Distant Echoes

After an errant Navy missile hits a tourist boat off the island of Kauai, killing several passengers, Hawaiian native and dolphin researcher Kaia Oana joins naval security officer Jesse Matthews in an investigation of the incident.

Val McDermid's The Distant Echo is, even more so than with her previous work, a masterpiece of trickery and misdirection. In 1978, four male students find the body of Rosie Duff half-buried in the snow and their lives are variously damaged by the suspicion that falls on them when the murder is never solved; a quarter of a century later, the case is reopened and suddenly the quartet start to be killed one after the other.

When testing for a new missile defense system results in the destruction of a tour boat, dolphin researcher Kaia Oana and Navy officer Jesse Matthews investigate, putting their lives in danger even as sparks fly between them.

Clearly, Paul was violating the long-established guidelines for receiving Gentiles into fellowship. The circumcision party had enough clout within the growing community of believers to necessitate a formal hearing with the apostles and elders in Jerusalem. They insisted that the writings of Moses were binding upon anyone who wished to have a relationship with one true God. The debate was lengthy, detailed, and heated. We can imagine what much of the discussion was since the disagreement spilled out beyond the confines of that momentous meeting. We are motivated to note those disagreements in much of Paul’s writings. Distant Echoes invites the reader to observe as the apostles and elders grappled with the issues. Even after an arduous effort, the decision letter published by the leaders was not universally accepted. The echoes of their debate continue to ripple through the Christian community today. The questions continue to be considered, and answers contested. In the final analysis, what does God require of us for sustaining our relationship with him? What standard do we use to come to a conclusion? If we are to include the Old and New Testaments as a guide for our Christian lifestyle, which parts do we accept as binding? What principle do we use to determine which portions to include or exclude? Are we willing to use the letter published in Jerusalem as our primary guide for acceptance of ourselves and others?

'Distant Echoes' tells the story of a dream creator whose only true desire is to live. The reader is taken on a journey through the naive persona of ' The Architect Of Dreams'. As he adventures the midst of busy cities, shorelines of wonderlust, desert lights and uncharted oceans, he is welcomed by unexpected souls with invaluable knowledge to share. Ultimately, it is a story about the nature of time and various philosophical aspects of life. We are all dreamers and can be the architects of our own lives.

“You done lived a tough life, boy, and I know I’m part responsible for that. I ain’t askin’ you to excuse me or forgive me. Just know I did the best I knew to do. I was just tryin’ to make you tough enough to deal with the world. To stand tall among men, I knew you had to be strong and have yo’ own mind.” “You were preparing me for war, Grandfather.” Guy Johnson, the author of the critically acclaimed debut Standing at the Scratch Line, continues the Tremain family saga. Jackson St. Clair Tremain hasn’t spoken to his grandfather King in nearly twenty years. Disgusted by the violence and bloodlust that seemed to be his grandfather’s way of life, Jackson chose to distance himself from King and live a simpler life. But now King is gravely ill, and his impending death places Jackson’s life—as well as those of his family and friends—in jeopardy. Reluctantly, Jackson travels to Mexico to see King. But after a brief reconciliation, his grandfather is assassinated, and Jackson suspects that his grandmother Serena may have had a hand in it. Jackson takes control of King’s organization, and as he does, he reflects on the summers he spent in Mexico as a child and the lessons he learned there at the knee of his strong-willed, complex grandfather. In Echoes of a Distant Summer, Guy Johnson introduces us to a new hero, Jackson St. Clair Tremain, who learns that, like his grandfather, he must be willing to protect those he loves—at all costs.

In December 1958, Ken Martin, his wife Barbara, and their three young daughters left their home in Northeast Portland to search for Christmas greens in the Columbia River Gorge—and never returned. The Martins' disappearance spurred the largest missing persons search in Oregon history and the mystery has remained perplexingly unsolved to this day. For the past six years, JB Fisher (Portland on the Take) has pored over the case after finding in his garage a stack of old Oregon Journal newspaper articles about the story. Through a series of serendipitous encounters, Fisher obtained a wealth of first-hand and never-before publicized information about the case including police reports from several agencies, materials and photos belonging to the Martin family, and the personal notebooks and papers of Multnomah County Sheriff's Detective Walter E. Graven, who was always convinced the case was a homicide and worked tirelessly to prove it. Graven, however, faced real resistance from his superiors to bring his findings to light. Used as a trail left behind after his 1988 death to guide future researchers, Graven's personal documents provide fascinating insight into the question of what happened to the Martins—a path leading to abduction and murder, an intimate family secret, and civic corruption going all the way to the Kennedys in Washington, DC.

Our neighboring planets may have the answer to this question. Scientists have already identified ice caps on Mars and what appear to be enormous oceans underneath the ice of Jupiter's moons. The atmosphere on Venus appeared harsh and insupportable of life, composed of a toxic atmosphere and oceans of acid -- until scientists concluded that Earth's atmosphere was eerily similar billions of years ago. An extraterrestrial colony, in some form, may already exist, just awaiting discovery. But the greatest impediment to such an important scientific discovery may not be technological, but political. No scientific endeavor can be launched without a budget, and matters of money are within the arena of politicians. Dr. Ben Bova explores some of the key players and the arguments waged in a debate of both scientific and cultural priorities, showing the emotions, the controversy, and the egos involved in arguably the most important scientific pursuit ever begun.