- Table View
- List View
Mathematical Modeling in Physical Sciences: 12th IC-MSQUARE, Belgrade, Serbia, August 28–31, 2023 (Springer Proceedings in Mathematics & Statistics #446)
by Dimitrios VlachosThis volume gathers selected papers presented at the ICMSQUARE 2023 - 12th International Conference on Mathematical Modeling in Physical Sciences held in Belgrade, Serbia from August 28–31, 2023. This proceedings offers a compilation of cutting-edge research, which aims to advance the knowledge and development of high-quality research in mathematical fields related to physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, economics, environmental sciences, and more. Annually held since 2012, the ICMSQUARE conference serves as a platform for the exchange of ideas and discussions on the latest technological trends in these fields. This book is an invaluable resource for researchers, academicians, and professionals in these areas seeking to stay up-to-date with the latest developments in mathematical modeling.
The Brides of High Hill (The Singing Hills Cycle #5)
by Nghi VoNghi Vo's Hugo Award-winning Singing Hills Cycle returns with a standalone gothic mystery that unfolds in the empire of Ahn."A remarkable accomplishment of storytelling."—NPR on The Empress of Salt and Fortune"Nghi Vo is one of the most original writers we have today."—Taylor Jenkins Reid on Siren QueenThe Cleric Chih accompanies a beautiful young bride to her wedding to the aging ruler of a crumbling estate situated at the crossroads of dead empires. The bride's party is welcomed with elaborate courtesies and extravagant banquets, but between the frightened servants and the cryptic warnings of the lord's mad son, they quickly realize that something is haunting the shadowed halls.As Chih and the bride-to-be explore empty rooms and desolate courtyards, they are drawn into the mystery of what became of Lord Guo's previous wives and the dark history of Doi Cao itself. But as the wedding night draws to its close, Chih will learn at their peril that not all monsters are to be found in the shadows; some monsters hide in plain sight.The Singing Hills Cycle has been shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Award, the Locus Award, and the Ignyte Award, and has won the Crawford Award and the Hugo Award.The novellas are standalone stories linked by the Cleric Chih, and may be read in any order.The Empress of Salt and FortuneWhen the Tiger Came Down the MountainInto the RiverlandsMammoths at the GatesThe Brides of High HillAt the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Gibberish
by Young VoBEST OF THE YEARKirkus · Parents · Asian/Pacific American Librarians Association · Chicago Public Library · Washington Post · Evanston Public Library · Los Angeles Public LibraryCharlotte Huck Recommended BookCommon Sense Media SelectionIt’s Dat’s first day of school in a new country! Dat and his Mah made a long journey to get here, and Dat doesn’t know the language. To Dat, everything everybody says — from the school bus driver to his new classmates — sounds like gibberish. How is Dat going to make new friends if they can’t understand each other?Luckily there’s a friendly girl in Dat’s class who knows that there are other ways to communicate, besides just talking. Could she help make sense of the gibberish?P R A I S E“A superb picture book.”—The Wall Street Journal“Masterly. A tender reflection.”—The New York Times★ “The execution is stellar. A visually and emotionally immersive immigration story.”—Kirkus (starred)★ “Delightful. Beginning readers will love this book as the illustrations say it all.”—School Library Connection (starred)★ “Will give hope to kids dealing with a new country and could inspire others to reach out to struggling immigrant children.”—Booklist (starred)
The Ethnobotany of Eden: Rethinking the Jungle Medicine Narrative
by Robert A. VoeksIn the mysterious and pristine forests of the tropics, a wealth of ethnobotanical panaceas and shamanic knowledge promises cures for everything from cancer and AIDS to the common cold. To access such miracles, we need only to discover and protect these medicinal treasures before they succumb to the corrosive forces of the modern world. A compelling biocultural story, certainly, and a popular perspective on the lands and peoples of equatorial latitudes—but true? Only in part. In The Ethnobotany of Eden, geographer Robert A. Voeks unravels the long lianas of history and occasional strands of truth that gave rise to this irresistible jungle medicine narrative. By exploring the interconnected worlds of anthropology, botany, and geography, Voeks shows that well-intentioned scientists and environmentalists originally crafted the jungle narrative with the primary goal of saving the world’s tropical rainforests from destruction. It was a strategy deployed to address a pressing environmental problem, one that appeared at a propitious point in history just as the Western world was taking a more globalized view of environmental issues. And yet, although supported by science and its practitioners, the story was also underpinned by a persuasive mix of myth, sentimentality, and nostalgia for a long-lost tropical Eden. Resurrecting the fascinating history of plant prospecting in the tropics, from the colonial era to the present day, The Ethnobotany of Eden rewrites with modern science the degradation narrative we’ve built up around tropical forests, revealing the entangled origins of our fables of forest cures.
