Books published by publisher Open Road Media

New York Times bestseller for fans of First Man: A “breathtaking” insider history of NASA’s space program—from astronauts Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton (Entertainment Weekly). On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik I, and the space race was born. Desperate to beat the Russians into space, NASA put together a crew of the nation’s most daring test pilots: the seven men who were to lead America to the moon. The first into space was Alan Shepard; the last was Deke Slayton, whose irregular heartbeat kept him grounded until 1975. They spent the 1960s at the forefront of NASA’s effort to conquer space, and Moon Shot is their inside account of what many call the twentieth century’s greatest feat—landing humans on another world. Collaborating with NBC’s veteran space reporter Jay Barbree, Shepard and Slayton narrate in gripping detail the story of America’s space exploration from the time of Shepard’s first flight until he and eleven others had walked on the moon.

Sherman Alexie’s darkly humorous story collection weaves memory, fantasy, and stark reality to powerfully evoke life on the Spokane Indian Reservation. The twenty-four linked tales in Alexie’s debut collection—an instant classic—paint an unforgettable portrait of life on and around the Spokane Indian Reservation, a place where “Survival = Anger x Imagination,” where HUD houses and generations of privation intertwine with history, passion, and myth. We follow Thomas Builds-the-Fire, the longwinded storyteller no one really listens to; his half-hearted nemesis, Victor, the basketball star turned recovering alcoholic; and a wide cast of other vividly drawn characters on a haunting journey filled with humor and sorrow, resilience and resignation, dreams and reality. Alexie’s unadulterated honesty and boundless compassion come together in a poetic vision of a world in which the gaps between past and present are not really gaps after all. The basis for the acclaimed 1998 feature film Smoke Signals,the Chicago Tribune noted, “The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven . . . is for the American Indian what Richard Wright’s Native Son was for the black American in 1940.” The collection received a Special Citation for the PEN/Hemingway Award for Best First Fiction. This ebook edition features a new prologue from the author, as well as an illustrated biography and rare photos from Sherman Alexie’s personal collection.

Wisdom from one of the greatest philosophical minds in all of Roman history Divided into twelve books, these meditations chronicle Aurelius’s personal quest for self-improvement. This enduring text from one of history’s greatest warriors and leaders has been compared to St. Augustine’s Confessions for its timelessness, clarity, and candor. These writings, composed between 161 and 180 CE, set forth Aurelius’s Stoic philosophy and stress the importance of acting in a way that is moral and just rather than self-indulgent. This ebook has been professionally proofread to ensure accuracy and readability on all devices.

Ishmael Reed’s inspired fable of the ragtime era, in which a social movement threatens to suppress the spread of black culture—hailed by Harold Bloom as one of the five hundred greatest books of the Western canonIn 1920s America, a plague is spreading fast. From New Orleans to Chicago to New York, the “Jes Grew” epidemic makes people desperate to dance, overturning social norms in the process. Anyone is vulnerable and when they catch it, they’ll bump and grind into a frenzy. Working to combat the Jes Grew infection are the puritanical Atonists, a group bent on cultivating a “Talking Android,” an African American who will infiltrate the unruly black communities and help crush the outbreak. But PaPa LaBas, a houngan voodoo priest, is determined to keep his ancient culture—including a key spiritual text—alive. Spanning a dizzying host of genres, from cinema to academia to mythology, Mumbo Jumbo is a lively ride through a key decade of American history. In addition to ragtime, blues, and jazz, Reed’s allegory draws on the Harlem Renaissance, the Back to Africa movement, and America’s occupation of Haiti. His style throughout is as avant-garde and vibrant as the music at its center. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Ishmael Reed including rare images of the author.

