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Art on the Block: Tracking the New York Art World from SoHo to the Bowery, Bushwick and Beyond
by Ann FensterstockA fascinating tour of the last five decades of contemporary art in New York City, showing how artists are catalysts of gentrification and how neighborhoods in turn shape their art--with special insights into the work of artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Cindy Sherman, and Jeff KoonsStories of New York City's fabled art scene conjure up artists' lofts in SoHo, studios in Brooklyn, and block after block of galleries in Chelsea. But today, no artist can afford a SoHo loft, Brooklyn has long gentrified, and even the galleries of Chelsea are beginning to move on. Art on the Block takes the reader on a journey through the neighborhoods that shape, and are shaped by, New York's ever-evolving art world. Based on interviews with over 150 gallery directors, as well as the artists themselves, art historian and cultural commentator Ann Fensterstock explores the genesis, expansion, maturation and ultimate restless migration of the New York art world from one initially undiscovered neighborhood to the next.Opening with the colonization of the desolate South Houston Industrial District in the late 1960s, the book follows the art world's subsequent elopements to the East Village in the ‘80s, Brooklyn in the mid-90s, Chelsea at the beginning of the new millennium and, most recently, to the Lower East Side. With a look to the newest neighborhoods that artists are just now beginning to occupy, this is a must-read for both art enthusiasts as well as anyone with a passion for New York City.
The Power of Agency: The 7 Principles to Conquer Obstacles, Make Effective Decisions & Create a Life on Your Own Terms
by Anthony Rao Paul NapperIntroducing The Power of Agency, a science-backed approach to living life on your own terms. Agency is the ability to act as an effective agent for yourself—reflecting, making creative choices, and constructing a meaningful life. Grounded in extensive psychological research, The Power of Agency gives you the tools to help alleviate anxiety, manage competing demands and help you live your version of success.Renowned psychology experts Paul Napper and Anthony Rao will help you break through your state of overwhelm by showing you how to access your personal agency with seven empowering principles: control stimuli, associate selectively, move, position yourself as a learner, manage your emotions and beliefs, check your intuition, deliberate and then act.Featuring stories of people who have successfully applied these principles to improve their lives, The Power of Agency will give you the insights and skills to build your confidence, conquer challenges, and live more authentically.
The Piranhas
by Harold RobbinsFriction. Mafia turmoil. Hollywood snakes and Wall Street vipers. That's what Jed Stephens has got. And a body. …Or, he would, if a certain species of vicious little fish couldn't strip a corpse bare in under a minute. Jed should have known better when his shady cousin insisted they take a trip down the Amazon, to see the sights and check out the local color… Jed can't say he's surprised when their scenic Amazonian vacation turns into an enormous coca leaf buy. And that's just the beginning.At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Hunting Evil
by Carlton SmithWhat did a high-priced hooker and a low-class sex-offender have in common? It was-according to police-their lust for stalking, raping, and terrorizing young women and girls, in once case as young as thirteen-years-old. Michelle Michaud and her husky-voiced boyfriend James A. "Froggy" Daveggio used to hang around the local high school in search of their prey-and are suspected of brutally raping numerous women in the gutted van that was rigged to strap down their victims. But they may have gone farther than that... When the body of 22-year-old Vanessa Lei Sampson was found by the side of a California highway, police zeroed in on Michaud and Daveggio, who may be responsible for the young woman's murder, as well as numerous rapes. In a case as strange and gruesome as fiction-one of the few in which a woman has taken part in sexual assault-author Carlton Smith explores the twisted motives and shocking exploits of this dark and deadly duo.
