Dogs and Demons: Tales From the Dark Side of Modern Japan


Alex Kerr - 2001
    He is the first to give a full report on the nation's endangered environment -- its seashores lined with concrete, its roads leading to nowhere in the mountains -- as well as its "monument frenzy," the destruction of old cities such as Kyoto and construction of drab new ones, and the attendant collapse of its tourist industry. Kerr writes with humor and passion, for "passion," he says, "is part of the story. Millions of Japanese feel as heartbroken at what is going on as I do. My Japanese friends tell me, 'Please write this -- for us.'"

The Birds


Camille Paglia - 1998
    Camille Paglia draws together in this text the aesthetic, technical and mythical qualities of Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds (1963), and analyzes its depiction of gender and familial relations.

The Frenchman


Jack Beaumont - 2021
    He's the agent at the sharp end of clandestine missions, responsible for eliminating terror threats and disrupting illegal nuclear and biological weapons programs. The element the missions have in common is danger - danger to de Payns, to his team and to those who stand in his way. But increasingly it's not just the enemies of France that are being damaged by de Payns' actions. His marriage is under strain, and at the back of his mind lurks the fear that haunts every operative with a family - what if they come after my children?When a routine mission in Palermo to disrupt a terrorist organisation goes fatally wrong, Alec is forced to confront the possibility that they may have been betrayed by a fellow operative. And now he's been tasked to investigate a secretive biological weapons facility in Pakistan. Alec must find out how they're producing a weaponised bacteria capable of killing millions, and what they plan to do with it. But with a traitor in the ranks, it's not just Alec in the firing line. Soon he'll be forced to confront his worst fear - and the potential destruction of Paris itself.This is fiction, but based on the experiences of a real French spy. The knowledge and tradecraft that lie behind Jack Beaumont's taut plotting and brilliant eye for detail enliven every page, making The Frenchman all the more plausible, and all the more frightening.

Core Concepts in Cultural Anthropology


Robert H. Lavenda - 2002
    Not a standard textbook, Core Concepts in Cultural Anthropology functions as a thorough annotated bibliography of the terms and concepts that anthropologists use in their work; its conceptual framework prepares students to read ethnography more effectively, with less misunderstanding.

The Australian Disease: On the Decline of Love and the Rise of Non-freedom


Richard Flanagan - 2011
    This stirring speech has been broadcast nationally on radio and television and published in Quarterly Essay 44. At a moment when the ferment of Tahrir Square has spread around the world to unsettle the status quo, Flanagan’s provocative ideas resonate with a new mood and a new questioning. Above all, Flanagan says, we need to take our compass more from ourselves and less from the powerful if we are to find hope. "We need to look the disease of Australia in the eye, the disease of conformity that is ill preparing us for the future. Does Australia still have the courage and largeness it once had when it pioneered the secret ballot and universal suffrage? Or will it simply become the United Arab Emirates of the West, content to roll on for a decade or two more glossing over its fundamental problems while brown coal and fracked gas keep the country afloat?" – Richard Flanagan

The Boston Irish: A Political History


Thomas H. O'Connor - 1995
    This book offers a history of Boston's Irish community.

You're in Command Now, Mr. Fog (A Dusty Fog's Civil War Western Book 2)


J.T. Edson - 1973
    FOG The Yankee sharpshooter turned out to be a lousy judge of character. He had three officers in his sights, a captain and two lieutenants. If he killed the right one, the Union Army’s victory at the Battle of Martin’s Hill would be guaranteed. So he made his choice and killed the Rebel cavalry’s commanding officer, Captain von Hartz. Big mistake. He should have concentrated on the small, insignificant-looking first lieutenant instead. Because the death of Captain von Hertz put Dusty Fog in command of the Texas Light Cavalry’s hard-riding, harder-hitting Company ‘C’. And with Dusty at their head, there was going to be hell to pay for the Bluebellies. ABOUT THE AUTHOR John Thomas Edson was born at Worksop, Nottinghamshire, on February 17 1928, the son of a miner who was killed in an accident when John was nine. He left Shirebrook Selective Central School at 14 to work in a stone quarry and joined the Army four years later. As a sergeant in the Royal Army Veterinary Corps, Edson served in Kenya during the Emergency, on one occasion killing five Mau Mau on patrol. He started writing in Hong Kong, and when he won a large cash prize in a tombola he invested in a typewriter. On coming out of the Army after 12 years with a wife and children to support, Edson learned his craft while running a fish-and-chip shop and working on the production line at a local pet food factory. His efforts paid off when Trail Boss (1961) won second prize in a competition with a promise of publication and an outright payment of £50. The publishers offered £25 more for each subsequent book, and with the addition of earnings from serial-writing for the comic Victor, Edson was able to settle down to professional authorship. When the comic's owners decided that nobody read cowboy stories any more, he was forced to get a job as a postman (the job had the by-product of enabling him to lose six stone in weight from his original 18). Edson's prospects improved when Corgi Books took over his publisher, encouraged him to produce seven books a year and promised him royalties for the first time. In 1974 he made his first visit to the United States, to which he was to return regularly in search of reference books. He declared that he had no desire to live in the Wild West, adding: "I've never even been on a horse. I've seen those things, and they look highly dangerous at both ends and bloody uncomfortable in the middle. My only contact was to shoot them for dog meat." His heroes were often based on his favourite film stars, so that Dusty Fog resembled Audie Murphy, and the Ysabel Kid was an amalgam of Elvis Presley in Flaming Star and Jack Buetel in The Outlaw. Before becoming a recluse in his last years, JT's favourite boast was that Melton Mowbray was famous for three things: "The pie, Stilton cheese and myself but not necessarily in that order."

