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Absent Without Leave: And Other Stories
by Jessica TreadwayFrom the award-winning author of How Will I Know You?: &“This powerful, unforgettable collection of ten short stories will mesmerize the reader.&” —Library Journal Two sisters meet for the first time after their father has killed their sister and himself; a man dying of cancer rescues a small boy from a closed refrigerator; an alcoholic, long divorced, shows up at his daughter&’s wedding; a man who long ago abused his daughter realizes at last the full impact of what he has done. These are among the situations described in Absent Without Leave, and they hit with a force that will shake you, disturb you, and teach you the truths you do not already know. The tales are clear-eyed but deeply moving; the characters spring three dimensional and alive from her pages; the stories are dangerous and fearless and thus not sentimental. We are confronting life here, made vivid by art.
Inland Passage: A Novel
by Jane RuleThe stories in this remarkable collection by Jane Rule explore the relationships among men and women, women and women, and families—both conventional and unconventional From traditional families to relationships that break new ground, this anthology runs the gamut of human emotions. The eponymous heroine &“Dulce&” is a self-proclaimed muse, witch, whore, &“preying lesbian,&” and &“devouring mother&” who has a profound effect on the lives of the women and men around her. &“His Nor Hers&” tracks the unraveling of a marriage—with unexpected results. &“The Real World&” explores the moral universe of a female mechanic who creates an unconventional family. In &“A Matter of Numbers,&” a divorced math professor falls in love with her twenty-year-old student. And the title story introduces two women—one widowed, one divorced—who rediscover romance aboard a cruise ship. Whether she&’s turning the spotlight on unfulfilled wives, frustrated husbands, friends, or secret lovers, Inland Passage is Jane Rule at her most insightful.
Bleeding Hearts (The Gregor Demarkian Holiday Mysteries #Bk. 10)
by Jane HaddamMurder is in the cards this Valentine&’s Day. &“Never quite cozy and never quite tough, this tale combines the best of both styles to stunning effect&” (Publishers Weekly). Psychiatrist Paul Hazzard was renowned for his insights into the human mind, until his wife was savagely murdered. She was stabbed to death with an ornamental dagger, a grisly crime for which Paul was tried but never convicted. Four years later, to escape his greedy family and his former mistress, Paul takes an unlikely lover: the homely, middle-aged Hannah Krekorian. Hannah&’s neighbors, including former FBI agent Gregor Demarkian, are charmed by the sudden romance—until they find her holding an antique dagger over Paul&’s bloody body. The police are convinced of Hannah&’s guilt, but Demarkian knows his neighbor could never stab Paul to death. Hannah&’s valentine may be gone, but if Gregor works a miracle, she&’ll have something even better come February 14th: her freedom.
The Community of Kindness: Reconnecting to Friends, Family and the World through the Power of Kindness
by The Editors The Editors of Random Acts of Kindness“An eloquent reminder of the great truth that life is with people and none of us can be truly human alone.” —Harold S. Kushner, author of When Bad Things Happen to Good PeopleThe world has changed in so many ways in recent decades—and as a result, meaningful connections are increasingly elusive. TheCommunity of Kindness encourages us to create new ways of building community through the practice of kindness. It is through that effort that we become most fully connected, alive, and integrated.From the people who brought us Random Acts of Kindness, this insightful book can not only lift your heart, but fill it with the happiness that comes from feeling a sense of connection with the world and people around us.
Come, My Beloved: A Novel
by Pearl S. BuckThe New York Times–bestselling, multigenerational family saga that reaches from America to India by the Nobel Prize–winning author of The Good Earth. Beginning in the 1890s, Come, My Beloved describes an American family&’s involvement with India over four generations. Touched by the poverty he encounters in Bombay, self-made millionaire David MacArd establishes a seminary for Christian missionary workers, and in so doing shapes the fates of his son and grandson. The choices made by each generation parallel one another, distinctly marked by the passage of time—though the patriarch remains in New York, the second David becomes a missionary in India himself, while his own son, Ted, goes even further, opting to live in a remote village—and these choices come with unforeseen sacrifices. Nor does their religious journey necessarily mean any growing harmony with their surroundings—something that is powerfully brought home when Ted refuses to let his daughter marry across racial lines. Featuring an unforgettable rendering of India during Gandhi&’s rise to power, Come, My Beloved is a family saga of rare power and sensitivity. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Pearl S. Buck including rare images from the author&’s estate.
