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The Secret: Heartbreaking historical fiction, inspired by real events, of a mother's love for her child from the global bestselling author
by Kathryn HughesFrom the #1 bestselling author of The Memory Box comes The Secret - a powerful, twisting novel that you won't be able to put down.'Gripping' Good Housekeeping'I lost a day of my life to this book, I simply could not put it down!' ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ READER REVIEW 'This is one of the BEST BOOKS I have ever read' ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ READER REVIEW _______Mary has been nursing a secret. Forty years ago, she made a choice that would change her world for ever, and alter the path of someone she holds dear. Beth is searching for answers. She has never known the truth about her parentage, but finding out could be the lifeline her sick child so desperately needs. When Beth finds a faded newspaper cutting amongst her mother's things, she realises the key to her son's future lies in her own past. She must go back to where it all began to unlock...The Secret._______ What readers are saying about the unputdownable stories of Kathryn Hughes: 'The twist made me gasp! ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐' 'I absolutely loved this book. Devoured it in a few days. I eagerly await more of Kathryn Hughes' books. I will be first in line. ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐' 'Get set to be hooked' ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ 'A page-turner from the beginning' ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ 'I cried buckets of tears reading it' ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ 'A beautifully told, tragic tale' ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
Sidesplitter: How To Be From Two Worlds At Once
by Phil Wang*A TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR*'A hilarious breath of fresh air' AMY SCHUMER'A razor-sharp dissection of cultural differences. And yes, it's side-splittingly funny' ADAM KAY'I've laughed out loud at least once on every page' VICTORIA COREN MITCHELLPhil Wang was born in Stoke-on-Trent, raised in Malaysia, and then came of age in Bath - 'a spa town for people who find Cheltenham too ethnic'. In this brilliantly funny and incisive comic memoir he looks at what it means to be torn between two continents, bringing his trademark cynicism and wit to topics ranging from family, food and comedy to race, empire and colonialism.
Some Schools Are Harder Than Others
by Phil NaylorSome schools are harder than others. All teachers have been navigating the same educational storm over the past few years but some have been in very different boats. The pressures on schools in challenging circumstances have been exacerbated by post-pandemic and the widely entrenched disparities have been augmented by absence, recruitment, retention and inspection.This book brings together interviews with teachers, leaders and educationalists discussing key areas of school development. This book provides advice and suggestions for teachers working in challenging circumstances and outlines the huge differences teachers and leaders can make to pupils, families, and the wider community. The interviews will outline the benefits of government support, MAT and local authority involvement, and the quality of professional development provided by these schools. At some stage in any teacher's career, they should work in these inspirational settings and this book shows the reader why.
Some Schools Are Harder Than Others
by Phil NaylorSome schools are harder than others. All teachers have been navigating the same educational storm over the past few years but some have been in very different boats. The pressures on schools in challenging circumstances have been exacerbated by post-pandemic and the widely entrenched disparities have been augmented by absence, recruitment, retention and inspection.This book brings together interviews with teachers, leaders and educationalists discussing key areas of school development. This book provides advice and suggestions for teachers working in challenging circumstances and outlines the huge differences teachers and leaders can make to pupils, families, and the wider community. The interviews will outline the benefits of government support, MAT and local authority involvement, and the quality of professional development provided by these schools. At some stage in any teacher's career, they should work in these inspirational settings and this book shows the reader why.
Redefining the Political: Black Feminism and the Politics of Everyday Life
by Alex J. Moffett-BateauRedefining the Political documents the political life of a community of Black women living below the poverty line. Alex Moffett-Bateau spent a year interviewing residents of a public housing development on the far South Side of Chicago about their politics, political communities, and how they create collective power. Moffett-Bateau uses radical Black feminist political theory and develops a framework called the political possible-self, which argues that belonging to a community and developing political imagination foment change. These women employ grassroots efforts to subvert oppressive power structures by protesting institutions within their communities, addressing the benign neglect of their housing development, organizing community art shows and meals, volunteering at local public schools, and holding meetings to increase the political confidence of public-housing tenants by educating them on navigating government bureaucracies. Ultimately, Redefining the Political shows how political engagement at both the individual and community levels can be fruitful for nontraditional political contributions.
