There was a need for a book that, eschewing sensationalism and simplistic answers, would examine the holes in the fabric of women’s talk of the last thirty or forty years. The contributors, a cross-section of women, would be asked to explore defining moments in their lives rarely aired in common discourse: truths they had never shared, subjects they hadn’t written about before or otherwise found a place for. What Carol Shields and Marjorie Anderson wanted to hear about were the experiences that had brought unexpected pleasure or disappointment, that somehow had caught each woman unawares. The pieces, woven together, would be a tapestry of stories about what women experience but don’t talk about. The resulting book became an instant #1 bestseller.“Our feeling was that women are so busy protecting themselves and other people that they still feel they have to keep quiet about some subjects,” Carol Shields explained in an interview. Dropped Threads takes as its model the kind of informal discussions women have every day – over coffee, over lunch, over work, over the Internet – and pushes them further, sometimes even into painful territory. Subjects include work, menopause, childbirth, a husband’s terminal illness, the loss of a child, getting old, the substance of women’s friendships, the power of sexual feelings, the power of power, and that nagging question, “How do I look?” Some of the experiences are instantly recognizable; others are bound to provoke debate or inspire readers to examine their own lives more closely.The book is a collection of short, engaging pieces by more than thirty women, from Newfoundland to Vancouver Island. Many are mothers, some are grandmothers, and many are professionals, including journalists, professors, lawyers, musicians, a corporate events planner and a senator. Readers will find the personal revelations of some of their favourite authors here, such as Margaret Atwood, Bonnie Burnard, Sharon Butala, Joan Barfoot, Joan Clark and Katherine Govier. Other contributors include:• Eleanor Wachtel, CBC radio host, talks about her early fears of speaking in public.• June Callwood, journalist, social activist and a Companion of the Order of Canada, at the age of seventy-six is surprised at her failure to find answers to the imponderable dilemmas surrounding human life, and of her lack of connection to the “apparition” in the mirror.• Isabel Huggan, short story writer, muses on what she considers the impossibility of mothers passing on knowledge to their daughters, and on her own feeling that “we are girls dressed up in ladies’ clothing, pretending.”With writing that is reflective, often amusing, poignant, emotional and profound, Dropped Threads is the first book to tackle the lesser-discussed issues of middle age and is the first anthology the editors have compiled together.

    Flow spans its fascinating, occasionally wacky and sometimes downright scary story: from mikvahs (ritual cleansing baths) to menopause, hysteria to hysterectomies—not to mention the Pill, cramps, the history of underwear, and the movie about puberty they showed you in 5th grade. Flow answers such questions as: What’s the point of getting a period? What did women do before pads and tampons? What about new drugs that promise to end periods—a hot idea or not? Sex during your period: gross or a turn-on? And what’s normal, anyway?  With color reproductions of (campy) historical ads and early (excruciating) femcare devices, it also provides a fascinating (and mind-boggling) gallery of this complex, personal and uniquely female process. As irreverent as it is informative, Flow gives an everyday occurrence its true props – and eradicates the stigma placed on it for centuries.

    We find a smart, funny bisexual torn between the pure, abstract world of programming and her involvement in San Francisco's city-wide registration system for AIDS patients.

    This pamphlet explores two important phases in the male takeover of health care: the suppression of witches in medieval Europe and the rise of the male medical profession in the United States. The authors conclude that despite efforts to exclude them, the resurgence of women as healers should be a long-range goal of the women’s movement.

