Download or read book These Precious Days written by Ann Patchett and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2021-11-23 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The beloved New York Times bestselling author reflects on home, family, friendships and writing in this deeply personal collection of essays. "The elegance of Patchett’s prose is seductive and inviting: with Patchett as a guide, readers will really get to grips with the power of struggles, failures, and triumphs alike." —Publisher's Weekly “Any story that starts will also end.” As a writer, Ann Patchett knows what the outcome of her fiction will be. Life, however, often takes turns we do not see coming. Patchett ponders this truth in these wise essays that afford a fresh and intimate look into her mind and heart. At the center of These Precious Days is the title essay, a surprising and moving meditation on an unexpected friendship that explores “what it means to be seen, to find someone with whom you can be your best and most complete self.” When Patchett chose an early galley of actor and producer Tom Hanks’ short story collection to read one night before bed, she had no idea that this single choice would be life changing. It would introduce her to a remarkable woman—Tom’s brilliant assistant Sooki—with whom she would form a profound bond that held monumental consequences for them both. A literary alchemist, Patchett plumbs the depths of her experiences to create gold: engaging and moving pieces that are both self-portrait and landscape, each vibrant with emotion and rich in insight. Turning her writer’s eye on her own experiences, she transforms the private into the universal, providing us all a way to look at our own worlds anew, and reminds how fleeting and enigmatic life can be. From the enchantments of Kate DiCamillo’s children’s books (author of The Beatryce Prophecy) to youthful memories of Paris; the cherished life gifts given by her three fathers to the unexpected influence of Charles Schultz’s Snoopy; the expansive vision of Eudora Welty to the importance of knitting, Patchett connects life and art as she illuminates what matters most. Infused with the author’s grace, wit, and warmth, the pieces in These Precious Days resonate deep in the soul, leaving an indelible mark—and demonstrate why Ann Patchett is one of the most celebrated writers of our time.

Download or read book The Strangeness of the Good Including Quarantine Notebook written by James Matthew Wilson and published by . This book was released on 2020-08-12 with total page 118 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: James Matthew Wilson makes the everyday lyrically urgent and memorable. Few poets writing today do so with such unfailing elegance, close attention to the human world, and generosity of spirit.

Download or read book Mike Mignola The Quarantine Sketchbook written by Mike Mignola and published by Dark Horse Comics. This book was released on 2021-03-16 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the coronavirus quarantine, legendary Hellboy creator Mike Mignola posted original pencil sketches online and auctioned off the art to raise money for José Andres' World Central Kitchen. The sketches went viral and were the talk of the comics internet. Now those sketches are published in print for the first time, with all profits going to the World Central Kitchen. This new, oversized hardcover collection is a must have for Mignola readers and art fans alike. The book features an introduction by Christine Mignola, alongside sketches of Hellboy, beloved and unexpected pop culture characters, macabre chess pieces, gothic vegetable creatures, strange vampires, and more.

Download or read book The Dutch House written by Ann Patchett and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2019-09-24 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pulitzer Prize Finalist | New York Times Bestseller | A Read with Jenna Today Show Book Club Pick | A New York Times Book Review Notable Book | TIME Magazine's 100 Must-Read Books of the Year Named one of the Best Books of the Year by NPR, The Washington Post; O: The Oprah Magazine, Real Simple, Good Housekeeping, Vogue, Refinery29, and Buzzfeed From Ann Patchett, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Commonwealth, comes a powerful, richly moving story that explores the indelible bond between two siblings, the house of their childhood, and a past that will not let them go. The Dutch House is the story of a paradise lost, a tour de force that digs deeply into questions of inheritance, love and forgiveness, of how we want to see ourselves and of who we really are. At the end of the Second World War, Cyril Conroy combines luck and a single canny investment to begin an enormous real estate empire, propelling his family from poverty to enormous wealth. His first order of business is to buy the Dutch House, a lavish estate in the suburbs outside of Philadelphia. Meant as a surprise for his wife, the house sets in motion the undoing of everyone he loves. The story is told by Cyril’s son Danny, as he and his older sister, the brilliantly acerbic and self-assured Maeve, are exiled from the house where they grew up by their stepmother. The two wealthy siblings are thrown back into the poverty their parents had escaped from and find that all they have to count on is one another. It is this unshakeable bond between them that both saves their lives and thwarts their futures. Set over the course of five decades, The Dutch House is a dark fairy tale about two smart people who cannot overcome their past. Despite every outward sign of success, Danny and Maeve are only truly comfortable when they’re together. Throughout their lives they return to the well-worn story of what they’ve lost with humor and rage. But when at last they’re forced to confront the people who left them behind, the relationship between an indulged brother and his ever-protective sister is finally tested.