The Transmutations of Chymistry: Wilhelm Homberg and the Académie Royale des Sciences (Synthesis Ser.)
by Lawrence M. DeMartinoThis book reevaluates the changes to chymistry that took place from 1660 to 1730 through a close study of the chymist Wilhelm Homberg (1653–1715) and the changing fortunes of his discipline at the Académie Royale des Sciences, France’s official scientific body. By charting Homberg’s remarkable life from Java to France’s royal court, and his endeavor to create a comprehensive theory of chymistry (including alchemical transmutation), Lawrence M. Principe reveals the period’s significance and reassesses its place in the broader sweep of the history of science. Principe, the leading authority on the subject, recounts how Homberg’s radical vision promoted chymistry as the most powerful and reliable means of understanding the natural world. Homberg’s work at the Académie and in collaboration with the future regent, Philippe II d’Orléans, as revealed by a wealth of newly uncovered documents, provides surprising new insights into the broader changes chymistry underwent during, and immediately after, Homberg. A human, disciplinary, and institutional biography, The Transmutations of Chymistry significantly revises what was previously known about the contours of chymistry and scientific institutions in the early eighteenth century.
Conservative Innovators: How States Are Challenging Federal Power
by Ben MerrimanAs American politics has become increasingly polarized, gridlock at the federal level has led to a greater reliance on state governments to get things done. But this arrangement depends a great deal on state cooperation, and not all state officials have chosen to cooperate. Some have opted for conflict with the federal government.Conservative Innovators traces the activity of far-right conservatives in Kansas who have in the past decade used the powers of state-level offices to fight federal regulation on a range of topics from gun control to voting processes to Medicaid. Telling their story, Ben Merriman then expands the scope of the book to look at the tactics used by conservative state governments across the country to resist federal regulations, including coordinated lawsuits by state attorneys general, refusals to accept federal funds and spending mandates, and the creation of programs designed to restrict voting rights. Through this combination of state-initiated lawsuits and new administrative practices, these state officials weakened or halted major parts of the Obama Administration’s healthcare, environmental protection, and immigration agendas and eroded federal voting rights protections. Conservative Innovators argues that American federalism is entering a new, conflict-ridden era that will make state governments more important in American life than they have been at any time in the past century.
The Moment of Racial Sight: A History
by Irene TuckerThe Moment of Racial Sight overturns the most familiar form of racial analysis in contemporary culture: the idea that race is constructed, that it operates by attaching visible marks of difference to arbitrary meanings and associations. Searching for the history of the constructed racial sign, Irene Tucker argues that if people instantly perceive racial differences despite knowing better, then the underlying function of race is to produce this immediate knowledge. Racial perception, then, is not just a mark of acculturation, but a part of how people know one another. Tucker begins her investigation in the Enlightenment, at the moment when skin first came to be used as the primary mark of racial difference. Through Kant and his writing on the relation of philosophy and medicine, she describes how racialized skin was created as a mechanism to enable us to perceive the likeness of individuals in a moment. From there, Tucker tells the story of instantaneous racial seeing across centuries—from the fictive bodies described but not seen in Wilkie Collins’s realism to the medium of common public opinion in John Stuart Mill, from the invention of the notion of a constructed racial sign in Darwin’s late work to the institutionalizing of racial sight on display in the HBO series The Wire. Rich with perceptive readings of unexpected texts, this ambitious book is an important intervention in the study of race.
Balthazar: Justine, Balthazar, Mountolive, And Clea (The Alexandria Quartet #2)
by Lawrence DurrellThe deeply affecting second novel of theAlexandria Quartet, which boldly questions perception and the nature of contemporary loveIn Alexandria, Egypt, in the years before World War II, Durrell&’s narrator, Darley, seeks to fully understand his sexual obsession with two women: the infamous Justine, and Melissa, a dancer. In Darley&’s conversations with Balthazar, a doctor and mystic, it soon becomes clear that Darley&’s fixation is more complex and ominous than either man could have imagined. Layered and unflinching, Balthazar is a poignant examination of the modern psyche, and a study of a world where love can become consumed by deceit. This ebook contains a new introduction by Jan Morris.
