So Close to Home

Author: Michael J Tougias
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1681771713
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 303

Book Description
On May 19, 1942, a U-boat in the Gulf of Mexico stalked its prey fifty miles from New Orleans. Captained by twenty nine-year-old Iron Cross and King's Cross recipient Erich Wurdemann, the submarine set its sights on the freighter Heredia with sixty-two souls on board. Most aboard were merchant seamen, but there were also a handful of civilians, including the Downs family: Ray and Ina, and their two children, eight-year-old Sonny and eleven-year-old Lucille. Fast asleep in their berths, the Downs family had no idea that two torpedoes were heading their way. When the ship exploded, chaos ensued—and each family member had to find their own path to survival. Including original, unpublished material from Commander Wurdemann’s war diary, the story provides balance and perspective by chronicling the daring mission of the U-boat—and its commander’s decision-making—in the Gulf of Mexico. An inspiring historical narrative, So Close to Home tells the story of the Downs family as they struggle against sharks, hypothermia, drowning, and dehydration in their effort to survive the aftermath of this deadly attack off the American coast.

So Close to Home

Author: Mick Cummins
Publisher: Affirm Press
ISBN: 1922930822
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 228

Book Description
Eighteen-year-old Aaron is charismatic, resourceful and addicted to heroin. His mum has kicked him out of home in a last-ditch move to help him get straight, and he wanders the streets of South Melbourne, living on his wits and sleeping rough - all the while chasing drugs, dreams and love. Desperate to fund his addiction, Aaron climbs into the car of The Man, a distinguished elderly gentleman willing to pay for a certain kind of relationship. This regular cash could be the lifeline Aaron needs to start again, but The Man keeps raising spectres from Aaron's past that he'd rather forget. As Aaron gathers the courage to confront the events that derailed his life, his rage grows - and the consequences could be fatal. So Close to Home is a pacy, gritty and captivating novel exploring homelessness, power dynamics and the ties that bind. Social worker, debut author and winner of the prestigious VPLA for Unpublished Manuscript Mick Cummins has created a striking, emotionally complex and unnervingly tense narrative that poses one simple question: who can we ever truly rely on?

Malcolm the Musician

Author: John A. Asuncion
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781951937003
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 40

Book Description
A children's book for young and older adults inspired by the Malcolm X Park located in the City of Poughkeepsie, New York, and our friends and families who live here.Written by Counseling Right Now, LLC, therapist and founder, John A. Asuncion, with artwork created by Elijah and Isabella Asuncion, Malcolm the Musician: So Close to Home examines the harmful effects of the phenomenon: gas-lighting, explores the heartache caused by loss and abandonment, and demonstrates the capacity of the human spirit to rise through adversity while transforming hate into love.Readers are invited to learn the placement of the 12 music tones on the ukulele with the use of color and sound. Right-hand and left-hand instruction is woven throughout the book. "Malcolm the Musician: So Close to Home calls for the end of psychological and emotional abuse in the world, portrays the journey of self-discovery and post-traumatic growth, and implores us to love ourselves and others stronger, become better together, and stop hate." John A. Asuncion

Good Luck with That

Author: Kristan Higgins
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 045148939X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 481

Book Description
One of Purewow’s “Best Beach Reads of Summer 2018” Winner for Best Book of 2018 of the Fresh Fiction Awards! New York Times bestselling author Kristan Higgins is beloved for her heartfelt novels filled with humor and wisdom. Now, she tackles an issue every woman deals with: body image and self-acceptance. Emerson, Georgia, and Marley have been best friends ever since they met at a weight-loss camp as teens. When Emerson tragically passes away, she leaves one final wish for her best friends: to conquer the fears they still carry as adults. For each of them, that means something different. For Marley, it's coming to terms with the survivor's guilt she's carried around since her twin sister's death, which has left her blind to the real chance for romance in her life. For Georgia, it's about learning to stop trying to live up to her mother's and brother's ridiculous standards, and learning to accept the love her ex-husband has tried to give her. But as Marley and Georgia grow stronger, the real meaning of Emerson's dying wish becomes truly clear: more than anything, she wanted her friends to love themselves. A novel of compassion and insight, Good Luck With That tells the story of two women who learn to embrace themselves just the way they are.

A Storm Too Soon

Author: Mike Tougias
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781338182644
Category : Boating accidents
Languages : en
Pages : 220

Book Description
Seventy-foot waves batter a torn life raft 250 miles out to sea in one of the world's most dangerous places: the Gulf Stream. Hanging on to the raft are three men: a Canadian, a Brit, and their captain, JP de Lutz, a dual citizen of the United States and France. Their capsized forty-seven-foot sailboat has disappeared below the tempestuous sea. The giant waves repeatedly toss the men out of their tiny vessel, and JP, with nine broken ribs, is hypothermic and on the verge of death. Trying to reach these survivors before it's too late are four brave Coast Guardsmen battling hurricane-force winds in their Jayhawk helicopter. With waves reaching an astounding eighty feet, lowering the helicopter into such chaos will be extremely dangerous. The pilots wonder if they have a realistic chance of saving the sailors or even retrieving their own rescue swimmer. Soon the rescuers find themselves in almost as much trouble as the survivors, facing one life-and-death moment after the next against the towering seas. Also caught in the storm are three other boats, each one in a Mayday situation. Of the ten people on these boats, only six will ever see land again. This middle-grade adaptation of the author's 2014 work of the same title tells the story of the four intrepid Coast Guardsmen who braved this ruthless storm in the hopes of saving them.

