In her work for New York, The Baffler, The New York Times Magazine, and The Atlantic, as well as in her advice column for The Cut, "Ask Polly," she dispenses a singular, cutting wisdom--an ability to inspire, provoke, and put a name to our most insidious cultural delusions.What If This Were Enough? is a mantra and a clarion call. In its chapters--many of them original to the book, others expanded from their initial publication--Havrilesky takes on those cultural forces that shape us. From the enforced cheer of American life to the celebration of survivalism, from the allure of materialism to our misunderstandings of romance and success, Havrilesky deconstructs some of the most poisonous and misleading messages we ingest today, all the while suggesting new ways we might navigate our increasingly bewildering world.Through her incisive and witty inquiries, Havrilesky emphasizes the importance of locating the miraculous within the mundane. In these timely, provocative, and often hilarious chapters, she urges readers to embrace the flawed--to connect with what already is, who we already are, what we already have. She asks us to consider: What if this were enough? Our salvation, Havrilesky asserts, can be found right here, right now, in this imperfect moment.The smile factory --The happiest place on earth --To infinity and beyond --Playing house --Delusion at the gastropub --Adults only --Stuffed --Running on empty --Lost treasure --Land of heroic villains --The popularity contest --Tag and release --Haunted --Bravado --Survival fantasies --True romance --A scourge of gurus --My mother's house --Miracle of the mundane

    Natalie Diaz’s brilliant second collection demands that every body carried in its pages—bodies of language, land, rivers, suffering brothers, enemies, and lovers—be touched and held as beloveds. Through these poems, the wounds inflicted by America onto an indigenous people are allowed to bloom pleasure and tenderness: “Let me call my anxiety, desire, then. / Let me call it, a garden.” In this new lyrical landscape, the bodies of indigenous, Latinx, black, and brown women are simultaneously the body politic and the body ecstatic. In claiming this autonomy of desire, language is pushed to its dark edges, the astonishing dunefields and forests where pleasure and love are both grief and joy, violence and sensuality.Diaz defies the conditions from which she writes, a nation whose creation predicated the diminishment and ultimate erasure of bodies like hers and the people she loves: “I am doing my best to not become a museum / of myself. I am doing my best to breathe in and out. // I am begging: Let me be lonely but not invisible.” Postcolonial Love Poem unravels notions of American goodness and creates something more powerful than hope—a future is built, future being a matrix of the choices we make now, and in these poems, Diaz chooses love.

     Legendary comedic actor, John Candy, is often described as one of the sweetest men in Hollywood. Police Academy legend, Tim Kazurinksy, once said that “John wasn’t just a one in a million guy - he was a one in a hundred million guy”. Incredibly talented, full of heart and extraordinarily hard working, with over forty movies under his belt, Candy was a screen icon during the 80s and early 90s. His starring roles in Uncle Buck, Cool Runnings, Spaceballs and Planes, Trains and Automobiles are testament to a rare and much loved talent. Candy could make you laugh and cry on the turn of a dime. Searching for Candy is an extensive overview of his career. The book reveals his early years growing up in post-war Toronto, his breakthrough as part of the legendary Second City comedy group, Candy’s wonderful movie career and his stint as a co-owner of the Toronto Argonauts Gridiron Team, right through to his tragic passing in 1994. The book features first-hand original interviews with over 70 of Candy’s colleagues and friends, some speaking on record for the first time. Stars interviewed include Mel Brooks, Mariel Hemingway, Carl Reiner, Dave Thomas, Juul Haalmeyer, Valri Bromfield and others, building a vibrant and authentic portrait of the much-missed actor, comedian and humanist.

    Poems confront craving, control, the constant battle of alcoholism and sobriety, and the questioning of the self and its instincts within the context of this never-ending fight.“In Calling a Wolf a Wolf, Kaveh Akbar exquisitely and tenaciously braids astonishment and atonement into a singular lyric voice. The desolation of alcoholism widens into hard-won insight: ‘the body is a mosque borrowed from Heaven.’ Doubt and fear spiral into grace and beauty. Akbar’s mind, like his language, is perpetually in motion. His imagery—wounded and resplendent—is masterful and his syntax ensnares and releases music that’s both delicate and muscular. Kaveh Akbar has crafted one of the best debuts in recent memory. In his hands, awe and redemption hinge into unforgettable and gorgeous poems.” —Eduardo C. Corral

    In this stunningly unusual prose debut, Doireann Ni Ghriofa sculpts essay and autofiction to explore inner life and the deep connection felt between two writers centuries apart. In the 1700s, an Irish noblewoman, on discovering her husband has been murdered, drinks handfuls of his blood and composes an extraordinary poem. In the present day, a young mother narrowly avoids tragedy. On encountering the poem, she becomes obsessed with its parallels with her own life, and sets out to track down the rest of the story. A devastating and timeless tale about one woman freeing her voice by reaching into the past and finding another's.

