"THRILLING. ... Up-end[s] the Apollo narrative entirely." —The Times (London) A "brilliantly observed" (Newsweek) and "endlessly fascinating" (WSJ) rediscovery of the final Apollo moon landings, revealing why these extraordinary yet overshadowed missions—distinguished by the use of the revolutionary lunar roving vehicle—deserve to be celebrated as the pinnacle of human adventure and exploration. One of The Wall Street Journal's 10 Best Books of the Month 8:36 P.M. EST, December 12, 1972: Apollo 17 astronauts Gene Cernan and Jack Schmitt braked to a stop alongside Nansen Crater, keenly aware that they were far, far from home. They had flown nearly a quarter-million miles to the man in the moon’s left eye, landed at its edge, and then driven five miles in to this desolate, boulder-strewn landscape. As they gathered samples, they strode at the outermost edge of mankind’s travels. This place, this moment, marked the extreme of exploration for a species born to wander. A few feet away sat the machine that made the achievement possible: an electric go-cart that folded like a business letter, weighed less than eighty pounds in the moon’s reduced gravity, and muscled its way up mountains, around craters, and over undulating plains on America’s last three ventures to the lunar surface. In the decades since, the exploits of the astronauts on those final expeditions have dimmed in the shadow cast by the first moon landing. But Apollo 11 was but a prelude to what came later: while Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin trod a sliver of flat lunar desert smaller than a football field, Apollos 15, 16, and 17 each commanded a mountainous area the size of Manhattan. All told, their crews traveled fifty-six miles, and brought deep science and a far more swashbuckling style of exploration to the moon. And they triumphed for one very American reason: they drove. In this fast-moving history of the rover and the adventures it ignited, Earl Swift puts the reader alongside the men who dreamed of driving on the moon and designed and built the vehicle, troubleshot its flaws, and drove it on the moon’s surface. Finally shining a deserved spotlight on these overlooked characters and the missions they created, Across the Airless Wilds is a celebration of human genius, perseverance, and daring.

"Walk on the Wild Side," the first anthology to plumb the maze of American urban life, gives us the city in all its forms: ethnic, economic, religious, political, sexual, intellectual. Poet and novelist Nicholas Christopher has chosen 115 poems from sixty poets, representing more than twenty cities. These are not just poems "about" cities, or with the city as subject; they filter and radiate the diversity and vitality of today's cities, from the electric night of New York to the sun-blanked sprawl of Los Angeles, from the factories of Pittsburgh to the waterfront of New Orleans. A kinetic mix of new voices and established writers, "Walk on the Wild Side" presents the timeless themes of poetry through the prism of our unique urban experience.

Sins You can never be too rich, or too thin…. When Gerard Findlay looked at Keira, he saw a tall, willowy beauty who took his breath away…. When Keira looked at herself in the mirror, she saw an unattractive girl who wasn't quite thin enough to deserve her fame as a supermodel. And now Gerard had discovered the secret she had kept hidden from the world. So why did he still pursue her? The closer Gerard got, the more Keira hungered over his love, but instinct fold her that her need would never be satisfied. After all, Gerard was a hardened journalist, and seduction could just be the means to a story…. Love can conquer the deadliest of Sins.

The story begins in Cuba when Julian Hamilton, aged eighty and after a life as a famous writer, is confronted with Victoria, his daughter, whose existence he was unaware of. Julian has been spending his retirement and final days of a life that began with the conflicting dilemma he experienced as a young student after leaving Princeton University, USAa conflict that people have between their belief in themselves and their emotional lives. For the writer and painter, it is a greater burden and more onerous than the many people who have to decide whether to sacrifice ambition for a sense of responsibility toward love and family life. After Princeton, Julian gets married but soon finds that following lifes normal format impairs the necessary dedication to evolve as a writer. Fearful of the emotional restrictions that come with full commitment, he leaves his wife to follow the romantic dream of coup de foudre or love at first sight. He meets Rebecca serendipitously, who gives him the necessary inspiration, and they go traveling on an ancient Triumph Speed Twin motorbike, heading towards Morocco with no sense of responsibility. Things go wrong, which fractures their passionate relationship, leaving them in a state of despair. Rebecca is raped and becomes pregnant, and Julian goes into a monastery to make a clean break in order to establish a balanced perspective of the situation. They separate, and Rebecca is left facing a lifetime of unhappiness. The book contains romance, suspense, tragedy, travel, and some thriller action of rape, murder, and sex. The doomed lovers final curtain falls in Barcelona when Julian chooses his art over lovesomething he lives to regret. The novel will present some readers with the unsolvable question as to which path should be taken!

Our editor scoured the planet to find the most engaging, fun, varied stories to entertain you. Then he worked night and day with the authors to shine these little bits of narrative to make sure that the results were great stories, great writing, that don't fit neatly in a box.

New York Times bestselling author Joyce Carol Oates’ imaginative look at the last days of five giants of American literature, now available in a deluxe paperback edition in Ecco’s The Art of the Story Series. Edgar Allan Poe, Emily Dickinson, Samuel Clemens (“Mark Twain”), Henry James, Ernest Hemingway—Joyce Carol Oates evokes each of these American literary icons in this work of prose fiction, poignantly and audaciously reinventing the climactic events of their lives. In subtly nuanced language suggestive of each of these writers, Oates explores the mysterious regions of the unknowable self that is “genius.” Darkly hilarious, brilliant, and brazen, Wild Nights! is an original and haunting work of the imagination.

From the winner of the 2018 Writers' Guild Award Vanish to a different land with Sissy Olikara. Sissy is twelve years old, living with her parents and baby brother on a school campus outside Lusaka. It is 1978, and the political situation in Zambia is becoming volatile. The family enjoy a gentle life until, suddenly, Sissy's father leaves and returns to India. His departure brings about a chain of events which force Sissy into the adult world and have profound, long-lasting consequences. Moving back and forth in time as the adult Sissy reflects on her childhood, The Wild Wind is a haunting, absorbing coming-of-age tale of lost loves and lost innocence - one that takes readers on a journey into a young woman's past and its repercussions on her future. Featured on the Guardian’s ‘NOT THE BOOKER LONGLIST, 2019’ (https://www.theguardian.com/books/series/not-the-booker-prize)

Considers S. 119 and S. 1092, to establish a National Wild River System and a National Scenic River System.