Download or read book Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2009-07-29 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Scores of talented and dedicated people serve the forensic science community, performing vitally important work. However, they are often constrained by lack of adequate resources, sound policies, and national support. It is clear that change and advancements, both systematic and scientific, are needed in a number of forensic science disciplines to ensure the reliability of work, establish enforceable standards, and promote best practices with consistent application. Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward provides a detailed plan for addressing these needs and suggests the creation of a new government entity, the National Institute of Forensic Science, to establish and enforce standards within the forensic science community. The benefits of improving and regulating the forensic science disciplines are clear: assisting law enforcement officials, enhancing homeland security, and reducing the risk of wrongful conviction and exoneration. Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States gives a full account of what is needed to advance the forensic science disciplines, including upgrading of systems and organizational structures, better training, widespread adoption of uniform and enforceable best practices, and mandatory certification and accreditation programs. While this book provides an essential call-to-action for congress and policy makers, it also serves as a vital tool for law enforcement agencies, criminal prosecutors and attorneys, and forensic science educators.

Download or read book Five Feet Apart written by Rachael Lippincott and published by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers. This book was released on 2019-02-05 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Also a major motion picture starring Cole Sprouse and Haley Lu Richardson! Goodreads Choice Winner, Best Young Adult Fiction of 2019 In this #1 New York Times bestselling novel that’s perfect for fans of John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars, two teens fall in love with just one minor complication—they can’t get within a few feet of each other without risking their lives. Can you love someone you can never touch? Stella Grant likes to be in control—even though her totally out of control lungs have sent her in and out of the hospital most of her life. At this point, what Stella needs to control most is keeping herself away from anyone or anything that might pass along an infection and jeopardize the possibility of a lung transplant. Six feet apart. No exceptions. The only thing Will Newman wants to be in control of is getting out of this hospital. He couldn’t care less about his treatments, or a fancy new clinical drug trial. Soon, he’ll turn eighteen and then he’ll be able to unplug all these machines and actually go see the world, not just its hospitals. Will’s exactly what Stella needs to stay away from. If he so much as breathes on Stella, she could lose her spot on the transplant list. Either one of them could die. The only way to stay alive is to stay apart. But suddenly six feet doesn’t feel like safety. It feels like punishment. What if they could steal back just a little bit of the space their broken lungs have stolen from them? Would five feet apart really be so dangerous if it stops their hearts from breaking too?

Download or read book The Second Machine Age Work Progress and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies written by Erik Brynjolfsson and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2014-01-20 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The big stories -- The skills of the new machines : technology races ahead -- Moore's law and the second half of the chessboard -- The digitization of just about everything -- Innovation : declining or recombining? -- Artificial and human intelligence in the second machine age -- Computing bounty -- Beyond GDP -- The spread -- The biggest winners : stars and superstars -- Implications of the bounty and the spread -- Learning to race with machines : recommendations for individuals -- Policy recommendations -- Long-term recommendations -- Technology and the future (which is very different from "technology is the future").

Download or read book The Things They Carried written by Tim O'Brien and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2009-10-13 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A classic work of American literature that has not stopped changing minds and lives since it burst onto the literary scene, The Things They Carried is a ground-breaking meditation on war, memory, imagination, and the redemptive power of storytelling. The Things They Carried depicts the men of Alpha Company: Jimmy Cross, Henry Dobbins, Rat Kiley, Mitchell Sanders, Norman Bowker, Kiowa, and the character Tim O’Brien, who has survived his tour in Vietnam to become a father and writer at the age of forty-three. Taught everywhere—from high school classrooms to graduate seminars in creative writing—it has become required reading for any American and continues to challenge readers in their perceptions of fact and fiction, war and peace, courage and fear and longing. The Things They Carried won France's prestigious Prix du Meilleur Livre Etranger and the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize; it was also a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award.

Download or read book Sand Casting Concrete written by Tina Skinner and published by Schiffer Publishing. This book was released on 2008 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Do you enjoy making sandcastles? Do your mashed potatoes become fine art before you eat them? If you enjoy working with your hands and being outdoors, you'll love sand-casting with concrete. Veteran concrete creator Bo Atkinson shares his passion and experience in this wonderful step-by-step pictorial. Starting with a pile of sand, a pile of gravel, some water, cement, and reinforcement, he demonstrates how simple it can be to create anything you fancy from concrete. His projects include a fairy lantern, a birdbath, a toadstool seat, a bench, and even a small footbridge.

