In 2625, the Earth is ahead of big changes, the biggest superpowers have been just tricked by a genius man called ‘Erin’, which leads to a completely new world order.
The story continues in the year 3800, where a future artificial intelligence technology so-called ‘CIS’ (Central Intelligent System) assists humanity to make the Solar system a better place. After the discovery of intergalactic travel technology, humankind initiates a mission to the four most likely habited planets in order to bring their own civilization to the next maturity level. ‘Keat’ who has a deep interest in the “big questions” of life is part of the first mission which turns their wealthy, human civilization upside down without facing any enemies.
Suddenly confronted with his own mortality after a routine checkup, eminent psychotherapist Julius Hertzfeld is forced to reexamine his life and work. He seeks out Philip Slate, a sex addict whom he failed to help some twenty years earlier. Yet Philip claims to be cured, miraculously transformed by the pessimistic teachings of German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, and is, himself, a philosophical counselor in training.
Philip's dour, misanthropic stance compels Julius to invite him to join his intensive therapy group in exchange for tutoring on Schopenhauer. But with mere months left, life may be far too short to help Philip or to compete with him for the hearts and minds of the group members. And then again, it might be just long enough.
From the New York Times bestselling author of In Five Years comes an intensely romantic modern recounting of the greatest love story ever told—narrated by the girl Romeo was supposed to love.
What’s in a name, Shakespeare? I’ll tell you: Everything.
Rosaline knows that she and Rob are destined to be together. Rose has been waiting for years for Rob to kiss her—and when he finally does, it’s perfect. But then Juliet moves back to town. Juliet, who used to be Rose’s best friend. Juliet, who now inexplicably hates her. Juliet, who is gorgeous, vindictive, and a little bit crazy...and who has set her sights on Rob. He doesn’t even stand a chance.
Rose is devastated over losing Rob to Juliet. This is not how the story was supposed to go. And when rumors start swirling about Juliet’s instability, her neediness, and her threats of suicide, Rose starts to fear not only for Rob’s heart, but also for his life. Because Shakespeare may have gotten the story wrong, but we all still know how it ends….
An intimate, revelatory book exploring the ways we can care for and repair ourselves when life knocks us down.
Sometimes you slip through the cracks: unforeseen circumstances like an abrupt illness, the death of a loved one, a break up, or a job loss can derail a life. These periods of dislocation can be lonely and unexpected. For May, her husband fell ill, her son stopped attending school, and her own medical issues led her to leave a demanding job. Wintering explores how she not only endured this painful time, but embraced the singular opportunities it offered.
A moving personal narrative shot through with lessons from literature, mythology, and the natural world, May’s story offers instruction on the transformative power of rest and retreat. Illumination emerges from many sources: solstice celebrations and dormice hibernation, C.S. Lewis and Sylvia Plath, swimming in icy waters and sailing arctic seas.
Ultimately, Wintering invites us to change how we relate to our own fallow times. May models an active acceptance of sadness and finds nourishment in deep retreat, joy in the hushed beauty of winter, and encouragement in understanding life as cyclical, not linear. A secular mystic, May forms a guiding philosophy for transforming the hardships that arise before the ushering in of a new season.
The Rings of Saturn — with its curious archive of photographs — records a walking tour along the east coast of England. A few of the things which cross the path and mind of its narrator (who both is and is not Sebald) are lonely eccentrics, Sir Thomas Browne's skull, a matchstick model of the Temple of Jerusalem, recession-hit seaside towns, wooded hills, Joseph Conrad, Rembrandt's "Anatomy Lesson," the natural history of the herring, the massive bombings of WWII, the dowager empress Tzu Hsi, and the silk industry in Norwich.
In Ireland, a man of reason is drawn to a true mystery older than the Pyramids and Stonehenge in this enthralling story about ethereal secrets by New York Times bestselling author Colm Tóibín.
During the winter solstice, on the shortest day and longest night of the year, the ancient burial chamber at Newgrange is empowered. Its mystifying source is a haunting tale told by locals.
Professor O’Kelly believes an archaeologist’s job is to make known only what can be proved. He is undeterred by ghost stories, idle speculation, and caution, much to the chagrin of the living souls in County Meath, as well as those entombed in the sacred darkness of Newgrange itself. They’re determined to protect the secret of the light, guarded for more than five thousand years. And they know O’Kelly is coming for it.
Once, in a cottage above the cliffs on the Dark Sea of Darkness, there lived three children and their trusty dog, Nugget. Janner Igiby, his brother Tink, and their sister Leeli are gifted children, loved well by their noble mother and ex-pirate grandfather. But they will need all their gifts and all that love to survive the evil pursuit of the venomous Fangs of Dang, who have crossed the dark sea to rule the land with malice.
