All The Gallant Men

The New York Times bestselling memoir of survival and heroism at Pearl Harbor “An unforgettable story of unfathomable courage.” —Reader’s Digest In this, the first memoir by a USS Arizona sailor, Donald Stratton delivers an inspiring and unforgettable eyewitness account of the Pearl Harbor attack and his remarkable return to the fight. At 8:10 a.m. on December 7, 1941, Seaman First Class Donald Stratton was consumed by an inferno. A million pounds of explosives had detonated beneath his battle station aboard the USS Arizona, barely fifteen minutes into Japan’s surprise attack on American forces at Pearl Harbor. Near death and burned across two thirds of his body, Don, a nineteen-year-old Nebraskan who had been steeled by the Great Depression and Dust Bowl, summoned the will to haul himself hand over hand across a rope tethered to a neighboring vessel. Forty-five feet below, the harbor’s flaming, oil-slick water boiled with enemy bullets; all around him the world tore itself apart. In this extraordinary, never-before-told eyewitness account of the Pearl Harbor attack—the only memoir ever written by a survivor of the USS Arizona—ninety-four-year-old veteran Donald Stratton finally shares his unforgettable personal tale of bravery and survival on December 7, 1941, his harrowing recovery, and his inspiring determination to return to the fight. Don and four other sailors made it safely across the same line that morning, a small miracle on a day that claimed the lives of 1,177 of their Arizona shipmates—approximately half the American fatalaties at Pearl Harbor. Sent to military hospitals for a year, Don refused doctors’ advice to amputate his limbs and battled to relearn how to walk. The U.S. Navy gave him a medical discharge, believing he would never again be fit for service, but Don had unfinished business. In June 1944, he sailed back into the teeth of the Pacific War on a destroyer, destined for combat in the crucial battles of Leyte Gulf, Luzon, and Okinawa, thus earning the distinction of having been present for the opening shots and the final major battle of America’s Second World War. As the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack approaches, Don, a great-grandfather of five and one of six living survivors of the Arizona, offers an unprecedentedly intimate reflection on the tragedy that drew America into the greatest armed conflict in history. All the Gallant Men is a book for the ages, one of the most remarkable—and remarkably inspiring—memoirs of any kind to appear in recent years. *Library Journal

Mavis Gallant is the modern master of what Henry James called the international story, the fine-grained evocation of the quandaries of people who must make their way in the world without any place to call their own. The irreducible complexity of the very idea of home is especially at issue in the stories Gallant has written about Montreal, where she was born, although she has lived in Paris for more than half a century. Varieties of Exile, Russell Banks's extensive new selection from Gallant's work, demonstrates anew the remarkable reach of this writer's singular art. Among its contents are three previously uncollected stories, as well as the celebrated semi-autobiographical sequence about Linnet Muir—stories that are wise, funny, and full of insight into the perils and promise of growing up and breaking loose.

"A wise, humane and beautifully written book." —Bret Stephens, Wall Street Journal From the best-selling author of Benjamin Franklin comes this remarkable work that will help redefine our notion of American heroism. Americans have long been obsessed with their heroes, but the men and women dramatically portrayed here are not celebrated for the typical banal reasons contained in Founding Fathers hagiography. Effortlessly challenging those who persist in revering the American history status quo and its tropes and falsehoods, Morgan, now ninety-three, continues to believe that the past is just not the way it seems.

As the American Revolution rages on the mainland, the British Navy prepares for action at sea. Against a growing fleet of American and French privateers, the navy must maintain its blockade of Washington's vital military supplies. Caught up in the turmoil, junior officer Richard Bolitho finds himself having to make momentous decisions in the heat of battle—decisions that could affect the lives of many men and, perhaps, even the fate of nations.

Eighty pieces of short fiction and nonfiction on manhood by some of the world's best writers. To help launch the literary nonprofit Narrative 4, Esquire asked eighty of the world's greatest writers to chip in with a story, all with the title, "How to Be a Man." The result is The Book of Men, an unflinching investigation into the essence of manhood.