The “raunchy, hilarious, and thrilling” true story of the incomparable Norma Wallace, proprietor of a notorious 1920s New Orleans brothel (NPR). Norma Wallace grew up fast. In 1916, at fifteen years old, she went to work as a streetwalker in New Orleans’ French Quarter. By the 1920s, she was a “landlady”—or, more precisely, the madam of what became one of the city’s most lavish brothels. It was frequented by politicians, movie stars, gangsters, and even the notoriously corrupt police force. But Wallace acquired more than just repeat customers. There were friends, lovers . . . and also enemies. Wallace’s romantic interests ran the gamut from a bootlegger who shot her during a fight to a famed bandleader to the boy next door, thirty-nine years her junior, who became her fifth husband. She knew all of the Crescent City’s dirty little secrets, and used them to protect her own interests—she never got so much as a traffic ticket, until the early 1960s, when District Attorney Jim Garrison decided to clean up vice and corruption. After a jail stay, Wallace went legitimate as successfully as she had gone criminal, with a lucrative restaurant business—but it was love that would undo her in the end. The Last Madam combines original research with Wallace’s personal memoirs, bringing to life an era in New Orleans history rife with charm and decadence, resurrecting “a secret world, like those uncovered by Luc Sante and James Ellroy” (Publishers Weekly). It reveals the colorful, unforgettable woman who reigned as an underworld queen and “capture[s] perfectly the essential, earthy complexity of the most fascinating city on this continent” (Robert Olen Butler).

Following World War II, a British widow joins a Benedictine monastery in this poignant New York Times bestseller from the author of Black Narcissus. For most of her adult life, Philippa Talbot has been a successful British professional. Now in her forties, the World War II–widow has made a startling decision: She’s giving up her civil service career and elite social standing to join a convent as a postulant Roman Catholic nun. In Sussex in the south of England, Philippa begins her new life inside Brede Abbey, a venerable, 130-year-old Benedictine monastery. Taking her place among a diverse group of extraordinary women, young and old, she is welcomed into the surprisingly rich and complex world of the devout, whom faith, fate, and circumstance have led there. From their personal stories, both uplifting and heartbreaking, Philippa draws great strength in the weeks, months, and years that follow, as the confidence, conflicts, and poignant humanity of her fellow sisters serve to validate her love and sacred purpose. But a time of great upheaval in the hierarchy of the Catholic Church approaches as the winds of change blow at gale force. And for the financially troubled Brede and the acolytes within, it will take no less than a miracle to weather the storm. Author Rumer Godden spent three years living in close proximity to Stanbrook Abbey in Worcestershire communing with the Benedictine nuns in preparation for the writing of this beloved bestseller. The result is an honest and unforgettable novel of love, sacrifice, and devotion, a major literary achievement from the acclaimed author of Black Narcissus and The River.This ebook features an illustrated biography of the author including rare images from the Rumer Godden Literary Estate.

The #1 New York Times–bestselling thriller about an airport thrust into chaos by a whiteout blizzard: “A spellbinder” (The Denver Post). As a raging blizzard wreaks havoc at Lincoln International Airport outside Chicago, airport and airline personnel try to cope with this unstoppable force of nature that is endangering thousands of lives. And in the air, a lone plane struggles to reach its destination. Over the course of seven pulse-pounding hours, a tense human drama plays out as a brilliant airport manager, an arrogant pilot, a tough maintenance man, and a beautiful stewardess strive to avert disaster. Featuring a diverse cast of vibrant characters, Airport is both a realistic depiction of the airline industry and a novel of nail-biting suspense.This ebook includes a foreword by the author.

The thrilling true story of the daring double agents who thwarted Hitler’s spy machine in Britain and turned the tide of World War II. After the fall of France in the mid-1940s, Adolf Hitler faced a British Empire that refused to negotiate for peace. With total war looming, he ordered the Abwehr, Germany’s defense and intelligence organization, to carry out Operation Lena—a program to place information-gathering spies within Britain. Quickly, a network of secret agents spread within the United Kingdom and across the British Empire. A master of disguises, a professional safecracker, a scrubwoman, a diplomat’s daughter—they all reported news of the Allied defenses and strategies back to their German spymasters. One Yugoslav playboy codenamed “Tricycle” infiltrated the highest echelon of British society and is said to have been one of Ian Fleming’s models for James Bond. The stunning truth, though, was that every last one of these German spies had been captured and turned by the British. As double agents, they sent a canny mix of truth and misinformation back to Hitler, all carefully controlled by the Allies. As one British report put it: “By means of the double agent system, we actually ran and controlled the German espionage system in this country.” In The Spies Who Never Were, World War II veteran cryptographer Hervie Haufler reveals the real stories of these double agents and their deceptions. This “fascinating account” lays out both the worldwide machinations and the personal clashes that went into the greatest deception in the history of warfare (Booklist).