The Igibys hold the secret to the lost legend and jewels of good King Wingfeather of the Shining Isle of Anniera. Andrew Peterson spins a quirky and riveting tale of the Igibys’ extraordinary journey from Glipwood’s Dragon Day Festival, past the terrifying Black Carriage, and through the Glipwood Forest. They encounter the mysterious Peet the Sock Man, known for a little softshoe and wearing tattered socks on his hands and arms, to the very edge of the Ice Prairies.
Full of characters rich in heart, smarts, and courage, On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness presents a world of wonder and a tale children of all ages will cherish. Families can read aloud, and readers’ groups are sure to discuss its layers of meaning about life’s true treasure and the tangle of the beautiful and horrible, temporal and eternal, and good and bad.
Luces de Bohemia es una obra maestra escrita por Ramón del Valle-Inclán en 1920, que inauguró un nuevo género teatral conocido como el esperpento. La historia sigue al poeta ciego Max Estrella y su amigo Latino, mientras recorren el sórdido Madrid en una serie de eventos exagerados y grotescos que transcurren a lo largo de dos días.
Ambientada en un "Madrid absurdo, brillante y hambriento", esta obra es un comentario mordaz sobre la España de la Restauración, vista a través de una lente sistemáticamente deformada. El protagonista, Max, simboliza una mirada más lúcida, a pesar de su ceguera, y su viaje revela las injusticias y opresiones de su tiempo.
Valle-Inclán utiliza el esperpento para diseccionar la realidad de su época, presentando a España como una "deformación grotesca de la civilización europea". A través de imágenes distorsionadas y personajes arquetípicos, como el bohemio y anarquista Max, inspirado en el poeta modernista Alejandro Sawa, la obra explora las dificultades y grandezas del estilo de vida bohemio.
Franny Stone has always been the kind of woman who is able to love but unable to stay. Leaving behind everything but her research gear, she arrives in Greenland with a singular purpose: to follow the last Arctic terns in the world on what might be their final migration to Antarctica.
Franny talks her way onto a fishing boat, and she and the crew set sail, traveling ever further from shore and safety. But as Franny’s history begins to unspool—a passionate love affair, an absent family, a devastating crime—it becomes clear that she is chasing more than just the birds.
When Franny's dark secrets catch up with her, how much is she willing to risk for one more chance at redemption?
Epic and intimate, heartbreaking and galvanizing, Charlotte McConaghy's Migrations is an ode to a disappearing world and a breathtaking page-turner about the possibility of hope against all odds.
Countless students, professors and general readers alike have relied upon The New Oxford Annotated Bible for essential scholarship and guidance to the world of the Bible. Now the Augmented Third Edition adds to the established reputation of this premier academic resource. A wealth of new maps, charts, and diagrams further clarify information found in the scripture pages. In addition, section introductions have been expanded and the book introductions have been made more uniform in order to enhance their utility.
Of course, the Augmented Third Edition retains the features prized by students, including single column annotations at the foot of the pages, in-text background essays, charts, and maps, a page number-keyed index of all the study materials in the volume, and Oxford's renowned Bible maps. This timely edition maintains and extends the excellence the Annotated's users have come to expect, bringing still more insights, information, and approaches to bear upon the understanding of the biblical text.
In the Ichidian Universe, The League and their ruthless assassins rule all. Expertly trained and highly valued, the League Assassins are the backbone of the government. But not even the League is immune to corruption...
Command Assassin Nykyrian Quikiades once turned his back on the League—and has been hunted by them ever since. Though many have tried, none can kill him or stop him from completing his current mission: to protect Kiara Zamir, a woman whose father’s political alliance has made her a target.
As her world becomes even deadlier, Kiara must entrust her life to the same kind of beast who once killed her mother and left her for dead. Old enemies and new threaten them both, and the only way they can survive is to overcome their suspicions and learn to trust in the very ones who threaten them the most: each other.
Our story begins in 1902, at the Brookhants School for Girls. Flo and Clara, two impressionable students, are obsessed with each other and with a daring young writer named Mary MacLane, the author of a scandalous bestselling memoir. To show their devotion to Mary, the girls establish their own private club and call it the Plain Bad Heroine Society. They meet in secret in a nearby apple orchard, the setting of their wildest happiness and, ultimately, of their macabre deaths. This is where their bodies are later discovered with a copy of Mary's book splayed beside them, the victims of a swarm of stinging, angry yellow jackets. Less than five years later, the Brookhants School for Girls closes its doors forever—but not before three more people mysteriously die on the property, each in a most troubling way.
