Search results for ""Balance""

This new 7th edition of Bradt's Cape Verde (Cabo Verde) has been fully revised and updated and remains the most comprehensive English-language guidebook available to the islands of this alluring Atlantic archipelago, described by some as 'Africa light'. The guide includes well-researched history and cultural sections, with a particularly strong section on music, and brings an honest approach to reporting the fragile balance between tourist development and protecting the environment. This new edition reflects the many changes since the previous one, including the introduction of charter flights from the UK to Sal and the first casino-hotel on Sal, as well as providing full information on how to make the most of the less developed islands away from the main tourist hotspots. Stable and peaceful, quietly isolated by its mid-Atlantic location, Cape Verde continues to grow economically and to develop its tourist infrastructure at a leisurely pace. With few natural resources, the islands are heavily dependent on imports, foreign remittances and still to some extent on foreign aid. The reduction in the latter has heightened the focus on the importance of tourism as an economic driver and visitor numbers continue to rise. Year-round sunshine makes Cape Verde a particularly appealing destination. The archipelago is diverse, particularly in terms of its tourist infrastructure. Sal and Boavista, the oldest of these volcanic islands are flat with white-sand beaches that rival anything in the world. Consequently, they attract 95% of Cape Verde's visitors, leaving the other seven inhabited islands undeveloped. Hikers and those curious to discover something authentic are drawn to them, spending their time walking amongst the jaw-dropping mountainous landscapes of Fogo or Santo Antão, taking some true time-out in tiny Brava or mellow Maio or enjoying the cultural fusion of African, Portuguese and Brazilian influences in the cities of Praia and Mindelo. The adventurous will find adrenalin rushing as they profit from windsurfing and kitesurfing opportunities, fuelled by strong breezes and Atlantic waves, while for culture, Mindelo is the attraction with a constant backdrop of seductive music, the thread which ties together the islands scattered across the mid-Atlantic.

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Syzygy? Jung used the term to describe the balancing of the opposites. Astronomically, syzygy (pronounced si-zi-gee) refers to a specific conjunction of the sun, moon and earth. On Mother Earth, the planet we call home, we are profoundly influenced by the radiance of the sun as well as the reflected light of the moon as we walk between light and darkness, physically and metaphorically. Solar energy evolves the ego and lunar energy evolves our essence. We learn the balance the two as we travel the twenty-two pathways of Kabbalah's Tree of Life. Honoring The Sacred Feminine, the spiritual practice offered here is an invitation to recognize and welcome intuitive wisdom more definitively into everyday awareness. A fresh interpretation of the traditional Major Arcana for women, here the patriarchal layering of the cards is lifted to reveal a timeless and timely revelation of intuitive wisdom in a sequence of insightful, profound, and empowering teachings for any woman who wishes to read her own life story as more substantive than superficial. Twenty-two of these cards reinterpret the Tarot's Major Arcana. Aligning the cards with the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet, we access three levels of soul consciousness, in Hebrew known as nefesh, ruach and neshamah through the specific letter, number and story of each card. Meet inspirational archetypes from world culture to light the way. Through meditations and mantras, discover your personal hero's journey that is a crucial part of evolving consciousness.Ten additional cards representing the sefirot or energy centers, offer the Tree of Life as an experiential introduction to Kabbalah. Coincidence and kabbalah, symbols and synchronicities, metaphors and mantras enrich and deepen life's experience. This mythic and metaphoric interpretation liberates these cards solely from the realm of prognostication and presents a meditative and inspirational tool for a daily personal practice. Heather Mendel's elegant, powerful images, full of mystery and complexity, will forever change the way you view the wisdom of the ancient Tarot. This book is published in paperback and epub formats and within its pages includes black & white illustrations of the cards, not the card themselves. The pack of cards is available to buy separately from the author Heather Mendel at

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"Read this important book to learn how cancer is an environmental, metabolic disease with many small causes that stack up—and what you can do to prevent or even reverse it."—Dave Asprey, New York Times bestselling author of The Bulletproof Diet The Optimal Terrain Ten Protocol to Reboot Cellular Health! The Metabolic Approach to Cancer offers an innovative, metabolic-focused nutrition protocol that works. Naturopathic, integrative oncologist and cancer survivor Dr. Nasha Winters and nutrition therapist Jess Higgins Kelley have identified the ten key elements of a person’s “terrain” (think of it as a topographical map of our body) that are crucial to preventing and managing cancer. Each of the terrain ten elements—including epigenetics, the microbiome, the immune system, toxin exposures, and blood sugar balance—is illuminated as it relates to the cancer process, then given a heavily researched and tested, non-toxic and metabolic, focused nutrition prescription. The ketogenic diet—which relies on the body’s production of ketones as fuel—is the centerpiece of The Metabolic Approach to Cancer. Further, Winters and Kelley explain how to harness the anticancer potential of phytonutrients abundant in low-glycemic plant and animal foods to address the 10 hallmarks of cancer—an approach Western medicine does with drug-based therapies. The optimized, genetically-tuned diet shuns: Grains Legumes Sugar Genetically modified foods Pesticides Synthetic ingredients The optimized, genetically-tuned diet emphasizes: Whole, wild foods Local Organic Ferments Heirloom Low-glycemic Other components of their approach include harm-reductive herbal therapies like mistletoe (considered the original immunotherapy and common in European cancer care centers) and cannabinoids (which shrink tumors and increase quality of life, yet are illegal in more than half of the United States). Through addressing the ten root causes of cancer and approaching the disease from a nutrition-focused standpoint, we can slow cancer’s endemic spread and live optimized lives. "The Metabolic Approach to Cancer is a powerhouse of detailed information on how to prevent, manage, and treat cancer. . . . It is written in an intimate conversation style that comes from decades of deep personal experience, research, and genuine passion."—Travis Christofferson, author of Tripping over the Truth

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Vimes is back, in all his curmudgeonly glory, in this classic, perceptive and laugh-out-loud Discworld mystery that will keep you turning the pages.'In my opinion, this is the book where Pratchett *really* hits his stride in terms of the city watch books . . . Is this book worth your time? Yes. A thousand times yes' Patrick Rothfuss, New York Times bestselling author of The Name of the WindTHERE'S A WEREWOLF WITH PRE-LUNAR TENSION IN ANKH-MORPORK. AND A DWARF WITH ATTITUDE AND A GOLEM WHO'S BEGUN TO THINK FOR ITSELF.But for Commander Vimes, Head of Ankh-Morpork City Watch, that's only the start...There's treason in the air. A crime has happened.He's not only got to find out whodunit, but howdunit too. He's not even sure what they dun. But soon as he knows what the questions are, he's going to want some answers.Readers love Feet of Clay:'One of the best Pratchett books, and possibly the funniest book ever written . . . Pratchett somehow gives you a healthy dose of philosophical musings that balance out the humour oh so perfectly' Goodreads reviewer, ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐'One of the best writers out there, consistently smart and funny . . . Somehow, Sam Vimes' sour take on his Discworld makes me feel a bit better about our Earth' Goodreads reviewer, ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐'An excellent mix between parody humorous fantasy setting with crime mystery plot' Goodreads reviewer, ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐'This one is another instant favourite . . . Reliably excellent, funny, emotional, insightful etc. Truly a wonderful series' Goodreads reviewer, ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐'Pratchett's genius is on full display here in yet another entry in which he somehow manages to write a book that is both "light reading," low-brow comedy, good-natured affirmation of humanity, and high-brow philosophy all at the same time' Goodreads reviewer, ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐'As usual, Terry Pratchett discusses a number of moral-philosophical questions in his story . . . the book was a complete success and definitely worth 5 stars' Goodreads reviewer, ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

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A detailed look at financial planning strategies surrounding professional corporations for doctors, dentists, lawyers, business owners and other Canadian professionals. If you're a doctor, a dentist, a lawyer, or a business owner—virtually any type of professional in Canada—you strongly need to consider how incorporating fits into your financial plan. A good financial planner should acknowledge they have absolutely no control of the markets. However, taxes are completely controllable, and having a corporation is a powerful tool that allows professionals to control their tax bill. Using a mix of personal observations, real-life examples, and strategy evaluations, this book guides the professional along their path to using their corporation in the most efficient way. Kickstart Your Corporation: The Incorporated Professional's Financial Planning Coach is your practical guide to controlling your tax bill and taking advantage of all that a Professional Corporation has to offer. Drawing upon decades of hands-on experience in wealth management, author Andrew Feindel provides clear and accurate advice on making the incorporation decision, setting up and investing inside your corporation, optimizing your salary and dividend compensation mix, valuing permanent insurance on your corporate balance sheet, using prudent leverage, weighing the pros and cons of active or passive investment management, using alternative strategies like a Capital Gains Strip, Individual Pension Plans and Retirement Compensation Arrangements, and much more. This must-have book: Provides Canadian professionals with an accurate and straightforward investment and financial planning guide to incorporation Covers the basics of incorporating for the professional and business owner, including a review of the process and the costs to incorporate, and the likely benefits Analyzes the best financial strategy for various situations Offers real-world advice on structuring compensation, risk management, borrowing to invest, and the role of trusts in professionals’ financial plans Written by a senior vice president at an independent leading-edge wealth management firm Kickstart Your Corporation: The Incorporated Professional's Financial Planning Coach is essential reading for any professional who has incorporated and is looking to maximize benefits, and those wanting to incorporate for the first time with expert guidance.

