Henderson's Spear

Henderson's Spear PDF Author: Ronald Wright
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company
ISBN: 1466871679
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 372

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Book Description
A masterly epic that weaves a contemporary search for a missing father with a vivid story from the heyday of the British Empire. Liv, a Canadian filmmaker, is writing from a Tahitian jail, piecing together her troubled past and her family's buried history for the unknown daughter she gave up at birth. The search for her own father, a pilot missing since the Korean War, has brought her to the South Seas and landed her behind bars on a trumped-up murder charge. In the stillness of her cell, Liv ponders the secret journal of her ancestor Frank Henderson, who came to these same waters a century before on an extraordinary three-year voyage with Queen Victoria's grandsons--Prince George (later George V) and Prince Eddy, who would die young and disgraced, linked by the gutter press to the Ripper killings and many other scandals. Through unforgettable characters and a mesmerizing story, Henderson's Spear traces two tales of obsession, intrigue, and loss--from the 1890s and the 1990s. These stories reach around the world from Africa, England, and North America to converge with compelling effect in the Polynesian islands. With a deep understanding of the landscape and culture of the South Sea Islands, Ronald Wright's Henderson's Spear explores the patterns of history and the accidents of love.

Henderson's Spear

Henderson's Spear PDF Author: Ronald Wright
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company
ISBN: 1466871679
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 372

Get Book Here

Book Description
A masterly epic that weaves a contemporary search for a missing father with a vivid story from the heyday of the British Empire. Liv, a Canadian filmmaker, is writing from a Tahitian jail, piecing together her troubled past and her family's buried history for the unknown daughter she gave up at birth. The search for her own father, a pilot missing since the Korean War, has brought her to the South Seas and landed her behind bars on a trumped-up murder charge. In the stillness of her cell, Liv ponders the secret journal of her ancestor Frank Henderson, who came to these same waters a century before on an extraordinary three-year voyage with Queen Victoria's grandsons--Prince George (later George V) and Prince Eddy, who would die young and disgraced, linked by the gutter press to the Ripper killings and many other scandals. Through unforgettable characters and a mesmerizing story, Henderson's Spear traces two tales of obsession, intrigue, and loss--from the 1890s and the 1990s. These stories reach around the world from Africa, England, and North America to converge with compelling effect in the Polynesian islands. With a deep understanding of the landscape and culture of the South Sea Islands, Ronald Wright's Henderson's Spear explores the patterns of history and the accidents of love.

Henderson's Hand-book of the Grasses of Great Britain and America

Henderson's Hand-book of the Grasses of Great Britain and America PDF Author: John Henderson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Grasses
Languages : en
Pages : 254

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Book Description


Oil-field Exploration and Development

Oil-field Exploration and Development PDF Author: Arthur Beeby-Thompson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Natural gas
Languages : en
Pages : 696

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Book Description


A Short History of Progress

A Short History of Progress PDF Author: Ronald Wright
Publisher: House of Anansi
ISBN: 0887847064
Category : Civilization
Languages : en
Pages : 226

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Book Description
Each time history repeats itself, so it's said, the price goes up. The twentieth century was a time of runaway growth in human population, consumption, and technology, placing a colossal load on all natural systems, especially earth, air, and water — the very elements of life. The most urgent questions of the twenty-first century are: where will this growth lead? can it be consolidated or sustained? and what kind of world is our present bequeathing to our future?In his #1 bestseller A Short History of Progress Ronald Wright argues that our modern predicament is as old as civilization, a 10,000-year experiment we have participated in but seldom controlled. Only by understanding the patterns of triumph and disaster that humanity has repeated around the world since the Stone Age can we recognize the experiment's inherent dangers, and, with luck and wisdom, shape its outcome.

Tip of the Spear

Tip of the Spear PDF Author: Ryan Hendrickson
Publisher: Center Street
ISBN: 1546084819
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 300

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Book Description
The inspiring true story of a US Special Forces soldier who was medically retired after stepping on an IED, and his incredible return to active duty. Sergeant First Class (SFC) Ryan Hendrickson is a brave, determined, and courageous soldier -- a Green Beret clearing the way for his twelve-man team while conducting combat operations against the Taliban. As the "tip of the spear," his role is to ensure the route taken by U.S. and Afghan troops are free of IEDs -- improvised explosive devices. Many soldiers do not survive their last step; those who do often lose at least one limb. While rescuing an Afghan soldier outside a mud-hut compound in 2010 -- knowing that he was in "uncleared" territory -- Ryan stepped on an IED with his right foot. The device exploded, leaving his foot dangling at the end of his leg. American soldiers losing a limb is an all-too-common occurrence. But what makes Ryan's story different is that after undergoing two dozen surgeries and a tortuous rehabilitation, he was medically retired but fought to return to active duty. Multiple skin grafts to his leg and right foot successfully reattached his lower leg, and he was aided in his recovery by wearing a new prosthetic device known as an IDEO (Intrepid Dynamic Exoskeletal Orthosis). Once he passed a series of crucial physical tests, Ryan was able to rejoin the Green Berets within a year and physically perform his duties, redeploying to Afghanistan in March 2012. In 2016, he volunteered to return to Afghanistan with Bravo Company, 2nd Battalion, 7th Special Forces Group. During a firefight with the Taliban, he risked his life under heavy enemy fire to rescue three Afghan soldiers cut off from friendly forces and return the bodies of two dead Afghan soldiers under the ethos that "no one gets left behind." For his heroic efforts on the battlefield, SFC Ryan Hendrickson was awarded a Silver Star, the nation's third-highest award for valor. An engaging and harrowing account, Tip of the Spear tells the amazing story of one Green Beret's indomitable spirit.

