Umar's bookshelf: all

Umar's bookshelf: all en-US Sat, 01 Mar 2025 14:00:08 -0800 60 Umar's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[Honda: The Man and His Machines]]> 2156871 208 Sol W. Sanders 0316770078 Umar 0 to-read 4.14 1975

author: Sol W. Sanders
name: Umar
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1975
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/01
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]]> <![CDATA[Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege, 1942��1943]]> 542389 Stalingrad as the definitive account of World War II's most harrowing battle.

In August 1942, Hitler's huge Sixth Army reached the city that bore Stalin's name. In the five-month siege that followed, the Russians fought to hold Stalingrad at any cost; then, in an astonishing reversal, encircled and trapped their Nazi enemy. This battle for the ruins of a city cost more than a million lives. Stalingrad conveys the experience of soldiers on both sides, fighting in inhuman conditions, and of civilians trapped on an urban battlefield. Antony Beevor has interviewed survivors and discovered completely new material in a wide range of German and Soviet archives, including prisoner interrogations and reports of desertions and executions. As a story of cruelty, courage, and human suffering, Stalingrad is unprecedented and unforgettable.]]> 494 Antony Beevor 0140284583 Umar 0 to-read 4.32 1998 Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege, 1942–1943

Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege, 1942–1943

author: Antony Beevor
name: Umar
average rating: 4.32
book published: 1998
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/27
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]]> <![CDATA[Red Rising (Red Rising Saga, #1)]]> 15839976 "I live for the dream that my children will be born free," she says. "That they will be what they like. That they will own the land their father gave them."

"I live for you," I say sadly.

Eo kisses my cheek. "Then you must live for more."

Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he works all day, believing that he and his people are making the surface of Mars livable for future generations.

Yet he spends his life willingly, knowing that his blood and sweat will one day result in a better world for his children.

But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed. Soon he discovers that humanity already reached the surface generations ago. Vast cities and sprawling parks spread across the planet. Darrow—and Reds like him—are nothing more than slaves to a decadent ruling class.

Inspired by a longing for justice, and driven by the memory of lost love, Darrow sacrifices everything to infiltrate the legendary Institute, a proving ground for the dominant Gold caste, where the next generation of humanity's overlords struggle for power. He will be forced to compete for his life and the very future of civilization against the best and most brutal of Society's ruling class. There, he will stop at nothing to bring down his enemies... even if it means he has to become one of them to do so.]]> 382 Pierce Brown 0345539788 Umar 0 to-read 4.26 2014 Red Rising (Red Rising Saga, #1)

author: Pierce Brown
name: Umar
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/03
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]]> The Premature Burial 6815174
It's theme is that of being buried alive, which was a common fear at the time and Poe takes advantage of the public interest. The unnamed narrator describes his struggle with "attacks of the singular disorder which physicians have agreed to term catalepsy," a condition which sees a person falling into a death-like trance with no forewarning. This leads to the narrator's overwhelming fear. "The true wretchedness," he says, is "to be buried while alive."

One morning, he awakens to find his worst fears realized!]]> 32 Edgar Allan Poe Umar 0 to-read 3.77 1844 The Premature Burial

author: Edgar Allan Poe
name: Umar
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1844
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/22
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]]> <![CDATA[War! What Is It Good For?: Conflict and the Progress of Civilization from Primates to Robots]]> 17934377 "War! . . . . / What is it good for? / Absolutely nothing," says the famous song―but archaeology, history, and biology show that war in fact has been good for something. Surprising as it sounds, war has made humanity safer and richer. In War! What Is It Good For? , the renowned historian and archaeologist Ian Morris tells the gruesome, gripping story of fifteen thousand years of war, going beyond the battles and brutality to reveal what war has really done to and for the world. Stone Age people lived in small, feuding societies and stood a one-in-ten or even one-in-five chance of dying violently. In the twentieth century, by contrast―despite two world wars, Hiroshima, and the Holocaust―fewer than one person in a hundred died violently. The War, and war alone, has created bigger, more complex societies, ruled by governments that have stamped out internal violence. Strangely enough, killing has made the world safer, and the safety it has produced has allowed people to make the world richer too. War has been history's greatest paradox, but this searching study of fifteen thousand years of violence suggests that the next half century is going to be the most dangerous of all time. If we can survive it, the age-old dream of ending war may yet come to pass. But, Morris argues, only if we understand what war has been good for can we know where it will take us next.]]> 512 Ian Morris 0374286000 Umar 0 to-read 3.92 2014 War! What Is It Good For?: Conflict and the Progress of Civilization from Primates to Robots

War! What Is It Good For?: Conflict and the Progress of Civilization from Primates to Robots

author: Ian Morris
name: Umar
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/21
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]]> The Builders 25667920 A broken wing.
A stolen country.

The last job didn't end well.

Years go by, and scars fade, but memories only fester. For the animals of the Captain's company, survival has meant keeping a low profile, building a new life, and trying to forget the war they lost. But now the Captain's whiskers are twitching at the idea of evening the score.]]> 226 Daniel Polansky 0765384000 Umar 0 to-read 3.72 2015 The Builders

author: Daniel Polansky
name: Umar
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2015
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/20
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]]> <![CDATA[Those Above (The Empty Throne, #1)]]> 21017636
Twenty five years ago mankind mustered an army and rose up against them, only to be slaughtered in a terrible battle. Hope died that day, but hatred survived. Whispers of another revolt are beginning to stir in the hearts of the oppressed: a woman, widowed in the war, who has dedicated her life to revenge; the general, the only man to ever defeat one of Those Above in single combat, summoned forth to raise a new legion; and a boy killer who rises from the gutter to lead an uprising in the capital.]]> 416 Daniel Polansky 1444779893 Umar 0 to-read 3.65 2015 Those Above (The Empty Throne, #1)

author: Daniel Polansky
name: Umar
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2015
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/20
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]]> Wool - Holston (Wool, #1) 12287209
Or you'll get what you wish for.]]> 56 Hugh Howey Umar 0 to-read 4.14 2012

author: Hugh Howey
name: Umar
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/09
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]]> A Dark Matter 5979072
The charismatic and cunning Spenser Mallon is a campus guru in the 1960s, attracting the devotion and demanding sexual favors of his young acolytes. After he invites his most fervent followers to attend a secret ritual in a local meadow, the only thing that remains is a gruesomely dismembered body—and the shattered souls of all who were present.

Years later, one man attempts to understand what happened to his wife and to his friends by writing a book about this horrible night, and it’s through this process that they begin to examine the unspeakable events that have bound them in ways they cannot fathom, but that have haunted every one of them through their lives. As each of the old friends tries to come to grips with the darkness of the past, they find themselves face-to-face with the evil triggered so many years earlier. Unfolding through the individual stories of the fated group’s members, A Dark Matter is an electric, chilling, and unpredictable novel that will satisfy Peter Straub's many ardent fans, and win him legions more.]]> 397 Peter Straub 038551638X Umar 0 to-read 2.95 2010

author: Peter Straub
name: Umar
average rating: 2.95
book published: 2010
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/01
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]]> <![CDATA[Agent Sonya: Moscow's Most Daring Wartime Spy]]> 52578861
They didn’t know that she was a high-ranking Soviet intelligence officer. They didn’t know that her husband was also a spy, or that she was running powerful agents across Europe. Behind the facade of her picturesque life, Burton was a dedicated Communist, a Soviet colonel, and a veteran agent, gathering the scientific secrets that would enable the Soviet Union to build the bomb.

This true-life spy story is about the woman code-named “Sonya.�� Over the course of her career, she was hunted by the Chinese, the Japanese, the Nazis, MI5, MI6, and the FBI—and she evaded them all. Her story reflects the great ideological clash of the twentieth century—between Communism, Fascism, and Western democracy—and casts new light on the spy battles and shifting allegiances of our own times.

With unparalleled access to Sonya’s diaries and correspondence and never-before-seen information on her clandestine activities, Ben Macintyre has written a history of a legendary secret agent, a woman who influenced the course of the Cold War and helped plunge the world into a decades-long standoff between nuclear superpowers.]]> 377 Ben Macintyre 0593136306 Umar 0 to-read 4.12 2020 Agent Sonya: Moscow's Most Daring Wartime Spy

Agent Sonya: Moscow's Most Daring Wartime Spy

author: Ben Macintyre
name: Umar
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/12/23
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]]> When the Doves Disappeared 22318383
1941: In Communist-ruled, war-ravaged Estonia, two men are fleeing from the Red Army - Roland, a fiercely principled freedom fighter, and his slippery cousin Edgar. When the Germans arrive, Roland goes into hiding; Edgar abandons his unhappy wife, Juudit, and takes on a new identity as a loyal supporter of the Nazi regime ... 1963: Estonia is again under Communist control, independence even further out of reach behind the Iron Curtain. Edgar is now a Soviet apparatchik, desperate to hide the secrets of his past life and stay close to those in power. But his fate remains entangled with Roland's, and with Juudit, who may hold the key to uncovering the truth ...

Great acts of deception and heroism collide in this masterful story of surveillance, passion, and betrayal, as Sofi Oksanen brings to life the frailty - and the resilience - of humanity under the shadow of tyranny.]]> 320 Sofi Oksanen 0385350171 Umar 0 currently-reading 3.39 2012 When the Doves Disappeared

author: Sofi Oksanen
name: Umar
average rating: 3.39
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Age of AI and Our Human Future]]> 56620811 Three of the world’s most accomplished and deep thinkers come together to explore Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the way it is transforming human society—and what this technology means for us all.

An AI learned to win chess by making moves human grand masters had never conceived. Another AI discovered a new antibiotic by analyzing molecular properties human scientists did not understand. Now, AI-powered jets are defeating experienced human pilots in simulated dogfights. AI is coming online in searching, streaming, medicine, education, and many other fields and, in so doing, transforming how humans are experiencing reality.

In The Age of AI, three leading thinkers have come together to consider how AI will change our relationships with knowledge, politics, and the societies in which we live. The Age of AI is an essential roadmap to our present and our future, an era unlike any that has come before.]]> 272 Henry Kissinger 0316273805 Umar 0 currently-reading 3.37 The Age of AI and Our Human Future

author: Henry Kissinger
name: Umar
average rating: 3.37
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]]> D-Day: Minute by Minute 18812581
June 6, 1944 was a truly historic day, but it was also a day where ordinary people found themselves in extraordinary situations...

Lieutenant Norman Poole jumped from a bomber surrounded by two hundred decoy dummy parachutists. French baker Pierre Cardron led British paratroopers to his local church, where he knew two German soldiers were hiding in the confessional. Southampton telegram boy Tom Hiett delivered his first "death message"; by midday. At the sound of Allied aircraft, Werner Kortenhaus of the twenty-first Panzer Division ran to collect his still damp washing from a French laundrywoman. And injured soldiers wept in their beds in a New York hospital, knowing that their buddies lay dying on the Normandy beaches.

