Showing results by narrator "Marlin May" in All Categories

Three generations of men gather at their family homestead in New Jersey as Franklin Bowman faces impending death. With a plan in mind, Franklin summons his son George, who faces the uncertainties of retirement, and his grandson Jack, who faces the prospect of discovering himself after being fired from his job.

August Simms—explorer, soldier, world traveler—returns to Rhome, Texas to chase one last adventure. Hundreds of UFO sightings have been reported, seven years before the Wright brothers' initial flight, and August intends to solve the airship mystery. Instead, the past comes calling. A murder, a lynching, and the death of his wife 15 years earlier are inextricably tied to the present, and the adventure August finds will not be the one he expects.

At the time of the Millennium, three people struggle for survival in a small New Hampshire town as the world spins into chaos, not realizing that each harbors secrets that will eventually pit them against one another.

Conflicted hearts search for human connection upon waters and vivid landscapes. Randolf, a Susquehanna ferryman, is piloting an Amish wedding party in the title story of this collection, “Nunc Stans—A Ferry Tale.” But mid-river, the ferry snags on a low dam, and a frightened mare bolts from the deck. As Randolf tries to save the ferry, he’s forced to confront his own remorse in a haunting reflection of a couple’s grief, guilt, and awakenings in the aftermath of a stillbirth.

Robert Dean Emslie (1859–1943) spent fifty-six of his eighty-four years in professional baseball—eight as a player and forty-nine as an umpire. When arm problems ended his career as a Major League pitcher, he turned to umpiring, serving in that capacity for thirty-five seasons, then as an umpire supervisor for thirteen years. Emslie endured the rough-and-tumble umpire-baiting 1890s, the Deadball era, injuries from thrown and batted balls, physical and verbal assaults from players and fans, and criticism in the press.

At a time when Americans are debating the future of public education, Johann N. Neem tells the inspiring story of how and why Americans built a robust public school system in the decades between the Revolution and the Civil War. It’s a story in which ordinary people in towns across the country worked together to form districts and build schoolhouses and reformers sought to expand tax support and give every child a liberal education. By the time of the Civil War, most northern states had made common schools free, and many southern states were heading in the same direction.

Jenny Smith, a young journalist, secures a career-making interview with a famous but reclusive author, AJ Kenton. Jenny's time with Mr. Kenton, however, is not spent with her asking questions but with his telling one last story. During three afternoons, Kenton describes a pivotal point in his life. As a 12-year-old, he went door to door in his neighborhood and sold packets of flower seeds. His goal was to earn a prize from the seed company's catalog. His memories reveal the hidden struggles of middle-class life in the early 1960s, a time that many people living today picture as ideal.

This book chronicles the long and tortured history of the NCAA's attempt to maintain the myth of amateurism and the student-athlete, along with the attendant fiction that the players academic achievement is the top priority of Division-I athletic programs. It is an indictment of the current system, making the case that big-time college sports cannot continue its connection to universities without undermining the mission of higher education. It concludes with bold proposals to separate big-time college sports from the university, transforming them into on-campus business operations.

Joe Skelton has never written anything longer than a shopping list, but now his brain tumor is making him write a novel. It's a baseball novel about a crippled janitor who cleans up at a forgotten minor league field, and who is accidentally discovered to be a perfect never-misses hitter. Will Joe die before we find out whether the Joltin' Janitor makes it to the big leagues? An imagined Roger Angell leads an unforgettable ensemble of quirky characters on a gentle and poignant race to discover the meaning of baseball, fate, will, and chance.

Scouting has been called pro baseball’s personalized way of renewing itself from year to year and a pathway to the game’s past. It takes a very special person to be a baseball scout: normal family life is out of the question because travel is a constant companion. Scouts have the difficult task of not only discovering and signing new players but envisioning the trajectory of raw talent into the future. But the place of the traditional scout has become increasingly dire.

In 1842, every resident of Copper Harbor, MI disappeared without a trace. In 2019, Bill Hitze and his son Brandon make a gruesome discovery while fishing on Lake Superior that starts to shed light on the old mystery. According to Professor Stephanie Crowe, an Ojibwa legend predicts that the town's residents will be lost again. Together, Bill and Stephanie strive to discover the truth about what happened so they can protect the small tourist town. But time runs out when brutal winter weather hits Copper Harbor and awakens the ancient horror.

Two years ago, Matt lost his wife to an asleep-at-the-wheel truck driver for the corrupt Clawson Chicken Corporation, and most of his savings to a court battle with the aforementioned fowl magnate. Trusting that the ocean will heal his battered psyche, Matt heads out from Corpus Christi Bay in a vintage sloop, trying to out sail bad memories and find a path forward. As he winds his way east beyond the Gulf, he has adventures (and misadventures), meets a quirky cast of characters, and is dogged at every turn by reminders of the reach of the greedy chicken king, Colonel Clyde Clawson.

Appalled at the carnage being wreaked on allied ships by Nazi war vessels, the movie actress Hedy Lamarr invents a device that will prevent German ships and U-boats from jamming the allied warships' radio-guided torpedoes.