Haunted Ohio: Ghostly Tales from the Buckeye State (Buckeye Haunts)


Chris Woodyard - 1991
     There are tales as old as Native American ghostlore, as new as the one about a haunted airplane. There are stories about haunted presidents and haunted swimming pools. There are tales of the dead and famous and of the faceless dead. Visit that altered state of consciousness--Haunted Ohio. Stories from the following Ohio counties: Ashland, Auglaize, Butler, Champaign, Clark, Clermont, Columbiana, Coshocton, Crawford, Cuyahoga, Defiance, Erie, Fairfield, Franklin, Greene, Guernsey, Hamilton, Hardin, Knox, Lawrence, Licking, Mahoning, Marion, Medina, Meigs, Miami, Montgomery, Morgan, Morrow, Muskingum, Noble, Perry, Portage, Richland, Sandusky, Summit, Tuscarawas, Vinton, Wood, Wyandot. Includes general index and index by county, bibliography, source notes, and directory of haunted places open to the public.

Miracle Ball: My Hunt for the Shot Heard 'Round the World


Brian Biegel - 2009
    Giants third baseman Bobby Thomson hit the most dramatic home run in the history of baseball. The moment occurred in the bottom of the ninth inning of a sudden-death playoff game between the New York Giants and their arch rivals from Brooklyn, the Dodgers. People across the nation watched on their new TV sets, and the home run became known as “the Shot Heard ’Round the World.” But after clearing the left-field wall, the central artifact of the play–the ball itself–inexplicably went missing. The mystery of what happened to the legendary baseball has remained unsolved for a half century. Until now.Miracle Ball is the gripping account of author Brian Biegel’s two-year effort to unravel the mystery that experts said could never be solved. After his father, Jack, finds a baseball at a thrift store with clues dating back to 1951 and believes it could possibly be the most coveted piece of sports history, father and son begin a journey to prove its authenticity. Biegel becomes consumed with the quest–recognizing it as the only chance to rescue himself from an emotionally devastating personal crisis that had long been crippling him.The trail takes Biegel, a sports fan and documentary filmmaker, from an auction house in Long Island to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, to a backroom meeting straight out of a Martin Scorsese film to a dusty oil field in Texas, finally arriving at his final destination on a quiet gravel road in New Mexico, the last place he ever expected to be.Along the way the author meets an amazing cast of characters, including Bobby Thomson himself, who help him in his quest. Each adds their personal memories of the golden age of baseball, giving a broader scope and greater depth to this real-life detective story. As entertaining as it is inspiring, Miracle Ball is a story about faith, family, and heroes, about overcoming the odds and coming into the light, and about discovering the wondrous result of believing in yourself–and the amazing benefits of unconditional love. A sports story for the ages, an engrossing mystery narrative, and a moving account of a man’s unbreakable bond with his family and of his struggles to save himself, Miracle Ball delivers both heart and headlines.

The Gilded Leaf: Triumph, Tragedy, and Tobacco: Three Generations of the R. J. Reynolds Family and Fortune


Patrick Reynolds - 1989
    J. Reynolds tobacco family, one of America's richest and most intensely private clans. R.J. was the original founder of the company that became part of RJR Nabisco, which in 1988 was involved in the largest business takeover in history. Spanning three generations, the Reynolds's story moves from the triumphs of founder and corporate genius R. J. to the dissipation, scandal, and tragedy that plagued his children and grandchildren. There is a redemptive close, with grandson Patrick Reynolds founding Smokefree America and becoming a leading anti-smoking advocate. The Gilded Leaf presents, for the first time, a complete account of the family who captured, spent and redeemed the American dream.

For the Love of My Mother


J.P. Rodgers - 2005
    After giving birth to a son, John, Bridie's child was taken away from her, and she was sent to one of Ireland's infamous Magdalene Laundries. This was only the beginning... They took her freedom. They took her innocence. They took her child. But they couldn't take her spirit.

Temple Tales: Secrets and Stories from India's Sacred Places


Sudha G. Tilak - 2019
    These unique temples are not just places of worship, but living museums of architectural wonders, mind-boggling sculptures, graceful dances, colourful crafts and many other cultural activities. More than anything, they are treasure troves of lore and legend, teeming with tales of gods and goddesses, demons and devotees, plants and beasts, the magical and the mysterious – all just waiting to be discovered by you. Join Sudha G. Tilak as she takes you on an unusual journey to the country’s most sacred places, where the lines between fact and faith are blurred and stories come alive!

