Showing results by narrator "Dick Hill" in All Categories

Refusing to be civilized by Southern society or cowed by his drunken father's lashings, young Huckleberry Finn decides he has only one option left: fake his own death and hop a raft down the Mississippi River. Instead of carrying him far from trouble, though, Huck's raft delivers him to a place of moral uncertainty. Mark Twain unwinds Huck's harrowing journey to manhood with satirical wit, revealing the troubled history of the American South, where slavery held sway long after the Civil War ended.

The first to disappear is a ski instructor in the secluded mountains of Colorado. Hours later, a pregnant woman is abducted from a crowded hospital. Two places, two incidents, a single motive. And so it begins....

While President Abigail Clarke attends a summit in Paris, an unknown enemy makes a brazen attempt on her life, inflicting horrific losses on her protection detail. Plunged into a battle beyond anything they could have trained for, Secret Service agents Rebecca Reid and David Stone must find a way to keep the president alive. The attackers have vast resources and would sacrifice everything for a devastating blow against America. The agents must be willing to do no less.

In 1890, a man collapses near the Piazza della Santa Carita in Naples, Italy. Strangers manage to revive him, but he is unable to speak. Police carry him to the nearest hospital, where he is not admitted because he has no money or identification. Frantically trying to communicate, he scribbles notes in ancient Greek and German that would have told the world about a discovery of immense importance - if anyone had read them.

Lieutenant Commander "Gunner" McCormick is assigned as an intelligence officer to Carrier Strike Force 10, being deployed to the Yellow Sea at the invitation of South Korea for joint exercises with the US Navy. During his pre-deployment briefing, he discovers a top-secret memo revealing rumors that the North Koreans may still be holding a handful of elderly Americans from the Korean War in secret prison camps.

Birmingham, Alabama, has lost all power. Its streets are jammed with cars that won’t start, and its airport is engulfed in flames from burning planes. All communications—cell phones, computers, even radios—are silent. Every home and business is dark. Is it a natural disaster, a terrorist attack, or something far worse?

A few years have passed since the conquering of the Mein, and Queen Corinn is firmly in control of the Known World---perhaps too firmly. With plans to expand her empire, she sends her brother, Daniel, on an exploratory mission to the Other Lands. There Daniel discovers a lush, exotic mainland ruled by an alliance of tribes that poses a grave danger to the stability of the Known World. Is Queen Corinn strong enough to face this new challenge?

In the charming rural town of Trail Stop, Idaho, accessible to the outside world by only a single road, young widow Cate Nightingale lives peacefully with her four-year-old twin boys, running a bed-and-breakfast. But one day, Cate is shocked when armed men storm the house, demanding the mystery man's belongings.

In a time when no Thread has fallen for centuries - when, indeed, many are beginning to dare to hope that Thread will never fall again - a boy is born to Harper Hall. His name is Robinton, and he is destined to be one of the most famous and beloved leaders Pern has ever known.

King Ludwig II ruled Bavaria for 22 years, commissioning extravagant castles throughout his homeland and exhibiting such bizarre behavior that he was eventually declared insane. According to legend, Ludwig had stockpiled a massive cache of gold and jewels that would finance the construction of the largest castle of all time. But in the years since the king's mysterious death, no one has found any evidence of such a trove. Until now.

At the big, aggressive newspaper The Washington Tribune, a young woman has been murdered. And the hunt for her killer is making sensational and lethal headlines. The victim, fresh out of journalism school, hoped to make a splash at the Trib - and then a maintenance man found her in a supply closet, brutally strangled to death. The Trib's journalists are at once horrified and anxious to solve the crime before the cops do, and put this scandal to rest.

America faces a full-scale socioeconomic collapse—the stock market plummets, hyperinflation cripples commerce, and the mounting crisis passes the tipping point. Practically overnight, the fragile chains of supply and high-technology infrastructure fall, and wholesale rioting and looting grip every major city. As hordes of refugees and looters pour out of the cities, a small group of friends living in the Midwest desperately tries to make their way to a safe-haven ranch in Northern Idaho.

Two blood-spattered strangers awake, locked in the trunk of a car - with a murdered cop and the smoking gun. Aside from raging headaches and no idea what's happened, they appear to have nothing in common. Troy thinks it's 2001 and he's still a combat surgeon fighting terrorists in Afghanistan. Emmy believes it's 2002 and she's still grifting a living from the streets of L.A.

At six-foot-four-inches and 375 pounds, Jack Garcia looked the part of a mobster, and he played his part so perfectly that his Mafia bosses never suspected he was an undercover agent for the FBI. "Big Jack Falcone," as he was known inside La Cosa Nostra, learned all the inside dirt about the Gambino organized crime syndicate and its illegal activities---from extortion and loan-sharking to assault and murder.

The Trial and Death of Socrates presents the trial and subsequent execution of Socrates in 399 BCE. Socrates was tried on the basis of two ambiguous charges: corrupting the youth and impiety. “Euthyphro”, one of Plato's early dialogues, takes place during the weeks leading up to Socrates' trial. “Apology” is Plato's version of the speech given by Socrates as he defends himself against the charges of being a man "who corrupted the young, refused to worship the gods, and created new deities".

A woman is murdered in a liquor store, hurtling the men from the 87th Precinct into an investigation of her secret lives and many possible enemies. Faced with a host of suspects—from the woman’s former mother-in-law to her ex-husband, employer, and a string of boyfriends—the detectives find themselves with a victim whose identity spurns all conventional definition.

Did you ever wish that you really understood money? Well, Dave Barry wishes that he did, too. But that hasn't stopped him from writing a book about how to understand money. In it, Dave explores (as only he can) such topics as: How the U.S. economy works, including the often-overlooked role of Adam Sandler, Why it is not a good idea to use squirrels for money, Strategies that will give you the confidence you need to try for a good job, even though you are, let's be honest, a no-talent loser.

The deaths of six men and women appeared to be bizarre accidents - until Dr. Alan Gregory discovered the chilling link. Years before, each was involved in the psychology and psychiatry training program at the University of Colorado. And each was the victim of an ingeniously planned, brilliantly executed murder. Now only two alumni survive: Dr. Gregory and Dr. Sawyer Sackett, a woman he once loved.

Nobody plays accordion like Dick Contino. His skilled fingers can find beauty in even the schmaltziest Borscht Belt favorites, and with his matinee-idol looks he could be a real star. Right now, though, he’s slumming it as the headliner in a Grade Z teenybopper picture called Daddy-O. He’s too good for this movie, and finishing it is going to take him to a very dark place. Daddy-O and Dick Contino are both real, their stories dredged out of the past by James Ellroy, a master of historical crime fiction. In Dick Contino's Blues he takes us to B-List Hollywood in 1957 - a time when movies were cheerful and dirty secrets lurked just off camera.