Book picks similar to
Historical Fiction II: A Guide to the Genre by Sarah L. Johnson


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Gospel Fictions


Randel Helms - 1988
    In Helms' exegesis of the Gospel miracle stories, he traces the greatest of these - the resurrection of Lazarus four days after his death - to the Egyptian myth of the resurrection of Osiris by the god Horus.Helms maintains that the Gospels are self-reflexive; they are not about Jesus so much as they are about the writers' attitudes concerning Jesus. Helms examines each of the narratives - the language, the sources, the similarities and differences - and shows that their purpose was not so much to describe the past as to affect the present.This scholarly yet readable work demonstrates how the Gospels surpassed the expectations of their authors, influencing countless generations by creating a life-enhancing understanding of the nature of Jesus of Nazareth.

The Naked Ape


Desmond Morris - 1967
    Here is the Naked Ape at his most primal in love, at work, at war. Meet man as he really is: relative to the apes, stripped of his veneer as we see him courting, making love, sleeping, socializing, grooming, playing. The Naked Ape takes its place alongside Darwin’s Origin of the Species, presenting man not as a fallen angel, but as a risen ape, remarkable in his resilience, energy and imagination, yet an animal nonetheless, in danger of forgetting his origins. With its penetrating insights on man's beginnings, sex life, habits and our astonishing bonds to the animal kingdom, The Naked Ape is a landmark, at once provocative, compelling and timeless.

Twisty Little Passages: An Approach to Interactive Fiction


Nick Montfort - 2003
    Twisty Little Passages (the title refers to a maze in Adventure, the first interactive fiction) is the first book-length consideration of this form, examining it from gaming and literary perspectives. Nick Montfort, an interactive fiction author himself, offers both aficionados and first-time users a way to approach interactive fiction that will lead to a more pleasurable and meaningful experience of it.Twisty Little Passages looks at interactive fiction beginning with its most important literary ancestor, the riddle. Montfort then discusses Adventure and its precursors (including the I Ching and Dungeons and Dragons), and follows this with an examination of mainframe text games developed in response, focusing on the most influential work of that era, Zork. He then considers the introduction of commercial interactive fiction for home computers, particularly that produced by Infocom. Commercial works inspired an independent reaction, and Montfort describes the emergence of independent creators and the development of an online interactive fiction community in the 1990s. Finally, he considers the influence of interactive fiction on other literary and gaming forms. With Twisty Little Passages, Nick Montfort places interactive fiction in its computational and literary contexts, opening up this still-developing form to new consideration.

McKnight's Physical Geography: A Landscape Appreciation [With Access Code]


Darrel Hess - 1993
    Its clear writing style, superior art program, and other learning aids appeal to students in many majors. This edition includes thoroughly updated content and introduces renowned illustrator Dennis Tasa--yet it maintains the proven approach first presented by respected authority Tom L. McKnight more than 20 years ago.

Blood on the Bighorns


Carson McCloud - 2019
    First it took his mother, then his father, and now it threatens to end his own life as well. Merciless killer Kip Lane found Brett and his sweetheart, Allie, while they were out for an afternoon ride. Now Allie is missing and Brett lies at the bottom of a deep hole carrying three bullet holes. He’s got to escape and then rescue Allie from Kip’s clutches, but first he’s got to survive the cold lonesome night. Kip Lane isn’t Brett’s only concern though. There’s another man lurking behind the dashing outlaw. A dangerous man with money, powerful friends, and more than one gunfighter on his payroll. He aims to be the territory’s biggest rancher and Brett’s ranch is the key. Brett has a few allies he can count on. Gideon Sweeney and his daughter Lisa at the local Mormon settlement along with Red Elk, an old Crow medicine man, and Mourning Song, a beautiful Cheyenne woman with her own tragic history. Will it be enough to take back Brett’s heritage or will young Rawlins find his end beneath the guns of his enemies? Either way there will be Blood on the Bighorns.