Tiger the Lurp Dog: A Novel
by Kenn MillerA landmark novel of the Vietnam WarThe men of the Long-Range Reconnaissance Patrol—Stagg, Wolverine, Mopar, Marvel Kim, and Gonzales—are commando-style soldiers, called &“Lurps&” for short. Five men, completely dependent on one another. Proud to the point of arrogance. They&’re joined by Tiger, their mascot: a flea-bitten scavenging stray or &“dust dog,&” a sneak and a coward, lazy and haughty. But, like his masters in this dirtiest of all wars, a survivor.When their buddies on Team Two-One disappear, the Lurp team members have to fight their own brass to go on a mission to find them. And suddenly a grueling war becomes an unimaginable nightmare.
The Intellectual Properties of Learning: A Prehistory from Saint Jerome to John Locke
by John WillinskyProviding a sweeping millennium-plus history of the learned book in the West, John Willinsky puts current debates over intellectual property into context, asking what it is about learning that helped to create the concept even as it gave the products of knowledge a different legal and economic standing than other sorts of property. Willinsky begins with Saint Jerome in the fifth century, then traces the evolution of reading, writing, and editing practices in monasteries, schools, universities, and among independent scholars through the medieval period and into the Renaissance. He delves into the influx of Islamic learning and the rediscovery of classical texts, the dissolution of the monasteries, and the founding of the Bodleian Library before finally arriving at John Locke, whose influential lobbying helped bring about the first copyright law, the Statute of Anne of 1710. Willinsky’s bravura tour through this history shows that learning gave rise to our idea of intellectual property while remaining distinct from, if not wholly uncompromised by, the commercial economy that this concept inspired, making it clear that today’s push for marketable intellectual property threatens the very nature of the quest for learning on which it rests.
The Hearts and Lives of Men: A Novel
by Fay WeldonIt&’s 1960s London, and the sexual revolution is in full swing in Fay Weldon&’s enduring story of lust, marriage, family, art, avarice, ambition, betrayal, and true loveClifford Wexford and Helen Lally meet at a party and fall passionately in love. But their baby, Nell, isn&’t yet one when their marriage unravels. Divorce quickly follows on the heels of wedding bliss, and so begins a battle for Nell&’s care and affection. Helen remarries; Clifford has affairs—and something quite remarkable happens to little Nell. Fay Weldon has written a sparkling gem of a novel, in which good triumphs over malice, and love can still conquer all. Part allegory, part adventure story, The Hearts and Lives of Men reveals the souls of both men and women.
The Odd Job (The Sarah Kelling and Max Bittersohn Mysteries #11)
by Charlotte MacLeodA museum murder puts Boston&’s married art sleuths to work: &“The screwball mystery is Charlotte MacLeod&’s cup of tea&” (Chicago Tribune). When the doddering patrons of the Wilkins Museum learned that dozens of their priceless masterworks had been stolen and replaced by forgeries, there was no one to turn to but Sarah Kelling and Max Bittersohn—the savviest art detectives of the Boston upper crust. Nabbing the crooks was easy, but finding the missing paintings has proven trickier. Years later, the collection&’s prized Titian is still lost, and the new director, loudmouthed cattle baron Elwyn Fleesom Turbot, is getting impatient. And things get even more troublesome when members of his staff begin to die. It starts when Dolores Tawne, the elderly, bossy museum administrator, is stabbed through the base of her skull with an antique hatpin. Inside the dead woman&’s safe deposit box Sarah finds clues to a conspiracy that stretches back decades and a way to stop the murders that are still to come.
Eating with Peace and Moderation: A Harperone Select (Harperone Selects Ser.)
by Mariel HemingwayCelebrity, author, yoga instructor, and wellness enthusiast Mariel Hemingway offers a 30-day plan for total mind and body health Mariel Hemingway’s Living in Balance is not another one-size-fits-all program with rigid rules and baffling instructions. Rather, the simple steps in this practical program to all-over wellness springs from four fundamental areas of life: food, exercise, silense, and environment. Hemingway, a longtime yoga devotee and one of the leading voices for holistic living, discusses what our bodies and minds need, how to make the best decisions for our daily lives, and why in just 30 days we can all look great, feel great, and find peace of mind. Readers learn:• How what we eat and drink affects how we feel every day. • That exercise not only helps us stay in shape, but connects us to ourselves• How bringing silent reflection into our lives helps us learn to observe, and can positively alter our habits and behaviors.• Why our homes echo the clutter and chaos of the outside world, and how they can be transformed into havens for the balanced life we seek.
