Throughout his childhood, Mike O’Connor’s family pretended to be normal. But Mike and his two younger sisters knew that their parents were hiding something–a secret they didn’t dare talk about. The family appeared to be no different from any of their small-town Texas neighbors–that is, until suddenly, the O’Connor’s would flee, leaving with only a few hours’ notice, abandoning houses and pets and possessions and running across the border to Mexico. For all of Mike’s adolescence, O’Connor family life alternated between relative comfort and abject poverty–sometimes within a matter of days. From living in a Texas ranch house to living in two rented rooms in an impoverished Mexican village, the O’Connors never knew what lay ahead–only that they must not draw attention to themselves. Though their parents steadfastly denied it, the children knew that something was chasing them–a past that hovered like an invisible enemy, always waiting to strike, always in pursuit. But it was not until much later, after his parents’ deaths, that Mike O’Connor, now an investigative reporter, was able to uncover the truth about his family’s past. As the secrets were unlocked one by one and the long trail of deception unfurled, Mike faced the heart-wrenching ramifications of his parents’ actions–and made a discovery that shook his family loyalty to its core. Full of incredible details of a life lived on both sides of the border, in near-poverty and near-wealth, Mike O’Connor’s account is a real-life suspense story of childhood mysteries and strange circumstances that will enthrall readers to its very end. Kirkus Reviews Journalist O’Connor’s riveting debut traces a childhood shaped by his mother’s and father’s lies and his adult quest to uncover the truths they hid. The author grew up knowing virtually nothing of his parents’ pasts or extended families, though his mother’s accent did reveal that she was English. The absence of cousins and grandparents was just one oddity. The O’Connors were also constantly moving, establishing tentative, tenuous households and then fleeing town in the middle of the night. They had a particular fear of government officials, and any encounter with cops left Mrs. O’Connor shaken for days. Given all this moving, the O’Connors were unable to make much money, and they slipped from a precarious perch in the middle class to shocking poverty. In late adolescence, the author finally recognized that life at home was poisonous, his parents unstable and deceptive. He moved out and had only sporadic contact with them in the ensuing decades, when he worked as a reporter for CBS News, the New York Times and NPR. Only after both his parents died did O’Connor’s two younger sisters beg him to tackle the mystery of their lives as though it were a political scandal he was assigned to expose. He began to dig, grudgingly at first but then increasingly determined to discover the secrets that had shaped his childhood. His research took him to Boston, where he connected with his father’s large family; to Burnley, England, where an elderly union organizer told him stories about his mother and uncle; and into the offices of the CIA, FBI and INS, following a sketchy paper trail that shed light on the government’s interest in his parents. O’Connor is a sympathetic narrator, never bitter, who reveals the complexities of every last character. By the end of this suspenseful memoir, readers will be just as eager as the author to discover what kept his family on the run. "This is a lot more than just a memoir. Mike O'Connor brings the pacing of a thriller, the eye of a great reporter and the intrigue of a life on the run to create a fascinating portrait of his own Boston Irish family and the secrets it held in McCarthy-era America. It is a page turner that takes you on a journey out of the confines of the Irish enclaves of New England through the big sky country of Texas and south of the border to Mexico. All along the way, O'Connor writes with a unique voice that manages to both enlighten the past and inform the present. This is a finely crafted work of non-fiction and one hell of a good read." -- Charles M. Sennott, author and staff writer for The Boston Globe "This book is a mystery and a memoir. But more than anything it is an unforgettable romance about two people who willingly sacrifice everything - their finances, their future, and their families - to stay together. Mike O’Connor is an extraordinary writer and in retracing his parents’ footsteps he asks big questions. What is a family? Does the truth matter? And most importantly, what is love?" -- Ruth Reichl, Editor-in-Chief, Gourmet "Mike O'Connor, the young son of a Boston Irish father and a British mother, spent his childhood on the lam in Texas, Mexico and California, never knowing what his parents were up to. Years later, after distinguished work as a foreign correspondent in war zones from El Salvador to the Middle East, O'Connor probes his bizarre past and gets to the bottom of what his parents feared most, what they were running from. The O'Connor family story is a story of post-war America. It is riveting, and it is unforgettable." --David Gelber, Producer, CBS News "O'Connor's book is a gripping yarn of inscrutable dangers, broken dreams and the power of grit. It is also a searing story of his efforts--first as a boy and later as a savvy journalist--to understand and unravel the mystery of why his family has to keep moving from Massachusetts to Texas to Mexico, back to Texas, back to Mexico, then to California and back to Mexico. The scenes of border crossings are so haunting you feel as if you are there. In a voice that is at times youthful and at times world weary, he masterfully tells a tale that evolves from McCarthy era paranoia but goes well beyond that troubled time in our history." --Henry Weinstein, Legal Affairs Writer, Los Angeles Times "Mike O'Connor is a masterful writer. A brave and relentless war correspondent, he now turns his investigative skills to his own mysterious family and the secrets behind a childhood filled with danger and constantly on the run. It's a poignant American saga that has its roots in a time when the country was intoxicated by fear, obsessed with enemies within as well as without. Powerful, elegant, compelling." --Sylvia Poggioli, Senior European Correspondent, National Public Radio