Over a century later, the now abandoned and crumbling Brookhants is back in the news when wunderkind writer Merritt Emmons publishes a breakout book celebrating the queer, feminist history surrounding the “haunted and cursed” Gilded Age institution. Her bestselling book inspires a controversial horror film adaptation starring celebrity actor and lesbian it girl Harper Harper playing the ill-fated heroine Flo, opposite B-list actress and former child star Audrey Wells as Clara. But as Brookhants opens its gates once again, and our three modern heroines arrive on set to begin filming, past and present become grimly entangled—or perhaps just grimly exploited—and soon it's impossible to tell where the curse leaves off and Hollywood begins.
How much light is too much light? Satellite pictures show our planet as a brightly glowing orb, and in our era of constant illumination, light pollution has become a major issue. The world's flora and fauna have evolved to operate in the natural cycle of day and night. But in the last 150 years, we have extended our day—and in doing so have forced out the inhabitants of the night and disrupted the circadian rhythms necessary to sustain all living things, including ourselves.
The Darkness Manifesto depicts the domino effect of diminishing darkness: insects, dumbfounded by streetlamps, failing to reproduce; birds blinded and bewildered by artificial lights; and bats starving as they wait in vain for food insects that only come out in the dark of night. For humans, light-induced sleep disturbances impact our hormones and weight, and can contribute to mental health problems like chronic stress and depression. The streetlamps, floodlights, and neon signs of cities are altering entire ecosystems, and scientists are only just beginning to understand the long-term effects. The light bulb—long the symbol of progress and development—needs to be turned off.
Educational, eye-opening, and ultimately encouraging, The Darkness Manifesto outlines simple steps that we can take to benefit ourselves and the planet. In order to ensure a bright future, we must embrace the darkness.
Black Sun is the first book in the Between Earth and Sky trilogy, inspired by the civilizations of the Pre-Columbian Americas and woven into a tale of celestial prophecies, political intrigue, and forbidden magic.
A god will return when the earth and sky converge under the black sun. In the holy city of Tova, the winter solstice is usually a time for celebration and renewal, but this year it coincides with a solar eclipse, a rare celestial event proscribed by the Sun Priest as an unbalancing of the world.
Meanwhile, a ship launches from a distant city bound for Tova and set to arrive on the solstice. The captain of the ship, Xiala, is a disgraced Teek whose song can calm the waters around her as easily as it can warp a man’s mind. Her ship carries one passenger. Described as harmless, the passenger, Serapio, is a young man, blind, scarred, and cloaked in destiny. As Xiala well knows, when a man is described as harmless, he usually ends up being a villain.
Crafted with unforgettable characters, Rebecca Roanhorse has created an epic adventure exploring the decadence of power amidst the weight of history and the struggle of individuals swimming against the confines of society and their broken pasts.
In the late 1800s, three sisters use witchcraft to change the course of history in this powerful novel of magic, family, and the suffragette movement. In 1893, there's no such thing as witches. There used to be, in the wild, dark days before the burnings began, but now witching is nothing but tidy charms and nursery rhymes. If the modern woman wants any measure of power, she must find it at the ballot box.
But when the Eastwood sisters—James Juniper, Agnes Amaranth, and Beatrice Belladonna—join the suffragists of New Salem, they begin to pursue the forgotten words and ways that might turn the women's movement into the witch's movement. Stalked by shadows and sickness, hunted by forces who will not suffer a witch to vote—and perhaps not even to live—the sisters will need to delve into the oldest magics, draw new alliances, and heal the bond between them if they want to survive. There's no such thing as witches. But there will be.
An homage to the indomitable power and persistence of women, The Once and Future Witches reimagines stories of revolution, motherhood, and women's suffrage—the lost ways are calling.
Lauren’s happy childhood on a farm in Minnesota is shattered after an assault during her teen years, and she retreats into her own world as America falls apart. Hers was the last generation to grow up before the economic collapse that followed the Corona pandemic.
Amidst roiling climate chaos, the government has been taken over by extremists, incompetents, and con-men who tear the country apart while clinging to power. Lauren is swept up in the madness when she falls for the wrong man. She’s looking for love and safety, but Bryan becomes distant and abusive as he obsesses over White Sharia and deepens his ties to the racist patriot militia group.