Routledge Handbook of Critical African Heritage Studies
by Shadreck Chirikure Ashton Sinamai John D. Giblin Ishanlosen OdiauaThis handbook is a foundational reference point for critical heritage research about Africa and its diaspora.Foregrounding the diversity of knowledge systems needed to examine heritage issues in such a diverse continent, the contributors to this volume: argue for an understanding heritage that is at once both natural and cultural, tangible and intangible, political and dissonant, going beyond the physical and objective to include subjective narratives, performances, rituals, memories and emotions examine the pre-coloniality, coloniality, post-coloniality, and decoloniality of current African heritage discourses and their consequences analyse how heritage legislation derived from colonial law is compatible or otherwise with how heritage is perceived, identified and remembered in African communities discuss questions of repatriation, restitution and reparations in relation to the return of artefacts from Western countries illuminate the importance of ‘difficult heritage’ within Africa and its diaspora consider the role of heritage for development in Africa Making a crucial contribution to our understanding of African conceptions and practices of heritage, this book is an important read for scholars of African Studies, heritage and museum studies, archaeology, anthropology and history.
Federated Learning: Unlocking the Power of Collaborative Intelligence (Chapman & Hall/CRC Artificial Intelligence and Robotics Series)
by M. Irfan Uddin and Wali Khan MashwaniFederated Learning: Unlocking the Power of Collaborative Intelligence is a definitive guide to the transformative potential of federated learning. This book delves into federated learning principles, techniques, and applications, and offers practical insights and real-world case studies to showcase its capabilities and benefits.The book begins with a survey of the fundamentals of federated learning and its significance in the era of privacy concerns and data decentralization. Through clear explanations and illustrative examples, the book presents various federated learning frameworks, architectures, and communication protocols. Privacy-preserving mechanisms are also explored, such as differential privacy and secure aggregation, offering the practical knowledge needed to address privacy challenges in federated learning systems. This book concludes by highlighting the challenges and emerging trends in federated learning, emphasizing the importance of trust, fairness, and accountability, and provides insights into scalability and efficiency considerations.With detailed case studies and step-by-step implementation guides, this book shows how to build and deploy federated learning systems in real-world scenarios – such as in healthcare, finance, Internet of things (IoT), and edge computing. Whether you are a researcher, a data scientist, or a professional exploring the potential of federated learning, this book will empower you with the knowledge and practical tools needed to unlock the power of federated learning and harness the collaborative intelligence of distributed systems.Key Features: Provides a comprehensive guide on tools and techniques of federated learning Highlights many practical real-world examples Includes easy-to-understand explanations
Wellness Architecture and Urban Design
by Phillip James Tabb Lahra TatrieleWellness is a contemporary concept with deep ancient roots promoting preventative and holistic activities, lifestyle choices, and salient architecture and urban design practices. Wellness Architecture and Urban Design presents definitions, an analysis of the wellness literature, and a brief history of the wellness movement. Specific planning and design strategies are presented citing examples worldwide and emphasizing the importance of wellness considerations at all scales of the built environment from rooms to cities. Both case studies offer fully integrated and comprehensive wellness design approaches creating resilient and life-enhancing wellness through each of the architecture and urban design scales. The book will be of interest to practitioners and students working in urban design, landscape architecture, architecture, planning, and affiliated fields.
Power Without Responsibility: Press, Broadcasting and the Internet in Britain
by James Curran Jean SeatonThis book attacks the conventional history of the press as a story of progress; offers a critical defence and history of public service broadcasting; provides a myth-busting account of the internet; gives a subtle account of the impact of social media; and explores key debates about the role and politics of the media.Power Without Responsibility has become a standard textbook on media and other courses, but it has also gone beyond an academic audience to reach a wider public. Hailed as a book that has ‘cracked the canon’ by the Times Higher Educational Supplement, it has been translated into five languages. In 2019, it was awarded the International Communication Association's Fellows Book Award. This ninth edition is based on a major overhaul of its content to take account of new developments (such as generative AI) and new scholarship in the field. It also contains a new chapter on the transformed opportunity for a reformed and buccaneering public service broadcasting in the face of automated misinformation and social division, locally, nationally and internationally.This trailblazing text is essential reading for all students and scholars interested in British media and contemporary media and society.
