Showing results by narrator "Gary Bennett" in All Categories

Over the past five years, organizations adopted Slack, Zoom, and Microsoft Teams in droves. Think of COVID-19 as pouring gasoline on the fire. The pandemic didn't start a trend, as much as it accelerated an existing one. Unfortunately, far too many of us mistakenly view these applications as Email 2.0. As a result, we are missing out on extraordinary opportunities to create more collaborative work environments, increase organizational transparency, reduce manual work, make our work lives less stressful, simplify core business processes, and much more.

After a decade of teaching writing using the same methods he'd experienced as a student many years before, writer, editor, and educator John Warner realized he could do better. Drawing on his classroom experience and the most persuasive research in contemporary composition studies, he devised an innovative new framework: a step-by-step method that moves the student through a series of writing problems, an organic, bottom-up writing process that exposes and acculturates them to the ways writers work in the world.

Once an international monster hunter, Joseph is now nothing more than a depressed drunk who occasionally showers. He retired from the magical world five years ago to protect his daughter from the evil that hunted him and killed his wife. Who killed her? Not even he could piece that mystery together. But her killers haven’t finished torturing him. On the anniversary of his wife’s death, a Sorceress had her vampire goons kidnap his daughter.

Zee and his friends didn’t expect that after they survived recovering the legendary First Player’s Sword that OVR World Online would announce it to the whole world. Even though no one knows about the secrets that the Sword protects it’s still a powerful one-of-a-kind game item that everyone wants. To make matters worse, they’ve reached Level 5 and the party has to depart the Orientation Zone. Outside of the OZ, Player-vs-Player combat isn’t just allowed, it’s encouraged. 

Have you ever been in love? Truly, madly, deeply? Only to lose it? Your tether suddenly snapped. How broken can you become? And how can you ever hope to piece yourself back together? This is a love story.

March 11, 2004. The Madrid train bombings kill 193 innocent civilians. What the terrorists didn’t know was on that fateful day they also succeeded in creating their worst nightmare. No one knew who he was, what he looked like, where he came from, nor who he worked for. He was a sniper who could take a target out from 800 yards to a mile. He could kill with a long gun, short gun, or no gun. He was lethal with edged weapons, explosives, poisons, or no weapon at all. Targets could be executed from afar or die with his breath in their faces.

Acclaimed in her own time for her short story “The Lottery” and her novel The Haunting of Hill House - classics ranking with the work of Edgar Allan Poe - Shirley Jackson blazed a path for contemporary writers with her explorations of evil, madness, and cruelty. Soon after her untimely death in 1965, Jackson’s children discovered a treasure trove of previously unpublished and uncollected stories, many of which are brought together in this remarkable collection.

In 2008, the American economy collapsed, taking with it millions of Americans' jobs, homes, and life savings. The impending financial crisis was devastating, and many are still feeling its effects today. Though the crisis was debilitating, the US government has yet to implement policies that would prevent a repeat of the Great Recession. Nothing Is Too Big to Fail holds a microscope to the very policies and corruption that led to this major economic recession.

In Dragons in the Snow, Power delves into the research and science behind avalanche forecasting and rescue, weaving in the art of backcountry skiing as well as dramatic tales of avalanche accidents, rescues, and recoveries. And he paints compelling portraits of the men and women who have made the study of avalanches their life's work. The tales told by these avalanche forecasters, as well as the stories of the backcountry riders who may "wake the dragon" make for not just a compelling listen, but also a powerful tool for raising avalanche awareness.

The Urvalin invaders had linked three realms in a bid to join their power and create an intergalactic dominion. And they would have succeeded without incident if not for one crucial mistake. They hadn’t counted on the resourcefulness of Charlie and his friends.

Backed by Russian airpower, Syria has begun an operation to push Turkish troops out of Northern Syria. Despite US efforts not to get dragged into the conflict, the US 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines "Lava Dogs", find their hilltop combat outpost encircled and their Kurdish allies under siege. Further west, a Syrian armored advance across the border into Turkey pivots, threatening US troops at the Turkish and NATO airbase of Incirlik. But will Syria be satisfied with reclaiming its northern border region, or is the operation just the first move in a bolder plan to regain lost territories?

Across America, TV screens are dominated by a smooth-talking man with an Arabic accent. He claims responsibility for the attacks, identifying himself as the head of a brand-new terrorist network who will hold America accountable for her sins. With the promise of further attacks hanging over the nation, Reed prepares to abandon retirement and hunt his enemies, no matter the cost. But with the White House unwilling to reestablish the Prosecution Force, Reed is pushed to act alone.

Maggie Trousdale has been vice president for only 48 hours before she’s thrust into the executive office. As smoke rises over Turkey from the wreckage of the former president’s plane, America demands answers. Nobody knows what brought the aircraft down, Turkey has restricted all access to the crash site, and the White House is in chaos. But as the nation unravels, President Trousdale discovers a cryptic message left by her recently deceased predecessor. The attack on Air Force One may not have been a matter of foreign aggression.

September 1962: On a moonless night over the raging Atlantic Ocean, a thousand miles from land, the engines of Flying Tiger flight 923 to Germany burst into flames, one by one. Pilot John Murray didn't have long before the plane crashed headlong into the 20-foot waves at 120 mph. As the four flight attendants donned life vests, collected sharp objects, and explained how to brace for the ferocious impact, 68 passengers clung to their seats. They all expected to die.

Aidan Marlowe is the superstitious type. He's been playing the same lottery numbers for fifteen years, never hitting the jackpot. Until now. On the day of his wife's funeral. Aidan struggles to cope with these two sudden extremes: instant wealth beyond his imagination and the loss of the only woman he's ever loved, the mother of his twin children. But the money gives him and his kids options they didn't have before. They can leave everything behind. They can start a new life in a new town. So they do.

When your luck just plain sucks in not one galaxy, but two, most people would throw in the towel. But not Charlie. In fact, it almost seemed like he was a glutton for that sort of misery. His friends were spread across two distant galaxies, separated by a heavily guarded magical portal and struggling to deal with a war now spilling over into both the technological realm as well as the magical one. And it was beginning to look like they’d reached their breaking point. But Charlie wasn’t about to give up, nor would he give in.

Friends and comrades had put their lives on the line, defending not only their homes and loved ones, but their galaxy as well. Both galaxies, to be exact. And more than a few had paid the ultimate price. Now the threat of a massive war spilling over between both realms had gone from a vague threat to a deadly reality, and facing Visla Dominus’s incredible power, Charlie and his friends were forced to call in every favor they were owed.

On a mission to Afghanistan to gather information about the opium trade, Rex Dalton stumbles across spine-chilling deceit and corruption reaching the highest hallways of power in Afghanistan, America, and Europe. His requests to his superiors to wipe out the drug stores, labs, and drug lords, fall on deaf ears.

While filming a documentary, the president's brother is captured deep within the Amazon rainforest by a Colombian cartel. The president calls the one person who has the underground criminal contacts needed to fight this type of vicious enemy - FBI agent Nick Bracco. Once again, Nick relies on his mafia-linked cousin Tommy to help with the operation. When Tommy recruits an assassin to join the rescue team, the rollercoaster comes off the track, and everyone becomes a target.

Kincaid returns from the north and finds himself embroiled in a decades-old war that reaches into the heart of his closest friends. Dark murders plague the streets and implicate a powerful mage striking from the shadows. With unchecked powers, Kincaid's enemy presents his greatest challenge. Kincaid and his friends must face their most terrible secrets and confront the power threatening to destroy the world. Are his powers as the Chronomancer enough to save the world?