    He could run, throw, field and he had a sweet swing. But during his twelve years in the major leagues, Pepi devoted most of his energy to swinging off the field. He blew his career, he destroyed two marriages, he lost three children and he came very close to a nervous breakdown. At age 33 he gave up a $70,000 contract in Japan and quit baseball for good. He finally admitted that most of his life he had been living a lie, acting the carefree clown to cover up his inner pain. It was time to close the act. In Joe, You Coulda Made Us Proud, Pepitone attempts to show what was behind his berserk behavior. He does so in the most devastatingly honest terms, holding back none of the embarrassment, the anguish, the guilt he kept accumulating. He tells of the father he loved so much, "Willie Pep" Pepitone, the toughest man in a tough Brooklyn neighborhood. Obsessed with making his son a baseball star, Willie constantly beat hell out of Joe. One night, enraged at his father, Joe said,"Mom- I wish he'd die!" The next day Willie died. He tells how he demolished two marriages by trying to ball American, of how he was haunted by the words of his first child - "Daddy, don't leave me" - and of the nights when the guilt left him impotent. Despite the travail, though, there is much humor in Joe's story. Such as the time he was staying at Frank Sinatra's home, and Joe has a $350 pool shot line up. Just as he shot, Sinatra knocked the ball away. "All right, Frank... I won the money." Sinatra, grinning, said, "Joe, this is my game, this is my table - and we are playing my rules." Usually Joe Pepitone played only by his rules, and those rules maimed him. Yet his regrets are not for what he did to himself... "You do what you have to do, and you pay the price - but you pay it double when you see how it has hurt others you love." - from book's dustjacket

    Part coming-of-age story, part mind-altering manifesto on gender and sexuality, coming directly to you from the life experiences of a transgender woman, Gender Outlaw breaks all the rules and leaves the reader forever changed.26 black-and-white illustrations.

    You have arrived in the hills. In here, you are surrounded by dense, menacing forests, enveloped in a deadly silence... You never know what lurks here in the Cold, dark night. Do not walk alone after sunset in the hills. A beautiful woman in white haunts the Lonely pathways, looking to enchant and ensnare men... All the people who died in accidents here... They say you hear their screams at night. And the deserted lodges sitting amidst lush greenery and calm streams... Spirits lie in wait here, ready to prey on the living. There are sceptics who did not heed these warnings. They tried to rationalize what they saw, what they felt. But when they came face to face with the beings that they believed didn’t exist, they couldn’t run away anymore... Ghosts of the silent hills is a collection that will make your nights a little scarier, encompassing the very best spine-chilling stories based on true hauntings.About the AuthorBorn in Shimla in 1955, Anita Krishan spent the initial twenty-two years of her life in this pristine Himalayan town, earning her master’s degree in English literature from Himachal University, and moving on to a career of introducing delights of the language to her young learners. In her long tenure as an educator, she has enriched the lives of countless students with the mystery of the narrative. A versatile writer, each of her literary works appertains to a different genre... from the joys and travails of life, to terrorism that has brought the world to its tenterhooks, to now the paranormal. She has travelled extensively around the globe absorbing the diverse human ethos and cultures—the delectable food for her thoughts. Presently, she lives in Gurgaon with her family.

    "Your hair matters far, far less than you think," is the wry advice that begins the letter bestselling mystery writer Lisa Scottoline pens to her twenty-year old self. And Maya Angelou, leaving home at seventeen with a newborn baby in her arms, assures herself she will succeed on her own, even if she does return home every now and then.These remarkable women are joined by Madeleine Albright, Queen Noor of Jordan, Cokie Roberts, Naomi Wolf, Eileen Fisher, Jane Kaczmarek, Olympia Dukakis, Macy Gray, and many others. Their letters contain rare glimpses into the personal lives of extraordinary women and powerful wisdom that readers will treasure.Wisdom from What I Know Now"Don't let anybody raise you. You've been raised." -Maya Angelou"Try more things. Cross more lines." -Breena Clarke"Learn how to celebrate." -Olympia Dukakis"You don't have to be afraid of living alone." -Eileen Fisher"Please yourself first...everything else follows." -Macy Gray"Don't be so quick to dismiss another human being." -Barbara Boxer"Work should not be work." -Mary Matalin"You can leave the work world--and come back on your own terms." -Cokie Roberts"Laundry will wait very patiently." -Nora Roberts"Your hair matters far, far less than you think" -Lisa Scottoline"Speak the truth but ride a fast horse." -Kitty Kelley

