Free Book (nook) - Needle in a Haystack

Needle in a Haystack ($8.99 Kindle), the first title in the Inspector Lascano series by Ernesto Mallo and Jethro Soutar (translator), is this week's Free Friday book from Barnes & Noble.

Book Description
Superintendent Lascano is a detective working under the shadow of military rule in Buenos Aires in the late 1970s. Sent to investigate a double murder, he arrives at the crime scene to find three bodies. Two are clearly the work of the Junta's death squads, murders he is forced to ignore; the other one seems different.

The trail leads Lascano through a decadent Argentina, a country poisoned to its core by the tyranny of the regime. The third corpse turns out to be that of Biterman, moneylender and Auschwitz survivor. When Lascano digs too deep, he must confront Giribaldi, an army major, quick to help old friends but ruthless in dealing with dissenters such as Eva, the young militant with whom Lascano is falling in love.

Born in 1948, Ernesto Mallo is a published essayist, newspaper columnist, screenwriter, and playwright. He is a former anti-Junta militant who was pursued by the dictatorship. Needle in a Hay Stack is his first novel and the first in a trilogy with superintendent Lascano. The first two are being made into films.

Get the free ebook from Barnes & Noble.

Free Book (Kindle/nook/EPUB) - Laugh-Out-Loud Jokes for Kids

Update: Also free from Barnes & Noble and ChristianBook.

Laugh-Out-Loud Jokes for Kids, by Rob Elliott, is free in the Kindle store.

Book Description
What happens to race car drivers when they eat too much? They get indy-gestion. Laugh-Out-Loud Jokes for Kids provides children ages 7-10 many hours of fun and laughter. Young readers will have a blast sharing this collection of hundreds of one-liners, knock knock jokes, tongue twisters, and more with their friends and family! This brand new book will have children rolling on the floor with laughter and is sure to be a great gift idea for any child.

Get the free ebook from Barnes & Noble.
Get the free ebook from ChristianBook.

Free Book (ADE-EPUB) - Instructions for American Servicemen in France during World War II

Instructions for American Servicemen in France during World War II ($7.38 Kindle), by The United States Army and Rick Atkinson, is this month's free book from The University of Chicago Press.

Book Description
“You are about to play a personal part in pushing the Germans out of France. Whatever part you take—rifleman, hospital orderly, mechanic, pilot, clerk, gunner, truck driver—you will be an essential factor in a great effort.”

As American soldiers fanned out from their beachhead in Normandy in June of 1944 and began the liberation of France, every soldier carried that reminder in his kit. A compact trove of knowledge and reassurance, Instructions for American Servicemen in France during World War II was issued to soldiers just before they embarked for France to help them understand both why they were going and what they’d find when they got there. After lying unseen in Army archives for decades, this remarkable guide is now available in a new facsimile edition that reproduces the full text and illustrations of the original along with a new introduction by Rick Atkinson setting the book in context.

Written in a straightforward, personal tone, the pamphlet is equal parts guidebook, cultural snapshot, and propaganda piece. A central aim is to dispel any prejudices American soldiers may have about the French—especially relating to their quick capitulation in 1940. Warning soldiers that the defeat “is a raw spot which the Nazis have been riding” since the occupation began, Instructions is careful to highlight France’s long historical role as a major U.S. ally. Following that is a brief, fascinating sketch of the French character (“The French are mentally quick;” “Rich or poor, they are economical”) and stark reminders of the deprivation the French have endured under occupation. Yet an air of reassuring confidence pervades the final section of the pamphlet, which reads like a straightforward tourists’ guide to Paris and the provinces—like a promise of better days to come once the soldiers complete their mission.

Written by anonymous War Department staffers to meet the urgent needs of the moment, with no thought of its historical value, Instructions for American Servicemen in France during World War II nevertheless brings to vivid life the closing years of World War II—when optimism was growing, but a long, demanding road still lay ahead.

Sign up for the free book from the University of Chicago. You'll need to enter your email address, then check your email for the link to download the book. Mine arrived within seconds -- you get a .ACSM file, which, when opened, will load the PDF book inside of Adobe ADE. This is a DRM'd PDF and is not compatible with the Kindle.

