Travels in West Africa

Travels in West Africa
Author: Mary H. Kingsley
Publisher:
Total Pages: 842
Release: 1897
Genre: Africa, West
ISBN:

As a dutiful Victorian daughter, the author was thirty before being freed (by her parents' deaths) to do as she chose. She went to West Africa in 1893 and again in 1895, to investigate the beliefs and customs of the inland tribes and also to collect zoological specimens. She was appalled by the 'thin veneer of rubbishy white culture' imposed by British officials and was not afraid to say so.

Fielding's the World's Most Dangerous Places

Fielding's the World's Most Dangerous Places
Author: Robert Young Pelton
Publisher:
Total Pages: 996
Release: 1998
Genre: Hazardous geographic environments
ISBN: 9781569521403

"Absolutely Fabulous" (Wired). "The single best source for unclassified intelligence information" (U.S. military deployment officer). "A real lifesaver" (Time). The critics rave and here's why: Robert Young Pelton goes where the timid fear to tread -- straight into the heart of the world's forbidden, lethal, even criminal places, and gives readers all they need to know to survive. Pelton reveals the hidden dangers, including disease, land mines, kidnapping, terrorists, mercenaries, mujahedin, and militias of more than 30 dangerous countries. With firsthand accounts of adventures in these places, Pelton provides indispensable information on contacts for rescue organizations, environmental groups, political activists (including rebel groups), training schools in outdoor survival, ice climbing, commando techniques, motorcycle racing, and other white-knuckle pursuits. The World's Most Dangerous Places is everything you didn't want to know about drugs, guns, crime, war, accidents, and uprisings, but should, in one engrossing book.

The Road Chose Me Volume 2

The Road Chose Me Volume 2
Author: Dan Grec
Publisher:
Total Pages: 384
Release: 2020-12-20
Genre:
ISBN: 9780995198968

Searching for even more wild places and new experiences, Dan became determined to explore 'off the map' in Africa. From the mighty Sahara Desert in the north to the dense equatorial jungles of the Congo and the open grasslands of Southern Africa, Dan turned his biggest dream into reality. Over the course of three years Dan's second major expedition spanned fifty-four thousand miles through thirty-five unique African countries. THE ADVENTURE WAS A THOUSAND TIMES BIGGER THAN HE DREAMED POSSIBLE. After exploring the Pan-American Highway from Alaska to Argentina Dan became hooked on the freedom of global overland travel, and he only wanted more. New languages, exotic foods, stunning landscapes and local people with an entirely different outlook became Dan's everyday life. As the months turned into years, through highlights and despair Dan gained a new appreciation for what it truly means to be alive. Viewing our modern world through African eyes gave Dan a new perspective, and he was pulled in by the endless joy, laughter and kindness at every turn. While the landscapes and wildlife are undeniably breathtaking, it is the natural warmth of the African people that is truly unforgettable. All across the continent Dan was welcomed with love and generosity, and now he will never be the same.

Rogue State

Rogue State
Author: William Blum
Publisher: Zed Books
Total Pages: 404
Release: 2006-02-13
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781842778272

Rogue State and its author came to sudden international attention when Osama Bin Laden quoted the book publicly in January 2006, propelling the book to the top of the bestseller charts in a matter of hours. This book is a revised and updated version of the edition Bin Laden referred to in his address.

The Prometheus Deception/The Sigma Protocol

The Prometheus Deception/The Sigma Protocol
Author: Robert Ludlum
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Total Pages: 1316
Release: 2006-09-05
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1429993731

Prometheus Deception Robert Ludlum is the acknowledged master of suspense and international intrigue. For over thirty years, in over twenty international bestsellers, he has a set a standard that has never been equaled. Now, with the Prometheus Deception, he proves that he is at the very pinnacle of his craft. Nicholas Bryson spent years as a deep cover operative for the American secret intelligence group, the Directorate. After critical undercover mission went horribly wrong, Bryson was retired to a new identity. Years later, his closely held cover is cracked and Bryson learns that the Directorate was not what it claimed - that he was a pawn in a complex scheme against his own country's interests. Now, it has become increasingly clear that the shadowy Directorate is headed for some dangerous endgame - but no one knows precisely who they are and what they are planning. With Bryson their only possible asset, the director of the CIA recruits Bryson to find, reinfiltrate, and stop the Directorate. But after years on the sidelines, Bryson's field skills are rusty, his contacts unreliable, and his instincts suspect. With everything he thought he knew about his own life in question, Bryson is all alone in a wilderness of mirrors - unsure what is and isn't true and who, if anyone, he can trust - with the future of millions in the balance. Sigma Protocol Ben Hartman is vacationing in Zurich, Switzerland when he chances upon his old friend Jimmy Cavanaugh—a madman who's armed and programmed to assassinate. In a matter of minutes, six innocent bystanders are dead. So is Cavanaugh. But when his body vanishes, and his weapon mysteriously appears in Hartman's luggage, Hartman is plunged into an unfathomable nightmare... Meanwhile, Anna Navarro, field agent for the Department of Justice, has been asked to investigate the sudden, random deaths of eleven men throughout the world. The only thing that connects them? A secret file, over a half-century old, that's linked to the CIA—and is marked with the same puzzling codename: Sigma. As Anna follows the connecting thread—and Hartman finds himself on the run—she ends up in the shadows of a relentless killer who is one step ahead of her...victim by victim. Now, she and Hartman together must uncover the diabolical secrets long held behind Sigma. It will threaten everything they think they know about themselves—and confirm their very worst fears...

