It is 1915 and the Great War has been raging for a year when Edward Rowbotham, a coal miner from the Midlands, volunteers for Kitchener’s Army. Drafted into the newly formed Machine Gun Corps, he is sent to fight in places whose names will forever be associated with mud and blood and sacrifice: Ypres, the Somme and Passchendaele. He is one of the ‘lucky’ ones, winning the Military Medal for bravery and surviving more than two-and-a-half years of the terrible slaughter, which wiped out all but six of his original company.He wrote these memoirs fifty years later, but found his memories of life in the trenches had not diminished at all. The sights and sounds of battle, the excitement, the terror, the extraordinary comradeship, are all vividly described as if they had happened to him only yesterday.
It is 1915 and the Great War has been raging for a year, when Edward Rowbotham, a coal miner from the Midlands, volunteers for Kitchener's Army. Drafted into the newly-formed Machine Gun Corps, he is sent to fight in places whose names will forever be associated with mud and blood and sacrifice: Ypres, the Somme, and Passchendaele. He is one of the 'lucky' ones, winning the Military Medal for bravery and surviving more than two-and-a-half years of the terrible slaughter that left nearly a million British soldiers dead by 1918 and wiped out all but six of his original company. He wrote these memoirs fifty years later, but found his memories of life in the trenches had not diminished at all. The sights and sounds of battle, the excitement, the terror, the extraordinary comradeship, are all vividly described as if they had happened to him only yesterday. Likely to be one of the last first-hand accounts to come to light, Mud, Blood and Bullets offers a rare perspective of the First World War from an ordinary soldier's viewpoint.
The true story of how Britain won the First World War. The popular view of the First World War remains that of BLACKADDER: incompetent generals sending brave soldiers to their deaths. Alan Clark quoted a German general's remark that the British soldiers were 'lions led by donkeys'. But he made it up. Indeed, many established 'facts' about 1914-18 turn out to be myths woven in the 1960s by young historians on the make. Gordon Corrigan's brilliant, witty history reveals how out of touch we have become with the soldiers of 1914-18. They simply would not recognize the way their generation is depicted on TV or in Pat Barker's novels. Laced with dry humour, this will overturn everything you thought you knew about Britain and the First World War. Gordon Corrigan reveals how the British embraced technology, and developed the weapons and tactics to break through the enemy trenches.
Adapts an engaging selection of true stories from World War I in a graphically illustrated format in the style of the creator's popular Hazardous Tales, sharing accessible introductions to well-known battles and lesser-known secrets. By the award-winning creator of Rapunzel's Revenge.
This book describes the experiences of the author's great-uncle, Wilberforce Cooper, who was an Anglican priest ministering to the people of Vancouver's downtown east side during 1921-1952. Reverend Cooper began his ecclesiastical calling in the slums of London and then as a British Army chaplain in the hospitals and trenches of WW1 before moving to Canada - first to the B.C. Cariboo and then to be the rector of St. James Church in Vancouver. During the early-mid 1900s the East End of Vancouver was home to most of the city's poor, homeless, addicted and unemployed, and was a magnet for illegal intoxicants, disreputable venues and prostitution. In addition, the East End was where Chinese and Japanese immigrants had settled and their presence attracted the continuing attention of white racists. And all this vice and prejudice was enabled by a corrupt Civic Administration that depended upon graft. This was the parish that Father Cooper presided over and where he became well known and loved as someone who cared and fought for the physical as well as the spiritual wellbeing of each individual resident. The author has made use of unpublished memoirs as well as stories in newspapers and other writings to document his great-uncle's life and times. While a number of references to Rev. Cooper's religious thought and outreach can be found in the literature, this is the first book to address his work and actions solidly within the context of the social and political milieu of the Lower Mainland during his tenure.