While you are there, check out their The Great Chicago Book Sale! 600 books with prices starting at $5! Use promo code AD9626

Today's Deals

Additional formats on free books:

• Harlequin Holiday Collection (nook/EPUB)
• Lie Down in Green Pastures (Kindle/nook/EPUB)
• The Fence My Father Built (Kindle/nook/EPUB)
• Priced to Move (Shop-Til-U-Drop, Book 1) (B&N, ChristianBook, Sony)
• Child of the Mist (These Highland Hills, Book 1) (B&N, ChristianBook, Sony)
• A Hearth in Candlewood (The Candlewood Trilogy, Book 1) (B&N, ChristianBook, Sony)
• 10 People Every Christian Should Know (B&N, ChristianBook, Sony)
• Dangerous Grounds: Seattle Steam, Book 1 (B&N)
• Jinxed (Friends and Lovers Collection) (B&N, iTunes)

Ivy and Bean ($0.99), is the first book in the bestselling series by Annie Barrow and Sophie Blackall (illustrator), is today's Kindle Deal of the Day.

Book Description
The moment they saw each other, Bean and Ivy knew they wouldn't be friends. But when Bean plays a joke on her sister, Nancy, and has to hide quick Ivy comes to the rescue, proving that sometimes the best of friends are people never meant to like each other. Vibrant characters and lots of humor make this a charming and addictive introduction to Ivy and Bean.

About the Authors
Annie Barrows has written a bunch of books for grown-ups, but Ivy and Bean is her first series for kids. Annie lives in Northern California with her husband and two daughters.

Sophie Blackall is an illustrator whose work has appeared in many newspapers and magazines, including the New York Times . She lives in New York, with her husband and two children. Her previous books include Ruby's Wish and Meet Wild Boars.

You ($1.84 / £1.19 UK), by Joanna Briscoe, is the Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK (the US Edition is $8.23).

Book Description
Cecilia is obsessively in love with her teacher, the older, married Mr. Dahl. She plots and speculates, yet she never guesses that what she dreams of could actually happen. Is it her imagination, or is the high-minded Mr. Dahl responding to her?

Cecilia's mother Dora wants the good life. She and her husband moved to Dartmoor so their children could run wild, free to make their own choices and mistakes. But Dora discovers that there is more to the countryside idyll, and indeed to her own marriage, than she assumed, when she finds herself fascinated by the very last, the very worst person she could fall for: the elegant and dangerous Elisabeth Dahl.

Now, after twenty years, Cecilia is coming home, to face Dora, and to face her past. But the excitement and pain she had thought were buried cannot be buried. The past is a dangerous place.

You, the unnerving and exceptional new novel from Joanna Briscoe, is a stunning story of sex, memory and family lies.

Salt ($2.99 Kindle, $0.85 B&N), by Mark Kurlansky, is the Nook Daily Find. Update: Now price matched at Amazon.

Book Description
Homer called salt a divine substance. Plato described it as especially dear to the gods. Today we take salt for granted, a common, inexpensive substance that seasons food or clears ice from roads, a word used casually in expressions ("salt of the earth," take it with a grain of salt") without appreciating their deeper meaning. However, as Mark Kurlansky so brilliantly relates in his world- encompassing new book, salt-the only rock we eat-has shaped civilization from the very beginning. Its story is a glittering, often surprising part of the history of mankind.

Until about 100 years ago, when modern chemistry and geology revealed how prevalent it is, salt was one of the most sought-after commodities, and no wonder, for without it humans and animals could not live. Salt has often been considered so valuable that it served as currency, and it is still exchanged as such in places today. Demand for salt established the earliest trade routes, across unknown oceans and the remotest of deserts: the city of Jericho was founded almost 10,000 years ago as a salt trading center. Because of its worth, salt has provoked and financed some wars, and been a strategic element in others, such as the American Revolution and the Civil War. Salt taxes secured empires across Europe and Asia and have also inspired revolution (Gandhi's salt march in 1930 began the overthrow of British rule in India); indeed, salt has been central to the age-old debate about the rights of government to tax and control economies.

The story of salt encompasses fields as disparate as engineering, religion, and food, all of which Kurlansky richly explores. Few endeavors have inspired more ingenuity than salt making, from the natural gas furnaces of ancient China to the drilling techniques that led to the age of petroleum, and salt revenues have funded some of the greatest public works in history, including the Erie Canal, and even cities.

$25 Appstore Credit with an Android Smartphone (KSO)

This offer appears to be only for those with the new Kindle Touch (at least, that's the only one of mine where it showed up).

Buy an Android smartphone from AmazonWireless & get a $25 Amazon Appstore for Android credit

Click on offer, then click on the link on the offer page to receive an email with the offer details. Sign-up for this offer expires on December 2.

Limit one offer per customer and per device.

There is no promotion code for this one - you click to get the offer sent to your email and if you buy a qualifying phone by January 2, 2012, using the same Amazon account, you'll get the credit, no later than February 2, 2012 (I suspect they delay by 30 days to account for those who return items; if you return the phone, you lose the credit).