Rediscovering Rawlings
by Bill Belleville

Nature writer Bill Belleville takes us behind the scenes of a PBS documentary via kayak, boat, and hiking trail as he and his fellow filmmakers come to better understand how the St. Johns has historically shaped culture and “sense of place” over time. They do so by recreating a river journey that Pulitzer prize-winning author Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings once made on the St. Johns in 1933. Chronicled in the “Hyacinth Drift” chapter of Cross Creek, the original sojourn took Rawlings and her cracker neighbor Dessie Smith out on the river for ten days. At one point, they became so lost that the drift of the floating water hyacinth was their only navigational clue.

In the modern voyage, two women recreate the trip by following the historic route from below Puzzle Lake, beyond lakes Harney, Jesup, Monroe, Dexter, and George, up into the Ocklawaha River. Along the way, the modern sojourners come to understand how the river still has the capacity to allow a connection. Despite the vanishing paradise of the place once known as “La Florida”, enough wilderness remains to let nature reach out and touch the soul. The process is revealed to us in a colorful narrative that is both descriptive and lyrical.

Irish Eyes
by Marty Kay

The mean streets of Philadelphia in mid-winter are no place for a homeless Irishman without legal residency status. When Michael Maguire gets beaten up, stabbed and left for dead, he finds himself hospitalized, then arrested and brought before a Federal judge. Avoiding deportation he comes to the attention of a local construction magnate who employs him to lobby two U.S. senators in support of legislation legitimizing the immigrant labor he depends on. Michael becomes involved with a senator’s daughter, has a child to another girlfriend, smashes a drug ring his ex-wife’s boyfriend is part of and maintains a strong friendship with his own beloved daughter throughout. A gripping story, the author follows the protagonist’s journey both in the United States and Ireland to take us on an emotional roller coaster exploring the problems that emanate from power, politics, love, loss and deceit.

Stormboy the Mouse
by Jessie L. Parker

Two Mothers, enemies by nature, leave their shelters during a raging storm.

Both are driven by a single purpose- to save their young.

Genna, a homeless mother cat, carrying her Kitt to a safer shelter faces a heart breaking loss as the storm sweeps her beloved baby away − and out of sight.

Wheat, a small field mouse far across town races to save her mouselet family that’s been swept away from their briar patch home by the driving rain.

An unsuspected fierce storm brings two animal families together, and out of a crisis situation comes friendship, care, and acceptance for one another.

Isle Royale's Open Seasons
by Greg M. Romaneck

Isle Royale National Park sits in the northern reaches of Lake Superior. There, in this isolated setting, a remote ecosystem co-exists beside the chilled depths of the largest freshwater lake in the New World. Isle Royale is home to wolves and moose who engage in a dance of death on a daily basis. Loons call from the inland lakes and along Superior’s shoreline. At night, the clear skies reveal the depths of the Milky Way. This is a place to hike and dream. The poetry of this landscape and its residents resounds for the few travelers who make the trek to this isolated wilderness during the three seasons when the park remains open. Isle Royale’s Open Seasons provides readers a cycle of poems written in this beautiful Northwoods setting. Readers will encounter the shapes, sounds, and emotions that this park can offer to an observant visitor. In reading these poems individuals who have visited Isle Royale may well recognize familiar places. For those unfamiliar with Isle Royale, this cycle of poems offers insights into not just one place, but life as large as well.

Prejudice in Harry Potter's World
by Karen A. Brown

Crisp, insightful, engaging, and thoroughly researched, Prejudice in Harry Potter’s World turns the tables on literary critique. Brown shows uncommon, in-depth knowledge of the Harry Potter canon. And she delves straight into her analysis of social themes in J.K. Rowling’s work without pulling any punches. First, the book provides a detailed outline of the social hierarchy in the so-called “wizarding world.” Then, the author offers perceptive and highly relevant commentaries. Each chapter focuses on how a select group contributes to wizarding society and helps to maintain the social order…whether by embracing their own oppression or by oppressing others.

