A vision from God, received in her parents' garden, instructed her to take up arms and help restore the kingdom of France. Without consulting her family, Joan left home on one of the most remarkable personal quests in history. As a young girl in a world of men, she faced unimaginable odds, yet her belief in her mission propelled her forward. Within months Joan was directing soldiers and bravely fighting for her nation. Before long she had become a national hero and was the guest of honor at her king's coronation. Yet fame ultimately became her undoing. The English shrewdly realized that Joan's demise and defamation would disgrace France and provide a more direct route to victory. Captured in war, Joan became a pawn in one of the longest and bloodiest wars in history.Since her death at the age of nineteen in 1431, Joan of Arc has maintained a remarkable hold on our collective imagination. She was a teenager of astonishing common sense and a national heroine who led men in battle as a courageous warrior. Yet she was also abandoned by the king whose coronation she secured, betrayed by her countrymen, and sold to the enemy. In this meticulously researched landmark biography, Donald Spoto expertly captures this astonishing life and the times in which she lived. Neither wife nor nun, neither queen nor noblewoman, neither philosopher nor stateswoman, Joan of Arc demonstrates that anyone who follows their heart has the power to change history.

    They explain what happened to the goddess, when, and how she was excluded from western culture, and the implications of this loss.

    In lucid, persuasive prose, Brownmiller has created a definitive, devastating work of lasting social importance.Chosen by THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW as One of the Outstanding Books of the Year

    Tracing their fates, Nicholson shows how the single woman of the inter-war years had to depend on herself and, in doing so, helped change society.

    That same year, she heard her first racial slur. At age eleven, when the United States had begun to invade Iraq and the television was flooded with anti-Muslim commentary, Amani felt overwhelmed with feelings of intense alienation from American society. At thirteen, her family took a trip to her father’s native homeland of Jordan, and Amani experienced firsthand a culture built on pure religion, not Islamic stereotypes. Inspired by her trip and after years of feeling like her voice as a Muslim woman was marginalized and neglected during a time when all the media could talk about was, ironically, Muslim women, Amani created a website called MuslimGirl. As the editor-in-chief, she put together a team of Muslim women and started a life dedicated to activism. This is the extraordinary account of Amani’s journey through adolescence as a Muslim girl, from the Islamophobia she’s faced on a daily basis, to the website she launched that became a cultural phenomenon, to the nation’s political climate in the 2016 election cycle with Donald Trump as the Republican nominee. While dispelling the myth that a headscarf makes you a walking target for terrorism, she shares both her own personal accounts and anecdotes from the “sisterhood” of writers that serve as her editorial team at MuslimGirl. Amani’s honest, urgent message is fresh, timely, and a deeply necessary counterpoint to the current rhetoric about the Middle East.

    We cannot quote Shakespeare to describe a headache. We must, Woolf says, invent language to describe pain. And though illness enhances our perceptions, she observes that it reduces self-consciousness; it is "the great confessional." Woolf discusses the cultural taboos associated with illness and explores how illness changes the way we read. Poems clarify and astonish, Shakespeare exudes new brilliance, and so does melodramatic fiction!On Being Ill was published as an individual volume by Hogarth Press in 1930. While other Woolf essays, such as A Room of One’s Own and Three Guineas, were first published by Hogarth as individual volumes and have since been widely available, On Being Ill has been overlooked. The Paris Press edition features original cover art by Woolf’s sister, the painter Vanessa Bell. Hermione Lee’s Introduction discusses this extraordinary work, and explores Woolf’s revelations about poetry, language, and illness.

    And that's why in Shameless, Pastor Nadia sets out to reclaim the conversation for a new generation. In the spirit of Martin Luther, Bolz-Weber calls for a reformation of the way believers understand and express their sexuality. To make her case, Bolz-Weber draws on experiences from her own life as well as her parishoners', then puts them side by side with biblical narrative and theology to explore what the church has taught and about sex, and the harm that has often come as a result. Along the way, Bolz-Weber reexamines patriarchy, gender, and sexual orientation with candor but also with hope--because, as she writes, "I believe that the Gospel can heal the pain that even the church has caused."

    Jonathan Eig's masterful narrative revolves around four principal characters: the fiery feminist Margaret Sanger, who was a champion of birth control in her campaign for the rights of women but neglected her own children in pursuit of free love; the beautiful Katharine McCormick, who owed her fortune to her wealthy husband, the son of the founder of International Harvester and a schizophrenic; the visionary scientist Gregory Pincus, who was dismissed by Harvard in the 1930s as a result of his experimentation with in vitro fertilization but who, after he was approached by Sanger and McCormick, grew obsessed with the idea of inventing a drug that could stop ovulation; and the telegenic John Rock, a Catholic doctor from Boston who battled his own church to become an enormously effective advocate in the effort to win public approval for the drug that would be marketed by Searle as Enovid.Spanning the years from Sanger’s heady Greenwich Village days in the early twentieth century to trial tests in Puerto Rico in the 1950s to the cusp of the sexual revolution in the 1960s, this is a grand story of radical feminist politics, scientific ingenuity, establishment opposition, and, ultimately, a sea change in social attitudes. Brilliantly researched and briskly written, The Birth of the Pill is gripping social, cultural, and scientific history.