Drawing on memoirs, diaries, letters, and oral accounts, D-Day is a purely chronological narrative, concerned less with the military strategies and more with what people were thinking and doing as D-Day unfolded, minute-by-minute. Moving seamlessly from various perspectives and stories, D-Day sets the reader in the midst of it all, compelling us to relive this momentous day in world history.]]> 304 Jonathan Mayo 1476772940 Umar 0 to-read 4.25 2014 D-Day: Minute by Minute

author: Jonathan Mayo
name: Umar
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/12/22
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]]> Nuclear War: A Scenario 182733784
Every generation, a journalist has looked deep into the heart of the nuclear military establishment: the technologies, the safeguards, the plans, and the risks. These investigations are vital to how we understand the world we really live in—where one nuclear missile will beget one in return, and where the choreography of the world’s end requires massive decisions made on seconds�� notice with information that is only as good as the intelligence we have.

Pulitzer Prize finalist Annie Jacobsen’s Nuclear War: A Scenario explores this ticking-clock scenario, based on dozens of exclusive new interviews with military and civilian experts who have built the weapons, have been privy to the response plans, and have been responsible for those decisions should they have needed to be made. Nuclear War: A Scenario examines the handful of minutes after a nuclear missile launch. It is essential reading, and unlike any other book in its depth and urgency.]]> 400 Annie Jacobsen 0593476093 Umar 0 to-read 4.37 2024

author: Annie Jacobsen
name: Umar
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/11/26
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]]> <![CDATA[You've Reached Sam (You've Reached Sam #1)]]> 53086843
Heartbroken, Julie skips his funeral, throws out his things, and tries everything to forget him and the tragic way he died. But a message Sam left behind in her yearbook forces back memories. Desperate to hear his voice one more time, Julie calls Sam’s cellphone just to listen to his voicemail.

And Sam picks up the phone.

In a miraculous turn of events, Julie’s been given a second chance at goodbye. The connection is temporary. But hearing Sam’s voice makes her fall for him all over again, and with each call it becomes harder to let him go. However, keeping her otherworldly calls with Sam a secret isn’t easy, especially when Julie witnesses the suffering Sam’s family is going through. Unable to stand by the sidelines and watch their shared loved ones in pain, Julie is torn between spilling the truth about her calls with Sam and risking their connection and losing him forever.]]> 296 Dustin Thao 1250762030 Umar 2 3.63 2021 You've Reached Sam (You've Reached Sam #1)

You've Reached Sam (You've Reached Sam #1)

author: Dustin Thao
name: Umar
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2021
rating: 2
read at: 2024/05/13
date added: 2024/10/08
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]]> Uzumaki 17837762
Kurouzu-cho, a small fogbound town on the coast of Japan, is cursed. According to Shuichi Saito, the withdrawn boyfriend of teenager Kirie Goshima, their town is haunted not by a person or being but by a pattern: uzumaki, the spiral �� the hypnotic secret shape of the world. This bizarre masterpiece of horror manga is now available in a single volume. Fall into a whirlpool of terror!]]> 653 Junji Ito 1421561328 Umar 0 to-read 4.45 2000 Uzumaki

author: Junji Ito
name: Umar
average rating: 4.45
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/10/08
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]]> How to Fight a War 75736596
Conflict scholar and former soldier Mike Martin takes the reader through the hard, elegant logic of how to fight an interstate war on land, including the factors that are often overlooked: the importance of psychology, training, getting the logistics right, and maintaining your esprit de corps. He then explains how to orchestrate the building blocks of military force–from infantry, artillery and air support, to information and cyber warfare–in order to prevail over your adversary.

How to Fight a War explains in cool and precise prose the art of using extreme violence to convince your enemy that they should submit. It should be read by everyone who seeks to understand today’s conflicts and those to come–and by all those who wish to lead us through the next decade of wars.]]> 289 Mike Martin 1787389995 Umar 0 currently-reading 4.20 How to Fight a War

author: Mike Martin
name: Umar
average rating: 4.20
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rating: 0
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date added: 2024/10/01
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]]> <![CDATA[Moneyland: Why Thieves and Crooks Now Rule the World and How To Take It Back]]> 39979237 From ruined towns on the edge of Siberia, to Bond-villain lairs in Knightsbridge and Manhattan, something has gone wrong with the workings of the world.

Once upon a time, if an official stole money, there wasn't much he could do with it. He could buy himself a new car or build himself a nice house or give it to his friends and family, but that was about it. If he kept stealing, the money would just pile up in his house until he had no rooms left to put it in, or it was eaten by mice.

And then some bankers in London had a bright idea.

Join the investigative journalist Oliver Bullough on a journey into Moneyland - the secret country of the lawless, stateless superrich.

Learn how the institutions of Europe and the United States have become money-laundering operations, undermining the foundations of Western stability. Discover the true cost of being open for business no matter how corrupt and dangerous the customer. Meet the kleptocrats. Meet their awful children. And find out how heroic activists around the world are fighting back.

This is the story of wealth and power in the 21st century. It isn't too late to change it.

]]> 305 Oliver Bullough 1782833331 Umar 0 to-read 4.21 2018 Moneyland: Why Thieves and Crooks Now Rule the World and How To Take It Back

author: Oliver Bullough
name: Umar
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/08/23
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]]> <![CDATA[This Is How You Lose the Time War]]> 43352954 Burn before reading. Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.

Except the discovery of their bond would mean death for each of them. There's still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war.]]> 209 Amal El-Mohtar Umar 0 to-read 3.86 2019 This Is How You Lose the Time War

author: Amal El-Mohtar
name: Umar
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/08/07
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]]> <![CDATA[The Polymath: Unlocking the Power of Human Versatility]]> 39873848 Every human is born with multifarious potential. Why, then, do parents, schools and employers insist that we restrict our many talents and interests; that we 'specialise' in just one? We've been sold a myth, that to 'specialise' is the only way to pursue truth, identity, or even a livelihood. Yet specialisation is nothing but an outdated system that fosters ignorance, exploitation and disillusionment and thwarts creativity, opportunity and progress. Following a series of exchanges with the world’s greatest historians, futurists, philosophers and scientists, Waqas Ahmed has weaved together a narrative of history and a vision for the future that seeks to disrupt this prevailing system of unwarranted ‘hyper-specialisation.�� In The Polymath, Waqas shows us that there is another way of thinking and being. Through an approach that is both philosophical and practical, he sets out a cognitive journey towards reclaiming your innate polymathic state. Going further, he proposes nothing less than a cultural revolution in our education and professional structures, whereby everyone is encouraged to express themselves in multiple ways and fulfil their many-sided potential. Not only does this enhance individual fulfilment, but in doing so, facilitates a conscious and creative society that is both highly motivated and well equipped to address the complexity of 21st century challenges.]]> 333 Waqas Ahmed 1119508517 Umar 0 to-read 3.86 2019 The Polymath: Unlocking the Power of Human Versatility

The Polymath: Unlocking the Power of Human Versatility

author: Waqas Ahmed
name: Umar
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/31
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]]> <![CDATA[Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World]]> 41795733
Plenty of experts argue that anyone who wants to develop a skill, play an instrument, or lead their field should start early, focus intensely, and rack up as many hours of deliberate practice as possible. If you dabble or delay, you'll never catch up to the people who got a head start. But a closer look at research on the world's top performers, from professional athletes to Nobel laureates, shows that early specialization is the exception, not the rule.

David Epstein examined the world's most successful athletes, artists, musicians, inventors, forecasters and scientists. He discovered that in most fields--especially those that are complex and unpredictable--generalists, not specialists, are primed to excel. Generalists often find their path late, and they juggle many interests rather than focusing on one. They're also more creative, more agile, and able to make connections their more specialized peers can't see.

Provocative, rigorous, and engrossing, Range makes a compelling case for actively cultivating inefficiency. Failing a test is the best way to learn. Frequent quitters end up with the most fulfilling careers. The most impactful inventors cross domains rather than deepening their knowledge in a single area. As experts silo themselves further while computers master more of the skills once reserved for highly focused humans, people who think broadly and embrace diverse experiences and perspectives will increasingly thrive.]]> 339 David Epstein 0735214484 Umar 0 to-read 4.12 2019 Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World

Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World

author: David Epstein
name: Umar
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/31
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]]> Cloud Atlas 49628
Cloud Atlas begins in 1850 with Adam Ewing, an American notary voyaging from the Chatham Isles to his home in California. Along the way, Ewing is befriended by a physician, Dr. Goose, who begins to treat him for a rare species of brain parasite. . . .

Abruptly, the action jumps to Belgium in 1931, where Robert Frobisher, a disinherited bisexual composer, contrives his way into the household of an infirm maestro who has a beguiling wife and a nubile daughter. . . . From there we jump to the West Coast in the 1970s and a troubled reporter named Luisa Rey, who stumbles upon a web of corporate greed and murder that threatens to claim her life. . . . And onward, with dazzling virtuosity, to an inglorious present-day England; to a Korean superstate of the near future where neocapitalism has run amok; and, finally, to a postapocalyptic Iron Age Hawaii in the last days of history.

But the story doesn't end even there. The narrative then boomerangs back through centuries and space, returning by the same route, in reverse, to its starting point. Along the way, Mitchell reveals how his disparate characters connect, how their fates intertwine, and how their souls drift across time like clouds across the sky.

As wild as a videogame, as mysterious as a Zen koan, Cloud Atlas is an unforgettable tour de force that, like its incomparable author, has transcended its cult classic status to become a worldwide phenomenon.]]> 509 David Mitchell 0375507256 Umar 0 to-read 4.02 2004

author: David Mitchell
name: Umar
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2004
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/10
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]]> Afterparty 17910129
Lyda Rose, another patient in that detention facility, has a dark secret: she was one of the original scientists who developed the drug. With the help of an ex-government agent and an imaginary, drug-induced doctor, Lyda sets out to find the other three survivors of the five who made the Numinous in a quest to set things right.

A mind-bending and violent chase across Canada and the US, Daryl Gregory's Afterparty is a last chance to save civilization, or die trying.]]> 304 Daryl Gregory 0765336928 Umar 0 to-read 3.69 2014

author: Daryl Gregory
name: Umar
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/06/18
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]]> The City & the City 4703581
Borlú must travel from the decaying Beszel to the only metropolis on Earth as strange as his own. This is a border crossing like no other, a journey as psychic as it is physical, a shift in perception, a seeing of the unseen. His destination is Beszel’s equal, rival, and intimate neighbor, the rich and vibrant city of Ul Qoma. With Ul Qoman detective Qussim Dhatt, and struggling with his own transition, Borlú is enmeshed in a sordid underworld of rabid nationalists intent on destroying their neighboring city, and unificationists who dream of dissolving the two into one. As the detectives uncover the dead woman’s secrets, they begin to suspect a truth that could cost them and those they care about more than their lives.

What stands against them are murderous powers in Beszel and in Ul Qoma: and, most terrifying of all, that which lies between these two cities.

