Jack McGee grows up on the violent streets of 1970s Bronx, burdened with a decision. This could shape Jack's identity forever-boy or man, courage or cowardice? Join Jack and his Irish bias, as he wanders through the Bronx life accompanied by a cast of colorful characters. Some are smarter than others, and there are some who might be deemed a little too colorful given their skin shade.

After losing more than 100 pounds, Rob Rogers, a lawyer and self-described desk jockey, decided to try backpacking at a state park near his Central Florida home. This followed an impulse purchase of a tent and backpack, despite having not camped since adolescence. When the recurrence of severe depression forced him to take a medical sabbatical, he discovered that backpacking in the Central Florida wilderness helped him cope with his inner demons; it also fostered a love affair with the natural spaces near his home. In Finding My Way Home, Rob details the adventure of learning to solo backpack in local state parks and forests, including Lake Louisa State Park, Lake Kissimmee State Park, the Withlacoochee State Forest, and the Green Swamp. He also describes in vivid and at times frightening detail his struggles to cope with bouts of melancholy and intermittent explosive disorder.

My dad is shining a spotlight on a much larger national problem-the dominance of big money in our elections. Campaign spending in 2024 will likely top $14 billion, and more than half that money will be deployed by PACs of various kinds spewing falsehoods and negative messages. Excessive political spending used to be a national story. It's now becoming a local one, and that's why Naples is a cautionary tale in a larger reality. But it's a story we, the people, can rewrite in the coming years if we reach across the political divide to reduce the undue influence of money over our politics.

Nicholas Penniman V, Founder, Issue One (www.issueone.org)

My grandfather brings it to the local level. It all started when Citizens United allowed wealthy people and corpo- rations to come together to funnel their money into campaigns for candidates who will directly benefit them. I feel solidly that the word corrupt comes to mind when I think of it.

Linda Wittenberg, Digital Director,

Allan Domb for Mayor of Philadelphia 2023

Over the last eight years, Bailey McManus has kept in touch with over 200 men in prison. Sincerely, Your Friend; Letters from My Incarcerated Pen Pals gives readers a window into the hearts and lives of people incarcerated across the United States. Both personal account and research are combined to provide a brief study on our nation's justice system and the people most affected by it. This collection is rich with despair suffering, shocking gratitude, and great hope. The lives captured in these letters can change how we view and therefore, how we sentence people who commit crimes. To understand the humanity behind the statistics, we need to hear the stories, struggles, and dreams of people who are sent to prison.

Desmond Tutu said, The truth of who we are is that we are because we belong. These letters give us a unique opportunity to hear from people who have been told and treated as if they do not belong. In these letters, we see how people who have been labeled criminal are simply human. How belong in the world. And we see how friendship can mend something broken inside all of us.

There's amazing stories in this book that not only could help change other people's lives buy maybe change your own. - Jake, Pen Pal

Simple and profound...full of insights and wisdom. - Rene Denfeld, best selling author of The Child Finder and The Enchanted

Noreen Anne Roche was four years and two months old when her mother died. She and her siblings were split up and sent to live with related families. After two failed attempts in the care of heartless relatives, she was removed due to neglect, abuse and malnutrition. Soon, her life moved in a new direction. Noreen was made a ward of the court and ordered to attend an Industrial school for girls in Waterford, Ireland. A nefarious order of nuns subjected her to rigid, religious indoctrination and corporal discipline. In spite of a stolen childhood, she emerges against all odds into a life of independent success. Hiding her traumatic childhood secret for more than fifty years, Noreen writes poignantly to face her past, bringing closure for both herself and others who suffered the same unrelenting and ruthless injustice.

Many people have heard of the famous 12 Hours of Sebring, a once-around-the clock International Motorsports Association

sports car endurance race. Drivers and cars from all over the world compete in different classes, pounding around a long, bumpy airport

road circuit for a half day to see who can outlast the field and the clock.

Fewer people know how this race began. How it started on the runways and access roads of a decommissioned World War II bomber

training facility, just outside a small central Florida town. This is the story of how amateur auto racers found a wonderful venue,

and how the town grew to love a sport that was foreign to many. It is an unlikely chain of events that ended with one man's dream becoming a

reality that springs to life on the third week of March each year.

Join the adventures of a young girl and her grandfather as they canoe through the Everglades. As you follow them on their journey, you will learn a great deal about the Everglades and its vast ecosystem.

I have learned what suffering means. In away that was impossible, I think I can understand something of the pain black people have come to endure. I know I contributed to that pain, and I can only ask your forgiveness. George Wallace made an unannounced speech at the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1979, where Martin Luther King was once pastor.

The Reverend Joseph Lowery, the 'dean' of the civil rights movement, thanked the former separatist for coming out of your sickness to meet us. You are a different George Wallace today. We both serve a God who can make the desert bloom. We ask God's blessing on you.

