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Non-Fiction

A Dark Science

Here translated for the first time are a series of shocking texts from the 19th century German psychiatric literature, which, while almost completely unknown to modern readers, have had a devastating influence on attitudes toward women and children in the 20th century. The articles on the sexual “lies” and sexual “fantasies” of children were seminal, brutal, and still resonate in today’s literature, having taken a terrible toll on the intellectual ideas of modern psychiatry.
The articles document brutal treatment for masturbation, hysteria, and vaginismus, as well as incidences of the so-called fabricated sexual abuse of “prematurely perverted” children. Though by no means an “easy read,” Masson’s collection of these nine articles exposes a point in the history of the practice of psychology that proves ignorance and negative attitudes towards women created a dark science that modern psychiatrists struggle to overcome.
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Absolute Positivity

It’s easy to be positive when the seas of life are calm and peaceful. But when we are thrown into the turmoil of a chaotic circumstance, such as a life-threatening disease, can unflappable positivity be maintained?

Join talent agent, musician, and author Karl B. Sanger as he details the long and arduous journey he walked with his wife Teresa through her diagnosis and battle with Hepatitis C. Through their faith in God and the support of family and friends, Sanger concludes that “Absolute Positivity” can only be found when we tap into the source of all good things: the Creator of the Universe.

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ADD/ADHD: A Guide for Teachers and Parents

This book is not written as a professional journal – though counseling professionals will certainly appreciate the practical application of therapy techniques found in its pages. It is what it proclaims to be: A guidebook for parents and teachers who deal with children on an everyday basis who have been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder or Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder. Dr. Marlow does not attempt to trace the history of the Attention Deficit Disorders, as that has been done in other, far more scholarly works. Rather, this book addresses symptoms and solutions, ideas and results, situations and practical applications.

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Against Therapy

In this ground-breaking and highly controversial book, Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson attacks the very foundations of modern psychotherapy from Freud to Jung, from Fritz Perls to Carl Rodgers. With passion and clarity, Against Therapy addresses the profession’s core weaknesses, contending that, since therapy’s aim is to change people, and this is achieved according to therapist’s own notions and prejudices, the psychological process is necessarily corrupt. With a foreword by the eminent British psychologist Dorothy Rowe, this cogent and convincing book has shattering implications.

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Behavior Disorders: A Guide for Teachers and Parents

Oppositional Defiant Disorder and Conduct Disorder create havoc in families and classrooms in our society today. In this book, Dr. Marlow addresses these problems in a case study format, outlining therapy techniques and problem solutions for children, teachers and parents. The case studies are taken from real-life situations, though names and other identifying characteristics have been changed to protect the confidentiality of the people involved.

This is a practical manual, and all techniques and procedures detailed have been used successfully many times by the author and his colleagues.

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Beyond Belief

Does your life look the same as it did the day you put your faith in Jesus Christ? Or have you discovered the power of the Spirit within you enabling you to live a holy, righteous life? For that matter, is it even possible to be holy?

Many Christians today are wading in the shallow end of the infinite relationship God desires to have with His children. They are strangled by addictions and idolatry, or distracted from the pursuit of spiritual maturity by a cheap imitation of moralism. Whatever the reason, their spiritual growth has been stunted; they’ve never gone beyond mere belief in Jesus Christ.

Beyond Belief: Jesus Saved You…Now What? explores what God has in store for you and what He wants from you. With a firm foundation on the centrality of Christ, this book will help you see exactly who you are and what you are called to, based on, and enabled by, His righteousness alone. Through intense study and humbling application of both the Old and New Testaments, Beyond Belief, will show you what a mature Christian life looks like and what it takes to get there.

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Beyond the Blues

This 2019 edition of Beyond the Blues contains the most current pregnancy and postpartum resources for prevention and treatment of mental health challenges for all parents. Updated information and research about medications, as well as complementary and alternative options are included. Direct and compassionate, it is required reading for those suffering before or after the baby is born and for all professionals working with them.

An indispensable guide to understanding and treating prenatal and postpartum depression. This book is a gift not only to healthcare providers but also to family and friends of mothers suffering from these devastating perinatal mood disorders.

—Cheryl Tatano Beck, DNSc, CNM, FAAN
Professor, University of Connecticut, School of Nursing
Coauthor of Postpartum Depression Screening Scale

In Beyond the Blues, Bennett and Indman offer a compact yet surprisingly comprehensive manual on prenatal and postpartum depression. Readable and practical, they systematically address screening and assessment, finding a therapist, myths about nursing and bonding, and treatment. Interesting and helpful are suggestions for family and friends. For health professionals, there is detailed diagnostic and treatment information. Beyond the Blues is a quick read with an easy-to-handle format. Recommended for consumer health and health sciences collections.”

Library Journal

This book will be of great help for both women and their health care providers, providing information on all aspects of depression in pregnancy and in the post-postpartum, including safety/risk of medication therapy.

—Adrienne Einarson RN
Assistant Director, The Motherisk Program, The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Canada

Take prenatal vitamins for the baby, but for the long-term health of the mother, this is a must read for both her and her doctor.

—Timothy A. Leach, M.D., F.A.C.O.G.
OB/GYN, San Ramon Regional Medical Center, John Muir Medical Center

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Bogart: In Search of My Father

For countless millions, Humphrey Bogart’s screen performances and real-life persona merged to make him one of the world’s most fabled figures—a legend of mythic proportions. Or, as his Sam Spade would have put it—the stuff that dreams are made of.

But for his only son, Stephen, eight years old in 1957 when his father died of lung cancer, Humphrey Bogart’s giant shadow was a burden he carried until he finally came to understand the private man behind his father’s public face. And now, in this candid and insightful biography, Stephen Bogart explores and illuminates Humphrey Bogart’s life, work, and relationships as they never have been before.

Writing with the encouragement of his famous mother, Lauren Bacall, Stephen calls on his memories, and take full advantage of the extraordinary access he has had to friends and colleagues of his father. The result is an intimate and personal profile of an enigmatic man whose tough image contrasted with very human ambitions and vulnerabilities. It is also a vastly entertaining book, filled with fascinating stories involving Frank Sinatra, Katharine Hepburn, “Swifty” Lazar, John Huston, Stephen Bogart’s stepfather, Jason Robards, and many others.

Here is Humphrey Bogart, the pro’s pro on the set and the Hollywood renegade off it. The man’s man, the ladies’ man, the hard worker, and the man who liked to drink too much. The husband in three roller-coaster marriages and finally one perfect match, the proud father and absentee parent, the good friend and even better enemy. Here are eye-witness accounts of his most celebrated public misdeeds and moving testimonies of his most unexpected private moments. And finally, in perhaps the most compelling chapter of this shining saga, here is the close-up of Bogart’s last months, where his courage, dignity, and humor made his most stirring celluloid roles seem pale.

