Max Cossack wrote this book a few years ago. I just finished doing the audio book. Interestingly, it’s about a woke political assassin hunting a private citizen with strong public views. Sound familiar? His motto: “Today’s headlines are ripped from the pages of my novels!”
When his client is railroaded in a DC court, Sam Lapidos decides to give up the practice of law and renew his long dormant interest in exploring nature. His maiden journey into the woods miscarries when an assassin tries to kill him. His friends rally to his defense and gather in his home. His attackers develop their own conflicts, as incompetence, confusion and dissension rile their ranks. What happens next is known only to the author and his listeners.
Now, from the narrator: all the Max Cossack books are great fun and I’m sure you’re going to like this one as well. They stand alone, or you can do the series. I’ve done a few of them for Max and I love them.
First, an explanation for the long dry spell in doing anything here but promote books: I’ve been making more audio books. Sadly, unless you hit an upper tier in publishing, it’s not very lucrative. Your book can have 5 star reviews and win awards, but it doesn’t pay for many dinners out with the wife unit. Audio books do once you hit a certain point. I’ve hit that point. As a result, the blog has not been very active and for that I apologize. I will try to do better.
I found out about Charlie Kirk being shot/dying while I was setting up a Salvation Army canteen to feed the poor last Wednesday. The two people working with me also got notifications on their phones about what had happened. We were all stunned and saddened. We prayed for him, and then mourned him when the news of his death erupted into our lives.
Charlie Kirk was everything I’d want to be when I grow up. He was young enough to be my son, but I watched, and listened to him in rapt fascination. His messages, his debate, his faith all touched me deeply long before his death. Never did I think, “This dude’s on drugs” and turn him off. Far from it, I often stopped whatever else I was doing and focused on the wisdom this young man provided. His faith in God reinforced mine and made me humbled in the glow of his biblical knowledge. Not the stuff phonies have with two or three scriptural quotes, but a coherent knowledge of God’s message. He was filled with the Holy Spirit in my opinion.
He left behind a wife and young children in the wake of his murder. He was assassinated because he was a brilliant debater and the left seems to resort to violence, or the imminent threat of violence, when they can’t win the argument.
I have been sad for the last 5 days in the wake of his death. I pray often during the day, and during the night when I awaken, for his wife and kids – and his parents. They lost a son. I have been praying a lot more as a result.
I try relatively hard to be a good Christian, but in reality I suck at it. I get off on tangents, I weasel word about things on occasion, and while I truly believe, I don’t go to the edge with that belief.
That changed last week. I will no longer hide my opinions as a Christian and a conservative. I will call out evil whenever I confront it. I realize this will likely cost me work and social acceptance. But if Charlie could lay down his life for those beliefs, I can be bold in my faith and conservatism.
Charlie was a man who inspired people around the world. In the days since his death people have marched in his name across the globe. #TommyRobinson took time from his rally in London to honor Charlie. I will as well.
You see, the truth, and good, cannot be defeated by our enemies. They can only be vanquished by our silence.
Silent no longer. God Bless the Kirk family and strengthen the rest of us to be as good a servant as Charlie Kirk. It’s the least we can do.
I’ve known Cary Friedman for several years, and he’s one of the best minds in the field of helping cops. We have worked on projects together, and now I’ve had the honor of narrating all three of his audio books.
This one is a great gift for LEO types, and if you’re in the business, or thinking about becoming an LEO, you need to get this book and put it into practice.
American police officers are the real-life counterparts of our beloved fictional superheroes and superheroines.
The best cops…
• perform the law enforcement mission nobly, with honor, principle, and compassion
• practice excellent discretion, tempering the letter of the law with the spirit that animates it
• still believe in, and are proud symbols of, truth, justice, and the American way
• restrain their exercise of power according to Constitutional safeguards and agency guidelines
• behave “with malice toward none; with charity for all,” ensuring that the American justice system extends its protection and dignity—without discrimination or favor—to each and every community within our society
If you aspire to be the very best cop you can be, then this handbook has been designed especially for you!
“The Superhero Handbook for Cops” combines timeless wisdom with the newest research and technology to provide a powerful, comprehensive training program that nourishes the physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, and ethical dimensions of law enforcement officers.
NARRATOR NOTE: This is my third book by Cary Friedman. I love his writing, and I sincerely, and regretfully, wish I had read his books before I entered the police academy. I would have been a much better patrol officer.
I am honored to have narrated all 4 of the Sub Tales books to date, and hope to knock out Sub Tales 5 before February 2026. (Full schedule, a true blessing!) These are great books, and I’ve been on some of the subs in the book for “road trips” to different places we won’t talk about. It allows me to be very authentic about narrating the work, as I can literally smell what they’re talking about and see it before my eyes in most cases.
Sub Tales 4 is the latest offering by brothers Charles and Frank Hood in their prolific output of nonfiction books about the US Submarine Force. Like the three volumes preceding it in the series, Sub Tales 4 offers a detailed recounting of some of the most pivotal and poignant moments in the rich history of the Silent Service. Arranged as an anthology of individual short stories, the book covers many subjects with prose, photographs, maps, schematics, and other illustrations to complement the narrative.
Written over the last year, Sub Tales4 benefits editorially from the knowledgeable input of three submarine veterans—Keith Weitemeyer, John Donaldson, and Greg Scott—who painstakingly reviewed all chapters and offered valuable feedback during the composition process. Many story ideas were supplied by followers of the authors’ Facebook group, “Poopie Suits & Cowboy Boots”, and many vexing questions about some vital piece of esoterica were often posed and answered very quickly using that format. Our books incorporate that “wiki” approach to yield both accurate and engrossing stories that are certain to inform you more deeply.
