Victory 365

365-Day Devotional Encourages Athletes and Coaches to Take a Time-Out to Center on Their Relationship with God Even as they strive for victory on the field or on the court, athletes and coaches can make strides toward richer spiritual lives. Growing in faith helps athletes and coaches grow as positive influences on the teammates, coaches, opponents, and parents around them. This 365-day devotional encourages athletes and coaches to take a time-out to rethink and re-center on their faith. Each entry opens with an inspirational thought and a related Scripture. A reflection question at the end of each entry helps the reader apply the lesson to his or her life as both a believer and a participant in the competitive arena.

Opening Moves -- The First Invasion -- A New British Strategy -- A Question of American Command -- Laying the Groundwork -- The Fall of Fort Ticonderoga -- Defeat, Retreat, Disgrace -- Aftershocks -- Burgoyne Moves South -- The Ordeal of Philip Schuyler -- The Murder of Jane McCrea -- Not to Make a Ticonderoga of It -- Oriskany and Relief -- Cat and Mouse -- Burgoyne's Dilemma -- The Battle of Bennington -- Gates takes Command -- The Battle of Freeman's Farm -- Sir Henry Clinton to the Rescue -- The Battle of Bemis Heights -- Retreat, Pursuit, and Surrender -- British Reassessment -- The Fruits of Victory -- Conclusion: Strategy and Leadership.

From the author of Ruins of War comes an electrifying novel featuring U.S. Army criminal investigator Mason Collins, set in the chaos of post-World War II Germany. When the Third Reich collapsed, the small town Garmisch-Partenkirchen became the home of fleeing war criminals, making it the final depository for the Nazis’ stolen riches. There are fortunes to be made on the black market. Murder, extortion, and corruption have become the norm. It’s a perfect storm for a criminal investigator like Mason Collins, especially when his friend, CIC Agent John Winstone, claims that a group of powerful men are taking over the lucrative trade. But before he can fully explain, Winstone—and his girlfriend— are brutally murdered. Determined to uncover the truth, Mason plunges into a shadowy labyrinth of co-conspirators including former SS and Gestapo officers, U.S. Army OSS officers, and liberated Polish POWs. As both witnesses and evidence begin disappearing, it becomes obvious that someone on high is pulling strings to stifle the investigation—and that Mason must feel his way in the darkness if he is going to find out who in town has the most to gain—and the most to lose… From the Hardcover edition.

After the success at Normandy, the Allied commanders are confident that the war in Europe will soon be over. But in December 1944, in the Ardennes Forest, the Germans launch a ruthless counteroffensive that begins the Battle of the Bulge. The Führer will spare nothing to preserve his twisted vision of a “Thousand Year Reich,” but stout American resistance defeats the German thrust. No Less Than Victory is a riveting account presented through the eyes of Eisenhower, Patton, and the soldiers who struggled face-to-face with their enemy, as well as from the vantage point of Germany’s old soldier, Gerd von Rundstedt, and Hitler’s golden boy, Albert Speer. Jeff Shaara carries the reader on a journey that defines the spirit of the soldier and the horror of a madman’s dreams.

Amidst a world in global turmoil, Victory, a half Native American woman searches for her identity. Victorys mother is a woman of Scottish nobility, an unknowing mistress to Victorys Native American Air Force Captain father, who does not tell her he is married with a wife and children in the States. Cast out from her family in disgrace, Lady Joy McLeod gives birth to Victory and her twin sister in a night of furious rain in a French convent. Victorys twin sister and mother do not survive the birth, plunging Victory into the traumatic world of an orphan, alone and far from both her birth families. Three years pass, in which Victory is an orphan, separated from The People, as her Native American grandfather calls the Cheyenne tribe. In an attempt to salvage his honor and reputation with his people, Victorys father kidnaps her from the convent and returns her to the Indian reservation where her grandfather lives. Victory returns to American, diagnosed as autistic, yet capable of great talents, powers and abilities. Her Native American Grandfather is the only two legged able to reach her, and nurtures and teaches her in the way of his people. Victory begins training as a medicine woman. Yet she finds that spirituality cannot completely explain her world, yet neither can science. Between these two worlds, the spiritual and the material, she must search for an answer, to her life, and to the future of Earth. Her relationship with her father is difficult and painful. Her search for identity as a woman who is half Native American and half wasichu (white) is full of anguish, and includes encounters with racism and rejection from both societies. Victory has experiences in her life that are so horrific that she doubts whether she can go on, but somehow she transcends the pain of the material world through her inner spiritual journeys. Victory is a profile in courage, and her story speaks for the journey of all women. Issues explored within this story are at once both contemporary and searching. Attention is focused on values such as family, love, loyalty, ethnic identification and cultural history. Yet also interwoven in what is right are themes of continual betrayal, hatred, murder and rage. The reader may feel Victory may not be able to rise once more from the ashes of her experiences, but always, true to her name, she has the courage to return to life and walk once more to a goal and a new life. Romance, passion, and sensual experiences are also a part of this vital womans life. Her attitude towards love is much like traditional males, and oftimes contains a double standard. Yet she is not afraid to experience life, even if it means failing and returning again to the world of love. During her lifetime she is married three times but divorce is not within her vocabulary. She experiences the greatest loss of a mother, the loss of children. Yet Victory goes on to celebrate her living children and grandchildren.