Combining the drama of Humphrey Bogart’s life with that of a son whose path of reconciliation first had to move through a very difficult time, this is biography at its best—at once a loving tribute and a fascinating revelation. This ebook edition includes photographs directly from Stephen Bogart’s personal collection.

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Both Sides Now

Both Sides Now is a vivid and compelling account of how one man’s search for wholeness led him through multiple, complex, and life-threatening surgeries that transformed him not only physically, but emotionally and spiritually as well. Born with the body of a female, Dhillon Khosla knew very early on that his true identity was male, yet he spent nearly two decades repressing that knowledge and trying to embrace his female form. Shortly after turning twenty-eight, he came across an article about men born with female bodies who had undergone surgeries to reclaim their male identity. When he read their stories, Khosla felt flashes of recognition stirring within and—for the first time—hope.

In this riveting memoir, Khosla discusses openly and honestly what it was like to live as a woman, and how that life shaped the man he is today. Through anecdotes, he shares unique and profound insights into the sexes. Ultimately, however, Both Sides Now is a story about what it means to truly love oneself, and the willingness to turn away from the dissenting voices that tell us who we ought to be…and toward that one, lone voice that has known all along.

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Call Me Clumsy

You are about to embark on a truly weird, interesting, and entertaining experience…
So begins the “odyssey of awkwardness” that is Call Me Clumsy, the my-life-so-far memoir of Matthew Weinrich. Through utterly humbling experiences that span the decades of his life, Weinrich provides anecdotes that are equally cringe-inducing and laugh-out-loud funny.
From his experience as a consummate slacker to his marriage proposal gone horribly awry to an unfortunate run-in with the fine men and women of the TSA, Weinrich brings you along as he strolls down memory lane, for better or for worse.
Ultimately, Weinrich gives us a heart-warming picture of the humility of a child of God who knows, without a doubt, that the old adage applies to him:
God is God, and I am not…
…not even close.
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Comfort and Joy: Simple Ways to Care for Ourselves and Others

Comfort and Joy is a small book that can engender big and welcomed changes in our lives and our attitude. It’s a book to keep handy, to turn to again and again. Lafia offers forty-five vignettes-small stories, pictures of comfort as simple and grand as a plush pillow, a warm cup of tea. Simply reading them is comforting and more than likely to inspire the reader to follow the suggestions in “Cultivating Comfort,” which follows each passage. And because she knows that comfort taken and comfort shared make the world a very much better place, in a section called “Applied Comfort,” Lafia gives us inspiring ways to take comfort and pass it on.

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Dogs Have the Strangest Friends

The author of the adult best-sellers When Elephants Weep and Dogs Never Lie About Love has reached into his treasure trove of stories about the emotional lives of animals to tell fifteen fascinating stories to young readers. Jeffrey Masson’s graceful, accessible prose illuminates the capacity of both wild and domestic animals to live by their emotions–to love, share joy, feel sorrow or loneliness, and show compassion.
Young people have little difficulty recognizing or believing that animals have feelings. They will respond to these real-life tales about a mother cat who saves her kittens from a fire; a parrot who says “I’m sorry”; the special friendship between a dog and a lion; and many others. The stories can be read aloud to younger children or enjoyed by independent readers. Beautifully illustrated with lush watercolor paintings, this book makes the perfect gift and is ideally suited to the animal lover in every child.
Illustrated by Shirley Felts.
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Drunk Dialing the Divine

How would you respond when a friend drunk-dials you to make a prayer request? What do you say when you are furious with God, but aren’t willing to part with Him? How do you vent your frustrations to your Creator? When is it okay to be angry with God?

Drunk Dialing the Divine is an attempt to capture a glimmer of the darker side of the emotional struggle of the deeply faithful. Though each poem begins in a negative space, they resist both the angry and the naively optimistic ending–instead finding a ray of hope in the maxim “Things are because God is.”

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Due to Enemy Action

Please Note: Due to the large file size of this ebook, we recommend downloading over a high-speed connection.

Due to Enemy Action tells for the first time a World War II story that spans generations and straddles two centuries, a story that begins with the dramatic Battle of the Atlantic in the 1940s and doesn’t conclude until an emotional Purple Heart ceremony in 2002. Based on previously classified government documents, military records, personal interviews, and letters between crew members and their families, this is the saga of the courageous survival of ordinary sailors when their ship was torpedoed and their shipmates were killed on April 23, 1945, and the memories that haunted them after the U.S. Navy buried the truth at war’s end. It is the story of a small subchaser, the Eagle 56, caught in the crosshairs of a German U-boat, the U-853, whose brazen commander doomed his own crew in a desperate, last-ditch attempt to record final kills before his country’s imminent defeat. And it is the account of how one man, Paul M. Lawton, embarked on an unrelenting quest for the truth and changed naval history.

Author Stephen Puleo draws from extensive personal interviews with all the major players, including the three living survivors (and a fourth who emerged as the book went to press); a senior U.S. naval archivist who worked with German historians after the war to catalog U-boat movements; and the son of the man who commanded America’s sub-tracking “Secret Room” during the war. Due to Enemy Action also describes the final chapter in the Battle of the Atlantic, tracing the epic struggle that began with shocking U-boat attacks against hundreds of defenseless merchant ships off American shores in 1942 and ended with the sinking of the Eagle 56, the last American warship sunk by a German U-boat.

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Earthquake, Fire & Epidemic

Almost five decades of exhaustive research by Gladys Hansen, Official Archivist Emeritus of San Francisco, makes Earthquake, Fire & Epidemic the definitive discourse on one of the most devastating natural disasters in American history.

With coauthors Richard Hansen and Dr. William Blaisdell, M.D., Gladys Hansen offers a comprehensive account of the events leading up to, during, and following the April 1906 Earthquake and Fire that devastated San Francisco. The book includes narratives depicting the firefighters, military personnel, and first responders whose extraordinary efforts helped establish order out of chaos. Of particular significance, the authors discredit the deceitful efforts by San Francisco’s political and business establishment who, to protect the commercial viability of the city, minimized the death toll and diminished the true magnitude of destruction.

Earthquake, Fire & Epidemic offers new documentation and provides insight into the incomprehensible scale of disaster that killed thousands of people, utterly destroyed a quarter of San Francisco’s buildings, and rendered tens of thousands of survivors homeless in the Golden City by the Bay.

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Final Analysis: The Making and Unmaking of a Psychoanalyst

He was the rising star of psychoanalysis, an intimate associate of Anna Freud and Kurt Eissler, a member of the Freudian “inner circle” with unrestricted access to the Freud Archives. And then Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson threw it all away because he dared to break the psychoanalytic community’s deepest taboo: he told the truth in public. As he unmasks the pretensions and abuses of this elite profession, Masson invites us to eavesdrop on the shockingly unorthodox analysis he was subjected to in the course of his analytic training. But the more prestige Masson attained, the more he came to doubt not only the integrity of his colleagues, but the validity of their method. In the end, he blew the whistle–fully aware of the personal and professional consequences.

