BOAORKT S THE STORY OF THE SKYWAY DISASTER On May 9, 1980, in the midst of a blinding storm, Summit Venture, a 20,000-ton inbound freighter, collided with the Sunshine Skyway Bridge that connects St. Petersburg with Sarasota. The destruction was massive. Without warning, vehicles traveling at highway speed drove over the precipice of the bridge’s destroyed road. The 150-foot fall into Tampa Bay resulted in thirty-five deaths. St. Petersburg native Bill De Young’s book, Skyway, is an account of the bridge’s conception in 1954, along with the events of that fateful day in 1980, the courtroom drama that followed and the building of the new, modern Sunshine Skyway Bridge. DeYoung uses electrifying details to illustrate the importance of the bridge and its significance in connecting Pinellas County to Manatee County and points south. 9 EDITOR’S NOTE: Skyway: The True Story of Tampa Bay’s Signature Bridge and the Man Who Brought it Down is published by University Press of Florida and is available at (800) 226-3822 or www.upf.com. THE 1976 AND 1977 TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS Having already written The Yugo: The Rise and Fall of the Worst Car in History, it is only logical that author Jason Vuic should now write about the worst football team in the NFL before it became the best in 2003, when it won the Super Bowl. The Bucs lost their first 26 games, until they finally won by defeating the Saints in New Orleans. They may have been called The Yucks!, but they helped identify our region under the name “Tampa Bay.” Vuic’s well-told tale is fun to read in retrospect, no matter how much it hurt back then. 9 EDITOR’S NOTE: The Yucks! is available on Amazon.com. UNDERCOVER IN THE CARIBBEAN New York University Professor, Manny Vidal, is pressured by a top-ranking official in Washington to take an assignment as a visiting professor at a university in the fictitious country of Guarida, an oil producing nation off the coast of Venezuela. Set one year after the September 11th terrorist attacks, the purpose of Manny’s secret mission on this Caribbean Island is to keep his government official informed of the growing anti-American movement. Manny reluctantly accepts the job but only after he learns his cousin, who was supposedly killed in a house fire 30 years earlier in Guarida, may be alive after all and living in the hills with the freedom fighters. Author and Hudson, Florida resident Richard S. Hillman tells this rousing story of social revolution with dramatic intrigue, carefully keeping details organized while appropriately weaving sex and love into this compelling spy novel. 9 EDITOR’S NOTE: Tropical Liaison is published by Brighton Publishing, LLC in Mesa Arizona. THE INSIDE OF OUT Set in the picturesque city of Charleston, South Carolina, The Inside of Out tells the story of Daisy Beaumont Smith, a passionate blue-haired girl whose best friend has just come out of the closet and fallen in love. This book strings the reader along Daisy’s absurd and, at times, selfish antics that ultimately mask her desire to get her best friend back while trying to be the best ally she can be. To make matters even more complicated, Daisy is falling for the Clark Kent look-alike college boy, who is reporting on the injustice of the school board’s homophobic policies. The author, Jenn Marie Thorne of Gulfport in the Tampa Bay area, has told a transformative and cautionary tale of first love. The Inside of Out, with its spot-on humor and authentic characters, should appeal to people of all ages. 9 EDITOR’S NOTE: The book is published by Dial Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, Penguin.com/teen. It is available from major booksellers or Amazon.com. NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2016 | TAMPA BAY MAGAZINE 53
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