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From solar panels to synthetic biology, an accessible-yet-authoritative overview of how climate change, the global Covid-19 pandemic, and emerging technologies are changing China's relationship with the world, and what it means for governments, companies, and organizations across the globe. Ever since China began its ascendancy to great-power status in the 1980s, observers have focused on its growing economic, military, and diplomatic power. But in recent years, Chinese officials, businesses, and institutions have increased their visibility and influence on every major global issue, from climate change and artificial intelligence to biotechnology and the global Covid-19 pandemic. How have these newer issues changed China's relationship with the world? And, importantly, how can we prepare for a future increasingly shaped by China? In China's Next Act, Scott M. Moore re-envisions China's role in the world, with a focus on sustainability and technology. Moore argues that these increasingly pressing, shared global challenges are reshaping China's economy and foreign policy, and consequently, cannot be tackled without China. Yet sustainability and technology present opportunities for intensified economic, geopolitical, and ideological competition--a reality that Beijing recognizes. The US and other countries must do the same if they are to meet ecological and technological challenges in the decades ahead. In some areas, like clean technology development, competition can be good for the planet. But in others, it could be catastrophic--only cooperation can lower the risks of artificial intelligence and other disruptive new technologies. In this clearly written and accessible overview, Moore examines how countries like the US must balance cooperation and competition with China in response to shared challenges. With an emphasis on opportunities as well as threats, Moore addresses not only key developments in sustainability and technology within China, but also their implications for foreign countries, companies, and other organizations. China's influence on sustainability and technology is both global and granular--and twenty-first century China itself looks more like a network than a nation-state. Featuring original interviews and an in-depth look at Chinese government policy, China's Next Act provides a unique--and uniquely balanced--window into these new dimensions of China's global ascension.

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"Resilient is one of those incredibly rare things – a sequel that actually improves on its predecessor. Stroud presents us with a complex, multifaceted science-fiction experience that offers a deeply compelling narrative, interlaced with rich and complex world-building and three-dimensional characters." — The Sci-Fi & Fantasy Reviewer AD 2118. Humanity has colonised the Moon, Mars, Ceres and Europa. The partnership of corporations and governments has energized the space programme for one hundred years. That partnership is shattered when a terrorist attack destroys the world’s biggest solar array in Atacama, Chile, altering the global economic balance. On Mars, at Phobos Station, Doctor Emerson Drake arrives, responding to an emergency call to assist a shuttle of wounded miners, but when those miners turn out to be insurgents, Drake realises he is trapped and fighting to survive. In deep space, Captain Ellisa Shann has passed her limits. Now, the last survivors of the Khidr have to choose whether to try to get home on the captured ship, Gallowglass, or stay to observe the strange gravity anomaly that swallowed up the remains of their vessel. On Earth, in an undisclosed location, Natalie Holder finally has an opportunity to break free from her confinement, where she has been experimented on, multiple times. Her consciousness is transmitted to Phobos Station, just as insurgents take over the facility. Holder and Drake form an alliance but are separated. Drake is captured and taken to the insurgent leader – Rocher – a clone of the stowaway who caused the munity on Captain Shann’s Khidr. Allen Stroud's Resilient is a masterpiece of hard sci-fi, a worthy follow up from events of his successful and highly-praised Flame Tree Press debut, Fearless. FLAME TREE PRESS is the imprint of long-standing independent Flame Tree Publishing, dedicated to full-length original fiction in the horror and suspense, science fiction & fantasy, and crime / mystery / thriller categories. The list brings together fantastic new authors and the more established; the award winners, and exciting, original voices. Learn more about Flame Tree Press at www.flametreepress.com and connect on social media @FlameTreePress

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If you have a child with anxiety, you need quick, in-the-moment solutions you can easily use now to help your child face their fears and worries. Written by a psychologist and expert in childhood anxiety, this easy-to-use guide offers proven-effective cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and exposure skills you can use at home, in social settings, or anywhere anxiety takes hold. Being a parent is tough work. And when your child has an anxiety disorder, the tough gets upgraded to downright hard. You love your child, and it hurts to see them afraid or constantly worried. But life needs to be lived, and schedules often need to be kept-especially if your child is in school! So, how can you manage your child's anxiety during those trying moments when you just need to get from A to B without losing your sanity? Helping Your Child Overcome Anxiety provides quick solutions based in evidence-based CBT and exposure therapy-two of the most effective treatments for anxiety disorders. You'll find a background and explanation of the different types of anxiety disorders, in case you aren't sure whether or not your child has one. You'll also learn to identify your child's avoidant and safety behaviors-the strategies your child uses to cope with their anxiety, such as repeatedly checking their homework or asking the same questions repeatedly-as well as anxiety triggers that set your child off. With this book, you'll find a wealth of information regarding your child's specific anxiety disorder and how to respond to it. For example, if your child has obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD, the skills you use to help them are different than other anxiety disorders. No matter your child's specific symptoms or diagnosis, you'll discover tailored interventions you can use now to help your child thrive.If your child has an anxiety disorder, simple, everyday activities can be a real challenge. The practical solutions in this book will help you deal with your child's anxiety when it happens and restore balance and order to both your lives.

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Sooner or later every Asian American must deal with the question \u0022Where do you come from?\u0022 It is probably the most familiar if least aggressive form of racism. It is a tip-off to the persistent notion that people of Asian ancestry are not real Americans, that \u0022Orientals\u0022 never really stop being loyal to their foreign homeland, no matter how long they or their families have been in this country. Confronting the cultural stereotypes that have been attached to Asian Americans over the last 150 years, Robert G. Lee seizes the label \u0022Oriental\u0022 and asks where it came from. The idea of Asians as mysterious strangers who could not be assimilated into the cultural mainstream was percolating to the surface of American popular culture in the mid-nineteenth century, when Chinese immigrant laborers began to arrive in this country in large numbers. Lee shows how the bewildering array of racialized images first proffered by music hall songsters and social commentators have evolved and become generalized to all Asian Americans, coalescing in particular stereotypes. Whether represented as Pollutant, Coolie, Deviant, Yellow Peril, Model Minority, or Gook, the Oriental is portrayed as alien and a threat to the American family -- the nation writ small. Refusing to balance positive and negative stereotypes, Lee connects these stereotypes to particular historical moments, each marked by shifting class relations and cultural crises. Seen as products of history and racial politics, the images that have prevailed in songs, fiction, films, and nonfiction polemics are contradictory and complex. Lee probes into clashing images of Asians as (for instance) seductively exotic or devious despoilers of (white) racial purity, admirably industrious or an insidious threat to native laborers. When Lee dissects the ridiculous, villainous, or pathetic characters that amused or alarmed the American public, he finds nothing generated by the real Asian American experience; whether they come from the Gold Rush camps or Hollywood films or the cover of Newsweek, these inhuman images are manufactured to play out America's racial myths. Orientals comes to grips with the ways that racial stereotypes come into being and serve the purposes of the dominant culture.

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In Field Guide to a Hybrid Landscape Dana Fritz traces the evolution of the Bessey Ranger District and Nursery of the Nebraska National Forest and Grasslands. Fritz’s contemporary photographs of this unique ecosystem, with provocative environmental essays, maps, and historical photographs from the U.S. Forest Service archives, illuminate the complex environmental and natural history of the site, especially as it relates to built environments, land use, and climate change. The Nebraska National Forest at Halsey, as it is known colloquially, is the largest hand-planted forest in the Western Hemisphere, and formerly in the world. This hybrid landscape of a conifer forest overlaid onto a semiarid grassland just west of the one-hundredth meridian was an ambitious late nineteenth-century idea to create a timber industry, to reclaim a landscape considered disordered and unproductive, and to change the local climate in northcentral Nebraska. While the planners seemed not to appreciate the native grasslands that form the ecosystem of the Nebraska Sandhills, they did recognize the reliable water from the Dismal and Middle Loup Rivers that border the site. In 1902 the first federal nursery was established as part of the Dismal River Forest Reserve to produce seedlings for plains homesteads and the adjacent treeless tract of land. At that time tree planting was not used for carbon sequestration but to mitigate the wind and evaporation of moisture. The Bessey Nursery now produces replacement seedlings for burned and beetle-damaged forests in the Rocky Mountains and for the Nebraska Conservation Trees Program. This constructed landscape of row-crop trees that were protected from fire for decades, yet never commercially harvested for timber, provides a rich metaphor for current environmental predicaments. The late nineteenth-century effort to reclaim with trees what was called the Great American Desert has evolved to a focus on twenty-first-century conservation, grassland restoration, and reforestation, all of which work to sequester carbon, maintain natural ecosystem balance, and mitigate large-scale climate change. Field Guide to a Hybrid Landscape offers a visual and critical examination of this unique managed landscape, which has implications far beyond its borders.

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What does it mean in practice to be a values-based leader? When faced with real situations, how can you be your best self and create best teams—while also being a best partner with customers and vendors, a best investment for your stakeholders, and a best citizen making a difference in the world? It's a tall order, but these are the expectations for world-class organizations today. In his bestselling book From Values to Action, Harry Kraemer showed how self-reflection, balance, true self-confidence, and genuine humility are the traits of today's most effective leaders. In Becoming the Best, his highly anticipated follow-up, Kraemer reveals how, in practical terms, anyone can apply these principles to become a values-based leader and to help create values-based organizations. Drawing on his own experiences as the former CEO and chairman of Baxter International, as well as those of other notable leaders and organizations, Kraemer lays out a pathway for understanding the principles and putting them into practice, showing specifically, how to: Use self-reflection to become your "best self" as you lead yourself and others more effectively Create a "best team" that understands and appreciates what they're doing, and why Forge "best partnerships" through win/win collaboration with vendors and customers that enhance the end user's experience Support the mission, vision, and values of the organization to generate returns that distinguish a "best investment" Make a difference in the world beyond the organization by becoming a "best citizen" Powerful case studies from Campbell's Soup, Ernst & Young, Target, Northern Trust, and many others demonstrate the four principles of values-based leadership in action and show how thinking beyond the corporation can trigger positive outcomes for both the company and the world. Regardless of level or job title, individuals can make a difference in their organization and beyond by embodying the essential traits of a great leader. Becoming the Best offers a definitive, actionable guide to show anyone how to apply in practice the principles of values-based leadership personally and professionally, making it an indispensable manual for the new wave of better leaders.All of Harry’s proceeds from the book sales are donated to the One Acre Fund in Africa.