Maybe He Just Likes You

Author: Barbara Dee
Publisher: Aladdin
ISBN: 1534432388
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 320

Book Description
2019 The Washington Post Best Children’s Book of the Year (Erin Entrada Kelly Pick) A 2020 ALA Notable Children’s Book “The novel’s all-too-familiar scenario offers a springboard for discussion among middle schoolers…Easily grasped scenarios and short chapters help make this timely #MeToo story accessible to a wide audience.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review) “Realistic and heartbreaking.” —BCCB Barbara Dee explores the subject of #MeToo for the middle grade audience in this heart-wrenching—and ultimately uplifting—novel about experiencing harassment and unwanted attention from classmates. For seventh-grader Mila, it starts with some boys giving her an unwanted hug on the school blacktop. A few days later, at recess, one of the boys (and fellow trumpet player) Callum tells Mila it’s his birthday, and asks her for a “birthday hug.” He’s just being friendly, isn’t he? And how can she say no? But Callum’s hug lasts a few seconds too long, and feels…weird. According to her friend, Zara, Mila is being immature and overreacting. Doesn’t she know what flirting looks like? But the boys don’t leave Mila alone. On the bus. In the halls. During band practice—the one place Mila could always escape. It doesn’t feel like flirting—so what is it? Thanks to a chance meeting, Mila begins to find solace in a new place: karate class. Slowly, with the help of a fellow classmate, Mila learns how to stand her ground and how to respect others—and herself. From the author of Everything I Know About You, Halfway Normal, and Star-Crossed comes this timely story of a middle school girl standing up and finding her voice.

So Close

Author: Tertia Albertyn
Publisher: Porcupine Press Trading Under Dgr Writing & Resear
ISBN: 9780620430302
Category : Fertilization in vitro
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
Meet, marry and make a baby: That's how it's supposed to go, right?What happens when you start trying for a family ... and trying, and trying some more? How far do you go to achieve your dream of having children?So Close is the heart wrenching, exhilarating, devastatingly funny story of Tertia Albertyn's battle with infertility. Tertia wanted a baby so badly she went through nine IVFs. Most people give up after the third.I don't think I am being brave at all. I am just too terrified NOT to try again.In her worst nightmare she could never have imagined that making a baby would take her four years, each treatment bringing her and her husband Marko closer and closer to creating their family.During Tertia's journey everything that can go wrong does go wrong. Until, finally, everything goes just right.Tertia is as hilarious as she is irrepressible, as approachable as she is knowledgeable. If you are struggling with infertility, have triumphed over infertility or have felt empathy with someone who is going through this experience, you will find a friend in Tertia.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

Author: Raymond Carver
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 1101970588
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 169

Book Description
The most celebrated story collection from “one of the true American masters” (The New York Review of Books)—a haunting meditation on love, loss, and companionship, and finding one’s way through the dark that includes the iconic and much-referenced title story featured in the Academy Award-winning film Birdman. "Raymond Carver's America is ... clouded by pain and the loss of dreams, but it is not as fragile as it looks. It is a place of survivors and a place of stories.... [Carver] has done what many of the most gifted writers fail to do: He has invented a country of his own, like no other except that very world, as Wordsworth said, which is the world to all of us." —The New York Times Book Review

The Distant Dead

Author: Heather Young
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062690833
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 389

Book Description
Nominated for the Edgar Award for Best Novel * Nominated for the ITW Thriller Award for Best Young Adult Novel A BookPage Best Book of the Year * A People Magazine Best Book of Summer* A Parade Best Book of Summer * A Crime Reads Most Anticipated Book of Summer "Powerful...a breathtaking read, with flawed and authentic characters who hit so close to home that at times it is impossible not to root for them." — San Francisco Chronicle A body burns in the high desert hills. A boy walks into a fire station, pale with the shock of discovery. A middle school teacher worries when her colleague is late for work. By day’s end, when the body is identified as local math teacher Adam Merkel, a small Nevada town will be rocked to its core. Adam Merkel left a university professorship in Reno to teach middle school in Lovelock seven months before he died. A quiet, seemingly unremarkable man, he connected with just one of his students: Sal Prentiss, a lonely sixth grader who lives with his uncles on a desolate ranch in the hills. The two outcasts developed a tender, trusting friendship that brought each of them hope in the wake of tragedy. But it is Sal who finds Adam’s body, charred almost beyond recognition, half a mile from his uncles’ compound. Nora Wheaton, the middle school’s social studies teacher, dreamed of a life far from Lovelock only to be dragged back on the eve of her college graduation to care for her disabled father, a man she loves but can’t forgive. She sensed in the new math teacher a kindred spirit--another soul bound to Lovelock by guilt and duty. After Adam’s death, she delves into his past for clues to who killed him and finds a dark history she understands all too well. But the truth about his murder may lie closer to home. For Sal Prentiss’s grief seems heavily shaded with fear, and Nora suspects he knows more than he’s telling about how his favorite teacher died. As she tries to earn the wary boy’s trust, she finds he holds not only the key to Adam’s murder, but an unexpected chance at the life she thought she’d lost. Weaving together the last months of Adam’s life, Nora’s search for answers, and a young boy’s anguished moral reckoning, this unforgettable thriller brings a small American town to vivid life, filled with complex, flawed characters wrestling with the weight of the past, the promise of the future, and the bitter freedom that forgiveness can bring.

Too Close to Home

Author: Aoife Walsh
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781783443000
Category : Dysfunctional families
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
Minny's life is crowded. There's barely elbow room in her grandmother's house, where the whole family has been living since Dad walked out. Bullies are breathing down her autistic older sister Aisling's neck, her best friend Penny acts like Minny's cramping her style, and it's impossible to look halfway normal in front of new boy Franklin. On top of it all, now her dad has announced he's returning to London with his new girlfriend