What Sport Tells Us About Life: Bradman's Average, Zidane's Kiss And Other Sporting Lessons. Ed Smith


Ed Smith - 2009
    Sport makes them think, engage and argue. Given that people already take sport so very seriously, and at such an intense level of enquiry, then Ed Smith concludes we should draw out some of sport's intellectual lessons and practical uses What Sport Teaches Us About Life gives us a rare glimpse into the world of sport as seen from an extraordinarily keen, and closely-involved observer. In one chapter Smith extols the virtues of amateurism in today's professional world; in another he explains why there'll never be another sportsman as dominant as Don Bradman. He unearths the hidden dimensions of England's 2005 Ashes win, examines the impact of the free market on cricket and football, argues that cheating is not always as clear cut as it might seem.

Totally, Tenderly, Tragically


Phillip Lopate - 1998
    As an undergraduate at Columbia, he organized the school's first film society. Later, he even tried his own hand at filmmaking. But it was not until his ascent as a major essayist that Lopate found his truest and most lasting contribution to the medium. And, over the past twenty-five years, tackling subjects ranging from Visconti to Jerry Lewis, from the first New York Film Festival to the thirty-second, Phillip Lopate has made film his most cherished subject. Here, in one place, are the very best of these essays, a joy for anyone who loves movies.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Other American Stories (Modern Library)


Hunter S. Thompson - 1971
    "The best book on the dope decade." -- "NY Times Book Review"

The Cat in the Hat Movie Storybook


Justine Korman Fontes - 2003
    . . "The Cat has arrived, and he's got a hat full of fun to save Conrad and Sally from a boring rainy afternoon. Written in buoyant easy-to-read prose (with more than a few hilarious asides from the pesky Fish), this official movie storybook is packed with full-color photos from the first-ever live-action film of the Dr. Seuss classic, starring Mike Meyers!

13:55 Eastern Standard Time


Nick Alexander - 2007
    13:55 EST makes - she counts on her fingers - about 6pm in Berlin. He'll be on his way home. Alice settles into the armchair and dials the number...If Alice hadn't bumped into Will then she would probably never have phoned that afternoon. And if Alice hadn't called, then Michael, poor Michael, might still be alive today...In a digital age of world-spanning communications and easy travel these stories explore how interconnected and yet fragmented our lives have become, and how - no matter where we live or what we do, no matter how different our lifestyles - the universal desires for love and happiness draw us ever onward.Both short story collection and novel, 13:55 Eastern Standard Time finds Nick Alexander at his best. Sometimes disturbing, sometimes funny, these are stories of lives that cross and collide in life-ending drama, or simply run peacefully alongside for a few hours - lives filled with characters who are attracted and repelled, hopeless and yet inspired. Narrated in Alexander's trademark tense prose, these interwoven stories explore the ripples emanating from our every act, ripples that alter distant destinies, and occasionally bounce back, catching us from behind to haunt or inspire.13:55 Eastern Standard Time repeats the success of Alexander's first novel, 50 Reasons to Say Goodbye because again, as with life itself, the whole is mysteriously greater than the sum of the parts.

The Red Line


Tanmay Dubey - 2019
    The exciting story witnesses the journey of an honest cop to discover his true dharma and a brave women army officer’s selfless service for her country.

8 Hours (Numbers)


Upendra Namburi - 2017
    The multi-billion dollar hotels to steel conglomerate, founded by her mercurial father, liquor baron Madhusudhan Reddy, has many suitors, all of them plotting a hostile takeover. Aratrika’s estranged husband, Siddhartha is one of them. His inside knowledge is the real ace up his sleeve. The Rathores, the Reddys’ arch-rivals are looking to buy ARYA too and thereby settle old scores. Aratrika has to weave her way through a litany of lawyers, politicians, bankers, bureaucrats, investors, power brokers and her dreaded family. Behind the scenes, Jagannath Rao, her wily uncle, is playing a dangerous double game of manipulation. Her father Madhusudan is furiously pulling the strings from behind the scenes. To add to the confusion, overseeing the whole sale process is her old flame, Peter. Over the course of a single night, 8 Hours to be precise, Aratrika must fight the demons at the gates of her company and those within. It’s a fight to the bitter end. A fight that Aratrika does not want to lose…

A Brooklyn Love Affair: Vixen & Gino's Story


Tya Marie - 2015
    The fiercely devoted one she uses for her best friend, the one of a lover and confidant to her fiancé, and the real one she keeps reserved for looking in the mirror and battling her inner demons. Life is fairly normal for Vixen until her verbally abusive mother reenters her life, dredging up traumatic childhood memories, and bringing a handsome stranger into the mix with her devious antics causing Vixen to reprise her role as caregiver and bread winner.Gino Romano is infamous for many reasons: his notoriety for being one of the youngest king pins in New York City, the cold manner in which he handles business, and the notable political ties he's managed to create along the way through "profit sharing." However, the most prominent thing he's known for is the ice fortress he's built around his heart. Because of his past, Gino keeps women at an arms length, believing it hard to find one who could accept the scarred past he comes with. Until he lays eyes on Vixen.Brought together for all the wrong reasons, Vixen and Gino find a common ground that not only develops into a budding friendship, but sparks a love affair. From the moment they become one they must fight to protect their love from those who plan to destroy it by any means necessary, one of which being the very reason Vixen ran away from home ten years ago in the dead of night.Will the forces determined to see Gino and Vixen destroyed win? Or will their love prevail? Set in a spicy Brooklyn backdrop, A Brooklyn Love Affair brings to life pain, forgiveness, and the never ending possibility of finding love.