Seahawk Burning

A Novel of the Civil War at Sea This final volume in the Raphael Semmes trilogy of Civil War naval thrillers, Seahawk Burning, follows the real-life adventures of Confederate Captain Raphael Semmes and his ship, the C.S.S. Alabama, on the final legs of their reign of terror on the high seas. The novel chronicles Semmes's rise to mythic stature as he becomes Lincoln's public enemy number one, seizing and burning scores of Yankee ships in the Caribbean Sea, the south Atlantic, the Indian Ocean, and the South China Sea before heading to France for sanctuary...all the while dodging scores of federal Navy ships pursuing him. Enemy vessels, spy games, mutinies, storms, and loneliness stock Semmes's cruise during 1863-64. Meanwhile, back in the Lincoln White House, Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles tries to marshal his warships to catch Semmes and simultaneously protect his president from spies and assassins, one of whom is Semmes's mistress. In addition to the main characters, the cast of Seahawk Burning includes historical figures from the governments and navies of the North and South as well as the Black Moses Harriet Tubman, John Wilkes Booth, and his fellow conspirators. All of the threads in this saga come together in a final showdown off Cherbourg, France, when Semmes decides to take the Alabama into battle against the U.S.S. Kearsarge, captained by his old friend John A. Winslow. It is one of the greatest naval battles in history.

In Seahawk Hunting Rafael Semmes abandons his broken raider, the Sumter, which is penned in by the Federals near Gibraltar. In the meantime, he has the Brits build him a new ship in Liverpool. Called the 290, it is the fastest commercial raider designed for its time, and it is waiting for Semmes in the Azores. After taking command of the ship he sets out seizing and burning whalers at the rate of one a day, sails back across the North Atlantic against the gulf stream where he picks off another dozen merchant ships headed to Europe. Then, after a thwarted attempt to sneak attack New York City, Semmes makes a beeline for Martinique in the Caribbean during the course of which he has to put down a mutiny on board and evade the USS San Jacinto which has come to destroy him. Finally, Semmes makes it to Galveston where he has an epic gun battle with the USS Hatteras.

Bullshit isn’t what it used to be. Now, two science professors give us the tools to dismantle misinformation and think clearly in a world of fake news and bad data. “A modern classic . . . a straight-talking survival guide to the mean streets of a dying democracy and a global pandemic.”—Wired Misinformation, disinformation, and fake news abound and it’s increasingly difficult to know what’s true. Our media environment has become hyperpartisan. Science is conducted by press release. Startup culture elevates bullshit to high art. We are fairly well equipped to spot the sort of old-school bullshit that is based in fancy rhetoric and weasel words, but most of us don’t feel qualified to challenge the avalanche of new-school bullshit presented in the language of math, science, or statistics. In Calling Bullshit, Professors Carl Bergstrom and Jevin West give us a set of powerful tools to cut through the most intimidating data. You don’t need a lot of technical expertise to call out problems with data. Are the numbers or results too good or too dramatic to be true? Is the claim comparing like with like? Is it confirming your personal bias? Drawing on a deep well of expertise in statistics and computational biology, Bergstrom and West exuberantly unpack examples of selection bias and muddled data visualization, distinguish between correlation and causation, and examine the susceptibility of science to modern bullshit. We have always needed people who call bullshit when necessary, whether within a circle of friends, a community of scholars, or the citizenry of a nation. Now that bullshit has evolved, we need to relearn the art of skepticism.

Led by ex-navy SEAL Mike Chambers, the Trident Force is the blackest of the black ops. Their specialty: fighting the war on terror at sea. Handpicked for their skills above and below the waterline, they do the jobs no one else can handle—and the jobs no one else can survive. When a cargo ship sailing into the port of Naples is torpedoed, the Trident Force is alerted to the new and unexpected danger. A mysterious terrorist known only as the Sea Hawk has deployed underwater mines at strategic choke points to disrupt cargo operations around the world and create political and economic chaos. The Trident Force plunges in, willing to put themselves in harm’s way, before another mine takes out another ship. But even as they search beneath the sea, their sights remain on their higher objective: find the Sea Hawk and bring him down.

Relive the Seattle Seahawks Super Bowl Season through the eyes of the 12th Man. From the perspective of a dedicated Seahawks fan, Mark Tye Turner, author of Notes from a 12 Man, com­piles this vivid and insightful account of the year the Seattle Seahawks won Super Bowl XLVIII with coach Pete Carroll and quarterback Russell Wilson. Starting in the 2013 preseason and following through to the aftermath of the team's momentous victory parade, Turner’s account of the season is filled with stories and anecdotes from the Seahawks' thirty-eight-year history.

In his latest mission, Commander Jeffrey Fuller will go head–to–head against his most dangerous adversary yet – his own allies. Jeffrey Fuller has a new mission – use his cutting–edge submarine Challenger to recover a German spy claiming to have key information about the Berlin–Boer Axis, information that could be crucial to winning the war. Fuller will have to navigate his super–silent sub through some of the most densely patrolled waters in Europe if he hopes to accomplish his mission. But Fuller knows he can't trust the spy, code–named Zeno, an expert in electronic and information warfare. The man could be a double agent sent by the enemy to compromise Challenger. And when they finally recover the mysterious spy, he reveals that only by helping him infiltrate Israel can he hope to prevent an imminent Axis attack. Fuller is caught in a terrible dilemma – if the man is a double agent, he could be dooming Israel, but if he does nothing, the country could fall to the German assault. To go ahead with the plan would pitch Fuller against the best defences of his own allies, placing his crew in danger and possibly shattering bonds between nations. It is a battle that, if fought, Fuller will have to fight entirely on his own.

Myke Cole continues to blow the military fantasy genre wide open with an all-new epic adventure in his highly acclaimed Shadow Ops universe—set in the early days of the Great Reawakening, when magic first returns to the world and order begins to unravel… US Navy SEAL Jim Schweitzer is a consummate professional, a fierce warrior, and a hard man to kill. But when he sees something he was never meant to see on a covert mission gone bad, he finds himself—and his family—in the crosshairs. Nothing means more to Jim than protecting his loved ones, but when the enemy brings the battle to his front door, he is overwhelmed and taken down. That should be the end of the story. But Jim is raised from the dead by a sorcerer and recruited by a top secret unit dabbling in the occult, known only as the Gemini Cell. With powers he doesn’t understand, Jim is called back to duty—as the ultimate warrior. As he wrestles with a literal inner demon, Jim realizes his new superiors are determined to use him for their own ends and keep him in the dark—especially about the fates of his wife and son…

Capturing the best and the worst moments in the history of some of America's favorite teams, this entertaining and informative series for sports fans includes information on the best and worst teams and players of all times, the greatest and worst moments in franchise history, dramatic comebacks and blown leads, overrated and underrated players and coaches, and more, all complemented by archival photographs.