With wit, wonder, and unflinching candor, Masson brilliantly exposes the cult of psychoanalysis and recounts his own self-propelled fall from grace. A sensation when it first appeared, Final Analysis is even more provocative and engrossing today. Written with passion and humor, this is the book that revealed a revered profession for what it was–and launched Masson on his true career.

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From Lisa with Love

Looking for a healthy alternative to taking your loved one out to a restaurant this Valentine’s Day? Do you want to create a terrific dinner at home for a special anniversary, or just show that certain someone you care? Let author Lisa Wagner show you how to make a delicious, vegan meal that’s sure to fill the stomach and warm the heart of the person you love. This recipe book includes a main dish, side and dessert, using all natural ingredients to create a meal that’s not only good for romance, but for your body as well.

From Lisa with Love is the first in a new series of recipes designed for healthier eating and the vegan lifestyle.

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Generation Jan

As the first wave of Baby Boomers begins to retire, their departure presents an awkward power vacuum in the American cultural, political, and business arenas. Though many members of Generation X expected to
inherit the reins of power and influence in the late 2000s, workplace trends at the time showed that the Boomers had taken a liking not to the Xers who were waiting in the wings, but the new Milennials in the workplace. Milennials, or Generation Y, are the cohort born between the early 1980s and the late 1990s, and their optimistic, group-centric workplace worldview presented a stark contrast to the isolated and cynical outlook traditionally seen in many Gen-Xers. Thus, as Xers found themselves overlooked in favor of their younger counterparts, many began to consider themselves the middle children in the workplace.

Matthew Henry analyzes this “middle child” position of Generation X using a Gen-X popular culture framework. Looking at the Boomers’ origins in post-World War II culture, and drawing parallels between Boomer and Millennial beliefs and attitudes, he makes several arguments for the May-December relationship between the two generations and suggests a possible solution for the Xers who often find themselves neglected in between.

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Get Into Business With Germany

Get inside the German market, Europe´s most dynamic and solid economy.

Germany has a long economic history and is a proud industrial country with a large service sector and high-tech industries. But also there is a big sector of small and middle sized businesses.

How does the German market look like and how can one get access to it? How to found a business in Germany and how to get in contact with Germans? What rules of interaction are important when doing business with German companies and how to get German customers without ever been to the country?

Get Into Business with Germany is written by an insider and offers an overview about several important questions that entrepreneurs face when they want get a foot on the German market.

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Gitchie Girl

A terrified voice cried out in the night.
“Who are you? What do you want?

The sound of snapping twigs closed in on the five teenagers enjoying an evening around a glowing campfire at Gitchie Manitou State Park. The night of music and laughter had taken a dark turn. Evil loomed just beyond the tree line, and before the night was over, one of the Midwest’s most horrific mass murders had left its bloodstains spewed across the campsite. One managed to survive and would come to be known as the “Gitchie Girl.” Harrowing memories of the terrifying crime sent her spiraling out of control, and she grasped at every avenue to rebuild her life. Can one man, a rescue dog, and a glimmer of faith salvage a broken soul? This true story will touch your heart and leave you cheering that good can prevail over the depravity of mankind.

Through extensive research, interviews, and personal insight, the authors bring a riveting look at the heinous crime that shook the Midwest in the early 1970s. Written from rare, inside interviews with the lone survivor, who broke nearly four decades of silence, this shocking yet moving story will not soon be forgotten.

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Good Shepherds: Living the Faith

“…so he asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’” Luke 10:29

In a society that is so thoroughly self-centered, that question becomes more pertinent than ever before. In this book of collected essays, articles, poetry, and devotionals, author Dana Yost explores not only the idea of regarding even “the least of these” as a “neighbor” by also emulating the life of Christ in acting as the “Good Shepherd” for those around us that are in need.

This title is published by eLectio Publishing and is distributed worldwide by Untreed Reads.

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Immeasurable: Diving the Depths of God’s Love

From the number of figures on our paychecks to the digits staring back at us from the bathroom scale, we often gauge our success by the numerical standards of this world – but there are some things that cannot be measured. Immeasurable is the personal story of a young woman who has found freedom from “measuring up” by seeking the One who numbers and names the stars, the One who gives graciously from the overflowing abundance of His love.

PRAISE FOR IMMEASURABLE:
“As I dealt with years of eating disorders myself, I too was broken, depressed and hopeless. Diana is a beautiful example of sharing Christ and speaking truth and hope to women everywhere.”
Andrea Logan White
Actress (Mom’s Night Out)
Co-Owner, Pure Flix Entertainment

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Letter From 10 Green (MP3)

As featured in the autobiography What Don’t Kill Me Just Makes Me Strong.
From the album Kiss Kiss Bang Bang: The Best of Stewart Francke.
This track and the song “Summer Soldier (Holler If Ya Hear Me) featuring Bruce Springsteen” are free when purchased with Stewart’s autobiography What Don’t Kill Me Just Makes Me Strong. Simply add both songs and the ebook to your shopping cart and enter coupon code MAKESMESTRONG during checkout.
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Making Love

Robert Johansen’s and Todd Gaffaney’s breakout book, Making Love — How to Create, Enjoy, and Sustain Intimacy, is a beautifully written, easy to understand, clinically proven concept that teaches the reader how he or she can create and sustain love for their partner.

Making Love is an extremely important book for today’s times, given that a staggering sixty-seven percent of couples married after 1990 are divorced. Ironically, marriage counselors divorce at the same alarming rate as the national average. While these failed relationship statistics are troubling, there is hope for a better tomorrow.

Author’s Johansen and Gaffaney’s research evolved into a groundbreaking and clinically tested model that gives readers the tools to thrive in their marriage or relationship.

What Other Doctors Have Said About Making Love:

The authors have brought a refreshing and new perspective to the difficulties and complexities of the intimate relationship. Making Love offers a uniquely inspiring view on how partners can grow love for each other. I highly recommend it. – Sherry Lewis, PhD. LCSW

Drs. Johansen and Gaffaney have devised a very powerful model for effectively intervening in couples lives to improve their intimacy. Their model reduces strife while teaching relating partners intimacy-building communication techniques. This book will benefit professional therapists and lay people alike. – Diana Haberland, M.A., Marriage and Family Therapist, Private Practice

I had the great opportunity to put the principles contained in this book to a scientific test for my doctoral dissertation. The results of my research were very positive to say the least. But perhaps even more importantly, I have applied these principles with clients in my practice and have seen first hand how effective they are. By offerring an organizing perspective on the complex data couples bring to therapy, the model reduces anxiety in clients and treating therapists. The model changes our traditional views on love and marriage. I strongly recommend it. – Ian T. Johansen, PhD, Clinical Psychologist, Private Practice, Author, Private Practice

This book can change one’s life. The authors have lucidly presented profoundly simple principles that enable couples to understand their own needs, hear those of their partner, and work toward continued open and nurturing communication and fulfillment. My own professional and personal growth after thirty years as a psychologist continues to be informed by this landmark addition to the practice of couples therapy.” – Lester Mindus, PhD, Private Practice

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Mastering the Thesis Statement

Author Steve Sharp tells his students that the thesis statement is the sun around which everything in their paper orbits. Every sentence must fall within its gravitational pull and obey rational orbital laws. Otherwise chaos ensues. If you really want to succeed in the academic world, you simply can’t afford to leave your readers scratching their heads after they’ve read your paper, wondering, What’s the point of this? Why was this written?

