An adventure tale for our times, the author combines real world events and supernatural elements in the style of a classical epic to tell a sometimes snarky, sometimes uproarious, and very poignant modern tale. Meet Hank Allensworth and Wilson Evans in a modern reflection of the Epic of Gilgamesh. An epic bromance between a Marine and his corpsman running around Oceanside, California . Degenerate Lance Corporals who have recently returned from Afghanistan, spending most of their time drunk at The Purple Church. One night while they're out drinking they are called back to base and the battalion is put on stand by because during the conflict with ISIS, the Islamic Republic of Iran decided to end the proxy war and get involved themselves. Soon after, Hank and Doc go with the regiment to keep the Iranians from crossing the Euphrates. The war kicks off and the Marines push across Iraq and into Iran. Hank and Doc both are wounded and sent home. The rest of the story they deal with survivor's guilt, alcoholism, PTSD, covering up for a murder, and trying to manage deteriorating love lives. I don't know if I could say there's any deeper meaning than gratuitous sex and violence, but I can guarantee you that if you've spent more than three days in an infantry battalion you will love this book.

Thirty years after the destruction of Earth, World War Three still rages between the Russian Federation and the United States in the depths of space. Thatch Allensworth, a decorated sergeant, struggles to maintain his personal relationships between deployments. Faced against terrifying new weapons, a relentless enemy, solar system wide combat, and an anti-romantic lover, Thatch only has his friends Stockton, Chuck, McKenzie, and O'Con to keep him from spiraling into alcoholism and madness.

Following the civil war on the human colonized world of Cygnus VII, humanity and its creations rise again. Free Trader Braden and his mindlinked Hillcat are plying the trade routes of Warren Deep when things start to get hot. Giving events time to be forgotten, Braden gathers engineered (mutant) creatures to him for a trip south of the Great Desert where he hopes to find Old Tech that he can trade for untold riches. The more he learns about the ancients, the more he wants to learn. Along the way, he establishes a new ideal regarding trade and collaboration in the south where trust of strangers is unknown. Braden and his companions, a Hawkoid, a Hillcat, a Tortoid, and a female warrior find that some Old Tech still functions, with the potential to change their world for the better or worse, depending on what they decide.

The Epic continues!Still politically incorrect, violent, and sexual, if you enjoyed Smokepit Fairytales then you will love the follow up: Sing Goddess, The Wrath of the Fonz. A war story combined with the supernatural in the style of a classical epic to tell a snarky, uproarious, and very poignant tale mixed with an edgy Sci-Fi and fantasy twist to keep you guessing. While on a NATO training mission gone awry in Latvia the Russian Federation invades the Baltic States. Hank and Doc are stuck in the snow of far off northern lands fighting for survival. Never losing their nerve. However, things go poorly when the Marines push into Russia. Ivan is a formidable opponent, and Death is an equal opportunity employer. Who will survive?

This book provides a stimulating account of the dominant cultural forms of 1950s America: fiction and poetry; theatre and performance; film and television; music and radio; and the visual arts. Through detailed commentary and focused case studies of influential texts and events - from Invisible Man to West Side Story, from Disneyland to the Seattle World's Fair, from Rear Window to The Americans - the book examines the way in which modernism and the cold war offer two frames of reference for understanding the trajectory of postwar culture. The two core aims of this volume are to chart the changing complexion of American culture in the years following World War II and to provide readers with a critical investigation of 'the 1950s'. The book provides an intellectual context for approaching 1950s American culture and considers the historical impact of the decade on recent social and cultural developments.

In Rethinking Global Security, Andrew Martin and Patrice Petro bring together ten path-breaking essays that explore the ways that our notions of fear, insecurity, and danger are fostered by intermediary sources such as television, radio, film, satellite imaging, and the Internet. The contributors, who represent a wide variety of disciplines, including communications, art history, media studies, women's studies, and literature, show how both fictional and fact-based threats to global security have helped to create and sustain a culture that is deeply distrustful-of images, stories, reports, and policy decisions. Topics range from the Patriot Act, to the censorship of media personalities such as Howard Stern, to the role that Buffy the Vampire Slayer and other television programming play as an interpretative frame for current events.