Download or read book Contemporary Urban Planning written by John M. Levy and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2024-07-17 with total page 443 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Contemporary Urban Planning, 12e provides students with an unvarnished and in‐depth introduction to the historic, economic, political, legal, ideological, and environmental factors affecting urban planning today. Planning is a highly political activity. Urban and regional planning decisions often involve large sums of money, both public and private, with the potential to deliver large benefits to some and losses to others. The extensively revised edition of this beloved text tackles the most pressing recent issues in urban development, including: current demographic, technological, and lifestyle changes and the possibility for a major turn toward reurbanization/urban revitalization after decades of decentralization; an expanded consideration of contemporary means of public participation in planning; the impact of contemporary social movements on planning, and the rising importance of social equity as a major planning objective; the affordable housing shortage facing cities in many large U.S. metropolitan areas; • making cities more adaptable to micro‐mobility; environmental goals and the role of planners in responding to global climate change, current public‐health challenges, and major environmental catastrophes; and the effect of varied applications of land use controls and other planning policies in different countries and under different political regimes, with case study examples from the UK, France, Eastern Europe, China, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. This thoroughly updated new edition also benefits from resources to help classroom instruction, both in the text and online. These include discussion and multiple‐choice questions, and links for students to online supplemental readings, websites, and media sources. Contemporary Urban Planning is an essential resource for students, city planners, and all who are concerned with the nature of contemporary urban development problems. Cisit the Instructor and Student Resources: www.routledge.com/cw/levy

Download or read book World s Pandemic Chronicles written by Sandra Sanada and published by . This book was released on 2020-08-28 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Year of 2020. For the first time in history, we live together a Global Pandemic. The outbreak of the Coronavirus locked us all in our houses for months. We chose to write. Nana Iavorschi Cnejevici, Istanbul, Turkey; Olga Balan, Rome, Italy; Andra Ticarau, Bucharest, Romania; Dragos Pop, Cluj-Napoca, Romania; Michelle Macias, Ciudad de Mexico, Mexico; Ramona Dumitrean, Cluj-Napoca, Romania; Alina Orasanu, Boston, USA; Santiago Chirino, Ciudad de Mexico, Mexico; Acna Samskiescu, London, UK; Dan Mecu, Braila, Romania; Mihaela Maier, Scarborough, UK; Steven Samples, UK; Kunal Rajput, New Delhi, India; Bianca Opris, Brussels, Belgium; Mihaela Gaicu, Bucharest, Romania; George Smarandache, Slatina, Romania; Sandie Michaels, Bucharest, Romania; Claudiu Neacsu, Tecuci, Romania; Sabina Hesse, Los Angeles, USA; Michael Angus, New York, USA; Mihaela Stoica, Siena, Italy; Serban Hesse, Nurnberg, Germany; Lucia Lobont, Bucharest, Romania; Max Petropoulos, Athens, Greece; Livia Negulescu, Cluj-Napoca, Romania; Zaid Khan, Agra India; Lucia Davis, Auckland, New Zealand; Cornel Nemes, Reno, Nevada, USA; Tenzin Tsundue, Dharamshala, India; Sandra Sanada, Bucharest, Romania; Takahiro Hatake, Tokyo, Japan; Asmaa Arafa, Cairo, Egypt; Mihai Ivanof, Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Monica Loloiu, Bucharest, Romania; Bruno Carrier, Paris, France. We are all into this! 33 Isolated Humans from around the Globe, 33 Authentic Quarantine Stories. Don't miss the "World's Pandemic Chronicles", The diary of each of us!

Download or read book Travel Writing in an Age of Global Quarantine written by Gary Fisher and published by Anthem Press. This book was released on 2021-09-07 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Travel Writing in an Age of Global Quarantine is an anthology of travel accounts, by a diverse range of writers and academics. Challenging conventional academic ‘authority’, each contributor writes, from memory during the Covid-19 lockdown, about a place they have previously visited, ‘accompanied’ by an historical traveller who published an account of the same place. As immobility is forced upon us, at least for the immediate future, we have the chance to reflect. Travel Writing in an Age of Global Quarantine presents opportunities to approach a text as a scholar differently. We break with the traditional academic ‘rules’ by inserting ourselves into the narrative and foregrounding the personal, subjective elements of literary scholarship. Each contributor critiques an historical description of a place about which, simultaneously, they write a personal account. The travel writer, Philip Marsden, posits a fundamental difference between traditional ‘academic’ writing and travel writing in that travel narratives do not, or ought not anyway, begin by assuming a scholarly authoritative understanding of the places they describe. Instead, they attempt to say what they found and how they felt about it. The very good point we think Marsden makes, and the one this book tries to demonstrate, is that, as a matter of form, the first-person narrative has the ability to expose the research process: to allow the reader to see when and how a scholarly transformation takes place; to give the scholar the opportunity to openly foreground their own subjectivity and say ‘this is the personal journey that led me to my conclusions’; to problematize the unchallenged authority of the scholar. Travel Writing in an Age of Global Quarantine challenges the idea of scholarly authority by embracing the subjective nature of research and the first-person element. We address a problematic distance between travel writing practice and travel writing scholarship, in which the latter talks about the former without ever really talking to it. Defining travel writing as a genre has often proved more difficult than it might seem, but Peter Hulme has suggested that it is ethically necessary for the writer to have visited the place described. Hulme asserts that ‘travel writing is certainly literature, but it is never fiction’. If this seems obvious, Travel Writing in an Age of Global Quarantine asks the reader to consider the idea that if visiting the place described is necessary for the writer to claim they have produced a travel account, might it also be necessary, or at least advantageous and valuable, for the writer of a scholarly critique of that account to have done the same.