The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes: The Novels


Arthur Conan Doyle - 1966
    Klinger's brilliant new annotations of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's 56 short stories in 2004 created a Holmes sensation. Here, in this eagerly awaited third volume, Klinger reassembles Doyle's four seminal novels in their original order, with over 1,000 new notes, 350 illustrations and period photographs, and tantalizing new Sherlockian theories. Inside, readers will find: A Study in Scarlet (1887)—a tale of murder and revenge that tells of Holmes and Dr. Watson's first meeting; The Sign of Four (1889)—a cinematic tale of lost treasure; The Hound of the Baskervilles (1901)—hailed as the greatest mystery novel of all time; and The Valley of Fear (1914)—a fresh murder scene that leads Holmes to solve a long-forgotten mystery. Whether as a stand-alone volume or as a companion to the boxed short stories, this classic work illuminates the timeless genius of Conan Doyle for an entirely new generation. Slipcased hardcover; two-color text; 300 illustrations.

Guitar Aerobics: A 52-Week, One-lick-per-day Workout Program for Developing, Improving and Maintaining Guitar Technique


Troy Nelson - 2007
    The guitar exercises cover several musical styles including rock, blues, jazz, metal, country, and funk. Techniques taught include alternate picking, arpeggios, sweep picking, string skipping, legato, string bending, and rhythm guitar. These exercises will increase your speed and improve your dexterity and pick- and fret-hand accuracy the more you practice them. The accompanying CD includes all 365 workout licks plus play-along grooves in every style at eight different metronome settings.

Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character


Jonathan Shay - 1994
    Shay examines the psychological devastation of war by comparing the soldiers of Homer's Iliad with Vietnam veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Although the Iliad was written twenty-seven centuries ago it has much to teach about combat trauma, as do the more recent, compelling voices and experiences of Vietnam vets.

Why You Should Read Kafka Before You Waste Your Life


James Hawes - 2008
    And that brooding face carries instant images: bleak and threatening visions of an inescapable bureaucracy, nightmarish transformations, uncanny predictions of the Holocaust. But while Kafka’s genius is beyond question, the image of a mysterious, sickly, shadowy figure who was scarcely known in his own lifetime bears no resemblance to the historical reality. Franz Kafka was a popular and well-connected millionaire’s son who enjoyed good-time girls, brothels, and expensive porn, who landed a highly desirable state job that pulled in at least $90,000 a year in today’s dollars for a six-hour day, who remained a loyal member of Prague’s German-speaking Imperial elite right to the end, and whose work was backed by a powerful literary clique.Here are some of the prevalent Kafka myths:*Kafka was the archetypal genius neglected in his lifetime.*Kafka was lonely.*Kafka was stuck in a dead-end job, struggling to find time to write.*Kafka was tormented by fear of sex.*Kafka was unbendingly honest about himself to the women in his life – too honest.*Kafka had a terrible, domineering father who had no understanding of his son’s needs.*Kafka’s style is mysterious and opaque.*Kafka takes us into bizarre worlds.James Hawes wants to tear down the critical walls which generations of gatekeepers---scholars, biographers, and tourist guides---have built up around Franz Kafka, giving us back the real man and the real significance of his splendid works. And he'll take no prisoners in the process.

James Joyce


Edna O'Brien - 1999
    After all, both authors engaged in a profoundly ambivalent excoriation of their native Ireland. And while O'Brien's sexual politics can make Joyce seem like a fusty Edwardian by comparison, both novelists got a certain amount of flack for their erotic frankness. So this latest match from the Penguin Lives series seems like a good one--and largely lives up to its promise. O'Brien makes no pretense of competing with Richard Ellmann's immense, magisterial portrait. Instead she has concocted in James Joyce something that resembles one of her own novels: a spirited, lyrical, and acerbic narrative that just happens to feature the author of Ulysses in the starring role. Having experienced the constrictions of Irish life firsthand, O'Brien is particularly good on Joyce's downwardly mobile childhood. Was his resulting hatred of his native land exaggerated? Apparently not: No one who has not lived in such straitened and hideous circumstances can understand the battering of that upbringing. All the more because they had come down in the world, a tumble from semi-gentility, servants, a nicely laid table, cut glasses, a piano, the accoutrements of middle-class life, relegated to the near slums in Mountjoy Square, the gaunt spectral mansions in which children sat like mice in the gaping doorways. The author also gives a vivid sense of her subject's devotion to his art, an altar upon which he happily sacrificed his family, health, friends, and even his eyesight. She is stubborn in her defense of Joyce's sublime irresponsibility, which she ascribes to all writers: "It is a paradox that while wrestling with the language to capture the human condition they become more callous, and cut off from the very human traits which they so glisteningly depict." O'Brien's own wrestling match in James Joyce has, to be honest, its share of pins and minor pratfalls: there are some embarrassing repetitions and punctuational oddities, and her occasional assimilation of Joyce's own language is an awkward (if heartfelt) form of homage. Still, when she sticks to her own inflections, her account of this "funnominal man" is an eminently readable and entertaining dose of Irish bitters. --James Marcus

