The Battle of Stalingrad was not only the psychological turning point of World War II: it also changed the face of modern warfare. From Antony Beevor, the internationally bestselling author of D-Day and The Battle of Arnhem.In August 1942, Hitler's huge Sixth Army reached the city that bore Stalin's name. In the five-month siege that followed, the Russians fought to hold Stalingrad at any cost; then, in an astonishing reversal, encircled and trapped their Nazi enemy. This battle for the ruins of a city cost more than a million lives. Stalingrad conveys the experience of soldiers on both sides, fighting in inhuman conditions, and of civilians trapped on an urban battlefield. Antony Beevor has itnerviewed survivors and discovered completely new material in a wide range of German and Soviet archives, including prisoner interrogations and reports of desertions and executions. As a story of cruelty, courage, and human suffering, Stalingrad is unprecedented and unforgettable.Historians and reviewers worldwide have hailed Antony Beevor's magisterial Stalingrad as the definitive account of World War II's most harrowing battle.

From one of Outside magazine’s “Literary All-Stars” comes the thrilling true tale of the fastest boat ride ever, down the entire length of the Colorado River and through the Grand Canyon, during the legendary flood of 1983.In the spring of 1983, massive flooding along the length of the Colorado River confronted a team of engineers at the Glen Canyon Dam with an unprecedented emergency that may have resulted in the most catastrophic dam failure in history. In the midst of this crisis, the decision to launch a small wooden dory named “The Emerald Mile” at the head of the Grand Canyon, just fifteen miles downstream from the Glen Canyon Dam, seemed not just odd, but downright suicidal. The Emerald Mile, at one time slated to be destroyed, was rescued and brought back to life by Kenton Grua, the man at the oars, who intended to use this flood as a kind of hydraulic sling-shot. The goal was to nail the all-time record for the fastest boat ever propelled—by oar, by motor, or by the grace of God himself—down the entire length of the Colorado River from Lee’s Ferry to Lake Mead. Did he survive? Just barely. Now, this remarkable, epic feat unfolds here, in The Emerald Mile.

This is the incredible story of Silva Mcleod, the first Tongan woman to become an airline pilot, told with frankness and wit by Silva herself. Silva was a Tongan girl from a small island with little hope of anything beyond getting married and having babies. Her dreams of becoming an airline pilot seemed just that — dreams — until Ken McLeod came into Silva’s life. He was an Australian hired to build a hospital on her island of Vava‘u. She started dating him despite frowns from her family. After a whirlwind romance, they got married in a traditional Tongan ceremony before moving to Australia.Silva faced challenges in Australia as a woman of color. Then came the biggest challenge of all — Ken was diagnosed with cancer. He said to Silva, ‘Do you still want to fly? Life is too short, if you have a dream, go for it.’There were many barriers to succeeding in such a male-dominated field, but Silva refused to give in. She became the first Tongan female airline pilot and worked for the Royal Flying Doctor Service amongst other small airlines then Virgin International, flying B777s around the world. With every new height Silva reached in her career, Ken’s struggle with cancer continued. Despite the hardships, Silva is sure she would dare to do it all over again. Dare to love a white man and dare to pursue her dream to go from island girl to airline pilot.

'Swallows and Amazons for ever!'Rediscover this classic tale of adventure. The Walker children - also known as Captain John, Mate Susan, Able-Seaman Titty, and Ship's Boy Roger - set sail on the Swallow and head for Wild Cat Island. There they camp under open skies, swim in clear water and go fishing for their dinner. But their days are disturbed by the Blackett sisters, the fierce Amazon pirates. The Swallows and Amazons decide to battle it out, and so begins a summer of unforgettable discoveries and incredible adventures. EXTRA ACTIVITIES INCLUDED: Crack the Swallow's code and learn all about the adventurous author in the brilliant extra educational resources included in this edition.

The classic story of a boy who makes his own rules and the small Missouri town where he and his friends experience the adventures of a lifetime Filled with schoolyard pranks, buried treasures, spooky caves, secret gangs, and grave robbers, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer is entertainment of the highest order. The clever schemes of its eponymous hero—from tricking his friends into completing his chores to sneaking into his own funeral—are the stuff of legend, and the cast of characters, including Huckleberry Finn, Becky Thatcher, Aunt Polly, and the Widow Douglas, is one of the most recognizable in American literature. A tale of friendship, fun, and intrigue that celebrates the rural life Mark Twain knew as a boy growing up on the Mississippi River, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer mixes good-natured humor with thoughtful consideration of serious issues such as race, religion, and the strictures of adult life. Amusing and insightful for readers of all ages, it is one of the most enduring novels in American literature. This ebook has been professionally proofread to ensure accuracy and readability on all devices.