What We See When We Read


Peter Mendelsund - 2014
    A VINTAGE ORIGINAL.What do we see when we read? Did Tolstoy really describe Anna Karenina? Did Melville ever really tell us what, exactly, Ishmael looked like? The collection of fragmented images on a page - a graceful ear there, a stray curl, a hat positioned just so - and other clues and signifiers helps us to create an image of a character. But in fact our sense that we know a character intimately has little to do with our ability to concretely picture our beloved - or reviled - literary figures.In this remarkable work of nonfiction, Knopf's Associate Art Director Peter Mendelsund combines his profession, as an award-winning designer; his first career, as a classically trained pianist; and his first love, literature - he thinks of himself first, and foremost, as a reader - into what is sure to be one of the most provocative and unusual investigations into how we understand the act of reading.

Jane Steele


Lyndsay Faye - 2016
    And like Jane Eyre, they call her wicked - but in her case, she fears the accusation is true. When she flees, she leaves behind the corpses of her tormentors.A fugitive navigating London's underbelly, Jane rights wrongs on behalf of the have-nots whilst avoiding the noose. Until an advertisement catches her eye. Her aunt has died and the new master at Highgate House, Mr Thornfield, seeks a governess. Anxious to know if she is Highgate's true heir, Jane takes the position and is soon caught up in the household's strange spell. When she falls in love with the mysterious Charles Thornfield, she faces a terrible dilemma: can she possess him - body, soul and secrets - and what if he discovers her murderous past?

The Feather Thief


Kirk Wallace Johnson - 2018
    Home to one of the largest ornithological collections in the world, the Tring museum was full of rare bird specimens whose gorgeous feathers were worth staggering amounts of money to the men who shared Edwin's obsession: the Victorian art of salmon fly-tying. Once inside the museum, the champion fly-tier grabbed hundreds of bird skins--some collected 150 years earlier by a contemporary of Darwin's, Alfred Russel Wallace, who'd risked everything to gather them--and escaped into the darkness. Two years later, Kirk Wallace Johnson was waist high in a river in northern New Mexico when his fly-fishing guide told him about the heist. He was soon consumed by the strange case of the feather thief. What would possess a person to steal dead birds? Had Edwin paid the price for his crime? What became of the missing skins? In his search for answers, Johnson was catapulted into a years-long, worldwide investigation. The gripping story of a bizarre and shocking crime, and one man's relentless pursuit of justice, The Feather Thief is also a fascinating exploration of obsession, and man's destructive instinct to harvest the beauty of nature.

The Anime Encyclopedia: A Guide to Japanese Animation Since 1917


Jonathan Clements - 2001
    Included are over 2,000 Japanese animation films-from today's "PokA(c)mon," "Tenchi Muyo, "and "Sailor Moon" to the classic "Tetsuwan Atomu" ("Astro Boy") and little-known artistic gems like the anime life of Mozart-with key personnel, running time, studio, alternative titles, cross references, critical comment, and sex/violence warnings. Illustrated and fully indexed.Jonathan Clements has translated over 70 anime and manga and was editor of "Manga Max" from 1998-2000. Helen McCarthy is former editor of "Anime UK" and "Manga Mania" and author of "The Anime Movie Guide," "Hayao Miyazaki: Master of Japanese Animation," and, with Jonathan Clements, "The Erotic Anime Movie Guide."

Cruel Optimism


Lauren Berlant - 2011
    Offering bold new ways of conceiving the present, Lauren Berlant describes the cruel optimism that has prevailed since the 1980s, as the social-democratic promise of the postwar period in the United States and Europe has retracted. People have remained attached to unachievable fantasies of the good life—with its promises of upward mobility, job security, political and social equality, and durable intimacy—despite evidence that liberal-capitalist societies can no longer be counted on to provide opportunities for individuals to make their lives “add up to something.”Arguing that the historical present is perceived affectively before it is understood in any other way, Berlant traces affective and aesthetic responses to the dramas of adjustment that unfold amid talk of precarity, contingency, and crisis. She suggests that our stretched-out present is characterized by new modes of temporality, and she explains why trauma theory—with its focus on reactions to the exceptional event that shatters the ordinary—is not useful for understanding the ways that people adjust over time, once crisis itself has become ordinary. Cruel Optimism is a remarkable affective history of the present.

The Circus: 1870s–1950s


Noel Daniel - 2008
    During the heyday of the American circus from the mid-1800s to mid-1900s, traveling circuses performed for audiences of up to 12,000-14,000 per show, employed as many as 1,600 men and women, and crisscrossed the country on 20,000 miles of railroad in one season alone. The spectacle of death-defying daredevils, strapping super-heroes and scantily-clad starlets, fearless animal trainers, and startling freaks gripped the American imagination, outshining theater, vaudeville, comedy, and minstrel shows of its day, and ultimately paved the way for film and television to take root in the modern era. Long before the Beat generation made ""on the road"" expeditions popular, the circus personified the experience and offered many young Americans the dream of adventure, reinvention, excitement, and glamour.