Last Train from Berlin
by W. T. TylerIn novels such as The Ants of God and Rogue's March, W. T. Tyler has earned a reputation as one of our very best authors. Whether writing about dictators on the African bush, the machinations of the Kremlin, or the equally mystifying antics of Washington's officialdom, Tyler views our global and national affairs with irony, pitch-perfect realism, and mordant insight in to the hubris and folly of great and lesser men alike. In the Last Train from Berlin, Tyler weaves together the tragedies of two men's lives - one American, one Russian - to produce what may be the most powerful indictment of, and most searching elegy to, the tragic waste of the four-decade-long Cold War. When Frank Dudley, a longtime Agency man languishing in the twilight of his career, vanishes without a trace, a junior officer, Kevin Corkey, new to the CIA and unsure he belongs there among the policy mandarins and "black ops" cowboys, is assigned the case. Has the missing man met with foul play? Or has Dudley, a disgruntled member of the old school and the subject of polite contempt, though still a man who knows where a great many skeletons lie buried, hatched a scheme for revenge against those who have passed him by? The answer - one young Corkey and the reader will learn only at the end of this gripping tale - is as profound, complex, and tragic as the history of the covert war between our century's two greatest superpowers. Treating issues of fidelity and betrayal, exile and alienation, Last Train from Berlin is a memorable achievement.
It's Not That I'm Bitter . . .: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying About Visible Panty Lines and Conquered the World
by Gina BarrecaIn a world where eye cream is made from placenta, Gina Barreca is the lone voice calling out "But wait, whose placenta is it?" She asks the crucial questions: Why is there no King Charming? Why does no bra ever fit? Why are there no tutus in XL? Why do more intelligent women have trusted psychics than have trusted financial advisors? While she definitely wants everyone to know that she's not bitter, Gina does want to know why no one realizes that Anne Bancroft was only thirty-six when she played Mrs. Robinson, the quintessential cougar. In "It's Not That I'm Bitter..." Gina shouts out her message to women everywhere: "You are smart enough to conquer the world, so please stop weeping when you try on bathing suits at T.J. Maxx." As Gina declares "The world lies to us and we want to believe. We want to believe that, if we wear a pair of palazzo pants with a latex escape hatch built into the stomach area, we'll appear five pounds slimmer instantly… We torture ourselves, even though we are smart broads." In deliciously quotable essays on the ability of both chin hairs and tweezers to affect your life, the reason every woman believes she's crazy, the possibility that the "glass ceiling" may just be a thick layer of men, and thoughts on intimate conversations she'd have with Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, Cindy McCain and Sarah Palin, Barreca gleefully rejects the emotional torture, embraces the limitless laughter, and shows other women how they can conquer the world with a sharp wit, good shoes and not a single worry about VPLs.
Lowboy: A Novel
by John WrayEarly one morning in New York City, Will Heller, a sixteen-yearold paranoid schizophrenic, gets on an uptown B train alone. Like most people he knows, Will believes the world is being destroyed by climate change; unlike most people, he's convinced he can do something about it. Unknown to his doctors, unknown to the police—unknown even to Violet Heller, his devoted mother—Will alone holds the key to the planet's salvation. To cool down the world, he has to cool down his own overheating body: to cool down his body, he has to find one willing girl. And he already has someone in mind. Lowboy, John Wray's third novel, tells the story of Will's fantastic and terrifying odyssey through the city's tunnels, back alleys, and streets in search of Emily Wallace, his one great hope, and of Violet Heller's desperate attempts to locate her son before psychosis claims him completely. She is joined by Ali Lateef, a missing-persons specialist, who gradually comes to discover that more is at stake than the recovery of a runaway teen: Violet—beautiful, enigmatic, and as profoundly at odds with the world as her son—harbors a secret that Lateef will discover at his own peril. Suspenseful and comic, devastating and hopeful by turns, Lowboy is a fearless exploration of youth, sex, and violence in contemporary America, seen through one boy's haunting and extraordinary vision.
How to Draw an Object: The Foolproof Method
by Soizic MoutonLearn to draw charming objects!Filled with colorful illustrations and step-by-step explanations, How to Draw an Object is the perfect introduction to the art of sketching. The delightful illustrations are equal parts inspiration and tutorial and are sure to have even the shyest artists reaching for a sketchbook. The book begins with simple explanations of drawing fundamentals—how to use perspective and draw basic shapes like cubes, cylinders, and cones. From there newly minted sketch artists will learn how to transform those simple components into realistic drawings. A cylinder becomes a many layered wedding cake festooned with frosting while a cone is transformed into a martini, a butterfly net, or a sea shell. Soon readers will see that even the most complicated drawing is really only a collection of these basic shapes. The book also includes a range of more specific tips and tricks, such as how to mimic the drape of fabric when drawing clothes or adding texture. Soizic Mouton's How to Draw an Object will give anyone who’s ever wanted to learn to draw the confidence to pick up a pencil and begin!