The Lou Conter Story: From USS Arizona Survivor to Unsung American Hero tells the incredible story of one of the last remaining survivors of the USS Arizona. More than just a recollection of the events that transpired in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on December 7, 1941, this book also records the author's memorable experiences before and after the Day of Infamy. Conter was on the USS Arizona deck when a Japanese armor-piercing bomb hit one million pounds of gunpowder stored in the ship's hull. He helped rescue crewmen following the explosion and dove into the wreckage to recover bodies in the days after. In 1942, Conter went to flight school where he earned his wings and became a VP-11 Black Cat pilot. He helped rescue over two hundred Australian Coastwatchers stranded in northern New Guinea and was shot down twice -- once swimming with his crew while sharks circled. Conter also helped rescue over two hundred Australian shore watchers up the Sepik River in New Guinea. After World War II, he became an intelligence officer, flew combat in Korea, created the Navy's first SERE program (survival, evasion, resistance, and escape), and served as a military advisor to presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson. Lou Conter shares his Pearl Harbor experiences with high school students throughout Northern California, and he returns to the USS Arizona every December to take part in National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day activities to honor and remember the 2,403 service members and civilians who were killed during the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor. In 2019, Conter was one of only three remaining crew members out of the 335 who had survived the attack on the USS Arizona. He was the only survivor able to attend the memorial event.

A NEW YORK REVIEW BOOKS ORIGINAL Mavis Gallant is a contemporary legend, a frequent contributor to The New Yorkerfor close to fifty years who has, in the words of The New York Times, "radically reshaped the short story for decade after decade." Michael Ondaatje's new selection of Gallant's work gathers some of the most memorable of her stories set in Europe and Paris, where Gallant has long lived. Mysterious, funny, insightful, and heartbreaking, these are tales of expatriates and exiles, wise children and straying saints. Together they compose a secret history, at once intimate and panoramic, of modern times.

Civil War letters from soldiers serving in a German regiment Organized by Colonel August Willich, a former Prussian army officer who led troops during the German Revolution of 1848, Indiana's German 32nd Indiana regiment fought in the Western Theater of the Civil War. The 32nd Indiana forged an enviable combat record on the battlefields at Rowlett's Station in Kentucky; at Shiloh, Stones River, and Missionary Ridge in Tennessee; and at Chickamauga and Pickett's Mill in Georgia. The letters collected here originally appeared in German in wartime issues of German American newspapers. These rare documents connect the contemporary reader to the world of the patriotic immigrant soldier and his hard-fighting regiment, revealing personal motivations, wartime experiences, opinions, ethnic pride, and bravery, as this regiment engaged in some of the most bitter fighting in the West. These gripping letters also provide insight into the social, political, and cultural dimensions of the war and reveal the competing ethnic identities, nativism, and immigrant acculturation of late-nineteenth-century America. The Germans of the 32nd Indiana proved themselves to be "Gallant Dutchmen" in the fight to save the Union. Gallant Dutchmen is a valuable addition to Civil War studies and will also be welcomed by those interested in ethnic and immigration studies.

In the magical kingdom of Evergreen, beautiful Princess Elena is suddenly whisked away by an old woman. Undefeated champion Gallant and shy bookworm Earnest go on a quest to find “the greatest treasure in the land” so one of them can save and marry the princess. Along the way, Earnest and Gallant realize “the greatest treasure in the land” is not what they expected. This is a 28-page, full-color, illustrated children's adventure picture book with a same-sex marriage.

This New York Times bestselling account of books parachuted to soldiers during WWII is a “cultural history that does much to explain modern America” (USA Today). When America entered World War II in 1941, we faced an enemy that had banned and burned 100 million books. Outraged librarians launched a campaign to send free books to American troops, gathering 20 million hardcover donations. Two years later, the War Department and the publishing industry stepped in with an extraordinary program: 120 million specially printed paperbacks designed for troops to carry in their pockets and rucksacks in every theater of war. These small, lightweight Armed Services Editions were beloved by the troops and are still fondly remembered today. Soldiers read them while waiting to land at Normandy, in hellish trenches in the midst of battles in the Pacific, in field hospitals, and on long bombing flights. This pioneering project not only listed soldiers’ spirits, but also helped rescue The Great Gatsby from obscurity and made Betty Smith, author of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, into a national icon. “A thoroughly engaging, enlightening, and often uplifting account . . . I was enthralled and moved.” — Tim O’Brien, author of The Things They Carried “Whether or not you’re a book lover, you’ll be moved.” — Entertainment Weekly