The Making of Stanley Kubrick’s '2001: A Space Odyssey'


Piers Bizony - 2014
    Fifty years after the film's conception, TASCHEN looks back at the process of making the most important science-fiction film of all time. Though 2001 has arguably spawned more critical texts and scholarly analyses than any other film, this publication marks the first time that a truly exhaustive book has been devoted to it. TASCHEN readers enjoyed a sampling of previously unseen 2001 material in The Stanley Kubrick Archives; this four-volume set revisits the subject, exploring in great depth every aspect of the film and its making: the groundbreaking technical effects, the extraordinary set designs, and the fascinating collaboration between Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke. Made in exclusive collaboration with the Kubrick estate and Warner Brothers, this copiously illustrated work features hundreds of unique 2001-related documents, concept artworks, and superb behind-the-scenes photographs from the Kubrick Archives most of which have never been published before as well as exclusive material from co-screenwriter Arthur C. Clarke s archives. The Making of Stanley Kubrick s '2001: A Space Odyssey' is a landmark book for film fans and a celebration of technical special-effects innovation before the digital age, conceived by the very designers of TASCHEN's instant collectible Stanley Kubrick's Napoleon: The Greatest Movie Never Made. The Making of Stanley Kubrick's '2001. A Space Odyssey' Four volumes contained in a monolith-shaped case, designed by M/M Paris: Volume 1: Film stills Volume 2: Behind the scenes (including new interviews with lead actors, senior production designers, and key special-effects experts) Volume 3: Facsimile of original screenplay Volume 4: Facsimile of original 1965 production notes Limited to a total of 1,000 copies: Art Edition No 1-500 (Art Edition A and B) and Collector's Edition No. 501-1,500"

Naked Angels: Kerouac, Ginsberg, Burroughs


John Tytell - 1976
    Burroughs' attempt to redefine a complacent society's notion of sanity and normalcy and to reinvent their own lives through jazz, drugs, and law-breaking.

Goth: Undead Subculture


Lauren M.E. Goodlad - 2007
    Goth: Undead Subculture is the first collection of scholarly essays devoted to this enduring yet little examined cultural phenomenon. Twenty-three essays from various disciplines explore the music, cinema, television, fashion, literature, aesthetics, and fandoms associated with the subculture. They examine goth’s many dimensions—including its melancholy, androgyny, spirituality, and perversity—and take readers inside locations in Los Angeles, Austin, Leeds, London, Buffalo, New York City, and Sydney. A number of the contributors are or have been participants in the subculture, and several draw on their own experiences.The volume’s editors provide a rich history of goth, describing its play of resistance and consumerism; its impact on class, race, and gender; and its distinctive features as an “undead” subculture in light of post-subculture studies and other critical approaches. The essays include an interview with the distinguished fashion historian Valerie Steele; analyses of novels by Anne Rice, Poppy Z. Brite, and Nick Cave; discussions of goths on the Internet; and readings of iconic goth texts from Bram Stoker’s Dracula to James O’Barr’s graphic novel The Crow. Other essays focus on gothic music, including seminal precursors such as Joy Division and David Bowie, and goth-influenced performers such as the Cure, Nine Inch Nails, and Marilyn Manson. Gothic sexuality is explored in multiple ways, the subjects ranging from the San Francisco queercore scene of the 1980s to the increasing influence of fetishism and fetish play. Together these essays demonstrate that while its participants are often middle-class suburbanites, goth blurs normalizing boundaries even as it appears as an everlasting shadow of late capitalism.Contributors: Heather Arnet, Michael Bibby, Jessica Burstein, Angel M. Butts, Michael du Plessis, Jason Friedman, Nancy Gagnier, Ken Gelder, Lauren M. E. Goodlad, Joshua Gunn, Trevor Holmes, Paul Hodkinson, David Lenson, Robert Markley, Mark Nowak, Anna Powell, Kristen Schilt, Rebecca Schraffenberger, David Shumway, Carol Siegel, Catherine Spooner, Lauren Stasiak, Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock

Cathedral


Ben Hopkins - 2021
    It deftly combines historical fiction and a tale of adventure and intrigue.At the center of this story is the Cathedral. Its design and construction in the 12th and 13th centuries in the town of Hagenburg unites a vast array of unforgettable characters whose fortunes are inseparable from the shifting political factions and economic interests vying for supremacy. Around this narrative center, Ben Hopkins has constructed his own monumental edifice, a novel that is rich with the vicissitudes of mercantilism, politics, religion, and human enterprise.Fans of Umberto Eco, Hilary Mantel, and Ken Follett will delight at the atmosphere, the beautiful prose, and the vivid characters of Ben Hopkins’s Cathedral.