Books with author Michael Allen Austin

Over the course of a year, Michael Austin--an English professor and literary critic who was raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints--read the Book of Mormon for the first time in more than 30 years and wrote weekly blog posts detailing his insights and challenges with the text. The 44 essays in Buried Treasures, adapted from those original posts, show a trained scholar and literary critic grappling with the foundational text of his own religious tradition and finding surprising things that he had never seen before. The essays in this volume draw a picture of the Book of Mormon that is rarely seen in the devotional writings of those who consider it a scripture or the polemical writings of those who consider it a fraud. For Austin, the Book of Mormon, whatever its origin, is a complex literary and spiritual text full of sophisticated narratives, recurring patterns, and big ideas that can sustain a high level of critical analysis. Buried Treasures shows what happens when a well-trained reader approaches this text with fresh eyes and an open mind and unearths the treasures that have been hidden in plain sight for almost 200 years. Michael Austin is the author of seven previous books, including Rereading Job, We Must Not Be Enemies, and the bestselling textbook, Reading the World: Ideas that Matter. He is currently the Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost at the University of Evansville in Evansville Indiana. “I discovered in the Book of Mormon a profoundly human record of people struggling with their relationship to God and to each other. It has all the messiness one would expect of a record compiled over a thousand years, with multiple narrative perspectives, biases, agendas, and blind spots—as the authors and narrators groped towards an understanding of the Kingdom of God. It is a book that can bear multiple readings from multiple perspectives without exhausting its treasures. And it is a book that Latter-day Saints should never be ashamed to place alongside the great books of the world’s traditions, both religious and secular.” &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp--Michael Austin, from the Introduction

FROM THE AUTHOR OF THAT'S NOT WHAT THEY MEANT! RECLAIMING THE FOUNDING FATHERS FROM AMERICA'S RIGHT WING! This follow-up single is a common-sense discussion of gun rights, gun control, and the often-diverging views of America's Founding Fathers. Acknowledging that the Constitution enshrines a clear and undeniable right to self-defense, and arguing that some limitations on this right have always existed, Austin charts a thoughtful and moderate course through the clashing absolutes that have dominated the gun-control debate for a generation.

A hilarious picture book about surviving the school bus and the first day of school.* “Outrageously humorous.” —School Library Journal, starred review* “Worthy of being shelved next to Jon Scieszka’s funniest.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review Kyle is dreading his first trip on the school bus. Luckily, his big brother, James, is a school-bus expert. James gives Kyle ten rules for riding the bus that he absolutely, positively must obey if he wants to avoid getting laughed at, yelled at, pushed around, or even pounded. On his fateful first ride, Kyle struggles to remember and follow each of his brother’s rules, but along the way, he learns the school bus isn’t so bad after all—and he may even have a thing or two to teach his brother.

Addressing kids' anxiety about unfamiliar situations, this irreverent book lists and explains the rules a kid must follow to survive the perilous world of the school cafeteria. Warnings about the pitfalls lurking in the lunchroom have Kyle imagining and fearing the worst, as the server, the lunch ladies, the cashier, and the menacing big kids become terrifying giant insects in his eyes. Kyle inadvertently breaks every rule but winds up enjoying his lunch—and overcoming his fears.

Cowpoke Clyde is plumb confused. An ad in his favorite catalog says he oughta buy a bike. But why should he do that? After all, he’s got a horse. Still, a bike wouldn’t buck or bite, and he wouldn’t have to feed it. He orders one, and when it comes, he mounts up and sets right off, wibble-wobblin’ down the road. Good thing he’s got his trusty friend Dawg to look out for him. Turns out learning to ride a bike is just a tad bit harder than he thought! With its rip-roaring rhyming text and turn-the-page revelations, this book is pure read-aloud fun. Praise for Cowpoke Clyde and Dirty Dawg: * “Plumb funny, fer sure.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review

Cowpoke Clyde’s house was completely clean—he’d even shooed off the horseflies: “Then right behind his cookin’ pot, / he spied one thing he’d plumb forgot: / ol’ Dawg, his faithful, snorin’ friend, / all caked with mud from end to end.” Needless to say, Dawg wakes up and runs. The chase that follows—with page-turn surprises—makes for a hilarious shaggy-dog story involving fleas, a hog, bribery, cats, deception, and a mule. The rhyming stanzas are pitch-perfect, Texas-style, and plumb near cry out to be read aloud. Austin’s expressive acrylic and colored-pencil caricatures of Cowpoke Clyde and his menagerie are priceless. A storytime shoo-in!