    While the plot of the book was wildly imaginative, it was also based on the author's own experience as a sex worker in the 1990s and early 2000s, and on her coming out as lesbian.How Poetry Saved My Life, Amber Dawn's sophomore book, reveals an even more poignant and personal landscape—the terrain of sex work, queer identity, and survivor pride. This memoir, told in prose and poetry, offers a frank, multifaceted portrait of the author's experiences hustling the streets of Vancouver, and the how those years took away her self-esteem and nearly destroyed her; at the crux of this autobiographical narrative is the tender celebration of poetry and literature, that—as the title suggests—acted as a lifeline during her most pivotal moments.

    

    Hey Natalie Jean is a terrific read for anyone who wants to make her life more beautiful.” – Gretchen Rubin                          The blog Hey Natalie Jean has won a cult following with writer Natalie Holbrook’s honest, inspiring, and often witty posts on topics like marriage, babies, nesting, and style. Natalie’s first book, Hey Natalie Jean is one part manifesto and three parts ideas, projects, and advice. Beautifully illustrated and whimsically designed, the book offers twenty-five essays and how-tos that serve as a guide to life: making date-night magic in the middle of the mundane, successfully exploring the city with a three-year-old, and creating a satisfying daily routine that still leaves room for little adventures and lots of magic.                                                         Natalie’s optimism, creativity, keen eye, and zeal for life are palpable, and she encourages others to make their lives beautiful with ease. This heartfelt, personal collection of essays and photographs shows Natalie’s ability to identify and describe life’s lovely incidentals in the everyday routine of errands, play dates, and naps. Inspiring, moving, and whip-smart, Hey Natalie Jean is an honest look at the hard work and courage that go into creating a beautiful life.

    Rosen, a veteran legal journalist, scholar, and president of the National Constitution Center, shares with us the justice's observations on a variety of topics, and her intellect, compassion, sense of humor, and humanity shine through. The affection they have for each other as friends is apparent in their banter and in their shared love for the Constitution--and for opera.In Conversations with RBG, Justice Ginsburg discusses the future of Roe v. Wade, her favorite dissents, the cases she would most like to see overruled, the #MeToo movement, how to be a good listener, how to lead a productive and compassionate life, and of course the future of the Supreme Court itself. These frank exchanges illuminate the steely determination, self-mastery, and wit that have inspired Americans of all ages to embrace the woman known to all as "Notorious RBG."Whatever the topic, Justice Ginsburg always has something interesting--and often surprising--to say. And while few of us will ever have the opportunity to chat with her face-to-face, Jeffrey Rosen brings us by her side as never before. Conversations with RBG is a deeply felt portrait of an American hero.

    Because life gets a hell of a lot better when we drop heaviness and take off the things we don't want to carry anymore.

    This moving and insightful bestseller, based on in-depth interviews with 135 women, explains why they feel this way. Updated with a new preface exploring how the authors' collaboration and research developed, this tenth anniversary edition addresses many of the questions that the authors have been asked repeatedly in the years since Women's Ways of Knowing was originally published.

    Margot Weiss’s research entailed attending dungeon play parties, workshops on SM techniques, and business meetings of the Society of Janus, one of America’s oldest BDSM organizations. She interviewed more than sixty SM practitioners, including dungeon owners, well-known prodommes (professional dominants), and community experts. Weiss vividly evokes the feel of the BDSM scene in San Francisco area in the early 2000s.At the same time, she challenges notions of SM as inherently transgressive, revealing a technique-oriented community, largely organized around classes, rules, and the acquisition of expensive sex toys. Most members of the Bay Area’s BDSM community were white, heterosexual, middle-aged, well-off, and involved in long-term relationships.Weiss analyzed SM “scenes”—sexual encounters involving roles, costumes, and props—including dramatizations of slave markets and the creation of the Abu Ghraib photographs. She contends that such performances eroticize social inequality, reproducing hierarchies based on race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality, rather than offering a safe space, separate from real-world inequities.