A Contextual Approach to Human Development: Integrating an Indian Perspective
by Girishwar Misra Ashok K. SrivastavaThis textbook offers a unique insight into the theoretical and applied aspects of human development in relation to the cultural traditions of non-Western countries.Presented in a modular form, this comprehensive and thematic approach to lifespan development will help students develop an understanding of human development in varied Indian social contexts. Covering all stages of development including the development of self and personality, social understanding, human strengths, sustainable development, lifelong learning, and many more, the book highlights current research in these areas as well as provides learning objectives, points for reflection, web links, and a glossary.This book is an essential reading for undergraduate students of psychology, human development, and allied fields, as well as for postgraduates with an interest in studying human development in a non-Western context.
Fundamentals of Additive Manufacturing: Principles, Technologies, and Applications
by Hassan El-Hofy Helmi Youssef Mahmoud AhmedAdditive manufacturing (AM) is a manufacturing process that has emerged as a viable technology for the production of engineering components. The aspects associated with additive manufacturing, such as less material wastage, ease of manufacturing, less human involvement, fewer tool and fixture requirements, and less post-processing, make the process sustainable for industrial use. Further, this new technology has led to highly optimized product characteristics and functional aspects. This textbook introduces the basics of this new additive manufacturing technology to individuals who will be involved in the grand spectrum of manufacturing finished products.Fundamentals of Additive Manufacturing Technology: Principles, Technologies, and Applications provides knowledge and insight into various aspects of AM and deals with the basics, categories, materials, tooling, and equipment used. It presents a classified and complete description of the most common and recently developed additive manufacturing methods with applications, solved examples, and review questions. This textbook also emphasizes the fundamentals of the process, its capabilities, typical applications, advantages, and limitations, and also discusses the challenges, needs, and general recommendations for additive manufacturing.This fundamental textbook is written specifically for undergraduates in manufacturing, mechanical, industrial, and materials engineering disciplines for courses in manufacturing technology taught in engineering colleges and institutions all over the world. It also covers the needs of production and manufacturing engineers and technologists participating in related industries. Additionally, the textbook can be used by students in other disciplines concerned with design and manufacturing, such as automotive, biomedical, and aerospace engineering.
Economics for Humanity: Integrating Well-being, Community, and Practical Philosophy (Routledge Frontiers of Political Economy)
by Mitsuaki OkabeEconomics is often referred to as “the queen of social sciences.” This is because mainstream economics has been established as an elegant academic discipline by assuming mankind simply to be homo economicus— an image of human beings showing interest in only material fulfilment and acting solely in his interest. This book challenges this basic perception of human beings.By replacing it with a more realistic and multifaceted human motive as supported by research in various academic disciplines, the book tries to provide a novel and more plausible picture of human society. Specifically, the book takes in such human aspects as pursuing well-being, forming human networks, and the realisation of potential of ability. Thus, if we try to better understand human motives and the society, it becomes necessary to replace the conventional two-sector (market–government) social model with a more general and theoretically superior social model, the “three-sector model” consisting of market–government–non-profit sectors. This book demonstrates the validity of this new view by utilising basic principles of economic policy and social welfare analyses. Moreover, the book has introduced a newly developing practical philosophy in Japan over the last 50 years to achieve both individual well-being and better human society.
Click Chemistry: Volume 1: Fundamentals and Synthesis
by Ram K. GuptaClick chemistry involves highly efficient, reliable, and stereoselective reactions that can synthesize new materials cost-effectively. The first volume entitled “Click Chemistry: Fundamentals and Synthesis” covers the fundamentals, mechanisms, kinetics, and various approaches to synthesizing new materials making it suitable for synthetic chemists and researchers working in nanoscience and technology. The main objective of this book is to provide information about current, state-of-the-art development in click chemistry as well as challenges. Experts from around the world have contributed towards this book, making this a suitable textbook for students and providing new guidelines to researchers and industries working in these areas.
