First published in 1955, this book tells the lively and entertaining story of the Olympic Peninsula, "the fist of land thrust north between Puget Sound and the Pacific Ocean, a wilderness area of six thousand square miles, as large as the state of Massachusetts, more rugged than the Rockies, its lowlands blanketed by a cool jungle of fir and pine and cedar, its peaks bearing hundreds of miles of living ice that gave rise to swift rivers alive with giant salmon; the first land in the Pacific Northwest to be reported by explorers, the last to be mapped--the last wilderness." Murray Morgan has recorded the epic adventures of the pioneers of this remote region in this rousing and humor-filled saga, one that should capture the imagination of Americans everywhere.

    But the same things that have made it so have also made a good marriage more fulfilling than ever before. In this enlightening and hugely entertaining book, historian and marriage expert Stephanie Coontz takes readers from the marital intrigues of ancient Babylon to the sexual torments of Victorian couples to demonstrate how recent the idea of marrying for love is-and how absurd it would have seemed to most of our ancestors. It was only 200 years ago that marriage began to be about love and emotional commitment, and since then the very things that have strengthened marriage as a personal relationship have steadily weakened it as a social institution. Marriage, A History brings intelligence, wit, and some badly needed perspective to today's marital debates and dilemmas.

    Lumped into the burgeoning alt-country movement, the band soon landed a major label deal and recorded an instant classic: Strangers Almanac. That's when tour manager Thomas O'Keefe met the young musician.For the next three years, Thomas was at Ryan's side: on the tour bus, in the hotels, backstage at the venues. Whiskeytown built a reputation for being, as the Detroit Free Press put it, "half band, half soap opera," and Thomas discovered that young Ryan was equal parts songwriting prodigy and drunken buffoon. Ninety percent of the time, Thomas could talk Ryan into doing the right thing. Five percent of the time, he could cover up whatever idiotic thing Ryan had done. But the final five percent? Whiskeytown was screwed.Twenty-plus years later, accounts of Ryan's legendary antics are still passed around in music circles. But only three people on the planet witnessed every Whiskeytown show from the release of Strangers Almanac to the band's eventual breakup: Ryan, fiddle player Caitlin Cary, and Thomas O'Keefe.

    Three Roads to the Alamo is the definitive book about the lives of David Crockett, James Bowie and William Barret Travis, ”the legendary frontiersmen and fighters who met their destiny at the Alamo in one of the most famous and tragic battles in American history” and about what really happened in that battle.

    The rumors are convincing enough to have inspired a handful of scientific expeditions over the years, including a recent solo effort by American explorer and cryptozoologist Rory Nugent. After a ritual exorcism in Brazzaville, Nugent made his way by plane, boat, and foot to the lake's muddy shores, an environment little changed since the age of the dinosaurs. Paddling and trekking for weeks, living on snakes and snails, he finally spotted a brontosaurus-like shape far across the water. But when he tried to get closer, his guides ordered him back at gunpoint, explaining that "the god can approach man, but man never approaches the god."

    . . an informed and disturbing portrait of the new American badlands."--Chicago Tribune"[Kaplan is] tireless, curious, and smart. . . . I cannot imagine anyone will concoct a more convincing scenario for the American future." --Thurston Clarke,   The New York TimesWith the same prescience and eye for telling detail that distinguished his bestselling Balkan Ghosts, Robert Kaplan now explores his native country, the United States of America. His starting point: the conviction that America is a country not in decline but in transition, slowly but inexorably shedding its identity as a monolithic nation-state and assuming a radically new one.        Everywhere Kaplan travels--from St. Louis, Missouri, to Portland, Oregon, from the forty-ninth parallel to the banks of the Rio Grande--he finds an America ever more fragmented along lines of race, class, education, and geography. An America whose wealthy communities become wealthier and more fortress-like as they become more closely linked to the world's business capitals than to the desolate ghettoes next door. An America where the political boundaries between the states--and between the U.S. and Canada and Mexico--are becoming increasingly blurred, betokening a vast open zone for trade, commerce, and cultural interaction, the nexus of tomorrow's transnational world. Never nostalgic or falsely optimistic, bracingly unafraid of change and its consequences, Kaplan paints a startling portrait of post-Cold War America--a great nation entering the final, most uncertain phase of its history. Here is travel writing with the force of prophecy."Lively . . . Kaplan has a sharp eye for social truth, and his encounters with a chorus of eloquent citizens of the West keeps the narrative humming." --Outside

    Filled with strange anecdotes and illustrated with many bizarre and ghoulish images, Death: A History of Man’s Obsessions and Fears records the lengths to which people throughout history have gone to cope with the five principle fears regarding death: the fear of being buried alive; of our body being defiled in the grave; of disintegrating; of being forgotten; and of suffering an ignominious death. Here you can read about: The case of Lavrinia Merli, who died of hysterics. Two days after burial she was discovered turned over in her grave, having given birth to a seven month old baby. The various methods of embalming, including the Egyptian, and a step-by-step account of modern embalming. The horrifying slow and painful ending of Robert Francois Damiens, who was tortured to death after attempting to assassinate King Louis XV.

