The Dresden Dolls Companion


Amanda Palmer - 2006
    This Boston-based alternative pop/German-like cabaret duo hand-designed this book which includes art, photos, commentary and 11 songs from their 2004 release. Songs included are: Bad Habit * Coin Operated Boy * Girl Anachronism * Good Day * Gravity * Half Jack * The Jeep Song * Missed Me *Perfect Fit * Slide * Truce.

Naked (in Italy): A Memoir About the Pitfalls of La Dolce Vita


M.E. Evans - 2019
     In her late twenties, M.E. Evans hops on a plane to Italy on a mission to change her life and that’s exactly what happens. Unfortunately, personal growth isn’t always easy. In Naked, bestselling author, M.E. Evans tackles the dysfunctional family narrative and travel memoir in a way that is refreshingly honest, painfully vulnerable, and wildly entertaining. If you’ve ever set foot in a foreign country or picked up a travel memoir you probably think you already know what Naked is about: a dreamy personal account of the life-altering beauty that is Italy. And sure, that’s in there, nestled somewhere between the profound grief, bruised ego, debilitating anxiety, chronic depression, vagina paintings, a boyfriend with billowing chest hair and a mother-in-law who forcibly irons your underwear. Evans’ dream of a magical life abroad is marred by forbidden love, the death of her younger brother, and a batshit crazy family, yet she skillfully merges tragedy and humor for a wild emotional journey exploring what it means to be human–flaws and all. Evans’ wit, compassion, and vulnerability make reading this book a rarely authentic and relatable experience. You’ll cry, you’ll cackle, and you’ll want Evans to be your best friend.

Unwelcomed Songs: Collected Lyrics 1980-1992


Henry Rollins - 2002
    A must for all Rollins fans.

Virgins of Venice: Broken Vows and Cloistered Lives in the Renaissance Convent


Mary Laven - 2002
    It was also a city of walls and secrets, ghettos and cloisters. In this captivating book, Cambridge historian Mary Laven uncovers the long-hidden stories of the “Virgins of Venice” and the surprising lives they led. Laven has created a detailed and dramatic tapestry of resourceful, determined, often passionate women who managed to lead fulfilling lives despite their virtual imprisonment. Far from being precincts of piety and silence, the convents were hotbeds of political scheming, colorful pageantry, and illicit love. Rich in intrigue and gossip, eye-opening in its revelations, Virgins of Venice brings to life a culturally vibrant period in Venice and the hidden residents who dwelled behind its walls.

Painting and Experience in Fifteenth-Century Italy: A Primer in the Social History of Pictorial Style


Michael Baxandall - 1972
    Serving as both an introduction to fifteenth-century Italian painting and as a text on how to interpret social history from the style of pictures in a given historical period, this new edition to Baxandall's pre-eminent scholarly volume examines early Renaissance painting, and explains how the style of painting in any society reflects the visual skills and habits that evolve out of daily life. Renaissance painting, for example, mirrors the experience of such activities as preaching, dancing, and gauging barrels. The volume includes discussions of a wide variety of painters, including Filippo Lippi, Fra Angelico, Stefano di Giovanni, Sandro Botticelli, Masaccio, Luca Signorelli, Boccaccio, and countless others. Baxandall also defines and illustrates sixteen concepts used by a contemporary critic of painting, thereby assembling the basic equipment needed to explore fifteenth-century art.

Phantom of the Highlands


Kenna Kendrick - 2020
    Her sex was a barrier to everything she wanted: freedom, adventure, and the need to be heard. Fascinated by tales of the misty Highlands when the opportunity arises, she flees secretly to Edinburgh.But the world is much more wicked than Gillian knows, and the noble Highlander she encounters might have ulterior motives.With his people suffering from poverty and hunger, Col, a fierce Scotsman, decides to defy fate. He turns himself into the Phantom and provides for the Scottish by pillaging the English.When he meets the most striking lass, he will be immediately charmed by her boldness and beauty.Until he discovers that her family is responsible for all his life's tragedies. And so, he captures her without knowing that he is the lesser of the evils after her.Gillian is not aware that she is in grave danger, and that without Col's help, nothing can stop her impending death.He captured her to save his people, but she stole his heart…

Center of Attention: A True Crime Memoir


Jami D. Brown Martin - 2020
    The photo looks completely out of place on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list where it’s been since December, 8, 2007. For eight of those years, Jason appeared directly beside Osama Bin Laden. Bin Laden is long gone, but Jason is still wanted for armed robbery and murder.For years, his sister, Jami D. Brown Martin has watched the true crime programs and read the amateur investigative blogs devoted to Jason, his crime, and the efforts to apprehend him knowing the story wasn’t as simple, nor was it just Jason’s. To be the sister, brother, or relative of one of the world’s most wanted men is to live every day with the horrible truth and many consequences of his brutal act.CENTER OF ATTENTION is the story of a former Mormon missionary turned murderer. It is also a riveting look behind the facade of the genetically blessed, seemingly prominent and pious Brown family of Laguna Beach, California. It is a tale of the family patriarch, John Brown, who disappeared without a trace ten years before his son. More important, it is the gripping and ultimately hopeful story of the sister of one of the world’s most wanted fugitives and her journey to accept that despite being a product of the same crazy environment as her brother, her life and path are her own.