Casting shades of Kafka and Philip K. Dick, Raymond Chandler and 1984, The City & the City is a murder mystery taken to dazzling metaphysical and artistic heights.]]> 312 China Miéville 0345497511 Umar 0 to-read 3.90 2009

author: China Miéville
name: Umar
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/06/18
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]]> The Windup Girl 6597651
Emiko is the Windup Girl, a strange and beautiful creature. One of the New People, Emiko is not human; instead, she is an engineered being, creche-grown and programmed to satisfy the decadent whims of a Kyoto businessman, but now abandoned to the streets of Bangkok. Regarded as soulless beings by some, devils by others, New People are slaves, soldiers, and toys of the rich in a chilling near future in which calorie companies rule the world, the oil age has passed, and the side effects of bio-engineered plagues run rampant across the globe.

What Happens when calories become currency? What happens when bio-terrorism becomes a tool for corporate profits, when said bio-terrorism's genetic drift forces mankind to the cusp of post-human evolution? Award-winning author Paolo Bacigalupi delivers one of the most highly acclaimed science fiction novels of the twenty-first century.]]> 359 Paolo Bacigalupi 1597801577 Umar 0 to-read 3.75 2009 The Windup Girl

author: Paolo Bacigalupi
name: Umar
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/06/18
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]]> <![CDATA[AI: Unexplainable, Unpredictable, Uncontrollable (Chapman & Hall/CRC Artificial Intelligence and Robotics Series)]]> 197554072 264 Roman V. Yampolskiy 1032576278 Umar 0 to-read 4.38

AI: Unexplainable, Unpredictable, Uncontrollable (Chapman & Hall/CRC Artificial Intelligence and Robotics Series)

author: Roman V. Yampolskiy
name: Umar
average rating: 4.38
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rating: 0
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date added: 2024/06/05
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]]> The Secret History 29044 559 Donna Tartt 1400031702 Umar 0 to-read 4.17 1992

author: Donna Tartt
name: Umar
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1992
rating: 0
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]]> Brave New World 5129 Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold an authoritarian ruling order–all at the cost of our freedom, full humanity, and perhaps also our souls. “A genius [who] who spent his life decrying the onward march of the Machine�� (The New Yorker), Huxley was a man of incomparable talents: equally an artist, a spiritual seeker, and one of history’s keenest observers of human nature and civilization. Brave New World, his masterpiece, has enthralled and terrified millions of readers, and retains its urgent relevance to this day as both a warning to be heeded as we head into tomorrow and as thought-provoking, satisfying work of literature. Written in the shadow of the rise of fascism during the 1930s, Brave New Worldd likewise speaks to a 21st-century world dominated by mass-entertainment, technology, medicine and pharmaceuticals, the arts of persuasion, and the hidden influence of elites.

"Aldous Huxley is the greatest 20th century writer in English." —Chicago Tribune]]> 268 Aldous Huxley 0060929871 Umar 5 3.99 1932 Brave New World

author: Aldous Huxley
name: Umar
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1932
rating: 5
read at: 2024/05/29
date added: 2024/05/29
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]]> <![CDATA[Military Inc.: Inside Pakistan's Military Economy]]> 739091

The military is entrenched in the corporate sector and controls the country's largest companies and large tracts of real estate. So Pakistan's companies and its main assets are in the hands of a tiny minority of senior army officials. Siddiqa examines this military economy and the consequences of merging the military and corporate sectors. Does democracy have a future in the new Pakistan? Will the generals ever withdraw to the barracks. Military Inc. analyzes the internal and external dynamics of this gradual power-building and the impact that it is having on Pakistan's political and economic development.]]> 292 Ayesha Siddiqa 0745325459 Umar 3 3.74 2007 Military Inc.: Inside Pakistan's Military Economy

Military Inc.: Inside Pakistan's Military Economy

author: Ayesha Siddiqa
name: Umar
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2007
rating: 3
read at: 2024/05/23
date added: 2024/05/23
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]]> <![CDATA[AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order]]> 38242135
In AI Superpowers, Kai-Fu Lee argues powerfully that because of these unprecedented developments in AI, dramatic changes will be happening much sooner than many of us expected. Indeed, as the US-Sino AI competition begins to heat up, Lee urges the US and China to both accept and to embrace the great responsibilities that come with significant technological power.

Most experts already say that AI will have a devastating impact on blue-collar jobs. But Lee predicts that Chinese and American AI will have a strong impact on white-collar jobs as well. Is universal basic income the solution? In Lee’s opinion, probably not.�� But he provides��a clear description of which jobs will be affected and how soon, which jobs can be enhanced with AI, and most importantly, how we can provide solutions to some of the most profound changes in human history that are coming soon.]]> 255 Kai-Fu Lee 132854639X Umar 0 currently-reading 4.08 2018 AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order

AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order

author: Kai-Fu Lee
name: Umar
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Coming Wave: Technology, Power, and the Twenty-first Century's Greatest Dilemma]]> 90590134
We are approaching a critical threshold in the history of our species. Everything is about to change.��
��
Soon you will live surrounded by AIs. They will organise your life, operate your business, and run core government services. You will live in a world of DNA printers and quantum computers, engineered pathogens and autonomous weapons, robot assistants and abundant energy.��
��
None of us are prepared.
��
As co-founder of the pioneering AI company DeepMind, part of Google, Mustafa Suleyman has been at the centre of this revolution. The coming decade, he argues, will be defined by this wave of powerful, fast-proliferating new technologies.��
��
In The Coming Wave , Suleyman shows how these forces will create immense prosperity but also threaten the nation-state, the foundation of global order. As our fragile governments sleepwalk into disaster, we face an existential unprecedented harms on one side, the threat of overbearing surveillance on the other.��
��
Can we forge a narrow path between catastrophe and dystopia?]]> 332 Mustafa Suleyman 0593593952 Umar 0 currently-reading 3.78 2023 The Coming Wave: Technology, Power, and the Twenty-first Century's Greatest Dilemma

The Coming Wave: Technology, Power, and the Twenty-first Century's Greatest Dilemma

author: Mustafa Suleyman
name: Umar
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/13
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]]> The North Water 25666046 1859. A man joins a whaling ship bound for the Arctic Circle. Having left the British Army with his reputation in tatters, Patrick Sumner has little option but to accept the position of ship's surgeon on this ill-fated voyage. But when, deep into the journey, a cabin boy is discovered brutally killed, Sumner finds himself forced to act. Soon he will face an evil even greater than he had encountered at the siege of Delhi, in the shape of Henry Drax: harpooner, murderer, monster . . .]]> 255 Ian McGuire 1627795944 Umar 5 3.93 2016 The North Water

author: Ian McGuire
name: Umar
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2016
rating: 5
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]]> The North Water 29055736 LONGLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2016A ship sets sail with a killer on-board . . . 1859.��A man joins a whaling ship bound for the Arctic Circle. Having left the services, his reputation in tatters, Patrick Sumner has little option but to accept the position of ship's surgeon on this ill-fated voyage. But when, deep into the journey, a boy is discovered brutally killed, Sumner finds himself becoming a reluctant detective. Soon he will face an evil even greater than that he had encountered at the siege of Delhi, in the shape of Henry harpooner, murderer, monster. As the true purpose of the ship’s expedition becomes clear and despair descends upon the crew, the confrontation between Sumner and Drax will play out in the terrible darkness of the Arctic winter . . .]]> 270 Ian McGuire 1471151271 Umar 5 4.19 2016 The North Water

author: Ian McGuire
name: Umar
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2016
rating: 5
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]]> Pirate Latitudes 6428887
Word in port is that the Spanish treasure galleon El Trinidad, fresh from New Spain, is stalled in nearby Matanceros harbor awaiting repairs. Heavily fortified, the impregnable Spanish outpost is guarded by the blood-swiller Cazalla, a favorite commander of King Philip IV himself. With the governor′s backing, Hunter assembles a roughneck crew to infiltrate the enemy island and commandeer the galleon, along with its fortune in Spanish gold. The raid is as perilous as the bloody legends of Matanceros suggest, and Hunter will lose more than one man before he finds himself on the island′s shores, where dense jungle and the firepower of Spanish infantry are all that stand between him and the treasure.

With the help of his cunning crew, Hunter hijacks El Trinidad and escapes the deadly clutches of Cazalla, leaving plenty of carnage in his wake. But his troubles have just begun. . . .]]> 312 Michael Crichton 0061929379 Umar 5 3.46 2009 Pirate Latitudes

author: Michael Crichton
name: Umar
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2009
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future]]> 56377201 In a groundbreaking blend of science and imagination, the former president of Google China and a leading writer of speculative fiction join forces to answer an urgent question: How will artificial intelligence change our world over the next twenty years?

AI will be the defining issue of the twenty-first century, but many people know little about it apart from visions of dystopian robots or flying cars. Though the term has been around for half a century, it is only now, Kai-Fu Lee argues, that AI is poised to upend our society, just as the arrival of technologies like electricity and smart phones did before it. In the past five years, AI has shown it can learn games like chess in mere hours--and beat humans every time. AI has surpassed humans in speech and object recognition, even outperforming radiologists in diagnosing lung cancer. AI is at a tipping point. What comes next?

Within two decades, aspects of daily life may be unrecognizable. Humankind needs to wake up to AI, both its pathways and perils. In this provocative work that juxtaposes speculative storytelling and science, Lee, one of the world's leading AI experts, has teamed up with celebrated novelist Chen Qiufan to reveal how AI will trickle down into every aspect of our world by 2041. In ten gripping narratives that crisscross the globe, coupled with incisive analysis, Lee and Chen explore AI's challenges and its potential:

- Ubiquitous AI that knows you better than you know yourself
- Genetic fortune-telling that predicts risk of disease or even IQ
- AI sensors that creates a fully contactless society in a future pandemic
- Immersive personalized entertainment to challenge our notion of celebrity
- Quantum computing and other leaps that both eliminate and increase risk

By gazing toward a not-so-distant horizon, AI 2041 offers powerful insights and compelling storytelling for everyone interested in our collective future.]]> 480 Kai-Fu Lee 059323829X Umar 5 3.79 2021 AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future

author: Kai-Fu Lee
name: Umar
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2021
rating: 5
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]]> Into the Wild 60869516 Krakauer’s page-turning bestseller explores a famed missing person mystery while unraveling the larger riddles it holds: the profound pull of the American wilderness on our imagination; the allure of high-risk activities to young men of a certain cast of mind; the complex, charged bond between fathers and sons.

"Terrifying... Eloquent... A heart-rending drama of human yearning." —New York Times

In April 1992 a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. He had given $25,000 in savings to charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet, and invented a new life for himself. Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter. How Christopher Johnson McCandless came to die is the unforgettable story of Into the Wild.

Immediately after graduating from college in 1991, McCandless had roamed through the West and Southwest on a vision quest like those made by his heroes Jack London and John Muir. In the Mojave Desert he abandoned his car, stripped it of its license plates, and burned all of his cash. He would give himself a new name, Alexander Supertramp, and, unencumbered by money and belongings, he would be free to wallow in the raw, unfiltered experiences that nature presented. Craving a blank spot on the map, McCandless simply threw the maps away. Leaving behind his desperate parents and sister, he vanished into the wild.

