Thursday, December 19, 2024

10 Things You Might Not Know About George Almond's Even Higher Than Everest #10things

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George Almond, the grandson of a Wyoming horse rancher, enjoys revisiting great adventures. Born in London and educated in France and Oxford University he has ridden horseback 1500 miles across Europe, worked for Calgary Stampede's Champion Chuck Wagon driver,  sailed two oceans with the world's most experienced square-rig sea captain, taken the Flying Scotsman steam train from Boston to Houston where he was hired by Neiman Marcus. These days Almond makes his home in Europe, working on other books, including one about Jack Rackham and his two lady pirates who formerly sailed the Caribbean, preying upon merchant vessels.

10 Things You Might Not Know About Even Higher Than Everest

 

1. In today’s world of jet aviation, it's entirely usual to zoom around at altitudes much higher than Everest. Because of this, I've been asked once or twice 'What's so special about flying over Everest?’. Such questions came from folk who had no concept of how it was, in 1933, to sit in an open cockpit no bigger than an armchair. and then to take it to 30,000 feet above sea level, into an area of dangerous and awe-inspiring peaks where the Earth's highest mountains top out. My task was to explain just that.

2. I was a private pilot myself. I took my first flight in a Tiger Moth biplane at Plymouth airport and then progressed to Cessna etc. Flying such aircraft at altitudes above 10,000 feet generally requires oxygen so I never flew higher. Even so at that height, I felt out of my depth (read altitude for that!), though that might sound strange. It was a long, long way down to the ground. I experienced a similar anxiety when I once took a swim in the mid-Atlantic. Out of my depth to put it mildly.

3. Everest was first discovered by Radhanath Sickdhar, a mathematician working for Sir George Everest, the Surveyor General of India in 1852. The mountain was then known then as Peak XV and its height was established at 29,002 feet (8,840 metres). It has since been re-estimated at around 29,032 feet because the Himalayas sit on lively tectonic plates that are testing one another.

4. The survey involved several thousand Indians and was named the Great Trigonometrical Survey. After Sir George Everest stood down, the Surveyor General’s role was given to Colonel Valentine Blacker who completed the survey. He then perished in a duel with a fellow officer, both officers being killed. It was his relative in 1932, Colonel Blacker, who proposed the flight plan to make an aerial survey of the region.

5. One of the tasks assigned to the pilots was to seek for any signs of the missing climbers Mallory and Irvine who had vanished near the peak nine years before the first flight. A cairn of rocks or even a tattered flag might have provided a clue. However such proof was not seen or photographed by the pilots. In recent years the remains of both climbers have been found frozen in the snow at lower altitude, indicating they fell to their deaths. If their cameras are ever found, any exposed film may finally solve the mystery of Mallory and Irvine.

6. Everest continues to attract attention from the media and courageous climbers who, travelling from some 110 nations, have managed to reach the summit. When researching my book, I met the chief pilot of Nepal Airlines, Emyl Wick, who expressed enormous praise for the 1933 aircrew. Wick had flown over Everest in a Pilatus Porter many times and revealed that he needed nerves of steel for the turbulence of such flights. 

7. French pilot Didier Delsalle landed a helicopter on the summit in 2005 where he found the updraught so fierce that he had to ram the chopper’s skids down all the time. When the Everest pilots flew over in their single-engine biplanes one pilot, the Glaswegian McIntyre, reported it was like flying over an exploding ammunition factory. This indicates it may be safer to fly over Everest than to climb it because to date  at least 340 people have died attempting the conquest on foot.

8. The author was inspired to write Even Higher Than Everest after meeting world famous Sherpa Tenzing who made the first successful conquest. The aerial survey assisted route planning which was vital in the so-called death zone. 

9. George Almond has no desire to fly over Everest but is a member of a team who are keen to revisit this aviation epic. The team includes eminent professional pilots from the USA and UK and a brand new reproduction of the original biplane is now being built in the UK. When finished it will be able to challenge the skies above Everest and then tour some of the world’s busiest airports, no doubt turning many heads in the process. 

10. Almond has spent much of his life on unusual adventures. After making a 1500 mile horseback ride across Spain and France, he worked on cattle ranches in Alberta and Texas. Then he sailed as a crewman in a square-rig brigantine from Plymouth in UK, though the Panama Canal and then five weeks later reached Hawaii where the ship played a role in a movie, Another task came his way as barman on The Flying Scotsman steam train when it travelled from Boston to Houston in 1969. 