The writings contained herein will reveal for the first time, from a family perspective, the real George Wallace, not the myth that has grown up around the legend.

Gilda is a teen, a SEER, taken as a small child and thrown into a dungeon by a harsh, vindictive devil, Lord Wolford, who unknowingly took the wrong twin. Using her magic, Gilda struggles to find an escape from her imprisonment, find her twin, and uncover the truth about why she was kidnapped.

When Gilda discovers an eerie crystal which opens the portal of her dark past, she must recall buried memories to escape her current captivity.

As she ventures into the magical portal of ethereal realms, she takes us through haunting forests, hidden caves, and ghastly secrets while struggling to resist the temptation of dark sorcery-and an addictive elixir. Along the way, trapped in the Realm of the Dark Night, Gilda, ever the SEER, realizes there is one thing preventing her freedom-one thing-she cannot see.

Elizabeth Parsons, a part-time librarian in St. John's Newfoundland, is attacked by the playboy son of a wealthy and influential businessman. Her quest for justice, her dream of becoming a midwife, and her love-hate interest in a local boy, are all interrupted by The Great War.

When most of the men in the small city enlist with the British Army, Elizabeth volunteers as an overseas nurse. She is catapulted into a world of horrific violence, broken men, and dying soldiers. The death and destruction of war exacts its toll on each of them, leaving emotional and physical scars which change them in ways she could never have imagined.

From the trenches of Gallipoli to the skies over France, this historically accurate story of love and war will leave you spell bound as you follow in the footsteps of those who fought, died, and survived a world war. Mark Barie's fifth novel in his award-winning series on love and war, promises to keep the reader on an emotional roller coaster of horror, heartbreak, and happiness. It is a read you do NOT want to miss.

That's Why They Call It Work is the final book of a three-part memoir that chronicles the author's life. Al three were written as stand-alone volumes. Brooklyn born and raised, the author writes with Brooklyn wit along with a Brooklyn cadence. George Washington Didn't Sleep Here is self-explanatory. The title of That's Why They Call It Work comes from the author's response to his son who noted that work was hard, to which the author replied, That's why they call it work. Readers are taken on a train of words that carries them through six states and a dozen or so cities. There are episodes that evoke fear, wonderment, challenges to believability, and some good old- fashioned belly laughs. Unique to this book are quotations from famous writers about writers and writing-some that are quite surprising.

Julian Valladares is on a spiritual journey. Julian's father, Ramón, Ernest Hemingway's majordomo at the Finca Vigía and a Palo priest, has died, leaving Julian uncertain of his future. While Julian's work is infused with Palo and Afro-Cuban spirituality, his connection is tenuous and he is desperate to visit his father in the spiritual realm.

Traveling with collaborator, Max Albury, and Hemingway scholars, Phoebe Brennan and Mera Stadler, to the Hemingway Colloquium in Havana, Julian hopes for answers. The mysterious Caridad can grant Julian his wish and their fateful meeting in the spiritual center of the Palo religion-the church in Regla-sets Julian on his ultimate path. After a glorious night and morning with the beautiful Ileana, he packs and heads to a friend's house in Mariel where an ancient ceremony will seal his destiny.

Only the powerful spirits know the outcome of the sacred ritual.

Book Two of the Japapa trilogy resumes with the three teens searching for treasure from a Spanish galleon that allegedly sank off Fortune Island. At the same time, the demon Baka continues to seek revenge against them and Sharkman.

The demon sends a horrific hurricane to the Bahamas during which he throws Sharkman back to Pompeii just prior to the eruption of Mount Vesuvius and hurls the teens back to a time where Japapa has assumed the body of the pirate Black Caesar and is charged with torturing them on behalf of Baka.

The intended revenge includes having the boys sold as slaves and Simone becoming part of Blackbeard's harem. While Sharkman and the teens face a number of challenges, Mama Atabei enlists the help of a wizard called The Seer who is able to transport himself and her back in time to find and rescue the teens and Sharkman. Will they be successful?

Mossad, the national intelligence agency of the State of Israel, also known as the Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations, came across a surprising piece of news. Somehow, the Afghanistan-based Taliban had reportedly struck an alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood, an extremist Islamist organization based in Egypt. With a first bombing having proven successful,

Mossad, working through The Shadow Experts, the group founded by Countess Renate, warned the Mukhabarat, the Egyptian Secret Service Agency, as soon as it heard of the second of what might be an impending series of terrorist actions aimed at destroying vestiges of Pharaonic Egypt. While the Mukhabarat was able to prevent that bombing, Mossad developed a series of retaliatory steps aimed at punishing those terrorist agents while keeping Israel below the radar.