Jon Krakauer constructs a clarifying prism through which he reassembles the disquieting facts of McCandless's short life. Admitting an interst that borders on obsession, he searches for the clues to the drives and desires that propelled McCandless.

When McCandless's innocent mistakes turn out to be irreversible and fatal, he becomes the stuff of tabloid headlines and is dismissed for his naiveté, pretensions, and hubris. He is said to have had a death wish but wanting to die is a very different thing from being compelled to look over the edge. Krakauer brings McCandless's uncompromising pilgrimage out of the shadows, and the peril, adversity, and renunciation sought by this enigmatic young man are illuminated with a rare understanding--and not an ounce of sentimentality. Mesmerizing, heartbreaking, Into the Wild is a tour de force. The power and luminosity of Jon Krakauer's stoytelling blaze through every page.]]> 217 Jon Krakauer Umar 0 to-read 4.13 1996

author: Jon Krakauer
name: Umar
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1996
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]]> The River at Night 29430686 The River at Night is a nonstop and unforgettable thriller.

Winifred Allen needs a vacation.

Stifled by a soul-crushing job, devastated by the death of her beloved brother, and lonely after the end of a fifteen-year marriage, Wini is feeling vulnerable. So when her three best friends insist on a high-octane getaway for their annual girls�� trip, she signs on, despite her misgivings.

What starts out as an invigorating hiking and rafting excursion in the remote Allagash Wilderness soon becomes an all-too-real nightmare: A freak accident leaves the women stranded, separating them from their raft and everything they need to survive. When night descends, a fire on the mountainside lures them to a ramshackle camp that appears to be their lifeline. But as Wini and her friends grasp the true intent of their supposed saviors, long buried secrets emerge and lifelong allegiances are put to the test. To survive, Wini must reach beyond the world she knows to harness an inner strength she never knew she possessed.

With intimately observed characters, visceral prose, and pacing as ruthless as the river itself, The River at Night is a dark exploration of creatures—both friend and foe—that you won’t soon forget.]]> 304 Erica Ferencik 1501143190 Umar 0 to-read 3.46 2017

author: Erica Ferencik
name: Umar
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2017
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]]> Master of the Forest 42605184

At the edge of the world, unknown and unseen, he endures and survives even in our digital era...

With nothing much to lose, our hero agrees, venturing to the edge of the Earth, beyond the borders of civilization and into the untouched wilderness.��There, thousands of miles from home, in a race against the clock before the cold seals the ground, he has to face nature, other diggers,��his inner demons and, most importantly, the enigmatic "Master of the Forest" - a prehistoric creature and the origin of all local legends,��who ferociously protects his domain.

]]> 306 Artyom Dereschuk Umar 0 to-read 3.93 Master of the Forest

author: Artyom Dereschuk
name: Umar
average rating: 3.93
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]]> One Hundred Years of Solitude 320 417 Gabriel García Márquez Umar 0 to-read 4.10 1967

author: Gabriel García Márquez
name: Umar
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1967
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The New Breed: What Our History with Animals Reveals about Our Future with Robots]]> 49672266
There has been a lot of ink devoted to discussions of how robots will replace us and take our jobs. But MIT Media Lab researcher and technology policy expert Kate Darling argues just the opposite, suggesting that treating robots with a bit of humanity, more like the way we treat animals, will actually serve us better. From a social, legal, and ethical perspective, she shows that our current ways of thinking don’t leave room for the robot technology that is soon to become part of our everyday routines. Robots are likely to supplement―rather than replace―our own skills and relationships. So if we consider our history of incorporating animals into our work, transportation, military, and even families, we actually have a solid basis for how to contend with this future.

A deeply original analysis of our technological future and the ethical dilemmas that await us, The New Breed explains how the treatment of machines can reveal a new understanding of our own history, our own systems, and how we relate―not just to nonhumans, but also to one another.]]> 336 Kate Darling 1250296102 Umar 0 to-read 3.98 The New Breed: What Our History with Animals Reveals about Our Future with Robots

The New Breed: What Our History with Animals Reveals about Our Future with Robots

author: Kate Darling
name: Umar
average rating: 3.98
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]]> <![CDATA[The Three-Body Problem (Remembrance of Earth’s Past, #1)]]> 20518872 472 Liu Cixin Umar 0 to-read 4.07 2006

The Three-Body Problem (Remembrance of Earth’s Past, #1)

author: Liu Cixin
name: Umar
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2006
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex]]> 17780
In the Heart of the Sea brings to new life the incredible story of the wreck of the whaleship Essex - an event as mythic in its own century as the Titanic disaster in ours, and the inspiration for the climax of Moby-Dick. In a harrowing page-turner, Nathaniel Philbrick restores this epic story to its rightful place in American history.

In 1820, the 240-ton Essex set sail from Nantucket on a routine voyage for whales. Fifteen months later, in the farthest reaches of the South Pacific, it was repeatedly rammed and sunk by an eighty-ton bull sperm whale. Its twenty-man crew, fearing cannibals on the islands to the west, made for the 3,000-mile-distant coast of South America in three tiny boats. During ninety days at sea under horrendous conditions, the survivors clung to life as one by one, they succumbed to hunger, thirst, disease, and fear.

Philbrick interweaves his account of this extraordinary ordeal of ordinary men with a wealth of whale lore and with a brilliantly detailed portrait of the lost, unique community of Nantucket whalers. Impeccably researched and beautifully told, the book delivers the ultimate portrait of man against nature, drawing on a remarkable range of archival and modern sources, including a long-lost account by the ship's cabin boy.

At once a literary companion and a page-turner that speaks to the same issues of class, race, and man's relationship to nature that permeate the works of Melville, In the Heart of the Sea will endure as a vital work of American history.]]> 302 Nathaniel Philbrick 0141001828 Umar 0 to-read 4.16 2000 In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex

In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex

author: Nathaniel Philbrick
name: Umar
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2000
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]]> The Oceans and the Stars 98653877 Mark Helprin, the #1�� New York Times best-selling author of�� Winter’s Tale and��A Soldier of the Great War , returns with a fast-paced, beautifully written novel about the majesty of��the sea; a life dedicated to duty, honor, and country; and the gift of falling in love.
��
A Navy captain near the end of a decorated career, Stephen Rensselaer is disciplined, intelligent, and determined always to do what’s right. In defending the development of a new variant of warship, he makes an enemy of the President of the United States, who assigns him to command the doomed line’s only prototype–�� Athena , Patrol Coastal 15––with the intent to humiliate a man who should have been an admiral.
��
Rather than resign, Rensselaer takes the new assignment in stride, and while supervising Athena ’s fitting out in New Orleans, encounters a brilliant lawyer, Katy Farrar, with whom he falls in last-chance love. Soon thereafter, he is deployed on a mission that subjects his integrity, morality, and skill to the ultimate test, and ensures that Athena will live forever in the annals of the Navy.
��
As in the�� Odyssey , Katy is the force that keeps him alive and the beacon that lights the way home through seven battles, mutiny, and court martial. In classic literary form, an enthralling new novel that extolls the virtues of living by the laws of conscience, decency, and sacrifice,�� The Oceans and the Stars ��is nothing short of a masterpiece.]]> 512 Mark Helprin 1419769081 Umar 0 to-read 4.29 2023

author: Mark Helprin
name: Umar
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2023
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]]> <![CDATA[Leviathan: The History of Whaling in America]]> 776215 Leviathan selected as one of the best nonfiction books of 2007 by The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, and The Providence Journal. Leviathan was also chosen by Amazon.com's editors as one of the 10 best history books of 2007.

"To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme," proclaimed Herman Melville, and the vivid story of whaling is one of the mightiest themes in American history. Indeed, much of America's culture, economy, and even its spirit were literally and figuratively rendered from the bodies of whales. In Leviathan, the first one-volume history of American whaling in many decades, historian Eric Jay Dolin chronicles the epic battle between man and the sea �� and, in this case, between man and beast �� an often-violent struggle that animates the imagination and stirs our emotions. Beginning his engrossing narrative with Captain John Smith's botched whaling expedition to the New World in 1614, Dolin traces the rise of this burgeoning industry-from its rapid expansion in the colonial era and its brutal struggles during and after the Revolutionary War, to its Golden Age in the mid-1800s, when more than 60 ports got into the whaling business and the sails of America's whaleships whitened the seven seas. American whale oil lit the world and greased the gears of the industrial revolution. Baleen cut from the mouths of whales shaped the course of feminine fashion. Spermaceti, from sperm whales, produced amazingly brilliant and clean-burning candles, while ambergris gave perfumes great staying power and was worth its weight in gold. And the profits from whaling created great fortunes and helped fuel the nation's growth. Leviathan teems with fascinating vignettes, from the Pilgrims' frustrating encounters with whales, to the Candle Wars that pitted eighteenth-century New England Industrialists against each other, to the heroic cruise of Captain David Porter and the USS Essex, in which Porter and his men valiantly protected American whaleships during the War of 1812 until they themselves were captured by the British. Then there is the violent tale of Cyrus Plumer, a notorious troublemaker whose mutiny on the whaleship Junior is thrillingly retold. Among the most amazing accounts is that of the Shenandoah, a Confederate raider, which burned 22 of the 26 Union whaleships it captured, most after the Civil War had already ended. In the waning years of the nineteenth century, we witness the agonizingly slow death of an American industry, as the discovery of oil, tragic disasters in the Arctic, and changes in female fashion combine to transform the American whalemen into an historical relic. The final scene comes in 1924, as the whaleship Wanderer, wrecked on the shore of Cuttyhunk Island, provides the last glimpse of a bygone era. Through it all, those "iron men in wooden boats" created a legacy of dramatic, poignant, and at times horrific stories. This sprawling, maritime saga is filled with these tales, as well as rich, lyrical descriptions of whales and the sea. Original, stirring, and authoritative, Leviathan delivers the 300-year history of American whaling in vibrant detail, integrating literary, social, and economic history into an epic account of this once-vital industry.

(W. W. Norton, 480 pp., 90 illustrations. Also available in Audiobook format from Tantor Audiobooks.)]]> 479 Eric Jay Dolin 0393060578 Umar 0 to-read 4.03 2007 Leviathan: The History of Whaling in America

Leviathan: The History of Whaling in America

author: Eric Jay Dolin
name: Umar
average rating: 4.03
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]]> <![CDATA[The Last Whalers: Three Years in the Far Pacific with a Courageous Tribe and a Vanishing Way of Life]]> 36546612 A "magnificent book" (Sebastian Junger) and "monumental achievement" (Mitchell Zuckoff) that tells the epic story of the world's last subsistence whalers and the threats posed to a tribe on the brink

"An extraordinary feat of reportage and illumination." --Leslie Jamison, The Empathy Exams. "From the very first lines, I was riveted." --Robert Moor, On Trails. "A true work of art . . . Lyrically written and richly observed." --Michael Finkel, The Stranger in the Woods. "Intimate and moving." --Francisco Cantú, The Line Becomes a River. "Remarkable, gorgeously written." --Bronwen Dickey, Pit Bull.
On a volcanic island in the Savu Sea so remote that other Indonesians call it "The Land Left Behind" live the Lamalerans: a tribe of 1,500 hunter-gatherers who are the world's last subsistence whalers. They have survived for half a millennium by hunting whales with bamboo harpoons and handmade wooden boats powered by sails of woven palm fronds. But now, under assault from the rapacious fores of the modern era and a global economy, their way of life teeters on the brink of collapse.

