Humorous, anecdotal stories from yesteryear and today, with my cousins, family and friends.

A rare first-person testimony of the hardships of a Soviet labor camp—long suppressed—that will become a cornerstone of understanding the Soviet Union. Originally written in a couple of humble exercise books, which were anonymously donated to the Memorial Human Rights Centre in Moscow, this remarkable diary is one of the few first-person accounts to survive the sprawling Soviet prison system. At the back of these exercise books there is a blurred snapshot and a note, "Chistyakov, Ivan Petrovich, repressed in 1937-38. Killed at the front in Tula Province in 1941." This is all that remains of Ivan Chistyakov, a senior guard at the Baikal Amur Corrective Labour Camp. Who was this lost man? How did he end up in the gulag? Though a guard, he is a type of prisoner, too. We learn that he is a cultured and urbane ex-city dweller with a secret nostalgia for pre-Revolutionary Russia. In this diary, Chistyakov does not just record his life in the camp, he narrates it. He is a sharp-eyed witness and a sympathetic, humane, and broken man. From stumblingly poetic musings on the bitter landscape of the taiga to matter-of-fact grumbles about the inefficiency of his stove, from accounts of the brutal conditions of the camp to reflections on the cruelty of loneliness, this diary is an astonishing record—a visceral and immediate description of a place and time whose repercussions still affect the shape of modern Russia, and modern Europe.

The Chadishar, Shindaheen and four thousand Native American warriors meet the unlikeliest invasion in the unlikeliest location, turning our preconceptions of off-world life upside down. Other-world attempts to make sense of Earth, however, go a long way toward straightening us out, if we'll only pay attention. Where are they from, why are they here, and do they really eat that stuff? Vilia's not going to like this one bit... Read volume 1, "Shindaheen" first for the beginning of the story!

How can a loving God send people to hell? Isn’t it arrogant to believe Jesus is the only way to God? What is up with holy war in the Old Testament? Many of us fear God has some skeletons in the closet. Hell, judgment, and holy war are hot topics for the Christian faith that have a way of igniting fierce debate far and wide. These hard questions leave many wondering whether God is really good and can truly be trusted. The Skeletons in God's Closet confronts our popular caricatures of these difficult topics with the beauty and power of the real thing. Josh Butler reveals that these subjects are consistent with, rather than contradictory to, the goodness of God. He explores Scripture to reveal the plotlines that make sense of these tough topics in light of God’s goodness. From fresh angles, Josh deals powerfully with such difficult passages as: The Lake of Fire Lazarus and the Rich Man The Slaughter of Canaanites in the Old Testament Ultimately, The Skeletons in God's Close uses our toughest questions to provoke paradigm shifts in how we understand our faith as a whole. It pulls the “skeletons out of God’s closet” to reveal they were never really skeletons at all.

Standing on a high wilderness ridge in northern New Mexico, Blaine Wells, a self-imposed hermit after the horrifying murders of his wife and daughter, is torn from an almost hypnotic absorption with the natural beauty around him by the sputtering engines of a small plane. The helpless aircraft, a fragment of society hurtling into his private paradise, both startles and angers him.With conflicting feelings, he seeks the crash site where he nurtures the survivors and fights those who would serve their selfish desires at the expense of those less capable. Blaine soon devises a means for their rescue and when a helicopter disappears into the distance with the survivors, he finds himself alone once again. During the trek back to his cabin and throughout the long harsh winter, he often thinks of the young girl who lost her father and the elderly woman whose husband was killed.Later, responding to the girl's need for help, he leaves the wilderness. While helping her, he contacts his sister-in-law and her husband whom he has not seen since his family's funeral. To his astonishment, he learns that he has inherited 700 acres of ranch land from his late wife. Meanwhile, the eventual healing of the young girl triggers feelings and emotions that challenge those stirred by the beauty and contentment of his mountain retreat. Will he reenter society or return to his beloved wilderness?