Stork Naked (The Xanth Novels)
by Piers AnthonyThe New York Times–bestselling fantasy author reveals surprising new dimensions within the magical realm of Xanth in this rollicking adventure novel.Surprise Golem and her husband Umlaut are eagerly anticipating the arrival of their baby—which should be delivered by stork any day. But when the bundle of joy fails to arrive, Surprise is more than a little upset. The Stork assigned to make the delivery has inexplicably refused to surrender the child, and instead flies off through a hole in the fabric of reality.To track down her offspring, Surprise must lead an ill-assorted assemblage of confederates on a desperate quest through dozens of different Xanths. But sinister, unseen forces are determined to stop her. And in order to find her child, Surprise may have to lose her heart.
Shark Attacks: Terrifying True Accounts of Shark Attacks Worldwide
by Alex MacCormickMore horrifying than Jaws-- because it's true!Since 1990 there have been 283 shark attacks worldwide--40 of which were fatal...In the past 15 years, reports of shark attacks have substantially increased...Over half the attacks occur in water no deeper than five feet...Believe it or not, shark attacks are still a very real threat to humans. These unspeakably bloody encounters happen in shallow water, in "safe" areas, to people just like you-- people who thought it could never happen to them.HONG KONG, 1995: A forty-five-year-old woman swimming in shallow water with fifty other people has one leg and one arm ripped off by the shark--she dies before reaching the hospital.CALIFORNIA, 1993: A man snorkeling with friends is swallowed headfirst halfway down his body--luckily, the shark spits him back out with only bite wounds.AUSTRALIA, 1993: A professional diver and mother of five is literally torn in half in front of her horrified family by a fifteen-foot great white shark.HAWAII, 1991: Two vacationing friends out for a swim suddenly see a shark "the size of a car" swim by. After one of the women begins thrashing in panic, the shark attacks and kills her--her body is later recovered with several limbs missing.Read on for more blood-chilling accounts of people who fell prey to...SHARK ATTACKS.
The Kim Kardashian Principle: Why Shameless Sells (and How to Do It Right)
by Jeetendr SehdevIn the instant New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post bestseller, Jeetendr Sehdev inspires people everywhere to learn from the way celebrities engage their fan bases.In the space of five years, Jeetendr Sehdev has shaken up the world of entertainment by revealing how social media stars generate more obsession than the Hollywood A-list. What can he teach us about making our own ideas, products, and services break through? Sehdev shows why successful images today–the most famous being Kim Kardashian–are not photoshopped to perfection, but flawed, vulnerable, and in your face. This total transparency generates a level of authenticity that traditional marketing tactics just can’t touch. From YouTube sensations like Jenna Marbles to billionaire tech mogul Elon Musk, The Kim Kardashian Principle reveals the people, products, and brands that do it best. After all, in a world where a big booty can break the Internet and the president is a reality TV star, self-obsession is a must-have. No posturing, no apologies, and no shying away from the spotlight.The Kim Kardashian Principle is a fresh, provocative, and eye-opening guide to understanding why only the boldest and baddest ideas will survive–and how to make sure yours is one of them.