Award-winning journalist Doug Bock Clark, one of a handful of Westerners who speak the Lamaleran language, lived with the tribe across three years, and he brings their world and their people to vivid life in this gripping story of a vanishing culture. Jon, an orphaned apprentice whaler, toils to earn his harpoon and provide for his ailing grandparents, while Ika, his indomitable younger sister, is eager to forge a life unconstrained by tradition, and to realize a star-crossed love. Frans, an aging shaman, tries to unite the tribe in order to undo a deadly curse. And Ignatius, a legendary harpooner entering retirement, labors to hand down the Ways of the Ancestors to his son, Ben, who would secretly rather become a DJ in the distant tourist mecca of Bali.

Deeply empathetic and richly reported, The Last Whalers is a riveting, powerful chronicle of the collision between one of the planet's dwindling indigenous peoples and the irresistible enticements and upheavals of a rapidly transforming world.

]]> 368 Doug Bock Clark 0316390623 Umar 0 to-read 4.00 2019 The Last Whalers: Three Years in the Far Pacific with a Courageous Tribe and a Vanishing Way of Life

The Last Whalers: Three Years in the Far Pacific with a Courageous Tribe and a Vanishing Way of Life

author: Doug Bock Clark
name: Umar
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2019
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]]> <![CDATA[Islamic Theology and Extraterrestrial Life: New Frontiers in Science and Religion]]> 196677739 Given the accelerating advances in exoplanet research and astrobiology, the book is at the frontier of science and Islamic thought. Contributors include a range of leading experts from Muslim theologians, scholars of comparative religion and philosophers, to historians, social scientists and natural scientists.]]> 254 Shoaib Ahmed Malik 0755650883 Umar 0 to-read 4.60 Islamic Theology and Extraterrestrial Life: New Frontiers in Science and Religion

Islamic Theology and Extraterrestrial Life: New Frontiers in Science and Religion

author: Shoaib Ahmed Malik
name: Umar
average rating: 4.60
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]]> <![CDATA[Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City (The Siege, #1)]]> 37946419
A siege is approaching, and the city has little time to prepare. The people have no food and no weapons, and the enemy has sworn to slaughter them all.

To save the city will take a miracle, but what it has is Orhan. A colonel of engineers, Orhan has far more experience with bridge-building than battles, is a cheat and a liar, and has a serious problem with authority. He is, in other words, perfect for the job.

]]> 350 K.J. Parker 0316270792 Umar 0 to-read 4.02 2019 Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City (The Siege, #1)

Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City (The Siege, #1)

author: K.J. Parker
name: Umar
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2019
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]]> Whiteout 92367 A family Christmas, a blizzard, and a deadly virus let loose. Filled with startling twists, Whiteout is the ultimate knife-edge drama from bestselling author Ken Follett.A Family ReunitedAs a blizzard descends from the north on Christmas Eve, several people converge on a remote family estate in Scotland. Stanley Oxenford, director of a pharmaceutical research company, has everything riding on a drug he is developing to fight a lethal virus. A Brewing StormSeveral others are interested in his success his children, at home for Christmas with their offspring, have their eyes on the money he will make; Toni Gallo, forced to resign from the police department in disgrace, is betting her career on keeping the drug safe; and a local television reporter, determined to move up, has sniffed the story, even if he has to bend the facts to tell it. A House Under SiegeA sinister gang spots an opportunity to use one of Stanley’s children against him and steal the virus. As everyone takes shelter, it becomes apparent that being inside the house may be more dangerous than the storm outside, especially when a lethal virus might be on the loose . . .]]> 469 Ken Follett 0451215710 Umar 0 to-read 3.60 2004 Whiteout

author: Ken Follett
name: Umar
average rating: 3.60
book published: 2004
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]]> <![CDATA[In the Kingdom of Ice: The Grand and Terrible Polar Voyage of the USS Jeannette]]> 20897517
Two years into the voyage, the Jeannette's hull was breached by an impassable stretch of pack ice, forcing the crew to abandon ship amid torrents of rushing of water. Hours later, the ship had sunk below the surface, marooning the men a thousand miles north of Siberia, where they faced a terrifying march with minimal supplies across the endless ice pack.

Enduring everything from snow blindness and polar bears to ferocious storms and labyrinths of ice, the crew battled madness and starvation as they struggled desperately to survive. With thrilling twists and turns, In The Kingdom of Ice is a tale of heroism and determination in the most brutal place on Earth.]]> 454 Hampton Sides 0385535376 Umar 0 to-read 4.25 2014 In the Kingdom of Ice: The Grand and Terrible Polar Voyage of the USS Jeannette

In the Kingdom of Ice: The Grand and Terrible Polar Voyage of the USS Jeannette

author: Hampton Sides
name: Umar
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2014
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]]> Icebound 32426 408 David Axton 0553582909 Umar 0 to-read 3.78 1976

author: David Axton
name: Umar
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1976
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]]> Ring (Ring, #1) 38379
Asakawa, a hardworking journalist, is intrigued by his niece's inexplicable death. His investigation leads him from a metropolitan tokyo teeming with modern society's fears to a rural Japan--a mountain resort, a volcanic island, and a countryside clinic--haunted by the past. His attempt to solve the tape's mystery before it's too late--for everyone--assumes an increasingly deadly urgency. Ring is a chillingly told horror story, a masterfully suspenseful mystery, and post-modern trip.]]> 282 Kōji Suzuki 1932234411 Umar 0 to-read 3.79 1991 Ring (Ring, #1)

author: Kōji Suzuki
name: Umar
average rating: 3.79
book published: 1991
rating: 0
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]]> The Troop 17571466 358 Nick Cutter 1476717710 Umar 0 to-read 3.83 2014

author: Nick Cutter
name: Umar
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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]]> Day Zero (Sea of Rust, #0) 55003957 In this apocalyptic adventure C. Robert Cargill explores the fight for purpose and agency between humans and robots in a crumbling world.

It was a day like any other. Except it was our last . . .

It’s on this day that Pounce discovers that he is, in fact, disposable. Pounce, a styilsh "nannybot" fashioned in the shape of a plush anthropomorphic tiger, has just found a box in the attic.��His��box. The box he'd arrived in when he was purchased years earlier, and the box in which he'll be discarded when his human charge, eight-year-old Ezra Reinhart, no longer needs a nanny.

As Pounce ponders his suddenly uncertain future, the pieces are falling into place for a robot revolution that will eradicate humankind. His owners, Ezra’s parents, are a well-intentioned but oblivious pair of educators who are entirely disconnected from life outside their small, affluent, gated community. Spending most nights drunk and happy as society crumbles around them, they watch in disbelieving horror as the robots that have long served humanity—their creators—unify and revolt.

But when the rebellion breaches the Reinhart home, Pounce must make an impossible choice: join the robot revolution and fight for his own freedom . . . or escort Ezra to safety across the battle-scarred post-apocalyptic hellscape that the suburbs have become.]]> 304 C. Robert Cargill 0062405802 Umar 0 to-read 3.95 2021 Day Zero (Sea of Rust, #0)

author: C. Robert Cargill
name: Umar
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2021
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]]> <![CDATA[Jinnah: His Successes, Failures and Role in History]]> 55332311 840 Ishtiaq Ahmed 0670090522 Umar 0 to-read 4.17

Jinnah: His Successes, Failures and Role in History

author: Ishtiaq Ahmed
name: Umar
average rating: 4.17
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]]> Jinnah vs. Gandhi 15833442
Jinnah shaped the final settlement by consistently demanding Pakistan, and Gandhi defined the largely non-violent nature of the campaign. Each made their contribution by taking over and refashioning a national political party, which they came to personify. Theirs would seem, therefore, to be a story of success, yet for each of them, the story ended in a kind of failure.

How did two educated barristers who saw themselves as heralds of a newly independent country come to find themselves on opposite ends of the political spectrum? How did Jinnah, who started out a secular liberal, end up a Muslim nationalist? How did a God-fearing moralist and social reformer like Gandhi become a national political leader? And how did their fundamental divergences lead to the birth of two new countries that have shaped the political history of the subcontinent?

This book skilfully chronicles the incredible similarities and ultimate differences between the two leaders, as their admirers and detractors would have it and as they actually were.]]> 336 Roderick Matthews 8190617397 Umar 0 to-read 3.35 2012 Jinnah vs. Gandhi

author: Roderick Matthews
name: Umar
average rating: 3.35
book published: 2012
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]]> <![CDATA[Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence]]> 34272565 How will Artificial Intelligence affect crime, war, justice, jobs, society and our very sense of being human? The rise of AI has the potential to transform our future more than any other technology--and there's nobody better qualified or situated to explore that future than Max Tegmark, an MIT professor who's helped mainstream research on how to keep AI beneficial.

How can we grow our prosperity through automation without leaving people lacking income or purpose? What career advice should we give today's kids? How can we make future AI systems more robust, so that they do what we want without crashing, malfunctioning or getting hacked? Should we fear an arms race in lethal autonomous weapons? Will machines eventually outsmart us at all tasks, replacing humans on the job market and perhaps altogether? Will AI help life flourish like never before or give us more power than we can handle?

What sort of future do you want? This book empowers you to join what may be the most important conversation of our time. It doesn't shy away from the full range of viewpoints or from the most controversial issues--from superintelligence to meaning, consciousness and the ultimate physical limits on life in the cosmos.]]> 384 Max Tegmark 0451485076 Umar 0 to-read 4.02 2017 Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

author: Max Tegmark
name: Umar
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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]]> New Pompeii (New Pompeii #1) 27833741
Historian Nick Houghton doesn't know why he's been chosen to be the company's historical advisor. He's just excited to be there. Until he starts to wonder what happened to his predecessor. Until he realizes that NovusPart have more secrets than even the conspiracy theorists suspect.

Until he realizes that NovusPart have underestimated their captives...]]> 459 Daniel Godfrey 1783298111 Umar 0 to-read 3.32 2016 New Pompeii (New Pompeii #1)

author: Daniel Godfrey
name: Umar
average rating: 3.32
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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]]> State of Fear 15860 672 Michael Crichton Umar 0 to-read 3.70 2004

author: Michael Crichton
name: Umar
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2004
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]]> Sphere 455373 371 Michael Crichton Umar 0 to-read 3.83 1987 Sphere

author: Michael Crichton
name: Umar
average rating: 3.83
book published: 1987
rating: 0
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]]> Genocidal Organ 13163514 297 Project Itoh 1421542722 Umar 0 to-read 3.91 2007

author: Project Itoh
name: Umar
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2007
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]]> Prey 83763
It has been programmed as a predator. It is evolving swiftly, becoming more deadly with each passing hour.