    A month later, none of that was true. Levy picks you up and hurls you through the story of how she built an unconventional life and then watched it fall apart with astonishing speed. Like much of her generation, she was raised to resist traditional rules—about work, about love, and about womanhood. “I wanted what we all want: everything. We want a mate who feels like family and a lover who is exotic, surprising. We want to be youthful adventurers and middle-aged mothers. We want intimacy and autonomy, safety and stimulation, reassurance and novelty, coziness and thrills. But we can’t have it all.” In this profound and beautiful memoir, Levy chronicles the adventure and heartbreak of being “a woman who is free to do whatever she chooses.” Her own story of resilience becomes an unforgettable portrait of the shifting forces in our culture, of what has changed—and of what is eternal.

    Taking the stage after the 46th president of the United States, Joe Biden, Gorman captivated the nation and brought hope to viewers around the globe. Her poem “The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country” can now be cherished in this special gift edition. Including an enduring foreword by Oprah Winfrey, this keepsake celebrates the promise of America and affirms the power of poetry.

    With her signature style and grace, Mayes explores the power of landscape, the idea of home, and the lasting force of a chaotic and loving family. From her years as a spirited, secretive child, through her university studies—a period of exquisite freedom that imbued her with a profound appreciation of friendship and a love of travel—to her escape to a new life in California, Mayes exuberantly recreates the intense relationships of her past, recounting the bitter and sweet stories of her complicated family: her beautiful yet fragile mother, Frankye; her unpredictable father, Garbert; Daddy Jack, whose life Garbert saved; grandmother Mother Mayes; and the family maid, Frances’s confidant Willie Bell.Under Magnolia is a searingly honest, humorous, and moving ode to family and place, and a thoughtful meditation on the ways they define us, or cause us to define ourselves. With acute sensory language, Mayes relishes the sweetness of the South, the smells and tastes at her family table, the fragrance of her hometown trees, and writes an unforgettable story of a girl whose perspicacity and dawning self-knowledge lead her out of the South and into the rest of the world, and then to a profound return home.

    From poems of painful self-inquiry, to celebrating the simple beauty of baking frittatas, Walker offers us a window into her magical, at times difficult, and liberating world of activism, love, hope and, above all, gratitude. Whether she’s urging us to preserve an urban paradise or behold the delicate necessity of beauty to the spirit, Walker encourages us to honor the divine that lives inside all of us and brings her legendary free verse to the page once again, demonstrating that she remains a revolutionary poet and an inspiration to generations of fans.

     Written with incredible honesty and self-knowledge, Between the Lines is a stunning collection of poems from Céline Zabad. Ranging in length from a single line to full pages, her poems mimic at once the brevity and vastness of feeling. Her verse is at times as free as a cloud, other times as solid as stone. Her words are philosophies and feelings in their own rights, on love, loss, loyalty, betrayal, hope, and disappointment—on life. Zabad encapsulates the thrill of love’s first blush and the freezing burn of heartbreak. Her feelings flow freely throughout the collection, lending her poetry uncommon authenticity and power. Nature thrives between the lines of her verse, reminding the reader that tears are as natural as raindrops. Whether you’re looking for new ways to think about your own feelings or are simply passionate about poetry, you’ll find plenty to love in this collection. To better understand the complexities of emotion in yourself and others, you must read Between the Lines.

    . . consistently wry, and ever savvy."—Harvard ReviewBrenda Shaughnessy's heartrending third collection explores dark subjects—trauma, childbirth, loss of faith—and stark questions: What is the use of pain and grief? Is there another dimension in which our suffering might be transformed? Can we change ourselves? Yearning for new gods, new worlds, and new rules, she imagines a parallel existence in the galaxy of Andromeda.Rave reviews for Our Andromeda“Love is the fierce engine of this beautiful and necessary book of poems. Love is the high stakes, the whip of its power and grief and possibility for repair. Brenda Shaughnessy has brought her full self to bear in Our Andromeda, and the result is a book that should be read now because it is a collection whose song will endure.” —The New York Times Book Review"It is a monumental work, and makes a hash of those tired superlatives that will no doubt crop up in subsequent reviews. But the truth is that I have no single opinion about this collection—how could I? The book is a series of narratives that resist interpretation but not feeling—except that I am certain it further establishes Shaughnessy’s particular genius, which is utterly poetic, but essayistic in scope, encompassing ideas about astronomy, illness, bodies, the family, 'normalcy,' home." —The New Yorker"Another Brooklyn poet, Marianne Moore, defined poetry as 'imaginary gardens, with real toads in them.' In Our Andromeda, Shaughnessy has imagined a universe, and in it, real love moves, quick with life." —Publishers Weekly,starred review“Brenda Shaughnessy…laments and sometimes makes narratives about the struggle to keep her small family together in the aftermath of a difficult birth. In the title poem, she posits a galaxy far, far away where familial love might overtake all woe and turmoil of the heart and body and mind. Once there, she says to her son, ‘you'll have the babyhood you deserved.’ She also delivers a number of lovely lyrics in a supple, plainly stated line; some merely expressive, some with a philosophically questioning air; on fate, dreams, the present time’s long gaze back at the past — you know, all the good things poets write about.”— Alan Cheuse, on NPR’s list “5 Books of Poems to Get You Through the Summer”“Brenda Shaughnessy’s work is a good place to start for any passionate woman feeling daunted by poetry. This book explores love and motherhood and the turbulent terrain of grief.”—Cosmopolitan"Shaughnessy articulates, with force and clarity, the transformation that motherhood has required of her. Her poems are full of regret and ferocity."—Boston Review"Brenda Shaughnessy explores the possibilities of a second chance in life and what could come of it. Enticing and thoughtful, Our Andromeda is a fine addition to contemporary poetry shelves." —The Midwest Book ReviewBrenda Shaughnessy was born in Okinawa, Japan and grew up in Southern California. She is the author of Human Dark with Sugar (Copper Canyon Press, 2008), winner of the James Laughlin Award and finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, and Interior with Sudden Joy (FSG, 1999). Shaughnessy’s poems have appeared in Best American Poetry, Harper's, The Nation, The Rumpus, The New Yorker, and The Paris Review. She is an Assistant Professor of English at Rutgers University, Newark, and lives in Brooklyn with her husband, son and daughter.