The Chestnut Tree: A Novel of the Women of World War II
by Charlotte BinghamBy bestselling British writer Charlotte Bingham, The Chestnut Tree is a sweeping, romantic novel about the women who stayed behind in World War II.It is the summer of 1939, and the residents of the idyllic Sussex fishing port of Bexham are preparing for war. Beautiful but shy Judy Melton, daughter of a naval hero; her determinedly feckless friend, the social butterfly Meggie Gore-Steward; seemingly demure Mathilda Eastcott, and Rusty Sykes, the tomboy daughter of the owner of the local boatyard, are all in their very individual ways determined to play an active part in the defense of their country. But knitting socks and bomb-dodging are not what they have in mind.Under the tree on the green the women of Bexham meet to look back on a landscape that has changed irrevocably, and which they have in their own ways helped to alter. None of them are the same, and yet, with the men returning from war, they are expected to slip back into their simple roles of mother, daughter, grandmother. This, more than anything perhaps, is their greatest sacrifice.Only the chestnut tree planted by Corrie at the edge of the village flourishes in the accepted manner, finally becoming the uniting symbol of all that has passed forever.
Passport to Beauty: Secrets and Tips from Around the World for Becoming a Global Goddess
by Shalini VadheraThroughout the world, every country has age-old, time-tested secrets that women use for looking and feeling beautiful. Shalini Vadhera, celebrity make-up artist and internationally recognized beauty expert takes you on an adventure -- to Europe, Asia, Africa, the United States, South America, Australia and beyond - revealing secrets for luxurious hair, glowing skin, and more.Passport to Beauty features unique, yet simple beauty tips and techniques as well as instructions for creating cleansing masks, exfoliation blends, and moisturizers for hair and body. Learn how women around the world stay beautiful:· turn back the hands of time with a white clay mask like Australian beauties do· refresh your complexion with white tea – an ancient Chinese anti-aging secret· use coconut oil for glossy, shimmering hair as South Asian women have done for centuriesA beauty treatment and make-over with an exotic flair is only as far away as your local grocery store – learn how to unleash the beatifying power of yogurt, lemon, olive oil, honey, and other surprising ingredients. Additionally, Shalini Vadhera will introduce you to the secrets of spices, natural remedies, and spa treatments from around the globe.And once you've got your skin and hair looking wonderful, Shalini Vadhera dips into her bag of international beauty tricks and reveals a multitude of techniques for selecting and applying make-up and always looking your absolute best. No matter your latitude or longitude on the globe, by using the information in this book you can truly become a global goddess!
Now I Sit Me Down: From Klismos to Plastic Chair: A Natural History
by Witold RybczynskiHave you ever wondered where rocking chairs came from, or why cheap plastic chairs are suddenly everywhere?In Now I Sit Me Down, the distinguished architect and writer Witold Rybczynski chronicles the history of the chair from the folding stools of pharaonic Egypt to the ubiquitous stackable monobloc chairs of today. He tells the stories of the inventor of the bentwood chair, Michael Thonet, and of the creators of the first molded-plywood chair, Charles and Ray Eames. He reveals the history of chairs to be a social history--of different ways of sitting, of changing manners and attitudes, and of varying tastes. The history of chairs is the history of who we are. We learn how the ancient Chinese switched from sitting on the floor to sitting in a chair, and how the iconic chair of Middle America--the Barcalounger--traces its roots back to the Bauhaus. Rybczynski weaves a rich tapestry that draws on art and design history, personal experience, and historical accounts. And he pairs these stories with his own delightful hand-drawn illustrations: colonial rockers and English cabrioles, languorous chaise longues, and no-nonsense ergonomic task chairs--they're all here.The famous Danish furniture designer Hans Wegner once remarked, "A chair is only finished when someone sits in it." As Rybczynski tells it, the way we choose to sit and what we choose to sit on speak volumes about our values, our tastes, and the things we hold dear.