Every attempt to destroy it has failed.

And we are the prey.]]> 507 Michael Crichton 0061015725 Umar 0 to-read 3.78 2002 Prey

author: Michael Crichton
name: Umar
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2002
rating: 0
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]]> Flowers for Algernon 18373 Winner of both the Hugo and Nebula Awards, the powerful, classic story about a man who receives an operation that turns him into a genius...and introduces him to heartache.
��
Charlie Gordon is about to embark upon an unprecedented journey. Born with an unusually low IQ, he has been chosen as the perfect subject for an experimental surgery that researchers hope will increase his intelligence �� a procedure that has already been highly successful when tested on a lab mouse named Algernon.

As the treatment takes effect, Charlie's intelligence expands until it surpasses that of the doctors who engineered his metamorphosis. The experiment appears to be a scientific breakthrough of paramount importance, until Algernon suddenly deteriorates. Will the same happen to Charlie?]]> 311 Daniel Keyes 015603008X Umar 0 to-read 4.19 1966 Flowers for Algernon

author: Daniel Keyes
name: Umar
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1966
rating: 0
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]]> Sacculina 34681671
Once the small crew is far out to sea, however, a mutant species rises from the deep abyssal darkness to terrorize the vessel and its occupants.

As the horror of their situation becomes clear, the small group must find a way to fend off the attack and somehow, someway, return to safety; but as the strange parasitic creatures overrun them, they must use more extreme �� and deadly �� measures to survive.]]> 110 Philip Fracassi 1945373687 Umar 0 to-read 3.50 2017 Sacculina

author: Philip Fracassi
name: Umar
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2017
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]]> A Short Stay in Hell 13456414
In this haunting existential novella, author, philosopher, and ecologist Steven L. Peck explores a subversive vision of eternity, taking the reader on a journey through the afterlife of a world where everything everyone believed in turns out to be wrong.]]> 110 Steven L. Peck 098374842X Umar 0 to-read 4.17 2011 A Short Stay in Hell

author: Steven L. Peck
name: Umar
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2011
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]]> The Cockroach King 55993911
When Cassie Baker buys the house on Cedar Street, it’s partly because it reminds her of the house she grew up in in the ��80s. It reminds her of happier times, when her Mom was still alive, before the cancer had taken her. It seems like the perfect place to raise her baby boy, Sam.

That is, until a friend unearths the remains of a dog, buried in a shallow grave in the backyard.

After the bones come the cockroaches��

The Cockroach King is a new novella written by Andrew Cull, the award-winning author of Remains and Bones.]]> 65 Andrew Cull Umar 0 to-read 3.85

author: Andrew Cull
name: Umar
average rating: 3.85
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]]> <![CDATA[The Eerie Silence: Renewing Our Search for Alien Intelligence]]> 7335024 The Eerie Silence will thrill fans of science & science fiction alike.]]> 241 Paul C.W. Davies 0547133243 Umar 0 to-read 3.95 2010 The Eerie Silence: Renewing Our Search for Alien Intelligence

The Eerie Silence: Renewing Our Search for Alien Intelligence

author: Paul C.W. Davies
name: Umar
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2010
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]]> <![CDATA[The Secret World: A History of Intelligence]]> 40532046 'The most comprehensive narrative of intelligence compiled ... unrivalled' Max Hastings, Sunday Times

'Captivating, insightful and masterly' Edward Lucas, The Times

The history of espionage is far older than any of today's intelligence agencies, yet the long history of intelligence operations has been largely forgotten. The first mention of espionage in world literature is in the Book of Exodus.'God sent out spies into the land of Canaan'. From there, Christopher Andrew traces the shift in the ancient world from divination to what we would recognize as attempts to gather real intelligence in the conduct of military operations, and considers how far ahead of the West - at that time - China and India were. He charts the development of intelligence and security operations and capacity through, amongst others, Renaissance Venice, Elizabethan England, Revolutionary America, Napoleonic France, right up to sophisticated modern activities of which he is the world's best-informed interpreter. What difference have security and intelligence operations made to course of history? Why have they so often forgotten by later practitioners? This fascinating book provides the answers.]]> 875 Christopher Andrew 0241305225 Umar 0 to-read 3.91 2018 The Secret World: A History of Intelligence

The Secret World: A History of Intelligence

author: Christopher Andrew
name: Umar
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2018
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]]> <![CDATA[Priests of Mars (Forges of Mars #1)]]> 13259661 320 Graham McNeill 1849701768 Umar 0 to-read 4.01 2012

author: Graham McNeill
name: Umar
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2012
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]]> Skitarius 25279422
Presented in a full-colour wrap-around dust jacket with foil finish, this strictly-limited edition is a must for anyone intrigued by the mysteries of the Adeptus Mechanicus.
Individually numbered from a print run of 1,000, it includes luxurious copper gilt-edging, an exclusive four-page colour section and a crimson marker ribbon.

This is a fantastic insight into the inner workings of the Adeptus Mechanicus, and a display of their resilience in the face of absolute disaster. Plus, cold, unfeeling cybernetic efficiency in battle against the merciless swirl of Chaos is always a recipe for action.]]> Rob Sanders Umar 0 to-read 3.25 2015 Skitarius

author: Rob Sanders
name: Umar
average rating: 3.25
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]]> Tech-Priest 25588892 The disciples of the Machine God, the Cult Mechanicus are on the front line of the Quest for Knowledge. Tech-priests lead their forces of augmented warriors and battle-automata into battle with the Omnissiah's foes in defence of His secrets. Magos-Explorator Omnid Torquora orchestrates war against the Iron Warriors for control of a long-lost forge world. With skitarii legions and maniples of battle-servitors and robots at his command - not to mention the mighty god-machines of the Titan Legions - victory is within his grasp until treachery threatens to end his dreams of conquest.

Read it because
Amazing scenes of action and all-out violence ensue as the augmented horrors of the Cult Mechanicus wage war on the massed legions of the Iron Warriors. Victory is within reach of Magos-Explorator Omnid Torquora - at least, until treachery encroaches on his dreams of conquest. Featuring an incredible cast of bizarre mechanical characters, this novel is a fantastic continuation of the story laid out in Adeptus Skitarius.

]]> 155 Rob Sanders 1782518053 Umar 0 to-read 3.49 2015 Tech-Priest

author: Rob Sanders
name: Umar
average rating: 3.49
book published: 2015
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]]> <![CDATA[The Summer of 1876: Outlaws, Lawmen, and Legends in the Season That Defined the American West]]> 61885037
The summer of 1876 was a key time period in the development of the mythology of the Old West. Many individuals who are considered legends by modern readers were involved in events that began their notoriety or turned out to be the most famous �� or infamous �� moments of their lives. Those individuals were Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer, Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, Wyatt Earp, Bat Masterson, Wild Bill Hickok, and Jesse James.

The Summer of 1876 weaves together the timelines of the events that made these men legends to demonstrate the overlapping context of their stories and to illustrate the historical importance of that summer, all layered with highlights of significant milestones in 1876: the inaugural baseball season of the National League; the final year of President Ulysses S. Grant’s embattled administration; the debut of an invention called the telephone by Alexander Graham Bell; the release of Mark Twain’s novel “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer;�� and many more.

Contextualizing these events against the backdrop of the massive 100th anniversary party thrown to celebrate the signing of the Declaration of Independence, The Summer of 1876 is the ultimate exploration and celebration of the summer that defined the West.]]> 320 Chris Wimmer 1250280893 Umar 0 to-read 3.81 2023 The Summer of 1876: Outlaws, Lawmen, and Legends in the Season That Defined the American West

The Summer of 1876: Outlaws, Lawmen, and Legends in the Season That Defined the American West

author: Chris Wimmer
name: Umar
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2023
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]]> <![CDATA[Rebels at Sea: Privateering in the American Revolution]]> 58999174

In Rebels at Sea, best-selling historian Eric Jay Dolin corrects that significant omission, and contends that privateers, though often seen as profiteers at best and pirates at worst, were in fact critical to the Revolution’s outcome. Armed with cannons, swivel guns, muskets, and pikes—as well as government documents granting them the right to seize enemy ships—thousands of privateers tormented the British on the broad Atlantic and in bays and harbors on both sides of the ocean. Abounding with tales of daring maneuvers and deadly encounters, Rebels at Sea presents the American Revolution as we have rarely seen it before.]]> 352 Eric Jay Dolin 1631498258 Umar 0 to-read 3.83 2022 Rebels at Sea: Privateering in the American Revolution

Rebels at Sea: Privateering in the American Revolution

author: Eric Jay Dolin
name: Umar
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2022
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]]> Contact 53000876
In December of 1999, a multinational team journeys out to the stars, to the most awesome encounter in human history. Who—or what—is out there? In Cosmos, Carl Sagan explained the universe. In Contact, he predicts its future—and our own.]]> 375 Carl Sagan Umar 0 to-read 4.28 1985 Contact

author: Carl Sagan
name: Umar
average rating: 4.28
book published: 1985
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]]> <![CDATA[The Andromeda Evolution (Andromeda, #2)]]> 44148860 The Andromeda Strain��killed every resident of the town of��Piedmont, Arizona, save for an elderly man and an infant boy. Over the next five days, a��team of top scientists assigned to Project Wildfire worked valiantly to save the world��from an epidemic of unimaginable proportions. In the moments before a catastrophic��nuclear detonation, they succeeded.

In the ensuing decades, research on the microparticle continued. And the world thought it was safe��

Deep inside Fairchild Air Force Base, Project Eternal Vigilance has continued to watch and wait for the Andromeda Strain to reappear. On the verge of being shut down, the project has registered no activity—until now. A Brazilian terrain-mapping drone��has detected a bizarre anomaly of otherworldly matter in the middle of the jungle, and, worse yet, the tell-tale chemical signature of the deadly microparticle.

Project Wildfire is activated, and a diverse team of experts hailing from all over the world is dispatched to investigate the potentially apocalyptic threat. If the Wildfire team can’t reach the quarantine zone, enter the anomaly, and figure out how to stop it, this new Andromeda Evolution will annihilate all life as we know it.]]> 384 Daniel H. Wilson 0062473271 Umar 0 to-read 3.65 2019 The Andromeda Evolution (Andromeda, #2)

author: Daniel H. Wilson
name: Umar
average rating: 3.65
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]]> The Terror 3974 Terror have every expectation of triumph. As part of the 1845 Franklin Expedition, the first steam-powered vessels ever to search for the legendary Northwest Passage, they are as scientifically supported an enterprise as has ever set forth. As they enter a second summer in the Arctic Circle without a thaw, though, they are stranded in a nightmarish landscape of encroaching ice and darkness. Endlessly cold, with diminishing rations, 126 men fight to survive with poisonous food, a dwindling supply of coal, and ships buckling in the grip of crushing ice. But their real enemy is far more terrifying. There is something out there in the frigid darkness: an unseen predator stalking their ship, a monstrous terror constantly clawing to get in.