Lauren worries about the safety of her sister and nephew, who is mixed-race. Will Lauren escape from Bryan and keep her nephew safe from danger? In a world where values are tested and morality is unsettlingly murky, Lauren must break free from the constraints in her mind to protect her family.
France, 1714: in a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever—and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets. Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world.
But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name.
The Ministry for the Future is a visionary novel from acclaimed science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson that offers a gripping tale of climate change and its impacts on humanity. The story unfolds through a series of fictional eyewitness accounts, providing a powerful narrative that is both immediate and impactful.
Established in 2025, the titular Ministry for the Future is an organization dedicated to advocating for the world's future generations and protecting all living creatures, present and future. The novel explores how climate change will affect us all over the coming decades, offering a future that is on the brink of our current reality—a future where humanity might just find the means to overcome the extraordinary challenges it faces.
Desperate and hopeful in equal measure, The Ministry for the Future stands as a significant work in the realm of climate fiction, inviting readers to contemplate the profound effects of environmental change and the potential pathways to a better world.
This explosive book of history and cultural criticism argues that white feminism has been a weapon of white supremacy and patriarchy deployed against Black and Indigenous women and all colonized women. It offers a long-overdue validation of the experiences of women of color.
Taking us from the slave era—when white women fought in court to keep ownership of their slaves—through the centuries of colonialism—when they offered a soft face for brutal tactics—to the modern workplace, White Tears/Brown Scars examines the entrenched systems of white supremacy that we are socialized within, a reality that we must apprehend in order to fight.
Examining subjects as varied as The Hunger Games, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the viral BBQ Becky video, and nineteenth-century lynchings of Mexicans in the American Southwest, Ruby Hamad builds a powerful argument about these systems.
This book is meant to be a companion to Heretics, and to put the positive side in addition to the negative. Many critics complained of the book because it merely criticised current philosophies without offering any alternative philosophy. This book is an attempt to answer the challenge. It is the purpose of the writer to attempt an explanation, not of whether the Christian Faith can be believed, but of how he personally has come to believe it.
The book is therefore arranged upon the positive principle of a riddle and its answer. It deals first with all the writer's own solitary and sincere speculations and then with the startling style in which they were all suddenly satisfied by the Christian Theology. The writer regards it as amounting to a convincing creed. But if it is not that it is at least a repeated and surprising coincidence.
Big Summer is a witty and moving story that dives into the complexities of female friendship, the challenges of living out loud and online, and the resilience of the human heart. Six years after the fight that ended their friendship, Daphne Berg is shockingly reunited with Drue Cavanaugh, who looks as stunning and successful as ever, with a massive favor to ask.
Daphne, who has built a life she loves, including a growing career as a plus-size Instagram influencer, is speechless when Drue asks her to be her maid-of-honor at the society wedding of the summer. Drue, who seemingly had everything, struggled to maintain friendships. Now, Daphne must navigate the risky waters of rekindling a friendship with the glamorous and seductive Drue, which comes with an invitation to a waterfront Cape Cod mansion and the promise of summer excitement.
Big Summer, by #1 New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Weiner, is the perfect summer escape, celebrating the beauty of embracing oneself and the enduring power of friendship.
A Deadly Education is set at Scholomance, a school for the magically gifted where failure means certain death (for real) — until one girl, El, begins to unlock its many secrets. There are no teachers, no holidays, and no friendships, save strategic ones. Survival is more important than any letter grade, for the school won't allow its students to leave until they graduate… or die! The rules are deceptively simple: Don't walk the halls alone. And beware of the monsters who lurk everywhere.
El is uniquely prepared for the school's dangers. She may be without allies, but she possesses a dark power strong enough to level mountains and wipe out millions. It would be easy enough for El to defeat the monsters that prowl the school. The problem? Her powerful dark magic might also kill all the other students.
Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption is a captivating novella by the renowned author Stephen King. It tells the story of Andy Dufresne, a banker unjustly convicted of murder, who is sent to the notorious Shawshank Prison. Over the decades, Andy maintains his innocence and forms a deep friendship with fellow inmate Red.
This mesmerizing tale explores themes of unjust imprisonment and the indomitable human spirit. Andy's journey through the harsh realities of prison life is both suspenseful and heart-wrenching, as he seeks hope and redemption in a seemingly hopeless place.
Originally published in 1982 as part of the collection Different Seasons, this novella is one of Stephen King's most beloved and iconic stories. Its unforgettable characters and compelling narrative have captivated readers and viewers alike, as it was adapted into the critically acclaimed film The Shawshank Redemption.
Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption remains a timeless classic, offering a poignant exploration of friendship, hope, and the resilience of the human spirit.
