But it is also a terrifically engrossing exploration and exploitation of self-reflection, self-absorption, full-blown narcissism, and the impulse to write about oneself. In a world awash with memoirs and tell-alls, Shields has created something unique: he invites the reader into his mind as he turns his life into a narrative. With moving and often hilarious candor, Shields ruminates on a variety of subjects, all while exploring the impulse to confess, to use oneself as an autobiographical subject, to make one's life into a work of art.Shields explores the connections between fiction and nonfiction, stuttering and writing, literary forms and literary contents, art and life; he confronts bad reviews of his earlier books; he examines why he read a college girlfriend's journal; he raids a wide range of cultural figures (from Rousseau, Nabokov, and Salinger to Bill Murray, Adam Sandler, and Bobby Knight) for what they have to tell him about himself; he quotes a speech he wrote on the occasion of his father's ninetieth birthday and then gives us the guilt-induced dream he had when he failed to deliver the speech; he also writes about basketball and sexuality and Los Angeles and Seattle, but he is always meditating on the origins of his interest in autobiography, on the limits and appeals of autobiography, on the traps and strategies of it, and finally, how to use it to get to the world.The result is a collection of poetically charged self-reflections that reveal deep truths about ourselves as well.

    This new book by one of our finest critics explains--historically, in depth, and with interviews with the celebrated creators themselves--how the art of must-see/binge-watch television evolved. Darwin had his theory of evolution, and David Bianculli has his. Bianculli's theory has to do with the concept of quality television: what it is and, crucially, how it got that way. In tracing the evolutionary history of our progress toward a Platinum Age of Television--our age, the era of The Sopranos and Breaking Bad and Mad Men and The Wire and Homeland and Girls--he focuses on the development of the classic TV genres, among them the sitcom, the crime show, the miniseries, the soap opera, the western, the animated series and the late night talk show. In each genre, he selects five key examples of the form, tracing its continuities and its dramatic departures and drawing on exclusive and in-depth interviews with many of the most famed auteurs in television history.Television has triumphantly come of age artistically; David Bianculli's book is the first to date to examine, in depth and in detail and with a keen critical and historical sense, how this inspiring development came about.

    Here we go again with real life and opinions made to look like one big, preposterous animal not unlike an invention by Dr. Seuss...--Kurt Vonnegut, from Fates Worse Than Death

     Books change lives, and if you have any doubts on that score, you need only dip into this joyous celebration of reading by 65 people who have distinguished themselves in various fields, from sports, to cooking, to journalism and the arts. In brief and lively essays, the contributors— wrestlers, actors, singers, monks, Nobel Prize winners, chefs, politicians, writers—tell about the single book that changed the way they see themselves and the world around them. A sampling of contributors includes: Elizabeth Berg on The Catcher in the Rye; Harold Bloom on Little, Big; Steven Brill on The Making of the President, 1960; Da Chen on The Count of Monte Cristo; Maureen Corrigan on David Copperfield; Nelson DeMille on Atlas Shrugged; Tomie dePaola on Kristin Lavransdatter; Anita Diamant on A Room of One’s Own; Linda Fairstein on The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes; Sebastian Junger on Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee; Wally Lamb on To Kill a Mockingbird; John McCain on For Whom the Bell Tolls; Lisa Scottoline on Angela’s Ashes; Susan Vreeland on To Kill a Mockingbird; and many more. . . .

    For well over two centuries now, Americans of all stripes--presidents and activists, writers and soldiers--have turned to Shakespeare's works to address the nation's political fault lines, such as manifest destiny, race, gender, immigration, and free speech. In a narrative arching across the centuries, James Shapiro traces the unparalleled role of Shakespeare's 400-year-old tragedies and comedies in making sense of so many of these issues on which American identity has turned. Reflecting on how Shakespeare has been invoked--and at times weaponized--at pivotal moments in our past, Shapiro takes us from President John Quincy Adams's disgust with Desdemona's interracial marriage to Othello, to Abraham Lincoln's and his assassin John Wilkes Booth's competing obsessions with the plays, up through the fraught debates over marriage and same-sex love at the heart of the celebrated adaptations Kiss Me Kate and Shakespeare in Love. His narrative culminates in the 2017 controversy over the staging of Julius Caesar in Central Park, in which a Trump-like leader is assassinated.Extraordinarily researched, Shakespeare in a Divided America shows that no writer has been more closely embraced by Americans, or has shed more light on the hot-button issues in our history. Indeed, it is by better understanding Shakespeare's role in American life, Shapiro argues, that we might begin to mend our bitterly divided land.

    Leanne rescues him from a rooftop in a floodplain and it is clear there is much more to the story. Can their love redeem the hurts of the past to rescue their future?Laughing All the Way by Lesley Ann McDanielWhen Jessica's friends put her up to "fixing" their commitment-phobic co-worker, Conner, she doesn't take them very seriously. Conner doesn't know whether to laugh at Jessica or tell her to mind her own business.Ghosted at the Altar by Chautona HavigAfter his fiancée, Brenna, abandons Mitchell on their wedding day, she insists she loves him and still wants to marry him. As truths come to light, her little sister, Lauren, turns sleuth to solve the mystery of why Brenna ghosted Mitchell at the altar.Five Gold Rings by Amanda TruWhen three relationship-challenged couples wish for Christmas weddings, commitment coach, Oliver, teams up with a wedding planner, TeraLyn, to help make their marriage dreams come true.