Oxadiazole in Material and Medicinal Chemistry
by Satish Kumar Priya Ranjan Sahoo Abhishek SaxenaThe book “Oxadiazole in Material and Medicinal Chemistry” is based on the utility of organic motifs that contain oxadiazole units in their molecular architecture. Most of the common and alternate ways to synthesize oxadiazole-based probes have been discussed. The book also features some of the advanced applications of such organic motifs in liquid crystals, OLEDs, imaging agents, and medicines. Few practical applications of oxadiazole-based molecules in material and electronic areas have also been outlined. The book focuses on understanding the role of oxadiazole scaffolds in biological events, disease monitoring, and detection. The therapeutic effect of oxadiazole-based probes on cancer, inflammation, and neurodegeneration have also been covered in the book. Oxadiazole probes in inhibitor design and the corresponding inhibitory potency as drug development have been outlined. The authors hope that the book will garner positive interest among students and researchers associated with material and medicinal chemistry.
Chaotic Dynamics of Fractional Discrete Time Systems
by Santo Banerjee Vignesh Dhakshinamoorthy Guo-Cheng WuThe book reviews the application of discrete fractional operators in diverse fields such as biological and chemical reactions, as well as chaotic systems, demonstrating their applications in physics. The dynamical analysis is carried out using equilibrium points of the system for studying their stability properties and the chaotic behaviors are illustrated with the help of bifurcation diagrams and Lyapunov exponents.The book is divided into three parts. Part I deals with the application of discrete fractional operators in chemical reaction-based systems with biological significance. Two different chemical reaction models are analysed- one being disproportionation of glucose, which plays an important role in human physiology and the other is the Lengyel – Epstein chemical model. Chaotic behavior of the systems is studied and the synchronization of the system is performed. Part II covers the analysis of biological systems like tumor immune system and neuronal models by introducing memristor based flux control. The memductance functions are considered as quadratic, periodic, and exponential functions. The final part of the book reviews the complex form of the Rabinovich-Fabrikant system which describes physical systems with strong nonlinearity exhibiting unusual behavior.
The Secrets & Suspense Collection: The Desperate Wife, What's Mine is Yours, and Sunday's Child
by C. L. JennisonThree gripping psychological thrillers in one volume about the dark things that go on behind closed doors . . . This compelling collection of full-length novels by rising star C. L. Jennison includes:The Desperate Wife Trapped in her marriage to Rex, a violent and controlling man, Ava has one bright spot in her life: her online tutoring sessions with Ali. Their lessons soon lead to an affair that promises a respite from her vicious marriage. But escape attempts can be dangerous . . .What&’s Mine Is Yours Polly has just begun working as a nanny for the Lawrensons at their new home in the Yorkshire countryside. But then the insecure Mrs. Lawrenson starts oversharing—and soon, Polly is caught in the crossfire when a seemingly happy marriage explodes . . .Sunday&’s Child Thirteen-year-old Kaleb has gone missing—and Laney Atkinson and her sister are keeping a secret: their kids were the last to see Kaleb alive . . .
Throw Yourself Away: Writing and Masochism (Thinking Literature)
by Julia JarchoProposes that we can best understand literature’s relationship to sex through a renewed focus on masochism. In a series of readings that engage American and European works of fiction, drama, and theory from the late nineteenth through the early twenty-first centuries, critic and playwright Julia Jarcho argues that these works conceive writing itself as masochistic, and masochism as sexuality enacted in writing. Throw Yourself Away is distinctive in its sustained focus on masochism as an engine of literary production across multiple authors and genres. In particular, Jarcho shows that theater has played a central role in modern erotic fantasies of the literary. Jarcho foregrounds writing as a project of distressed subjects: When masochistic writing is examined as a strategy of response to injurious social systems, it yields a surprisingly feminized—and less uniformly white—image of both masochism and authorship. Ultimately, Jarcho argues that a retheorized concept of masochism helps us understand literature itself as a sex act and shows us how writing can tend to our burdened, desirous bodies. With startling insights into such writers as Henry James, Henrik Ibsen, Mary Gaitskill, and Adrienne Kennedy, Throw Yourself Away furnishes a new masochistic theory of literature itself.