Specific topics addressed in Sub Tales 4 include the inspiring life story of Charles Lockwood, a key figure in US submarine success during World War II; the serendipitous role of the USS Nautilus during the Battle of Midway; the submarine that carried gold and silver to safety during World War II; Richard Nixon’s relationship with Hyman Rickover, and their memorable overnight cruise aboard the USS Cincinnati; the mysterious and remote lake in Idaho where the Navy performs some of its most robust acoustic research; the story of the deep-diving USS Dolphin; the nuts and bolts of the submarine maneuvering watch; Ronald Reagan’s screen turn as a submarine captain; and many more.
Almost every year for over a decade I’ve been writing a piece of flash fiction for Memorial Day and Veterans Day. It dawned on me that I hadn’t written one for Monday and I’d better get to it. Filled the coffee cup and came into the office to write. Neil Diamond on the headphones and time to log in. I realized I hadn’t blogged much this past year. That one is simply explained: God has richly blessed me with so much audio book work that writing has fallen to the side for the time being. But today I write. Please share with others on your social media if you like this one.
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“LET’S GO FOR A SPIN”
“Close that friggin hatch!” The shout came from a choking Lt. Jg who had a lot more time in a Wildcat than an M113. He was more than mildly outraged that the exhaust from the diesel was flowing right into the crew compartment of the armored personnel carrier.
“Sorry, Sir, but if we close that hatch it will get worse. The smell, not the exhaust. You guys are a little ripe after this morning.”
That was probably true. The assembly of heroes had met up in the line to leave Heaven for a day and visit their former homes. Most of this mob had nobody to go back to, most of their children were all passed and none of their spouses had lived long after their respective wars. The grandkids and cousins had forgotten them, and they simply weren’t going to let that stop them. They wanted a brew and one day a year they could take leave and return to the land of the living for a cold one.
The day had started at midnight and they went to the storage depot in Arizona where they found aircraft they knew from their youth. Some were static displays, others waiting for cannibalizing for parts – Buffy was never going to retire at this rate. One of the guys had flown a B-57 for a while before transitioning, and there were a couple of them in the boneyard.
The nice thing about being dead, if such a thing could be said, was that the usual rules of physics and time did not apply. You could fly a parts bird with no repairs and have your buddies riding on the wings. They all fit, and the only thing that was the same was the roar of the engines, the g-forces in a tight turn, and the smell of kerosene permeating their clothing. All 12 of them loved it, especially when they found a Thud (F-105) and took it for a spin around Phoenix at 0500. That must have been weird for the people on the ground: windows rattling and the roar of a jet as they passed at 15 feet above ground level down the streets of the oldest section of the city. No busted windows (God prevented that one) but lots of people up before the sun and wondering what maniac was flying that low. Lt. Colonel Byron Jenkins just laughed and hit the throttle as he saw lights triggered by the shockwave behind him. He felt more alive than when he was. The bozos sitting on the canopy were all whooping like Slim Pickens in Dr. Strangelove.
They stopped for breakfast at a diner that had been closed for years, but was providentially staffed by a bunch of cute girls who had worked there during WWII. Eggs, toast, waffles (and of course beer) in quantity.
Next stop was at an armored vehicle museum, and that’s how they happened to be lumbering down I-10 at 1100 on this sunny Monday morning. Three of them had been tankers in various wars, but the kid driving had passed during Desert Storm when an Apache took them for enemy armor. He held no grudge, but he did enjoy being back in the driver’s seat and feeling the old rattle-and-bump of the tracked vehicle as it barged along. The drivers around them didn’t see them, but felt the air bubble as they passed into the zone around it. No living being could hear the laughter as the guys inside split a case of beer and traded stories.
Just before noon, they stopped at the National Memorial Cemetery for the ceremony. The track was parked next to the simulated grave and they all lined up in formation to honor the dead, for that’s what Memorial Day is all about. An odd assortment of flight gear, tanker helmets, fatigues and dungarees in precision order. The way they looked at the moment of their death. But they stood quietly to honor the ones they knew had fallen with them, but were elsewhere that day. Too many had forgotten, the crowd was small, and they stood with bowed heads. Silent. Reverent. A little bit lost in the emotions of the day.
When the ceremony was over, one of the sailors asked if they could visit his daughter. She was a baby when he died, but had heard the stories of her dad. The other linguist with him spoke up and asked if they could go visit his family in Texas. Nobody had a problem with that, those two had hopped in the orphan line by mistake.
Off they went, again in an aircraft reinvigorated for the day by God for their personal use. A quick flight into the deep south to see a daughter and his widow. The daughter was now older than he was when he died and that was hard to take. He’d avoided this moment for decades and realized he should have kept it that way. Heaven would ease that memory, but for now it stung.
The other linguist decided to pass on the visit home after this, and the group talked for a bit before deciding to end the day with a favorite event they all enjoyed: they went bowling.
And on this one day of the year every ball they threw was a strike, with the crashing of the pins adding to the thunder of the their sacrifice to the nation that they all loved. It was eternally loud, and caused people for miles around to look to Heaven for the source. But all the people saw was what some thought to be the flash of explosions on the horizon.
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Have a blessed Memorial Day. Honor those who paid for our holiday weekend, if just for a moment. They deserve our respect. They never came home.