The Sound and the Furry: A Chet and Bernie Mystery (The Chet and Bernie Mystery Series #6)
by Spencer QuinnIn the sixth installment in the New York Times bestselling mystery series that the Los Angeles Times called &“nothing short of masterful,&” Chet and Bernie are handed a hard case in the Big Easy.Chet and Bernie, the best canine/human P.I. team in the business, encounter a prison work crew that includes Frenchie Boutette, an old pal they sent up the river. Frenchie begs Bernie to go find his brother Ralph, a reclusive inventor who has disappeared—along with his houseboat—from the bayou. Not long after, Bernie fends off a deadly attack from a member of a shadowy gang called the Q’s. The attacker dies without revealing anything. In bayou country, Chet and Bernie meet the no-good Boutette family and their ancient enemies, the maybe-even-worse Robideaus. At first it looks like Ralph’s disappearance is tied to a dispute between the two families over a load of stolen shrimp. But Chet turns up a buried clue that sends them in a new and dangerous direction involving the oil business. The more they find out about Ralph and what he knew, the less their chances of surviving to do anything about it. Now they’re up against Big Oil, shadowy black ops figures, and the Q’s—plus Iko, a legendary bayou gator with a big appetite… A top-notch addition to the “deliciously addictive” (Publishers Weekly) series, The Sound and the Furry is an irresistibly suspenseful and humorous read that will keep you begging for more.
The Dog Who Knew Too Much: A Chet and Bernie Mystery (The Chet and Bernie Mystery Series #4)
by Spencer QuinnThe fourth installment in the irresistible New York Times bestselling mystery series featuring canine narrator Chet and his human companion Bernie—&“the coolest human/pooch duo this side of Wallace and Gromit&” (Kirkus Reviews).Humor and intrigue combine for a &“thoroughly entertaining comic mystery&” (Booklist) as Spencer Quinn&’s engaging and unlikely team of crime solvers takes on the case of a boy gone missing from a wilderness camp. The kid&’s mother thinks her ex-husband snatched their son, but Chet&’s always reliable nose leads Bernie in a new and dangerous direction. Meanwhile, matters at home get complicated when a stray puppy that looks suspiciously like Chet shows up. Affairs of the heart collide with a job that&’s never been tougher, requiring our intrepid sleuths to trust each other even when circumstances—and a rival P.I.—conspire to keep them far apart.
Blind Goddess: Hanne Wilhelmsen Book One (A Hanne Wilhelmsen Novel #1)
by Anne HoltThe first book in Edgar-nominated Anne Holt&’s international bestselling mystery series featuring detective Hanne Wilhelmsen, last seen in 1222.A small-time drug dealer is found battered to death on the outskirts of the Norwegian capital, Oslo. A young Dutchman, walking aimlessly in central Oslo covered in blood, is taken into custody but refuses to talk. When he is informed that the woman who discovered the body, Karen Borg, is a lawyer, he demands her as his defender, although her specialty is civil, not criminal, law. A couple of days later another lawyer is found shot to death. Soon police officers Håkon Sand and Hanne Wilhelmsen establish a link between the two killings. They also find a coded message hidden in the murdered lawyer&’s apartment. Their maverick colleague in the drugs squad, Billy T., reports that a recent rumor in the drug underworld involves drug-dealing lawyers. Now the reason why the young Dutchman insisted on having Karen Borg as a defender slowly dawns on them: since she was the one to find and report the body, she is the only Oslo lawyer that cannot be implicated in the crime. As the officers investigate, they uncover a massive network of corruption leading to the highest levels of government. As their lives are threatened, Hanne and her colleagues must find the killer and, in the process, bring the lies and deception out into the open.
Bucking the Sun: A Novel
by Ivan DoigBucking the Sun is the story of the Duff family, homesteaders driven from the Montana bottomland to work on one of the New Deal’s most audacious projects—the damming of the Missouri River.Through the story of each family member—a wrathful father, a mettlesome mother, and three very different sons, and the memorable women they marry—Doig conveys a sense of time and place that is at once epic in scope and rich in detail.