Blood Slave. Captured and taken from her beloved family and woods, Aria's biggest fear is not the imminent death facing her, but that she will be chosen as a blood slave for a member of the ruling vampire race. No matter what becomes of her, Aria knows she must keep her identity hidden from the monsters imprisoning her. She has already been branded a member of the rebellion, but the vampires do not know the true depth of her involvement, and they must never find out.
Though hoping for death, Aria’s world is turned upside down when a vampire named Braith steps forward to claim her. He delays her execution, but Aria knows it’s only a matter of time before he drains her and destroys her. Especially once she learns his true identity as a prince within the royal family—the same royal family that started the war that ultimately brought down humankind, reducing them to nothing more than servants and slaves.
Aria is determined to hate the prince, determined not to give in to him in any way, but his strange kindness and surprising gentleness astonish her. Torn between her loyalties to the rebellion and her growing love for her greatest enemy, Aria struggles to decide between everything she has ever known and a love she never dreamed of finding.
Can't Even: How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation is an incendiary examination of burnout in millennials, probing the social conditions that feed the pervasive anxiety, powerlessness, and disenfranchisement that have defined this generation. Author Anne Helen Petersen, a well-regarded writer and cultural columnist, delves into how societal pressures and the relentless pursuit of success have led to a state of chronic stress and disillusionment among young adults.
The book explores the intricate tapestry of factors contributing to millennial malaise, including the gig economy, student debt, social media pressures, and the ever-elusive concept of work-life balance. Through a blend of personal narrative, interviews, and cultural analysis, Petersen casts a critical eye on the institutions and societal norms that have left many feeling overworked and undervalued.
Ultimately, Can't Even acts as both a rallying cry and a beacon of understanding for a generation often mischaracterized, offering insights that resonate beyond the millennial cohort and into the fabric of modern work culture.
Lawrence Durrell's series of four novels set in Alexandria, Egypt during the 1940s. The lush and sensuous series consists of Justine(1957) Balthazar(1958) Mountolive(1958) Clea(1960).Justine, Balthazar and Mountolive use varied viewpoints to relate a series of events in Alexandria before World War II. In Clea, the story continues into the years during the war. One L.G. Darley is the primary observer of the events, which include events in the lives of those he loves, and those he knows. In Justine, Darley attempts to recover from and put into perspective his recently ended affair with a woman. Balthazar reinterprets the romantic perspective he placed on the affair and its aftermath in Justine, in more philosophical and intellectual terms. Mountolive tells a story minus interpretation, and Clea reveals Darley's healing, and coming to love another woman.
From the New York Times bestselling author of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, Susanna Clarke delivers an intoxicating, hypnotic new novel set in a dreamlike alternative reality with Piranesi.
Piranesi's house is no ordinary building; its rooms are infinite, its corridors endless, its walls are lined with thousands upon thousands of statues, each one different from all the others. Within the labyrinth of halls, an ocean is imprisoned; waves thunder up staircases, rooms are flooded in an instant. But Piranesi is not afraid; he understands the tides as he understands the pattern of the labyrinth itself. He lives to explore the house.
There is one other person in the house--a man called The Other, who visits Piranesi twice a week and asks for help with research into A Great and Secret Knowledge. But as Piranesi explores, evidence emerges of another person, and a terrible truth begins to unravel, revealing a world beyond the one Piranesi has always known.
House Rules:
Do your own dishes.
Knock before entering the bathroom.
Never look up your roommate online.
The Wheatons are infamous among the east coast elite for their lack of impulse control, except for their daughter Clara. She's the consummate socialite: over-achieving, well-mannered, predictable. But every Wheaton has their weakness.
When Clara's childhood crush invites her to move cross-country, the offer is too much to resist. Unfortunately, it's also too good to be true. After a bait-and-switch, Clara finds herself sharing a lease with a charming stranger. Josh might be a bit too perceptive—not to mention handsome—for comfort, but there's a good chance he and Clara could have survived sharing a summer sublet if she hadn't looked him up on the Internet...
Once she learns how Josh has made a name for himself, Clara realizes living with him might make her the Wheaton's most scandalous story yet. His professional prowess inspires her to take tackling the stigma against female desire into her own hands. They may not agree on much, but Josh and Clara both believe women deserve better sex. What they decide to do about it will change both of their lives, and if they're lucky, they'll help everyone else get lucky too.
Join a fantasy game. Make new friends. Oh, and try not to die.
