JEDEDIAH MAGNUS WEST is "The Great Wild West." Award-winning author Jeff Appelquist takes us on an amazing odyssey as Jed West's story unfolds against the dramatic sweep of modern American history. Jed, the grandson of humble immigrants, grows up in a comfortable Midwestern household. He graduates from schoolboy mischief to the pain and glory of collegiate athletics. He serves America as a Marine officer and courageously confronts multiple life-changing events. From the shores of Omaha Beach to the jungles of Vietnam, from the Marine occupation of Beirut to the killing fields of Iraq and Afghanistan, Jed and his family are touched by the harsh scourge of war. Jed leaves the military and enters into a law practice that he comes to detest. But fortune shines when he marries a wife and fathers two daughters whom he adores. Sara, Angela, and Jessica teach him much as they profoundly change the way he thinks about the world. Jed becomes an entrepreneur who builds a business empire, only to watch his world come crashing down around him. He suffers the embarrassment of failure, the agony of physical injury, and the heartbreak of personal loss. With his pals Zach, Tommy, and Luke, Jed savors the joys of friendship, camaraderie, and laughter. Together they experience the wild and wonderful world of nature in pursuit of epic hunting and fishing exploits around the world. Finally, over time, in ways that they could never have imagined, Jed and his beloved circle of family and friends are forced to come to grips with highly charged issues of race, religion, gender, and sexuality. Jed West proves that what matters is not the destination, but the journey. Throughout all of his adventures and challenges, Jed strives to persevere, to maintain his outrageous sense of humor, to do the right thing, and to become a better man. The Great Wild West is a great wild ride and an unforgettable vision of the American dream.

The Great Wild West: An American Journey

Literature & Fiction

Appelquist, Jeff

Literary

Wise Ink Creative Publishing

Changing Places: Travels in a Vanishing World

Science & Math

Nature & Ecology

Capsule

Jeff Appelquist has traveled to all fifty of the United States, myriad foreign countries, and six continents. He has survived three years in the Marine Corps infantry; a violent rock slide on the Western Breach of Mount Kilimanjaro; a Force Nine gale in a sailboat on the Atlantic Ocean; a frozen regulator while wreck diving deep in icy Lake Superior; a precipitous mid-flight plunge aboard a commercial airliner; two earthquakes; numerous bodily injuries, concussions, and surgeries; and a ghostly encounter with a Confederate soldier on Little Round Top at Gettysburg. He is a student of history who teaches leadership. He is an international sportsman who loves the outdoors. And he is deeply concerned about the state of our beloved Earth.
In Changing Places, Appelquist journeys from the Great Barrier Reef of Australia to the highest mountaintop in Africa; from Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean to the Vatican City in Rome; from the Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor to the Inca Trail and Machu Picchu; from the lush vineyards of Napa Valley to the rushing rivers of Montana to the fertile farmlands of rural Minnesota to the gorgeous waters off Key West, and many points in between. Changing Places is both an engaging travel memoir and a sobering treatise on the environment. Our world is a beautiful place, which Appelquist chronicles with a keen, loving eye and captivating storytelling. But it is also in danger: its coastlines, reefs, glaciers, rainforests, icecaps and species are vanishing before our eyes. In the end, Changing Places is a call to action for every person who cherishes the Planet Earth.

Travel

Travel Writing

Wisdom Is Not Enough: Reflections on Leadership and Teams

Business & Money

Management & Leadership

On Sunday July 20, 1969, at 10:56 pm EST, American astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first human being to set foot upon the Moon. The Apollo 11 mission represented a moment of profound inspiration and hope at the end of what had been a really hard time. In addition to the murder of a promising young president, the 1960s had seen the escalation of America's tragic and misguided involvement in faraway Vietnam; some but not enough progress in the Civil Rights movement; multiple political assassinations; tumultuous and deadly race riots in our cities; and general social turmoil on a grand and disruptive scale. Despite all of this, somehow, imagining the possibility of reaching the Moon brought us together, even if only for a moment. It was not just an American achievement, but an achievement for all people everywhere. The Moon landing truly represented a triumph of the human spirit. In Earthrise, author Jeff Appelquist seeks to answer a fascinating question: What leadership lessons can we glean from the epic story of the Apollo spaceflights? In addition to Apollo 11, he details the Apollo 8 mission, which successfully orbited the Moon in 1968, and the infamous near-disaster that was Apollo 13, made famous by the words, "Houston, we've had a problem." In each of these epic voyages, and in a series of compelling companion case studies, Appelquist finds that such leadership dimensions as establishing a common purpose, developing strong relationships and trust, communicating clearly, continuing to learn, demonstrating energy and passion, and making good decisions all played a critical role. Earthrise is an essential roadmap for any person who is faced with the never-ending challenges of an ongoing leadership journey.

Earthrise: Leadership Lessons from the Apollo Space Missions

In Sacred Ground, Jeff Appelquist takes us on an amazing journey of exploration and discovery to the Gettysburg and Little Bighorn battlefields. By studying these momentous events through the lens of individual leadership and team dynamics, we see that the stories from history are fascinating, the parallels to today are memorable, and the principles of leadership enduring. History at its best is one unending, frequently unforgettable story about people who lived and breathed, and sometimes accomplished extraordinary things under great duress. While not everyone loves history, everyone loves a great story. And stories from the past still have power to inform our lives in the present. Sacred Ground is storytelling at its best, and will forever change the way you think, lead, and do business.

Sacred Ground: Leadership Lessons From Gettysburg & The Little Bighorn

Biography & History

Blue Knight Leadership, LLC

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Books by Appelquist, Jeff