The Filmmakers
by Michael Corrigan

Through a chance encounter, a young film student kills a hitman in self defense and steals mob money to fund his film. He finds himself the object of a hunt by a police detective and the mob,including the hitman's brother. Will the film ever get made? Who will show up on the set?

My Toy! My Toy! My Toy!
by P.D. Edwards

A thought provoking seldom told story about a love affair between a man and a woman with a secret. ‘My Toy’ is a human-interest story that details the difficulty of living a double life and the importance of the image of a happy marriage in modern society—which all too often is a story of deception born of necessity.

The Story takes place in Athens and San Francisco with contrasting views of Greek and American cultures and sub-cultures.

The Abduction of Adam Danik
by Ron Karcz

Family values…Deadbeat Dad…Deadbeat mom…Abandonment…Alienation…Parental Abduction…these are hot button issues today. The kind politicians strive to get elected on and not as easy to define, as some seem to think. As Jack Danik learned, the hard way, our nation’s ‘system’ of laws and judicial atmosphere contribute heavily to the negative aftermath of these issues. Little consideration, if any, is given to the fact ‘both’ parents are ‘necessary’ to the emotional and physical development of all children. However, manipulating the system through legal semantics with immense financial resource, Paula Danik creates a tragic outcome for their son, Adam.

Jack Danik believed he and his son were soul mates from the moment Jack cut the umbilical cord as the infant lay on his mother’s abdomen. In the ensuing six years their marriage disintegrated and finally came to an end after Jack discovered a long-term affair with another man in a neighboring state. Trusting Paula’s word to never come between Jack and Adam, they hashed out the conditions of their divorce and joint custody of Adam, with Jack ignoring the warnings of his attorney about letting Paula take Adam to another state.

Without rhetoric or idealistic ‘mumbo-jumbo’ this is the ‘other side,’ the ‘real side,’ of today’s divorce/custody hot button issues and the devastation they wreak. The alienation and subsequent legal abduction of Adam Danik from his father described in this compelling story leads to neither murder nor out-and-out concealment. However, the mayhem wreaked on the psyche of the non-custodial parent, grandparents, and the child is horrible beyond comprehension.

The message in this non-gender-based, factually true book is significant and informative to all parents, grandparents, teachers, social workers, doctors, attorneys, and judges. In the end, alone, broken, and defeated, Jack Danik’s warning is chilling…Except for the names and a few other changes, this story could be yours.

Smart Blonde
by Ron Karcz

I know this is hard to believe but, men are not the only less then forthright people in the online dating world as you’ve been led to believe by Oprah and many others like her. Tony Costa takes you on an unbelievable and hilarious trip through the online dating world. His belief that women are the ‘perfect hunters’ is born out of his adventures with a number of ‘Nymphs of the Net’ as he falls head first into relationships with a bevy of beauties who are less than honest in the writing and publication of their profiles and the posting of their pictures. As he soon finds out, most have more baggage than a carousel at JFK.

One of his first adventures was with Kiki Swift, aka Smart Blonde. After a brief romantic encounter, Tony and Kiki soon became brother/sister close. Kiki quickly becomes Tony’s close advisor and muse while providing Tony a shoulder to cry on through many of his misguided adventures.

Undaunted, the unflagging optimist Tony Costa continues his search for his perfectly matched mate while dealing within the online dating circles. He soon reaches a crushing realization; what you see is not necessarily what you get.

Costa’s story is humorous, lighthearted, serious, and at times exposes real human emotion. Nonetheless, Tony continues taking you on the roller coaster ride over The Love Highway of the Internet. The human event, after all, is humor for the most part and we are merely the players in the great comedy of life. The ending is heartwarming as Costa finds himself where he originally longed to be and not quite knowing how to handle his emotions or how he got there.

Welcome to the whacky world of Ron Karcz as he tells tales of online dating adventures in Smart Blonde. Find a little of yourself and enjoy the laugh.