 



EVEN HIGHER THAN EVEREST is a vastly entertaining, fact-based, yet dramatized story of a London cockney heiress who, in the 1930s, sent a small fleet of double winger biplanes on a daring and remarkably dangerous mission to fly over Mt. Everest and film the world’s highest and most famous mountain peak.

Author George Almond met the Himalayan heroes (Sherpa Tenzing and Lord Hunt), who explained how the first aerial photographs, taken in 1933, assisted their heroic ascent of Everest in 1953. Captivated by this dazzling and little known tale, the book - Even Higher than Everest - is a dramatized recount of the tenacity of the heiress Lucy Houston and her team of prestigious aviators whose five aircraft flew to the world's highest mountains.  A short 1930s film from footage of Houston’s flight, titled Wings Over Everest, won an Oscar in 1936 from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wings_Over_Everest 

Commenting on his work, author George Almond says: “Inspired by true events of that first flight over Everest, the novel Even Higher Than Everest follows skilled personnel in finance, diplomacy, media, filming, engineering and aviation, all aiming for a shared objective. How these characters blended successfully, overcoming constant setbacks and challenges, was in itself a major accomplishment. I have followed the truth, tweaking just a few elements, in recounting the event.”

PRAISE:

“Yay, George Almond! You DID it! You delivered a fine story- -and a fun story- -with your Higher Than Everest dramatization. I loved many aspects about this book. You had me on the edge of my seat with the actual flights over the Himalayas. I could SEE the mountains in my mind's eye and could feel the tension and the dangers they faced.” - Amazon (Marla Bray)

Even Higher Than Everest is available at Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/Even-Higher-Than-Everest-Dramatised/dp/1782226249.


 

 

 

 

Wednesday, December 18, 2024

🔥 Hot New Release! The Death of the Kremlin Czar by Jörg H. Trauboth #newrelease

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An exciting, cutting-edge political thriller about the removal of a psychopathic Russian president who wants to restore the old Soviet Union.



Title: The Death of the Kremlin Czar

Author: Jörg H. Trauboth

Publication Date: August 26, 2024

Pages: 443

Genre: Thriller

Russian President and new Czar Ivan Pavlenko suddenly shows his true colors during the war in Ukraine. He wants the old Soviet Union back. The world is on the brink. The influential oligarch Alexei Sokolov wants to prevent Ivan’s megalomaniacal plans and is planning a fundamental new beginning for Russia. To achieve this, the Russian president must die. How will the US President react to the CIA’s proposal to support the oligarch, who has a romantic relationship with the Russian President’s partner, Yulia? 

The poison attack is perfectly prepared, but the Boeing with the oligarch Alexei Sokolow, his lover and over 100 passengers on board is hijacked by a Ukrainian terrorist and is supposed to crash over Berlin after knocking out the crew by shooting. Former elite soldier Marc Anderson is on board with his family and takes over with Alexei. The two flight amateurs try to get control. Will the landing and the assassination succeed or will the Kremlin Czar strike back brutally after realizing the role of Yulia?

The Death of the Kremlin Czar is available at Amazon (U.S. edition) and Amazon (German edition).

 

Book Excerpt 


“Watch out! High-voltage line at three hundred meters!“, shouted the co-pilot.
“In sight!“ the commander replied calmly, pulling up just before the obstacle and immediately pushing the helicopter down again. 

The two pilots of the Ukrainian armed forces guided the old Russian Mi-8 helicopter with their night vision devices on a zigzag course away from populated areas and Russian defense walls to the target. The destination was Luhansk. The mission: to free their own soldiers from Russian captivity. They had volunteered for the Ascension mission and trained for the flight intensively in the simulator supplied by the USA, including simulated enemy fire and evasive maneuvers. The simulator‘s current aerial photographs proved to be extremely helpful in the dimly lit night. A lot had changed in Donbass since the region was forcibly annexed by Russian President Ivan Pavlenko. Destroyed cities, abandoned villages, mined escape routes, deportations, rapes, mass graves, poverty, hunger, thirst and despair. 

