Showing results by narrator "Steve Marvel" in All Categories

On a camping trip at Ayer’s Rock, the Chamberlain family’s infant daughter disappeared in the middle of the night. Her distraught mother, Lindy, claimed she saw a dingo carry her off into the Australian outback. Two years later, their tragedy worsened when, without a murder weapon, a body, or even a motive, a jury convicted Lindy Chamberlain of killing her own daughter. The public cheered.

Artificial intelligence surrounds us. More and more of the systems and services you interact with every day are based on AI technology. Most AI is narrowly specific; that is, it can only do a single thing, in a single context. Human intelligence is different. We can solve a variety of tasks, including those we have not seen before. In Artificial General Intelligence, Julian Togelius explores technical approaches to developing more general artificial intelligence and asks what general AI would mean for human civilization.

There are no more red or blue states; just empty states. And empty cities. But a few Americans survived, and are fighting to stay alive. Ted, the pilot, still protects Vice President Emily Williams as he retains the hope of finding his niece. His skills are tested as enemy forces zero in on their location. Tabby, the tour guide, is stuck with three young teens as she looks for her parents. Entire cities are theirs to explore. Dwight, the homeless man, is known for talking to an invisible parrot. He might also be witness to the first wave of the invasion force.

Dogs keep us company, provide unconditional love, and share in the ups and downs of our lives. They see every day as an adventure. You'll love these 101 dog tales of family, friendship, and fun. How do dogs do it? Even non-"dog people" fall under their spell. Our dogs make us better people. If we rescued them, they rescue us back. If we're sad, they comfort us. If we need to have more fun, they show us how. They are our therapists, our role models, and our best friends.

The American homeland is slowly being devoured by a relentless enemy, and the number of people fighting back continues to dwindle. But all is not lost. Ted and Emily work tirelessly to stay alive and fight back, and they've joined up with some of the leftovers missed by the initial terrorist attack. After scoring a minor victory for the fledgling rebellion, they're faced with the withering prospect of assaulting the invader's main base of operations.

What explains the massive worldwide success of video games such as Fortnite, Minecraft, and Pokemon Go? Game companies and their popularity are poorly understood and often ignored from the standpoint of traditional business strategy. What lessons can we draw from its major successes and failures about the future of entertainment?

More murders, more ambition, and a whole lot more women. My life changed for the better when I bonded with an ancient, powerful Incubus. My status improved in leaps and bounds, I got to sleep with multiple women at once, and I even turned the tables on the Syndicate's most deadly hitman. As it turns out, being the bad guy can be fun if you don't mind killing a whole bunch of people. Trouble is, that type of overnight success tends to attract attention. And not the good kind. A mid-level Syndicate boss is out to destroy everything I hold dear. 

What would the world be like without America? The attack only takes a few minutes to sweep from coast to coast. When it ends, nearly everyone on mainland USA is gone. Every policeman. Every housewife. Every trucker. Everyone. A continent free for the taking.... Ted MacInnis is a backup pilot on Air Force Two, over the Atlantic, when it happens. A warrior by nature, he can do little but listen as the radio signals from his homeland fade away and die.

Defeat a sea monster. Kill a legendary man-eater. Protect my harem from an old enemy. We escaped the cannibals and the volcano, and are now headed to a promising new island. It's going to be great. A bigger island to explore, a new tribe to meet, and endless possibilities for our growing family. But it's no longer just about having shelter and finding food. We have bigger plans than ever. It's no longer adapt or die. Now, it's adapt and thrive. 

From the renowned author of A Year in the Maine Woods, the intimate, thoughtful reflections of a lifetime spent observing the natural world. For forty years, Bernd Heinrich has been ensconced in the woods of the northern, or boreal, forest, a vast sea of spruce, fir, and larch in the mountains...

Drake Woolf is the perfect throwaway agent - a deadly, invisible force able to handle the blackest of black-ops missions. No one's better when it comes to search and destroy. But his lethal drive feeds a relentless hunger. It's all his handlers at Task Force Orange can do to point him at the right targets. This time, he's up against a massive, global conspiracy. In his deadly crosshairs are a Venezuelan terrorist, hordes of elite Iranian assassins, and a beautiful and wily FBI counterintelligence agent.

Skip tracer Henry Swann cares little about anything but money, so when a beautiful Upper East Side woman shows up in his office and hires him to find her missing husband, he smiles and takes the cash. But when this seemingly simple missing-person case turns into homicide, Swann finds himself trapped in a complex web of connections and multiple identities that takes him out of New York City and across two continents.

In the clandestine world of shadow ops, he's known as The Man From Orange. A master of surveillance, signals intelligence - and silent killing - special operative Drake Woolf has been groomed and trained by the old-guard intel community after his CIA father and mother were murdered in Tunisia. Now he works for Task Force Orange, handling cases the government doesn't want its fingerprints on. Woolf can always be relied on to carry out an assignment with surgical precision - and exterminate a threat with extreme prejudice. But his latest mission is different.  

Ten-year-old Nem has just witnessed her mother's brutal murder and her life appears destined for tragedy. Until, that is, she finds her mother‘s old green journal which holds an incredible secret. This innocent looking book seems to contain the power over luck. As she uses it, Nem discovers the diary keeps a strange kind of karmic balance, that in gifting someone good fortune she must steal another's first. All it takes is a simple entry. There's dangers though, and not just for others but also for Nem.

Matt Bowen and his team made it out of Slovakia by the skin of their teeth. But the fight's not over. And there's no rest for the weary. The European Defense Council, desperate to salvage their dream of a Europe reshaped in their image, threaten invasion of Poland. The Triarii and what is left of American forces in Northern Europe stand by their Polish allies. But they're outnumbered and outgunned. And they might well be watching the wrong part of the border.

Evelyn Lewis's secret dream of marrying her brother's best friend is shattered when he leaves their home town to seek his fortune elsewhere. For six long years, she's waited and wondered if he would return. After the shocking murder of her parents, her brother is the only family she has left. Refusing to accept a betrothal to a man she doesn't love, she decides to take control of her destiny and confront her parents' killer.

Adam Plantinga, author of the acclaimed 400 Things Cops Know and a 17-year veteran sergeant with the San Francisco Police Department, gives an inside view of the police officer's job, from handling evidence and conducting interrogations to coping with danger, violence, and death. Not hesitating to confront controversial issues, Plantinga presents the police officer's views on police shootings, racial profiling, and relationships between police and the community.

Dakota Bombay prided himself on his Bond-like image-bad-guy killer by day, lady-killer by night. But his life gets both shaken and stirred by an irate grandmother demanding a marketing plan for the family assassination business, a precocious six-year-old son he never knew he had, and a mysterious redheaded funeral director who's got him intrigued in more ways than one.

China's Quest for Military Supremacy provides a broad and accessible exploration of Chinese military power, including relations between the Chinese Communist Party and its army, the strategic worldview of Chinese leaders, military strategy and resourcing, conventional and nuclear modernization, military diplomacy and coercion, preparations for war, and the People's Liberation Army's emerging global role.

Many believe that despite its destructive character, war ultimately boosts long-term economic growth. For the United States this view is often supported by appeal to the experience of the Second World War, understood as a triumph of both production and productivity. Alexander Field shows that between 1941 and 1945 manufacturing productivity actually declined, depressed by changes in the output mix and resource shocks from enemy action, including curtailed access to natural rubber and, on the Eastern Seaboard, petroleum.