Search results for ""Author Tim O'Brien""

The acclaimed novel from the award-winning author of ‘If I Die in a Combat Zone’, ‘Going After Cacciato’ and ‘In the Lake of the Woods’. The action in ‘Northern Lights’ takes place not in Vietnam but back in the USA, as Tim O’Brien explores the after-effects of that war – on those who served, and those they left behind. Set in the frozen wilderness of north Minnesota, it concerns two brothers, one who served in Vietnam, and has returned tough, cynical and world-weary; and the other who stayed at home. When they take off on a long skiing trip together through the frozen woods, they quickly get lost in a blizzard, and are tested to their limits as they face a battle against the elements and each other.

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The bestselling author of The Things They Carried and If I Die in a Combat Zone shares wisdom from a life in letters, lessons learned in wartime, and the challenges, humour and rewards of raising two sons. When Tim O’Brien became an older father, he resolved to give his young sons what he wished his own father had given to him – a few scraps of paper signed ‘Love, Dad’. Maybe a word of advice. Maybe a sentence or two about some long-ago Christmas Eve. Maybe some scattered glimpses of their rapidly ageing father, a man they might never really know. For the next fifteen years, the author talked to his sons on paper, as if they were adults, imagining what they might want to hear from a father who was no longer among the living.O’Brien traverses the great variety of human experience and emotion, moving from soccer games to warfare to risqué lullabies, from alcoholism to magic shows to history lessons to bittersweet bedtime stories, but always returning to a father’s soul-saving love for his sons.The result is Dad’s Maybe Book, a funny, tender, wise, and enduring literary achievement that will squeeze the reader’s heart with joy and recognition.

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“Tim O'Brien is the one American author whose works I look forward to the most. His new novel’s ironic depiction of a post-Iraq war, mid-COVID, and mid-Trump world is piercing and razor-sharp.” —HARUKI MURAKAMIAn American Master returns: the author of The Things They Carried delivers his first new novel in two decades, a brilliant and rollicking odyssey, in which a bank robbery sparks “a satirical romp through a country plagued by deceit” (Kirkus, starred review)One of Esquire's 20 Best Books of the Year * Named one of Fall 2023's most anticipated books: New York Times, Associated Press, Kirkus, Goodreads, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and moreAt 11:34 a.m. one Saturday in August 2019, Boyd Halverson strode into Community National Bank in Northern California.“How much is on hand, would you say?” he asked the teller. “I’ll want it all.”“You’re robbing me?”He revealed a Temptation .38 Special.The teller, a diminutive redhead named Angie Bing, collected eighty-one thousand dollars.Boyd stuffed the cash into a paper grocery bag.“I’m sorry about this,” he said, “but I’ll have to ask you to take a ride with me.”So begins the adventure of Boyd Halverson—star journalist turned notorious online disinformation troll turned JCPenney manager—and his irrepressible hostage, Angie Bing. Haunted by his past and weary of his present, Boyd has one goal before the authorities catch up with him: settle a score with the man who destroyed his life. By Monday the pair reach Mexico; by winter, they are in a lakefront mansion in Minnesota. On their trail are hitmen, jealous lovers, ex-cons, an heiress, a billionaire shipping tycoon, a three-tour veteran of Iraq, and the ghosts of Boyd’s past. Everyone, it seems, except the police.In the tradition of Jonathan Swift and Mark Twain, America Fantastica delivers a biting, witty, and entertaining story about the causes and costs of outlandish fantasy, while also marking the triumphant return of an essential voice in American letters. And at the heart of the novel, amid a teeming cast of characters, readers will delight in the tug-of-war between two memorable and iconic human beings—the exuberant savior-of-souls Angie Bing and the penitent but compulsive liar Boyd Halverson. Just as Tim O’Brien’s modern classic, The Things They Carried, so brilliantly reflected the unromantic truth of war, America Fantastica puts a mirror to a nation and a time that has become dangerously unmoored from truth and greedy for delusion.