    In 1965, Feiffer wrote what is arguably the first critical history of the comic book superheroes of the late 1930s and early 1940s, including Plastic Man, Batman, Superman, The Spirit and others. In the book, Feiffer writes about the unique the place of comics in the space between high and low art and the power which this space offers both the creator and reader.The Great Comic Book Heroes is widely acknowledged to be the first book to analyze the juvenile medium of superhero comics in a critical manner, but without denying the iconic hold such works have over readers of all ages. Out of print for over 30 years, Feiffer's book discusses the role that the patriotic superhero played during World War II in shaping the public spirit of civilians and soldiers, as well as the escapist power these stories held over the zeitgeist of America. With wit and insight Feiffer discusses what the great comic book heroes meant to him as a child and later as an artist.

    Heinlein• Defending the Third Industrial Revolution • by G. Harry Stine• Interior artwork by David Egge• Old Woman by the Road • (1978) • by Gregory Benford• Encased in the Amber of Eternity • poem by Robert Frazier• Moon Rocks • (1973) • by Tom Purdom• Lasers, Grasers, and Marxists • (1976) • by Jerry Pournelle• Fixed Price War • (1978) • by Charles Sheffield• Marius • (1957) • by Poul Anderson• Weapons in Future Warfare • essay by Roger A. Beaumont and R. Snowden Ficks• Scenario for the Fall of Night • by Roger A. Beaumont• The Spell of War • [Lord Darcy] • (1978) • by Randall Garrett• Military Vehicles: Into the Third Millennium • essay by Dean Ing• Interior artwork by Stephen Fabian• The Man in the Gray Weapons Suit • by Paul J. Nahin• Just an Old-Fashioned War Story • (1977) • by Michael G. Coney• The Private War of Private Jacob • (1974) • by Joe Haldeman• One Foot in the Grave: Medicine in Future Warfare • essay by Alan E. Nourse• Shark • (1973) • by Edward Bryant• Training • by David Langford• Final Muster • (1961) • by Rick Rubin

    Her razor-sharp wit combines with her acute powers of observation to produce social and political commentary that will have you in stitches even as it informs and provokes you to think seriously about the topics she discusses. In Best White, Davis offers advice on life’s tricky issues; discusses the perils of being a ‘Best White’; laments the fact that society does not have a universally adopted form of greeting, such as the high five; explores the intricacies of social media and internet dating; considers the future of reading and tackles a range of controversial topics in between.

    The most exciting book yet! More "special" stories, an all-new 'Russell Lee Interview' section and over 50 stories inside! A must-read, extra-special 10th book!

    Among essays like "Radiantly Indefensible," "Notes on the Danger of Notebooks," and "The Abrasion of Loneliness," are piquant pieces on the virtues of emptiness, forgetfulness, and other under-loved concepts. Edited and with an introduction by Christian Wiman, this generous collection of Ryan's distinctive thinking gives us a surprising look into the mind of an American master.

    Vengeful spirits are the main attraction at a carnival of the damned. And a woman is stalked by evil she can never escape…Scare Street is proud to present the best in bone-chilling supernatural horror. This volume contains three macabre morsels for your reading pleasure. Each tale is a bone-chilling glimpse into a shadowy abyss of fear and terror.But don’t stare for too long. Because it’s only a matter of time before you feel a presence longing for your soul…

     In the past few years, Fox News host Greg Gutfeld has covered everything from crazed academics, to unhinged celebrities, to the wildest election in recent history on his shows The Five and The Greg Gutfeld Show. In The Gutfeld Monologues, he brings together his best and favorite monologues in this funny, unconventional collection for new and longtime fans alike. Scored through with marginal edits, scratch-outs, 20/20 hindsight, and up-to-the-minute commentary on what he got wrong, this book isn’t your grandmother’s anthology collection. With his signature humor, wit, and insight, Greg explains it all in this memorable collection about some of our country’s most crucial—and not so crucial—modern moments.

    Hundreds of active and former officers from all over the United States responded: men and women from big cities and small towns, some who had written professionally, but most of whom were doing so for the first time. The result is True Blue, a collection of funny, charming, exciting, haunting stories about murder investigations, missing children, bungling burglars, car chases, lonely and desperate shut-ins, routine traffic stops, officers killed in the line of duty, and the life-changing events of September 11. Here, officers reveal their emotions as they recount the defining moments of their careers. Some of the stories include:-Two cops' desperate search for a missing child feared kidnapped -The revival of the one-month old baby who was shot in the face in a drive-by shooting-A patrol officer's dramatic showdown with a hostage-holding gunman-On-the-scene details of rescue and tragedy during the 9/11 terrorist attacks

    Why does Mr Kipling bake such exceedingly good cakes? Is Jeremy Beadle really the devil incarnate? What happens when advertising turns you into a monomaniac? This title allows you to find out the answers.