Glorious Bodies: Trans Theology and Renaissance Literature
by Colby GordonA prehistory of transness that recovers early modern theological resources for trans lifeworlds. In this striking contribution to trans history, Colby Gordon challenges the prevailing assumption that trans life is a byproduct of recent medical innovation by locating a cultural imaginary of transition in the religious writing of the English Renaissance. Marking a major intervention in early modern gender studies, Glorious Bodies insists that transition happened, both socially and surgically, hundreds of years before the nineteenth-century advent of sexology. Pairing literary texts by Shakespeare, Webster, Donne, and Milton with a broad range of primary sources, Gordon examines the religious tropes available to early modern subjects for imagining how gender could change. From George Herbert’s invaginated Jesus and Milton’s gestational Adam to the ungendered “glorious body” of the resurrection, early modern theology offers a rich conceptual reservoir of trans imagery. In uncovering early modern trans theology, Glorious Bodies mounts a critique of the broad consensus that secularism is a necessary precondition for trans life, while also combating contemporary transphobia and the right-wing Christian culture war seeking to criminalize transition. Developing a rehabilitative account of theology’s value for positing trans lifeworlds, this book leverages premodern religion to imagine a postsecular transness in the present.
Ripley Under Ground: A Virago Modern Classic (Mr. Ripley Ser. #25)
by Patricia Highsmith"Ripley is an unmistakable descendant of Gatsby, that 'penniless young man without a past' who will stop at nothing."—Frank Rich Now part of American film and literary lore, Tom Ripley, "a bisexual psychopath and art forger who murders without remorse when his comforts are threatened" (New York Times Book Review), was Patricia Highsmith's favorite creation. In these volumes, we find Ripley ensconced on a French estate with a wealthy wife, a world-class art collection, and a past to hide. In Ripley Under Ground (1970), an art forgery goes awry and Ripley is threatened with exposure; in The Boy Who Followed Ripley (1980), Highsmith explores Ripley's bizarrely paternal relationship with a troubled young runaway, whose abduction draws them into Berlin's seamy underworld; and in Ripley Under Water (1991), Ripley is confronted by a snooping American couple obsessed with the disappearance of an art collector who visited Ripley years before. More than any other American literary character, Ripley provides "a lens to peer into the sinister machinations of human behavior" (John Freeman, Pittsburgh Gazette).
We Don't Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Modern Ireland
by Fintan O'TooleNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER NEW YORK TIMES • 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR NATIONAL BESTSELLER The Atlantic: 10 Best Books of 2022 Best Books of the Year: Washington Post, New Yorker, Salon, Foreign Affairs, New Statesman, Chicago Public Library, Vroman's “[L]ike reading a great tragicomic Irish novel.” —James Wood, The New Yorker “Masterful . . . astonishing.” —Cullen Murphy, The Atlantic "A landmark history . . . Leavened by the brilliance of O'Toole's insights and wit.” —Claire Messud, Harper’s Winner • 2021 An Post Irish Book Award — Nonfiction Book of the Year • from the judges: “The most remarkable Irish nonfiction book I’ve read in the last 10 years”; “[A] book for the ages.” A celebrated Irish writer’s magisterial, brilliantly insightful chronicle of the wrenching transformations that dragged his homeland into the modern world. Fintan O’Toole was born in the year the revolution began. It was 1958, and the Irish government—in despair, because all the young people were leaving—opened the country to foreign investment and popular culture. So began a decades-long, ongoing experiment with Irish national identity. In We Don’t Know Ourselves, O’Toole, one of the Anglophone world’s most consummate stylists, weaves his own experiences into Irish social, cultural, and economic change, showing how Ireland, in just one lifetime, has gone from a reactionary “backwater” to an almost totally open society—perhaps the most astonishing national transformation in modern history. Born to a working-class family in the Dublin suburbs, O’Toole served as an altar boy and attended a