A first person LitRPG Gamelit Fantasy novel, Savvy Sage Online tells the story of how Nate, a twenty something guy ended up a beta tester for a next generation game system. While inside, he tries to build relationships while avoiding evil sorcerers, deadly monsters and learning how to creatively apply his new magical skills in interesting ways.
Once inside the game world, Nate quickly makes friends, first with Roger and then Jenny, a plucky warrior redhead who saves him from becoming cat food. After that, Nate meets Alice, a mage working tables to save for guild dues. When Alice gives Nate a Request, he dives deep magical exploration to help make their ambitious plans come true.
Together, the three fight monsters, dive into a dangerous dungeon, learn innovative magical techniques and plot to create a new place of learning for the curious. Debut novel from Richard Sprout, Savvy Sage Online is an original story over 124,000 words in length.
Pick up this binge-worthy tale today!
The co-host of the popular NPR podcast Planet Money provides a well-researched, entertaining, somewhat irreverent look at how money is a made-up thing that has evolved over time to suit humanity's changing needs. Money only works because we all agree to believe in it.
In Money, Jacob Goldstein shows how money is a useful fiction that has shaped societies for thousands of years, from the rise of coins in ancient Greece to the first stock market in Amsterdam to the emergence of shadow banking in the 21st century.
At the heart of the story are the fringe thinkers and world leaders who reimagined money. Kublai Khan, the Mongol emperor, created paper money backed by nothing, centuries before it appeared in the west. John Law, a professional gambler and convicted murderer, brought modern money to France (and destroyed the country's economy). The cypherpunks, a group of radical libertarian computer programmers, paved the way for bitcoin.
One thing they all realized: what counts as money (and what doesn't) is the result of choices we make, and those choices have a profound effect on who gets more stuff and who gets less, who gets to take risks when times are good, and who gets screwed when things go bad. Lively, accessible, and full of interesting details (like the 43-pound copper coins that 17th-century Swedes carried strapped to their backs), Money is the story of the choices that gave us money as we know it today.
John Difool, a low-class detective in a degenerate dystopian world, finds his life turned upside down when he discovers an ancient, mystical artifact called The Incal. Difool's adventures will bring him into conflict with the galaxy's greatest warrior, the Metabaron, and will pit him against the awesome powers of the Technopope.
These encounters and many more make up a tale of comic and cosmic proportions that has Difool fighting for not only his very survival, but also the survival of the entire universe.
The Last Last-Day-of-Summer brings a refreshing twist to children's literature, reminiscent of The Hardy Boys and The Phantom Tollbooth, yet unique for the modern reader. Cousins and adventurers, Otto and Sheed, find themselves in a peculiar situation when they inadvertently freeze time on the last day of summer. As they explore the static world around them, they uncover hidden secrets in the suspended moments and realize that their dream of endless fun has its own challenges.
Author Lamar Giles crafts a tale that captures the essence of youthful curiosity and the importance of friendship, all while taking readers on a wild, time-traveling ride. It's an adventure where every second counts and the boys must decide what truly matters before time runs out and summer ends forever.
From former CEO and popular TED speaker Margaret Heffernan comes a timely and enlightening book that equips you with the tools you need to face the future with confidence and courage.
How can we think about the future? What do we need to do—and who do we need to be? In her bold and invigorating new book, distinguished businesswoman and author Margaret Heffernan explores the people and organizations who aren't daunted by uncertainty. We are addicted to prediction, desperate for certainty about the future. But the complexity of modern life won't provide that; experts in forecasting are reluctant to look more than 400 days out. History doesn't repeat itself and even genetics won't tell you everything you want to know. Tomorrow remains uncharted territory, but Heffernan demonstrates how we can forge ahead with agility.
Drawing on a wide array of people and places, Uncharted traces long-term projects that shrewdly evolved over generations to meet the unpredictable challenges of every new age. Heffernan also looks at radical exercises and experiments that redefined standard practices by embracing different perspectives and testing fresh approaches. Preparing to confront a variable future provides the antidote to passivity and prediction. Ranging freely through history and from business to science, government to friendships, this refreshing book challenges us to mine our own creativity and humanity for the capacity to create the futures we want and can believe in.
A story about the meaning of life and death, and the value of companionship.
A woman describes a series of encounters she has with various people in the ordinary course of her life: an ex she runs into by chance at a public forum, an Airbnb owner unsure how to interact with her guests, a stranger who seeks help comforting his elderly mother, a friend of her youth now hospitalized with terminal cancer. In each of these people, the woman finds a common need: the urge to talk about themselves and to have an audience to their experiences.
