Take a step back in time with some of the best writers with disabilities as they recount their first adventure, their first heartbreak, and the first time the unexpected treaded into their life. From body transformations to societal setbacks, to love a airs and family trauma, Firsts collects the most thought-provoking and exciting stories of our time by people with disabilities. Contributors include Nigel David Kelly, Kimberly Gerry-Tucker, Caitlin Hernandez, Andrew Gurza, and David-Elijah Nahmod.

Jack Vincent has been a gentleman, a naval lieutenant, a fisherman and a smuggler. Now he is Convict 41 on a ship bound for the penal colony of Norfolk Island on the other side of the world - transported for life. Unluckily for Jack, the commander of the prison ship is none other than his sworn enemy, Lieutenant Anderson, who seems determined that Jack should not reach the colony alive... From the creator of the Robin of Sherwood series comes this new, thrilling, action-packed tale of bravery, determination and adventure!

Relationships are tricky, even for gods. As writer Alan Zelenetz begins his run scribing THOR, the son of Odin faces challenges ranging from cosmic-powered adversaries to the pains of love! Can Sif assimilate to life on Midgard with Dr. Don Blake? Thor's complicated relationship soon becomes even more so with the arrival of Dracula. Will Sif become the Lord of the Vampires' latest victim, turned to an undead existence of bloodsucking? And how will Jane Foster's return complicate matters? It's a love triangle, Asgardian-style! Plus: An Annual adventure gorgeously drawn by Bob Hall, a never-before reprinted THOR graphic novel and a host of material from the fan-favourite Official Handbook of The Marvel Universe! Collecting: Thor (1966) #328-336 and Annual #11, and Marvel Graphic Novel: Thor - I, Whom The Gods Would Destroy

An unabridged compilation of the bestselling and award winning trilogy The Boys from Bondi, Going Home and Joshua. A rare look at the adolescent Jewish-Australian experience filled with daring and wit. The unforgettable portrayal of the conflict between Arab and Jew is told with passion, humour and unlikely optimism. The book is a tragi-comic adventure touched with romance and growing up.

Humanitarian, philanthropist, and campaigner for Jewish emancipation on a grand scale, Sir Moses Montefiore (1784–1885) was the preeminent Jewish figure of the nineteenth century - and one of the first truly global celebrities. His story, told here in full for the first time, is a remarkable and illuminating tale of diplomacy and adventure. Abigail Green's sweeping biography follows Montefiore through the realms of court and ghetto, tsar and sultan, synagogue and stock exchange. Interweaving the public triumph of Montefiore's foreign missions with the private tragedy of his childless marriage, this book brings the diversity of nineteenth-century Jewry brilliantly to life - from London to Jerusalem, Rome to St. Petersburg, Morocco to Istanbul. Here we see the origins of Zionism and the rise of international Jewish consciousness, the faltering birth of international human rights, and the making of the modern Middle East. With the globalization and mobilization of religious identities now at the top of the political agenda, Montefiore's life story is relevant as never before. Mining materials from eleven countries in nine languages, Green's masterly biography bridges the East-West divide in modern Jewish history, presenting the transformation of Jewish life in Europe, the Middle East, and the New World as part of a single global phenomenon. As it reestablishes Montefiore's status as a major historical player, it also restores a significant chapter to the history of our modern world.

A replica of the July 1942 issue of FANTASTIC ADVENTURES pulp magazine featuring THE EAGLE MAN by Don Wilcox. "Fire Jump was a hybrid--half man, half vulture; which complicated his search for real happiness." THE RETURN OF THE HUN by William J. Brittain, THE WEIRD DOOM OF FLOYD SCRILCH by Robert Bloch, THE TRAITOR by Arthur T. Harris, VITALITY FOR MURDER by Richard O. Lewis, SAFARI TO THE LOST AGES by William P. McGivern, THE MYSTERY OF SHAFT 13 by Robert Moore Williams, DUNCAN'S DREADFUL DOLL by P. F. Costello, HOKUM HOTEL by David Wright O'Brien, MEN SCARED OF NOTHING by E. K. Jarvis, and HEADLINES FOR TOD SHAYNE by August W. Derleth.

British spy Sidney Reilly looks at his life and his attempt to overthrow the Bolshevik regime in Russia and restore the Czar.

In this book, Barney explores her family tree, chronicles her friendships and associations through reprinted correspondence and recreated conversations, and evokes the golden age of her salon in gallery of literary portraits.

The end of Soviet Socialism signalled to some observers that the ghost of Marx had finally been laid to rest. But history’s refusal to grind to a halt and the global credit crisis that began in 2008 have rekindled interest in capitalism’s most persistent critic. Written during the mid-nineties, a period of Western complacency and neo-liberal reaction, Marx for Our Times is a critical reading of dialectical materialism as a method of resistance. Without denying the contradictory character of Marx’s thought, and with a sensitivity to the plurality of theories it has inspired, Daniel Bensaid sets out to discover what in Marx remains dynamic and relevant in our era of accelerating economic change. Marx’s theory emerges, not as a doctrinal system, but as an intellectual tool of social struggle and global transformation in a world where capital continues to dominate social relations.

