"When compared to the fact that he might very well be dead by this time tomorrow, whether he was courageous or not today was pointless, empty. When compared to the fact that he might be dead tomorrow, everything was pointless. Life was pointless. Whether he looked at a tree or not was pointless. It just didn't make any difference. It was pointless to the tree, it was pointless to every man in his outfit, pointless to everybody in the whole world. Who cared? It was not pointless only to him; and when he was dead, when he ceased to exist, it would be pointless to him too. More important: Not only would it be pointless, it would have been pointless, all along." Such is the ultimate significance of war in The Thin Red Line (1962), James Jones's fictional account of the battle between American and Japanese troops on the island of Guadalcanal. The narrative shifts effortlessly among multiple viewpoints within C-for-Charlie Company, from commanding officer Capt. James Stein, his psychotic first sergeant Eddie Welsh, and the young privates they send into battle. The descriptions of combat conditions--and the mental states it induces--are unflinchingly realistic, including the dialog (in which a certain word Norman Mailer rendered as "fug" 15 years earlier in The Naked and the Dead appears properly spelled on numerous occasions). This is more than a classic of combat fiction; it is one of the most significant explorations of male identity in American literature, establishing Jones as a novelist of the caliber of Herman Melville and Stephen Crane.

In July 2020, Laurent Duvernay-Tardif sent shockwaves through the sports world by becoming the first NFL player to opt out of the upcoming season during the global pandemic As plans for the 2020 NFL season ramped up and daily cases of Covid-19 continued to skyrocket, Laurent Duvernay-Tardif, a fixture on the offensive line of the Kansas City Chiefs, stepped away from the game he loved. Not only an active player but also a medical school graduate, Laurent withdrew when he realized that continuing to play—and potentially spreading the virus—was antithetical to everything he believed in. For the first time in his remarkable career, Laurent couldn't reconcile his twin passions of football and medicine, and with his team's Super Bowl win only months behind him, found himself on the front lines of the pandemic, working in a long-term care facility in Quebec. But that was just the beginning of the story. As Laurent settled into his new...

All I want is to be me. No drama. No hiding. No loneliness. Is that too much to ask? I’ve lost my family because I’m gay. But one thing has always been there for me… hockey. It’s been my saving grace. Instead of going pro, I opted to play for my university team. A way to keep my private life, well, private. Just because I’m gay, doesn’t mean that I want to be a poster child even if it means that I’m not as “out” as I’d like to me. The only problem is him… Jaedon, the coffee god. And my sanity saver during my final year. The man I’ve got an unrequited crush on. He’s always surrounded by gorgeous women. Yet when he touches me for a little longer than normal, I can’t help but wish that he feels the same. But until I work up enough courage to tell him who I really am, there’s no hope for more.

WWIII explodes in this electrifying debut military thriller in the tradition of Red Storm Rising and The Third World War."Delta-Two, I've got tanks through the wire! They're everywhere!" World War III explodes in seconds when a resurgent Russian Federation launches a deadly armored thrust into the heart of Germany. With a powerful blizzard providing cover, Russian tanks thunder down the autobahns while specially trained Spetsnaz teams strike at vulnerable command points. Standing against them are the woefully undermanned American forces. What they lack in numbers they make up for in superior weapons and training. But before the sun rises they are on the run across a smoking battlefield crowded with corpses. Any slim hope for victory rests with one unlikely hero. Army Staff Sergeant George O'Neill, a communications specialist, may be able to reestablish links that have been severed by hostile forces, but that will take...

Sarah Randolph believes she's just an ordinary woman, at least until the day she meets Ramsey—a mysterious man who tells her that not only is she not ordinary...she's not even human. John Sherlock Ramsey, an Earth-born Eudoran, is a Protector. He's assigned to help Sarah complete her Shift, a period of intense transformation experienced by those of his species. But her shift is different and risky, because she's a Red-Line, a member of his kind not seen in over sixty years. As her abilities are revealed and the secrets of their destiny exposed, they must confront an assailant who shares Sarah's unique origins and whose motives are far more sinister than anything Ramsey has ever encountered. Will Sarah's unique powers change their fate? Or will she prove to be Ramsey's last assignment on earth and watch as her people succumb to extinction? Part one of a three-part series.

When a teenager from a wealthy suburb outside of Oakland, CA is dumped at an inner city bus stop, homicide detective Matt Sinclair catches the case. It's his first since being bumped to desk duty for a bust that went south... fast. With few leads and plenty of attention, it's the worst kind of case to help him get back up to speed.And it only gets worse as the bodies start to pile up—first at the same bus bench, then around the city. Sinclair is unable to link the victims to each other, and the killer is just getting started. Time is running out on Sinclair's career, not to mention the people closest to him.With Red Line, Brian Thiem, a veteran of the Oakland police department and the Iraq war, has written a nuanced police procedural filled with the kind of insight that could only be written by a detective who has walked the streets and lived the life.

From best-selling author of Tail-End Charlie and Tornado Down comes this powerful and deeply moving account of Bomber Command's 1944 Nuremberg Raid -- the RAF's bloodiest night of the Second World War More men from Royal Air Force Bomber Command died on one single night of the Second World War than the total RAF aircrew losses during the whole of the four-month-long Battle of Britain. This is the story of the air raid intended to be the climax of Sir Arthur 'Bomber' Harris's relentless campaign to defeat Nazi Germany. The target was Nuremberg: 795 aircraft set out, nearly 700 men did not return. In 'The Red Line', we meet the young aircrew who flew on the night of 30 March 1944. John Nichol has interviewed the few surviving veterans, British and German, in the air and on the ground, to record the voices of a diminishing generation. While the airmen of Bomber Command were among the greatest heroes of the conflict, their...

For sixteen years the red line sliced through the heart of Nora's city. The young doctor had grown up knowing that the virtual line cut Beirut into a Christian east side and a Muslim west side. She took it for granted that no one on either side in this civil war could cross the red line, the boundary of tradition, morality, and even identity. Then the Muslim patient appeared in the psychiatric ward who would convince her to do the unthinkable. Nora's passion for this man would draw her into enemy territory where she would have to weave words around her friends, relatives, and even a powerful and dangerous family, but one misstep and she would be caught in her own web. Nora is the grown-up child of war, and her story—which is based on a real one—is the story of Beirut itself, a city divided, a city driven to self-destruction in a frenzy of passion, a city that got addicted to the bitter taste war left on its tongue.