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Applying the Lessons of History to Understanding Fraud Today and Tomorrow Financial Stability provides a roadmap by which the world can anticipate and avoid future financial disruptions. This unique discussion of past and present financial events offers new insights that explain economic, political, and legal antecedents of financial crises in Western markets. With a detailed discussion of the history of finance, this book shows modern investors and finance professionals how to learn from past successes and failures to gauge future market threats. Readers will gain new insight into the antecedents of todays financial markets and the political economy that surrounds them. Armed with this knowledge, they will be able to craft a strategy that steers away from financial disorder and toward maximum stability. Coverage includes discussion of capital, forecasting, and political reaction, and past, present, and future applications within all realms of business. The companion website offers additional data and research, providing a complete resource for those seeking a better understanding of the risk at hand. As the world struggles to emerge from the latest financial crisis, professionals in finance, the law and other disciplines, and the people they advise, are searching for understanding to avoid future crises. Financial Stability argues that the best lessons are learned from our own mistakes, and that the ability to look ahead depends upon our willingness to look back. Readers will: Review the historical laws, practices, and outcomes that shaped the modern day financial markets of the great western economies Understand the theory of financial stability, the roles of law and transparency, and the importance of action to punish fraud in order to prevent future contagion Work through the theoretical proofs in terms of math, law, accounting, economics, philosophy, and international trade Build a strategy for the future with consideration toward needs, sources, balance, and learning from past mistakes Everywhere around the globe, at all points in history, financial crises have always been rooted in the confluence of politics, finance, and law. Financial Stability puts the latest global financial crisis in perspective, highlighting the lessons we have already learned, and those we need to internalize today.

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For over five hundred years the Russians wondered what kind of people their Arctic and sub-Arctic subjects were. "They have mouths between their shoulders and eyes in their chests," reported a fifteenth-century tale. "They rove around, live of their own free will, and beat the Russian people," complained a seventeenth-century Cossack. "Their actions are exceedingly rude. They do not take off their hats and do not bow to each other," huffed an eighteenth-century scholar. They are "children of nature" and "guardians of ecological balance," rhapsodized early nineteenth-century and late twentieth-century romantics. Even the Bolsheviks, who categorized the circumpolar foragers as "authentic proletarians," were repeatedly puzzled by the "peoples from the late Neolithic period who, by virtue of their extreme backwardness, cannot keep up either economically or culturally with the furious speed of the emerging socialist society."Whether described as brutes, aliens, or endangered indigenous populations, the so-called small peoples of the north have consistently remained a point of contrast for speculations on Russian identity and a convenient testing ground for policies and images that grew out of these speculations. In Arctic Mirrors, a vividly rendered history of circumpolar peoples in the Russian empire and the Russian mind, Yuri Slezkine offers the first in-depth interpretation of this relationship. No other book in any language links the history of a colonized non-Russian people to the full sweep of Russian intellectual and cultural history. Enhancing his account with vintage prints and photographs, Slezkine reenacts the procession of Russian fur traders, missionaries, tsarist bureaucrats, radical intellectuals, professional ethnographers, and commissars who struggled to reform and conceptualize this most "alien" of their subject populations.Slezkine reconstructs from a vast range of sources the successive official policies and prevailing attitudes toward the northern peoples, interweaving the resonant narratives of Russian and indigenous contemporaries with the extravagant images of popular Russian fiction. As he examines the many ironies and ambivalences involved in successive Russian attempts to overcome northern—and hence their own—otherness, Slezkine explores the wider issues of ethnic identity, cultural change, nationalist rhetoric, and not-so European colonialism.

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The American Dream is in serious danger, according to Robert Wuthnow--not because of economic conditions, but because its moral underpinnings have been forgotten. In the past this vision was not simply a formula for success, but a moral perspective that framed our thinking about work and money in terms of broader commitments to family, community, and humanitarian values. Nowadays, we are working harder than ever, and yet many of us feel that we are not realizing our higher aspirations as individuals or as a people. Here Wuthnow examines the struggles in which American families are now engaged as they try to balance work and family, confront the pressures of consumerism, and find meaning in their careers. He suggests that we can find economic instruction and inspiration in the nation's past--in such figures as Benjamin Franklin, for instance, who was at once the prudent Poor Richard, the engaged public person, and the enthusiastic lover of life. Drawing on first-hand accounts from scores of people in all walks of life and from a national survey, the book shows that work and money cannot be understood in terms of economic theories alone, but are inevitably rooted in our concepts of ourselves and in the symbolic rituals and taboos of everyday life. By examining these implicit cultural understandings of work and money, the book provides a foundation for bringing moral reasoning more fully to bear on economic decisions. It re-examines the moral arguments that were prominent earlier in our history, shows how these arguments were set aside with the development of economistic thinking, and suggests their continuing relevance in the lives of people who have effectively resisted the pressures of greater financial commitments. Demonstrating that most Americans do bring values implicitly to bear on their economic decisions, the book shows how some people are learning to do this more effectively and, in the process, gain greater control over their work and finances. At a time when policymakers are raising questions about the very survival of the American dream, Poor Richard's Principle offers an analysis of how moral restraint can once again play a more prominent role in guiding our thinking.

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"This is a terrific book and the best I have read on the subject. Scott covers the economics and management issues in professional services with great authority and insight." Peter Doyle, Professor of Marketing, Warwick Business School "What I find generally so praiseworthy is the balance of theory and practical application that runs throughout the book. Clearly, Mark Scott is someone well versed in the whole range of management sciences, yet able to ground this perspective in the world of real experience. This book accomplishes this in a natural, coherent and very readable way." John Zweig, CEO Specialist Communications Businesses, WPP Group USA Inc. Spanning a diverse range of activities from accountancy to marketing communications, the professional services industry now accounts for up to 17% of employment in the Western economies and had worldwide revenues in 1999 of around $800 billion. It is continuing to experience one of the most spectacular growth rates of any Western-dominated industry and is progressively cornering an ever larger share of industrial value added. Yet, it remains one of the most unanalysed and undocumented areas of business acitivity. It has been subjected to little scrutiny and received minimal attention from the capital markets. This book aims to change all that! The Professional Services Firm is intended for three key audiences: * managers and owners of professional services firms who want to understand the strategic options they face and how to improve their financial performance. * investors who want to understand how they can exploit the largely untapped and misunderstood opportunity the industry holds. * managers in industrial and service sectors who want to understand how to emulate the two critical skills mastered by PSFs - hiring, developing and retaining the best intellectual talent available and exploiting collective knowledge to achieve differentiation and to-die-for margins. This seminal book provides not only the first real insight into the structure, strategy and economics of this huge and prosperous industry but also an excellent guide to understanding the challenges and opportunities it faces. Mark C. Scott's analysis of the professional services industry is an indispensible guide for anyone involved in these types of companies wishing to maximize performance and profitability.

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To truly be successful, today’s financial advisor must strike the right balance between effectively engaging with his or her clients and finding meaningful ways to maintain their financial security. By framing your mission in this way, you can help your clients clarify their vision, build a plan to achieve it, and manage that plan so they stay on track. Nobody understands this better than authors Timothy Noonan and Matt Smith—two seasoned financial professionals with over five decades of combined experience working in the asset management business. And now, in Someday Rich, they show financial advisors with clients who are rich, or have the opportunity to become rich, how to sustain a client’s desired lifestyle to, and through, retirement. Engaging and informative, Someday Rich provides the context, description, and implementation suggestions for the Personal Asset Liability Model—a process that will allow you to determine a client’s funded status relative to their future spending needs as well as develop and monitor their investment plan accordingly. While the methods in the Personal Asset Liability Model may not have been practically accessible to past advisors with a large number of clients, this model now brings together the technical methods to answer important client questions in a way that is feasible and includes the communication strategies that can make the delivery of the advice model more effective. Along the way, this reliable resource discusses the business of giving good advice and addresses how to incorporate these steps into a client engagement road map. Insights on various other issues associated with this discipline are also included, such as how to develop client trust and deliver personalized service when you have so many clients, and contingency risks—life, health, disability, and long-term care—that need to be considered in the financial planning process. And in later chapters, single-topic essays, contributed by experts in the financial planning field, cover issues ranging from target date funds and the investment aspects of longevity risk to modern portfolio decumulation. Building more valuable relationships with your clients is a difficult endeavor. But with Someday Rich, you’ll discover what it takes to achieve this goal as you put them on a path to a sustainable financial future.