Beyond the Pale: A Novel
by Elana DykewomonWinner of the Lambda Literary Award: &“A page-turner that brings to life turn-of-the-century New York&’s Lower East Side.&” —Library Journal Born in a Russian-Jewish settlement, Gutke Gurvich is a midwife who immigrates to New York&’s Lower East Side with her partner, a woman passing as a man. Their story crosses with that of Chava Meyer, a girl who was attended by Gutke at her birth and was later orphaned during the Kishinev pogrom of 1903. Chava has come to America with the family of her cousin Rose, and the two girls begin working at fourteen. As they live through the oppression and tragedies of their time, Chava and Rose grow to become lovers—and search for a community they can truly call their own. Set in Russia and New York during the early twentieth century and touching on the hallmarks of the Progressive Era—the Women&’s Trade Union League, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire of 1911, anarchist and socialist movements, women&’s suffrage, anti-Semitism—Elana Dykewomon&’s Beyond the Pale is a richly detailed and moving story, offering a glimpse into a world that is often overlooked. &“A wonderful novel.&” —Sarah Waters
Killed in Fringe Time: A Matt Cobb Mystery (The Matt Cobb Mysteries #7)
by William L. DeAndreaMatt Cobb, troubleshooter extraordinaire, must track a killer when a talk-show host goes off the air permanentlyIn television production, &“fringe time&” refers to the period after the late-night news before the morning shows begin—the time when anything could happen. For Matt Cobb, a VP charged with getting &“The Network&” out of jams, fringe time is especially fraught, because it&’s a time when one of his charges is seriously at risk. Cobb has had his hands full with Richard Bentyne, a volatile wee-hours talk-show host with more than one lover and many deserved enemies. And when Bentyne&’s dinner is laced with arsenic, there&’s no shortage of leads to investigate, and Cobb must do it quickly, with as little exposure to the network as possible. But while a betrayed girlfriends, jealous colleagues, or crazed fans might have the motive for murder, Cobb&’s gut instinct tells him that the answer lies somewhere on the fringe.
A Theory of Virtual Agency for Western Art Music (Musical Meaning and Interpretation)
by Robert S. HattenIn his third volume on musical expressive meaning, Robert S. Hatten examines virtual agency in music from the perspectives of movement, gesture, embodiment, topics, tropes, emotion, narrativity, and performance. Distinguished from the actual agency of composers and performers, whose intentional actions either create music as notated or manifest music as significant sound, virtual agency is inferred from the implied actions of those sounds, as they move and reveal tendencies within music-stylistic contexts. From our most basic attributions of sources for perceived energies in music, to the highest realm of our engagement with musical subjectivity, Hatten explains how virtual agents arose as distinct from actual ones, how unspecified actants can take on characteristics of (virtual) human agents, and how virtual agents assume various actorial roles. Along the way, Hatten demonstrates some of the musical means by which composers and performers from different historical eras have staged and projected various levels of virtual agency, engaging listeners imaginatively and interactively within the expressive realms of their virtual and fictional musical worlds.
Ratha's Creature: The First Book Of The Named (The Named #1)
by Clare BellOne brave feline, exiled from her clan, must fight to survive in this PEN Award–winning author&’s epic fantasy adventure about a tribe of prehistoric cats. Twenty-five million years in the past, a clan of sentient, prehistoric big cats called &“the Named&” have their own language, traditions, and law. Led by Meoran, the Named herd horses and deer for food. They keep order and peace, fending off predatory raiders—the UnNamed—from all sides. But, the battle has taken its toll, and the Named are skirting the edge of survival. Much to the displeasure of Meoran, a young female named Ratha discovers a powerful defense against the UnNamed. She calls it &“the Red Tongue,&” and it is a creature of incredible power. Red Tongue is fire, a force of both life and destruction that must be at once nurtured and tamed. Sensing that Ratha&’s mastery of fire threatens his power, Meoran banishes her from the clan. As she travels out amongst the savage UnNamed, Ratha learns about both them and herself. But, her tribe needs her. Can she return? Will the Named survive constant attacks without the Red Tongue? Will the power of the Red Tongue change the clan forever? Acclaimed author Clare Bell crafts a serious coming-of-age story filled with adventure, triumph, and heartbreak. Perfect for readers of Jean M. Auel&’s The Clan of the Cave Bear, Ratha&’s Creature will have readers hooked and clamoring for more stories of these big, noble cats.