Ancient Lake
by David Coleman

Ex-librarian Anne Cheron returns to her native Texas town to find her missing brother Eddie, who has vanished beneath the deceptively calm waters of Ancient Lake. But Anne will never see Eddie again, at least not as the warm, loving sibling of a shared, pain-filled childhood. Before Anne realizes the depths of evil she faces, she is in way over her terrified head, targeted for death by the very horror that killed Eddie… and now wants her hideously slaughtered, too. Stalked by unknown enemies paranormal and human as well, Anne Cheron must solve the mystery of the forbidding Ancient Lake or die in its depths, the last in a series of unsolved murders.

Tied-Up in Tonawanda
by David Golden

FROM THE AUTHOR:
My books are welcomed get-aways from the turmoil of life’s everyday struggles. They are very explicitly described and elaborate on many detailed incidents that the characters in the books encounter. I intended for these books to be a cross between a Louis L’Amour, a Zane Grey, a Danielle Steele, and a Harlequin Romance novel. I tried to appeal to a diverse reading audience. Each volume of my on-going saga has humor, suspense, romantic encounters (without being ‘too’ explicit), and an ending that the reader never suspects! Each book contains a “hook”. My books depict in words the 1890s but each book has something that is chronologically out of order. See if you can find it. E-mail me on my website, if you can’t!

It Takes a Worried Man
by Phil Vinson

Greg Spencer is a worried young man. He’s set his sights on a career as a newspaper editor and a future life with his college sweetheart, Suzy Cox. But after a serious accident, Greg is beset by crippling panic attacks. He finishes college and is named city editor of a Galveston newspaper, where he becomes involved in covering a major scandal. As a result of the pressure, his panic attacks return in full fury. Suzy loses patience with his illness, and Greg reaches the end of his rope. He wades through a labyrinth of failed therapies practiced by doctors, who, in the 1960s, had yet to fully understand anxiety disorders. Then, Greg meets Dr. Marilyn Reed in an unlikely location. This is a gripping story of love, loss, perseverance, and triumph in a time when American society was undergoing major changes.

The Second Coming of Common Sense
by A.J. Wildman

FROM THE AUTHOR:
When starting this book on July 1, 2005 I already believed that neither Party had the vision or political guts to effectively confront the Special Interest driven Status Quo and resolve our Common Problems. It is now early February 2008 and the events of the last two-and-a-half years, unfortunately, have proven them less capable or willing to confront those challenges.

It is just another reason why somebody had to write such a book as CS2 about really confronting or resolving some of those serious on-going problems – to call our People to action – and to propose our Second American Revolution.

In 1776, it took Common Sense and our national ancestor’s blood and determination to create America and our radical new Democratic government. They confronted the all too powerful Few that are exercising far too much power over the Common Good and regain control over our national Destiny. That not being dramatic, because it is the Plain Truth.

We the People must decide our nation’s future. To confront our historic challenges of 2008 and decide whether or not to control our own destiny…

In particular I am challenging my fellow Baby Boomers for it is now our watch. We must show true leadership for the sake of our children’s generation and for those that follow them.

And, like it or not, We will now unavoidably make that Common Decision−either by our deliberate action or our inaction.

An Insight into the Information Technology Industry
by Dr. Amir Tajfar

The growth in the information technology in the past twenty years has been so significant that many professionals working in various industries and even large number of individuals in the IT industry are falling behind the ever-growing IT related technologies. This book is designed to provide the readers with a very good understanding about the IT industry as well as the most up-to-date knowledge about the industry. The unique features of this book are:

• It is very industrial oriented
• Very comprehensive and covers almost all features about the industry, including project management related techniques, quality assurance, quality management and audit, project architecture, project life cycle, business development, project economy, etc. In fact no other books cover so many different topics.

It covers very basic as well as the most detailed part of the industry, in order to support a wide range of audiences. Regardless of your knowledge level, you will find something new in this book.