Download or read book Ambiguous Loss written by Pauline BOSS and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2009-06-30 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When a loved one dies we mourn our loss. We take comfort in the rituals that mark the passing, and we turn to those around us for support. But what happens when there is no closure, when a family member or a friend who may be still alive is lost to us nonetheless? How, for example, does the mother whose soldier son is missing in action, or the family of an Alzheimer's patient who is suffering from severe dementia, deal with the uncertainty surrounding this kind of loss? In this sensitive and lucid account, Pauline Boss explains that, all too often, those confronted with such ambiguous loss fluctuate between hope and hopelessness. Suffered too long, these emotions can deaden feeling and make it impossible for people to move on with their lives. Yet the central message of this book is that they can move on. Drawing on her research and clinical experience, Boss suggests strategies that can cushion the pain and help families come to terms with their grief. Her work features the heartening narratives of those who cope with ambiguous loss and manage to leave their sadness behind, including those who have lost family members to divorce, immigration, adoption, chronic mental illness, and brain injury. With its message of hope, this eloquent book offers guidance and understanding to those struggling to regain their lives. Table of Contents: 1. Frozen Grief 2. Leaving without Goodbye 3. Goodbye without Leaving 4. Mixed Emotions 5. Ups and Downs 6. The Family Gamble 7. The Turning Point 8. Making Sense out of Ambiguity 9. The Benefit of a Doubt Notes Acknowledgments Reviews of this book: You will find yourself thinking about the issues discussed in this book long after you put it down and perhaps wishing you had extra copies for friends and family members who might benefit from knowing that their sorrows are not unique...This book's value lies in its giving a name to a force many of us will confront--sadly, more than once--and providing personal stories based on 20 years of interviews and research. --Pamela Gerhardt, Washington Post Reviews of this book: A compassionate exploration of the effects of ambiguous loss and how those experiencing it handle this most devastating of losses ... Boss's approach is to encourage families to talk together, to reach a consensus about how to mourn that which has been lost and how to celebrate that which remains. Her simple stories of families doing just that contain lessons for all. Insightful, practical, and refreshingly free of psychobabble. --Kirkus Review Reviews of this book: Engagingly written and richly rewarding, this title presents what Boss has learned from many years of treating individuals and families suffering from uncertain or incomplete loss...The obvious depth of the author's understanding of sufferers of ambiguous loss and the facility with which she communicates that understanding make this a book to be recommended. --R. R. Cornellius, Choice Reviews of this book: Written for a wide readership, the concepts of ambiguous loss take immediate form through the many provocative examples and stories Boss includes, All readers will find stories with which they will relate...Sensitive, grounded and practical, this book should, in my estimation, be required reading for family practitioners. --Ted Bowman, Family Forum Reviews of this book: Dr. Boss describes [the] all-too-common phenomenon [of unresolved grief] as resulting from either of two circumstances: when the lost person is still physically present but emotionally absent or when the lost person is physically absent but still emotionally present. In addition to senility, physical presence but psychological absence may result, for example, when a person is suffering from a serious mental disorder like schizophrenia or depression or debilitating neurological damage from an accident or severe stroke, when a person abuses drugs or alcohol, when a child is autistic or when a spouse is a workaholic who is not really 'there' even when he or she is at home...Cases of physical absence with continuing psychological presence typically occur when a soldier is missing in action, when a child disappears and is not found, when a former lover or spouse is still very much missed, when a child 'loses' a parent to divorce or when people are separated from their loved ones by immigration...Professionals familiar with Dr. Boss's work emphasised that people suffering from ambiguous loss were not mentally ill, but were just stuck and needed help getting past the barrier or unresolved grief so that they could get on with their lives. --Asian Age Combining her talents as a compassionate family therapist and a creative researcher, Pauline Boss eloquently shows the many and complex ways that people can cope with the inevitable losses in contemporary family life. A wise book, and certain to become a classic. --Constance R. Ahrons, author of The Good Divorce A powerful and healing book. Families experiencing ambiguous loss will find strategies for seeing what aspects of their loved ones remain, and for understanding and grieving what they have lost. Pauline Boss offers us both insight and clarity. --Kathy Weingarten, Ph.D, The Family Institute of Cambridge, Harvard Medical School