A Mercy

A Mercy
Author: Toni Morrison
Publisher: Vintage Canada
Total Pages: 210
Release: 2009-08-11
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 030737307X

A powerful tragedy distilled into a small masterpiece by the Nobel Prize-winning author of Beloved and, almost like a prelude to that story, set two centuries earlier. Jacob is an Anglo-Dutch trader in 1680s United States, when the slave trade is still in its infancy. Reluctantly he takes a small slave girl in part payment from a plantation owner for a bad debt. Feeling rejected by her slave mother, 14-year-old Florens can read and write and might be useful on his farm. Florens looks for love, first from Lina, an older servant woman at her new master's house, but later from the handsome blacksmith, an African, never enslaved, who comes riding into their lives . . . At the novel's heart, like Beloved, it is the ambivalent, disturbing story of a mother and a daughter – a mother who casts off her daughter in order to save her, and a daughter who may never exorcise that abandonment.

The Dawn of the Deed

The Dawn of the Deed
Author: John A. Long
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 296
Release: 2012-10-22
Genre: Science
ISBN: 022600211X

“[A] deliciously written account of the evolution of sex, in all of its bizarre manifestations” by a noted paleontologist—"Read, blush, and enjoy!” (Jared Diamond, author of Guns, Germs, and Steel). We all know about the birds and the bees, but what about the ancient placoderm fishes and the dinosaurs? In 2008, paleontologist John A. Long and a team of researchers announced their discovery of a 380-million-year-old placoderm fish fossil, known as “the mother fish,” which revealed the earliest known example of internal fertilization. As a result, placoderms are now considered to be the first species to have had intimate sexual reproduction, or sex as we know it—sort of. Inspired by this incredible find, Long began a quest to uncover the evolutionary history of copulation and insemination. In The Dawn of the Deed, he takes readers on a lively tour through the sex lives of ancient fish and the unusual mating habits of arthropods, tortoises, and even a well-endowed Argentine Duck. Long discusses these discoveries alongside what we know about reproductive biology and evolutionary theory, using the fossil record to provide a provocative account of prehistoric sex. The Dawn of the Deed also explores fascinating revelations about animal reproduction, from homosexual penguins to monogamous seahorses to the difficulties of dinosaur romance.

The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches

The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches
Author: Matsuo Basho
Publisher: Penguin UK
Total Pages: 145
Release: 2020-02-27
Genre: Poetry
ISBN: 0141913657

'It was with awe That I beheld Fresh leaves, green leaves, Bright in the sun' When the Japanese haiku master Basho composed The Narrow Road to the Deep North, he was an ardent student of Zen Buddhism, setting off on a series of travels designed to strip away the trappings of the material world and bring spiritual enlightenment. He writes of the seasons changing, the smell of the rain, the brightness of the moon and the beauty of the waterfall, through which he sensed the mysteries of the universe. These writings not only chronicle Basho's travels, but they also capture his vision of eternity in the transient world around him. Translated with an Introduction by Nobuyuki Yuasa

Daddy's Girl

Daddy's Girl
Author: Lisa Scottoline
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 414
Release: 2009-10-13
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0061797766

From the New York Times bestselling author of Dirty Blonde comes a fast-paced thriller in which a young law professor must unravel a conspiracy to see justice done Law professor Natalie Greco’s life is going according to plan, with a boyfriend handpicked by her father and tenure status only a review board away. Then, during a visit to a prison with her colleague Angus, a riot explodes. Rushing to the aid of a fatally wounded prison guard, Nat is privy to his last words—words that, unknown to Nat, can unlock the key to a dangerous conspiracy. Suddenly Nat, A Girl Who Always Plays By The Rules, finds threats around every curve: ruthless killers desperate to keep her from exposing their secret; police who are convinced she is responsible for a cold-blooded murder; and sexy Angus, whose mere presence makes her question her dedication to her long-term boyfriend. With her life on the line, her career in the balance, and her boyfriend on hold, Nat has to go into hiding to buy enough time to figure out the hidden secrets behind one man’s last words.