Moneywood: Hollywood in Its Last Age of Excess
by William StadiemAs wild and sexy and over the top as the decade it brings to life, author, William Stadiem, tells the inside story of Hollywood producers in the 80s.From hits like Beverly Hills Cop, Top Gun and Batman to flops like Heaven's Gate, Howard the Duck and Leonard Part 6, Hollywood was never more excessive than it was in the 1980s. In this, the Moneywood era, the purse strings were not controlled by reasonably consenting adults but by pop culture cowboys who couldn't balance their own checkbooks. What they could do was sweet talk the talent, seduce the starlets, snowball the Japanese and slither out of Dodge when the low grosses trickled in. Their out of control lifestyles and know-nothing, raging narcissistic personalities make the original brutal studio heads like Sam Goldwyn and Jack Warner seem like Oxford dons. Yet, for all their flops, these Scoundrels of Spago turned Hollywood into a Big Business that was catnip to Wall Street. They were The Producers, and they were way beyond anything Mel Brooks could dream up.The Moneywood cast of characters includes: -Simpson and Bruckheimer; Guber and Peters; Eisner/Katzenberg/Ovitz: An unusual fresh take on the usual subjects. -Ray Stark, the wizard of Holmby Hills, the most powerful producer of the 80s. -Mario Kassar and Andy Vajna, the Rambo boys, who went from making wigs to making blockbusters.-Menahem Golan-Yoram Globus, the Israeli schlockmeisters who proved that every star had a price.-David Begelman, the embezzler, gambler and sex addict who was rewarded for his sins by getting to run both Columbia and MGM.-Roland Betts, the aristocratic Silver Screen Partners founder and former Yale frat-mate of George W. Bush who was a master at playing the Reagan White House card.-Giancarlo Parretti, the Italian cannery worker who bought MGM, with a little help from his (Sicilian) friends.-David Puttnam The high-toned English advertising whiz who was supposed to raise the Hollywood bar, but ended up barred from Hollywood.Moneywood is the ultimate expose of the real hit men of Hollywood's go-go decade.
The Perfect Desire (The Perfect Trilogy)
by Leslie LaFoyBarrett Stanbridge has a lovely home in one of London's best neighborhoods, great friends, a thriving private investigation business, and feminine companionship whenever it's convenient. The shadows of his past have been accepted and neatly put away. In short, he's a man really quite content with the structure and direction of his deliberately solitary life. Being accused of the murder of a beautiful woman changes everything.The daring Isabella Dandaneau, a widow, has left America and the memories of a less-than-happy marriage behind in order to find her fortune in England. With half of a pirate's treasure map in hand, she's arrived in London, determined to find her cousin--and the other half of the map--and better her financial lot in life. Only she has been murdered and the devilishly handsome, Barrett Stanbridge stands accused of her murder. But it takes only one look at the rogue for Isabella to know, not only is this a man who could have never killed her cousin, but that he also sets her blood on fire the way no man ever has. And it's not long before she realizes that falling in love changes everything.
De Kooning's Bicycle: Artists and Writers in the Hamptons
by Robert LongSome of the twentieth century's most important artists and writers--from Jackson Pollock to Saul Steinberg, Frank O'Hara to Jean Stafford--lived and worked on the East End of Long Island years before it assumed an alternate identity as the Hamptons. The home they made there, and its effect on their work, is the subject of these searching, lyrical vignettes by the critic and poet Robert Long.Pollock moved to Springs because he thought he wanted to stop drinking, but he found a connection to nature there that inspired some of the most significant paintings of our time. Others followed him. When Fairfield Porter bought a house in Southampton, the New York School suddenly had a new headquarters, and James Schuyler and Frank O'Hara found companionship and raw material for their poems on South Main Street and on the three-hour train ride between the city and the East End. Willem de Kooning rode his bike every day between his studio in the East Hampton woods and the bay, where the light informed every brushstroke he put to canvas from the early 1960s on. In De Kooning's Bicycle, Long mixes storytelling with history to re-create the lives and events that shaped American art and literature as we know it today, in a landscape where town met country and the modern met America's rural past.
Defending Israel: A Strategic Plan for Peace and Security
by Martin van CreveldIsrael is a tiny country. From tip to toe, it stretches 260 miles long but is only 60 miles at its widest point. Since the days of the British mandate, the question of "defensible borders" for the Jewish state has always been problematic. Yet considering the larger picture of what has happened in the Middle East over the last 25 years -- the peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan, the weakening of Syria as a result of the collapse of the USSR, the smashing of Iraq by the U.S. -- Israel is, militarily speaking, stronger than ever before. The greatest remaining threats are terrorism and guerilla warfare; and those, this book argues, are best dealt with territorial concessions. Martin van Creveld's Defending Israel is a compact, incisive study that is certain to draw attention.