An “absorbing and fast-moving” saga of Korea as experienced by one unforgettable family, from the Nobel Prize–winning author of The Good Earth (The New York Times). “The year was 4214 after Tangun of Korea, and 1881 after Jesus of Judea.” So begins Pearl S. Buck’s The Living Reed, an epic historical novel seen through the eyes of four generations of Korean aristocracy. As the chronicle begins, the Kims are living comfortably as advisors to the Korean royal family. But that world is torn apart with the Japanese invasion, when the queen is killed and the Kims are thrust into hiding. Through their story, Buck traces the country’s journey from the late nineteenth century through the end of the Second World War. “The Korean people come hauntingly alive,” wrote the Journal of Asian Studies about The Living Reed. “The remarkable novels of Pearl S. Buck have given the world an awakened understanding and appreciation of the Chinese people, and now she has wrought a like marvel for Korea.” A New York Times bestseller, The Living Reed is an enlightening account of a nation’s fight for survival and a gripping tale of a family caught in the ebb and flow of history. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Pearl S. Buck including rare images from the author’s estate.

The modern classic about an idealistic British schoolmaster’s influence on his students: “A minor miracle” (The New York Times). Throughout his forty-three-year tenure at Brookfield, “a good public school of the second rate” in eastern England, Arthur Chipping has been Mr. Chips to his students. From his unpolished first years during the Franco-Prussian War through the radical changes of the twentieth century and the outbreak of the First World War, Mr. Chips has shaped many young lives. But Chips has been inspired as well—by the unremarkable and the extraordinary alike, by his colleagues, by a woman who will change him forever, and not least, by his children, “thousands of them, all boys.” Since it was first published in 1934 to international success, Goodbye, Mr. Chips has never been out of print. It was followed by a collection of stories, To You, Mr. Chips, and provided the basis for two award-winning feature films, a stage musical, a radio play, and two television adaptations. Based on author James Hilton’s experiences as a student at the Leys School, Cambridge, this short novel endures as a revelation of the difference one good teacher can make, and “what the better emotions do toward making people important” (Kirkus Reviews).

The New York Times bestseller that’s “so glowingly human a picture of Tom Paine and America in the revolutionary days” (The New York Herald). Thomas Paine’s voice rang in the ears of eighteenth-century revolutionaries from America to France to England. He was friend to luminaries such as Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, and William Wordsworth. His pamphlets extolling democracy sold in the millions. Yet he died a forgotten man, isolated by his rough manners, idealistic zeal, and unwillingness to compromise. Howard Fast’s brilliant portrait brings Paine to the fore as a legend of American history, and provides readers with a gripping narrative of modern democracy’s earliest days in America and Europe. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

The New York Times–bestselling author of A Wrinkle in Time takes an introspective look at her life and muses on creativity in these four memoirs. Set against the lush backdrop of Crosswicks, Madeleine L’Engle’s family farmhouse in rural Connecticut, this series of memoirs reveals the complexity behind the beloved author whose works have long been cherished by children and adults alike. A Circle of Quiet: In a deeply personal account, L’Engle shares her journey to find balance between her career as an author and her responsibilities as a wife, mother, teacher, and Christian. The Summer of the Great-Grandmother: Four generations of family have gathered at Crosswicks to care for L’Engle’s ninety-year-old mother, whose health is rapidly declining and whose once astute mind is slipping into senility. L’Engle takes an unflinching look at diminishment and death, all the while celebrating the wonder of life and the bonds between mothers and daughters. The Irrational Season: Exploring the intersection of science and religion, L’Engle uncovers how her spiritual convictions inform and enrich the everyday. The memoir follows the liturgical year from one Advent to the next, with L’Engle’s reflections on the changing seasons in her own life as a writer, wife, mother, and global citizen. Two-Part Invention: L’Engle beautifully evokes the life she and her husband, actor Hugh Franklin, built and the family they cherished. Beginning with their very different childhoods, their life in New York City in the 1940s, and their years spent raising their children at Crosswicks, this is L’Engle’s most personal work yet. Offering a new perspective into her writing and life and how the two inform each other, the National Book Award–winning author explores the meanings behind motherhood, marriage, and faith.