Mastering the Thesis Statement teaches you just about everything you need to know to write an effective thesis statement and improve the quality of your academic writing. Because writing is such hard work, you may have to revise your thesis many, many times before you discover the gem that shines brightest – a thesis that not only suits the content and purpose of your paper but also truly reflects what you’re trying to say.

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Mastering Your Role As a Nonprofit Manager

Mastering Your Role as a Nonprofit Manager is a practical guide for managers who want to enhance their current skills and learn the strategies and practices of mid-level and senior-level managers.

In-depth discussions show how to increase your effectiveness in supervising people and managing programs. With “‘A Day in the Life”’ examples throughout the book, managers will have the opportunity to broaden their skills and practice newly acquired managerial acumen.

For new managers, the core tasks of supervision, delegation and evaluation are reviewed, and the steps managers can take to create a “‘best practice”’ are described.

For mid-level to senior-level managers interested in expanding their skill sets to include program management, elements of program development are discussed.

Mastering Your Role as a Nonprofit Manager provides managers with an activist/advocacy vision, the ability to incorporate the critical thinking habits and thought leadership practices that are essential elements of this role.

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Milking the Moon

FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD
This sumptuous oral biography of Eugene Walter, the best-known man you’ve never heard of, is an eyewitness history of the heart of the last century—enlivened with personal glimpses of luminaries from William Faulkner and Martha Graham to Judy Garland and Leontyne Price—and a pitch-perfect addition to the Southern literary tradition that has critics cheering.
 
In his 76 years, Eugene Walter ate of “the ripened heart of life,” to quote a letter from Isak Dinesen, one of his many illustrious friends. Walter savored the porch life of his native Mobile, Alabama, in the the l920s and ‘30s; stumbled into the Greenwich Village art scene in late-1940s New York; was a ubiquitous presence in Paris’s expatriate café society in the 1950s (where he was part of the Paris Review at its inception); and later, in 1960s Rome, participated in the golden age of Italian cinema. He was somehow everywhere, bringing with him a unique and contagious spirit, putting his inimitable stamp on the cultural life of the twentieth century.
“Katherine Clark…has edited Eugene Walter’s oral history into a book as amazing as the man himself.” JONATHAN YARDLEY, WASHINGTON POST BOOK WORLD
 
“Milking the Moon has perfect pitch and flawlessly captures Eugene’s pixilated wonderland of a life…. I love this book—and I couldn’t put it down.”
PAT CONROY
 
“Surprising and serendipitous.”
NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
 
“Anecdotes so frothy they ought to be served with a paper parasol over crushed ice.”
PEOPLE
 
“A rare literary treat…the temptation is to wolf it down all at once, but it’s much more satisfying to take your sweet time. The most unique oral history of the mid-twentieth century.”
TIMES-PICAYUNE (NEW ORLEANS)
 
“An exceptionally fun read.”
ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION
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Motherwit: An Alabama Midwife’s Story

“Motherwit” and “common sense” were the watchwords of Onnie Lee Logan’s career as a lay midwife in Mobile County, Alabama.
Although she received little formal education, endured the Depression and faced a racist society, Onnie Lee Logan experienced her life as the triumphant fulfillment of a dream to be one of those who could bring babies into the world, as her mother and grandmother had done before her.
Her story, told in the soft, now vanishing dialect of the Deep South, is powerful and fascinating oral history. Motherwit follows her life through her work as a servant for a wealthy Mobile family, her troubled marriage during the Depression, and her struggle to become a licensed midwife. We watch as she delivers the babies of both black and white women of Alabama–losing only one baby in 40 years. Onnie Lee Logan’s forbearance in the face of the crushing prejudice of the rural South makes inspiring and unforgettable reading. When she passed away in 1995, the New York Times declared her a “folk hero,” and Time called her book “a feminist classic.”
Filled with startling drama and profound wisdom, Motherwit is an important contribution to African-American history.
“An amazing story.  A heroic woman and life after my own heart.”  Alice Walker
“To have told her own story, to have borne this eloquent witness to her life is Onnie Lee Logan’s final triumph.”  Ellen Douglas in the Washington Post Book World
“Oral history doesn’t come much better than this.” Booklist
“Beautiful…her passion rings through in every line.”  Los Angeles Times
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My Father’s Guru

As a child growing up in the Hollywood Hills during the 1950s, Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson thought it was perfectly normal that a guru named Paul Brunton lived with his family and dictated everything about their daily rituals, from their diet to their travel plans to his parents’ sex life. But in this extraordinary memoir, Masson reflects on just how bizarre everything about his childhood was–especially the relationship between his father and the elusive, eminent mystic he revered (and supported) for years.

Writing with candor and charm, Masson describes how his father became convinced that Paul Brunton–P.B. to his familiars–was a living God who would fill his life with enlightenment and wonder. As the Masson family’s personal guru, Brunton freely discussed his life on other planets, laid down strict rules on fasting and meditation, and warned them all of the imminence of World War III. For years, young Jeffrey was as ardent a disciple as his father–but with the onset of adolescence, he staged a dramatic revolt against this domestic deity and everything he stood for.

Filled with absurdist humor and intimate confessions, My Father’s Guru is the spellbinding coming-of-age story of one of our most brilliant writers.

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Mystical Experiences

A young man heard a voice inside his head, “Get outta the car. Get outta the car.” He jumped out and, seconds later, the car was destroyed. 

This story of a supernatural warning is one of many mystical encounters Dr. Farrell heard in twenty-three years working as a prison psychologist. Men in solitary confinement have nowhere to go, so some go out of body. Prisons are ghost-laden, and some murderers are confronted by the ghost of their victim asking, “Why?” Other men are comforted by visitations. Some men learn to put themselves into a trance where they contact dead relatives for advice or to relieve loneliness. Many drug dealers tell of dead former comrades telling them, “Get off the street. Get out of the drug game.”

Dr. Farrell heard similar stories from his middle-class patients representing a variety of professions including teachers, nurses, construction workers, firefighters, veterans and others who had mystical experiences. People who have these encounters are transformed. After most mystical experiences people become more centered and less distracted by superficial excitements such as drugs, alcohol, gambling, or uncommitted sex. For this reason the final section of the book presents a variety of paths, including meditation, which induce spiritual experiences.

