The Castaway's War

The Castaway's War
Author: Stephen Harding
Publisher: Hachette+ORM
Total Pages: 252
Release: 2016-05-03
Genre: History
ISBN: 0306823411

Shipwrecked on a South Pacific island, a young US Navy lieutenant waged a one-man war against the Japanese In the early hours of July 5, 1943, the destroyer USS Strong was hit by a Japanese torpedo. The powerful weapon broke the destroyer's back, killed dozens of sailors, and sparked raging fires. While accompanying ships were able to take off most of Strong's surviving crewmembers, scores went into the ocean as the once-proud warship sank beneath the waves--and a young officer's harrowing story of survival began. Lieutenant Hugh Barr Miller, a pre-war football star at the University of Alabama, went into the water as the vessel sank. Severely injured, Miller and several others survived three days at sea and eventually landed on a Japanese-occupied island. The survivors found fresh water and a few coconuts, but Miller, suffering from internal injuries and believing he was on the verge of death, ordered the others to go on without him. They reluctantly did do, believing, as Miller did, that he would be dead within hours. But Miller didn't die, and his health improved enough for him to begin searching for food. He also found the enemy--Japanese forces patrolling the island. Miller was determined to survive, and so launched a one-man war against the island's occupiers. Based on official American and Japanese histories, personal memoirs, and the author's exclusive interviews with many of the story's key participants, The Castaway's War is a rousing story of naval combat, bravery, and determination.

Weather's Here, Wish You Were Great

Weather's Here, Wish You Were Great
Author: Sandy Beech
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 198
Release: 2010-05-11
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 1439113599

Ship to shore! Or whatever that expression is... Yup, still here on this dumb island, and still no sign of rescue. Feels like all we've been doing is hauling firewood around and gathering food. Cleaning up an island is one thing, but this is not what I signed up for! Anyway, now we're planning a dance, if you can believe that. The sky looks a little overcast, but the dance might be fun (even though it was Evil Angela's idea). Especially since I'm trying to figure out whether Josh likes me or not. If only Kenny would stop bugging me, things might be okay. I mean, seriously, what else could go wrong?

Castaways in Time

Castaways in Time
Author: Robert Adams
Publisher:
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2014-04
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9781594263040

A WHIRLWIND IN TIME It was a storm to end all storms, and when it was over Sebastian Foster and his five unexpected house guests--all refugees from the fury of the wind and rain--should have been happy just to be alive. But when the clouds finally cleared, the world outside Bass's home was no longer the twentieth-century America they all knew. Instead, through some bizarre twist in time, the six of them had ended up in England's past. But it was a past that never existed in any history book, a place where the Church was waging a holy war to depose Arthur III and make his nephew king of England and Wales. Thrust into this barbaric world of bloody combat, the time travelers were quick to realize that their modern weapons and knowledge could change the whole course of this England's future--and maybe help them find their way home again--if the warring factions didn't destroy them before they even had a chance to get started...

Tarzan and the Castaways

Tarzan and the Castaways
Author: Edgar Rice Burroughs
Publisher: eStar Books
Total Pages: 584
Release: 2013-06-01
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1612106587

Tarzan becomes stranded on an island inhabited by the members of the ancient Mayan Civilization…

Cast Away

Cast Away
Author: Charlotte McDonald-Gibson
Publisher: New Press, The
Total Pages: 254
Release: 2016-09-06
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1620972646

Longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence 2017 “Galvanizing and deeply compassionate.” —O Magazine From Time magazine's European Union correspondent, a powerful exploration of the refugee crisis in the Mediterranean, told through the stories of migrants who have made the perilous journey into Europe In 2015, more than one million migrants and refugees, most fleeing war-torn countries in Africa and the Middle East, attempted to make the perilous journey into Europe. Around three thousand lost their lives as they crossed the Mediterranean and Aegean in rickety boats provided by unscrupulous traffickers, including over seven hundred men, women, and children in a single day in April 2015. In one of the first works of narrative nonfiction on the ongoing refugee crisis and the civil war in Syria, Cast Away describes the agonizing stories and the impossible decisions that migrants have to make as they head toward what they believe is a better life: a pregnant Eritrean woman, four days overdue, chooses to board an obviously unsafe smuggler's ship to Greece; a father, swimming from a sinking ship, has to decide whether to hold on to one child or let him go to save another. Veteran journalist Charlotte McDonald-Gibson offers a vivid, on-the-ground glimpse of the pressures and hopes that drive individuals to risk their lives. Recalling the work of Katherine Boo and Caroline Moorehead, Cast Away brings to life the human consequences of one of the most urgent humanitarian issues of our time.

Voyage of Slaves

Voyage of Slaves
Author: Brian Jacques
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2007-08-28
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1440621020

Adrift in the Mediterranean, Ben and his loyal dog Ned-cursed by an avenging angel to roam the earth forever-fall into the clutches of a slaver, and have no one to rely on but each other in their quest for freedom.

