that war may be hell, but it's actually pretty exciting too. --Mary Park.
Price: $5.50
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Mutiny: The True Events That Inspired The Hunt For Red October
In 1984, Tom Clancy released his blockbuster novel, The Hunt for Red October, an edge-of-your seat thriller that skyrocketed him into international notoriety. The inspiration for that novel came from an obscure report by a US naval officer of a mutiny aboard a Soviet warship in the Baltic Sea. The Hunt for Red October actually happened, and Boris Gindin lived through every minute of it. After decades of silence and fear, Gindin has finally come forward to tell the entire story of the mutiny aboard the FFG Storozhevoy, the real-life Red October. It was the fall of 1975, and the tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States were climbing. It seemed the two nations were headed for thermonuclear war, and it was that fear that caused most of the crewman of the FFG Storozhevoy to mutiny. Their goal was to send a message to the Soviet people that the Communist government was corrupt and major changes were needed. That message never reached a single person. Within hours the orders came from on high to destroy the Storozhevoy and its crew members. And this would have happened if it weren't for Gindin and few others whose heroism saved many lives. Now, with the help of USA Today bestselling author David Hagberg, Gindin relives every minute of that harrowing event. From the danger aboard the ship to the threats of death from the KGB to the fear that forced him to flee the Soviet Union for the United States, Mutiny reveals the real-life story behind The Hunt for Red October and offers an eye-opening look at the Soviet Union during the height of the Cold War. .
Price: $10.97
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October 1964
Heroes have a habit of growing larger over time, as do the arenas in which they excelled The 1964 World Series between the Yankees and Cardinals was coated in myth from the get-go. The Yankees represented the establishment: white, powerful, and seemingly invincible. The victorious Cards, on the other hand, were baseball's rebellious future: angry and defiant, black, and challenging. Their seven-game barnburner, played out against a backdrop of an America emerging from the Kennedy assassination, escalating the war in Vietnam, and struggling with civil rights, marked a turning point--neither the nation, nor baseball, would ever be quite so innocent again. Halberstam, one of the great reporters of the '60s, looks back in this marvelous and spirited elegy to the era, the game, and players such as Mantle, Maris, Ford, Gibson, Brock, and Flood with a clear eye in search of the truth that time has blurred into legend. His confident prose, diligent reporting, and deft analysis make it clear how much more interesting--and forceful--the truth can be. .
Price: $5.73
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The Return of the Real: Art and Theory at the End of the Century (October Books)
In The Return of the Real Hal Foster discusses the development of art and theory since 1960, and reorders the relation between prewar and postwar avant-gardes. Opposed to the assumption that contemporary art is somehow belated, he argues that the avant-garde returns to us from the future, repositioned by innovative practice in the present. And he poses this retroactive model of art and theory against the reactionary undoing of progressive culture that is pervasive today. After the models of art-as-text in the 1970s and art-as-simulacrum in the 1980s; Foster suggests that we are now witness to a return to the real--to art and theory grounded in the materiality of actual bodies and social sites: If The Return of the Real begins with a new narrative of the historical avant-garde; it concludes with an original reading of this contemporary situation--and what it portends for future practices of art and theory, culture and politics..
Price: $18.11
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The Best Game Ever: Pirates 10, Yankees 9: October 13, 1960
October 13, 1960: The hardscrabble Pirates were a hungry squad, led by Roberto Clemente, Bill Mazeroski, and a colorful bunch of overachievers who hit singles and rode solid fielding and pitching to the franchise's first World Series appearance in 35 years. The Yankees, lordly and corporate, were making their 12th trip to the World Series in 15 years and, through the managing of Casey Stengel, power hitting, and immense talent, usually found a way to win. Featuring such legends as Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Whitey Ford, and Roger Maris, the Yankees had outscored the Pirates 46–16 through six games — only to go down, 10–9, when Mazeroski became the only player ever to decide a World Series Game 7 with a walk-off home run. From extensive personal interviews with those who were there, along with newspaper, radio, and television accounts, Reisler reconstructs this fall classic pitch by pitch, from analysis of managerial tactics and the chatter of the players on the field to the lively atmosphere within the ballpark and throughout the country. The result is the feeling of being right there from the seemingly predictable start to the truly unbelievable finish of the best game ever. .
Price: $15.28
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The October Horse: A Novel of Caesar and Cleopatra
With her renowned storytelling gifts in full force, Colleen McCullough delivers a breathtaking novel that proves once again that she is the top historical novelist of our time. Grand in scope and vivid in detail, McCullough's gripping narrative thrusts readers headlong into the complex and fascinating world of Rome in the tumultuous last days of the Republic. At the height of his power, Gaius Julius Caesar becomes embroiled in a civil war in Egypt, where he finds himself enraptured by Cleopatra, the nation's golden-eyed queen. To do his duty as a Roman, however, he must forsake his love and return to the capital to rule. Though Caesar's grip on power seems unshakable, the political landscape is treacherous -- the returning hero has no obvious successor, and his legacy seems to be the prize for any man with the courage and cunning to fell Rome's laurelled leader. Caesar's jealous enemies masquerade as friends and scheme to oust the autocrat from power and restore true republican government to Rome. But as the plot races to its dramatic conclusion, it becomes clear that with the stakes this high, no alliance is sacred and no motives are pure. .
Price: $9.56
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