As memories of the Cold War recede, it becomes more and more difficult to remember what it was about and why it evoked such feelings of intensity and fatalism. Fortunately, we have a gold mine of movies and novels to help us recall why an entire generation of Americans grew up ducking under school desks in air raid drills and stocking the family bomb shelter. Cold War Fantasies retrieves those times, based on the idea that a nation's history, self-concept, and collective anxiety are reflected in popular culture. In Cold War Fantasies, Ronnie Lipschutz combines an historical account of foreign and domestic politics from 1945 to 1995 with summaries and analyses of thirty novels and films contemporaneously published and produced. Lipschutz rejects the standard line on the Cold War and critically examines the impacts and effects of language and images on politics. Viewing those films and reading those novels enables the reader to come away with a clearer sense of how people felt during the Cold War period--about themselves, about "the enemy," and about the world while living in the shadow of the atomic bomb.

Throughout the world, there has been much scholarly and general interest in French popular culture, but very little has been written on the subject in English. The authors of this book address that lack in a series of highly readable and well-documented essays describing French life styles, attitudes, and entertainments as well as the writers and performers currently favored by the French public. Several chapters explore French tastes in popular literature and other reading matter, including comics, cartoons, mystery and spy fiction, newspapers and magazines, and science fiction. Film, popular music, radio, and television are also discussed in detail, and influences from other cultures--particularly American imports--are assessed. The remaining essays examine French sports, the use of leisure time, the French style of eating and drinking, and relations between men and women and their attitudes toward romantic love. Each chapter provides up-to-date historical and bibliographic information that will enable the reader to pursue subjects of particular interest. Written by an international group of specialists, this handbook offers the benefits of broad coverage, a variety of viewpoints, and solid scholarship.

Thatch, Chuck, and Stockton have fled their burdensome lives on Mars in favor of raiding the stars with Hornigold MacCrinain and pirates. The future seems bright until Thatch is twisted into committing a heinous crime that leads down a road too dark to travel. Ambition may be the road to success, but there are no compasses in space and no king on the road to Hell. What goes up crashed back down.

A lively and reliable narrative account of the horror genre, featuring new and revised material throughout The Horror Film: An Introduction surveys the history, development, and social impact of the genre. Covering American horror cinema from its earliest period to the present, this reader-friendly volume explores the many ways horror movies have been received by filmmakers, critics, and general audiences throughout the decades. Concise, easily accessible chapters describe historical instances of the genre's social reception based on primary research, analyze landmark films such as Frankenstein, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and more. Incorporating recent scholarship on the genre, the second edition of The Horror Film contains new discussion and context for Hollywood horror films in the 1980s and 1990s, as well as notable developments in the genre such as “torture porn,” found-footage horror, remakes and reboots of past horror films, zombies, and the “elevated horror” debate. This edition explores the rise of new filmmakers such as Ari Aster, Robert Eggers, and Jordan Peele, surveys horror films made by women and African American filmmakers, and investigates contemporary issues in the production and consumption of horror films. Combining historical narrative with close readings of significant works, The Horror Film: Covers major works in the genre such as Cat People, Halloween, and Bram Stoker's Dracula Examines important antecedents including gothic literature and the Grand Guignol Theater Offers thorough analyses of the style, context, and themes of specific horror milestones Provides examples of close analysis that can be applied to a wide range of other horror films Discusses important representative titles across the genre's evolution, including more recent films such as 2017's Get Out The Horror Film: An Introduction, Second Edition, is an ideal textbook for undergraduate surveys of the horror genre and other courses in American film history, and an invaluable resource for scholars, lecturers, and general readers with an interest in the subject.