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Extracts

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Who Did You Tell?

Just because you imagine yourself doing something and enjoy the way it makes you feel, doesn’t mean you actually want to do it.

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Lost

Miami International Airport isn’t exactly a tranquil space on a normal day—if there’s such a thing as a normal day at MIA.

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Blindside

I did everything I could to distract Lucille Evans from noticing the bloody footprint.

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Dear Edward

“Since death is certain, but the time of death is uncertain, what is the most important thing?” — PEMA CHÖDRÖN

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Inner Worlds Outer Spaces

Dana Cordell recently told me an anecdote about an eco-village in Sweden with urine-diverting composting toilets.

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The Drover's Wife

I love the snow gum.

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Tom Clancy's Code of Honour

Had the young woman at the bar been slightly more attractive, Geoff Noonan might have smelled a trap.

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The Captain and the Glory

The aging captain, gray at the temples now, had steered the great ship Glory for many years, and was ready to retire.

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The Good Liar

It is, Roy thinks, perfect. Kismet, serendipity, destiny, happenstance; call it what you will.

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Primitive Technology

Primitive technology is the practice of making tools, structures, textiles, and clothing using only natural materials found in the wild.

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The Man in the Red Coat

In June 1885, three Frenchmen arrived in London. One was a Prince, one was a Count, and the third was a commoner with an Italian surname.

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Please Gamble Irresponsibly

There’s a story from World War I, perhaps apocryphal, but possibly true, that sums up Australia’s love of gambling.

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Who Owns History?

You Verres will plead that your statues and pictures have adorned the city and the forum of the people of Rome …

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Against All Odds

The world was riveted by the news coming out of Thailand.

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Final Option

Through his periscope, Kapitän Hans Schultz watched the chaos aboard the schooner Carroll A. Deering and smiled.

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Girl, Woman, Other

Amma is walking along the promenade of the waterway that bisects her city, a few early morning barges cruise slowly by to her left is the nautical-themed footbridge with its deck-like walkway and sailing mast pylons

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Olive, Again

In the early afternoon on a Saturday in June, Jack Kennison put on his sunglasses, got into his sports car with the top down, strapped the seatbelt over his shoulder and across his large stomach, and drove to Portland.

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Grandmothers

Nan Appleby, waiting for the kettle to boil in the kitchen of her fifth-floor flat, observed the signs of weather.

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The Two Popes

“Let me go to the house of the Father.”

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Criss Cross

It was a miserable mid-march afternoon, chill and sleeting, as John Sampson and I ran to the main gate of the Greensville Correctional Center, a hexagon-shaped high-security prison in the rural, southern part of the Commonwealth of Virginia.

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Island on the Edge of the World

“Voila!” Charlie spun the chair around and smiled into the mirror as she stood behind Meg.

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The Starless Sea

Back in his den with the cocoa he settles into the beanbag chair bequeathed to him by a departing student the year before.

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Shelf Life

Here are some things I know about weight. A pound of feathers weighs as much as a pound of bricks, but a pound of bricks is easier to carry.

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Up the Duff 2020 edition

Well, here it is: the newest, bang-up-to-date edition of Up the Duff.

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