To Aviation Journalist and experienced Test Pilot, Jim Campbell, a bird's eye view to adventure was a major part of his life... but little did he know that a chance meeting with revolutionary innovator, XPRIZE Founder Dr. Peter H Diamandis, would not only offer him some extraordinary sights, sounds and vistas, but challenge him personally and professionally to share the inspiring story of the extraordinary people and events that surrounded him. In the upcoming 180 page, lavishly illustrated, four color photo-book documenting this amazing experience, Campbell's "Beyond The Blue," provides unparalleled access to one of the most extraordinary periods in man's quest to reach for and beyond the stars. "I am so proud of this book. It is an incredible telling of the Ansari XPRIZE story and the journey to creating this breakthrough competition," said Dr. Diamandis. "This book will hopefully allow more people to understand the impact this competition had on the space travel industry." As a pivotal member of the massive XPRIZE team and community, Campbell's insider access and ever-present Canon cameras allowed him to catalog thousands of images, witness hundreds of incredible stories, and meet the kind of people who could not only change the world, but were well on the way to doing so. The summer of 2014 marks the beginning of a celebration of the pivotal first decade of innovation and world-changing activism on the part of the XPRIZE community. From the momentous June 21st, 2004 sub-orbital proving flight of Mike Melvill in the Burt Rutan-designed SpaceShipOne, to the actual spaceflights that won the 10 million dollar Ansari XPRIZE on to the earliest test flights of the Zero-Gravity Corporation and the Rocket Racing League and the heady, lofty days of the XPRIZE Cup, the start of the Google Lunar XPRIZE and the emotional journey of Professor Steven Hawking into the realm of weightless flight, 'Beyond The Blue' lays it all out with the kind of visual impact that is second only to having been there one's self.

In the ten years since its publication in 1988, Stephen Hawking's classic work has become a landmark volume in scientific writing, with more than nine million copies in forty languages sold worldwide. That edition was on the cutting edge of what was then known about the origins and nature of the universe. But the intervening years have seen extraordinary advances in the technology of observing both the micro- and the macrocosmic worlds. These observations have confirmed many of Professor Hawking's theoretical predictions in the first edition of his book, including the recent discoveries of the Cosmic Background Explorer satellite (COBE), which probed back in time to within 300,000 years of the universe's beginning and revealed wrinkles in the fabric of space-time that he had projected. Eager to bring to his original text the new knowledge revealed by these observations, as well as his own recent research, Professor Hawking has prepared a new introduction to the book, written an entirely new chapter on wormholes and time travel, and updated the chapters throughout.

The New York Times bestselling “manifesto for the future that is grounded in practical solutions addressing the world’s most pressing concerns: overpopulation, food, water, energy, education, health care and freedom” (The Wall Street Journal).Since the dawn of humanity, a privileged few have lived in stark contrast to the hardscrabble majority. Conventional wisdom says this gap cannot be closed. But it is closing—and fast. In Abundance, space entrepreneur turned innovation pioneer Peter H. Diamandis and award-winning science writer Steven Kotler document how progress in artificial intelligence, robotics, digital manufacturing synthetic biology, and other exponentially growing technologies will enable us to make greater gains in the next two decades than we have in the previous 200 years. We will soon have the ability to meet and exceed the basic needs of every person on the planet. Abundance for all is within our grasp. Breaking down human needs by category—water, food, energy, healthcare, education, freedom—Diamandis and Kotler introduce us to innovators and industry captains making tremendous strides in each area. “Not only is Abundance a riveting page-turner…but it’s a book that gives us a future worth fighting for” (The Christian Science Monitor).

This is the story of how a Baggins had an adventure, and found himself doing and saying things altogether unexpected... ‘A flawless masterpiece’The Times Bilbo Baggins is a hobbit who enjoys a comfortable, unambitious life, rarely travelling further than the pantry of his hobbit-hole in Bag End. But his contentment is disturbed when the wizard, Gandalf, and a company of thirteen dwarves arrive on his doorstep one day, to whisk him away on a journey ‘there and back again’. They have a plot to raid the treasure hoard of Smaug the Magnificent, a large and very dangerous dragon... The prelude to THE LORD OF THE RINGS, THE HOBBIT has sold many millions of copies since its publication in 1937, establishing itself as one of the most beloved and influential books of the twentieth century.