Tools, Techniques and Strategies for Reflective Second & Foreign Language Teacher Education: Insights from Contexts Around the World
by Paul Voerkel Mergenfel A. Vaz Ferreira Nancy DrescherEssential questions about the skills teachers need for effective classroom practice have raised by researchers such as Shulman, Schön, Altrichter & Posch and Hattie, and discussions still continue. In this context, the anthology combines theoretical studies and practical insights about Reflection from foreign and second language teacher education and professional development. It includes examples of reflective tools, techniques and strategies that can help teachers to (re)think their practices and ensure the quality of their everyday work.
Narrating a New Mobility Landscape in the Modern American Road Story, 1893–1921: Ambivalence and Aspiration (Studies in Mobilities, Literature, and Culture)
by Andrew VogelThis book examines travel narratives as a medium used by the American public to imagine and negotiate new ways to live in, move through, and share national space. Setting an array of archival material, including congressional deliberations, into analytical conversation with road stories by Walt Whitman, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Upton Sinclair, Emily Post, Zitkala-Ša, Henry Ford and many others, this book reframes our understanding of the origins of American automobility. The evidence gathered here sheds light on the processes by which the defining social infrastructure of the twentieth century came to be enacted, and also exposes the fraught debates and abiding misgivings that continue to roil infrastructure planning today. The insights captured in this study purposefully deepen our attention to questions of land use and collective responsibility at a moment when the ecological and social-justice consequences of American automobility must be thoroughly re-evaluated so that more conscientious mobility futures may be developed.
Sorting Sexualities: Expertise and the Politics of Legal Classification
by Stefan VoglerIn Sorting Sexualities, Stefan Vogler deftly unpacks the politics of the techno-legal classification of sexuality in the United States. His study focuses specifically on state classification practices around LGBTQ people seeking asylum in the United States and sexual offenders being evaluated for carceral placement—two situations where state actors must determine individuals’ sexualities. Though these legal settings are diametrically opposed—one a punitive assessment, the other a protective one—they present the same question: how do we know someone’s sexuality? In this rich ethnographic study, Vogler reveals how different legal arenas take dramatically different approaches to classifying sexuality and use those classifications to legitimate different forms of social control. By delving into the histories behind these diverging classification practices and analyzing their contemporary reverberations, Vogler shows how the science of sexuality is far more central to state power than we realize.
From the Seashore to the Seafloor: An Illustrated Tour of Sandy Beaches, Kelp Forests, Coral Reefs, and Life in the Ocean's Depths
by Janet VoightAn octopus expert and celebrated artist offer a deep dive to meet the enchanting inhabitants of the world’s marine ecosystems. Have you ever walked along the beach and wondered what kind of creatures can be found beneath the waves? Have you pictured what it would be like to see the ocean not from the shore but from its depths? These questions drive Janet Voight, an expert on mollusks who has explored the seas in the submersible Alvin that can dive some 14,000 feet below the water’s surface. In this book, she partners with artist Peggy Macnamara to invite readers to share her undersea journeys of discovery. With accessible scientific descriptions, Voight introduces the animals that inhabit rocky and sandy shores, explains the fragility of coral reefs, and honors the extraordinary creatures that must search for food in the ocean’s depths, where light and heat are rare. These fascinating insights are accompanied by Macnamara’s stunning watercolors, which illuminate these ecosystems and other scenes from Voight’s research. Together, they show connections between life at every depth—and warn of the threats these beguiling places and their eccentric denizens face.