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'Claire North brings a powerful, fresh and unflinching voice to ancient myth - darkly fascinating, raw and breathtaking' Jennifer Saint, author of Sunday Times bestseller Ariadne***A Sunday Times Historical Fiction Book of the Year***This is the story of Penelope of Ithaca, famed wife of Odysseus, as it has never been told before. Beyond Ithaca's shores, the whims of gods dictate the wars of men. But on the isle, it is the choices of the abandoned women - and their goddesses - that will change the course of the world.'The greatest power we women can own is that which we take in secret.'Seventeen years ago, King Odysseus sailed to war with Troy, taking with him every man of fighting age from the isle of Ithaca. None of them has returned, and the women of Ithaca have been left behind to run the kingdom. Penelope was barely into womanhood when she wed Odysseus. While he lived, her position was secure. But now, years on, speculation is mounting that her husband is dead, and suitors are beginning to knock at her door. No one man is strong enough to claim Odysseus's empty throne - not yet. But as everyone waits for the balance of power to tip, Penelope knows that any choice she makes could plunge Ithaca into bloody civil war . . .From the multi award-winning Claire North comes a daring, exquisite and moving tale that breathes life into ancient myth, and tells of the women who stand defiant in a world ruled by ruthless men. It's time for the women of Ithaca to tell their tale . . . 'Everything I've wanted in a retelling: a vibrant cast, full of suspense, told with a phenomenal narrative voice - this is an absolute masterpiece' Sarah Bonner, author of Her Perfect Twin'Told in the arresting voice of the goddess Hera . . . Ithaca conjures up a world in which women, abandoned by their men, must weave their own destinies' The Times'Richly poetic . . . This is an impassioned plea for the lost, disenfranchised queens of ancient Greece, a love letter to the silenced women of history' Booklist'Claire North has set a new standard for Ancient Greek retellings. Absolutely sublime' Hannah Lynn, author of Athena's ChildThe Songs of Penelope novels:Ithaca House of Odysseus

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Weighing in with a balance of the visceral and the cerebral, boxing has attracted writers for millennia. Yet few of the writers drawn to it have truly known the sport and most have never been in the ring. Moving beyond the typical sentimentality, romanticism, or cynicism common to writing on boxing, The Bittersweet Science is a collection of essays about boxing by contributors who are not only skilled writers but also have extensive firsthand experience at ringside and in the gym, the corner, and the ring itself. Editors Carlo Rotella and Michael Ezra have assembled a roster of fresh voices, ones that expand our understanding of the sport's primal appeal. The contributors to The Bittersweet Science journalists, fiction writers, fight people, and more explore the fight world's many aspects, considering boxing as both craft and business, art form and subculture. From manager Charles Farrell's unsentimental defense of fixing fights to former Gold Glover Sarah Deming's complex profile of young Olympian Claressa Shields, this collection takes us right into the ring and makes us feel the stories of the people who are drawn to or sometimes stuck in the boxing world. We get close-up profiles of marquee attractions like Bernard Hopkins and Roy Jones Jr., as well as portraits of rising stars and compelling cornermen, along with first-person, hands-on accounts from fighters' points of view. We are schooled in not only how to hit and be hit, but why and when to throw in the towel. We experience the intimate immediacy of ringside as well as the dim back rooms where the essentials come together. And we learn that for every champion there's a regiment of journeymen, dabblers, and anglers for advantage, for every aspiring fighter, a veteran in painful decline. Collectively, the perspectives in The Bittersweet Science offer a powerful in-depth picture of boxing, bobbing and weaving through the desires, delusions, and dreams of boxers, fans, and the cast of managers, trainers, promoters, and hangers-on who make up life in and around the ring.Contributors: Robert Anasi, Brin-Jonathan Butler, Donovan Craig, Sarah Deming, Michael Ezra, Charles Farrell, Rafael Garcia, Gordon Marino, Louis Moore, Gary Lee Moser, Hamilton Nolan, Gabe Oppenheim, Carlo Rotella, Sam Sheridan, and Carl Weingarten.

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The Haribana style was created in May 2020 in the mid of the global pandemic when the supply of fresh flowers and other materials was limited in Singapore. Used to making flamboyant designs with an abundance of flowers, the material shortage forced floral designer Harijanto Setiawan to drastically rethink his design style and to come up with a fresh way to create high-quality and impactful designs using the least number of materials as possible. One could argue that the pandemic was a blessing in disguise for Harijanto, as it rekindled his passion for floristry and allowed him to reinvent himself and show another aspect of his personality as a designer – away from the extravagance everyone was used to. It allowed him to go back to his roots as an architect. While Harijanto’s imagination was still limitless, the realisation of his ideas had to be within the reality of the pandemic. A grass leaf and a single flower are enough to create a Haribana piece, a highly architectural design statement with a single flower as focal point. The name Haribana hints at Ikebana – even though these designs cannot officially be classified as ‘Ikebana’, as even the most free-spirited Ikebana schools objected to this. Haribana therefore is Harijanto’s own interpretation of ‘some sort of Ikebana’ married with an architectural style and approach. Haribana pieces incorporate architectural concepts such as structure, balance, shape, line, color, texture, rhythm and harmony into floral art, as if the two are destined for each other, rather than forced upon. Steel grass stalks can be seen as the load bearing structures in architecture: the steel reinforcements and the concrete. The greenery is shaped to create the base structure, a filigree facade against which a single flower can shine. Haribana is suitable for any designer who wants to explore and understand how architecture can be translated through flowers. Haribana has been well received and it is Harijanto Setiawan’s hope that it will fill a unique void in floristry and develop into a specific style that is adapted worldwide. This book contains 65 stunning Haribana pieces designed by the master himself.

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Life on Earth began some 4 billion years ago when the first primitive prokaryotes managed to isolate themselves from the rather hostile environment. The immediate challenge that these first life forms faced was to ensure an optimal balance between two apparently mutually exclusive tasks â protection and separation from the extracellular milieu on the one hand and an efficient exchange of ions, energy sources and metabolites with the very same milieu on the other hand. The commencing evolutionary progress had to address even more challenging problems, such as how to delegate specific cell functions to discrete structures inside of the cell, called organelles (such as the nucleus), and, at the level of multi-cellular organisms, to ensure proper separation of different cell types (e.g. those found in different tissues and organs) while ensuring efficient communication between them. In fact, the human body is highly compartmentalized, from the cell level where local signals are generated and propagated in a highly ordered manner, to the whole body level. This book aims to introduce the interested reader to the universe of these complex segregated compartments in mammals. It discusses how the integrity of different types of barriers â endothelial, epithelial â is normally maintained and what could go wrong when these barriers' permeability becomes abnormally low or high in different disease states. We will focus on several such barriers, which are well studied and which are pivotal for a healthy well-being. In particular, we will focus on the skin, airways, the gut barrier, the endometrium, and cardiovascular and urinary systems. Special reference throughout the book will be made to several most novel groups of potential molecular candidates for the correction of barrier-related dysfunctions, in particular Transient Receptor Potential channels. Hence the title of the book has a triple meaning â a trip in its common sense, TRP channels (as in TRiP database) and Translating Research Into Practice (TRIP). Our team of authors is comprised of physiologists, pharmacologists, biophysicists and medics, including the national representative of Ukraine in the European Crohn's and Colitis organization (ECCO) and a member of the Scientific Committee of the European Association of Urologists. We include clinical cases and discuss molecular and cellular mechanisms underlying such real-life problems in-depth.

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Discover the stories behind Jane Goodall’s visionary approach to community-led conservation. You know of Jane Goodall’s work with wild chimpanzees and her lifelong career advocating for environmental justice. But just as transformative is her work empowering local communities that live on the edge of human settlement to act to protect their natural resources—or to risk losing them forever. Local Voices, Local Choices: The Tacare Approach to Community-Led Conservation is the story of the Jane Goodall Institute’s holistic approach to conservation, which puts the local people in charge of preserving their surrounding ecosystems. Rather than conservationists leading the effort and imposing their solutions, local communities that live in the affected regions make their own decisions. Working with science and technology and with the support of conservationists, these communities grow to understand their human impact on the environment. By choosing to adopt sustainable livelihoods, they decide their own path into the future, finding ways to balance their environmental impact with their communities’ needs. Story by story, Local Voices, Local Choices brings readers into the diverse perspectives behind this approach to community-driven conservation—not only those of JGI staff and program partners but also, and equally, those of the local people who lead these initiatives. Read about: The origins of the Tacare approach, originally designed as a 1994 reforestation project with an abbreviation pronounced “ta-CAR-reh” A retired village member keeping the knowledge of medicinal plants alive in his community Spiritual and cultural story-holders who are vital to the recording and preservation of their traditional ecological knowledge Local people participating as forest monitors, village health workers, beekeepers, small-business owners, and educators of the next generation Former poachers turned advocates for sustainable land management Written for conservationists, fans of Jane Goodall, and readers interested in environmental issues, Local Voices, Local Choices is a vibrant expression of Jane Goodall’s vision and her hope that the Tacare approach will be understood and adopted wherever there is a need for genuine community-driven conservation. Local voices matter, and their choices can make all the difference for generations to come.

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The Whole Elephant Revealed offers clear insights into the existence and operation of universal laws and the golden ratio. It is a synthesis based on common insights found in all wisdom traditions into the operation of universal laws on the one hand and on cutting-edge scientific discoveries that are in line with those insights on the other hand. These principles are called universal because they work on all levels of existence, apply to everything that exist and create order and harmony in the universe. Insights into the operation of the universal laws reveals a whole new worldview. It helps us to understand how everything works in the universe, who we really are and how we can make conscious choices that are more in line with these universal laws. Above all it helps us to understand what works and what doesn't work in the long term. Everything that operates in line with the universal laws, follows the path of least resistance and is in harmony with the greater whole. It makes us realize that while everything in the universe works in harmony with these principles, many aspects of our personal life and our Western culture are not in line with the operation of these underlying principles. If we choose to act in line with the operation of the universal laws, it will go easier, will be more in tune with who we really are and more in harmony with the greater whole. This choice is hard to make though, if we don't know those principles. For that reason the rediscovery of the working of these principles seems to be of extreme importance. In this time of great changes and global unbalance a growing number of people begin to feel the need for a clear and well-founded insight into the universal laws, because this gives an understanding of what is needed to restore the balance and harmony in ourselves as well as worldwide. Because the nature of these principles is universal, they apply to all aspects of our individual and social life. Therefore they can be used as a frame of reference for all personal and social transformations which aim at a greater harmony within ourselves and with the greater whole.

