But when he discovers the body of a mysterious woman floating in the waters of the Venetian Lagoon, he finds himself in a desperate race to recover a lost masterpiece by Leonardo da Vinci.
The painting, a portrait of a beautiful young girl, has been gathering dust in a storeroom at the Vatican Museums for more than a century, misattributed and hidden beneath a worthless picture by an unknown artist.
Because no one knows that the Leonardo is there, no one notices when it disappears one night during a suspicious power outage.
No one but the ruthless mobsters and moneymen behind the theft—and the mysterious woman whom Gabriel found in a watery grave in Venice. A woman without a name. A woman without a face.
The action moves at breakneck speed from the galleries and auction houses of London to an enclave of unimaginable wealth on the French Riveria—and, finally, to a shocking climax in St. Peter’s Square, where the life of a pope hangs in the balance.
With the Soviet Union emphasizing diversity by including a woman in subsequent landings, the United States is forced to match pace, equally training female and minorities talents (who were largely excluded from the initial decades of U.S. space exploration).
… Apollo 15 take a significant risk, changing their landing site to be near Shackleton crater, a promising location for finding water that would be essential to any lunar colonization effort. …
… two years later … October 12, 1973, … NASA’s first Moon base.
Poison Flower is 7th in the excellent Jane Whitefield series.
Whitefield, a member of the Seneca nation, self-identifies as a guide, one who leads her clients — innocents, by and large — out of harm’s way. …
The book commences with Whitefield extricating a man named James Shelby from incarceration in the California Institution for Men in Chino, California.
Shelby is serving a prison sentence there for the murder of his wife, a crime he did not commit. Whitefield successfully frees Shelby in a daring and gutsy courthouse sting, but is herself captured by men masquerading as policemen.
Her captors, as it turns out, are in the employ of the man who framed Shelby to begin with. ….
Two writers compete for the chance to tell the larger-than-life lie story of a woman who has stayed out of the public eye for decades. She’s the widow of a singer something like Elvis.
An interesting story. Plenty of romance.
Plenty of sex, as well.
I’d recommend it — even if you don’t normally read romance.
But even more so, Terry Gou, who, in 1974, founded FoxConn in Taiwan.
Incredibly ambitious, by 2012 Foxconn made up approximately 40% of worldwide consumer electronics production.
Just one of his many huge factories in China produces the bulk of Apple’s iPhone line and is sometimes referred to as “iPhone City”.
Needless to say, there are many abused workers in those plants. They don’t last many months on the gruelling production line.
Over the years, Gou and others steadily wooed Tim Cook and Apple to move manufacturing to China.
Today over 90% of Apple products are made in China. A huge risk for the company if authoritarian dictator-for-life Xi decides to invade Taiwan. Or shut down exports.
Attempts to move production to other nations have been mostly experiments. Or motivated by politics, not business.
In the meantime, Chinese engineers — many trained by Apple — are building cheaper, better Chinese phones in China. They no longer need Apple.
It’s a precarious situation.
Apple in China is a 2025 book uniquely looking at the company from the viewpoint of China.
In her May 15, 2025 review for The New York Times, Hannah Beech called Apple in China “smart and comprehensive,” praising Patrick McGee’s clever and chronologically organized timeline of how Apple’s expansion to China manufacturing facilities under then COO Tim Cook created a global success but also an “existential vulnerability” for the United States.
The FX miniseries A Teacher (2020) was filmed in my old High School, after it had closed and was scheduled for demolition.
… I don’t recall any teachers like Kate Marawhen I was a student. 😀
Set in the span of 10 years, this series follows a female English teacher in her early 30s as she begins to groom and abuse her 17-year-old male student in the fictional high school of Westerbrook in Austin, Texas.
DEAL Closed. Occupancy by the new owners before the end of August 2025.
My family owned this small, cute single level home in Parksville, B.C. for the past 20 years.
Rob & Yvonne put it on the market for CAD $599,000.
Starting out or slowing down……this centrally located Parksville cutie is sure to please. It features 2 bedrooms, 1 1/2 baths, an open plan design, solid hardwood floors, an updated kitchen with granite counters, an updated bathroom, skylit entry, crawlspace construction and an attached garage. Sit on your deck and enjoy your lovely backyard that is surrounded by hedges and quite private. It’s a very short walk to shops and Parksville’s famous beach. This home has been well maintained and is move in ready.
You can almost ignore the plot. For some reason Tom must single-handedly defeat a malevolent rogue A.I. known as the Entity. He somehow didn’t die from the bends. I couldn’t understand that. 😀
This is supposed to be the final portrayal of Ethan Hunt. But the ending leaves it open for yet another instalment. I wouldn’t be surprised.
Rick McCharles 