"To perform heroically in a perilous situation is one thing, but I found that, in my case, the real difficulty was in getting myself into a spot where heroism was possible. Nobody on latrine duty ever got the Medal of Honor." This delightful memoir of A. E. Hotchner’s World War II experiences explores a different side of the troubled war years. Hotchner, who grew up in St. Louis, was a rookie lawyer fresh out of Washington University Law School when the United States declared war. Like many others of his generation, he aspired to serve his country. He tried to enlist in the navy, first as a pilot and then as a deck officer, but he was rejected for faulty depth perception and flat feet, respectively. Drafted as a lowly GI into the air force branch of the army, he was accepted to bombardier school. But on the eve of his departure, he was ordered to write and perform in an air force musical comedy instead. He eventually went to Officer Candidate School and was assigned to the Anti-Submarine Command as a lieutenant adjutant, but just before his squadron’s departure for North Africa he was detached and, despite knowing nothing about moviemaking, ordered to make a film that glorified the Anti-Submarine Command’s role in combating U-boats. All through his four-year military career, despite his efforts to get into combat, fate and the military bureaucracy thwarted him. The author skillfully recounts the events of those years, describing the encounters he had with many unforgettable characters, including a footsore and sentimental Clark Gable and an inept Alan Ladd—best known as the star of Shane. Ladd, then a GI, did such a poor job reading the narration for Hotchner’s film Atlantic Mission that Hotchner had to fire him. The author also describes his encounters with other well-known people, notably Tennessee Williams, with whom he attended a playwriting class at Washington University, and a wistful, vulnerable Dorothy Parker. Although much of Hotchner’s memoir is lighthearted, it also provides a unique look at the impact of the war on everyday life in the United States. Hotchner’s fast-paced prose makes this memoir an insightful pleasure to read.

Adrian Seligman served before the mast in square rigged ships and came home to find his grandfather had left him some money - enough to buy a three-masted barquentine. With an amateur crew and his wife, he sailed to Rio, Tristan da Cunha and Cape Town, then across the Southern Ocean to Sydney.

The story of a heroic group of Red Army soldiers during the winter of 1945 who must hold fast and die at their positions `south of the main offensive' without calling for the reinforcements that are needed at the main front for a major assault against the Nazi hordes. Although not a pacifist novel, the author's deep humanism prevents this from being just another story of wartime adventures. "Baklanov was 17 when the Nazis invaded his country. He was the only one of the 20 boys in his high school graduating class to survive the war."--New York Times

Things are really smoking on the island of El Tiparillo when the Holy Land's superest, secretest agent Israel Bond is called to wield his weaponized mezuzah to save innocent lives and formerly-innocent beautiful lasses in the midst of rebellion. Will he manage to fend off the assassins, the vicious wildlife, and the mysterious Herbie while seducing the island's wide array of fascinating and exotic women... or will it be the other way around? With Soviet spymaster General Bolshyeeyit, the insidious Dr. Nu, Rotten Roger, and "The Man with the Golden Gums" all on his tuchis, things will not be easy for Oy-Oy-7, licensed not only to kill but also to say prayers over the body... In the mid-1960s, when Playboy was serializing the adventures of the world's most famous superspy, they interspersed them with the rollicking tales of Israel's most hilarious weapon, Israel Bond. After the book editions of what the Chicago Tribune called "probably the funniest secret agent parodies ever written" had sold over a million copies, they were allowed to fall out of print. Decades later, all four books in the Israel Bond series are back in new editions!

In quest of the unpublished manuscript of a martyred Yiddish writer, the American novelist Nathan Zuckerman travels to Soviet-occupied Prague in the mid-1970s. There, in a nation straightjacketed by totalitarian Communism, he discovers a literary predicament, marked by institutionalized oppression, that is rather different from his own. He also discovers, among the oppressed writers with whom he quickly becomes embroiled in a series of bizarre and poignant adventures, an appealingly perverse kind of heroism. The Prague Orgy, consisting of entries from protagonist Nathan Zuckerman's notebooks recording his sojourn among these outcast artists, completes the trilogy and epilogue "Zuckerman bound," It provides a startling ending to Roth's intricately designed magnum opus on the unforeseen consequences of art. This Vintage edition is the first paperback publication of the epilogue.

In this wry, candid, and sometimes poignant memoir, Peter Owen recalls his lonely Jewish boyhood in Nazi Germany and migration to England where he survived the London Blitz, a teenage dalliance with aspiring actress Fenella Fielding, and working with a motley variety of book publishers. He founded his eponymous publishing firm in 1951, becoming one of the youngest publishers in Britain. A pioneer of books on social themes, gay and lesbian writing, and literature in translation, Owen's authors included ten Nobel laureates and brought Hermann Hesse, Ezra Pound, and Anaïs Nin to a wider audience. Enjoying their success, he and his wife Wendy were memorably stylish and eccentric figures at the literary parties of the 1960s and 1970s. Owen describes his often hilarious encounters with many of those he published, including John Lennon, Yoko Ono, and Salvador Dalí, his adventures in Japan with Yukio Mishima and Shūsaku Endō, and in Morocco with Tennessee Williams and Paul and Jane Bowles. As one of the last of the great émigré publishers, his death in 2016 aged 89 signalled the end of a literary era.