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With the simple instructions and large, full-color photos in STEAM Play & Learn, preschoolers will love tackling the 20 fun, easy-to-follow step-by-step projects as they learn about science, technology, engineering, arts, and math. The acronym STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math. At the preschool level, this doesn’t mean trying to teach your kids robotics and engineering, but rather presenting them with open-ended projects that allow them to problem-solve, make mistakes, get creative, and most of all, have fun. While most preschool-age children are not yet reading, STEAM Play & Learn is meant to be child-driven. The images, illustrations, and projects are meant to appeal to kids of their age and abilities. Let them be the guide as you explore the projects in this book. Topics include symmetry and how light bounces to create reflections with mirror mandalas, diffusion and capillary action with tie dye towels, structural framing and bracing with marshmallow structures, and electrical currents with salty circuits. Other projects include: Color Mixing Lab Frozen Goop Sound Tubes Citrus Volcanoes Paper Bag Blocks Egg Carton Geoboards Pool Noodle Marble Run Potions Lab Balance Scale Spin Art Tops Marble Mazes Tinkering Set Pattern Projectors Newton’s Cradle Art Machine Lime Light The projects in this book fall into three difficulty levels: Easy projects require parents and teachers to do nothing more than set out the materials and offer a challenge to children. A few of the easy projects will need parents to assemble components in advance of presenting them to kids. Medium projects will require some adult assistance while the project is underway. Children should be able to complete some of the tasks while stopping periodically for an adult to assist in a step. Difficult projects are meant to be adult-led. This is an opportunity for parents to encourage their child to offer problem-solving ideas along the way, giving children a chance to help and make suggestions. The cross-subject approach to learning in STEAM Play & Learn will prepare young children for the subjects they will soon learn in elementary school and beyond. These 20 projects will provide hours of fun education for both kids and parents!

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Home-healing spells and meditations—accompanied by more than 100 colorful and inspiring illustrations—give you everything you need to transform your home into a restorative and magical space.House Magic presents home protections for every living space that bring together the traditions of earth magic, meditation, herbalism, self-awareness, astrology, and feminist spirituality. From the evil eye to stagnant energy, learn how to transform any space into a sacred sanctuary using the power of crystals, herbs, and flowers. By first learning the ancient histories of home magic spells, their origins, and their practices, House Magic presents spells and protections to produce fundamental manifestations in each space within the home—Clearing, Protection, Comfort, Harmony, and Balance. This gorgeous guide takes you through manifesting a magical life with intentions, altars, and colors. Meditate with the earth and the moon to bring specific intentions into your space. Bless and protect your house from evil spirits, and create a harmonizing home with charming symbols like dream catchers, runes, hamsa, and triquetra symbols. Use old traditions and objects like brooms and candles to bless your home. Invite household spirits such as the Bean-Tighe, Domovoi, and Gaelic Goddess Brigid for protection. Declutter and feng shui your space! Practice spellwork and rituals made for each room in your home to: Bring more joy and familial connections to your living room for a happier home Attract creativity and success to your office Create a peaceful atmosphere in your bedroom for soothing sleep, good dreams, and romance Allow restoration to enter your bathroom to feel refreshed and calm Make nourishing recipes for when you and your loved ones gather in the kitchen And much more! Harness the power of magic to create a beautiful, healing living space with this unique resource manual. The Mystical Handbook series from Wellfleet takes you on a magical journey through the wonderful world of spellcraft and spellcasting. Explore a new practice with each volume and learn how to incorporate spells, rituals, blessings, and cleansings into your daily routine. These portable companions feature beautiful foil-detail covers and color-saturated interiors on a premium paper blend. Other titles in the series include: Witchcraft, Love Spells, Moon Magic, Knot Magic, and Superstitions.

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What will your 100-year life look like? A new edition of the international bestseller, featuring a new preface 'Brilliant, timely, original, well written and utterly terrifying' Niall Ferguson Does the thought of working for 60 or 70 years fill you with dread? Or can you see the potential for a more stimulating future as a result of having so much extra time? Many of us have been raised on the traditional notion of a three-stage approach to our working lives: education, followed by work and then retirement. But this well-established pathway is already beginning to collapse – life expectancy is rising, final-salary pensions are vanishing, and increasing numbers of people are juggling multiple careers. Whether you are 18, 45 or 60, you will need to do things very differently from previous generations and learn to structure your life in completely new ways. The 100-Year Life is here to help. Drawing on the unique pairing of their experience in psychology and economics, Lynda Gratton and Andrew J. Scott offer a broad-ranging analysis as well as a raft of solutions, showing how to rethink your finances, your education, your career and your relationships and create a fulfilling 100-year life. · How can you fashion a career and life path that defines you and your values and creates a shifting balance between work and leisure? · What are the most effective ways of boosting your physical and mental health over a longer and more dynamic lifespan? · How can you make the most of your intangible assets – such as family and friends – as you build a productive, longer life? · In a multiple-stage life how can you learn to make the transitions that will be so crucial and experiment with new ways of living, working and learning? Shortlisted for the FT/McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award and featuring a new preface, The 100-Year Life is a wake-up call that describes what to expect and considers the choices and options that you will face. It is also fundamentally a call to action for individuals, politicians, firms and governments and offers the clearest demonstration that a 100-year life can be a wonderful and inspiring one.

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Banish burnout and reclaim your calm with this innovative 12-week start-anytime journal. Burnout is a state of emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion caused by prolonged stress. It occurs when you feel overwhelmed, emotionally drained, and unable to meet constant demands. Burnout has become more than just a buzz word or a symptom of stress. With searches related to burnout rising on average 41% annually since 2017, and 77% of employees saying they've experienced burnout, it's no wonder the World Health Organisation has started to take it more seriously. And that's before the pandemic and working-from-home burnout became even more prevalent. It was these worrying facts and her own experience of burnout that led mental-health advocate Bex Spiller to set up The Anti-Burnout Club, which has grown exponentially since launch in 2021. Bex has witnessed first-hand how burnout isn't just reserved for high-flying execs at FTSE 100 companies. It's creeping into our homes, making it impossible for many of us to cope with all of the demands of modern life. With this journal, Bex has created a multi-platform solution to a growing problem. Combining people's love for pen and paper with the rise in online wellness apps and platforms, The Anti-Burnout Journal works for traditionalists and technology lovers alike. This undated journal spans 12 weeks with weekly lessons and challenges to help beat burnout, delivered through the pages of the journal alongside an online dashboard with lifetime access to video lessons in yoga, mindfulness, meditation, nutrition and breathwork, can be watched time and again. Alongside the lessons are weekly and daily pages that encourage journalling the more traditional way using everything you've learned. This multi-platform approach makes this journal completely unique and ensures that you can use it in a way that suits you, without feeling more stress or overwhelm. This one-of-a-kind journal is the perfect gift to yourself or someone in need of self-care in this stressful world we live in and promises to help you slow down, reflect, find balance and restore a sense of calm.

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The New York Times best-selling author of My Stroke of Insight blends neuroanatomy with psychology to show how we can short-circuit emotional reactivity and find our way to peace.For half a century we have been trained to believe that our right brain hemisphere is our emotional brain, while our left brain houses our rational thinking. Now neuroscience shows that it’s not that simple: in fact, our emotional limbic tissue is evenly divided between our two hemispheres. Consequently, each hemisphere has both an emotional brain and a thinking brain. In this groundbreaking new book, Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor—author of the New York Times bestseller My Stroke of Insight—presents these four distinct modules of cells as four characters that make up who we are: Character 1, Left Thinking; Character 2, Left Emotion; Character 3, Right Emotion; and Character 4, Right Thinking. Everything we think, feel, or do is dependent upon brain cells to perform that function. Since each of the Four Characters stems from specific groups of cells that feel unique inside of our body, they each display particular skills, feel specific emotions, or think distinctive thoughts. In Whole Brain Living, available in paperback for the first time, Dr. Taylor blends neuroanatomy with psychology to help us:Get acquainted with our own Four Characters, observe how they show up in our daily life, and learn to identify and relate to them in others as wellApply the wisdom of the Four Characters to every area of life—from work to relationships to health Use a powerful practice called the Brain Huddle—a tool for bringing our Four Characters into conversation with one another—to short-circuit emotional reactivity, tap our characters’ respective strengths, and choose which one to embody in any situation The more we become familiar with each of the characters in ourselves and others, the more power we gain over our thoughts, our feelings, our relationships, and our lives. Indeed, we discover that we have the power to choose who and how we want to be in every moment. And when our Four Characters work together and balance one another as a whole brain, we gain a radical new road map to deep inner peace.

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Between 1926 and 1929, thousands of Mexicans fought and died in an attempt to overthrow the government of their country. They were the Cristeros, so called because of their battle cry, ¡Viva Cristo Rey!—Long Live Christ the King! The Cristero rebellion and the church-state conflict remain one of the most controversial subjects in Mexican history, and much of the writing on it is emotional polemic. David C. Bailey, basing his study on the most important published and unpublished sources available, strikes a balance between objective reporting and analysis. This book depicts a national calamity in which sincere people followed their convictions to often tragic ends. The Cristero rebellion climaxed a century of animosity between the Catholic church and the Mexican state, and this background is briefly summarized here. With the coming of the 1910 revolution the hostility intensified. The revolutionists sought to impose severe limitations on the Church, and Catholic anti-revolutionary militancy grew apace. When the government in 1926 decreed strict enforcement of anticlerical legislation, matters reached a crisis. Church authorities suspended public worship throughout Mexico, and Catholics in various parts of the country rose up in arms. There followed almost three years of indecisive guerrilla warfare marked by brutal excesses on both sides. Bailey describes the armed struggle in broad outline but concentrates on the political and diplomatic maneuvering that ultimately decided the issue. A de facto settlement was brought about in 1929, based on the government’s pledge to allow the Church to perform its spiritual offices under its own internal discipline. The pact was arranged mainly through the intercession of U.S. Ambassador Dwight Morrow. His role in the conflict, as well as that of other Americans who decisively influenced the course of events, receives detailed attention in the study. The position of the Vatican during the conflict and its role in the settlement are also examined in detail. With the 1929 settlement the clergy returned to the churches, whereupon the Cristeros lost public support and the rebellion collapsed. The spirit of the settlement soon evaporated, more strife followed, and only after another decade did permanent religious peace come to Mexico.