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Nightmarriage

Chad Thomas Johnston’s Nightmarriage is a whimsical memoir that explores the terrors of marriage and the perils of parenthood. Adapted from Johnston’s blog series of the same name, Nightmarriage proves that, when two people marry, their flaws tie the knot, too. In essays such as “My Wife, the Black Hole,” “Hearts and Jumper Cables,” “Knives and Wives,” “Honeymoonwalking (to Jail),” and “Blessed Are the Tentmakers,” Johnston weaves stories on his literary loom that are equal parts luminous and lunatic.

Writing as only a minister’s son with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder can, Johnston has crafted an observational ode to both the blunders and wonders of wedlock, and his writing is punctuated accordingly with absurd alliteration, appalling puns, and madcap metaphors. Nightmarriage is a must-read for fans of David Sedaris, Robert Fulghum, and Anne Lamott.

While Johnston created the cover art himself, the interior of the book features original work by artists BARRR, Dan Billen, Ben Chlapek, Megan Frauenhoffer, Danny Joe Gibson, Mark Montgomery, and Darin M. White. The appendices of the book also include Twitter stream excerpts, recipes, artist information, and other miscellany from the world of Chad Thomas Johnston.

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Perfect Breathing

Breathe. It is the most important thing that you do. It is the common denominator that touches every dimension of your life – mind, body and spirit. Every thought that passes through your mind, every word that you speak, every muscle you move, every beat of your heart depends on the steady flow of oxygen to every one of the 50 trillion cells in your body.

Although the breath is automatic, we can consciously control it. Modern science and thousands of years of experience have shown us that conscious control of the breath can lead to dramatic changes to your mind, body and emotions. It impacts your health, your ability to heal, your emotional intelligence and wellbeing, your mental, physical, and creative performance, as well as your spiritual experience.

Conscious breathing techniques are routinely used by fighter pilots, astronauts, elite climbers and divers, Olympic athletes, Zen archers, dancers, musicians, actors and performing artists, as well as healing professionals from every discipline, and spiritual seekers from all traditions.

Perfect Breathing: Transform Your Life One Breath at a Time can help lead you to this remarkable source of energy, awareness and health. Grounded in cutting edge science and research as well as fascinating interviews with renowned experts and peak-performers, Perfect Breathing shows you how you can easily take advantage of this powerful source of energy, awareness, and healing in your personal and professional life in just minutes a day.

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Proof of Divine

Proof of Divine presents the journey of author Andrew Murtagh as he straddles the fence between faith and cynicism in an all-or-none look at the greatest story ever told. Blending his family’s incredible stories of survival, faith, hope, and love, matched with his own walk from hockey player to coach to husband, father, and career man, he embarks on a five-year expedition towards the intersection of faith and reason.

Is there a God? Are science and faith mutually exclusive? What is truth and what of logic, morality, and meaning? Who is the historical Jesus, and why Christianity? The faith of scientists, the science of skeptics, the questions of time, life, and purpose, Murtagh looks back at his own life and the inspiring lives of his forefathers to decide if he is an accident or an intention.

The graze of a bullet, a soldier surrounded, an armed robbery, and a fateful desert drive – Murtagh puts the faith of his youth to the ultimate test: the Proof of Divine.

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Raising the Peaceable Kingdom

“I did not want to fail, because the stakes were too high. After all, I was after nothing less than the secret of human harmony.”

The challenge that bestselling author Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson set for himself was formidable: to create a true interspecies peaceable kingdom within his own household. He hoped to learn if several different species–some, natural enemies–raised together from an early age could live peacefully side by side. So he took into his home seven young animals–a kitten, a rabbit, two rats, two chickens, and a puppy–and set about observing the whole process of socialization (or non-socialization) from the very beginning.

The initial results were mixed. Tamaiti, the kitten, made herself instantly comfortable, but Hohepa, the Flemish giant rabbit, remained inscrutably reserved. Kia and Ora, the rats, slept all day and became active at night. Moa and Moana, the Polish frizzle chickens, bonded with each other but to no one else. Mika, the stray pup, barked much too much. But as the hours and days passed in this never-before-attempted environment, the animals began to change in startling ways, as Masson wondered which animals would bond, and which would recoil from one another? Can animals, including humans, truly change when direct experience tells them it’s safe to do so? Would the experiment end in triumph, or in tragedy?

Raising the Peaceable Kingdom poses universal questions we’ve all had about relationships, social strife, and peaceful coexistence. In its intimations of the potential for planetary harmony, this elegantly written book is a work of major significance. As a unique account of life in an interspecies community, it offers unmitigated enchantment, joy, and delight.

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Rules Get Broken

John falls in love with Peggy the moment he meets her on New Year’s Eve. Nine years of marriage and two children later, nothing has changed. The beautiful Irish girl with the thick, black shining hair and sparkling, brilliant blue eyes is still the center of his world.

But when Peggy tells him one Saturday night in July that she can’t go sailing because she’s too tired to move, John’s concerned. When Peggy is diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia later that week, he’s terrified. And when she dies seventeen days later, he’s shattered, his world destroyed.

So why then just days after Peggy’s death does John call Nancy, the young woman who once lived next door, and ask her out to dinner? Why does Nancy say yes? And what happens when people ignore the rules of propriety and allow themselves to be drawn into a relationship they know will shock and offend family and friends? What price do they pay for breaking one of society’s most time-honored rules of behavior?

Rules Get Broken deals with love lost, love found, and the collateral damage along the way and demonstrates what love is…and isn’t.

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Saturday Night

Saturday Night is the intimate history of the original Saturday Night Live, from its beginnings as an outlaw program produced by an unruly band of renegades from the comedy underground to a TV institution that made stars of John Belushi, Bill Murray, Chevy Chase, Gilda Radner, Jane Curtin, Laraine Newman, Garrett Morris, Joe Piscopo and Eddie Murphy.

This is the book that revealed to the world what really happened behind the scenes during the first ten years of this groundbreaking program, from the battles SNL fought with NBC to the battles fought within the show itself. It’s all here: The love affairs, betrayals, rivalries, drug problems, overnight successes, and bitter failures, mixed with the creation of some of the most outrageous and original comedy ever. “It reads like a thriller,” said the Associated Press, “and may be the best book ever written about television.”

Available for the first time in ebook format, this edition features nearly fifty photographs of cast, crew and sketches.

Please Note: These ebook files are considerable in size. We recommend downloading them over a high-speed connection.

