Showing results by narrator "Joe Barrett" in All Categories

Some writers look at life with their eyes, others with their heart. In this collection of evocative, funny, and moving stories, Peter Damm does both. These are vignettes of growing up in small town, rural Michigan, but also a closely observed portrait of mid-century America. The tone is alternately wry, elegiac, poignant, and humorous, as Damm recalls the joys of fishing on a northern lake, the rigors and confusion of childhood, or feasting on blueberries in autumn.

Once in the White House, Andrew Jackson stood for the rights of common citizens, founded the Democratic Party, expanded the powers of the presidency, paid off the national debt, and postponed civil war by prevailing against the advocates of states' rights. By today's standards, however, Jackson was hardly politically correct: he also owned many slaves on his Tennessee plantation and sponsored the Indian Removal Act.

The allure of literary letters and rare first editions captures the imaginations of three professors of English literature and leads to tragedy in the wake of the Great Kobe Earthquake of 1995.

Three years ago, Lew Fonseca quit his job as a process server with the State's Attorney's office in Cook County, Illinois, and headed for Key West. Sidetracked by fate when his car broke down in Sarasota, Florida, he decided to stick around, making ends meet by doing some investigative work for local attorneys. Asked simply to locate the missing wife of a well-known local entrepreneur, Lew finds that finding Melanie Sebastian is anything but simple.

In May 1861, Virginian Thomas Henry Carter raised an artillery battery and joined the Confederate Army. Over the next four years, he rose steadily in rank from captain to colonel, placing him among the senior artillerists in Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. During the war, Carter wrote more than 100 revealing letters to his wife, Susan, about his service. His interactions with prominent officers - including Lee, Jubal A.Early, John B. Gordon, Robert E. Rodes, and others - come to life in Carter's astute comments about their conduct and personalities.

Katharine can’t believe what she’s seeing. Her world has always been planned and orderly, but now, she’s petrified that she’s going insane, and she’s equally afraid that she’s not. What if the strange creatures she’s seeing really are disappearing and the messages showing up in Latin actually mean something?

Twelve-year-old Marion Parker was kidnapped from her Los Angeles school by an unknown assailant on December 15, 1927. Her body was found days later, delivered to her father by the killer, who fled with the ransom money. When William Hickman was hunted down and charged with the killing, he admitted to all of it, in terrifying detail, but that was only the start. His insanity plea was the first of its kind in the history of California, and the nature of the crime led to a media frenzy unlike any the country had seen up to that point.

Goings: In Thirteen Sittings is Gordon Lish’s first completely original work in sixteen years, thirteen stories that mark the ongoing vitality of one of the era’s enduring scribes. Widely acknowledged as one of the most influential editors of our era, Gordon Lish has quite simply changed the face of American literature.

Joel Brandt swears he’s never met the woman before. His wife dead six months before, the small-time businessman is perplexed when Del Moray police inform him that a local woman, Marla Cloy, has accused him of harassing her. According to her, Joel has been lurking outside of her house, following her car, even assaulting her at the grocery store. Brandt says it’s all a lie, but the police don’t believe him. He goes to Fred Carver, an ex-cop turned PI, for help clearing his name.

In this short biography, Michael Schaller, acclaimed historian of the American political right, offers readers a poignant account of Ronald Reagan's life and achievements, from his small-town upbringing in rural Illinois to his cinematic success in Hollywood, entry into politics as governor of California, and meteoric rise to the White House, where he served for eight years.

This insightful novel follows Bill Warrington, an elderly Korean War veteran and widower, on his quest to reconcile with his three grown children. When his fifteen-year-old granddaughter, April, runs away from home, Bill obliges her wish to drive from Ohio to San Francisco, where she hopes to become a rock singer. As the unlikely pair head west, he leaves clues intended to force April’s mother and uncles to overcome their grievances and mutual distrust and work together to find them.

When John Nelson abandoned his government job to join a scrappy band of activists, he didn't realize trying to save the world would be so hard. His ideals remain strong, but his optimism is wearing thin. Parts per Million, Julia Stoops' socially conscious, fast-paced debut novel, is set in Portland, Oregon, in 2002. As the trio dives into antiwar protests and investigates fraud at an elite university, Nelson falls in love with an unlikely houseguest, Deirdre, a photographer from Ireland - and a recovering addict.

Defending a flashy, big-time Houston lawyer who is accused of killing his wife, Dallas attorney Bino Phillips becomes involved with a sultry blues singer, a vindictive judge, and a hired killer with a cleanliness fetish. Before long Bino will uncover corruption and conspiracies perpetrated by those on both sides of the law. And with all the deals being made, Bino is left to sort it out on his own.

When a stolen car is recovered on the Gulf Coast of Florida, it sets off a search for a missing woman, local motel owner Sabine Musil-Buehler. Three men are named persons of interest - her husband, her boyfriend, and the man who stole the car - and the residents of Anna Maria Island, with few facts to fuel their speculation, begin to fear the worst. Then, with the days passing quickly, her motel is set on fire, her boyfriend flees the county, and detectives begin digging on the beach. Cutter Wood was a guest at Musil-Buehler's motel as the search for the missing woman gained momentum.

Noted Civil War historian Richard Wheeler brings this narrative to life with haunting images of the final days of the Civil War: President Lincoln walking through the streets of Richmond, drawing an admiring crowd of blacks; Confederate and Union troops gathering in the fields around Appomattox Court House, mingling with former foes, experiencing disbelief, bitterness, relief.

Bino Phillips has seen his share of crime-fighting, but nothing has prepared him for the desperate search for a serial killer stalking the streets of Dallas - a serial killer that has more than the usual thirst for blood. One woman has been found, the blood sucked from her body. She and a friend, who remains missing, were to be key witnesses in Bino's defense of a young coed dealer. Now Bino finds himself in a sudden race against death, especially when the killer gets personal and targets Bino's secretary as his next victim.

In today's highly competitive world of complex sales, commoditization of your brand is one of the greatest dangers. You must differentiate yourself from the competition—or you will lose out. Erik Peterson and Tim Riesterer have been developing and honing their Power Messaging sales technique for more than twenty years, and now they reveal all their secrets in Conversations That Win the Complex Sale. Peterson and Riesterer provide the tools you need to recraft your message into a compelling story that wins more deals.

After a tip-off, a man's body is exhumed from a shallow grave in Edinburgh. Murder surely, yet he died from natural causes, so, case closed? Indeed was there ever a case? But Chief Constable Skinner and his people keep on digging. Who was the man, why was he buried so reverentially, and by whom? Meanwhile corruption is discovered within the force, and an investigation launched.

When Capt. Nate Leathers is taken prisoner by Iraqi insurgents, he thinks things can't get any worse than that. But when he escapes, the city of Basra is covered in green fog and besieged by nightmarish monsters.

Ace Criminal Attorney Cash McCahill makes two potentially fatal mistakes. First, he agrees to represent a cartel kingpin, who lays down an ultimatum of win or else. Not even an acquittal will save Cash if his second mistake surfaces. His affair with the client's wife turns him into the perfect pawn to take a fall for the cartel. Falsely convicted of jury tampering, he must survive a prison teeming with enemies and navigate the more dangerous world on the outside in order to clear his name, regain his law license, and return to his only real home - the courtroom.