Crisis, Pursued by Disaster, Followed Closely by Catastrophe: A Memoir of Life on the Run

Biographies & Memoirs

O'Connor, Mike

Arts & Literature

Random House]

As recently as 2008, when Presidents Bush and Obama acted to bail out the nation's crashing banks and failing auto companies, the perennial objection erupted anew: government has no business in...business. To the contrary, Mike O'Connor argues in this book: Those who cite history to decry government economic intervention are invoking a tradition that simply does not exist. In a cogent and timely take on this ongoing and increasingly contentious debate, O'Connor uses deftly drawn historical analyses of major political and economic developments to puncture the abiding myth that business once operated apart from government. From its founding to the present day, our commercial republic has always mixed--and battled over the proper balance of--politics and economics. Contesting the claim that the modern-day libertarian conception of U.S. political economy represents the "natural" American economic philosophy, O'Connor demonstrates that this perspective has served historically as only one among many. Beginning with the early national debate over the economic plans proposed by Alexander Hamilton, continuing through the legal construction of the corporation in the Gilded Age and then the New Deal commitment to full employment, and concluding with contemporary concerns over lowering taxes, this book demonstrates how the debate over government intervention in the economy has illuminated the possibilities and limits of American democratic capitalism.

A Commercial Republic: America's Enduring Debate over Democratic Capitalism (American Political Thought)

Business & Money

Economics

University Press of Kansas

Join Jamie, the son of a travelling Droll-Teller, as he journeys across Cornwall, a land steeped in myth and legend. Along the way we will hear twenty tales – specially chosen to be enjoyed by 7-11 year old readers – which sparkle with magic and explode with adventure.Some of these stories are strange and sad, some are a bit scary and some are a bit mad. Maybe it’s wrong to try and trap them in a book. Maybe you should set them free and tell them. Our ancestors liked them, that is why they passed them down to us. Read them, tell them and pass them on!As old as the moors and as wild as the sea, these tales are freshly re-told for today’s readers by Cornish storyteller Mike O’Connor.

Cornish Folk Tales for Children

Children's Books

Fairy Tales, Folk Tales & Myths

The History Press

Traditional tales with strong messages retold with relevance for the 21st century\nBefore schooling was widely available in the classroom, there was the fireside, the field or the country lane. Many folk tales exist to convey ‘wisdom’: lessons from life, in an entertaining way. Aesop’s Fables are well-known and many wonderful Oriental tales are in this category. British wisdom tales are no less engaging yet almost unknown. These tales are not the pontifications of ancient philosophers; they are the learning of countless storytellers, educated in the school of hard knocks and graduates of the university of life. The tales reflect the times and places of their origin, but they have been handed down from generation to generation, evolving to meet changing times. Often the tales are amusing, some are thought-provoking. Now they have been polished and honed for so long that their message slips, almost imperceptibly, into the mind. We owe it to the bards of old to retell these stories for new generations.

Fools and Wise Men: Folk Tales of Wisdom

Literature & Fiction

Short Stories & Anthologies

The anicent land of Cornwall is steeped in mysterious tradition, proud heritage and age-old folklore. Before books were widely available, wandering 'droll tellers' used to spread Cornish insight and humour to all parts of the Duchy - exchanging their tales for food and shelter. Anthony James was one such droll teller, and this collection follows him as he makes his way around Cornwall one glorious summer. Richly illustrated with hand-drawn images and woodcuts, Cornish Folk Tales will appeal to anyone captivated by this beautiful land and its resident kindly giants, mischievous piskeys, seductive mermaids, bold knights and barnacle-encrusted sea captains.

