The start of a brand NEW series from bestselling author Rosie ClarkeCambridgeshire - March 1939 As the clouds of war begin to gather in Europe, the Talbot family of rural Blackberry Farm will be torn apart, just as so many families all over the world will be. Life will never be the same again. Whilst in London, the Salmons family will feel the pain of parting and loss. Brought together by war, the two families become intertwined and, as the outlook looks bleak, they must draw on each other's strength to fight through the hard times. Lizzie Johnson and Tom were sweethearts until a mistake caused a terrible rift. Lizzie takes herself off to London to heal the pain in a glamorous new job but she still loves Tom. His pride has been hurt - but deep down inside Tom still cares. Can they find happiness before their chance is gone and the whole world is swept into the terrible madness of war?

Ordinary Americans in the armed services and at home face the poignancy and the raw emotions of wartime. In this, the third volume of The Soldiers Trilogy, members of the Henderson and Martin families put on military uniforms to defend their country after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, We follow them through training and watch some of the family at war in the Pacific. The major characters, however, serve in Europe. There through the eyes of a foot soldier, an airman, a paratrooper, a ranking officer at Supreme Headquarters, and a spy behind enemy lines we see preparations and training for the assault on Hitler''s Fortress Europe, the carrying out of the assault on D-Day, and its aftermath.

"War and Destiny"
By the late summer of 1940 most of Europe lay under the heel of the Nazi boot or allied with the Axis powers. The tiny but strategic kingdom of Greece with a population of only six million was trying hard, despite several Axis provocations, to maintain her neutrality between the warring powers. Markos Androlakis, an American of Greek descent, chose to travel to his parent's homeland to the island of Crete for an archeological sabbatical. By that winter, the clouds of war soon covered Greece and the tiny nation was invaded by Fascist Italy who was looking for a quick victory.
Markos soon joins the cause against the fascists as an interpreter liaison to the British allied mission on Crete. Offered a commission to the Greek Army, Markos gladly accepts. Throughout the winter of 1940-41 the Greeks astonished the world by not only stopping the second largest axis power dead in its tracks but going on the counter attack and imposing a series of humiliating defeats on Italy. Unfortunately, the euphoria would not last. Germany took notice and quickly remedied the situation. In April 1941 Germany invaded the tiny nation and quickly defeated the allied and Greek forces forcing thousands of survivors and the Greek king to evacuate to Crete.
On 20 May 1941, Germany launched Operation Merkur (Mercury) the largest airborne invasion in history to capture the strategic island of Crete from the allies. Markos is tasked by the allied commander to help evacuate the Hellenic King to the island's south cost to be transported by the Royal Navy to prevent his capture by the Nazis. Unbeknownst to Markos the German Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler has dispatched a ruthless SS officer Georg Mueller to capture the King and return him to Germany. The German paratroopers suffer tremendous loses but the allies fail to dislodge them from a strategic airfield and eventually the Germans get the upper hand. Markos manages to evade the Germans and journeys to Cairo where he is recruited into US army and the COI which would soon become the OSS, Office of strategic services under the leadership "Wild Bill Donovan."
Markos returns to America to help organize a cadre of Greek American agents to help the Greek resistance fight the ruthless and bloody Nazi occupation. The US soon enters the war after the attack on Pearl Harbor and German war Declaration. Markos is eventually reassigned to Egypt were the allies plan a major attack on German airfields on the island of Crete, using commando teams. Markos joins one of the teams in a successful attack but runs into Mueller and his men who attempt to capture and kill the allied agents as they endeavor to escape the island.
Hitler's 1940 drive through the Balkans and the rich oil fields of the mid-east depend on a clear path through Greece. Also, Hitler runs up the stakes by trying to abduct her King. During all this, young New Yorker Markos Androl visits his parent's homeland and is swept up in the Nazi invasion. The tale moves on with a strong sense of realism as Androl races from Crete to Cairo and back again, this time working for Wild Bill Donovan and the OSS. Told in the finest tradition of Eric Ambler and Ken Follete, you won't be able to put this page-turner down. War and Destiny is a classic that will be in print for many years to come.
--John J. Gobbell, Author of Call To Colors and Edge Of Valor

The New Cadet is a coming of age story about eighteen year old Alicia Randall, who enters The College of Armed Forces, CAF, as the second class of women. During her first year, she is faced with the rigorous challenges of the Tick Line and attempts to juggle her life within the college while staying connected to her old life. When her life outside the school shatters, Alicia begins walking the plank between falling apart and surviving.

What ends up saving Alicia is a new found relationship with a woman, Cathleen, who introduces a variety of books, which expands Alicia's awareness and puts her on a new path of self discovery and spiritual awareness.

The trials and tribulations from the school extend beyond the Tick Line when Alicia is accused of participating in behavior that is "unbecoming of an officer," and it takes every last ounce of strength to survive the school she had promised her brother she would never leave.

In using the new concepts Cathleen taught her, it is those ideas that consequently give Alicia the tools for fighting a system and keeping her at a school she conflictingly loves.