Download or read book Peace Locomotion written by Jacqueline Woodson and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2009 with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through letters to his little sister, who is living in a different foster home, sixth-grader Lonnie, also known as "Locomotion," keeps a record of their lives while they are apart, describing his own foster family, including his foster brother who returns home after losing a leg in the Iraq War.

Download or read book Passions written by Carolyne Roehm and published by . This book was released on 2021-09-15 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 3 book set

Download or read book The Complete Works of Primo Levi written by Primo Levi and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2015-09-28 with total page 2388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Notable Book of the Year Named one of the Best Books of the Year by the Washington Post and Library Journal A Holiday Gift Guide Selection in the San Francisco Chronicle and Newsday A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice Selection The Complete Works of Primo Levi, which includes seminal works like If This Is a Man and The Periodic Table, finally gathers all fourteen of Levi’s books—memoirs, essays, poetry, commentary, and fiction—into three slipcased volumes. Primo Levi, the Italian-born chemist once described by Philip Roth as that “quicksilver little woodland creature enlivened by the forest’s most astute intelligence,” has largely been considered a heroic figure in the annals of twentieth-century literature for If This Is a Man, his haunting account of Auschwitz. Yet Levi’s body of work extends considerably beyond his experience as a survivor. Now, the transformation of Levi from Holocaust memoirist to one of the twentieth century’s greatest writers culminates in this publication of The Complete Works of Primo Levi. This magisterial collection finally gathers all of Levi’s fourteen books—memoirs, essays, poetry, and fiction—into three slip-cased volumes. Thirteen of the books feature new translations, and the other is newly revised by the original translator. Nobel laureate Toni Morrison introduces Levi’s writing as a “triumph of human identity and worth over the pathology of human destruction.” The appearance of this historic publication will occasion a major reappraisal of “one of the most valuable writers of our time” (Alfred Kazin). The Complete Works of Primo Levi features all new translations of: The Periodic Table, The Drowned and the Saved, The Truce, Natural Histories, Flaw of Form, The Wrench, Lilith, Other People’s Trades, and If Not Now, When?—as well as all of Levi’s poems, essays, and other nonfiction work, some of which have never appeared before in English.

Download or read book The Particulars of Peter written by Kelly Conaboy and published by Grand Central Publishing. This book was released on 2020-12-08 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This might be one of the month’s, if not the year’s, sweetest books — zaniest, too.” ―The Washington Post "A hilarious addition to the dogoir canon.” ―People "Perhaps the greatest love story ever told.” ―Refinery29 "The feel-good book the world needs." —PopSugar From one of the Internet's most original voices, a hilarious journey through the odd corners of obsessive dog ownership and the author's own infatuation with her perfect dog Peter. The author met Peter in the spring of 2017. He -- calm, puppy-eyed, with the heart of a poet and the soul of, also, a poet -- came to her first as a foster. He was unable to stay with his previously assigned foster for reasons that are none of your business, but which we will tell you were related to frequent urination. The rescue needed someone free of the sort of responsibilities that would force her to regularly leave the house for either work or socializing, and a writer was the natural choice. Thus began a love story for the ages. The Particulars of Peter is a funny exploration of the joy found in loving a dog so much it makes you feel like you're going to combust, and the author's potentially codependent relationship with her own sweet dog, Peter. Readers will follow Peter and his owner to Woofstock, "the largest outdoor festival for dogs in North America," and accompany them to lessons in Canine Freestyle, a sport where dogs perform a routine set to music, creating the illusion that they're dancing with their owners. From learning about Peter's DNA, to seeing if dogs can sense the presence of ghosts, The Particulars of Peter will give readers a smart, entertaining respite from the harsh world of humans into the funny little world of dogs. Readers will accompany this lovable duo through exciting trips, lessons, quiet moments of connection, and probably a failure or two. By fusing memoir and infotainment, The Particulars of Peter promises to refresh the perennially popular dog lit category in a scrumptiously bighearted barnstormer of a book.