The narrator orchestrates this chorus of voices for the most part as a passive listener, until one of them makes an extraordinary request, drawing her into an intense and transformative experience of her own.
In What Are You Going Through, Nunez brings wisdom, humor, and insight to a novel about human connection and the changing nature of relationships in our times. A surprising story about empathy and the unusual ways one person can help another through hardship, her book offers a moving and provocative portrait of the way we live now.
This magnificent novel—which secured for its author the 1955 Nobel Prize in Literature—is at last available to contemporary American readers. Although it is set in the early twentieth century, it recalls both Iceland's medieval epics and such classics as Sigrid Undset's Kristin Lavransdatter. And if Bjartur of Summerhouses, the book's protagonist, is an ordinary sheep farmer, his flinty determination to achieve independence is genuinely heroic and, at the same time, terrifying and bleakly comic.
Having spent eighteen years in humiliating servitude, Bjartur wants nothing more than to raise his flocks unbeholden to any man. But Bjartur's spirited daughter wants to live unbeholden to him. What ensues is a battle of wills that is by turns harsh and touching, elemental in its emotional intensity and intimate in its homely detail. Vast in scope and deeply rewarding, Independent People is simply a masterpiece.
Lady Lucie is fuming. She and her band of Oxford suffragists have finally scraped together enough capital to control one of London's major publishing houses, with one purpose: to use it in a coup against Parliament. But who could have predicted that the one person standing between her and success is her old nemesis and London's undisputed lord of sin, Lord Ballentine?
Or that he would be willing to hand over the reins for an outrageous price—a night in her bed. Lucie tempts Tristan like no other woman, burning him up with her fierceness and determination every time they clash. But as their battle of wills and words fans the flames of long-smoldering devotion, the silver-tongued seducer runs the risk of becoming caught in his own snare.
As Lucie tries to out-maneuver Tristan in the boardroom and the bedchamber, she soon discovers there's truth in what the poets say: all is fair in love and war…
Stuart Little is no ordinary mouse. Born to a family of humans, he lives in New York City with his parents, his older brother George, and Snowbell the cat. Though he's shy and thoughtful, he's also a true lover of adventure.
Stuart's greatest adventure comes when his best friend, a beautiful little bird named Margalo, disappears from her nest. Determined to track her down, Stuart ventures away from home for the very first time in his life. He finds adventure aplenty. But will he find his friend?
A queen now in exile as a traitor, Lara has watched Ithicana be conquered by her own father, helpless to do anything to stop the destruction. But when she learns her husband, Aren, has been captured in battle, Lara knows there is only one reason her father is keeping him alive: as bait for his traitorous daughter. And it is bait she fully intends to take.
Risking her life to the Tempest Seas, Lara returns to Ithicana with a plan not only to free its king, but for liberating the Bridge Kingdom from her father’s clutches using his own weapons: the sisters whose lives she spared. But not only is the palace inescapable, there are more players in the game than Lara ever realized, enemies and allies switching sides in the fight for crowns, kingdoms, and bridges. But her greatest adversary of all might be the very man she’s trying to free – the husband she betrayed.
With everything she loves in jeopardy, Lara must decide who – and what – she is fighting for: her kingdom, her husband, or herself.
Seiichi's aunt and uncle have arrived to confront Seiko, and the truth has come out at last. The lies—and his family—are falling apart, and Seiichi is left to pick up the pieces... But as he shakes off his mother's influence and faces police questioning, a shocking revelation about his past emerges!
Late in 2017, the conversation about the global impact of artificial intelligence (AI) changed forever. China delivered a bold message when it released a national plan to dominate all aspects of AI across the planet. Within weeks, Russia's Vladimir Putin raised the stakes by declaring AI the future for all humankind, and proclaiming that, "Whoever becomes the leader in this sphere will become the ruler of the world."
The race was on. Consistent with their unique national agendas, countries throughout the world began plotting their paths and hurrying their pace. Now, not long after, the race has become a sprint.
Despite everything at risk, for most of us AI remains shrouded by a cloud of mystery and misunderstanding. Hidden behind complex technical terms and confused even further by extravagant depictions in science fiction, the realities of AI and its profound implications are hard to decipher, but no less crucial to understand.
In T-Minus AI: Humanity's Countdown to Artificial Intelligence and the New Pursuit of Global Power, author Michael Kanaan explains the realities of AI from a human-oriented perspective that's easy to comprehend. A recognized national expert and the U.S. Air Force's first Chairperson for Artificial Intelligence, Kanaan weaves a compelling new view on our history of innovation and technology to masterfully explain what each of us should know about modern computing, AI, and machine learning.