Christian Brothers school, much as his forebears did. He was enthralled by American Westerns suddenly appearing on Irish television, which were not that far from his own experience, given that Ireland’s main export was beef and it was still not unknown for herds of cattle to clatter down Dublin’s streets. Yet the Westerns were a sign of what was to come. O’Toole narrates the once unthinkable collapse of the all-powerful Catholic Church, brought down by scandal and by the activism of ordinary Irish, women in particular. He relates the horrific violence of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, which led most Irish to reject violent nationalism. In O’Toole’s telling, America became a lodestar, from John F. Kennedy’s 1963 visit, when the soon-to-be martyred American president was welcomed as a native son, to the emergence of the Irish technology sector in the late 1990s, driven by American corporations, which set Ireland on the path toward particular disaster during the 2008 financial crisis. A remarkably compassionate yet exacting observer, O’Toole in coruscating prose captures the peculiar Irish habit of “deliberate unknowing,” which allowed myths of national greatness to persist even as the foundations were crumbling. Forty years in the making, We Don’t Know Ourselves is a landmark work, a memoir and a national history that ultimately reveals how the two modes are entwined for all of us.
Damascus Station: A Novel
by David McCloskeyFinalist for the 2022 ITW Thriller Award for Best First Novel "Damascus Station is simply marvelous storytelling.…[A] stand-out thriller and essential reading for fans of the genre." —Financial Times A CIA officer and his recruit arrive in war-ravaged Damascus to hunt for a killer in this page-turner that offers the "most authentic depiction of modern-day tradecraft in print." (Navy SEAL sniper and New York Times bestselling author Jack Carr). CIA case officer Sam Joseph is dispatched to Paris to recruit Syrian Palace official Mariam Haddad. The two fall into a forbidden relationship, which supercharges Haddad’s recruitment and creates unspeakable danger when they enter Damascus to find the man responsible for the disappearance of an American spy. But the cat and mouse chase for the killer soon leads to a trail of high-profile assassinations and the discovery of a dark secret at the heart of the Syrian regime, bringing the pair under the all-seeing eyes of Assad’s spy catcher, Ali Hassan, and his brother Rustum, the head of the feared Republican Guard. Set against the backdrop of a Syria pulsing with fear and rebellion, Damascus Station is a gripping thriller that offers a textured portrayal of espionage, love, loyalty, and betrayal in one of the most difficult CIA assignments on the planet.
The Best Land Under Heaven: The Donner Party In The Age Of Manifest Destiny
by Michael WallisLonglisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence Finalist for the Oklahoma Book Award A Publishers Weekly Holiday Guide History Pick “A book so gripping it can scarcely be put down.... Superb.” —New York Times Book Review "WESTWARD HO! FOR OREGON AND CALIFORNIA!" In the eerily warm spring of 1846, George Donner placed this advertisement in a local newspaper as he and a restless caravan prepared for what they hoped would be the most rewarding journey of a lifetime. But in eagerly pursuing what would a century later become known as the "American dream," this optimistic-yet-motley crew of emigrants was met with a chilling nightmare; in the following months, their jingoistic excitement would be replaced by desperate cries for help that would fall silent in the deadly snow-covered mountains of the Sierra Nevada. We know these early pioneers as the Donner Party, a name that has elicited horror since the late 1840s. With The Best Land Under Heaven, Wallis has penned what critics agree is “destined to become the standard account” (Washington Post) of the notorious saga. Cutting through 160 years of myth-making, the “expert storyteller” (True West) compellingly recounts how the unlikely band of early pioneers met their fate. Interweaving information from hundreds of newly uncovered documents, Wallis illuminates how a combination of greed and recklessness led to one of America’s most calamitous and sensationalized catastrophes. The result is a “fascinating, horrifying, and inspiring” (Oklahoman) examination of the darkest side of Manifest Destiny.