Since emerging as a discipline in the middle of the eighteenth century, natural history has been at the heart of the life sciences. It gave rise to the major organizing theory of life--evolution--and continues to be a vital science with impressive practical value. Central to advanced work in ecology, agriculture, medicine, and environmental science, natural history also attracts enormous popular interest. In Finding Order in Nature Paul Farber traces the development of the naturalist tradition since the Enlightenment and considers its relationship to other research areas in the life sciences. Written for the general reader and student alike, the volume explores the adventures of early naturalists, the ideas that lay behind classification systems, the development of museums and zoos, and the range of motives that led collectors to collect. Farber also explores the importance of sociocultural contexts, institutional settings, and government funding in the story of this durable discipline. "The quest for insight into the order of nature leads naturalists beyond classification to the creation of general theories that explain the living world. Those naturalists who focus on the order of nature inquire about the ecological relationships among organisms and also among organisms and their surrounding environments. They ask fundamental questions of evolution, about how change actually occurs over short and long periods of time. Many naturalists are drawn, consequently, to deeper philosophical and ethical issues: What is the extent of our ability to understand nature? And, understanding nature, will we be able to preserve it? Naturalists question the meaning of the order they discover and ponder our moral responsibility for it." -- from the Introduction

More adventures of the Fielding children - Tom, Carrie, Em and Michael - who live in the derelict house at World's End with their family of animals.Their first winter at World's End is packed with incident and excitement that involves children and animals alike ...

"In these 23 original stories, mothers and fathers from all walks of life - straight, gay, single, surrogate, biological, adoptive - explore the challenges and rewards of parenthood. Here, among other adventures, parents fall hopelessly in love with newborns, secretly fear having made huge mistakes, race to finish birthing at home before the paramedics arrive, struggle with the bureaucracy of international adoption, despair of ever getting a one-year-old to nap, are nearly broken by colic, encounter other judgy parents in birthing class, learn how to parent children with special needs, and more. Together, these thoughtful, searing, often hilarious essays map the grand (and sometimes terrifying) journey that begins with each new life."--Page 4 of cover.

Several of them, in fact. He's the heir to an empire-but he doesn't want to be. And nobody believes that he could or would walk away, and give the job of ruling the kingdom to someone else. In this roller coaster of a sequel to Not Exactly the Three Musketeers , it looks like the stage is set for a major shake-up in the kingdom. Jason's help in keeping everything from blowing up are the self-appointed soldiers of the errant Jason, sent by that wily off-worlder Walter Slovotsky to keep Jason in one piece . . . more or less. There's Kethol, the long and lanky redhead with an easy smile, who's quick with a quip and quicker with a sword; Pirojil, the ugly one, whose looks deceive and whose might and loyalty are worth a kingdom; and the fledgling wizard Erenor, a man who tries to stay two steps ahead of his enemies--as well as one step ahead of his friends. They're all part of the Cullinane retinue, sworn to protect the Cullinane manse and the sometimes-heroic Jason Cullinane and they have their hands full. Because no one likes a vacuum--or one too many contenders for power, Jason's soldiers are going to have to do some fast adventuring to make it all turn out all right. Next in Joel Rosenberg's bestselling Guardians of the Flame series, Not Quite Scaramouche continues the adventures of the journeyman soldiers of Castle Cullinane (and their sometimes ill-fated leader) in all their raucous glory.

The interviews in this collection will convince the reader that Jerzy Kosinski's public persona was one of the greatest creations. Few authors were ever more adept at press interviews. For Kosinski, the author of nine novels, including The Painted Bird, Steps, Being There , and The Hermit of 69th Street , the interview was part performance, part public relations, part blind date. Kosinski in person was different from the existential adventurer in his novels. He was not so much engaged as engaging. though his fiction was brutal, he was charming. The contrast between Kosinski and the intensity of his fiction created the backdrop for his interviews. Like his readers, Kosinski's interviews were obsessed with the facts of his life. As a young boy he survived the Holocaust. He escaped Communist Poland. His life became the stuff of novels. He came to the United States with little money and no command of the English, but within a year he was a Ford Fellow at Columbia University and not long afterward was married to an American heiress and was living on Park Avenue. Yet Kosinski felt that his unique experiences, when transmuted to fiction, became a didactic lesson for others. A human being is loaded with the greatest power, he says in one interview, his imagination and the power to transcend his own conditions. The interviews here are published chronologically without abridgement. The same questions recur and Kosinski's answers are filled with discrepancies and contradictions. A good interview, he once wrote, is like truth itself, the temporary resolution of various contradictions. These compelling conversations recapture part of Jerzy Kposinski, who took his own life on May 3, 1991.