Download or read book River Teeth written by David James Duncan and published by Dial Press. This book was released on 2012-01-11 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In his passionate, luminous novels, David James Duncan has won the devotion of countless critics and readers, earning comparisons to Harper Lee, Tom Robbins, and J.D. Salinger, to name just a few. Now Duncan distills his remarkable powers of observation into this unique collection of short stories and essays. At the heart of Duncan's tales are characters undergoing the complex and violent process of transformation, with results both painful and wondrous. Equally affecting are his nonfiction reminiscences, the "river teeth" of the title. He likens his memories to the remains of old-growth trees that fall into Northwestern rivers and are sculpted by time and water. These experiences—shaped by his own river of time—are related with the art and grace of a master storyteller. In River Teeth, a uniquely gifted American writer blends two forms, taking us into the rivers of truth and make-believe, and all that lies in between.

Download or read book Popular Mechanics written by and published by . This book was released on 2000-01 with total page 140 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Popular Mechanics inspires, instructs and influences readers to help them master the modern world. Whether it’s practical DIY home-improvement tips, gadgets and digital technology, information on the newest cars or the latest breakthroughs in science -- PM is the ultimate guide to our high-tech lifestyle.

Download or read book Textbook Amy Krouse Rosenthal written by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2020-04-14 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The bestselling author of Encyclopedia an Ordinary Life returns with a literary experience that is unprecedented, unforgettable, and explosively human. Ten years after her beloved, groundbreaking Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life, #1 New York Times bestselling author Amy Krouse Rosenthal delivers a book full of her distinct blend of nonlinear narrative, wistful reflections, and insightful wit. It is a mighty, life-affirming work that sheds light on all the ordinary and extraordinary ways we are connected. Like she did with Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life, Amy Krouse Rosenthal ingeniously adapts a standard format—a textbook, this time—to explore life’s lessons and experiences into a funny, wise, and poignant work of art. Not exactly a memoir, not just a collection of observations, Textbook Amy Krouse Rosenthal is a beautiful exploration into the many ways we are connected on this planet and speaks to the awe, bewilderment, and poignancy of being alive. “…a groundbreaking new twist on the traditional literary experience… Textbook is a delightful collection of interesting scenarios that directly point to life lessons. Rosenthal manages to spotlight grand moments and everyday moments with equal curiosity, proving that it can be both a privilege — and petrifying — to peek into one’s humanity.”—Associated Press “Rosenthal is a marvel… a talented storyteller with an experimental flair for formatting… This engaging, playful, and clever glimpse into one woman’s life offers lots of photographs, graphic illustrations, and diagrams, resulting in a book that will make readers smile as their notions of story delivery expand.” —Booklist

Download or read book The World of John Burroughs written by Edward Kanze and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Born in 1837 in the Catskill Mountains of New York State and a longtime resident of the Hudson River Valley, Burroughs spent his life studying the natural world. His powerful verbal landscapes and philosophical insights into the natural world during the height of the Industrial Revolution were read by hundreds of thousands of people -- from powerful industrialists to countless schoolchildren. He counted among his friends the poet Wait Whitman, the pioneering preservationist President Teddy Roosevelt, Thomas Edison, and Andrew Carnegie. Henry Ford, whose own farmland upbringing Burroughs's writing recalled, not only gave the writer a Model T car and went camping with him, but also purchased his boyhood homestead, which Burroughs and other relatives were having trouble maintaining, and deeded it to his friend. Author Ed Kanze, himself a naturalist, writer and photographer, sheds new light on Burroughs's enormous contribution to how we think about our environment. His biographical text is enhanced by many quotations from Burroughs's essays and poems and, uniquely, by conversations with Burroughs's granddaughter, who contributed numerous affectionate recollections of her grandfather as well as many archival photographs of him, his farm and woodland writing studio, "Slabsides, " and family and friends -- including Muir, Roosevelt, Ford, Edison, and others. The text is further enlivened with crisp color photographs by Ed Kanze that evoke the landscapes Burroughs knew and loved and the many birds, animals, and plants that he wrote about with such intimacy and feeling. Burroughs's world truly comes alive again in the words and pictures of this book.

