The uncertain position of the Persian Period in Jewish memory is nothing new -- in fact, it can be traced back to nearly two thousand years. Yet it can lead contemporary scholars to exercise too much caution when dating, analyzing, and discussing ancient scribal texts. Utilizing recent tools to examine scribal methods, Mark Leuchter takes a definitive approach. An Empire Far and Wide focuses on a careful selection of literary test cases to better understand how Jewish scribes in Persian Yehud interacted with a feature of Persian imperialism that has not received adequate attention: the dynastic mythology of the Achaemenid rulers and the way it shaped emerging Jewish identity in the Persian period.

Foundling Peter Tobin lived through a vanished age, a time when the wide Australian outback was opening up to the force of steel rails, steam power, visionary civic builders, and the power of determined men and their horses.In the remote outback of the late 19th century, Peter makes his own way in the world, from drover, sheep shearer and horse breaker, training horses for the South African War, to wealthy man of the land.The saga of a world now gone is told in powerful terms in the novel Thursday?s Child: Journeys Far and Wide in the Australian Outback.

In the early 20th century the Canadian North was a mystery, but the Canadian military stepped in, and this book explores its historic activities in Canada’s Arctic. Is the Canadian North a state of mind or simply the lands and waters above the 60th parallel? In searching for the ill-fated Franklin Expedition in the 19th century, Britain’s Royal Navy mapped and charted most of the Arctic Archipelago. In 1874 Canadian Prime Minister Alexander Mackenzie agreed to take up sovereignty of all the Arctic, if only to keep the United States and Tsarist Russia out. But as the dominion expanded east and west, the North was forgotten. Besides a few industries, its potential was unknown. It was as one Canadian said for later. There wasn’t much need to send police or military expeditions to the North. Not only was there little tribal warfare between the Inuit or First Nations, but there were few white settlers to protect and the forts were mainly trading posts. Thus, in the early 20th century, Canada’s Arctic was less known than Sudan or South Africa. From Far and Wide recounts exclusively the historic activities of the Canadian military in Canada’s North.

35 concerts. 17,000 motorcycle miles. Three months. One lifetime. Now in paperback In May 2015, the veteran Canadian rock trio Rush embarked on their 40th anniversary tour, R40. For the band and their fans, R40 was a celebration and, perhaps, a farewell. But for Neil Peart, each tour is more than just a string of concerts, it’s an opportunity to explore backroads near and far on his BMW motorcycle. So if this was to be the last tour and the last great adventure, he decided it would have to be the best one, onstage and off. This third volume in Peart’s illustrated travel series shares all-new tales that transport the reader across North America and through memories of 50 years of playing drums. From the scenic grandeur of the American West to a peaceful lake in Quebec’s Laurentian Mountains to the mean streets of Midtown Los Angeles, each story is shared in an intimate narrative voice that has won the hearts of many readers. Richly illustrated, thoughtful, and ever-engaging, Far and Wideis an elegant scrapbook of people and places, music and laughter, from a fascinating road — and a remarkable life.

Utopia’s Pirates satirizes the founders and agents of Political Zionism and the deceptive and violent means they employed in establishing their militant Rat Utopia in the Holy Land. The process involved illegal immigration, smuggling of arms, bombings, kidnapping, sabotage, and massacres - all culminating in driving the British out of the land and forcing the indigenous inhabitants to flee for their lives. What was finally achieved has been falsely paraded as the only democracy in the Middle East, when in fact it is the only apartheid state in the region. Will this sham Utopia last for a thousand years? Utopia’s Pirates is a satire about Zionist terrorism, interspersed with propaganda slogans, humorous verses, and lines taken from recognisable songs.