They called Dover "Hellfire Corner." For Michael Ayling, it was just home.Born in the shadow of wartime shelling and raised on paraffin fumes, working-class grit, and his father's relentless optimism, Michael's childhood was anything but ordinary. From dodging runaway carts and surviving stomach-pumping mishaps to navigating the chaotic world of a family-run off-licence and his first battered motor, this memoir is a rollicking ride through 1950s and 60s Britain.Recollec...

"Crosseyed Puzzle" is 30 optical illusions that I invented over the years. It all started when I put a circle on a transparency and focused my eyes through the transparency paper until I saw two circles. This led me to the next step of drawing a face around the now two circles, which gave me the face of a bison. Then came the next step of coming up with a non-abstract picture, which looked to me like a Viking hat. Then I noticed that I didn't have to focus my eyes through the picture to co...

From Spiritual Uncertainty to Joyful Divine AttachmentWhat do you do when the gap between what you believe and what you experience feels insurmountable? Where do you turn when trauma leaves you feeling lost, ashamed, and exhausted, spinning in spiritual uncertainty but still longing for relationship with God?Michael John Cusick, a psychotherapist and spiritual director, voices the questions and contradictions that are inherently part of living an a...

This revealing history explores Hermann Goering’s desperate creation of twenty-two Luftwaffe Field Divisions—air force personnel hastily repurposed as infantry and sent to the Eastern Front with disastrous results. Michael J. Stout delivers the first full account of these ill-fated units, exposing their role in the collapse of Nazi military effectiveness.In September 1942, with German armies bleeding on the Eastern Front and manpower stretched to the breaking point...

This book is about the practice of peace in daily life. Although most of us want peace, we often struggle to live it. Someone annoys us and we find ourselves in a vortex of conflict. When we care deeply about something it can be easy to burn relationships if we encounter people whose values differ from ours. We may ask ourselves, “How can we make a positive difference in the world without diminishing others or ourselves?” Michael Wood explores the practice of peace through the lenses of th...

“Every man who knocks on the door of a brothel is knocking for God.” – G. K. ChestertonWhat if lust for porn is really a search for true passion?In a world where there are 68 million searches for pornography every day and where over 70 percent of Christian men report viewing porn in the last year, it's no surprise that more and more men struggle with an addiction to this false fantasy. Common wisdo...

Soon enough, nobody will remember life before the Internet. What does this unavoidable fact mean? Those of us who have lived both with and without the crowded connectivity of online life have a rare opportunity. We can still recognize the difference between Before and After. We catch ourselves idly reaching for our phones at the bus stop. Or we notice how, midconversation, a fumbling friend dives into the perfect recall of Google. In this eloquent and thought-provoking book, Michael Harris...

Ottomar's Tail is a very short allegorical story about discovering who you are, believing in yourself, dreaming, and becoming who you were meant to be. Everyone has a purpose and we all need to find it. Everyone has a dream, although many have lost sight of it in the drudgery of life, or set it aside in the urgency of performing tasks we have to perform. But we need dreams or we become something we're not supposed to be, someone we weren't designed to be. We may not even like ourselves. Bu...

Once a promising young pilot in the Air Force, John had always dreamed of soaring through the skies and pushing the limits of what was possible in an aircraft. However, his dreams were nearly shattered when he was brought down by a rogue missile during a mission, crashing and losing his left foot in the process. He worked for many years to gain the trust of any customers who might be sceptical of a pilot with a prosthetic foot.Over the years, he was able to allay these fears and hi...

March With the Muse is a collection of poems on various subjects, written in the 31 day month of March 2012 by Michael N. Johns. Perhaps creativity, perhaps a childlike spirit, or perhaps unmedicated attention deficit disorder, inspires friends to occasionally remark, "You're so random." In this random collection look for honesty, heart, humor and hope, in, and between the lines of verse.

Been a photographer is like trying to meet certain expectations in your life, you'll always try to make sure everything is in place, and create a perfect image of someone else, People's fantasy is like a photo, they want their life to be as perfect as a photo but like all fantasy, it doesn't come true.My name is Benjamin but you can call me Ben, I'm a photographer and a painter, I started my career after my grad, there was no work available so I did what I was good at which was ...

A local rock star once said, ‘San Francisco is 49 square miles surrounded by reality.’ Michael Johns's San Francisco: Instant City, Promised Land portrays the sensibilities of this small city with an outsized personality.No American city has such a broad sweep of staggering views – of the ocean, of a huge bay, of surrounding hills – or such a high opinion of its own worth. San Francisco has always been rich, too: the city’s great wealth underwrites the broadmindedness so v...