A Topical Approach to Life-Span Development


John W. Santrock - 2001
    Drawing on a who's who list of expert consultants in all areas of developmental psychology, Santrock once again provides a trusted, comprehensive, readable, and engaging survey of the field. Rich applications and examples from a range of areas such as parenting, health care, and education ensure that students will remain engaged with the material. Significant revisions for the 5th edition include updated discussions of health and well-being as well as expanded coverage of diversity, culture, and gender.

Dying to Be Free: A Healing Guide for Families after a Suicide


Bev Cobain - 2005
    Those who have survived the loss of loved ones to suicide, unexpected illness, violence, and deaths of despair offer guidance for these painful and confusing times.Honest, gentle advice for those who have survived an unspeakable loss—the suicide of a loved one. Surviving the heartbreak of a loved one's suicide - you don't have to go through it alone. Authors Beverly Cobain and Jean Larch break through suicide's silent stigma in Dying to Be Free, offering gentle advice for those left behind, so that healing can begin.

Race, Class, and Gender in the United States: An Integrated Study


Paula S. Rothenberg - 1992
    Rothenberg offers students 126 readings, each providing different perspectives and examining the ways in which race, gender, class, and sexuality are socially constructed. Rothenberg deftly and consistently helps students analyze each phenomena, as well as the relationships among them, thereby deepening their understanding of each issue surrounding race and ethnicity.

Revelations: Visions, Prophecy, and Politics in the Book of Revelation


Elaine Pagels - 2012
    Through the bestselling books of Elaine Pagels, thousands of readers have come to know and treasure the suppressed biblical texts known as the Gnostic Gospels. As one of the world's foremost religion scholars, she has been a pioneer in interpreting these books and illuminating their place in the early history of Christianity. Her new book, however, tackles a text that is firmly, dramatically within the New Testament canon: The Book of Revelation, the surreal apocalyptic vision of the end of the world . . . or is it?In this startling and timely book, Pagels returns The Book of Revelation to its historical origin, written as its author John of Patmos took aim at the Roman Empire after what is now known as "the Jewish War," in 66 CE. Militant Jews in Jerusalem, fired with religious fervor, waged an all-out war against Rome's occupation of Judea and their defeat resulted in the desecration of Jerusalem and its Great Temple. Pagels persuasively interprets Revelation as a scathing attack on the decadence of Rome. Soon after, however, a new sect known as "Christians" seized on John's text as a weapon against heresy and infidels of all kinds-Jews, even Christians who dissented from their increasingly rigid doctrines and hierarchies.In a time when global religious violence surges, Revelations explores how often those in power throughout history have sought to force "God's enemies" to submit or be killed. It is sure to appeal to Pagels's committed readers and bring her a whole new audience who want to understand the roots of dissent, violence, and division in the world's religions, and to appreciate the lasting appeal of this extraordinary text.

A History of Pictures: From the Cave to the Computer Screen


David Hockney - 2016
    Here, in a collaboration with art critic Martin Gayford, he explores the many ways that artists have pictured the world, sharing sparkling insights and ideas that will delight every art lover and art maker. Readers who thrilled to Hockney’s Secret Knowledge know that he has an uncanny ability to get into the minds of artists. In A History of Pictures he covers far more ground, getting at the roots of visual expression and technique through hundreds of images—from cave paintings to frames from movies—that are reproduced. It’s a joyful celebration of one of humanity’s oldest impulses.