Conquering The Power Of Death details the journey of one Marine radioman through 1970-71 Vietnam in the face of ubiquitous death. Whether using radio skills to call in air strikes and artillery or to help Marines contact their loved ones through the Military Affiliate Radio System (MARS), the young Marine's encounter with death as a seemingly unstoppable force provides a glimpse into the horrors of war. Ambushes, daring rescues, poignant relationships, and civilian deaths compete with survival, maturity, and rites of passage to reveal life and death in a combat zone and afterwards.

The intricacies of a Tactical Recovery of Aircraft Personnel (TRAP) unit's day to day efforts to rescue downed pilots and the sometimes mundane routine of MARS personnel plying their skills to keep Marines in touch with the "world" only highlight death's ever present threat to mind, body, and soul. Death's presence on the battlefield, in the "rear," and in the ongoing lives of the Marines long after the war, however, begins to identity death's "Achilles' Heel"; unwavering faith, love, and humility prove potent antidotes to death's destructive prowess.

Enmeshed within the obvious need for the warrior Marine's physical survival lies the need of the Marine war veteran to cope with a life scarred by trauma and loss; a timeless quest for any veteran and one examined in depth by Conquering The Power Of Death. Death, mythological death, romantic death, and death defined by the artist's keen insight into the human condition provide the yardstick for the author's measurement of death's power while faith, scripture, discipline and love afford the author invaluable insights into the human ability to deal with a preordained force.

A highly personal plumbing of the depths where death resides and reigns in war provides a unique context for Conquering The Power of Death as well as an opportunity to unpack the emotions which travel with every combat warrior. It also provides a glimpse into Death stripped of its mystique, its presumed power, and its claimed finality.

Minor Detail begins during the summer of 1949, one year after the war that the Palestinians mourn as the Nakba-the catastrophe that led to the displacement and exile of some 700,000 people-and the Israelis celebrate as the War of Independence. Israeli soldiers murder an encampment of Bedouin in the Negev desert, and among their victims they capture a Palestinian teenager and they rape her, kill her, and bury her in the sand. Many years later, in the near-present day, a young woman in Ramallah tries to uncover some of the details surrounding this particular rape and murder, and becomes fascinated to the point of obsession, not only because of the nature of the crime, but because it was committed exactly twenty-five years to the day before she was born. Adania Shibli masterfully overlays these two translucent narratives of exactly the same length to evoke a present forever haunted by the past.

A gripping historical novel, "The Winds of Change" encompasses the last fourteen months of the American Civil War. Beginning in March of 1864, President Abraham Lincoln meets Ulysses S. Grant, who explains to Lincoln his strategy of attacking the South at all points simultaneously, thereby preventing the South from reinforcing threatened points by shifting troops.

Grant's plan of "total war"-thousands of families driven from their homes in despair-is designed not only to defeat the armies of the Confederacy, but also to take the will to fight from the Southern population. He works in conjunction with William Sherman and George Thomas in the West, Philip Sheridan in the Shenandoah Valley, and George Meade in the East.

In "The Winds of Change," you can experience the conflicts and intrigue encountered by President Lincoln and his trusted generals as lives are lost in battle and strategies are revised to ensure victory.

Unrelenting Love is the story of Jack Soule. Growing up as a boy in Colorado and Washington, he came to know the Lord at an early age. Like so many young men in the 1960s and early 1970s, Jack was sent to fight in Vietnam as a Hospital Corpsman with the US Marines. The horror and suffering of war changed Jack and separated him from his relationship and faith in God. Decorated for valor, Jack was a Corpsman many looked up to, yet inside he was scared, alone, and suffering from PTSD.

Jack began to achieve all that he ever wanted, but nothing filled the emptiness deep inside. Jack believed that he had failed God and had committed acts that were beyond God's forgiveness. Jack's journey back to God's grace and mercy is an exciting story of love, loss, suffering, and heartache as he questioned whether he would ever again feel God's love-until God sent Jack the answers to all of his questions in the form of a seven-year-old girl.

Flying rescue missions is part of George Young's job, and he accepts the risks of a night flight through a blizzard to a remote Canadian village, despite a finicky engine. Although dicey, the long journey provides George with time to reminisce:

The lure of flight to a 17-year-old boy, proud to have earned his pilot's license. The exciting, terrifying disruption of World War II to everything he's known. Insane flying missions in the Aleutians, where less than ten percent of the weather is fit for aircraft or airmen. A suicide sortie after intelligence on a prototype Japanese bomber with a range that threatens US soil. The bittersweet success of a guerilla movement in the Philippine jungles. Dynamic pilots who taught George how to survive, whose dedication to duty cost them their lives. And a patchwork love, never fully realized, always just out of reach.

As he wrestles his aircraft and the storm on this errand of mercy, George also wrestles with eternal questions of destiny. What is his purpose, that he should live and others die? Is he doomed to drift, his heart hardening as he struggles to survive in civilian life even more than he did during the war?