Unbroken

Unbroken
Author: Laura Hillenbrand
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
Total Pages: 530
Release: 2014-07-29
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0812974492

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE • Look for special features inside. Join the Random House Reader’s Circle for author chats and more. In boyhood, Louis Zamperini was an incorrigible delinquent. As a teenager, he channeled his defiance into running, discovering a prodigious talent that had carried him to the Berlin Olympics. But when World War II began, the athlete became an airman, embarking on a journey that led to a doomed flight on a May afternoon in 1943. When his Army Air Forces bomber crashed into the Pacific Ocean, against all odds, Zamperini survived, adrift on a foundering life raft. Ahead of Zamperini lay thousands of miles of open ocean, leaping sharks, thirst and starvation, enemy aircraft, and, beyond, a trial even greater. Driven to the limits of endurance, Zamperini would answer desperation with ingenuity; suffering with hope, resolve, and humor; brutality with rebellion. His fate, whether triumph or tragedy, would be suspended on the fraying wire of his will. Appearing in paperback for the first time—with twenty arresting new photos and an extensive Q&A with the author—Unbroken is an unforgettable testament to the resilience of the human mind, body, and spirit, brought vividly to life by Seabiscuit author Laura Hillenbrand. Hailed as the top nonfiction book of the year by Time magazine • Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for biography and the Indies Choice Adult Nonfiction Book of the Year award “Extraordinarily moving . . . a powerfully drawn survival epic.”—The Wall Street Journal “[A] one-in-a-billion story . . . designed to wrench from self-respecting critics all the blurby adjectives we normally try to avoid: It is amazing, unforgettable, gripping, harrowing, chilling, and inspiring.”—New York “Staggering . . . mesmerizing . . . Hillenbrand’s writing is so ferociously cinematic, the events she describes so incredible, you don’t dare take your eyes off the page.”—People “A meticulous, soaring and beautifully written account of an extraordinary life.”—The Washington Post “Ambitious and powerful . . . a startling narrative and an inspirational book.”—The New York Times Book Review “Magnificent . . . incredible . . . [Hillenbrand] has crafted another masterful blend of sports, history and overcoming terrific odds; this is biography taken to the nth degree, a chronicle of a remarkable life lived through extraordinary times.”—The Dallas Morning News “An astonishing testament to the superhuman power of tenacity.”—Entertainment Weekly “A tale of triumph and redemption . . . astonishingly detailed.”—O: The Oprah Magazine “[A] masterfully told true story . . . nothing less than a marvel.”—Washingtonian “[Hillenbrand tells this] story with cool elegance but at a thrilling sprinter’s pace.”—Time “Hillenbrand [is] one of our best writers of narrative history. You don’t have to be a sports fan or a war-history buff to devour this book—you just have to love great storytelling.”—Rebecca Skloot, author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

The Castaways

The Castaways
Author: Iain Lawrence
Publisher: Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2007-11-13
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
ISBN: 0375890645

ADRIFT AT SEA, Tom Tin and his four convict companions are only too glad when they come upon a deserted ship. The boys clamber aboard, not knowing whether they've been saved or set on a course toward doom. But after rescuing two men stranded on a melting iceberg, Tom begins to suspect that these unsavory sailors are dangerous castaways from this very vessel. The more Tom questions the men, the more they dislike him. So, when Tom overhears them plotting to get rid of him, he knows they mean it. But the other boys don't feel threatened - at least not until the sailors attempt to sell them as slaves, a decision that ends with death for some . . . and with Tom sailing the ship home to England. Soon Tom discovers that he has to cast away every ill-intentioned companion from his voyage home before he can truly be free.

The Castaways

The Castaways
Author: Jessika Fleck
Publisher: Entangled: Teen
Total Pages: 303
Release: 2017-04-03
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
ISBN: 1633759180

The Castaway Carnival: fun, mysterious, dangerous. Renowned for its infamous corn maze...and the kids who go missing in it. When Olive runs into the maze, she wakes up on an isolated and undetectable island where a decades-long war between two factions of rival teens is in full swing. Trapped, Olive must slowly attempt to win each of her new comrades’ hearts as Will—their mysterious, stoically quiet, and handsome leader—steals hers. Olive is only sure about one thing: her troop consists of the good guys, and she’ll do whatever it takes to help them win the war and get back home. But victory may require more betrayal, sacrifice, and heartbreak than she’s ready for.

Why Texans Fought in the Civil War

Why Texans Fought in the Civil War
Author: Charles David Grear
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
Total Pages: 257
Release: 2012-09-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1603448098

In Why Texans Fought in the Civil War, Charles David Grear provides insights into what motivated Texans to fight for the Confederacy. Mining important primary sources—including thousands of letters and unpublished journals—he affords readers the opportunity to hear, often in the combatants’ own words, why it was so important to them to engage in tumultuous struggles occurring so far from home. As Grear notes, in the decade prior to the Civil War the population of Texas had tripled. The state was increasingly populated by immigrants from all parts of the South and foreign countries. When the war began, it was not just Texas that many of these soldiers enlisted to protect, but also their native states, where they had family ties.