    Bidwell offers her firsthand experience and advice on Mount Rushmore and the Black Hills — including the Southern Hills, the Badlands, and Keystone. Bidwell provides unique travel strategies such as Best Hiking Trails, Viewing Wildlife, and Fossil Collecting in the Parks, Grasslands, and National Forest. Expert tips include the best sights for dining, shopping, accommodations, and camping, providing travelers with the tools they need for a more personal and memorable visit to Mount Rushmore and the Black Hills.

    Joel Gold had seen before was admitted to his unit at Bellevue Hospital. This man claimed he was being filmed constantly and that his life was being broadcast around the world like The Truman Show—the 1998 film depicting a man who is unknowingly living out his life as the star of a popular soap opera. Over the next few years, Dr. Gold saw a number of patients suffering from what he and his brother, Dr. Ian Gold, began calling the “Truman Show delusion,” launching them on a quest to understand the nature of this particular phenomenon, of delusions more generally, and of madness itself.The current view of delusions is that they are the result of biology gone awry, of neurons in the brain misfiring. In contrast, the Golds argue that delusions are the result of the interaction between the brain and the social world. By exploring the major categories of delusion through fascinating case studies and marshaling the latest research in schizophrenia, the brothers reveal the role of culture and the social world in the development of psychosis—delusions in particular. Suspicious Minds presents a groundbreaking new vision of just how dramatically our surroundings can influence our brains.

    He traces the crucial contributions made by the Indians to our federal system of government, our democratic institutions, modern medicine, agriculture, architecture, and ecology, and in this astonishing, ground-breaking book takes a giant step toward recovering a true American history.

    Authors Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English have never lost faith in science itself, but insist that we hold those who interpret it to higher standards. Women are entering the medical and scientific professions in greater numbers but as recent research shows, experts continue to use pseudoscience to tell women how to live. This edition of For Her Own Good provides today's readers with an indispensable dose of informed skepticism.

    In these conversations with Tariq Ali, recorded in Edward Said's Riverside Drive apartment in New York in June 1994, about a decade before he finally lost his battle with cancer, Said brings his considerable intellect and deep personal engagement to bear on some of the most troubling and volatile issues of our time as he ranges back over his own dislocated existence, his initiation into politics, his involvement with the Palestine cause, his approach to the study of culture and his pervasive love of literature and music. Intimate, personal, thought-provoking and absorbing, these conversations capture Said as political activist, cultural historian, professor of literature and music aficionado -- and confirm his position as one of the most passionate and thoughtful intellections of our time.

    This is not the familiar saga of mansions, avenues, and robber barons, but the messy, turbulent, often murderous story of the city's slums; the teeming streets--scene of innumerable cons and crimes whose cramped and overcrowded housing is still a prominent feature of the cityscape.Low Life voyages through Manhattan from four different directions. Part One examines the actual topography of Manhattan from 1840 to 1919; Part Two, the era's opportunities for vice and entertainment--theaters and saloons, opium and cocaine dens, gambling and prostitution; Part Three investigates the forces of law and order which did and didn't work to contain the illegalities; Part Four counterposes the city's tides of revolt and idealism against the city as it actually was.Low Life provides an arresting and entertaining view of what New York was actually like in its salad days. But it's more than simpy a book about New York. It's one of the most provocative books about urban life ever written--an evocation of the mythology of the quintessential modern metropolis, which has much to say not only about New York's past but about the present and future of all cities.

    

    Fascinated by the recurring theme of flight in Peruvian folklore, Shah sets out to discover whether the Incas really were able to "fly like birds" over the jungle, as a Spanish monk reported. Or was their soaring drug-induced? His journey, full of surreal experiences, takes him from the Andes mountains to the desert and finally, in the company of a Vietnam vet, up the Amazon deep into the jungle to discover the secrets of the Shuar, a tribe of legendary savagery.- Travel writing at its best, at once colorful, informative, and amusing. Doris Lessing said that Shah has a "genius for surreal traveling."- The cast of characters includes madmen and dreames, sorcerers and con men, headhunters and scholars--in short, the usual assortment for Shah.- Features an appendix on flora-based hallucinogens of Amazonia, including ayahuasca, "the vine of the dead."- Hardcover ISBN: 1-55970-613-9