Kanaan also illuminates the global implications of AI by highlighting the cultural and national vulnerabilities already exposed and the pressing issues now squarely on the table. AI has already become China's all-purpose tool to impose authoritarian influence around the world. Russia, playing catch up, is weaponizing AI through its military systems and now infamous, aggressive efforts to disrupt democracy by whatever disinformation means possible.
America and like-minded nations are awakening to these new realities, and the paths they're electing to follow echo loudly, in most cases, the political foundations and moral imperatives upon which they were formed.
As we march toward a future far different than ever imagined, T-Minus AI is fascinating and critically well-timed. It leaves the fiction behind, paints the alarming implications of AI for what they actually are, and calls for unified action to protect fundamental human rights and dignities for all.
This is the story of a lie that became the most powerful kind of truth. A timeless novel as urgently compelling as War Day or Alas, Babylon, David Brin's The Postman is the dramatically moving saga of a man who rekindled the spirit of America through the power of a dream, from a modern master of science fiction.
He was a survivor—a wanderer who traded tales for food and shelter in the dark and savage aftermath of a devastating war. Fate touches him one chill winter's day when he borrows the jacket of a long-dead postal worker to protect himself from the cold. The old, worn uniform still has power as a symbol of hope, and with it he begins to weave his greatest tale, of a nation on the road to recovery.
All Dogs Have ADHD takes an inspiring and affectionate look at Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), using images and ideas from the canine world to explore a variety of traits that will be instantly recognizable to those who are familiar with ADHD.
Following the style of the award-winning All Cats Have Asperger Syndrome, charming color photographs of dogs bring to life familiar ADHD characteristics such as being restless and excitable, getting easily distracted, and acting on impulse.
This delightful book combines humor with understanding to reflect the difficulties and joys of raising a child with ADHD and celebrates what it means to be considered 'different'. This absorbing and enjoyable book takes a refreshing approach to understanding ADHD.
Discover love from times long ago... Join Bolu Babalola as she retells the most beautiful love stories from history and mythology in this stunning collection. From the homoromantic Greek myths, to magical Nigerian folktales, to the ancient stories of South Asia, Bolu brings new life to tales that truly show the vibrance and colours of love around the world.
The anthology is a step towards decolonising tropes of love, and celebrates in the wildly beautiful and astonishingly diverse tales of romance and desire that already exist in so many cultures and communities. Get lost in these mystical worlds and you will soon realise that humanity - like love - comes in technicolour.
A man wakes up in present-day Alaskan wilderness with no idea who he is, nothing on him save an empty journal with the date 1898 and a mirror. He sees another man hunting nearby, astounded that they look exactly alike except for his own beard. After following this other man home, he witnesses a wife and child that brings forth a rush of memories of his own wife and child, except he's certain they do not exist in modern times—but from his life in the late 1800s. After recalling his name is Wyatt, he worms his way into his doppelganger Travis Barlow's life. Memories become unearthed the more time he spends, making him believe that he'd been frozen after coming to Alaska during the Gold Rush and that Travis is his great-great grandson. Wyatt is certain gold still exists in the area and finding it with Travis will ingratiate himself to the family, especially with Travis's wife Callie, once Wyatt falls in love. This turns into a dangerous obsession affecting the Barlows and everyone in their small town, since Wyatt can't be tamed until he also discovers the meaning of why he was able to be preserved on ice for over a century.
A meditation on love lost and unfulfilled dreams, The Ancestor is a thrilling page-turner in present day Alaska and a historical adventure about the perilous Gold Rush expeditions where prospectors left behind their lives for the promise of hope and a better future. The question remains whether it was all worth the sacrifice…
Two vikings – one of whom is the formidable former Varangian Guard whose name is carved on a marble slab in Constantinople's Hagia Sophia – settle down in Kurdland, driven by different objectives. Though broken and defined by the opportunities and challenges imposed on them, they both long for recognition and affection.
As their lives intertwine with the enchanting and virtuous doctor, Vesta, the successful Palace manager, Zara, and the newly coronated Kurdish King, Saaid, they try to deal with the inevitable trials of love and loss at a time when uncertainty continues to cloud their future.
Well-researched and seductively charming, The Viking's Kurdish Love spans across continents, cultures, religions and decades of tumultuous regional and global history. Widad's lyrical prose sensuously immerses the reader in the thoughts and perspectives of the time while creatively weaving the themes of injustice, identity, impulsive decisions, traumas, survival, deprival and revival into the story of how the people of the era refuse to be trapped by their past experiences.