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He is one of the most beloved athletes in history and one of the most gifted men ever to step onto a tennis court – but from early childhood Andre Agassi hated the game. Coaxed to swing a racket while still in the crib, forced to hit hundreds of balls a day while still in grade school, Agassi resented the constant pressure even as he drove himself to become a prodigy, an inner conflict that would define him. Now, in his beautiful, haunting autobiography, Agassi tells the story of a life framed by such conflicts. Agassi makes us feel his panic as an undersized seven-year-old in Las Vegas, practicing all day under the obsessive gaze of his violent father. We see him at thirteen, banished to a Florida tennis camp. Lonely, scared, a ninth-grade dropout, he rebels in ways that will soon make him a 1980s icon. By the time he turns pro at sixteen, his new look promises to change tennis forever, as does his lightning fast return. And yet, despite his raw talent, he struggles early on. We feel his confusion as he loses to the world's best, his greater confusion as he starts to win. After stumbling in three Grand Slam finals, Agassi shocks the world, and himself, by capturing the 1992 Wimbledon. Overnight he becomes a fan favorite and a media target. Agassi brings a near-photographic memory to every pivotal match, and every public relationship. Alongside vivid portraits of rivals, Agassi gives unstinting accounts of his brief time with Barbra Streisand and his doomed marriage to Brooke Shields. He reveals the depression that shatters his confidence, and the mistake that nearly costs him everything. Finally, he recounts his spectacular resurrection and his march to become the oldest man ever ranked number one. In clear, taut prose, Agassi evokes his loyal brother, his wise coach, his gentle trainer, all the people who help him regain his balance and find love at last with Stefanie Graf. With its breakneck tempo and raw candor, Open will be read and cherished for years. A treat for ardent fans, it will also captivate readers who know nothing about tennis. Like Agassi's game, it sets a new standard for grace, style, speed and power.

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Duke's Company actress Kitty Burgess has a stunning future before her - until she vanishes after the opening performance of Aminta Grey's new play, The Summer Birdcage. One of her fellow actors swears he saw her being bundled into a black coach driven by six black horses outside the theatre. Then no more is heard of her - until the body of a young woman is found dead beside the road in Hertfordshire. It appears to be Kitty, so Aminta and her husband Sir John Grey, travel to Bishop's Stortford to identify her. The girl has been so badly beaten it is impossible to tell who she is, but there are three clues - the dress she is wearing, a ring and a copy of the script of Aminta's play, left (perhaps a little too conveniently) in the victim's hands.Back in London Aminta catches sight of a young woman who looks exactly like Kitty but before she can do anything, the woman runs off and is lost in the crowd. Meanwhile, rumours abound at court that Kitty was about to become the king's new mistress and all fingers are being pointed at Lady Castlemaine for having arranged for her rival to be spirited away and killed. And now John Grey finds that is no longer just his wife who is determined to prove Kitty Burgess is alive. It would seem her disappearance - and possible reappearance - is part of some much wider conspiracy, and that Kitty may be about to play the most dangerous, and possibly deadly, role of her life. A role from which there may be no escape ...Praise for L.C. Tyler'Len Tyler writes with great charm and wit . . . made me laugh out loud' Susanna Gregory'I was seduced from John Grey's first scene' Ann Cleeves'Tyler juggles his characters, story, wit and clever one liners with perfect balance' The Times'A dizzying whirl of plot and counterplot' Guardian'Unusually accomplished' Helen Dunmore'A cracking pace, lively dialogue, wickedly witty one-liners salted with sophistication . . . Why would we not want more of John Grey?' The Bookbag

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Is this the right book for me?The world of finance and accountancy can seem one of impenetrable mystery but it is one that many managers have to face in their day to day lives. With its comprehensive coverage of the subject, this book allows you not only to ask pertinent questions but also to understand the answers. Chapter by chapter, the workings of finance are mapped out and laid bare - the formal reports, the methods used to prepare the numbers and what accountants actually do every day.This edition is fully updated to reflect current allowances, rates and regulations and further information. It also includes even more questions (with comprehensive answers) to challenge the reader's understanding. Finance for Non-Financial Managers includes:Chapter 1: The purpose of accountingChapter 2: Basic terminologyChapter 3: Accounting concepts and principlesChapter 4: The profit and loss accountChapter 5: The balance sheetChapter 6: The cash flow statementChapter 7: Ratio analysisChapter 8: Users of financial informationChapter 9: The general ledgerChapter 10: CostingChapter 11: Standard costingChapter 12: Variance analysis Chapter 13: Two more things on costingChapter 14: The audit of annual accountsChapter 15: Tricks of the tradeChapter 16: Financial information for managersChapter 17: Capital investment appraisal: experts only!Chapter 18: Activities of an Accounts departmentChapter 19: Cash flow managementChapter 20: Corporate financial planningChapter 21: Personal finance: income tax and national insuranceChapter 22: Personal finance: investmentChapter 23: Personal finance: capital gains tax and othersLearn effortlessly with a new easy-to-read page design and interactive features: Not got much time?One, five and ten-minute introductions to key principles to get you started.Author insightsLots of instant help with common problems and quick tips for success, based on the author's many years of experience.Test yourselfTests in the book and online to keep track of your progress.Extend your knowledgeExtra online articles to give you a richer understanding of the subject.Five things to rememberQuick refreshers to help you remember the key facts.Try thisInnovative exercises illustrate what you've learnt and how to use it.

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Tropical East Asia is home to over one billion people and faces massive human impacts from its rising population and rapid economic growth. It has already lost more than half of its forest cover to agriculture and urbanization, and has the highest rates of deforestation and logging in the tropics. Habitat loss, coupled with hunting and the relentless trade in wildlife products, threatens all its large and many of its smaller vertebrates. Despite these problems, the region still supports an estimated 15-25% of global terrestrial biodiversity and a growing environmental awareness means that it is no longer assumed that economic development justifies environmental damage, and no longer accepted that this trade-off is inevitable. Effective conservation action now depends on integrating a clear understanding of the ecological patterns and processes in the region with the varied needs of its human population. This third edition continues to provide an overview of the terrestrial ecology of Tropical East Asia: from southern China to Indonesia, and from Bhutan and Bangladesh to the Ryukyu Islands of Japan. It retains the balance between compactness and comprehensiveness of the previous editions, and the even-handed geographical treatment of the whole region, but it updates both the contents and the perspective. Approximately one third of the text is new or greatly modified, reflecting the explosion of new research in the region in the last few years and the increasing use of new tools, particularly from genomics and remote sensing. The change in perspective largely reflects the growing realization that we are in a new epoch, the Anthropocene, in which human activities have at least as large an influence as natural processes, and that stopping or reversing ecological change is no longer an option. This does not mean that biodiversity conservation is no longer possible or worthwhile, but that the biodiverse future we strive for will inevitably be very different from the past. The Ecology of Tropical East Asia is an advanced textbook suitable for senior undergraduate and graduate level students taking courses on the terrestrial ecology of the East Asian tropics, as well as an authoritative regional reference for professional ecologists, conservationists, and interested amateurs worldwide.

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It is 2001 in New York City, in the lull between the collapse of the dotcom boom and the terrible events of September 11th. Silicon Alley is a ghost town, Web 1.0 is having adolescent angst, Google has yet to IPO, Microsoft is still considered the Evil Empire. There may not be quite as much money around as there was at the height of the tech bubble, but there's no shortage of swindlers looking to grab a piece of what's left.Maxine Tarnow is running a nice little fraud investigation business on the Upper West Side, chasing down different kinds of small-scale con artists. She used to be legally certified but her licence got pulled a while back, which has actually turned out to be a blessing because now she can follow her own code of ethics - carry a Beretta, do business with sleazebags, hack into people's bank accounts - without having too much guilt about any of it. Otherwise, just your average working mum - two boys in elementary school, an off-and-on situation with her sort of semi-ex-husband Horst, life as normal as it ever gets in the neighbourhood - till Maxine starts looking into the finances of a computer-security firm and its billionaire geek CEO, whereupon things begin rapidly to jam onto the subway and head downtown. She soon finds herself mixed up with a drug runner in an art deco motorboat, a professional nose obsessed with Hitler's aftershave, a neoliberal enforcer with footwear issues, plus elements of the Russian mob and various bloggers, hackers, code monkeys and entrepreneurs, some of whom begin to show up mysteriously dead. Foul play, of course.With occasional excursions into the Deep Web and out to Long Island, Thomas Pynchon, channelling his inner Jewish mother, brings us a historical romance of New York in the early days of the Internet, not that distant in calendar time but galactically remote from where we've journeyed to since.Will perpetrators be revealed, forget about brought to justice? Will Maxine have to take the handgun out of her purse? Will she and Horst get back together? Will Jerry Seinfeld make an unscheduled guest appearance? Will accounts secular and karmic be brought into balance?Hey. Who wants to know?

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Zero-cost, low effort and a long term solution to your fresh produce needs! Huw Richards set himself a challenge - to be self-sufficient by growing his own fruit and veg for free for a year. He succeeded, and now wants to help you do the same.Grow your own food in your home garden, allotment or container and look forward to a bountiful harvest year-round. You can plant fruit and veg at home without spending a penny and Huw Richard's shows you how.Packed with tried-and-tested advice, this gardening book covers:- Finding a space to grow - in the garden or on a terrace or balcony - and sourcing the materials you need- Deciding what to grow your crops in (the ground, a raised bed, or containers)- Clear growing instructions on more than 30 species of popular annual and perennial crops- Huw Richards' 52-week journal of how he grew his own food for free for a year without spending a penny- Advice on how to go about selling your produce to raise money to expand your growing areaAuthor Huw Richards is a man on a mission. He is passionate about teaching you how to garden and grow your own food. Years of experience and trying different things has taught Huw how to garden with little money (or without a garden) and he shows you how to do the same! Grow Food for Free teaches you how to produce no-cost, low-maintenance fruit and veg - and finding low-cost ways to overcome common gardening worries. Learn about the space you need and how to prepare it, make your own compost, tackle weeds, pests, and diseases, and how to get hold of your first set of seeds! Discover strategies to expand your garden. Can't afford a raised bed? Try repurposing an old wooden pallet. Don't have money to buy lots of different seeds? Look in your kitchen cupboards for food that you can plant. This home gardening book shows you everything you need to barter, borrow, repurpose, and propagate your way to a bountiful harvest without burdening your bank balance!