What Is America?

What Is America? PDF Author: Ronald Wright
Publisher: Knopf Canada
ISBN: 0307371670
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 386

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Book Description
From the award-winning, #1 bestselling author of A Short History of Progress comes another surprising, frightening and essential book. The USA is now the world’s lone superpower, whose deeds could make or break this century. For better and worse, America has Americanized the world. How did a marginal frontier society, in a mere two centuries, become the de facto ruler of the world? Why do America’s great achievements in democracy, prosperity and civil rights now seem threatened by forces within itself? Brimming with insight into history and human behaviour, and written in Wright’s captivating style, What Is America? shows how this came to pass; how the United States, which regards itself as the most modern country on earth, is also deeply archaic, a stronghold not only of religious fundamentalism but of “modern” beliefs in limitless progress and a universal mission that have fallen under suspicion elsewhere in the west, a rethinking driven by two World Wars and the reckless looting of our planet. A fresh, passionate look at the past and future of the world’s most powerful nation, What Is America? will reframe the debate about our neighbour and ourselves.

Claws!

Claws! PDF Author: Geoffrey Teller
Publisher: iUniverse
ISBN: 0595309461
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 192

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Book Description
A homeless man, Richard Starr, sees a terrified woman struggling in rain-swollen Black Creek. As he reaches to pull her ashore she suddenly sinks in the murky water. He dives into the creek but can't find her. Neither can the police. They dismiss his report as a hoax. Later, Richard learns that his friend, Joe Baker, had been attacked. Joe told a mutual acquaintance he was sleeping under a bridge when the unknown assailant struck. At the time, it was dark, and Joe was drunk and disoriented, so he couldn't tell what was going on, except that he was being dragged into the creek. The assailant broke off the attack and escaped into the water after Joe clobbered him with a baseball bat. Now, Joe is missing. That night, Richard is sitting under the bridge while a thunderstorm rages. During intermittent bursts of lightning, he sees a boy being attacked. He rushes to help the kid but finds no one at the scene of the attack. Seeking an explanation for the mysterious events, he follows clues left by the boy and discovers a bizarre world dominated by terrifying creatures, bent on inflicting unthinkable horrors on him and on Humankind.

The Gold Eaters

The Gold Eaters PDF Author: Ronald Wright
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 110198287X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 325

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Book Description
“Utterly irresistible…The Gold Eaters is truly the gold standard to which all fiction — historical and otherwise — should aspire.” — Buzzfeed A sweeping, epic historical novel of exploration and invasion, of conquest and resistance, and of an enduring love that must overcome the destruction of one empire by another. Kidnapped at sea by conquistadors seeking the golden land of Peru, a young Inca boy named Waman is the everyman thrown into extraordinary circumstances. Forced to become Francisco Pizarro's translator, he finds himself caught up in one of history's great clashes of civilzations, the Spanish invasion of the Incan Empire of the 1530s. To survive, he must not only learn political gamesmanship but also discover who he truly is, and in what country and culture he belongs. Only then can he be reunited with the love of his life and begin the search for his shattered family, journeying through a land and a time vividly depicted here. Based closely on real historical events, The Gold Eaters draws on Ronald Wright’s imaginative skill as a novelist and his deep knowledge of South America to bring alive an epic struggle that laid the foundations of the modern world.

Cut Stones and Crossroads

Cut Stones and Crossroads PDF Author: Ronald Wright
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0143198173
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
Traveling through Peru, tracing the history of the Incas from their royal cities of Cusco and Machu Picchu to their mythic origin in Lake Titicaca, Ronald Wright explores a country of contrasts—between Spanish and Indian, past and present, coastal desert and mountainous interior. In his highly entertaining and perceptive account, Wright brings to life a complex culture, a land of ancient traditions seeking its place in the modern world. Embracing history, politics, anthropology, and literature, Cut Stones and Crossroadsis a fascinating travel memoir and the study of a civilization by a writer who has won international awards as both a novelist and a historian.

Stolen Continents

Stolen Continents PDF Author: Ronald Wright
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 9780618492404
Category : America
Languages : en
Pages : 468

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Book Description
Powerful and passionate, Stolen Continents is a history of the Americas unlike any other. This incisive single-volume report tells the stories of the conquest and survival of five great American cultures — Aztec, Maya, Inca, Cherokee, and Iroquois. Through their eloquent words, we relive their strange, tragic experiences — including, in a new epilogue, incidents that bring us up to the twenty-first century.