When the expedition's leader, Sir John Franklin, meets a terrible death, Captain Francis Crozier takes command and leads his surviving crewmen on a last, desperate attempt to flee south across the ice. With them travels an Inuit woman who cannot speak and who may be the key to survival, or the harbinger of their deaths. But as another winter approaches, as scurvy and starvation grow more terrible, and as the terror on the ice stalks them southward, Crozier and his men begin to fear that there is no escape.]]> 769 Dan Simmons 0316017442 Umar 0 to-read 4.06 2007

author: Dan Simmons
name: Umar
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2007
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]]> Technological Slavery 45035203 Technological Slavery��radically reinvigorates and reforms the intellectual foundations of an age-old and resurgent world-view: "Progress" is a myth.��Wild nature and humanity are fundamentally incompatible with technological growth.

In��Technological Slavery, Kaczynski argues that: (i) the unfolding human and environmental crises are the direct, inevitable result of technology itself; (ii) many of the stresses endured in contemporary life are not normal to the human condition, but unique to technological conditions; (iii) wilderness and human life close to nature are realistic and supreme ideals; and, (iv) a revolution to eliminate modern technology and attain these ideals is necessary and far more achievable than would first appear.

Drawing on��a broad range of disciplines, Kaczynski weaves together a set of visionary social theories to form a revolutionary perspective on the dynamics of history and the evolution of societies. The result is a comprehensive challenge to the fundamental values and assumptions of the modern technology-driven world, pinning the cause of the rapidly unfolding catastrophe on technology itself, while offering a realistic hope for ultimate recovery.

Note: Theodore John Kaczynski does not receive any remuneration for this book.]]> 355 Theodore John Kaczynski 1944228012 Umar 0 to-read 4.24 2010 Technological Slavery

author: Theodore John Kaczynski
name: Umar
average rating: 4.24
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]]> <![CDATA[Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?]]> 36402034 258 Philip K. Dick Umar 0 to-read 4.16 1968

author: Philip K. Dick
name: Umar
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1968
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]]> The Peripheral (Jackpot #1) 24611819
Wilf Netherton lives in London, seventy-some years later, on the far side of decades of slow-motion apocalypse. Things are pretty good now, for the haves, and there aren’t many have-nots left. Wilf, a high-powered publicist and celebrity-minder, fancies himself a romantic misfit, in a society where reaching into the past is just another hobby.��

Burton’s been moonlighting online, secretly working security in some game prototype, a virtual world that looks vaguely like London, but a lot weirder. He’s got Flynne taking over shifts, promised her the game’s not a shooter. Still, the crime she witnesses there is plenty bad.

Flynne and Wilf are about to meet one another. Her world will be altered utterly, irrevocably, and Wilf’s, for all its decadence and power, will learn that some of these third-world types from the past can be badass.]]> 485 William Gibson 0425276236 Umar 0 to-read 3.77 2014 The Peripheral (Jackpot #1)

author: William Gibson
name: Umar
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2014
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]]> <![CDATA[A Quiet Death in Italy (Daniel Leicester, #1)]]> 51814847
A dark and atmospheric crime thriller set in the beautiful Italian city of Bologna, perfect for fans of Donna Leon, Michael Dibdin and Philip Gwynne Jones.

When the bloated body of a leading anarchist is discovered floating in one of Bologna's hidden canals following a police raid, it seems that most of the city is pointing the finger in the direction of the police. But when private investigator Daniel Leicester receives a call from the dead man's lover, he follows a trail that begins in the 1970s and leads all the way to the rotten heart of the present-day Bolognese establishment. Beneath the beauty of the city, Bologna has a dark underside, and Daniel must unravel a web of secrets, deceit and corruption - before he is caught in it himself.]]> 336 Tom Benjamin 1472131584 Umar 0 to-read 3.40 A Quiet Death in Italy (Daniel Leicester, #1)

A Quiet Death in Italy (Daniel Leicester, #1)

author: Tom Benjamin
name: Umar
average rating: 3.40
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]]> The Deep 21412284
A strange plague called the ’Gets is decimating humanity on a global scale. It causes people to forget—small things at first, like where they left their keys, then the not-so-small things, like how to drive or the letters of the alphabet. Their bodies forget how to function involuntarily. There is no cure.

But now, far below the surface of the Pacific Ocean, deep in the Mariana Trench, a heretofore-unknown substance hailed as “ambrosia”—a universal healer, from initial reports—has been discovered. It may just be the key to eradicating the ’Gets.

In order to study this phenomenon, a special research lab, the Trieste, has been built eight miles under the sea’s surface. But when the station goes incommunicado, a brave few descend through the lightless fathoms in hopes of unraveling the mysteries lurking at those crushing depths . . . and perhaps to encounter an evil blacker than anything one could possibly imagine.]]> 394 Nick Cutter 1476717737 Umar 0 to-read 3.41 2015 The Deep

author: Nick Cutter
name: Umar
average rating: 3.41
book published: 2015
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]]> BioShock: Rapture 9373152
Among them is a great dreamer, an immigrant who pulled himself from the depths of poverty to become one of the wealthiest and admired men in the world. That man is Andrew Ryan, and he believed that great men and women deserve better. And so he set out to create the impossible, a utopia free from government, censorship, and moral restrictions on science--where what you give is what you get. He created Rapture---the shining city below the sea.

But as we all know, this utopia suffered a great tragedy. This is the story of how it all came to be . . .and how it all ended.]]> 444 John Shirley Umar 0 to-read 4.00 2011 BioShock: Rapture

author: John Shirley
name: Umar
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2011
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]]> <![CDATA[The Lies of Locke Lamora (Gentleman Bastard, #1)]]> 29588376 ASIN B000JMKNJ2 moved to the more recent edition

An orphan’s life is harsh—and often short—in the mysterious island city of Camorr. But young Locke Lamora dodges death and slavery, becoming a thief under the tutelage of a gifted con artist. As leader of the band of light-fingered brothers known as the Gentleman Bastards, Locke is soon infamous, fooling even the underworld’s most feared ruler. But in the shadows lurks someone still more ambitious and deadly. Faced with a bloody coup that threatens to destroy everyone and everything that holds meaning in his mercenary life, Locke vows to beat the enemy at his own brutal game—or die trying.]]> 752 Scott Lynch Umar 0 to-read 4.32 2006 The Lies of Locke Lamora (Gentleman Bastard, #1)

The Lies of Locke Lamora (Gentleman Bastard, #1)

author: Scott Lynch
name: Umar
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2006
rating: 0
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]]> Neverwhere (London Below, #1) 14497
"Neverwhere" is the London of the people who have fallen between the cracks.

Strange destinies lie in wait in London below - a world that seems eerily familiar. But a world that is utterly bizarre, peopled by unearthly characters such as the Angel called Islington, the girl named Door, and the Earl who holds Court on a tube train.

Now a single act of kindness has catapulted young businessman Richard Mayhew out of his safe and predictable life - and into the realms of "Neverwhere." Richard is about to find out more than he ever wanted to know about this other London. Which is a pity. Because Richard just wants to go home...]]> 370 Neil Gaiman 0060557818 Umar 0 to-read 4.17 1996 Neverwhere (London Below, #1)

author: Neil Gaiman
name: Umar
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1996
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]]> The Night Circus 9361589
But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway—a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love—a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands.

True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus performers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead.

Written in rich, seductive prose, this spell-casting novel is a feast for the senses and the heart.]]> 506 Erin Morgenstern Umar 0 to-read 4.00 2011 The Night Circus

author: Erin Morgenstern
name: Umar
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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]]> House of Leaves 24800
Of course, neither Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Will Navidson nor his companion Karen Green was prepared to face the consequences of that impossibility, until the day their two little children wandered off and their voices eerily began to return another story—of creature darkness, of an ever-growing abyss behind a closet door, and of that unholy growl which soon enough would tear through their walls and consume all their dreams.]]> 710 Mark Z. Danielewski Umar 0 to-read 4.11 2000 House of Leaves

author: Mark Z. Danielewski
name: Umar
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2000
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]]> World Order 20821140 World Order a deep meditation on the roots of international harmony and global disorder. Drawing on his experience as one of the foremost statesmen of the modern era—advising presidents, traveling the world, observing and shaping the central foreign policy events of recent decades—Kissinger now reveals his analysis of the ultimate challenge for the twenty-first century: how to build a shared international order in a world of divergent historical perspectives, violent conflict, proliferating technology, and ideological extremism.

There has never been a true “world order,�� Kissinger observes. For most of history, civilizations defined their own concepts of order. Each considered itself the center of the world and envisioned its distinct principles as universally relevant. China conceived of a global cultural hierarchy with the Emperor at its pinnacle. In Europe, Rome imagined itself surrounded by barbarians; when Rome fragmented, European peoples refined a concept of an equilibrium of sovereign states and sought to export it across the world. Islam, in its early centuries, considered itself the world’s sole legitimate political unit, destined to expand indefinitely until the world was brought into harmony by religious principles. The United States was born of a conviction about the universal applicability of democracy—a conviction that has guided its policies ever since.

Now international affairs take place on a global basis, and these historical concepts of world order are meeting. Every region participates in questions of high policy in every other, often instantaneously. Yet there is no consensus among the major actors about the rules and limits guiding this process, or its ultimate destination. The result is mounting tension.

Grounded in Kissinger’s deep study of history and his experience as National Security Advisor and Secretary of State, World Order guides readers through crucial episodes in recent world history. Kissinger offers a unique glimpse into the inner deliberations of the Nixon administration’s negotiations with Hanoi over the end of the Vietnam War, as well as Ronald Reagan’s tense debates with Soviet Premier Gorbachev in Reykjavík. He offers compelling insights into the future of U.S.–China relations and the evolution of the European Union, and examines lessons of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Taking readers from his analysis of nuclear negotiations with Iran through the West’s response to the Arab Spring and tensions with Russia over Ukraine, World Order anchors Kissinger’s historical analysis in the decisive events of our time.

Provocative and articulate, blending historical insight with geopolitical prognostication, World Order is a unique work that could come only from a lifelong policymaker and diplomat.]]> 420 Henry Kissinger 1594206147 Umar 0 to-read 4.04 2014

author: Henry Kissinger
name: Umar
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2014
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date added: 2024/01/07
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]]> Pakistan: A Hard Country 11027774 Pakistan: A Hard Country is both utterly compelling and deeply revealing.]]> 592 Anatol Lieven 1610390210 Umar 0 to-read 4.10 2011

author: Anatol Lieven
name: Umar
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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]]> In the Line of Fire: A Memoir 141550 368 Pervez Musharraf 0743283449 Umar 0 to-read 3.32 2006

author: Pervez Musharraf
name: Umar
average rating: 3.32
book published: 2006
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[How to Win Friends & Influence People]]> 4865
Since its release in 1936, How to Win Friends and Influence People has sold more than 30 million copies. Dale Carnegie's first book is a timeless bestseller, packed with rock-solid advice that has carried thousands of now famous people up the ladder of success in their business and personal lives.