Download or read book Fast Food Nation written by Eric Schlosser and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 2012 with total page 387 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exploration of the fast food industry in the United States, from its roots to its long-term consequences.

Download or read book Good Economics for Hard Times written by Abhijit V. Banerjee and published by PublicAffairs. This book was released on 2019-11-12 with total page 398 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The winners of the Nobel Prize show how economics, when done right, can help us solve the thorniest social and political problems of our day. Figuring out how to deal with today's critical economic problems is perhaps the great challenge of our time. Much greater than space travel or perhaps even the next revolutionary medical breakthrough, what is at stake is the whole idea of the good life as we have known it. Immigration and inequality, globalization and technological disruption, slowing growth and accelerating climate change--these are sources of great anxiety across the world, from New Delhi and Dakar to Paris and Washington, DC. The resources to address these challenges are there--what we lack are ideas that will help us jump the wall of disagreement and distrust that divides us. If we succeed, history will remember our era with gratitude; if we fail, the potential losses are incalculable. In this revolutionary book, renowned MIT economists Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo take on this challenge, building on cutting-edge research in economics explained with lucidity and grace. Original, provocative, and urgent, Good Economics for Hard Times makes a persuasive case for an intelligent interventionism and a society built on compassion and respect. It is an extraordinary achievement, one that shines a light to help us appreciate and understand our precariously balanced world.

Download or read book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings written by Maya Angelou and published by Random House. This book was released on 2010-07-21 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Here is a book as joyous and painful, as mysterious and memorable, as childhood itself. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings captures the longing of lonely children, the brute insult of bigotry, and the wonder of words that can make the world right. Maya Angelou’s debut memoir is a modern American classic beloved worldwide. Sent by their mother to live with their devout, self-sufficient grandmother in a small Southern town, Maya and her brother, Bailey, endure the ache of abandonment and the prejudice of the local “powhitetrash.” At eight years old and back at her mother’s side in St. Louis, Maya is attacked by a man many times her age—and has to live with the consequences for a lifetime. Years later, in San Francisco, Maya learns that love for herself, the kindness of others, her own strong spirit, and the ideas of great authors (“I met and fell in love with William Shakespeare”) will allow her to be free instead of imprisoned. Poetic and powerful, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings will touch hearts and change minds for as long as people read. “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings liberates the reader into life simply because Maya Angelou confronts her own life with such a moving wonder, such a luminous dignity.”—James Baldwin From the Paperback edition.

Download or read book The Serpent King written by Jeff Zentner and published by Ember. This book was released on 2017-06-06 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Named to ten BEST OF THE YEAR lists and selected as a William C. Morris Award Winner,The Serpent King is the critically acclaimed, much-beloved story of three teens who find themselves--and each other--while on the cusp of graduating from high school with hopes of leaving their small-town behind. Perfect for fans of John Green's Turtles All the Way Down. "Move over, John Green; Zentner is coming for you." —The New York Public Library “Will fill the infinite space that was left in your chest after you finished The Perks of Being a Wallflower.” —BookRiot.com Dill isn't the most popular kid at his rural Tennessee high school. After his father fell from grace in a public scandal that reverberated throughout their small town, Dill became a target. Fortunately, his two fellow misfits and best friends, Travis and Lydia, have his back. But as they begin their senior year, Dill feels the coils of his future tightening around him. His only escapes are music and his secret feelings for Lydia--neither of which he is brave enough to share. Graduation feels more like an ending to Dill than a beginning. But even before then, he must cope with another ending--one that will rock his life to the core. Debut novelist Jeff Zentner provides an unblinking and at times comic view of the hard realities of growing up in the Bible belt, and an intimate look at the struggles to find one’s true self in the wreckage of the past. “A story about friendship, family and forgiveness, it’s as funny and witty as it is utterly heartbreaking.” —PasteMagazine.com “A brutally honest portrayal of teen life . . . [and] a love letter to the South from a man who really understands it.” —Mashable.com “I adored all three of these characters and the way they talked to and loved one another.”—New York Times