    In 1889, Bly went around the world as a journalism "stunt" to beat the fictional record of Jules Verne's Phileas Fogg -- and even made a stop in France to meet Verne. Since no cover image has shown up for this edition, shown is an 1890s advertising card with Nellie Bly belting up the world.

    Skinny martinis. Vodka sodas with lime. These are the cocktails that come in sleek-stemmed glasses, bright colors and fruity flavors—these are the Girly Drinks.From the earliest days of civilization, alcohol has been at the center of social rituals and cultures worldwide. But when exactly did drinking become a gendered act? And why have bars long been considered “places for men” when, without women, they might not even exist?With whip-smart insight and boundless curiosity, Girly Drinks unveils an entire untold history of the female distillers, drinkers and brewers who have played a vital role in the creation and consumption of alcohol, from ancient Sumerian beer goddess Ninkasi to iconic 1920s bartender Ada Coleman. Filling a crucial gap in culinary history, O’Meara dismantles the long-standing patriarchal traditions at the heart of these very drinking cultures, in the hope that readers everywhere can look to each celebrated woman in this book—and proudly have what she’s having.

    It rejoices in men and women made of the Wrong Stuff: writers who believed in the power of words, but could never quite find the rights ones; artists and performers who indulged their creative impulse with a passion, if not a sense of the ridiculous, an eye for perspective or the ability to hold down a tune; scientists and businessmen who never quite managed to quit while they were ahead; and sportsmen who seemed to manage always to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Like Walter Oudney, one of three men chosen to find the source of the River Niger in Africa, who could not ride a horse, nor speak any foreign languages and who had never travelled more than 30 miles beyond his native Edinburgh; or the explorer-priest Michel Alexandre de Baize, who set off to explore the African continent from east to west equipped with 24 umbrellas, some fireworks, two suits of armor, and a portable organ; or the Scottish army which decided to invade England in 1349 - during the Black Death. Entries include: briefest career in dentistry; least successful bonding exercise; most futile attempt to find a lost tribe; most pointless lines of research by someone who should have known better; least successful celebrity endorsement; least convincing excuse for a war; worst poetic tribute to a root vegetable; least successful display of impartiality by a juror; Devon Loch - sporting metaphor for blowing un unblowable lead; least dignified exit from office by a French president; and least successful expedition by camel.

    Such drudgery was routine for the parents of people still living, but the knowledge of it has passed as if it had never been. Following the daily life of a middle-class Victorian house from room to room; from childbirth in the master bedroom through the kitchen, scullery, dining room, and parlor, all the way to the sickroom; Judith Flanders draws on diaries, advice books, and other sources to resurrect an age so close in time yet so alien to our own. 100 illustrations, 32 pages of color.

    However, the grisly ripping of Polly Nichols on August 31st was not the first unsolved murder of the year. The April murder of Emma Smith and the August murder of Martha Tabram both occurred on bank holidays. They baffled the police and press alike and were assumed by the original investigators to have been the first murders in the series. Where they correct?In this provocative work of literary archeology, author Tom Wescott places these early murders in their proper historical context and digs to unearth new evidence and hard facts not seen in over 125 years.The Bank Holiday Murders is the only book of its kind. It eschews the tired approach of unsatisfying ‘final solutions’ in favor of solid research, logical reasoning and new information. The clues followed are not drawn from imagination but from the actual police reports and press accounts of the time. The questions asked by Wescott are ones first suggested by the original investigators but lost to time until now. The answers provided are compelling and sometimes explosive.Among the revelations are: • New information linking the murders of Smith & Tabram to the same killer(s).• Proof that the police did not believe key witnesses in either case.• Proof that at least one of these witnesses was working with the murderer.• New evidence connecting many of the victims that may lead to their actual slayers.• Information on Emily Horsnell, the ACTUAL first Whitechapel murder victim.• The hidden truth of ‘Leather Apron’ and its role in unraveling the Ripper mystery.• Proof of a corrupt police sergeant who thwarted the investigation. Was he protecting the Ripper?• Much more.The Bank Holiday Murders: The True Story of the First Whitechapel Murders brings us closer than ever to the actual truth behind the Jack the Ripper story and is sure to appeal to fans of Paul Begg, Stewart P. Evans, Philip Sugden, Donald Rumbelow, Ann Rule, Patricia Cornwell as well as readers of Victorian true crime, true life mysteries and historical cold cases in general.

    But magic - the idea that we have a connection with the universe - has developed a bad reputation.It has been with us for millennia - from the curses and charms of ancient Greek, Roman and Jewish magic, to the shamanistic traditions of Eurasia, indigenous America and Africa, and even quantum physics today. Even today seventy-five per cent of the Western world holds some belief in magic, whether snapping wishbones, buying lottery tickets or giving names to inanimate objects.Drawing on his decades of research, with incredible breadth and authority, Professor Chris Gosden provides a timely history of human thought and the role it has played in shaping civilization, and how we might use magic to rethink our understanding of the world.

    The city is one giant grave, filled with the remains of previous eras. The Houses of Parliament sit on the edge of a former plague pit; St Paul's is built over human remains; Underground tunnels were driven through forgotten catacombs, thick with bones. A society can be judged by the way it treats its dead, and this is especially true of London. From Roman burial rites to the horrors of the plague, from the founding of the great Victorian cemeteries to the development of cremation and the cult of mourning that surrounded the death of Diana, Princess of Wales - Necropolis leaves no headstone unturned in its exploration of our changing attitudes towards the deceased among us.