At Amazon, B&N, and Walmart (Kobo):
Golden Curse (Fantasy and Fairytales Book 1), by M. Lynn, free
(add Audible narration for $7.49*)
[Note: when an ebook is free across multiple platforms that I use, I download it on all of them. It messes with an assessment of how many individuals an author "sold" the book to, but it's legal and it doesn't cost the author any more money than it does to give it away on one platform.]
487 ratings
5-star: 66%
4-star: 20%
3-star: 8%
A warrior with nothing left to lose. A prince trying to hold his kingdom together.
As a child, Etta ran from the palace for her life. Now, she must find a way back in.
The kingdom of Gaule is a dangerous place for those with magic. To be found is a death sentence, forcing magic wielders into the forests to hide from the crown.
Etta Basile has spent years among the trees, training for the day she’ll take up the curse of her ancestors, a curse tying her life to that of her greatest enemy, the Prince of Gaule.
Prince Alexandre was once a childhood friend, but now, Etta must keep her identity a secret as she enters a tournament to become his champion.
Her goals are simple.
Protect the prince. Break the curse. Kill the prince.
What her training never prepared her for? Falling in love.
But love is for the weak, and Etta can’t forget the reason she’s there.
Her people are counting on her.
https://www.amazon.com/Golden-Curse-Fantasy-Fairytales-Book-ebook/dp/B07HYP46DH/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/golden-curse-m-lynn/1130315711?ean=2940162337034
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/golden-curse-1
Golden Chains (Fantasy and Fairytales Book 2), by M. Lynn, $2.99
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163 ratings
5-star: 67%
4-star: 21%
3-star: 7%
A champion trapped.
A king betrayed.
She once visited the poor souls who lived in the dark cells. Now, she is one of them.
Persinette Basile has always known the ruling family of Gaule were meant to be her enemy. With no other choice, she fought to join them anyway.
And they will break her now that they know her true name.
As she sits in her prison cell, she wants one thing: for the Kingdom of Gaule to burn to the ground.
But they need her.
When the king is kidnapped, the kingdom turns to the only person who could possibly find him: the woman tied to him by magic. Etta.
Life-altering secrets. Magical duels. A love that could tear two kingdoms apart.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07HXQRT6M
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/golden-chains-m-lynn/1129094139?ean=2940162364535
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/golden-chains-4
Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut, $2.99
10,161 ratings
5-star: 72%
4-star: 16%
3-star: 7%
Centering on the infamous World War II firebombing of Dresden, the novel is the result of what Kurt Vonnegut described as a twenty-three-year struggle to write a book about what he had witnessed as an American prisoner of war. It combines historical fiction, science fiction, autobiography, and satire in an account of the life of Billy Pilgrim, a barber’s son turned draftee turned optometrist turned alien abductee. As Vonnegut had, Billy experiences the destruction of Dresden as a POW. Unlike Vonnegut, he experiences time travel, or coming “unstuck in time.”
https://www.amazon.com/Slaughterhouse-Five-Novel-Modern-Library-Novels-ebook/dp/B000SEGHT6/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/slaughterhouse-five-kurt-vonnegut/1100298143?ean=9780440339069
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/slaughterhouse-five
The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution, by Richard Dawkins, $1.99
1,562 ratings
5-star: 83%
4-star: 11%
3-star: 3%
"Intelligent Design" is being taught in our schools; educators are being asked to "teach the controversy" behind evolutionary theory. There is no controversy. Dawkins sifts through rich layers of scientific evidence—from living examples of natural selection to clues in the fossil record; from natural clocks that mark the vast epochs wherein evolution ran its course to the intricacies of developing embryos; from plate tectonics to molecular genetics—to make the airtight case that "we find ourselves perched on one tiny twig in the midst of a blossoming and flourishing tree of life and it is no accident, but the direct consequence of evolution by non-random selection." His unjaded passion for the natural world turns what might have been a negative argument, exposing the absurdities of the creationist position, into a positive offering to the reader: nothing less than a master’s vision of life, in all its splendor.
https://www.amazon.com/Greatest-Show-Earth-Evidence-Evolution-ebook/dp/B002LVVCQM/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/greatest-show-on-earth-richard-dawkins/1100333495?ean=9781416597780
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-greatest-show-on-earth-2
How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems, by Randall Munroe, $1.99
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4,384 ratings
5-star: 84%
4-star: 11%
3-star: 4%
For any task you might want to do, there's a right way, a wrong way, and a way so monumentally complex, excessive, and inadvisable that no one would ever try it. How To is a guide to the third kind of approach. It's full of highly impractical advice for everything from landing a plane to digging a hole.