Mevlido's Dreams: A Post-Exotic Novel (Univocal)
by Antoine VolodineA postapocalyptic noir that asks if love and political ideals can survive civilizational collapse A meditative, postapocalyptic noir, Mevlido&’s Dreams is an urgent communiqué from a far-future reality of irreversible environmental damage and civilizational collapse. Mevlido is a double agent working for the police and living in the last habitable city on the planet, a sprawling abyssal ruin marked by war and ruled by criminals. Suspended in the bardo between his loyalty to the surveillance state and to the anarchists, communists, and other rebels he monitors, Mevlido clings to life and hope—barely—in the city&’s vast slums, haunted by the memory of the wife he failed to save during the last war and dreaming of a mysterious mission he is told he must accomplish. At the same time, an enigmatic organization existing elsewhere—the Organs—observes Mevlido&’s actions and debates its responsibility to him and to humanity as a whole. Asking what it means to love and care for others at the end of the world, this dense, brilliantly detailed postcollapse reality imagined by Antoine Volodine is one that grows ever more relevant amidst intensifying climate and political catastrophes. A key work in Volodine&’s post-exotic fictional universe, Mevlido&’s Dreams envisions a world changed beyond recognition and ruled under irrational authoritarianism in which dreams nest within dreams and the boundaries between life and death are fluid and uncertain.
Intentionality as Constitution (Routledge Studies in Contemporary Philosophy)
by Alberto VoltoliniThis book develops a novel theory of intentionality. It argues that intentionality is an internal essential relation of constitution between an intentional state and an object, or between such a state and a possible state of affairs as subsisting.The author’s main claim is that intentionality is a fundamentally modal property, hence a non (scientifically) natural property in that it does not supervene, either locally or globally, on its nonmodal physical basis. This is the property, primarily for an intentional mental state, to be constituted by the entities it is about. In the case of intentionality of reference, such constituents are objects, in the sense of individuals; in the case of intentionality of content, such constituents are possible states of affairs as subsisting. Constitution is meant in a mereologically literal sense: those constituents are essential parts of the relevant states. As a result, the theory claims not only that intentionality is relational but also that it is an internal, essential relation holding between an intentional state and its object or proposition-like content.Intentionality as Constitution will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, metaphysics, and cognitive science.
Music and the Skillful Listener: American Women Compose the Natural World (Music, Nature, Place)
by Denise Von GlahnFor Denise Von Glahn, listening is that special quality afforded women who have been fettered for generations by the maxim "be seen and not heard." In Music and the Skillful Listener, Von Glahn explores the relationship between listening and musical composition focusing on nine American women composers inspired by the sounds of the natural world: Amy Beach, Marion Bauer, Louise Talma, Pauline Oliveros, Joan Tower, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, Victoria Bond, Libby Larsen, and Emily Doolittle. Von Glahn situates "nature composing" among the larger tradition of nature writing and argues that, like their literary sisters, works of these women express deeply held spiritual and aesthetic beliefs about nature. Drawing on a wealth of archival and original source material, Von Glahn skillfully employs literary and gender studies, ecocriticism and ecomusicology, and the larger world of contemporary musicological thought to tell the stories of nine women composers who seek to understand nature through music.
Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship (Princeton Classics #134)
by Johann Wolfgang von GoetheAn authoritative English translation of one of the most important works in the history of the novelWilhelm Meister&’s Apprenticeship (1795–1796), Goethe&’s second novel, is a foundational work in the history of the genre—perhaps the first Bildungsroman, a coming-of-age story focusing on the growth and self-realization of the main character. The story centers on Wilhelm, a young man living in the mid-1700s who strives to break free from the restrictive bourgeois world of his upbringing and seek fulfillment as an actor and playwright. Goethe&’s novel had a huge impact on the Romantics. Hegel, Schelling, Novalis, and Schopenhauer considered it one of the most important novels yet written. Schlegel famously called it one of the &“three tendencies of the age,&” along with the French Revolution and the philosophy of Fichte. And Beethoven, Schubert, and Schumann set poems from the novel to music. It also had a major influence on nineteenth-century British writers, including Thomas Carlyle, who was its first English translator, and George Eliot. Drawn from Princeton&’s authoritative collected works of Goethe, and featuring a new introduction by David Wellbery, this is the definitive English version of a landmark of world literature.
Lyric Powers
by Robert von HallbergThe authority of poetry varies from one period to another, from one culture to another. For Robert von Hallberg, the authority of lyric poetry has three sources: religious affirmation, the social institutions of those who speak the idioms from which particular poems are made, and the extraordinary cognition generated by the formal and musical resources of poems. Lyric Powers helps students, poets, and general readers to recognize the pleasures and understand the ambitions of lyric poetry. To explain why a reader might prefer one kind of poem to another, von Hallberg analyzes—beyond the political and intellectual significance of poems—the musicality of both lyric poetry and popular song, including that of Tin Pan Alley and doo-wop. He shows that poets have distinctive intellectual resources—not just rhetorical resources—for examining their subjects, and that the power of poetic language to generalize, not particularize, is what justly deserves a critic’s attention. The first book in more than a decade from this respected critic, Lyric Powers will be celebrated as a genuine event by readers of poetry and literary criticism.
A Practical Guide to Group Facilitation: The Threefold Approach
by Yorck von KorffA Practical Guide to Group Facilitation introduces a unique threefold approach to facilitation, blending Person-Centered Practice, system knowledge, and method expertise together. It serves as a comprehensive resource for facilitators seeking to enhance their professional skills.The book delves into the significance of Person-Centered Practice as the cornerstone of facilitation, exploring personal facilitator qualities like congruence, empathic listening, and unconditional positive regard, inspired by the principles of Carl Rogers. It successfully integrates Jane Loevinger's personal development theories with facilitator skill development, illustrating the symbiotic relationship between personal growth and effective facilitation. Additionally, the book incorporates Nonviolent Communication (NVC) into the facilitator's toolkit, offering practical strategies for navigating challenging situations. It covers a spectrum of facilitation methods, from structured approaches to the Person-Centered style of Carl Rogers, equipping facilitators to face diverse group contexts.Presenting valuable skills and insights to enhance professional practice, this book will be highly relevant reading for facilitators, mediators, and those offering training. It will also be useful reading for professionals in participatory processes such as coaches, team leaders, organizational leaders, managers, and mentors.
Organized Crime: Analyzing Illegal Activities, Criminal Structures, and Extra-legal Governance (The\cross-border Crime Colloquium Ser. #11)
by Klaus von Lampe2016 Outstanding Publication Award (The International Association for the Study of Organized Crime) Organized Crime: Analyzing Illegal Activities, Criminal Structures, and Extra-legal Governance provides a systematic overview of the processes and structures commonly labeled "organized crime," drawing on the pertinent empirical and theoretical literature primarily from North America, Europe, and Australia. The main emphasis is placed on a comprehensive classificatory scheme that highlights underlying patterns and dynamics, rather than particular historical manifestations of organized crime. Esteemed author Klaus von Lampe strategically breaks the book down into three key dimensions: (1) illegal activities, (2) patterns of interpersonal relations that are directly or indirectly supporting these illegal activities, and (3) overarching illegal power structures that regulate and control these illegal activities and also extend their influence into the legal spheres of society. Within this framework, numerous case studies and topical issues from a variety of countries illustrate meaningful application of the conceptual and theoretical discussion.