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Shakespeare By Another Name

The debate over the true author of the Shakespeare canon has raged for centuries. Astonishingly little evidence supports the traditional belief that Will Shakespeare, the actor and businessman from Stratford-upon-Avon, was the author. Legendary figures such as Mark Twain, Walt Whitman and Sigmund Freud have all expressed grave doubts that an uneducated man who apparently owned no books and never left England wrote plays and poems that consistently reflect a learned and well-traveled insider's perspective on royal courts and the ancient feudal nobility. Recent scholarship has turned to Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford—an Elizabethan court playwright known to have written in secret and who had ample means, motive and opportunity to in fact have assumed the "Shakespeare" disguise. "Shakespeare" by Another Name is the literary biography of Edward de Vere as "Shakespeare." This groundbreaking book tells the story of de Vere's action-packed life—as Renaissance man, spendthrift, courtier, wit, student, scoundrel, patron, military adventurer, and, above all, prolific ghostwriter—finding in it the background material for all of The Bard's works. Biographer Margo Anderson incorporates a wealth of new evidence, including de Vere’s personal copy of the Bible (in which de Vere underlines scores of passages that are also prominent Shakespearean biblical references).
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So Far, So Good

Every year, 40,000 Americans suffer spinal cord injuries. Lee Goldstein is one of them.
Lee has been living with his injury for 66+ years, making him unofficially the longest living quadriplegic in history. The story of his injury and the reasons for his survival are chronicled in this stunning book. Lee tells of his terrible injury, his fight for life, and the amazing life he has led ever since.
He was rescued from drowning by a famous singer. He hob-nobbed with celebrities during his hospitalization, and afterwards. Behind his success, as a young man and an adult, was a loving, caring and supportive family. Lee Goldstein and his late wife Marilyn raised five adopted children, including Tim, who suffers from autism, and whom they raised to successful adulthood. Lee’s present wife Ellen is a rock and has made Lee’s later years close to divine.
No punches are pulled in this very honest and sometimes graphic account of what para/quads and their caretakers must be prepared to deal with every day, from the use of wheelchairs, to bathroom needs, to the sometimes life-threatening, embarrassing, or hilarious moments in the para/quad’s life.
Everyone who reads this book will be inspired and will come to better understand the real lives of para/quads, how they must live in order to keep living, and knowing that a good attitude has much to do with how good life, even in a chair, can be.
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Striking Out ALS: A Hero’s Tale

When author Ethan D. Bryan sent an email to W. P. Kinsella (author of Shoeless Joe and the basis for the film Field of Dreams) describing the scope and vision of his latest project, Kinsella replied in short time and form:

“I’m very distrustful of anyone who claims to hear voices. It is the fiction writer’s job to create weird characters, but I wouldn’t want to know any of them in real life.”

—W. P. Kinsella

Journey with Ethan D. Bryan, a self-proclaimed real-life “weird character,” in his quest to attend the Kansas City Royals’ Fantasy Camp in Surprise, Arizona, and the unforeseen twists in the journey that led Ethan to take up a new cause: to raise money and awareness for High School baseball coach Howard Bell, a Springfield, Missouri legend recently diagnosed with ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease).

A portion of all proceeds will be donated to “Help Coach Bell Strike Out ALS” Charity.

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Summer Soldier (Holler If Ya Hear Me)(MP3)

From the 2011 cd release Heartless World.

Special thanks to Bruce Springsteen for helping make this track possible.
This track and the song “Letter From 10 Green” are free when purchased with Stewart’s autobiography What Don’t Kill Me Just Makes Me Strong. Simply add both songs and the ebook to your shopping cart and enter coupon code MAKESMESTRONG during checkout.
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Tales of the Taylor: Songs That Changed the World

Changing the world.

It’s a concept that gets thrown around in political campaigns and Miss America pageants. But what does it really take to spark real change?

In his book, Tales of the Taylor: Songs that Changed the World, Ethan D. Bryan shows us just what one person can do, as well as the truth of the saying: “A journey of one million miles begins with a single step.” Join Ethan as he meets former KC Royals great Frank White, future leaders of America and prisoners who have had very visceral encounters with the living Christ.

This title is published by eLectio Publishing and is distributed worldwide by Untreed Reads.

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Temporarily Out of Order

Despite taking steps to ensure a healthy winter, Debbie Redman develops mysterious aches and pains that persist over the Holidays, making the busy season at her hair salon increasingly difficult to endure. Several doctor appointments, emergency room visits, and overnight hospital stays fail to yield answers or relief as her pains transition into paralysis.

Eventually, Debbie is rushed to a university hospital, where she is diagnosed with Guillain-Barré Syndrome. To make matters even more desperate, she soon succumbs to respiratory failure.

Almost completely paralyzed, she is in complete agony and unable to move or communicate. When she is finally stabilized, Debbie’s sight, her only sensory means of communication, is also taken away.

Her mother, friend, son, and husband Jim provide support and tough love with a sense of humor, helping her endure her torturous condition. Surrounded by machines, tubes, and beeping noises, they faced each day with a mixture of fear and courage. What did God have in store for them? A lesson in faith and love? Jim’s steadfast love for Debbie held strong through this unbelievable quest to bring inspiration to his wife. With stubborn grit and strength from loved ones, she ultimately rallies through recovery and rehabilitation to return to work one year later.

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The Art of Styling Sentences

Accepted writing style conventions change very slowly, but they do change. That is all the more reason why this favorite reference book for students, writers, and educators requires periodic updating. In this new edition, the authors review the fundamentals of correct sentence structure, then present twenty basic sentence patterns that encompass virtually every effective way of writing simple, compound, and complex sentences. They give advice on ways to vary rhythm and sentence patterns to produce a more interesting writing style. Example sentences as well as brief essays by recognized writers are presented and analyzed. This brand-new edition, updated with many contemporary examples of fine writing style, will inspire both students and seasoned writers to make their own essays sing.

This work is published in electronic format by Barron’s, and is available from most ebook retailers in a variety of formats.

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The Assault on Truth

In 1896, Sigmund Freud presented his revolutionary “seduction theory,” arguing that acts of sexual abuse and violence inflicted on children are the direct cause of adult mental illness. Nine years later, Freud completely reversed his position, insisting that these sexual memories were actually fantasies that never happened. Why did Freud retract the seduction theory? And why has the psychoanalytic community gone to such lengths to conceal that retraction? In this landmark book, drawing on his unique access to formerly sealed and hidden papers, Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson dares to uncover the truth about this critical turning point in Freud’s career and its enduring impact on the theory and practice of psychoanalysis.

The Assault on Truth reveals a reality that neither Freud nor his followers could bear to face. Bracing in its honesty, gripping in its revelations, this is the book that prompted Masson’s break with the psychoanalytic community—and launched his subsequent brilliant career as an independent thinker and writer.

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The Barrios of Manta: A Memoir of the Peace Corps

In February 1962, Earle and Rhoda Brooks, a young sales engineer and his schoolteacher wife, left home and friends in Illinois to serve as members of the Peace Corps in Manta, Ecuador. This book is an account of their life in the Peace Corps. The first book ever written by Peace Corps volunteers, it is a revealing chronicle of personal involvement, of people from vastly different cultures learning to know one another on the level of their common humanity.

Earle and Rhoda begin their story with their decision to enlist as trainees in President Kennedy’s people-to-people grassroots aid program. They describe their jubilation at being accepted, the initial testing in Chicago, and the briefings in New York. With warmth and humor, they recount their experiences during the four-month training period in Puerto Rico. This was a time of trials and learning, of physical exertion and mental and emotional challenge. Of the 100 men and women who had formed their original group, 61, including Earle and Rhoda Brooks, graduated from trainees to volunteers.