Misery Obscura: The Photography of Eerie Von (1981-2009)


Eerie Von - 2009
    Beginning as the unofficial photographer for punk legends The Misfits and later taking charge of the bass guitar as a founding member of underground pioneers Samhain and metal gods Danzig, the evil eye of Eerie Von's camera captured the dark heart of rock's most vital and bleeding-edge period, a time when rock and roll was not only dangerous, but downright menacing. Eerie Von's lens has documented everything from The Misfits' humble beginnings in Lodi, New Jersey, to the heights of Danzig's stadium-rock glory alongside metal superstars Metallica. As well as an essential visual document of music history, Eerie's road stories of triumph and damnation bring to life an era the likes of which will never again be seen.

The Passion of Artemisia


Susan Vreeland - 2001
    From extraordinary highs - patronage by the Medicis, friendship with Galileo and, most importantly of all, beautiful and outstandingly original paintings - to rape by her father's colleague, torture by the Inquisition, life-long struggles for acceptance by the artistic Establishment, and betrayal by the men she loved, Artemisia was a bold and brilliant woman who lived as she wanted, and paid a high price.

Spon: A Guide to Spoon Carving and the New Wood Culture


Barn The Spoon - 2017
    King of the whittlers.' Sunday Telegraph Barn The Spoon, as he’s affectionately known is a rare master craftsman in the art of spoon carving. In this book he generously shares his extraordinary skill, gentle philosophy and his life’s work – designing and carving beautiful spoons that are both a joy to use and hold.The simple, ordinary spoon is part of our everyday lives, intimately entwined with the acts of eating and socialising, from stirring our first cup of coffee to scraping the last bit of pudding from the bowl. And who doesn't like to spoon in bed? Barn’s spoons will take you on a journey into the new wood culture, from understanding the relationship between wood, the raw material and its majestic origins in our trees and woodland, to the workshop and the axe block, and into your own kitchen. Barn will show you how to use the axe and knife, from how they should feel in your hand to honing the perfect edge when carving your own spoons. Featuring sixteen unique designs in the four main categories of spoon – eating, serving, cooking and measuring spoons, Barn takes you through the nuances of their making, how each design is informed by its function at the table or in the kitchen, and the key skills you will learn – such as creating octagonal handles, manipulating grain patterns and mastering bent branches. Beautiful photography will inspire and act as a blue-print to help perfect your technique.

The Book of the Courtier


Baldassare Castiglione
    Set in 1507, when the author himself was an attaché to the Duke of Urbino, the book consists of a series of fictional conversations between members of the Duke's retinue. All aspects of leadership come under discussion, but the primary focus rests upon the relationship between advisors and those whom they counsel. Ever-relevant subjects include the decision-making process, maintaining an ethical stance, and the best ways of interacting with authority figures. Frequently assigned in university courses on literature, history, and Renaissance studies, the Dover edition of this classic work will be the lowest-priced edition available.

All the Time in the World: A Book of Hours


Jessica Kerwin Jenkins - 2013
    Divided into more than seventy-five entries, All the Time in the World is brimming with witty bons mots, interesting etymologies, and arresting anecdotes encompassing an array of cultures and eras. Subjects covered include the daylong ceremony of laying a royal Elizabethan tablecloth; the radicalization of sartorial chic in 1890s Paris; Nostradamus's belief in the aphrodisiac power of jam; the sensuous practice of sniffing incense in fifteenth-century Japan; the American fascination with flaming desserts; the short-lived artistic discipline of “lumia,” or visual music; the evolution of coffee from a religious ritual to a forbidden delight in the Middle East; Henriette d'Angeville's fearless and wine-fueled ascent of Mont Blanc; the elaborate treasure hunts concocted by London's Bright Young Things; and the musical revolution known as bebop. An antidote to the contemporary cult of “getting things done,” All the Time in the World revives forgotten treasures of the past while inspiring a passion for good living in the present.

Dissolve


Nikki Gemmell
    Decades later she has written a deeply personal, profoundly intimate reflection on love and female creativity, and what happens when the two collide in a man's world.Dissolve is a conversation. A conversation with the young women of Gemmell's teenage daughter's generation, and of course with men.'Reading this memoir is like therapy for the soul' ArtsHub'one of the most enriching, yet debilitating reads I've experienced... tremendous, moving writing' Jessie Tu, Women's Agenda'Nikki Gemmell wrote this book for me, and I suspect there will be many women who feel the same way... Each page is imbued with startling self-awareness and profound wisdom... Vulnerable, honest and raw' Better Reading

Worldly Goods: A New History of the Renaissance


Lisa Jardine - 1996
    As Jardine boldly states, "The seeds of our own exuberant multiculturalism and bravura consumerism were planted in the European Renaissance." While Europe's royalty and merchants competed with each other to acquire works of art, vicious commercial battles were being fought over who should control the centers for trade around the globe. Jardine encompasses Renaissance culture from its western borders in Christendom to its eastern reaches in the Islamic Ottoman Empire, bringing this opulent epoch to life in all its material splendor and competitive acquisitiveness. "A savvy, street-smart history of the Renaissance."—Dan Cryer, Newsday "Jardine's lively book is specific and down-to-earth. A particularly fascinating section recalls how books suddenly ceased to be principally collector's items or aids to scholars and became the sixteenth century's Internet, dispensing fact and fancy to high and low."—The New Yorker

Lives of the Artists (Volume II)


Giorgio Vasari
    Vasari's original and soaring vision plus his acute aesthetic judgements have made him one of the most influential art historians of all time.