Organized Crime: Analyzing Illegal Activities, Criminal Structures, and Extra-legal Governance (The\cross-border Crime Colloquium Ser. #11)
by Klaus von Lampe2016 Outstanding Publication Award (The International Association for the Study of Organized Crime) Organized Crime: Analyzing Illegal Activities, Criminal Structures, and Extra-legal Governance provides a systematic overview of the processes and structures commonly labeled "organized crime," drawing on the pertinent empirical and theoretical literature primarily from North America, Europe, and Australia. The main emphasis is placed on a comprehensive classificatory scheme that highlights underlying patterns and dynamics, rather than particular historical manifestations of organized crime. Esteemed author Klaus von Lampe strategically breaks the book down into three key dimensions: (1) illegal activities, (2) patterns of interpersonal relations that are directly or indirectly supporting these illegal activities, and (3) overarching illegal power structures that regulate and control these illegal activities and also extend their influence into the legal spheres of society. Within this framework, numerous case studies and topical issues from a variety of countries illustrate meaningful application of the conceptual and theoretical discussion.
The "Lives" and Writings of Edith Rickert (1871-1938): Novelist, Cryptologist, and World-Class Chaucerian
by Christina von NolckenThis biography represents a nuanced account of Edith Rickert’s life—and inner life. It follows Rickert’s own writing and draws attention to her life as a writer. Rickert has been long remembered as a medievalist, but she also contributed to American scholarship, pedagogy, and codicology. Born into a family of very modest means in Canal Dover, Ohio, she numbered among the University of Chicago’s earliest doctoral students (1895-1899) and was among the first eight women to reach the top of that University's professorial ladder. She prepared what remains the definitive edition of the medieval romance Emaré. She documented aspects of the medieval, as well as Chaucer’s life, with a historian’s accuracy and a novelist’s insight. In the Ladies Home Journal she wrote on women's issues that remain pressing today. With University of Chicago professor John Matthews Manly (1865-1940), she prepared numerous readers and textbooks, including several that helped putcontemporary British and American literature on the academic map. Again in collaboration with Manly, she was responsible for what has been described as “perhaps the most important of the MI-8 solutions” during World War I,as well as the eight-volume edition of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales (1940). Rickert also published short stories, novels, poems, and essays. As this biography shows, Rickert's achievement as a writer was equal to her work as a literary critic.
Wilhelm Tell (German Literacy Classics in Translation)
by Friedrich von SchillerWhen Schiller completed Wilhelm Tell as a "New Year's Gift for 1805" he foretold that it would cause a stir. He was right. In the midst of Great Power politics a play which drew substance from one of the fourteenth-century liberation movements proved both attractive and inflammatory. Since then the work as become immensely popular. This new English translation by William F. Mainland brings out the essential tragi-comic nature of Wilhelm Tell but also emphasizes its impressive formal unity. Schiller based his play on chronicles of the Swiss liberation movement, in which Wilhelm Tell played a major role. Since Tell's existence has never been proven, Schiller, a historian by profession, felt he had to devise a figure who would bring the uncertainties and contradictions of the various Swiss chronicles into focus. Respected for his courage and skill with a bow, for his peaceable nature and his integrity, Schiller's archer—while always ready to aid his fellows—habitually seeks solitude. In the midst of political turmoil Wilhelm Tell is the nonpolitical man of action. Keenly interested in the problematic interplay of history and legend, Schiller turned it to be dramatic advantage. He constructed his play to illustrate the greatest possible development of the character traits suggested for Tell by the chronicles. The result of Schiller's supreme achievement in historical drama.