Earle and Rhoda were assigned to a community development project in Manta, a small fishing village on the coast of Ecuador. Here they would spend two years, working with the people, helping them to help themselves.

The Brookses’ story of Peace Corps life in Ecuador is no simple success story, no tale of triumph over staggering odds, rather it is one of beginnings, as these two young Americans put all their skills, knowledge, compassion, and ingenuity into an effort to provide humanitarian grassroots help in alleviating poverty and disease.

Their story also shares what they learned from their humble fisher-people friends and neighbors. From their rich and varied experience emerges a picture of Latin American life far different in focus, and in many respects, far truer, than that of learned economists and political pundits. It is an intimate, human picture of a land filled with paradoxes and beset by problems that yield no easy solutions. It is a picture of a quest for learning and sharing, not on a soapbox or in the press, but in the hearts and minds of the common people.

Now, in 2012, on the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Peace Corps and fifty years after their decision to join the Peace Corps, Rhoda Brooks has created a new Foreward and Afterword, to highlight the intervening years during which she and her husband adopted two Ecuadorian youngsters, ages 2 and 4, and brought them home to Minnesota. She tells of the growing up years of Carmen and Koki (Ricardo) in a suburban community west of Minneapolis, the birth of their biological son and the adoption of a mixed race daughter three years later. Brooks explores the challenges and opportunities presented in the raising of their bi-racial family, the pain and sorrow of the untimely deaths of her husband Earle and their daughter, Josie, as well as the excitement and apprehension generated by the return to Manta for a visit when the children were in their teens. Brooks continues the Afterword with the return to Manta of her five Ecuadorian grandchildren who, then in their teens, went to explore their roots and meet their own biological grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. She concludes the final part of her story with an update into the lives of her seven grandchildren and the arrival of new great grandson, Brooks.

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The Cowboy Year

Mosey on over to the campfire, take a load off, and let me tell you about the adventures of J-Bar and me, Fret Maverick.

J-Bar is my dad, a multi-state cowboy action shooting champion.

To the best of my recollection, in nearly forty years, I had shot guns twice in my life.

Returning home from a family vacation, I suddenly felt compelled to take a risk and try something completely new. So, I joined my recently retired father in playing the cowboy action game. Competing under the alias “Fret Maverick,” I was introduced to a slice of Americana I would have never known otherwise. The Cowboy Year is a quirky and beautiful, Midwest-set, father-and-son memoir.

But ultimately, The Cowboy Year is a story about having the courage to tell new stories.

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The Evolution of Fatherhood

Inspired by the wonder of his own experiences as a parent, former psychoanalyst and New York Times best-selling author Jeffrey Masson offers a remarkable look at one of the most fulfilling roles in the animal world: fatherhood. In The Evolution of Fatherhood, he examines the extraordinary behavior of outstanding fathers, heroes among animals, including: the male emperor penguin, who incubates the egg of his young through Antarctic blizzards; prairie dog dads, who teach their pups to play; the South American tamarin monkey, who “coaches” his mate through labor and delivery; and the wolf—and why wolves make good fathers, whereas their close relatives, dogs, don’t. With captivating writing and impeccable research, Masson celebrates the unique and often surprising role that males play in the lives of their young.

Masson also looks at nature’s worst fathers: lions, langurs, bears—and humans. He shows that when a father cares for his young, as does the beaver, we immediately look for a biological, and not an emotional, explanation. But Masson demonstrates that for these animals fatherhood is a profound, all-encompassing experience. Compelling and inspirational, The Evolution of Fatherhood is a book that will forever change our perceptions of parenthood and family love.

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The Girl Next Door…And How She Grew

A CINDERELLA JOURNEY FROM SMALL-TOWN KID TO MGM’S SINGING AND DANCING GIRL NEXT DOOR–…BUT WHAT GOT LOST ALONG THE WAY?
She was the sweet-faced gal who won our hearts as the spunky heroine of SEVEN BRIDES FOR SEVEN BROTHERS…the all-American beauty who kicked up her heels with Fred Astaire in ROYAL WEDDING.
Jane Powell grew up alongside Elizabeth Taylor, Roddy McDowall and Ann Blyth…and she and Liz were bridesmaids at each other’s weddings. But with four marriages and nineteen films behind her, MGM’s golden-voiced Girl Next Door realized she’d never found happiness—or herself—until now.
In her own words, Jane Powell gives an unabashed account of her struggle to grow beyond her screen image—after it had been created and torn down by Hollywood.
A SPIRITUAL AND EMOTIONAL TRIUMPH! With memorable photos!
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The Rangity Tango Kids

The cadence of Rominger’s narrative style is soundly evocative of the world she brings to life in The Rangity Tango Kids. Growing up on a California farm riding horses and motorcycles, Rominger figured out where her heart was. The rich story of how to be a great family, to overcome challenges together, and to win in the end is one you won’t want to miss.”

—ROBERT REDFORD

From the ground it looks like a falcon flies in circles. It actually rises flying over the same territory to a new, higher level. Rominger’s life and charming book are like this. She was born to a traditional, religious, farm family with the kind of old-fashioned values and principles politicians rant about and rarely practice. Lorraine’s story melds the best of true conservatism, neither Right nor Left, with a huge human heart. I loved this book.”

—PETER COYOTE

The Rangity Tango Kids is the story of a fifth-generation, German Catholic farm family in 1950s and 1960s California, narrated by the eldest of 17 grandchildren. Born into a loving, hard-working, highly competitive family, and united by a strong faith, every day was an adventure growing up on a bucolic American farm, a way of life that is rapidly disappearing. The land provided her, her siblings and cousins with a sense of place, an upbringing steeped in rituals and traditions that was in stark contrast with the values and preoccupations of the outside world.

When the Rangity Tango Kids’ coming-of-age rebellion ran wild, they were often tangled up in the family’s strict morals and values. Regardless of the situation or conflict, the kids were surrounded by a swarm of loving relatives who put their arms around them and stuck together, no matter what.

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The Tailgater’s Cookbook

This cookbook provides 75 must-have recipes to make at the game or take along for tailgating. Recipes include everything from simple appetizers like beer boiled shrimp, to impressive grilled foods like Memphis-style babyback ribs, to sophisticated desserts like tiramisu. An introductory chapter provides tips on essential equipment and techniques for cooking up a great party in the parking lot. Tips throughout offer entertaining tailgate trivia, sources for supplies, and ideas on how to better enjoy your gametime gathering.

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The Unleavened Truth

Sit down and have a cup of coffee (and eat something…you’re looking a little thin), because oy vey does humorist Darryl A. Forman have something to tell you.

Join Darryl in this rollicking collection of essays covering everything from growing up Jewish to surgery to a secret love for Jon Stewart (ok, not so secret anymore). You’ll encounter cruise ship travels gone awry and wry looks at relationships that have cruised. From dads that are rabbis to jobs that have gone bye-bye, Darryl puts her own unique spin on telling-it-like-it-is.