Ivan Pavlenko was called “Czar Ivan II“ by the co-pilot, a former history teacher. But not only by him. The Ukrainian people hated this man who had brought so much suffering to their families with his megalomania and wanted to steal their country. Even those people whose thinking was shaped by Russian culture had turned their backs on this madman in Moscow. 

The co-pilot turned to Iris, the commander of the special forces, and signaled “30 minutes.“ 

Iris had been given his nickname because - like the German anti-aircraft missile of the same name - he was known for always hitting the bull‘s eye. Everything Iris tackled led to success. On a street in Kiev, the child-pushing, medium-sized, friendly man at his wife‘s side would not have been noticed. No one could have guessed that the man flirting with his young daughter was a rare mixture of analyst, combat soldier and leader with a stellar military career ahead of him. 

Iris looked at his men. The two teams sat opposite each other and remained completely relaxed despite the loud engine noise in the old transport helicopter with its fake Russian registration. 

Perhaps it was a kind of meditative calm before the dangerous mission. Or perhaps it was the awareness that they could be hit by a Russian missile at any time during this night-time low-level flight into the Luhansk Oblast without being able to do anything about it. There weren‘t even any parachutes on board, because every kilogram counted for the return flight, during which the aged and rattling Mi-8 would be fully occupied. 

The commander of the special forces fixed his gaze on the German opposite, who returned the look and nodded. Iris had received authorization for this rescue mission with a foreign team member from the highest authority. He had only agreed to it because the German Marc Anderson was considered a legend in the West despite being only thirty-five years old. Together with the US Navy SEALs, he had evacuated an American aircrew from the depths of Afghanistan and later served as a private security officer. 

The US president‘s family was rescued from the hands of Iranian terrorists on a luxury yacht by the security agent and his team. He and his team were personally honored by the US President. The Iranian terrorists took revenge and brutally murdered Marc‘s wife in front of their house in Hamburg. 

About the Author

Jörg H. Trauboth, born in 1943 near Berlin, logged over two thousand flight hours as a Weapon Systems Officer Instructor in the Luftwaffe, flying PHANTOM F-4F / RF-4E and TORNADO fighter jets, and over 3000 hours in light aircraft. At the age of fifty, he left the service with the rank of Colonel in the General Staff. He received training as a Special Risk Consultant from the English Control Risk Group and served as Managing Director Germany, dealing with extortion and kidnapping cases in South America and Eastern Europe. Shortly thereafter, he founded his own consulting firm, quickly establishing an outstanding international reputation. Trauboth protected his clients with a 24-hour task force during product extortions, product recalls, kidnappings, and image crises. He was the first President of the European Crisis Management Academy in Vienna and President of the American Yankee Association.

He is known as a respected expert in the media on security-related topics. He volunteers as an emergency counselor and is a member of the Crisis Intervention Team (KIT Bonn) of the German Foreign Office. He is a private pilot, married, with two sons and three grandchildren.

In 2002, Trauboth wrote the now out of print standard work “Crisis Management for Company Threats”.

In 2016 the follow-up work was published with Jörg H. Trauboth as editor in collaboration with five authors: “Crisis Management in Companies and Public Institutions”.

Terror expert J. H. Trauboth presented his debut novel in 2015 with the Germany thriller “Three Brothers”. (Available in English). In 2019 “Operation Jerusalem” followed and in 2020 “Omega”. The trilogy is about the former elite soldier Marc Anderson and his team. With these three self-contained thrillers, Trauboth is rated by many readers as the “German Tom Clancy.” The trilogy is available as a printed edition, eBook and audio book.

His first detective novel, “Jakobs Weg” (German), followed in 2021. The highly explosive topic of “sexual abuse of children” is processed sensitively in a scenario on the Way of Saint James and at the end offers contact options for those seeking help.

In 2022, the novella “Bonjour Saint-Ex” was published (German) in which the passionate pilot Jörg H. Trauboth turns the last flight of the legend Antoine de Saint Exupéry into an exciting literary event.