I have learned what suffering means. In a way that was impossible, I think I can understand something of the pain black people have come to endure. I know I contributed to that pain, and I can only ask your forgiveness. George Wallace made an unannounced speech at the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1979, where Martin Luther King was once pastor.

The Reverend Joseph Lowery, the 'dean' of the civil rights movement, thanked the former separatist for coming out of your sickness to meet us. You are a different George Wallace today. We both serve a God who can make the desert bloom. We ask God's blessing on you.

In reflecting upon my journey as the namesake of one of the most controversial political figures of the 20th century, and understanding how the dramatic and traumatic experiences affected my immediate family, I have always believed our experiences were unlike those of any other family in our nation's history. What we endured, we endured under the watchful eye of the public. The writings contained herein will reveal for the first time, from a family perspective, the real George Wallace, not the myth that has grown up around the legend.

- George Wallace Jr.

An old patient who has spent the last thirty odd years of his life in pre-assisted living and then in an assisted living community dies. Everything which was in his large two-bedroom apartment is placed on consignment in a nearby shop, with the mandate to get whatever they can for these worthless' items. Coincidentally, a couple who si looking for a pair of nice antique chairs walks into the shop. The husband, of distant French origins, sees a painting he likes and enquires about it. He is told it is a copy and used to belong to an old gentleman who had a small collection of such copies, all, apparently, works from the Impressionist era. Looking at the canvas more carefully, he discovers something which leads him to wonder whether the painting might not be mischaracterized as a copy. He and his wife further look around the shop and happen to like a couple of old Louis XVI chairs, which the shopkeeper hastens to describe as 19th century reproductions at best, possibly even more recent. The shopkeeper adds that these two small armchairs belonged to the same gentleman who owned the impressionist reproductions.

An old patient who has spent the last thirty odd years of his life in pre-assisted living and then in an assisted living community dies. Everything which was in his large two-bedroom apartment is placed on consignment in a nearby shop, with the mandate to get whatever they can for these worthless' items. Coincidentally, a couple who si looking for a pair of nice antique chairs walks into the shop. The husband, of distant French origins, sees a painting he likes and enquires about it. He is told ti is a copy and used to belong to an old gentleman who had a small collection of such copies, all, apparently, works from the Impressionist era. Looking at the canvas more carefully, he discovers something which leads him to wonder whether the painting might not be mischaracterized as a copy. He and his wife further look around the shop and happen to like a couple of old Louis XVI chairs, which the shopkeeper hastens to describe as 19th century reproductions at best, possibly even more recent. The shopkeeper adds that these two small armchairs belonged to the same gentleman who owned the impressionist reproductions.

There is so much that the future holds for this divorced, middle-aged school secretary. Drenched with depression and only $100 in her wallet, she chooses to run away.

The mantra anything is possible defines her logic in answering an ad for a Legal Secretary-of which she has no experience! She accepts the offer, and it is not for a legal secretary! With an assigned bodyguard and an empty office, this mysterious, hush-hush, adventure is her introduction to the Office Wife. Her world then revolved around divorces, mistresses, schemes, lies, secrets, hidden fears, broken relationships, company kickbacks, and sexual harassment, along with unbelievable perks and pleasures!

Her Treasure Chest of Jewels suggests lessons and tactics to navigate and realize your authentic life with success and confidence.

Indications of a new, potentially quite significant, hydrocarbon discovery in the Philippines brings a wealthy Filipino businessman to seek the help of a Manilla-based Mossad agent with whom he has struck a friendship, without knowing of his role. Though Mossad initially expresses only a limited interest in providing the help the businessman seeks, it eventually agrees to assist with the creation of self-defense mechanisms for the oil production platform. Subsequent developments broaden the assistance provided, as a few incidents create a potentially more critical dimension to the current problem. Terrorist acts involving the use of biological agents cultivated to be particularly harmful force the hand of Mossad, who feel they must help uncover the source of a mysterious disease initially affecting fishermen in the Spratly islands. This requires Mossad to invite The Shadow Experts to join the undercover operations. As improbable as it might seem, in part because of the physical distance between the Philippines and Israel and in part in view of the lack of a direct geopolitical interest in the South China Sea on the part of the Hebrew state, an alliance forms which demonstrates how discreet, and laser-focused help can achieve what might otherwise appear impossible.

It's eastern Europe, 1863. Snatched from his village to be pressed into service in the Tsar's army, 13-year-old Zalaman embarks on a series of harrowing adventures, risking his life on numerous occasions as he engages in attacks on the Cossacks and joins in the struggle to oust the invading Russians.

Profoundly changed by both physical and moral challenges, Zalaman returns to his shtetl no longer the boy who left, but a warrior. Confronted with the barbarity of pogroms at home and deeply traumatized, he sets off on an odyssey through eastern Europe in the attempt to make peace with his demons.