Ordinary Thunderstorms

Author: William Boyd
Publisher: Random House Canada
ISBN: 0307358224
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 418

Book Description
A thrilling, plot-twisting novel from the author of Restless, a national bestseller and winner of the Costa Novel of the Year Award. It is May in Chelsea, London. The glittering river is unusually high on an otherwise ordinary afternoon. Adam Kindred, a young climatologist in town for a job interview, ambles along the Embankment, admiring the view. He is pleasantly surprised to come across a little Italian bistro down a leafy side street. During his meal he strikes up a conversation with a solitary diner at the next table, who leaves soon afterwards. With horrifying speed, this chance encounter leads to a series of malign accidents through which Adam will lose everything - home, family, friends, job, reputation, passport, credit cards, mobile phone - never to get them back. A heart-in-mouth conspiracy novel about the fragility of social identity, the corruption at the heart of big business and the secrets that lie hidden in the filthy underbelly of the everyday city.

Ordinary Thunderstorms

Author: William Boyd
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0061966266
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 422

Book Description
“William Boyd seems singularly blessed with both an innate love of storytelling and the talent to render those stories in swift, confident prose.” —The New York Times From William Boyd, award-winning author of Brazzaville Beach and Restless, comes a stunning literary mystery about crime and punishment: Ordinary Thunderstorms. One of the most accomplished writers of our time, Boyd has written a profound and gripping novel about the fragility of social identity, the corruption at the heart of big business, and the secrets that lie hidden in the filthy underbelly of every city.

Waiting for Sunrise

Author: William Boyd
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 1408830396
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 449

Book Description
THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLERVienna, 1913. Lysander Rief, a young English actor, sits in the waiting room of the city's preeminent psychiatrist as he anxiously ponders the particularly intimate nature of his neurosis. When the enigmatic, intensely beautiful Hettie Bull walks in, Lysander is immediately drawn to her, unaware of how destructive the consequences of their subsequent affair will be. One year later, home in London, Lysander finds himself entangled in the dangerous web of wartime intelligence - a world of sex, scandal and spies that is slowly, steadily, permeating every corner of his life...

Jedediah Smith

Author: Barton H. Barbour
Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
ISBN: 0806183225
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 306

Book Description
Mountain man and fur trader Jedediah Smith casts a heroic shadow. He was the first Anglo-American to travel overland to California via the Southwest, and he roamed through more of the West than anyone else of his era. His adventures quickly became the stuff of legend. Using new information and sifting fact from folklore, Barton H. Barbour now offers a fresh look at this dynamic figure. Barbour tells how a youthful Smith was influenced by notable men who were his family’s neighbors, including a member of the Lewis and Clark expedition. When he was twenty-three, hard times leavened with wanderlust set him on the road west. Barbour delves into Smith’s journals to a greater extent than previous scholars and teases out compelling insights into the trader’s itineraries and personality. Use of an important letter Smith wrote late in life deepens the author’s perspective on the legendary trapper. Through Smith’s own voice, this larger-than-life hero is shown to be a man concerned with business obligations and his comrades’ welfare, and even a person who yearned for his childhood. Barbour also takes a hard look at Smith’s views of American Indians, Mexicans in California, and Hudson’s Bay Company competitors and evaluates his dealings with these groups in the fur trade. Dozens of monuments commemorate Smith today. This readable book is another, giving modern readers new insight into the character and remarkable achievements of one of the West’s most complex characters.

Ordinary Grace

Author: William Kent Krueger
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1451645856
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 336

Book Description
Looking back at a tragic event that occurred during his thirteenth year, Frank Drum explores how a complicated web of secrets, adultery, and betrayal shattered his Methodist family and their small 1961 Minnesota community.

Restless

Author: William Boyd
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 1408835185
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 337

Book Description
It is 1939. Eva Delectorskaya is a beautiful 28-year-old Russian émigrée living in Paris. As war breaks out she is recruited for the British Secret Service by Lucas Romer, a mysterious Englishman, and under his tutelage she learns to become the perfect spy, to mask her emotions and trust no one, including those she loves most. Since the war, Eva has carefully rebuilt her life as a typically English wife and mother. But once a spy, always a spy. Now she must complete one final assignment, and this time Eva can't do it alone: she needs her daughter's help.