Download or read book The Talent Code written by Daniel Coyle and published by Bantam. This book was released on 2009-04-28 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is the secret of talent? How do we unlock it? This groundbreaking work provides readers with tools they can use to maximize potential in themselves and others. Whether you’re coaching soccer or teaching a child to play the piano, writing a novel or trying to improve your golf swing, this revolutionary book shows you how to grow talent by tapping into a newly discovered brain mechanism. Drawing on cutting-edge neurology and firsthand research gathered on journeys to nine of the world’s talent hotbeds—from the baseball fields of the Caribbean to a classical-music academy in upstate New York—Coyle identifies the three key elements that will allow you to develop your gifts and optimize your performance in sports, art, music, math, or just about anything. • Deep Practice Everyone knows that practice is a key to success. What everyone doesn’t know is that specific kinds of practice can increase skill up to ten times faster than conventional practice. • Ignition We all need a little motivation to get started. But what separates truly high achievers from the rest of the pack? A higher level of commitment—call it passion—born out of our deepest unconscious desires and triggered by certain primal cues. Understanding how these signals work can help you ignite passion and catalyze skill development. • Master Coaching What are the secrets of the world’s most effective teachers, trainers, and coaches? Discover the four virtues that enable these “talent whisperers” to fuel passion, inspire deep practice, and bring out the best in their students. These three elements work together within your brain to form myelin, a microscopic neural substance that adds vast amounts of speed and accuracy to your movements and thoughts. Scientists have discovered that myelin might just be the holy grail: the foundation of all forms of greatness, from Michelangelo’s to Michael Jordan’s. The good news about myelin is that it isn’t fixed at birth; to the contrary, it grows, and like anything that grows, it can be cultivated and nourished. Combining revelatory analysis with illuminating examples of regular people who have achieved greatness, this book will not only change the way you think about talent, but equip you to reach your own highest potential.

Download or read book The Wine Bible written by Karen MacNeil and published by Workman Publishing Company. This book was released on 2015-10-13 with total page 2408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: No one can describe a wine like Karen MacNeil. Comprehensive, entertaining, authoritative, and endlessly interesting, The Wine Bible is a lively course from an expert teacher, grounding the reader deeply in the fundamentals—vine-yards and varietals, climate and terroir, the nine attributes of a wine’s greatness—while layering on tips, informative asides, anecdotes, definitions, photographs, maps, labels, and recommended bottles. Discover how to taste with focus and build a wine-tasting memory. The reason behind Champagne’s bubbles. Italy, the place the ancient Greeks called the land of wine. An oak barrel’s effect on flavor. Sherry, the world’s most misunderstood and underappreciated wine. How to match wine with food—and mood. Plus everything else you need to know to buy, store, serve, and enjoy the world’s most captivating beverage.

Download or read book Stranger Care written by Sarah Sentilles and published by Random House. This book was released on 2021-05-04 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE • “A powerful, heartbreaking, necessary masterpiece.”—Cheryl Strayed, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Wild The moving story of what one woman learned from fostering a newborn—about injustice, about making mistakes, about how to better love and protect people beyond our immediate kin May you always feel at home. After their decision not to have a biological child, Sarah Sentilles and her husband, Eric, decide to adopt via the foster care system. Despite knowing that the system’s goal is the child’s reunification with the birth family, Sarah opens their home to a flurry of social workers who question them, evaluate them, and ultimately prepare them to welcome a child into their lives—even if it means most likely having to give the child back. After years of starts and stops, and endless navigation of the complexities and injustices of the foster care system, a phone call finally comes: a three-day-old baby girl named Coco, in immediate need of a foster family. Sarah and Eric bring this newborn stranger home. “You were never ours,” Sarah tells Coco, “yet we belong to each other.” A love letter to Coco and to the countless children like her, Stranger Care chronicles Sarah’s discovery of what it means to mother—in this case, not just a vulnerable infant but the birth mother who loves her, too. Ultimately, Coco’s story reminds us that we depend on family, and that family can take different forms. With prose that Nick Flynn has called “fearless, stirring, rhythmic,” Sentilles lays bare an intimate, powerful story with universal concerns: How can we care for and protect one another? How do we ensure a more hopeful future for life on this planet? And if we’re all related—tree, bird, star, person—how might we better live?