Or, as Darryl would say, laying out her ‘notautobiographical’ life story as The Unleavened Truth.

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The Wall & Beyond

As the volume’s title suggests, my recurring motif is “the wall.” It reflects the confrontation between dreams and reality, between individual and institution. It also depicts my sense of estrangement following my immigration from Poland to the US in 1988. Finally, it echoes my struggle with the idea of God against the experience of religion and world’s theodicy. Probing the wall’s nature, I gradually come to realization that the wall is part of human nature. Ultimately, I always strive to affirm life – to reach beyond the wall.

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The Wander Woman’s Phrasebook

Updated for 2013 with new words and phrases!
Sometimes you need a phrasebook that does a lot more than just tell you where the bathroom is. If you’re a woman in a country where you don’t speak the language, you might need more assistance.
What if you want to flirt with that really cute waiter in Paris? What if a strange man hits on you in Venice? Maybe you just want to sleep in a hostel in Madrid without worrying that your bag will get stolen.
Alison Owings, solo traveler extraordinaire, presents a handy guidebook to key words and phrases in French, Italian and Spanish. In addition to important, everyday phrases to help with finding hotels, currency exchange, dining out and transportation, you’ll also find terms from dating to shopping and political discussions to working out. There’s something here for every woman on the go.
San Francisco Examiner said: “This cheeky, savvy, sexy primer, designed for women but entertaining for all, is not your conventional ‘Can I have the check please?’ phrasebook. If it were a movie, it would probably get an R rating.”
And from The New York Times: “For women, here are ways to say scram or stay. A phrasebook for women traveling solo or with other women – whether you’re looking for a companion or look to get rid of one.”
Hilarious and helpful, The Wander Woman’s Phrasebook belongs in every woman traveler’s carry-on.
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Under the Influence

“You’re going to end up in prison!”

Phil Hamman was told this repeatedly while growing up. His life was
spiraling out of control. A dismal home life with an abusive, con-artist
father who drank, gambled, womanized, and disappeared for days taught
Hamman all the wrong lessons. Even appearing before judges, ending up in
jail, being sent to the hospital at the hands of the police, and
dealing with the murder of his best friend did not deter him. He fought
back against the world, refusing to be brought to his knees by anyone.
Cheating death became a way of life. One day he stepped into a parking
lot at a predestined moment, and his life’s course began to change. Fate
propelled him from the streets of a harsh, impoverished neighborhood
and put him face-to-face with troubled teenagers and the challenge to be
their positive influence. Under the Influence is packed with firsthand
accounts of violence, death, bullies, street fights, love, and a
powerful message that will warm the heart, and leave an indelible mark
on the reader.

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What Don’t Kill Me Just Makes Me Strong

The songs “Summer Soldier (Holler If Ya Hear Me)” featuring Bruce Springsteen and “Letter From 10 Green” are free when purchased with Stewart’s autobiography What Don’t Kill Me Just Makes Me Strong. Simply add both songs and the ebook to your shopping cart and enter coupon code MAKEMESTRONG during checkout. This promotion is only valid in The Untreed Reads Store.
What Don’t Kill Me Just Makes Me Strong is a survival memoir that recounts Stewart Francke’s remarkable journey through leukemia and a bone marrow transplant, complications and recovery. Understanding he is, as a survivor, part of the “lucky unlucky,” Francke finds the silver lining in his struggle and then some.
Each chapter begins with guides to survival–through any adversity, not just cancer. These informed aphorisms lend What Don’t Kill Me a spiritual dimension, making it both literary memoir and a guide to living. As a young father and renowned musician, Francke describes the relationships with his family, friends, medical team and muse with poignant detail, humor and love. He ultimately comes to treat each breath as a gift and grows to understand that a life in service to others is a life lived with true purpose.
The trip from initial biopsy to full recovery is often horrific, but Francke writes as an unflinching advocate for his own condition, and comes to understand that both surrender and faith are choices. He continually chooses the latter, and finds only death is irrevocable. All else either makes us stronger or can be learned to live with. Although this is a somewhat singular journey through illness, faith and family, Francke makes it everyone’s story.
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What’s It Take to Make a Man?: A Handbook for the Parents of Boys

Written as a handbook for new or aspiring parents, What’s It Take To Make A Man? proposes a bold, even visionary approach to solving the twin problems of boys with little purpose and families with little connection. The book provides a practical, comprehensive road map for the rebirth of real Manhood and Family-hood. Just as the Women’s Movement forever dispelled the notion of women as second class, What’s It Take To Make A Man? will lead the simmering parent revolt against pop culture’s degradation of young men and their character.

With engaging chapter titles like “The Hole In The Soul Generation” and “Raising vs. Nurturing,”  What’s It Take To Make A Man? gets right to the point, in a common sense style that is inclusive of all boys, no matter what their sexual preference, or even their parents’ gender or relationship.Over 132,000 American teens attempted suicide in a recent year. Boys were five times more likely to try than girls. Boys are seven times more likely to drop out of school before age 18, and are joining gangs at alarming rates. By any measure, our boys are timed out, disengaged, and failing fast. Most have no idea of their obligation, or even their option, to become Men of character.

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When Your Child Is Being Bullied

Why this book and why now?

Because children deserve solutions and deserve to be protected!

Introducing the first book of its kind in the bullying book category: a “how-to-stop-it-and-get-beyond-it guide” for those who are experiencing the humiliation, isolation and despair brought on by bullying.

When Your Child Is Being Bullied: Real Solutions For Parents, Educators & Other Professionals, is a step-by-step guide written by two parents who have lived through the process. This book uses a blend of relevant stories, lessons learned, research, and clearly laid out steps to help identify, understand, solve the problem, and get families back on track.

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“Shakespeare” by Another Name

The debate over the true author of the Shakespeare canon has raged for centuries. Astonishingly little evidence supports the traditional belief that Will Shakespeare, the actor and businessman from Stratford-upon-Avon, was the author. Legendary figures such as Mark Twain, Walt Whitman and Sigmund Freud have all expressed grave doubts that an uneducated man who apparently owned no books and never left England wrote plays and poems that consistently reflect a learned and well-traveled insider’s perspective on royal courts and the ancient feudal nobility. Recent scholarship has turned to Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford—an Elizabethan court playwright known to have written in secret and who had ample means, motive and opportunity to in fact have assumed the “Shakespeare” disguise.

“Shakespeare” by Another Name is the literary biography of Edward de Vere as “Shakespeare.” This groundbreaking book tells the story of de Vere’s action-packed life—as Renaissance man, spendthrift, courtier, wit, student, scoundrel, patron, military adventurer, and, above all, prolific ghostwriter—finding in it the background material for all of The Bard’s works. Biographer Mark Anderson incorporates a wealth of new evidence, including de Vere’s personal copy of the Bible (in which de Vere underlines scores of passages that are also prominent Shakespearean biblical references).

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