Readers wanted a sequel to the Marc Anderson series. In 2023, ZarenTod – Das Ende der Präsidenten was published, a highly topical political thriller. The Russian president and new tsar, Ivan Pavlenko, suddenly shows his true face during the war in Ukraine. He wants the old Soviet Union back. The world is on the brink. The influential oligarch, Alexei Sokolov, wants to prevent Ivan’s megalomaniac plans and is planning a fundamental new beginning for Russia. To achieve this, the Russian president must be removed. But the plan goes awry. Ex-elite soldier Marc Anderson intervenes. Will Czar Ivan die? What will become of Europe? The book 8/ 2024 in English „The Death of the Kremlin Czar” is the fourth political thriller in the Marc Anderson series.

Website & Social Media:

Website  https://trauboth-autor.de/english/

Twitter ➜ https://twitter.com/JorgTrauboth



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Monday, December 16, 2024

📚 Back Story: Princess Sophie and the Christmas Elixir by Mike Martin #BackStories

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📚Back Story: PRINCESS SOPHIE AND THE CHRISTMAS ELIXIR

By Mike Martin

Princess Sophie and the Christmas Elixir is a children’s Christmas book. But its message that love is always the answer goes far beyond the reach of children and Christmas. But I do love Christmas.

That’s the real inspiration behind this story. Christmas. That warm, fuzzy feeling that we Christmas lovers get around the magical season. And it’s more than nostalgia, although I do have pleasant memories of Christmases in my past. It’s about bringing that spirit into our everyday lives. Today and every day of the year.

Princess Sophie could be any of us. Missing that good feeling we once had but now have lost. Searching for answers outside of ourselves. And then discovering it was inside of us all along. The power of imagination and creation rolled into one by the power of love. And in believing in ourselves and each other.

 



Mike Martin was born in St. John’s, NL on the east coast of Canada and now lives and works in Ottawa, Ontario. He is a long-time freelance writer and his articles and essays have appeared in newspapers, magazines and online across Canada as well as in the United States and New Zealand.

He is the award-winning author of the best-selling Sgt. Windflower Mystery series, set in beautiful Grand Bank. There are now 15 books in this light mystery series with the 2024 publication of Too Close for Comfort

He is also the author of 3 Chldren’s Christmas books. The Christmas Beaver, A Friend for Christmas and now Princess Sophie and the Christmas Elixir.

Let’s Connect!

X https://www.x.com/mike54martin 

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61552604938333 

Goodreads https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/220363612-princess-sophie-and-the-christmas-elixir
 
 


Title: Princess Sophie and the Christmas Elixir

Author: Mike Martin

Publication Date: October 15, 2024

Pages: 24

Genre: Children's Book

Princess Sophie and the Magic Elixir is the story of a young girl who loves Christmas. When she sees that the people of Melodica are losing their Christmas spirit, she sets out to help them rekindle their magic. At the end she finds that all we really need is to believe in the power of love.

Princess Sophie and the Magic Elixir is available at Amazon.





Sunday, December 15, 2024

🔥Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard #newrelease

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This carefully plotted journey of the fate of humankind has captivated readers for more than 40 years and earned its place as one of the most beloved science fiction novels of all time.

 


Title: Battlefield Earth

Author: L. Ron Hubbard

Pages: 1080

Genre: Science Fiction

In response to Voyager I, the human race was nearly wiped out by an alien invader of superior strength and weapons so technologically advanced that any counterattack was futile. 

After a thousand years of dystopian terror, one courageous man attempts to gather the scattered tribes of humanity and reclaim the planet. He must unite a beaten people and uncover any possible weakness in the alien’s hold on our world.

Already pitted against overwhelming odds, Jonnie is being secretly undermined by an unexpected enemy within his own people, who will stop at nothing to destroy him.

This carefully plotted journey of the fate of humankind has captivated readers for more than 40 years and earned its place as one of the most beloved science fiction novels of all time.

A Random House Modern Readers Library poll voted Battlefield Earth one of the Best 100 English-Language Novels of the 20th Century.