Server Down: A Mad Dog And Englishman Mystery (Mad Dog & Englishman Series #5)
by J. M. HayesAttending the Yaqui tribe's Easter Ceremonies in Tucson should be a dream come true for Cheyenne-wannabe-shaman Mad Dog. But immediately after his arrival, he is accused of being a witch. Then a policeman is murdered, and suddenly Mad Dog and his wolf-hybrid, Hailey, are targets of a city-wide manhunt with shoot-first overtones. Mad Dog's niece, Heather English, a part-time deputy for her father in Kansas, comes to Tucson to arrange a peaceful surrender or find the real killer.Back in Kansas, someone has blown Mad Dog's house off the face of the Great Plains. Sheriff English learns Mad Dog has been playing an online computer game, War of Worldcraft, where a vampire wizard has been tormenting him. Mad Dog claims the creature has come after him in the real world. The sheriff isn't convinced...until he begins receiving threats from a vampire wizard on his office computer....
Making Bags, A Field Guide: Supplies, Skills, Tips & Techniques to Sew Professional-Looking Bags; 5 Projects to Get You Started (A\field Guide Ser.)
by Jessica Sallie BarreraA complete guide to bag-making Couture bags without the couture price? Yes, please. Whether you are beginning or looking to expand your bag-making, you can create professional-looking bags to fit your style and practical needs with Making Bags. Bags are infinitely customizable projects -- there are so many fabrics, hardware, and zippers to explore. This valuable resource has all the information and techniques needed to work with diverse materials and achieve endless style combinations. Trendy baguette bags, duffle bags, saddle bags, and so many more styles are covered in this book. Make five bag projects to practice your new skills and apply basic to advanced sewing techniques Jessica Barrera, the owner of Sallie Tomato, gives you the full scoop on fabrics from standard quilting cotton to specialty materials like cork, velvet, vinyl, kraft-tex (vegan leather), and so much more Follow along all the steps of the bag-making process with this visual guide
Enemy in the House
by Mignon G. EberhartA tale of murder and suspense in Revolutionary-era South Carolina, from an Edgar Award–winning author: &“One of America&’s favorite writers&” (Mary Higgins Clark). Amity Mallam fears that her family&’s loyalty to King George III may result in their land being seized by George Washington&’s army—and in a last-ditch effort to save it, she marries her cousin Simon, a rebel. After the priest who officiated the ceremony is murdered—along with a lawyer who attended—she sets off to Jamaica to find her father, who had left her behind to run the plantation. But even more danger and turmoil awaits in the Caribbean, and Amity must untangle the truth and stave off the armies of two nations to protect them all. &“Intriguing.&” —Houston Chronicle &“One of the most thorough and ingenious plotters in the trade.&” —The New Yorker
Signal Red: Empire Of Sand, Death On The Ice, And Signal Red (The Great British Heroes and Antiheroes Trilogy #3)
by Robert RyanAn edge-of-your-seat caper based on one of the most sensational crimes in British history In August 1963, a Royal Mail train traveling between Glasgow and London was forced to make an unscheduled stop. Led by a charismatic jewel thief, a gang of fifteen unarmed men boarded the train, incapacitated the driver, and made off with more than £2 million. Divided equally, it was more than enough money for them to disappear forever—if they could all keep quiet. Incensed by the brazenness of the crime, Scotland Yard investigators employed every means they could think of to get the thieves to turn on one another. Soon, a meticulous plan descended into a desperate free-for-all as the gang went down one by one. This heart-racing novel inspired by the Great Train Robbery asks the most fascinating question of all: Who talked? This ebook includes an afterword by Bruce Reynolds, mastermind of the Great Train Robbery. Signal Red is the 3rd book in the Great British Heroes and Antiheroes Trilogy, which also includes Empire of Sand and Death on the Ice.