Cornish Folk Tales

History

Europe

A collection of humorous Q&amp;As about everything you've always wanted to ask about birds and birding Mike O’Connor knows bird watchers as well as he knows birds. He knows that if you’re even slightly interested in identifying birds or attracting them to your backyard with a feeder, then you’ve also had your share of strange and silly questions about birds and their sometimes inexplicable behavior. In Why Do Bluebirds Hate Me?, O’Connor applies his deep knowledge of all things avian to answer the questions that keep birders up at night. Questions like · Should you clean your birdhouses? · Do swallows have a feather fetish? · How much does it cost to run a heated birdbath? · Is drinking coffee bad for birds? Other questions O’Connor covers range from the practical (Should I rotate the seed in my feeder?) to the quirky (Why are vultures eating my vinyl screen door?) to the just plain adorable (Are those birds kissing or feeding each other?). And he also explains why bluebirds just don’t seem to like some people.

Why Do Bluebirds Hate Me?: More Answers to Common and Not-So-Common Questions about Birds and Birding

Humor & Entertainment

Humor

Beacon Press

In 1983, Mike O'Connor opened the Bird Watcher's General Store on Cape Cod, which might well have been the first store devoted solely to birding in the United States. Since that time he has answered thousands of questions about birds, both at his store and while walking down the aisles of the supermarket. The questions have ranged from inquiries about individual species ("Are flamingos really real?") to what and when to feed birds ("Should I bring in my feeders for the summer?") to the down-and-dirty specifics of backyard birding ("Why are the birds dropping poop in my pool?"). Answering the questions has been easy; keeping a straight face has been hard. Why Don't Woodpeckers Get Headaches? is the solution for the beginning birder who already has a book that explains the slight variation between Common Ground-Doves and Ruddy Ground-Doves but who is really much more interested in why birds sing at 4:30 A.M. instead of 7:00 A.M., or whether it's okay to feed bread to birds, or how birds rediscover your feeders so quickly when you've just filled them after a long vacation. Or, for that matter, whether flamingos are really real.

Why Don't Woodpeckers Get Headaches?: And Other Bird Questions You Know You Want to Ask

Following on the success of Airfields and Airmen of Ypres, the author turns his attention to the most legendary sector of the British effort in World War I, the Somme. From 1916 to 1918 the British and German armies were locked in a deadly struggle here, while the Royal Flying Corps and the Imperial German Air Service flew overhead. Initially acting as scouts and artillery spotters, the ever more sophisticated aircraft became instruments of war themselves, engaging in deadly conflict far above the deadlocked armies below. This new volume uses the Battleground Europe format of maps and then-and-now illustrations to cover all the airfields, crash sites and areas associated with the units, battles and individual aces of the aerial conflict of World War I. Coverage also includes French actions, and a few American units that served in the region near the end of the war.

Airfields and Airmen : Somme (Battleground Europe)

Military

Leo Cooper

Gorgeous and unique, Where the World Does Not Follow captures an almost-hidden China. Acclaimed translator Mike O'Connor and photographer Steven Johnson uncover a world rarely seen by outsiders--even as they capture it in its everyday beauty. O'Connor's translations of poems from China's Tang Dynasty sing in the present day, while Johnson's photographs reveal a modern-day China that seems almost unchanged by the passing of centuries. Chinese authorities are only now allowing access to ancient Buddhist sites and many writings and devotional objects are being made available for the first time in decades. These poems written by Zen and Taoist hermit-sages, together with the crisp yet almost dreamlike images capture the aesthetic, literary, and spiritual roots of Buddhist China. Where the World Does Not Follow provides insight into a world that very few have been able to visit--and a time difficult even to imagine. O'Connor and Johnson's book is a hymn to nature, to the art of photography, and to the common beauty of humanity that extends to us like a silk thread from another time and place.

Where the World Does Not Follow: Buddhist China in Picture and Poem

Arts & Photography

Neill, William

Johnson, Steven R.

Photography & Video

Wisdom Publications

The basin: Life in a Chinese province : poems & translations

Poetry

Empty Bowl

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