Storming Intrepid

Hijack, Betrayal, Murder -- The Ultimate Suspense In this classic Cold War novel, Payne Harrison straps you in for a techno-thriller ride as the superpowers square off to control the strategic high ground of space. Crippled and silent, the Intrepid orbits the earth. On board is a military payload so secret that only the most senior defense and intelligence officials know of its existence. But as Space Command mounts a mission to rescue a crew they fear is dead, a spy satellite eavesdrops on an astounding transmission between the shuttle and a ground station deep in the heart of the Soviet Union. An SR-71 Blackbird spyplane is scrambled to brave the full fury of the Soviet air defense forces, and confirms a horrific suspicion. The shuttle and its irreplaceable payload are under Russian control!

The convergence of twentieth-century narrative and technology is one of the most important developments in current literary study. Roughly a decade after the founding of the Society for Literature and Science, and after the appearance of such influential books as Kathleen Woodward's Culture of Information and William Paulson's Noise of Culture, Joseph Tabbi and Michael Wutz have edited a landmark volume that seeks to summarize this still-emerging field. Through the essays and the wide-ranging overview provided by the editors' introduction, Reading Matters shows how these theoretical concerns can contribute to the practical study of narrative, and it helps to make the field far more accessible to students and other serious readers of fiction. The twelve original essays, published here for the first time, are the work of distinguished scholar-critics on both sides of the Atlantic. They cover the range of contemporary literature, from the canonical novels of high modernism and postmodernism through subjects only recently put on the academic agenda, such as cyberpunk and hypertext fiction. In an age that has proclaimed the death of the novel many times over, the editors and contributors argue persuasively for the continued vitality of literary narrative. By responding in ingenious ways to the capabilities of other media, they assert, the novel has enlarged and redefined its territory of representation and its range of techniques and play, while maintaining its viability in the new media assemblage.

Since its invention in 1903, the airplane has become the dominant mode of transport, travel, and combat. It has brought the entire planet closer together and changed almost every aspect of how we live today. Along the way, the airplane has inspired writers in every decade of the twentieth century to celebrate this world-changing creation. From the wild first years of aviation when daredevil men challenged each other to set altitude records to the terrible three-dimensional landscape of combat in the air through all the wars of this century, authors from around the world have written of the airplanes and the men and women who fly them. Now, bestselling author Stephen Coonts has collected some of the finest fiction about flying in one volume. On Glorious Wings contains stories and excerpts from world-renowned authors, including Dale Brown, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Louis L'Amour, James Michener, Joseph Heller, Len Deighton, Frederick Forsyth, William Faulkner, Ralph Peters and Stephen Coonts himself. From the rickety wire-and-wood contraptions of the 1920s to the possible future of warfare in 2020, this collection invites you to take to the skies with some of today's most acclaimed authors, including: "Five Weeks in a Balloon" by Jules Verne: Take a fanciful trip through the air as imagined by one of the great authors of the nineteenth century. "All of the Dead Pilots" by William Faulkner: One of America's greatest storytellers looks at Britain in World War II, where a brash American pilot and an unflappable British officer clash over the same woman. "Wings over Khabarovsk" by Louis L'Amour: The great Western writer also penned many tales for the pulp magazines of the 1930s and '40s, including this classic of the genre about an American pilot framed for spying on the far side of the world. "An Hour to San Francisco," from The High and the Mighty, by Ernest K. Gann: When a four-engine plane loses an engine over the Pacific Ocean, what had been an uneventful trip becomes a white-knuckle race for survival. "Corey Ford Buys the Farm," from Flight of the Intruder, by Stephen Coonts: During the Vietnam Conflict, pilots took lightly armed A-6 Intruders on harrowing near-suicide missions against the North Vietnamese army. Here, the master of the military thriller takes you along for the ride inside the cockpit as three Intruders head out to destroy some Russian MiG fighters grounded in Laos. "Power River MOA," from The Sky Masters, by Dale Brown: At the Powder River weapons-testing site, the jet fighters may fire blanks, but the air combat simulations are as real as can be. Strap yourself in for a ride in the latest in bomber technology-the EB-52 Megafortress. "Retaliation," from The War in 2020, by Ralph Peters: In the near future, America is threatened by a joint Iran-Japan military force that threatens the Middle East and Europe. Saddle up with the high-tech, hard-hitting cavalry soldiers of the future and their armored, fire-breathing future flying machines as they take to the air to raid on an enemy base. With an introduction and story notes written by Stephen Coonts, On Glorious Wings is a must-have for any aviation enthusiast. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

THE MANY LIVES AND DEATHS OF JAMES BOND looks at both the James Bond novels, and the James Bond films, and how they have related to each other and pop culture as a whole, from the place of Ian Fleming in the history of the spy novel, to the impact of the early Bond films on the action movie, to how the series has responded to six decades of political and cultural change. This second edition of the book up to date with coverage of the fiftieth anniversary film SKYFALL, and William Boyd's Bond novel, SOLO.

Criminal defense lawyer Cash McCahill pleads for his life before a jury of one: La Tigra, the lethal leader of a drug cartel. To avoid ending up as an appetizer for her pet tiger, he promises to defend the case of her choice and win it. When La Tigra calls in the chit, Cash has no way out of cartel hell, except death. Lose at trial, and he will pay with his life. Win, and he becomes the go-to mouthpiece for merchants of death—surviving only as long as he keeps winning. A rival cartel moves into Texas and gives Cash a choice: work for the new killers on the block or die at La Tigra’s side. Bombings on both sides of the border put Cash in the crosshairs of two gangs and two governments. As if there is a difference. To escape the clutches of the cops and the cartels, Cash must broker a ceasefire, but peace and his deliverance will come with a heavy price.

Two centuries before the daring exploits of Navy SEALs and Marine Raiders captured the public imagination, the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps were already engaged in similarly perilous missions: raiding pirate camps, attacking enemy ships in the dark of night, and striking enemy facilities and resources on shore. Even John Paul Jones, father of the American navy, saw such irregular operations as critical to naval warfare. With Jones’s own experience as a starting point, Benjamin Armstrong sets out to take irregular naval warfare out of the shadow of the blue-water battles that dominate naval history. This book, the first historical study of its kind, makes a compelling case for raiding and irregular naval warfare as key elements in the story of American sea power. Beginning with the Continental Navy, Small Boats and Daring Men traces maritime missions through the wars of the early republic, from the coast of modern-day Libya to the rivers and inlets of the Chesapeake Bay. At the same time, Armstrong examines the era’s conflicts with nonstate enemies and threats to American peacetime interests along Pacific and Caribbean shores. Armstrong brings a uniquely informed perspective to his subject; and his work—with reference to original naval operational reports, sailors’ memoirs and diaries, and officers’ correspondence—is at once an exciting narrative of danger and combat at sea and a thoroughgoing analysis of how these events fit into concepts of American sea power. Offering a critical new look at the naval history of the Early American era, this book also raises fundamental questions for naval strategy in the twenty-first century.