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Hailed as one of the finest books to emerge from the Vietnam War, If I Die in a Combat Zone is a fascinating insight into the lives of the soldiers caught in the conflict. First published in 1973, this intensely personal novel about one foot soldier’s tour of duty in Vietnam established Tim O’Brien’s reputation as the outstanding chronicler of the Vietnam experience for a generation of Americans. From basic training to the front line and back again, he takes the reader on an unforgettable journey – walking the minefields of My Lai, fighting the heat and the snipers in an alien land, crawling into the ghostly tunnels – as he explores the ambiguities of manhood and morality in a war no one believes in.

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The million-copy bestseller, which is a ground-breaking meditation on war, memory, imagination, and the redemptive power of storytelling. ‘The Things They Carried’ is, on its surface, a sequence of award-winning stories about the madness of the Vietnam War; at the same time it has the cumulative power and unity of a novel, with recurring characters and interwoven strands of plot and theme. But while Vietnam is central to ‘The Things They Carried’, it is not simply a book about war. It is also a book about the human heart – about the terrible weight of those things we carry through our lives.

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First Published in 1998. 'Behaviour', and all of its associated negative connotations, is the most common topic of conversation in staffrooms across the United Kingdom. ‘Promoting Positive Behaviour’ seeks to refocus the debate on behaviour management (a term this book challenges) so that the individual is seen within the context of the wider school community, its ethos and the curricular context in which learning for all pupils takes place.

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A remarkable novel from the National Book Award-winning author of ‘Going After Cacciato’ and ‘The Things They Carried’, which combines the power of the finest Vietnam fiction with the tension of a many-layered mystery. In a remote lakeside cabin deep in the Minnesota forests, Kathy Wade is comforting her husband John, an ambitious politician, after a devastating electoral defeat. Then one night she vanishes, and gradually the search for Kathy becomes a voyage into the darkest corners of John Wade’s life, a life of deception and deceit – the life of a man able to escape everything but the chains of his darkest secret.

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“Tim O''Brien is the one American author whose works I look forward to the most. His new novel’s ironic depiction of a post-Iraq war, mid-COVID, and mid-Trump world is piercing and razor-sharp.” —HARUKI MURAKAMIAn American Master returns: the author of The Things They Carried delivers his first new novel in two decades, a brilliant and rollicking odyssey, in which a bank robbery sparks “a satirical romp through a country plagued by deceit” (Kirkus, starred review)One of Esquire''s 20 Best Books of the Year * Named one of Fall 2023''s most anticipated books: New York Times, Associated Press, Kirkus, Goodreads, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and moreAt 11:34 a.m. one Saturday in August 2019, Boyd Halverson strode into Community National Bank in Northern California.“How much is on ha

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Tom the F-14 Tomcat has a need for speed. Convinced he's only valued for his ability to break the sound barrier, the mighty fighter jet is determined to win a race to Australia to keep the airshow alive. But when a rival F-15 Eagle tricks him into skipping refueling, the supersonic plane fears he's let everyone down as his tanks run empty. Can Tom get help from his talented friends and finish the contest before it's too late? We land with the Tomcat on the pitching deck of an aircraft carrier while Woody, the little biplane, finds he has some remarkable abilities that earn Tom's respect. Will Woody succeed in transporting a tiny passenger without losing face? But wait, what's that terrible smell? Can Vul rescue a six-engined giant who desperately needs help to get home? With his lonely backstory, having been shut in a hangar deemed unfit to fly, the Vulcan is determined to prevent an Antonov with a faulty landing gear from experiencing the same fate. And the Spitfire's leadership skills are exceptional as expected of a flying ace. With a keen sense of protocol, he is experienced and knowledgeable, but to his consternation, he has to transport a passenger who is oblivious to his importance. (His elliptical wings are described in a useful section at the back of the books entitled In and Out of the Cockpit, an A-Z of aviation information.) Flying Circus Takes to the Skies is a collection stories from the Aeroplane Adventure series centering around four true-to-life aeroplanes, exciting action, and important themes of self-esteem, patience and friendship. Illustrated with line drawings by the highly esteemed aviation illustrator Tim O'Brien.

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