The Dark In Between
by Elizabeth HribAction-packed and emotionally powerful like big- and small-screen hits such as The Sixth Sense and Supernatural, The Dark In-Between by Elizabeth Hrib is sure to stay with you long after the lights go out.Something lurks in the shadows between life and death.A terrible accident brings sixteen-year-old Casey Everett's life to a halt—literally. Pulled from the water, Casey is rushed to the hospital and miraculously revived. But her sudden return to the living is shadowed by the drowning of her best friend, Liddy.Overcome with grief, Casey returns home for the summer only to find the memories of the accident won’t let her go. Shadow-drenched nightmares. Whispers in the back of her mind. Her friend's screams. Casey thinks she's losing it... until she watches a boy fall from the sky. Red—an angel fallen to earth to regain his wings—takes her to Limbo, a place that exists somewhere between the living and the dead. Now, in order to save her best friend, Casey must learn to walk these mysterious and dangerous paths or else risk losing Liddy's trapped soul to something worse than death.
Flu: The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus That Caused It
by Gina KolataVeteran journalist Gina Kolata's Flu: The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus That Caused It presents a fascinating look at true story of the world's deadliest disease.In 1918, the Great Flu Epidemic felled the young and healthy virtually overnight. An estimated forty million people died as the epidemic raged. Children were left orphaned and families were devastated. As many American soldiers were killed by the 1918 flu as were killed in battle during World War I. And no area of the globe was safe. Eskimos living in remote outposts in the frozen tundra were sickened and killed by the flu in such numbers that entire villages were wiped out.Scientists have recently rediscovered shards of the flu virus frozen in Alaska and preserved in scraps of tissue in a government warehouse. Gina Kolata, an acclaimed reporter for The New York Times, unravels the mystery of this lethal virus with the high drama of a great adventure story. Delving into the history of the flu and previous epidemics, detailing the science and the latest understanding of this mortal disease, Kolata addresses the prospects for a great epidemic recurring, and, most important, what can be done to prevent it.
Bloomsbury Pie: The Making of the Bloomsbury Boom
by Regina MarlerCelebrated and maligned with equal vigor, the Bloomsbury Group is the best-documented artistic coterie in twentieth-century literature. The novelists Virgonia Woolf and E.M. Forster, the artists Roger Fry, Duncan Grant, and Vanessa Bell, and the economist John Maynard Keynes were among this charmed circle that emerged in London before the First World War and came to exercise a complex, lingering influence on English art and letters. Theirs was a world of great talent--even genius--sexual intrigue, and gossip; they cultivated an atmosphere in which it was possible to say anything, do anything. Their peak of influence in the 1920s was followed by forty years of sustained sidelong derogation, and occasional frontal attack, from such famously hostile critics as D.H. Larence and Wyndham Lewis, until, in the 1960s, the idea of Bloomsbury exploded in the public imagination, transforming the Group into an almost mass-market attraction.Not in their darkest nightmares could Bloomsbury's contemporary detractors have imagined that Charleston Farmhouse, where Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant once lived and painted, would eventually attract some 15,000 visitors each year, or that a high-profile film, Carrington, would be based on Lytton Strachey's largely platonic love affair with an obscure artist on the fringes of the hallowed Group. Bloomsbury Pie examines the persistent allure of Bloomsbury--a fascination driven by nostalgia, adoration, and antipathy--and tracks the resurgence of interest in the Group, from a handful of biographies in the 1960s through the feminist discovery of Virginia Woolf in the 1970s and the enshrinement of the Bloomsberries as cultural icons in the 1980s and 1990s. Drawing on a wealth of material generated by this revival, Regina Marler chronicles the story of the Bloomsbury boom--its scholars, collectors, and fanatics and explores the industry it has spawned among writers, publishers, and art dealers. In the proces she creates an impressive social history of a tenacious and unwieldy cultural phenomenon.