He and Him is an autobiography dealing with both psychology and archaeology in the author's life. He was born during the Great Depression. His parents were an Ohio .farmerette and a man from the Tennessee mountains who had become an alcoholic on moonshine whiskey. It was a dysfunctional family from the start. The mom soon developed very serious emotional problems apparently because she wasn't satisfied with the man whom she had married. When the author was a six-year-old boy she told him that she planned to take him and leave his dad. However, she did the exact opposite and had more kids. Upon adding more offspring to the household; the author, then seven years old, became the victim of terrible physical and emotional abuse, as well as complete neglect. From the age of seven the author had to essentially raise himself. He tried to avoid his parents as much as possible by spending his days in the fields and meadows by himself collecting butterflies, pretty rocks, and looking for prehistoric Indian arrowheads. After finding a few Indian arrowheads on farms in Ohio he started a collection of Indian arrowheads and other artifacts at a very young age. His collection eventually turned into a very renowned private museum as he got a little older. When the author was almost thirteen years old his parents quit farming and started operating their own country store in a different community. Chapter 3 in this book describes life in country stores in Ohio during the 1940s and 1950s. The author lived in such a country store environment until he turned eighteen and went away to college. He was the first of any of his relatives to ever go away to college. His mother furnished him money to attend college, but he did it completely on his own with absolutely no family encouragement or support to get a degree. From "the time that the author started getting educated his mom refused to ever call him by his given name. She only referred to him as either "He or Him." Others in the family soon became full of covetousness towards him because they perceived that he had advantages which they didn't have. Competitive jealousy of others in the household mounted, their believinq that they had to try to outdo the educated member of the family. A long, drawn-out, bitter family war against the author ensued. Disrespect for the author's higher education continued in later years by not only the third generation, but also by in-laws who didn't even know the author when he was in college! After receiving both a BS degree and an MA degree in geology, with a master's thesis dealing with archaeology of Archaic Indian sites near his hometown, the author took a temporary summer job as a national park ranger at Canyon de Chelly National Monument at Chinle, Arizona. Canyon de Chelly is located in the center of the vast Navajo Indian Reservation. Getting to live and work in such a beautiful natural area was like a dream come true. That first summers work at Canyon de Chelly motivated the author to eventually work as a seasonal park ranger in six other national parks and monuments. After working at Canyon de Chelly for one summer , the author ended up going back to Arizona where he lived for ten more years. He married a woman in Kansas who he hardly even knew, then he went to the University of Arizona where he spent two years working towards a PhD degree. After that, he and his wife spent eight more years back on the Navajo Indian Reservation. During those years on the reservation he taught Navajo Indian children on a substitute teaching certificate. It was a full-time job in the winter. Almost all of his students were Navajo Indians. He taught all grade levels from kindergarten through high school. Chapters 6, 7, and 8 of this book are devoted to stories about life in remote areas of the reservation in the 1960s and 1970s. At that time the author's doctor and grocery stores were 145 miles from where he lived. There we
Four hundred years in the future, genetic engineering has created three species of humans. Homo sapiens – the Sapes – are the masters. The Sirians are savage and insular. The Helots are slaves, denied even the right to breed. Now, after generations of abuse and exploitation, the Helots seek to overthrow their masters by attacking Zeus, the supercomputer that oversees the Sapes’ society. For Maddy Hawthorn, a Sape colonist, the peaceful life she had planned at Barnard’s Star is torn apart when she becomes involved in the Helot’s terrorist plot to destroy the stranglehold of the Elite over the other races. Reluctantly, she joins up with insurgent Helot Igil Hoo and renegade Sirian Dorac Elsilunda. Together, they are forced to work for the revolution. Soon they are sent on a suicide mission to destroy Zeus. Trying to stop them is Agnes Lawson, a navy commander who finds herself sympathizing more and more with the rebels. On a remote planet called Lizard all four find themselves facing not only formidable military opposition but also fundamental questions about their own motives, as well as the nature of the society which has made them who they are.
Shortlisted for the 2022 Gordon Burn Prize • Shortlisted for the 2022 Ned Kelly Awards • Longlisted for the 2022 Booker Prize • Longlisted for the 2022 HWA Gold Crown Award The Booker-shortlisted author of His Bloody Project blurs the lines between patient and therapist, fiction and documentation, and reality and dark imagination. London, 1965. 'I have decided to write down everything that happens, because I feel, I suppose, I may be putting myself in danger,' writes an anonymous patient, a young woman investigating her sister's suicide. In the guise of a dynamic and troubled alter-ego named Rebecca Smyth, she makes an appointment with the notorious and roughly charismatic psychotherapist Collins Braithwaite, whom she believes is responsible for her sister's death. But in this world of beguilement and bamboozlement, neither she nor we can be certain of anything. Case Study is a novel as slippery as it is riveting, as playful as it is sinister, a meditation on truth, sanity, and the instability of identity by one of the most inventive novelists of our time.
His first big Hollywood job was herding geese on the set of a John Ford western. Willing to do anything-props, set dressing, stunts-to finance his college education, John Wayne finally broke into acting. For over thirty years, he's ridden across the big screen bringing destruction to the bad guys, ever-willing to lend a helping hand to maidens in distress. (from the back cover of the book).