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'We all have our own battles and in this book, I've decided to be completely honest about mine. I've struggled with my weight, tried multiple fad diets, binged on tubs of ice cream and, in darker times, been scarily obsessed with food. It's been tough seeking that healthy balance in life: trying to lose weight and maintain it has been one of the hardest challenges I've faced. But I've finally found the answer, I've successfully sustained the results and am sharing my recipes and tips with you in this book, so that is why this is the happiest weight loss book ever! I promise that once you read this book, you will never look back.' Connie SimmondsConnie Simmonds, former marketing manager and make-up artist decided to get HEALTHY after years of yo-yo dieting and all sorts of attempts to get 'skinny'. A shocking visit to the doctors aged just 24 Connie was diagnosed with a severe stomach infection and a fatty liver. This was the wake-up call she needed and since focusing on her long-term health rather than quick fixes and instant weight loss, she has dropped 2 dress sizes, sustained it and inspired thousands to do the same. Healthy Forever comes with 60 delicious, well balanced meals that Connie has personally devised using her nutritional knowledge and complete and utter love and passion for food. You'll find an array of comforting dishes, chocolate recipes and even recipes for those days that you simply cannot be bothered to cook. Healthy Forever is like no other recipe book, it is refreshingly fun and light hearted with touching moments of struggle and fight. Connie Simmonds' first cookbook takes you on the most personal and honest journey as she reflects on her past and what brought her here today as a credible advocate for healthy weight loss. Connie wants her readers to understand that they are not alone, the struggle to lose weight is real but it doesn't have to be forever. You can finally get healthy, lose weight and be happy, just like she did - not just for today but forever!

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"Resilient is one of those incredibly rare things – a sequel that actually improves on its predecessor. Stroud presents us with a complex, multifaceted science-fiction experience that offers a deeply compelling narrative, interlaced with rich and complex world-building and three-dimensional characters." — The Sci-Fi & Fantasy Reviewer AD 2118. Humanity has colonised the Moon, Mars, Ceres and Europa. The partnership of corporations and governments has energized the space programme for one hundred years. That partnership is shattered when a terrorist attack destroys the world’s biggest solar array in Atacama, Chile, altering the global economic balance. On Mars, at Phobos Station, Doctor Emerson Drake arrives, responding to an emergency call to assist a shuttle of wounded miners, but when those miners turn out to be insurgents, Drake realises he is trapped and fighting to survive. In deep space, Captain Ellisa Shann has passed her limits. Now, the last survivors of the Khidr have to choose whether to try to get home on the captured ship, Gallowglass, or stay to observe the strange gravity anomaly that swallowed up the remains of their vessel. On Earth, in an undisclosed location, Natalie Holder finally has an opportunity to break free from her confinement, where she has been experimented on, multiple times. Her consciousness is transmitted to Phobos Station, just as insurgents take over the facility. Holder and Drake form an alliance but are separated. Drake is captured and taken to the insurgent leader – Rocher – a clone of the stowaway who caused the munity on Captain Shann’s Khidr. Allen Stroud's Resilient is a masterpiece of hard sci-fi, a worthy follow up from events of his successful and highly-praised Flame Tree Press debut, Fearless. FLAME TREE PRESS is the imprint of long-standing independent Flame Tree Publishing, dedicated to full-length original fiction in the horror and suspense, science fiction & fantasy, and crime / mystery / thriller categories. The list brings together fantastic new authors and the more established; the award winners, and exciting, original voices. Learn more about Flame Tree Press at www.flametreepress.com and connect on social media @FlameTreePress

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The Breathing Cure will guide you through techniques that embody the key to healthy breathing and healthy living. McKeown’s goal is to enable you to take responsibility for your own health, to prevent and significantly reduce a number of common ailments, to help you realise your potential and to offer simple, scientifically-based ways to change your breathing habits. On a day-to-day basis, you will experience an increase in energy and concentration, an enhanced ability to deal with stress and a better quality of life.The essential guide to functional breathing, learn techniques tried and tested by Olympic athletes and elite military. Clear your blocked nose, stress and relax your nervous system, improve lung function, prepare for competition and more. For use at home, in professional/amateur sports, by breathing instructors, dentists, doctors, physical therapists, strength and conditioning coaches, Pilates and yoga teachers, and anyone interested in health and fitness – from everyday wellbeing through to sporting excellence.Breathe Light: experience optimal blood circulation, peak oxygenation, maximal exercise performance, relief from respiratory symptoms and the best sleep you ever had.Breathe Slow: stress is a risk factor in 75 to 90 percent of all human diseases. Discover and apply the breathing rate scientifically proven to stimulate relaxation, reduce high blood pressure, boost your immune system, maximise HRV and improve blood glucose control.Breathe Deep: physical and emotional balance comes from within. Learn how to strengthen your diaphragm muscle to achieve greater endurance and resilience, calmness of mind, focused concentration and ease of movement.From the bestselling author of The Oxygen Advantage, The Breathing Cure: Exercises to Develop New Breathing Habits for a Healthier, Happier, and Longer Lifecovers new, ground-breaking topics such as how breathing techniques can support functional movement of the muscles and joints; improve debilitating conditions such as diabetes, epilepsy, lower back pain, PMS and high blood pressure; how the nasal breathing technique can be a weapon against influenza and related infections especially Covid-19; and last but not least, help you to enjoy deeper sleep and improved intimacy.Tap into your innate resilience. Fire up your potential. Enhance your health.Breathe Better Now!

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Having come of age during a period of vibrant union-centered activism, Jack Metzgar begins this book wondering how his father, a U.S> Steel shop steward in the 1950s and '60s, and so many contemporary historians could forget what this country owes to the union movement. Combining personal memoir and historical narrative, Striking Steel argues for reassessment of unionism in American life during the second half of the twentieth century and a recasting of \u0022official memory.\u0022 As he traces the history of union steelworkers after World War II, Metzgar draws on his father's powerful stories about the publishing work in the mills, stories in which time is divided between \u0022before the union\u0022 and since. His father, Johnny Metzgar, fought ardently for workplace rules as a means of giving \u0022the men\u0022 some control over their working conditions and protection from venal foremen. He pursued grievances until he eroded management's authority, and he badgered foremen until he established shop-floor practices that would become part of the next negotiated contract. As a passionate advocate of solidarity, he urged coworkers to stick together so that the rules were upheld and everyone could earn a decent wage. Striking Steel's pivotal event is the four-month nationwide steel strike of 1959, a landmark union victory that has been all but erased from public memory. With remarkable tenacity, union members held out for the shop-floor rules that gave them dignity in the workplace and raised their standard of living. Their victory underscored the value of sticking together and reinforced their sense that they were contributing to a general improvement in American working and living conditions. The Metzgar family's story vividly illustrates the larger narrative of how unionism lifted the fortunes and prospects of working-class families. It also offers an account of how the broad social changes of the period helped to shift the balance of power in a conflict-ridden, patriarchal household. Even if the optimism of his generation faded in the upheavals of the 1960s, Johnny Metzgar's commitment to his union and the strike itself stands as an honorable example of what a collective action can and did achieve. Jack Metzgar's Striking Steel is a stirring call to remember and renew the struggle.

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With the United States' superpower status rivalled by a rising China and emerging powers like India and Brazil playing a growing role in international affairs, the global balance of power is shifting. But what does this mean for the future of the international order? Will China dominate the 21st Century? Will the so-called BRICS prove to be a disruptive force in global affairs? Are we headed towards a world marked by frequent strife, or will the end of Western dominance make the world more peaceful? In this provocative new book, Oliver Stuenkel argues that our understanding of global order and predictions about its future are limited because we seek to imagine the post-Western world from a parochial Western-centric perspective. Such a view is increasingly inadequate in a world where a billions of people regard Western rule as a temporary aberration, and the rise of Asia as a return to normalcy. In reality, China and other rising powers that elude the simplistic extremes of either confronting or joining existing order are quietly building a "parallel order" which complements today's international institutions and increases rising powers' autonomy. Combining accessibility with expert sensitivity to the complexities of the global shift of power, Stuenkel's vision of a post-Western world will be core reading for students and scholars of contemporary international affairs, as well as anyone interested in the future of global politics. "A fascinating interpretation of our understanding of politics and global affairs, which demonstrates the evolving nature of power today. Oliver Stuenkel presents a compelling argument - not just about the "Rise of the Rest", but also the overlooked power and influence of the non-Western world. Highly engaging and instructive." Dr Shashi Tharoor, India’s Minister of State for External Affairs (2009-10) "Oliver Stuenkel is one of the best new voices in the field of international politics. In Post-Western World, he explores the primary challenges of the global order and critiques the parochial, Eurocentric vision which conforms to international power structures. This book is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand what a multipolar world order would look like and how it might be effectively realized." Celso Amorim, Brazil’s Minister of External Relations (1993-5, 2003-11) and Minister of Defence (2011-15)