Alien invaders enslave the Earth, sending sadistic turncoats and brainwashed cannibals to hunt down survivors. One young man escapes. Fleeing snatchers and starvation, he holds on to hope with stubborn fingertips. A daring rescue becomes a precarious escape. When all seems lost, a sarcastic starship AI steals him off the planet, forcing him to abandon his friends. They pit their uneasy alliance against a treacherous galaxy, each desperate to repair the once formidable old ship for their own reasons.Nothing will stop him from reclaiming Earth and saving his friends, not the AI, not even a choice that could save worlds or ruin galaxies…One Click now to begin the series readers are calling Hunger Games meets Firefly.

In 2011, Glenn Beck released a "modern translation" of the Federalist Papers and a new biography of George Washington. In the same year, Rick Perry, the governor of Texas, published a book in which he argued that the Founding Fathers intended the individual states to be more powerful than the federal government. Each of these books, and many others published over the past few years, presents the Founding Fathers as a group of wise, philosophically indistinguishable statesmen who spoke about timeless issues with a unified voice. In the place of rigorous history, the authors substitute out-of-context proof texts; in the place of real analysis of the remarkable individuals who created America, they offer us a collective mythology of the founding era. In That's Not What They Meant! Professor Michael Austin examines dozens of books, articles, speeches, and radio broadcasts by such figures as Glenn Beck, Mark Levin, Sean Hannity, Larry Schweikart, and David Barton to expose the deep historical flaws in their use of America's founding history. In contrast to their misleading method of citing proof texts to serve a narrow agenda, Austin allows the Founding Fathers to speak for themselves, situating all quotations in the proper historical context. What emerges is a true historical picture of men who often disagreed with one another on such crucial issues as federal power, judicial review, and the separation of church and state. As Austin shows, the real legacy of the Founding Fathers to us is a political process: a system of disagreement, debate, and compromise that has kept democracy vibrant in America for more than two hundred years. Austin's carefully researched and rigorously argued book is essential reading for anyone seeking the accurate historical background to many of the hot-button political debates of today.

In 2011, Glenn Beck released a "modern translation" of the Federalist Papers and a new biography of George Washington. In the same year, Rick Perry, the governor of Texas, published a book in which he argued that the Founding Fathers intended the individual states to be more powerful than the federal government. Each of these books, and many others published over the past few years, presents the Founding Fathers as a group of wise, philosophically indistinguishable statesmen who spoke about timeless issues with a unified voice. In the place of rigorous history, the authors substitute out-of-context proof texts; in the place of real analysis of the remarkable individuals who created America, they offer us a collective mythology of the founding era. In That's Not What They Meant! Professor Michael Austin examines dozens of books, articles, speeches, and radio broadcasts by such figures as Glenn Beck, Mark Levin, Sean Hannity, Larry Schweikart, and David Barton to expose the deep historical flaws in their use of America's founding history. In contrast to their misleading method of citing proof texts to serve a narrow agenda, Austin allows the Founding Fathers to speak for themselves, situating all quotations in the proper historical context. What emerges is a true historical picture of men who often disagreed with one another on such crucial issues as federal power, judicial review, and the separation of church and state. As Austin shows, the real legacy of the Founding Fathers to us is a political process: a system of disagreement, debate, and compromise that has kept democracy vibrant in America for more than two hundred years. Austin's carefully researched and rigorously argued book is essential reading for anyone seeking the accurate historical background to many of the hot-button political debates of today.Michael Austin (Wichita, KS) is the author or editor of six books, including Reading the World: Ideas That Matter. He is provost, vice president for Academic Affairs, and professor of English at Newman University.

Cassii’s AI module is missing. Alaric must launch a desperate search to reclaim Cassiopeia’s heart, but the old frigate is too much without an AI to run her systems. Taking on a reluctant doctor, a pacifist AI, an Alistari war hero and his ace pilot mate, Alaric must find a way to track down Cassii’s abductor in the vast Protectorate.To make matters worse, criminals haunt the star lanes almost unopposed, enslaving refugees and ruining lives. Alaric must dance a fine line between heroics and villainy as circumstances and hard luck drive him to dark choices.To thwart the Protectorate’s criminal elite, Alaric embraces the vast interstellar emptiness in a struggle to harden himself for survival. Every move seems the wrong one, and every choice carves a slice from his soul. Can he free Cassii before he loses himself or will she return to find her beloved captain just another monster in the black?