Freedom and Adaptive Preferences (The Graz Schumpeter Lectures)
by Carl Christian von WeizsäckerTraditional welfare economics works with the assumption of the fully rational economic agent (homo economicus) whose preferences are fixed: that is, they are not influenced by their economic environment. To the contrary, this book presents a theory of welfare economics that maintains the principles of normative individualism while allowing for adaptive or changeable preferences.Why do economists talk of preferences? In this book, Carl Christian von Weizsäcker shows that the concept is intimately related to freedom of action. The concept of preferences is the mode by which normative economics introduces the idea of freedom or liberty into its theory of human interaction. Moreover, the economic research of recent decades has provided a large amount of experimental and other empirical findings – e.g. the work on bounded rationality – which contradicts the assumption of fixed preferences. This book argues that this large body of findings is consistent with the hypothesis of adaptive preferences. This, together with the proposition that adaptive preferences allow a generalization of traditional welfare economics, has implications for policy applications of behavioral economics based on “normative individualism”. Normative individualism is an approach which intrinsically connects with the value of liberty or freedom. It is argued that normative individualism is indispensable for a society of free citizens, thus providing the foundations of civil liberty.This book will be of great interest to readers of welfare economics, behavioral economics and economic theory.
Cobble Hill: A Novel
by Cecily von ZiegesarThe #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Gossip Girl series brings her sharp-eyed and irresistible wit to this &“quirky novel of lovable misfits&” (Publishers Weekly) chronicling a year in the lives of four families in an upscale Brooklyn neighborhood as they seek purpose and community—until one unforgettable night at a raucous neighborhood party knocks them to their senses.Welcome to Cobble Hill. In this eclectic Brooklyn neighborhood, private storms brew amongst four married couples and their children. There&’s ex-groupie Mandy, so underwhelmed by motherhood and her current physical state that she fakes a debilitating disease to get the attention of her skateboarding, ex-boyband member husband Stuart. There&’s the unconventional new school nurse, Peaches, on whom Stuart has an unrequited crush, and her disappointing husband Greg, who wears noise-cancelling headphones—everywhere. A few blocks away, Roy, a well-known, newly transplanted British novelist, has lost the thread of his next novel and his marriage to indefatigable Wendy. Around the corner, Tupper, the nervous, introverted industrial designer with a warehouse full of prosthetic limbs struggles to pin down his elusive artist wife Elizabeth. Throw in two hormonal teenagers, a ten-year-old pyromaniac, a drug dealer pretending to be a doctor, and a lot of hidden cameras, and you&’ve got a combustible mix of egos, desires, and secrets bubbling in brownstone Brooklyn. &“Breezy, witty, and compulsively fun to read&” (Kirkus Reviews), Cobble Hill is highly entertaining portrait of contemporary family life and the colorful characters who call Brooklyn home.
The Contested Crown: Repatriation Politics between Europe and Mexico
by Khadija von Zinnenburg CarrollFollowing conflicting desires for an Aztec crown, this book explores the possibilities of repatriation. In The Contested Crown, Khadija von Zinnenburg Carroll meditates on the case of a spectacular feather headdress believed to have belonged to Montezuma, emperor of the Aztecs. This crown has long been the center of political and cultural power struggles, and it is one of the most contested museum claims between Europe and the Americas. Taken to Europe during the conquest of Mexico, it was placed at Ambras Castle, the Habsburg residence of the author’s ancestors, and is now in Vienna’s Welt Museum. Mexico has long requested to have it back, but the Welt Museum uses science to insist it is too fragile to travel. Both the biography of a cultural object and a history of collecting and colonizing, this book offers an artist’s perspective on the creative potentials of repatriation. Carroll compares Holocaust and colonial ethical claims, and she considers relationships between indigenous people, international law and the museums that amass global treasures, the significance of copies, and how conservation science shapes collections. Illustrated with diagrams and rare archival material, this book brings together global history, European history, and material culture around this fascinating object and the debates about repatriation.