Download or read book Concerning the Nature of Things written by William Bragg and published by Courier Corporation. This book was released on 2004-01-01 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Developed from a Nobel Laureate's popular lectures at the Royal Institution of Great Britain, this easy-to-understand book explains the nature of atoms, metal, gases, diamonds, ice, crystals, liquids, and other aspects of science. It illuminates many topics that are seldom explained, defining them in simple terms. 138 illustrations. 1925 edition.

Download or read book The End of October written by Lawrence Wright and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2021-04-27 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower—a riveting thriller and “all-too-convincing chronicle of science, espionage, action and speculation” (The Wall Street Journal). At an internment camp in Indonesia, forty-seven people are pronounced dead with acute hemorrhagic fever. When epidemiologist Henry Parsons travels there on behalf of the World Health Organization to investigate, what he finds will have staggering repercussions. Halfway across the globe, the deputy director of U.S. Homeland Security scrambles to mount a response to the rapidly spreading pandemic leapfrogging around the world, which she believes may be the result of an act of biowarfare. And a rogue experimenter in man-made diseases is preparing his own terrifying solution. As already-fraying global relations begin to snap, the virus slashes across the United States, dismantling institutions and decimating the population. With his own wife and children facing diminishing odds of survival, Henry travels from Indonesia to Saudi Arabia to his home base at the CDC in Atlanta, searching for a cure and for the origins of this seemingly unknowable disease. The End of October is a one-of-a-kind thriller steeped in real-life political and scientific implications, filled with the insight that has been the hallmark of Wright’s acclaimed nonfiction and the full-tilt narrative suspense that only the best fiction can offer.

Download or read book Seven Days of Us written by Francesca Hornak and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2017-10-17 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A family can’t escape their secrets when they’re forced to spend a week in quarantine in this “sharply funny” (People) novel—an Indie Next and #1 Library Reads Pick! It's Christmas, and for the first time in years the entire Birch family will be under one roof. Even Emma and Andrew's elder daughter—who is usually off saving the world—will be joining them at Weyfield Hall. But Olivia, a doctor, is only coming home because she has to. She's just returned from treating an epidemic abroad and has been told she must stay in quarantine for a week...and so too should her family. For the next seven days, the Birches are locked down, cut off from the rest of humanity, and forced into each other's orbits. Younger, unabashedly frivolous daughter Phoebe is fixated on her upcoming wedding, while Olivia deals with the culture shock of first-world problems. As Andrew sequesters himself in his study writing scathing restaurant reviews and remembering his glory days as a war correspondent, Emma hides a secret that will turn the whole family upside down. In close proximity, not much can stay hidden for long, and as revelations and long-held tensions come to light, nothing is more shocking than the unexpected guest who's about to arrive....

Download or read book From the Notebooks of a Middle School Princess written by Meg Cabot and published by Feiwel & Friends. This book was released on 2015-05-19 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Return to the world of Meg Cabot's bestselling and beloved Princess Diaries series in From the Notebooks of a Middle School Princess—this time through the illustrated diary of a spunky new heroine: Princess Mia's long lost half-sister, Olivia! Olivia Grace Clarisse Mignonette Harrison is a completely average twelve-year-old: average height, average weight, average brown hair of average length, average brown skin and average hazel eyes. The only things about her that aren't average are her name (too long and princess themed), her ability to draw animals (useful for her future career as a wildlife illustrator), and the fact that she is a half-orphan who has never met her father and is forced to live with her aunt and uncle (who treat her almost like their own kids, so she doesn't want to complain). Then one completely average day, everything goes wrong: the most popular girl in school, Annabelle Jenkins, threatens to beat her up, the principal gives her a demerit, and she's knocked down at the bus stop . . . Until a limo containing Princess Mia Thermopolis of Genovia pulls up to invite her to New York to finally meet her father, who promptly invites her to come live with him, Mia, Grandmère and her two fabulous poodles . . . . Maybe Olivia Grace Clarisse Mignonette Harrison isn't so average after all!

Download or read book The Wild Robot written by Peter Brown and published by . This book was released on 2020-04-07 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Roz the robot discovers that she is alone on a remote, wild island with no memory of where she is from or why she is there, and her only hope of survival is to try to learn about her new environment from the island's hostile inhabitants.

Download or read book Open Your Bible Bible Study Book written by Raechel Myers and published by Lifeway Church Resources. This book was released on 2015-11-02 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Are you longing to hear from God, aching to know who He really is? The beautiful truth is this—we can encounter the living God today and every day in the pages of His Word. Whether you are a seasoned Bible reader or struggle to keep up with studying Scripture, Open Your Bible will leave you with a greater appreciation for the Word of God, a deeper understanding of its authority, and a stronger desire to know the Bible inside and out. Using powerful storytelling, real-life examples, and scripture itself, Open Your Bible will quench a thirst you might not even know you have, one that can only be satisfied by God's Word.