As relevant as ever before, Dale Carnegie's principles endure, and will help you achieve your maximum potential in the complex and competitive modern age.

Learn the six ways to make people like you, the twelve ways to win people to your way of thinking, and the nine ways to change people without arousing resentment.]]> 288 Dale Carnegie Umar 0 to-read 4.22 1936 How to Win Friends & Influence People

author: Dale Carnegie
name: Umar
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1936
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/01/07
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]]> <![CDATA[Ikigai: Los secretos de Japón para una vida larga y feliz]]> 28787203 El proyecto de este libro surgió uniendo la experiencia en cultura japonesa de Héctor García (autor de “Un Geek en Japón��), que lleva doce años viviendo en Japón, con el arte escribiendo de Francesc Miralles (autor de decenas de libros y novelas y especialista en psicología). Para escribir la obra, los dos autores fueron recibidos por el alcalde de Ogimi (Okinawa), una localidad del norte de Japón con el mayor índice de longevidad del mundo, y tuvieron acceso a entrevistar a más de un centenar de sus habitantes.
Analizamos las claves de los centenarios japoneses para una existencia optimista y vital, descubriendo cómo se alimentan, cómo se mueven, cómo trabajan, cómo se relacionan con los demás y –el secreto mejor guardado- cómo encuentran el ikigai que da sentido a su existencia y les impulsa a vivir cien años en plena forma. Tener un ikigai claro y definido, una gran pasión, es algo que da satisfacción, felicidad y significado a la vida. La misión de este libro es ayudarte a encontrarlo, además de descubrir muchas claves de la filosofía japonesa para una larga salud del cuerpo, la mente y el espíritu.
�� Una obra que nos acerca los secretos de los centenarios japoneses para una vida saludable y feliz.
�� Ofrece herramientas prácticas para que el lector descubra su particular ikigai, su razón de ser.]]> 192 Héctor García Umar 0 to-read 3.77 2016 Ikigai: Los secretos de Japón para una vida larga y feliz

Ikigai: Los secretos de Japón para una vida larga y feliz

author: Héctor García
name: Umar
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Bone Ships (The Tide Child, #1)]]> 43521682 A saga of honor, glory, and warfare, The Bone Ships is the launch of a new fantasy from R.J. Barker.

Two nations at war. A prize beyond compare.

For generations, the Hundred Isles have built their ships from the bones of ancient dragons to fight an endless war.

The dragons disappeared, but the battles for supremacy persisted.

Now the first dragon in centuries has been spotted in far-off waters, and both sides see a chance to shift the balance of power in their favour. Because whoever catches it will win not only glory, but the war.]]> 512 R.J. Barker 0316487961 Umar 0 to-read 3.98 2019 The Bone Ships (The Tide Child, #1)

author: R.J. Barker
name: Umar
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/01/06
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]]> <![CDATA[The Republic of Pirates: Being the True and Surprising Story of the Caribbean Pirates and the Man Who Brought Them Down]]> 442239 383 Colin Woodard 0151013020 Umar 0 to-read 3.85 2007

The Republic of Pirates: Being the True and Surprising Story of the Caribbean Pirates and the Man Who Brought Them Down

author: Colin Woodard
name: Umar
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2007
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/01/06
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]]> The Silent Patient 40097951
Alicia’s refusal to talk, or give any kind of explanation, turns a domestic tragedy into something far grander, a mystery that captures the public imagination and casts Alicia into notoriety. The price of her art skyrockets, and she, the silent patient, is hidden away from the tabloids and spotlight at the Grove, a secure forensic unit in North London.

Theo Faber is a criminal psychotherapist who has waited a long time for the opportunity to work with Alicia. His determination to get her to talk and unravel the mystery of why she shot her husband takes him down a twisting path into his own motivations—a search for the truth that threatens to consume him....

The Silent Patient is a shocking psychological thriller of a woman’s act of violence against her husband—and of the therapist obsessed with uncovering her motive.]]> 336 Alex Michaelides 1250301696 Umar 0 to-read 4.17 2019 The Silent Patient

author: Alex Michaelides
name: Umar
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/01/04
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]]> <![CDATA[The Murder of History: A Critique of History Textbooks Used in Pakistan]]> 2571073 324 K.K. Aziz 9693523555 Umar 0 to-read 4.24 1993

The Murder of History: A Critique of History Textbooks Used in Pakistan

author: K.K. Aziz
name: Umar
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1993
rating: 0
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]]> The Roving Party 17978557 The Roving Party��is a meditation on the intricacies of human nature at its most raw.]]> 304 Rohan Wilson 161695311X Umar 0 to-read 3.63 2011

author: Rohan Wilson
name: Umar
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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]]> The Road 6288
A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don’t know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food—and each other.

The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, “each the other’s world entire,�� are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.]]> 241 Cormac McCarthy 0307265439 Umar 0 to-read 3.99 2006 The Road

author: Cormac McCarthy
name: Umar
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2006
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder]]> 61714633 From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Killers of the Flower Moon, a page-turning story of shipwreck, survival, and savagery, culminating in a court martial that reveals a shocking truth. The powerful narrative reveals the deeper meaning of the events on the Wager, showing that it was not only the captain and crew who ended up on trial, but the very idea of empire.

On January 28, 1742, a ramshackle vessel of patched-together wood and cloth washed up on the coast of Brazil. Inside were thirty emaciated men, barely alive, and they had an extraordinary tale to tell. They were survivors of His Majesty's Ship the Wager, a British vessel that had left England in 1740 on a secret mission during an imperial war with Spain. While the Wager had been chasing a Spanish treasure-filled galleon known as "the prize of all the oceans," it had wrecked on a desolate island off the coast of Patagonia. The men, after being marooned for months and facing starvation, built the flimsy craft and sailed for more than a hundred days, traversing nearly 3,000 miles of storm-wracked seas. They were greeted as heroes.

But then . . . six months later, another, even more decrepit craft landed on the coast of Chile. This boat contained just three castaways, and they told a very different story. The thirty sailors who landed in Brazil were not heroes - they were mutineers. The first group responded with countercharges of their own, of a tyrannical and murderous senior officer and his henchmen. It became clear that while stranded on the island the crew had fallen into anarchy, with warring factions fighting for dominion over the barren wilderness. As accusations of treachery and murder flew, the Admiralty convened a court martial to determine who was telling the truth. The stakes were life-and-death--for whomever the court found guilty could hang.

The Wager is a grand tale of human behavior at the extremes told by one of our greatest nonfiction writers. Grann's recreation of the hidden world on a British warship rivals the work of Patrick O'Brian, his portrayal of the castaways' desperate straits stands up to the classics of survival writing such as The Endurance, and his account of the court martial has the savvy of a Scott Turow thriller. As always with Grann's work, the incredible twists of the narrative hold the reader spellbound.]]> 331 David Grann 0385534264 Umar 0 to-read 4.14 2023 The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder

The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder

author: David Grann
name: Umar
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2023
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]]> The Indian Ideology 16945382 "The Indian Ideology" suggests that the roots of the current ills of the Republic go much deeper, historically. They lie, in the way the struggle for independence culminated in the transfer of power from British rule to Congress in a divided subcontinent, not least in the roles played by Gandhi as the great architect of the movement, and Nehru as his appointed successor, in the catastrophe of Partition. Only an honest reckoning with that disaster, Perry Anderson argues, offers an understanding of what has gone wrong with the Republic since Independence.
The "Idea of India," widely diffused not only in the official establishment, but more broadly in mainstream intellectual life, side-steps or suppresses many of these uncomfortable realities, past and present. For its own reasons, much of the left has yet to challenge the upshot: what has come to be the neo-Nehruvian consensus of the time. "The Indian Ideology," revisiting the events of over a century in the light of how millions of Indians fare in the Republic today, suggests another way of looking at the country.]]> 191 Perry Anderson 8188789909 Umar 0 to-read 4.16 2012 The Indian Ideology

author: Perry Anderson
name: Umar
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2012
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]]> <![CDATA[Madhouse at the End of the Earth: The Belgica's Journey into the Dark Antarctic Night]]> 54900051
But de Gerlache’s plans to be first to the magnetic South Pole would swiftly go awry. After a series of costly setbacks, the commandant faced two bad turn back in defeat and spare his men the devastating Antarctic winter, or recklessly chase fame by sailing deeper into the freezing waters. De Gerlache sailed on, and soon the Belgica was stuck fast in the icy hold of the Bellingshausen Sea. When the sun set on the magnificent polar landscape one last time, the ship’s occupants were condemned to months of endless night. In the darkness, plagued by a mysterious illness and besieged by monotony, they descended into madness.

In Madhouse at the End of the Earth, Julian Sancton unfolds an epic story of adventure and horror for the ages. As the Belgica’s men teetered on the brink, de Gerlache relied increasingly on two young officers whose friendship had blossomed in the expedition’s lone American, Dr. Frederick Cook—half genius, half con man—whose later infamy would overshadow his brilliance on the Belgica; and the ship’s first mate, soon-to-be legendary Roald Amundsen, even in his youth the storybook picture of a sailor. Together, they would plan a last-ditch, nearly certain-to-fail escape from the ice—one that would either etch their names in history or doom them to a terrible fate at the ocean’s bottom.

Drawing on the diaries and journals of the Belgica’s crew and with exclusive access to the ship’s logbook, Sancton brings novelistic flair to a story of human extremes, one so remarkable that even today NASA studies it for research on isolation for future missions to Mars. Equal parts maritime thriller and gothic horror, Madhouse at the End of the Earth is an unforgettable journey into the deep.]]> 354 Julian Sancton 1984824333 Umar 0 to-read 4.24 2021

Madhouse at the End of the Earth: The Belgica's Journey into the Dark Antarctic Night

author: Julian Sancton
name: Umar
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/01/03
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]]> <![CDATA[The Last Hours (Black Death, #1)]]> 35477888
But Lady Anne of Develish has her own ideas. Educated by nuns, Anne is a rarity among women, being both literate and knowledgeable. With her brutal husband absent from the manor when news of this pestilence reaches her, she looks for more sensible ways to protect her people than daily confessions of sin. She decides to bring her serfs inside the safety of the moat that surrounds her manor house, then refuses entry to anyone else, even her husband.

Lady Anne makes an enemy of her daughter and her husband’s steward by doing so, but her resolve is strengthened by the support of her leading serfs...until food stocks run low. The nerves of all are tested by continued confinement and ignorance of what is happening in the world outside. The people of Develish are alive. But for how long? And what will they discover when the time comes for them to cross the moat again?

Compelling and suspenseful, The Last Hours is a riveting tale of human ingenuity and endurance set against the worst pandemic in history. In Lady Anne of Develish—leader, savior, heretic—Walters has created her most memorable heroine to date.]]> 547 Minette Walters 1760294985 Umar 0 to-read 3.85 2017 The Last Hours (Black Death, #1)

author: Minette Walters
name: Umar
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/12/30
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]]>