Bestselling author and cartoonist Randall Munroe explains how to predict the weather by analyzing the pixels of your Facebook photos. He teaches you how to tell if you're a baby boomer or a 90's kid by measuring the radioactivity of your teeth. He offers tips for taking a selfie with a telescope, crossing a river by boiling it, and powering your house by destroying the fabric of space-time. And if you want to get rid of the book once you're done with it, he walks you through your options for proper disposal, including dissolving it in the ocean, converting it to a vapor, using tectonic plates to subduct it into the Earth's mantle, or launching it into the Sun.
https://www.amazon.com/How-Absurd-Scientific-Real-World-Problems-ebook/dp/B07NCQTJV3/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/how-to-randall-munroe/1130494832?ean=9780525537106
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/how-to-8
How to Decide: Simple Tools for Making Better Choices, by Annie Duke, $1.99
452 ratings
5-star: 66%
4-star: 20%
3-star: 8%
Through a blend of compelling exercises, illustrations, and stories, the bestselling author of "Thinking in Bets" will train you to combat your own biases, address your weaknesses, and help you become a better and more confident decision-maker.
What do you do when you're faced with a big decision? If you're like most people, you probably make a pro and con list, spend a lot of time obsessing about decisions that didn't work out, get caught in analysis paralysis, endlessly seek other people's opinions to find just that little bit of extra information that might make you sure, and finally go with your gut.
What if there was a better way to make quality decisions so you can think clearly, feel more confident, second-guess yourself less, and ultimately be more decisive and be more productive?
Making good decisions doesn't have to be a series of endless guesswork. Rather, it's a teachable skill that anyone can sharpen. In How to Decide, bestselling author Annie Duke and former professional poker player lays out a series of tools anyone can use to make better decisions. You'll learn:
• To identify and dismantle hidden biases.
• To extract the highest quality feedback from those whose advice you seek.
• To more accurately identify the influence of luck in the outcome of your decisions.
• When to decide fast, when to decide slow, and when to decide in advance.
• To make decisions that more effectively help you to realize your goals and live your values.
Through interactive exercises and engaging thought experiments, this book helps you analyze key decisions you've made in the past and troubleshoot those you're making in the future.
https://www.amazon.com/How-Decide-Simple-Making-Choices-ebook/dp/B07TRJB3S3/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/how-to-decide-annie-duke/1132102961?ean=9780593084618
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/how-to-decide-1
Ashes to Ashes: The Songs of David Bowie, 1976-2016, by Chris O'Leary, $1.99
145 ratings
5-star: 82%
4-star: 10%
3-star: 6%
A comprehensive exploration of the final four decades of David Bowie’s musical career—covering every song he wrote, performed, or produced during that time (does not include earlier songs, like Space Oddity or Young Americans).
In Ashes to Ashes, the ultimate David Bowie expert offers a song-by-song retrospective of the legendary pop star's musical career from 1976 to 2016.
Starting with Low, the first of Bowie's Berlin albums, and finishing with Blackstar—his final masterpiece released just days before his death in 2016—each song is annotated in depth and explored in essays that touch upon the song's creation, production, influences and impact.
https://www.amazon.com/Ashes-Songs-David-Bowie-1976-2016-ebook/dp/B07F5XJCBS/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/ashes-to-ashes-chris-oleary/1128905028?ean=9781912248360
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/ashes-to-ashes-54
One Night Gone: A Novel, by Tara Laskowski, $2.99
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321 ratings
5-star: 52%
4-star: 29%
3-star: 14%
It was the perfect place to disappear...
One sultry summer, Maureen Haddaway arrives in the wealthy town of Opal Beach to start her life anew—to achieve her destiny. There, she finds herself lured by the promise of friendship, love, starry skies, and wild parties. But Maureen’s new life just might be too good to be true, and before the summer is up, she vanishes.
Decades later, when Allison Simpson is offered the opportunity to house-sit in Opal Beach during the off-season, it seems like the perfect chance to begin fresh after a messy divorce. But when she becomes drawn into the mysterious disappearance of a girl thirty years before, Allison realizes the gorgeous homes of Opal Beach hide dark secrets. And the truth of that long-ago summer is not even the most shocking part of all...
https://www.amazon.com/One-Night-Gone-Tara-Laskowski-ebook/dp/B07KN67XBT/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/one-night-gone-tara-laskowski/1129908353?ean=9781488053672
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/one-night-gone
Bones of Hilo: A Novel, by Eric Redman, $1.99
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61 ratings
5-star: 71%
4-star: 11%
3-star: 12%
A young, inexperienced detective from the wet, working-class side of Hawaii's Big Island, Kawika Wong faces an uphill battle to gain the respect of his more seasoned colleagues. And he has the chance of a lifetime when Ralph Fortunato, the Mainland developer of an unpopular resort on the island's tourist side, is found murdered on a luxury golf course, an ancient Hawaiian spear driven through his heart.
With the other detectives desperately trying to solve another string of grisly killings, Captain Terry Tanaka has no choice but to send Kawika to investigate. As Kawika joins forces with his father and girlfriend to help read the signs and make sense of the ritualistic murder scene, they uncover a cache of secrets reaching far back to the Island's ancient past. And the journalist who found the body has her own theories about Fortunato's demise--but do they line up with the evidence?