“L. Ron Hubbard was one of the big change agents of science fiction. He helped shift the genre from a cold exploration of machines, technology, and alien worlds, to a warm exploration of human beings and how they reacted to such machines, technologies, and worlds. Battlefield Earth is a prime example, a character-driven epic that grabs you from the start and never lets go. You root for the heroes and despise the villains, all the while becoming immersed in a compulsively-readable science-fiction tour de force, complete with breathtaking action, non-stop adventure, and enough creativity to fill a dozen novels.” —Douglas E. Richards (author of Unidentified)

Battlefield Earth is one of my favorite works of science fiction ever. I’ve probably read it eight times or so. It’s always in my top five. As a writer myself, I think about the pacing and the plotting of that book and just marvel that he pulled it off. It’s really brilliant.” —Hugh Howey (author of Wool)

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Battlefield-Earth-Arrival-Invasion-Post-Apocalyptic/dp/1592129579
Barnes & Noble: 
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/battlefield-earth-l-ron-hubbard/1100824883?ean=9781592129577
Booksamillion:
https://www.booksamillion.com/p/Battlefield-Earth/L-Ron-Hubbard/9781592129577

 

Book Excerpt

Man,” said Terl, “is an endangered species.” 

The hairy paws of the Chamco brothers hung suspended above the broad keys of the laser-bash game. The cliffs of Char’s eyebones drew down over his yellow orbs as he looked up in mystery. Even the steward, who had been padding quietly about picking up her saucepans, lumbered to a halt and stared. 

Terl could not have produced a more profound effect had he thrown a meat-girl naked into the middle of the room. 

The clear dome of the Intergalactic Mining Company employee recreation hall shone black around and above them, silvered at its crossbars by the pale glow of the Earth’s single moon, half full on this late summer night. 

Terl lifted his large amber eyes from the tome that rested minutely in his massive claws and looked around the room. He was suddenly aware of the effect he had produced, and it amused him. Anything to relieve the humdrum monotony of a ten-year duty tour in this gods-abandoned mining camp, way out here on the edge of a minor galaxy. 

In an even more professorial voice, already deep and roaring enough, Terl repeated his thought. “Man is an endangered species.” 

Char glowered at him. “What in the name of diseased crap are you reading?” 

Terl did not much care for his tone. After all, Char was simply one of several mine managers, but he, Terl, was chief of minesite security. “I didn’t read it. I thought it.” 

“You must’ve got it from somewhere,” growled Char. “What is that book?” Terl held it up so Char could see its back. It said General Report of Geological Minesites, Volume 250,369. Like all such books, it was huge. Time, distance and weight have been translated in all cases throughout this book to old Earth time, distance and weight systems for the sake of uniformity and to prevent confusion in the various systems employed by the Psychlos but printed on material that made it almost weightless, particularly on a low-gravity planet such as Earth, a triumph of design and manufacture that did not cut heavily into the payloads of freighters. 

“Rughr,” growled Char in disgust. “That must be two, three hundred Earth-years old. If you want to prowl around in books, I got an up-to-date general board of directors’ report that says we’re thirty-five freighters behind in bauxite deliveries.” 

The Chamco brothers looked at each other and then at their game to see where they had gotten to in shooting down the live mayflies in the air box. But Terl’s next words distracted them again. “Today,” said Terl, brushing Char’s push for work aside, “I got a sighting report from a recon drone that recorded only thirty-five men in that valley near that peak.” 

Terl waved his paw westward toward the towering mountain range silhouetted by the moon. 

“So?” said Char. 

“So I dug up the books out of curiosity. There used to be hundreds in that valley. And furthermore,” continued Terl with his professorial ways coming back, “there used to be thousands and thousands of them on this planet.” 

“You can’t believe all you read,” said Char heavily. “On my last duty tour—it was Arcturus IV—” 

“This book,” said Terl, lifting it impressively, “was compiled by the Culture and Ethnology Department of the Intergalactic Mining Company.” 

The larger Chamco brother batted his eyebones. “I didn’t know we had one.” 

– Excerpted from Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard, Galaxy Press, 2016. Reprinted with permission.


About the Author
 

With 19 New York Times bestsellers and more than 350 million copies of his works in circulation, L. Ron Hubbard is among the most enduring and widely read authors of our time. As a leading light of American Pulp Fiction through the 1930s and '40s, he is further among the most influential authors of the modern age. Indeed, from Ray Bradbury to Stephen King, there is scarcely a master of imaginative tales who has not paid tribute to L. Ron Hubbard.

Website ➜ https://battlefieldearth.com/battlefield-earth/

X ➜  https://x.com/BE_the_Book

Facebook ➜ https://www.facebook.com/BattlefieldEarth/

Instagram ➜ https://www.instagram.com/be_the_book/

 


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