Spin of Fate (The Fifth Realm #1)
by A. A. VoraIn a world inspired by karma, three teens encounter magnificent beasts, unforgiving magic, and epic battles in this propulsive and wholly original young adult fantasy.&“Evocative of Sanderson, Pullman, and Fullmetal Alchemist, yet at the same time shockingly original.&” —Rosaria Munda, author of FireborneAina&’s world is governed by Toranic Law, a force that segregates people into upper and lower realms. It&’s said that if the sinful lowers commit themselves to kindness and charity, their souls will lighten, allowing them into the peaceful upper realms.But Aina, one of the few lowers to ever ascend, just wants to go back home.Aina is desperate to reunite with her mother, hoping she&’s survived the beasts and wars of her homeland alone. After failing to weigh down her soul with petty crimes, Aina joins a rebel group defying the authorities and bringing aid to those condemned to a life of suffering in the lower realms. Alongside Aina are two new recruits: Meizan, a ruthless fighter trying to save his clan from extinction, and Aranel, a spoiled noble spying for the powers that be.Before long, the rebels find themselves in the middle of a brewing war. On one side, a violent king of a lower realm is bent on destroying Toranic Law; on the other, the authorities of the upper realms will do anything to stay on top. Now the young rebels must face both sides head-on if they want to stop a conflict that could break not only Toranic Law—but the universe itself.Fans of epic, propulsive fantasies like Six of Crows and innovative world-building like Avatar: The Last Airbender will delight in A. A. Vora's ambitious, unmissable debut.
Coding Games in Scratch
by Carol VordermanIf you like playing computer games, why not make your own? This book has all you need to build amazing games, including thrilling racing challenges, zany platform games, and fiendish puzzles.Follow the simple steps to become an expert coder, using the popular programming language Scratch™ 3.0. This updated edition is the first to be tablet-computer friendly, making it even easier to get coding.Improve your coding skills and create your own games, before remixing and customizing them. Jumpy Monkey will show you how to simulate gravity in your games, or give Dog's Dinner a try to learn about collision detection.Pick up the fundamentals of computer programming in steps that make even the most difficult coding concepts fun and easy to understand. Don't just learn how computer code works—understand why it's done that way.Then share your games online and challenge friends and family to beat each other's scores. Once you've whizzed through the book, the possibilities are endless!
Dopeworld: Adventures in the Global Drug Trade
by Niko VorobyovIn this irreverent ode to gonzo journalism, one writer travels the globe to explore the use of recreational drugs in cultures around the world.After I got out of jail, I was determined to find out more about how the issue of drugs not only landed me there, but has shaped the entire world: wars, scandals, coups, revolutions. I read every book, watched every documentary. I saved up to buy plane tickets. I went to Colombia, Mexico, Russia, Italy, Japan and the Afghan border—all in all, fifteen countries across five continents.Call me Narco Polo. Just as Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations did for the world of food, Dopeworld is an intoxicating journey into the world of drugs. From the cocaine farms in South America to the streets of Manila, Dopeworld traces the emergence of psychoactive substances and our intimate relationship with them. As a former drug dealer turned subversive scholar, with unparalleled access to drug lords, cartel leaders, street dealers and government officials, journalist Niko Vorobyov attempts to shine a light on the dark underbelly of the drug world.At once a bold piece of journalism and a hugely entertaining travelogue, Dopeworld is a brilliant and enlightening journey across the world, revealing how drug use is at the heart of our history, our lives, and our future.
Perry Homer Ruins Everything
by Beth VrabelA boy and his con artist family&’s rascally ways keep them on a never-ending vacation full of rip-offs and schemes, leaving him to wonder if it&’s too late to change his fate in this funny, hijinks-filled middle grade romp.Perry Homer is bad news, just like the rest of his troublemaking family. His parents skip out on restaurant bills. Uncle Manny uses his legal training to get free stuff. Perry&’s cousins use their coding skills to scam people. On a disastrous vacation to Lindsborg, &“the nicest town in America,&” Perry&’s siblings steal their new favorite toys from local businesses and set the town&’s whimsical Swedish decorations ablaze. The Homers are worthy of the nickname the local news gives them—the Bad Family—and they&’re having a blast. Perry thinks he could be good. His favorite teacher, Miss Penelope, recommended him for a scholarship at the prestigious Ithaca School, and it&’s his chance to change things. He just has to get home from Lindsborg and show up for the interview. Still, that&’s easier said than done. After the Homers get kicked off their plane, Perry comes up with one last scheme to keep them pointed toward home. But can Perry really make it to Ithaca—or is it his fate to ruin everything?