    In her new hometown, Ruth quickly figures out she can be Jewish or she can be popular, but she can’t be both. Eager to fit in with the blond girls in the “pastel posse,” Ruth decides to hide her religion. Before she knows it, she is falling for the handsome and charming Davis and sipping Cokes with him and his friends at the all-white, all-Christian Club.Does it matter that Ruth’s mother makes her attend services at the local synagogue every week? Not as long as nobody outside her family knows the truth. At temple Ruth meets Max, who is serious and intense about the fight for social justice, and now she is caught between two worlds, two religions, and two boys. But when a violent hate crime brings the different parts of Ruth’s life into sharp conflict, she will have to choose between all she’s come to love about her new life and standing up for what she believes.

    Indeed, Washingtons army suffered defeat after defeat in the first few years of the war, fighting bravely but mainly trading space for time. However, the Americans did have a trump, in a reservoir of tough, self-reliant frontier fighters, who were brave beyond compare, and entirely willing to contest the Kings men with unconventional tactics.In this book, renowned author, and former U.S. Army Colonel, Robert Tonsetic describes and analyzes numerous examples of special operations conducted during the Revolutionary War. While the British might seize the coastlines, the interior still belonged to the Americans should the Empire venture inward. Most of the operations were conducted by American irregulars and volunteers, carefully selected, with specialized skills, and led by leaders with native intelligence. While General Washington endeavored to confront the Empire on conventional terms—for pure pride’s sake at the founding of the Republic--he meantime relied on his small units to keep the enemy off balance. The fledgling Continental Navy and Marines soon adopted a similar strategy. Realizing that the small American fleet was no match for the powerful British navy in major sea battles, the new Navy and its Marines focused on disrupting British commercial shipping in the Atlantic and Caribbean, and launching raids against British on-shore installations first in the Bahamas and then on the British coastline itself.As the war continued, Washington increasingly relied on special operations forces in the northeast as well as in the Carolinas, and ad hoc frontiersmen to defy British sovereignty inland. When the British and their Indian allies began to wage war on American settlements west of the Appalachians, Washington had to again rely on partisan and militias to conduct long-range strikes and raids targeting enemy forts and outposts. Throughout the war, what we today call SpecOps were an integral part of American strategy, and many of the lessons learned and tactics used at the time are still studied by modern day Special Operations forces. As this book establishes, the improvisation inherent in the American spirit proved itself well during the Revolution, continuing to stand as an example for our future martial endeavors.

    Stein's strong influence on 20th-century literature is evident in this 1915 work of highly original prose rendered in thought-provoking experimental techniques.

    If the leaders refuse, the entire ghetto will be liquidated. Terrified, they go to the ghetto's rabbi for advice; he tells them to return the next morning. Over the course of the night the rabbi calls up the spirits of rabbis from centuries past, but no one can give him a satisfactory answer; they've never encountered anything like this. The eighteenth century mystic and founder of Hasidism, the Ba'al Shem Tov, tries to intercede with God by singing a niggun, a wordless, joyful melody with the power to break the chains of evil, but his efforts end in failure. Heartbroken, the Ba'al Shem Tov teaches the niggun to the ghetto's rabbi, and vanishes. That evening, everyone in the ghetto is herded into the synagogue courtyard. When no one steps forward, they are informed that in an hour they will all be killed. How does one prepare to die? The question is laid before the ghetto rabbi, and he teaches his assembled community the song that the Ba'al Shem Tov taught him the night before. As their voices soar upward, they are joined by those of Jews from centuries past from all over the world, all singing the Ba'al Shem Tov's niggun as the massacre begins. And as the souls of these men, women, and children rise to the heavens, their song continues, uninterrupted, to the end of time and beyond.With an introduction by Elisha Wiesel