Fast Company: A Memoir of Life, Love, and Motorcycles in Italy
by David M. GrossIt's the thick of the mid-1990s boom, and David M. Gross is racking up billable hours for a Manhattan corporate law firm and thinking that there must be more to life. Out of the blue, a friend calls with a tantalizing and risky proposal: How would he feel about moving to Bologna to help turn around a legendary, down-on-its-luck Italian motorcycle company, known for its dominance on the track and its inability to turn a profit? After a brief soul-search and popping his first (unintentional) wheelie during his maiden ride on the company's monstrous superbike, he signs on.And so Gross heads to Bologna, fabled home of marbled meats, radical leftist politics, and bespoke shoes, diving into his new life as the "corporate image consultant" to gearheads and learning to navigate the giddy mores of Bolognese society. He meets the CEO, who can relax only on planes between meetings; the manic, bellicose bike designer, convinced that only his genius can save the company; and the director of the museum, obsessed by the factory's role in World War II. Gross sparks the business's "spectacularization" with sexy ad campaigns starring factory workers who, when not on strike, strut to the espresso machine clad in Versace. Above all, he falls in love with motorcycles, seduced by speed, and realizes that becoming a better rider means tapping into dormant parts of his self that, as it turns out, were just waiting to be unleashed. And when he picks up a handsome, young—and closeted—skinhead, things really get interesting . . .In sensuous, hilarious, and wildly entertaining prose, Gross pens a wry yet ecstatic love letter to an uproarious city and its style-obsessed denizens, and to the motorcycle that gave him the freedom to live life at its very fastest.
Bader’s Spitfire Wing: Tangmere 1941
by Dilip Sarkar"Whether you have feelings about Bader or not, this is an excellent book to gain insight into the summer of 1941 when, ready or not, the RAF went on the offensive."—The Journal of the Air Force Historical FoundationOn 30 August 1940, at the height of the Battle of Britain, the pilots of RAF Fighter Command’s No.12 Group were requested to reinforce 11 Group and intercept a Luftwaffe raid on an aircraft factory at Hatfield. The events that day led the swashbuckling, legless, fighter pilot Douglas Bader to submit a report arguing that the more fighters he had at his disposal, the greater would be the execution of the enemy that could be achieved. It was a concept that received support from 12 Group’s Air Officer Commanding, Air Vice-Marshal Leigh-Mallory. In Bader’s proposal, Leigh-Mallory saw an opportunity for 12 Group to play a greater part in what was clearly an historic battle. Leigh-Mallory authorised Bader to lead three, then five, squadrons – a controversial formation that came to be known as the ‘Duxford Wing’ or ‘Big Wing’. For the rest of 1940, Bader and the ‘Big Wing’, then based at Duxford, played its part in the defense of Britain’s skies. Then, in March 1941, the role of ‘Wing Commander (Flying)’ was created. This was the fighter pilot’s dream appointment because the Wing Leader’s sole responsibility was leading his wing in action, unfettered by tedious administration and logistical matters. Needless to say, Douglas Bader was amongst the first wing leaders. He was even given the choice of which Wing he preferred. He chose to take command of that based at Tangmere on the South Coast – right at the fore of the RAF’s battle against the Luftwaffe. In Bader’s Spitfire Wing, Dilip Sarkar not only explores the full story of the men and machines of the Tangmere Wing in 1941, as well as the controversy that surrounds their use, he also fully investigates the part that they played in the RAF’s efforts to take the offensive to the Luftwaffe on the opposite side of the English Channel. It was in one such sortie in August 1941 that the Tangmere Wing lost its famous leader. Bader went on to spend the rest of the war in captivity.
Little Odessa
by Joseph KoenigIn the grimy hell of Brighton Beach, a stripper needs smarts to surviveIn the waning years of the Soviet Union, only the very young or very old are allowed to immigrate to the United States. Places like Brooklyn&’s Brighton Beach—or, as residents call it, &“Little Odessa&”—are flooded with teenage strivers eager to shake their accents and take what America has to offer. Kate Piro is as ambitious as they come, but her pluck only gets her as far as Times Square&’s Starlight Club, where she dances naked under the stage name M. Anita Supreme. After being assaulted by a drunken Nigerian diplomat, Kate meets a kindly cop who falls hard for the headstrong stripper. He wants to save her—or at least sleep with her—but Kate doesn&’t need his help. She&’s determined to get out of Brighton Beach, even though every man she meets drags her deeper into a cesspit of sleaze, vice, and murder.