On a perilous journey that stretches from the Big Island to Washington State and back, Kawika finds danger at every turn. But he still has much to learn about Hawaii, and about the rugged terrain of the North Cascades. And he'd better learn it fast, because his instincts may not be enough to catch a killer who's closing in even faster.
https://www.amazon.com/Bones-Hilo-Novel-Eric-Redman-ebook/dp/B08FZLFJ3N/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/bones-of-hilo-eric-redman/1137492158?ean=9781643857039
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/bones-of-hilo
Strange Weather in Tokyo: A Novel, by Hiromi Kawakami, $1.99
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1,052 ratings
5-star: 53%
4-star: 28%
3-star: 17%
Tsukiko, thirty–eight, works in an office and lives alone. One night, she happens to meet one of her former high school teachers, "Sensei," in a local bar. Tsukiko had only ever called him "Sensei" ("Teacher" ). He is thirty years her senior, retired, and presumably a widower. Their relationship develops from a perfunctory acknowledgment of each other as they eat and drink alone at the bar, to a hesitant intimacy which tilts awkwardly and poignantly into love.
As Tsukiko and Sensei grow to know and love one another, time's passing is marked by Kawakami's gentle hints at the changing seasons: from warm sake to chilled beer, from the buds on the trees to the blooming of the cherry blossoms.
https://www.amazon.com/Strange-Weather-Tokyo-Hiromi-Kawakami-ebook/dp/B0716S4ZQ6/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/strange-weather-in-tokyo-hiromi-kawakami/1115690965?ean=9781640090170
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/strange-weather-in-tokyo-2
Hostage: A Novel, by Clare Mackintosh, $1.99
(add Audible narration for $12.99*)
1,043 ratings
5-star: 49%
4-star: 34%
3-star: 12%
You can save hundreds of lives. Or the one that matters most...
From New York Times bestselling author Clare Mackintosh comes a claustrophobic thriller set over 20 hours on-board the inaugural nonstop flight from London to Sydney.
Mina is trying to focus on her job as a flight attendant, not the problems with her five-year-old daughter back home, or the fissures in her marriage. But the plane has barely taken off when Mina receives a chilling note from an anonymous passenger, someone intent on ensuring the plane never reaches its destination: "The following instructions will save your daughter's life..."
Someone needs Mina's assistance and knows exactly how to make her comply.
When one passenger is killed and then another, Mina knows she must act. But which lives does she save: Her passengers...or her own daughter and husband who are in grave distress back at home?
It's twenty hours to landing. A lot can happen in twenty hours.
https://www.amazon.com/Hostage-Locked-Room-Thriller-Clare-Mackintosh-ebook/dp/B08XMDZ5S8/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/hostage-clare-mackintosh/1137608482?ean=9781728245539
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/hostage-57
*Audible narration only available for purchases at Amazon.com.
Dr. Drew interviewed Scott Adams recently, and Scott Adams mentioned the absurdity that Republicans went to overthrow the government on Jan 6, but they neglected to bring their guns. On the first or second anniversary of the event, that alleged oversight made the narrative appear absurd to me, so I made a "video" that was supposed to be audio from January 6, captured on a video camera from which the lens cap had not been removed. I'm posting it again just because.
While I was waiting on hold to talk with a human at the IRS, I decided to put some food out for the dogs. I set the full bag of dog food on a chair, and walked away to get the bowls. When I turned around I saw the bag slowly tipping over, spilling much of its contents onto the floor. Fortunately I had help cleaning it up.
The main task for today is to begin revising McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader. It may take a couple of weeks, possibly more. I still have to work at Publix, and next week I start a new job in the memory care unit of a rehab/nursing home facility, and I'll also be working at Publix at least one night.
After that I'll take a look at the double-slit experiment, and see if there is an interpretation that is consistent with my theory of wave physics.
Also, I came across the attached meme, which I had created two or three years (or so) ago. I thought I'd include it because I still like it.
I recently proposed a theory of matter and energy called Wave Physics. In this theory, the only things in the universe are energy and the universal membrane, which is the medium through which all energy is transfered and stored.
Tonight I realized that according to this theory, everyone and everything in the universe are connected to each other at all times. Things that would be impossible according to the standard model of particle physics, are very possible in the universe of wave physics. Psychic transmissions and the power of prayer are physically possible and make sense if the universe works in any way like the theory I proposed.
If you've ever heard the phone ring and felt sure who it was before answering it, and were proven correct, this makes sense in wave physics, but not with particle physics. If you've ever looked intently at someone, and had that person quickly turn and look directly at you (I have), that phenomenon makes sense if all of us are parts of the same vast, ...
I was only scheduled to work three days this week, so I decided to work on a theory I'd been playing around with for fun over the last few years. I'd never been a big fan of the standard model of particle physics, so a few years ago, just for fun, I thought about exploring some alternate ideas, with zero training and zero experiments.
This week I wrapped up a few loose ends, and posted it to a community I created called Wave Physics. Originally I had called it Alternative Physics, but I changed my mind, so the link still has alternativephysics in it, but the community name is Wave Physics. I'd love for people to pay $5.00 a month to tell me how wrong I am.
https://alternativephysics.locals.com/
I also posted it on my personal website:
