Stephen Coonts' "Flight of the Intruder": Summary
This week I read Flight of the Intruder by Stephen Coonts. I read from page 1 to page 437 for a total of 437 pages.
The book is about an A-6A Intruder (a naval bomber) pilot named Jake
Grafton. In the first few pages Jake's best friend and B/N
(Bombardier/Navigator) is killed by a Vietnamese soldier's rifle. In this mission their target was a "suspected truck park." Jake goes into despondency
(depression, despair) for a days and tries to convince his squadron leader that the targets are worthless, that thousand of Americans have died en route and returning from these. The leader replies that he is not in control of the targets, the Pentagon and Air Force is. Jake gathers information from maps and a friend in the navigation department to learn about a target he wants to go after: The Vietnam Communist Party Headquarters. The three figure that if they succeed, they'll have a good chance of hitting the leader of the party. Grafton and his bombardier, Virgil Cole miss the building completely and just hit a few bystanders and blow craters in the sidewalk. Just when the two are about to be court-martialed, President Nixon gives the orders of unauthorized bombings anywhere in North and South Vietnam. Grafton and Cole fly their next mission with a EA-6B for SAM (surface-to-air missiles) suppression. This plane only carried antiradiation missiles to destroy the SAMs and their radar. ...
The American Civil war is considered to be one of the most defining moments in American history. It is the war that shaped the social, political and economic structure with a broader prospect of unifying the states and hence leading to this ideal nation of unified states as it is today. In the book “Confederates in the Attic”, the author Tony Horwitz gives an account of his year long exploration through the places where the U.S. Civil War was fought. He took his childhood interest in the Civil War to a new level by traveling around the South in search of Civil War relics, battle fields, and most importantly stories. The title “Confederates in the Attic”: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War carries two meanings in Tony Horwitz’s thoughtful and entertaining exploration of the role of the American Civil War in the modern world of the South. The first meaning alludes to Horwitz’s personal interest in the war. As the grandson of a Russian Jew, Horwitz was raised in the North but early in his childhood developed a fascination with the South’s myth and history. He tells readers that as a child he wrote about the war and even constructed a mural of significant battles in the attic of his own home. The second meaning refers to regional memory, the importance or lack thereof yet attached to this momentous national event. As Horwitz visits the sites throughout the South, he encounters unreconstructed rebels who still hold to outdated beliefs. He also meets groups of “re-enactors,” devotees who attempt to relive the experience of the soldier’s life and death. One of his most disheartening and yet unsurprising realizations is that attitudes towards the war divide along racial lines. Too many whites wrap the memory in nostalgia, refusing...
The World Fair of 1933 brought promise of new hope and pride for the representation of Chicago, America. As Daniel Burnham built and protected America’s image through the pristine face of the fair, underlying corruption and social pollution concealed themselves beneath Chicago’s newly artificial perfection. Erik Larson’s The Devil in the White City meshes two vastly different stories within 19th century America and creates a symbolic narrative about the maturing of early Chicago.
watching a neighbor tearing down his house because it lay in the path of an
Flannery O’Connor was an American writer who wrote several short stories. O’Connor was known for shocking her readers with violence. O’ Connor had strong Christian beliefs that were reflected in her writings. O’ Connor once said:
It is absolutely clear that you feel sad when somebody cheated and duplicate your own things. This causes many people to feel frustration and getting upset when they are facing this difficult situation. We know it is not a good attitude for students, authors, and anyone else to use something misappropriate that they didn’t belong it. I read an article that called “When the Story Stolen is Your Own”. When the author Sherman Alexie was writing this article, he was feeling nervous because somebody has stolen his article and use it in his own. Nobody didn’t believe him when he told the publisher that his story was stolen by someone and imitate that he belong it. Same as the students when they cheated each other and submit the same paper, it was one of the biggest challenge that happens some of the students when they are in the college.
The film and literature presented in this unit was an eye opener to the modern western views regarding race and gender. In this western society we view a male as being strong, powerful, a provider for his family, the head of the household and many other characteristics that relates to what a man should be. When growing up as a child into adulthood we’re stimulated by the many books and movies of a woman being second to a man, a stay at home mom while the man is at home making ends meet just trying to provide for his family and we accept that role because in this western society that’s the ideal role as a woman where we look up to the man as a safety blanket and that’s all we’re brainwashed to know. We were never told about how powerful
The chapters 5-9 of “Son of the Mob” by Gordon Korman reminded me of my dad, who is very hard-working and engaged. For example, he’s been trucking for 16 years now. Trucking is a very hard job which requires a lot of patience and road sense. I only get to see him for 2 days of the week and the rest of the time he’s working. Even when he’s home, he does things like clean the lawn, repair his truck, clean the cars, and other house work. He is very determined and never takes a day off. Also, he has always loved driving since a young age (drove tractor in India) and he enjoys his job. It is inspiring how hard he works and he is probably the hardest working person I know. This is exactly how Vincent feels towards Kendra. He feels like Kendra is
In “The Most Dangerous Game,” General Zaroff isolates himself on his own private island, to prey on the most dangerous prey, humans. He decides to purchase this island as his own for a couple reasons, to lure future game in and to be isolated. The island itself is a perfect place to hunt a human. An island being, a mass of land in the middle of a body of water, allows General Zaroff to hunt with the peace of mind that the game can not escape. General Zaroff was an amazing hunter and planned his game perfectly on his very own island.
Only Stephen King could write such a spellbinding tale of a bunch of boys doing nothing but walking.
Seamus Heaney’s “The Redress of Poetry” reveals the idea that “it is the imagination [of poetry] pressing back against the pressure of reality (1).” The two opposing forces of imagination and reality are active in Geoffrey Hill’s “Little Apocalypse.” The poem deals with the personal religious conflict of Friedrich Hoderlin (1770-1843), a German lyric poet. Hill focuses on Hoderlin’s struggle with his strong belief in Greek mythology and then Contemporary Protestant theology. From this reality Hill utilizes Greek and Christian imagery. Hill’s imagination complements Hoderlin’s reality and results in an artistic retelling and vivid depiction of the German poet’ strife.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest Hoang Tran English 3A - Mr. Nguyen Period 5 11/27/17 One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, written by Ken Kesey, takes place within the 1960’s and centralizes its plot around the patients of the mental hospital. The asylum is governed with a matriarchy by Nurse Ratched. Nurse Ratched keeps her dominance within the ward through strict rules that keeps the patients in order. Her ways to keep her patient's intact may be a bit extreme
Newjack is Ted Conover’s personal memoir as a correctional officer in one of New York’s famous maximum security prisons: Sing Sing. The job of a correctional officer consists of long days locking and unlocking cells, moving prisoners to and from various locations while the prisoners beg, aggravate and abuse them. After a short time at the academy and a brief period of on-the-job training, Conover found himself working, often alone and always unarmed, in galleries housing sixty or more inmates. He heard of many stories that happen in prison. Stories include inmates beating inmates and burning their cell house, an inmate who was beaten by correctional officers after striking an officer in the head with a broom handle. Surprisingly, there are even some instances where there are voluntary sexual encounters between female staff and inmates. It is really a welcoming job for the “newjacks” and for the readers. On top of that, supervisors do not mentor or guide new officers and officers on one shift push problems off onto the next. Conover sees and realizes that correctional workers are very flexible characters, neither good nor bad, but must cope with stress and problems in a well-organized manner. As Conover points out, that at Sing Sing is against the possibility of staff getting to know prisoners. It is ridiculous to see that there are problems that prison administrators clearly could have solved but do not, instead, they care more about the inmates and officer’s relationship. In particular, enticements for better supervision and more support for effective staff are clearly needed.
The book The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton, follows a horrific part of the life of a boy named Ponyboy Curtis. He is what you might call a Greaser, and has had a rough go at it in his life compared to others. It is difficult, but Ponyboy somehow manages to be himself and has the tenacity to stick through it all. He is in a gang with his friends and family and they are loyal to one another no matter what. A rival gang from the Socs crowd, a richer, more refined group, send him and his pals into a whirlwind of trouble and hurt. This book shows on multiple occasions that perseverance is necessary to get through life .
The Outsiders is about the life of a 14-year-old boy. The book tells the story of Ponyboy “Curtis” and his struggles with right and wrong in a society in which he believes that he is an outsider. Ponyboy and his two brothers, Darrel (Darry), who is 20, and Sodapop, who is 16, have recently lost their parents in an automobile accident. Pony and Soda are allowed to stay under Darry's guardianship as long as they all behave themselves. The boys are greasers, a class term that refers to the young men on the East Side, the poor side of town. The greasers' rivals are the Socs, short for Socials, who are the "West-side rich kids."
Many talk about the road less traveled; however, words mean nothing without the follow through of commitment. The rare person who is able to follow their true calling in life, must be totally focused on their goal and objectives without distraction, walks alone.