The Yellow Admiral (Aubrey/Maturin Novels #18)
by Patrick O'Brian"There are those already planning this afternoon's trip to the bookstore. Their only reaction is: Thank god, Patrick O'Brian is still writing. To you, I say, not a moment to lose."—John Balzar, Los Angeles Times Life ashore may once again be the undoing of Jack Aubrey in The Yellow Admiral, Patrick O'Brian's best-selling novel and eighteenth volume in the Aubrey/Maturin series. Aubrey, now a considerable though impoverished landowner, has dimmed his prospects at the Admiralty by his erratic voting as a Member of Parliament; he is feuding with his neighbor, a man with strong Navy connections who wants to enclose the common land between their estates; he is on even worse terms with his wife, Sophie, whose mother has ferreted out a most damaging trove of old personal letters. Even Jack's exploits at sea turn sour: in the storm waters off Brest he captures a French privateer laden with gold and ivory, but this at the expense of missing a signal and deserting his post. Worst of all, in the spring of 1814, peace breaks out, and this feeds into Jack's private fears for his career. Fortunately, Jack is not left to his own devices. Stephen Maturin returns from a mission in France with the news that the Chileans, to secure their independence, require a navy, and the service of English officers. Jack is savoring this apparent reprieve for his career, as well as Sophie's forgiveness, when he receives an urgent dispatch ordering him to Gibraltar: Napoleon has escaped from Elba.
Ripley's Game
by Patricia HighsmithWith its sinister humor and genius plotting, Ripley's Game is an enduring portrait of a compulsive, sociopathic American antihero. Living on his posh French estate with his elegant heiress wife, Tom Ripley, on the cusp of middle age, is no longer the striving comer of The Talented Mr. Ripley. Having accrued considerable wealth through a long career of crime—forgery, extortion, serial murder—Ripley still finds his appetite unquenched and longs to get back in the game. In Ripley's Game, first published in 1974, Patricia Highsmith's classic chameleon relishes the opportunity to simultaneously repay an insult and help a friend commit a crime—and escape the doldrums of his idyllic retirement. This third novel in Highsmith's series is one of her most psychologically nuanced—particularly memorable for its dark, absurd humor—and was hailed by critics for its ability to manipulate the tropes of the genre. With the creation of Ripley, one of literature's most seductive sociopaths, Highsmith anticipated the likes of Norman Bates and Hannibal Lecter years before their appearance.
Strongmen: Mussolini To The Present
by Ruth Ben-GhiatWhat modern authoritarian leaders have in common (and how they can be stopped). Ruth Ben-Ghiat is the expert on the "strongman" playbook employed by authoritarian demagogues from Mussolini to Putin—enabling her to predict with uncanny accuracy the recent experience in America and Europe. In Strongmen, she lays bare the blueprint these leaders have followed over the past 100 years, and empowers us to recognize, resist, and prevent their disastrous rule in the future. For ours is the age of authoritarian rulers: self-proclaimed saviors of the nation who evade accountability while robbing their people of truth, treasure, and the protections of democracy. They promise law and order, then legitimize lawbreaking by financial, sexual, and other predators. They use masculinity as a symbol of strength and a political weapon. Taking what you want, and getting away with it, becomes proof of male authority. They use propaganda, corruption, and violence to stay in power. Vladimir Putin and Mobutu Sese Seko’s kleptocracies, Augusto Pinochet’s torture sites, Benito Mussolini and Muammar Gaddafi’s systems of sexual exploitation, and Silvio Berlusconi and Donald Trump’s relentless misinformation: all show how authoritarian rule, far from ensuring stability, is marked by destructive chaos. No other type of leader is so transparent about prioritizing self-interest over the public good. As one country after another has discovered, the strongman is at his worst when true guidance is most needed by his country. Recounting the acts of solidarity and dignity that have undone strongmen over the past 100 years, Ben-Ghiat makes vividly clear that only by seeing the strongman for what he is—and by valuing one another as he is unable to do—can we stop him, now and in the future.