Twelve Ordinary Men

Author: John F. MacArthur
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
ISBN: 141856737X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 188

Book Description
You don't have to be perfect to do God's work. Look no further than the twelve disciples, whose many weaknesses are forever preserved throughout the pages of the New Testament. Join bestselling author John MacArthur in Twelve Ordinary Men as he draws principles from Christ's careful, hands-on training of the original disciples for today's modern disciple, you! Jesus chose ordinary men--fishermen, tax collectors, political zealots--and turned their weakness into strength, producing greatness from people who were otherwise unremarkable. The twelve disciples weren't the stained-glass saints we imagine. On the contrary, they were truly human, all too prone to mistakes, misstatements, wrong attitudes, lapses of faith, and bitter failure. Simply put, they were flawed people, just like us. But under Jesus' teaching and touch, they became a force that forever changed the world. MacArthur takes you into the inner circle of the disciples--their selection, their training, their personalities, and their incredible impact. As MacArthur took a closer look at the lives of the twelve disciples, he found himself asking difficult questions along the way, including: Why did Jesus pick each of the twelve disciples? How did Jesus teach them everything he could in just eighteen short months? Can the lessons that Jesus taught the disciples can still influence our faith today? In Twelve Ordinary Men, you'll learn that disciples are living proof that God's strength is made perfect in weakness. As you get to know the men who walked with Jesus, you'll see that if he can accomplish his purposes through them, he can do the same through you.

Ordinary Girl

Author: Donna Summer
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 280

Book Description
Ordinary Girl is legendary singer-songwriter Donna Summer's delightfully candid memoir about her journey from signing in a Boston church to her unexpected reign as the Queen of Disco, and the tragedy and spiritual rebirth that followed.

The Ordinary Spaceman

Author: Clayton C. Anderson
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
ISBN: 0803277318
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 460

Book Description
What's it like to travel at more than 850 MPH, riding in a supersonic T-38 twin turbojet engine airplane? What happens when the space station toilet breaks? How do astronauts "take out the trash" on a spacewalk, tightly encapsulated in a space suit with just a few layers of fabric and Kevlar between them and the unforgiving vacuum of outer space? The Ordinary Spaceman puts you in the flight suit of U.S. astronaut Clayton C. Anderson and takes you on the journey of this small-town boy from Nebraska who spent 167 days living and working on the International Space Station, including nearly forty hours of space walks. Having applied to NASA fifteen times over fifteen years to become an astronaut before his ultimate selection, Anderson offers a unique perspective on his life as a veteran space flier, one characterized by humility and perseverance. From the application process to launch aboard the space shuttle Atlantis, from serving as a family escort for the ill-fated Columbia crew in 2003 to his own daily struggles--family separation, competitive battles to win coveted flight assignments, the stress of a highly visible job, and the ever-present risk of having to make the ultimate sacrifice--Anderson shares the full range of his experiences. With a mix of levity and gravitas, Anderson gives an authentic view of the highs and the lows, the triumphs and the tragedies of life as a NASA astronaut.

Escaping Ordinary

Author: Scott Reintgen
Publisher: Yearling
ISBN: 0525646752
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 353

Book Description
In this action-packed sequel to Saving Fable perfect for readers of The Land of Stories and The Phantom Tollbooth, Indira finds herself thrown into a quest full of dragons, unlikely allies, and high stakes. It's been a year since Indira rescued the city of Fable and landed a starring role in a story of her own. Now Indira's ready for a well-earned vacation. Too bad her advisors have other plans. In preparation for her story's sequel, Indira has been enrolled in the Hero's Journey tutorial, a quest designed to teach her how to be a team player. Indira's assigned crew is a mix of familiar faces and new friends, each hoping to follow in her footsteps into a story. Indira is ready for this new challenge--until someone crashes their quest. The intruder is more powerful than anyone she's faced before and begins transforming Ordinary into a giant video game. Indira's team will have to level up and outplay their opponent, or else the world's most beloved stories might be lost forever.