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Escape to the winding cobblestone streets and rolling hills of Tuscany in this delicious, romantic and charming tale perfect for fans of Chocolat and Under the Tuscan Stars. Margherita is a spirited young woman with a passion for cooking. When her heart is broken in Rome, she returns to her hometown of Roccafitta, a small Tuscan village filled with lovable eccentrics and beautiful vineyards. She dreams of saving enough money to reopen her late mother’s restaurant and hopes she may find help from the handsome stranger in town, Nicola Ravelli. An aloof and ambitious businessman, Nicola is buying up the village’s vineyards and is also on the lookout for a personal chef. Though the two dislike one another immediately, Nicola agrees to pay Margherita well for each delicious meal she prepares to help win over his clients. But with each new dish, Nicola discovers that he is the one being seduced and Margherita realizes that she is expressing much more through her cooking than she cares to admit.A warm-hearted, sensual story full of eccentric characters, this is a celebration of life and love – with a distinctly Italian flavour – and of the power of food to bring people together. *Includes delicious Italian recipes!* What readers are saying about this book: 'Absolutely superb! I thoroughly enjoyed this novel from beginning to end; wonderfully evocative with engaging characters. Margherita was funny, feisty and endearing whilst Nicola needed time before the reader appreciated his qualities. Roccafitta came alive with the detailed descriptions of places and characters, so much so that you could imagine walking down the street with them, whilst the descriptions of the food were outstanding. Margherita's love of food, the process of creating it and the thought behind it was captivating; you could almost taste the dishes' Linda Wilson, Netgalley reviewer 'Afoodie's treat with the right balance of romantic attraction mixed in. Definitely yummy' Bharti Chandnani, Netgalley reviewer'I was excited to start this book about a romance in Italy. It was a delightfully quick read, perfectly suited for the beach! The beautiful descriptions of food throughout the book brought the characters and dialogue to the next level. A very enjoyable read' Lora Mueller, Netgalley reviewer

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Plan your path to leadership with insight from real women at the top In Real Women, Real Leadership, twenty-four women leaders describe their personal journeys to the top, providing deep insight and a fascinating perspective on "making it" as a woman in the male-dominated business environment. They discuss their experiences and offer guidance on topics such as balancing family and career, building alliances, mentoring and being mentored, and overcoming obstacles in the business world which is still dominated by men in the senior levels of management. Drawn from a range of industries including higher education, technology, law, the military, politics, the media, and more, these stories provide the details that every ambitious woman needs to know. You'll learn which skills, attributes, and relationships served these women best, how they overcame the obstacles thrown into their paths, and the people they credit as instrumental along the way. A self-assessment chapter helps you discover your own leadership attributes, and determine which skills you need to acquire as you formulate your own personal roadmap to the top. There are many books about women who have been excellent leaders, but Real Women, Real Leadership provides the personal, relatable testimonials from women who have navigated the opportunities and pitfalls of the business world. Each story sheds light on women's unique leadership attributes, and provides guidance for professional women charting their own professional advancement. Learn from women leaders in a diverse range of industries Discover the leadership attributes that make the biggest impact Gain insight into work/life balance, mentors, relationships, and more Discover your leadership strengths and develop a plan forward Studies have shown that companies with three or more women board members dramatically outperform the competition in returns on equity, sales, and invested capital — yet women only claim a tiny percentage of boardroom seats and top executive positions. Why? And why, when they do achieve leadership positions, do women tend to make such outstanding leaders? Real Women, Real Leadership tackles these questions and more from an in-the-trenches perspective to help you become the leader you want to be.

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Praise for ON TOP OF THE CLOUD "21st-century CIOs have a dual responsibility: driving down costs and creating new business value. Managing this seeming dichotomy is the domain of top business executives everywhere, and CIOs everywhere are learning to step it up. The original research contained in Hunter's book serves as a practical road map for IT strategy in today's ultra-competitive markets."—Randy Spratt, EVP, CIO, and CTO, McKesson Corporation "This is a thoughtfully written book, and the timing is perfect. Hunter really understands the challenges confronting transformational CIOs in today's markets, and he captures the choices they face as they work to create value for their organizations while driving down the costs of doing business in the modern world. The wealth of information contained in this book makes it truly valuable to career IT leaders and future CIOs alike."—Mark Polansky, Senior Client Partner and Managing Director, Information Technology Center of Expertise, Korn/Ferry International, North America "The cloud involves more than just technology. It's really more of a new business model. Hunter grasps the central truth about cloud computing, and that's why this is a valuable book. Hunter understands the issues and conveys them in a conversational tone that is truly refreshing."—Dave Smoley, SVP and CIO, Flextronics International "You may think this is a book about technology; well it's not. It's a book about leadership, packed with stories about real leaders finding new customers and markets, transforming the way their organizations work, and adding value—with the next generation of technology as the enabler. The cloud holds real potential. Read this book to see how top CIOs are positioning their companies."—Tony Leng, Managing Director, Diversified Search "Hunter has the unique ability to distill the best thinking of world-class CIOs into something you can act on. If you are a technology executive trying to find the right balance between generating business value and managing IT costs, this is the right book for you. On Top of the Cloud will be especially useful for transformational CIOs tasked with developing their company's strategies for technology-driven business growth."—Randy Krotowski, CIO, Global Upstream, Information Technology, Chevron Corporation

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The diary of radio correspondent James Cassidy presents a unique view of World War II as this reporter followed the Allied armies into Nazi Germany. James Joseph Cassidy was one of 362 American journalists accredited to cover the European Theater of Operations between June 7, 1944, and the war’s end. Radio was relatively new, and World War II was its first war. Among the difficulties facing historians examining radio reporters during that period is that many potential primary documents—their live broadcasts—were not recorded. In NBC Goes to War, Cassidy’s censored scripts alongside his personal diary capture a front-line view during some of the nastiest fighting in World War II as told by a seasoned NBC reporter. James Cassidy was ambitious and young, and his coverage of World War II for the NBC radio network notched some notable firsts, including being the first to broadcast live from German soil and arranging the broadcast of a live Jewish religious service from inside Nazi Germany while incoming mortar and artillery shells fell 200 yards away. His diary describes how he gathered news, how it was censored, and how it was sent from the battle zone to the United States. As radio had no pictures, reporters quickly developed a descriptive visual style to augment dry facts. All of Cassidy’s stories, from the panic he felt while being targeted by German planes to his shock at the deaths of colleagues, he told with grace and a reporter’s lean and engaging prose. Providing valuable eyewitness material not previously available to historians, NBC Goes to War tells a “bottom-up” narrative that provides insight into war as fought and chronicled by ordinary men and women. Cassidy skillfully placed listeners alongside him in the ruins of Aachen, on icy back roads crawling with spies, and in a Belgian bar where a little girl wailed “Les Américains partent!” when Allied troops retreated to safety, leaving the town open to German re-occupation. With a journalistic eye for detail, NBC Goes to War unforgettably portrays life in the press corps. This newly uncovered perspective also helps balance the CBS-heavy radio scholarship about the war, which has always focused heavily on Edward R. Murrow and his “Murrow’s Boys.”

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This book, the first themed volume in the series The Future of the Religious Past, elaborates the manifold and fascinating interconnections between power and religion. It carries forward the work of the series in bringing together scholars from many disciplines and countries to research forms of religion in a way unfettered by the idea that religion is solely or even primarily a matter of belief in specific tenets or intellectual systems—it is also a matter of multiple particulars in individual and social life, such as powers, things, gestures, and words. Dealing with the nexus of religion and power, the present volume radically undermines the idea that the political relevance of religion is a thing of the past. Its essays treat power as a central aspect of religion on many levels, from that of macro-politics through the links between religion and nationhood to the level of personal empowerment or its obverse, disempowerment. Power and religion are both omnipresent in human action and interaction. There is no human act that does not include some kind of faith in a positive outcome and no deed in which power does not play some role. People obviously can attempt to use religion as an instrument to enhance their power or improve their status, whether personally or at the level of the nationstate. Yet religion is in principle ambiguous in relation to power: It can disempower as well as empower, and it can even function as a critique of existing power relations. Moreover, there is the consolatory function of religion, offering ways of compensation, of healing, and of enduring feelings of powerlessness. Like the first volume in the series, Religion: Beyond a Concept, the essays in this volume strike a balance between broad analyses of the nature of religion and power in their modes of emergence today and specific case studies from anthropology, sociology, and the arts. It is noteworthy for the breadth of the material it treats and its reach outside the Christian West, while not taking anything in that Western tradition for granted, given the astonishing changes of supposedly familiar religious phenomena we are viewing in the contemporary world.

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One of the most dramatic economic changes of the past century has been the increase in married women’s work outside the home. This volume examines the nature of married women’s participation in the economies of three East Asian countries—Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea. In addition to asking what is similar or different about women’s economic participation in this region of the world compared to Western societies, the book also asks how women’s work patterns vary across the three countries. The essays focus on key theoretical questions for the study of women’s labor and, more broadly, economic gender inequality. How do we assess the “value” of work available to married women in different countries and cultural contexts? What forces promote or hinder women’s work outside the home throughout marriage and childrearing? Does wage employment necessarily benefit women more than the “informal” sector (e.g., family-run businesses)? Is full-time work always more desirable than part-time work? Do women who return to the labor force after absences due to family responsibilities incur a heavy wage penalty for interrupted careers? The essays balance comparative assessments in a broad East Asian context with detailed investigations of one or more questions in the context of a specific country. The studies reveal that, although all three countries share common cultural and demographic conditions, patterns of women’s economic participation are distinctly different in Taiwan from those in Japan and South Korea. Whereas women’s participation in Taiwan’s economy shows striking similarities to many Western countries, married women in Japan and Korea participate less in the economy, and their earnings differ more from men’s than in Taiwan or the West. Why is Taiwan more similar to the West while Japan and South Korea are more similar to each other? The book draws on a broad range of materials to explain this puzzle. One of the explanations advanced is that overall labor demand, a greater supply of highly educated men, and more rigid work conditions (especially in large firms) in Japan and South Korea are major obstacles to the equal economic participation of married women in those countries. Also, the greater flexibility in work demands and work hours prevalent in Taiwan is complemented by relatively weaker patriarchal values in the family.

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Lokamanya (revered leader) Bal Gangadhar Tilak (1856 - 1920), the extremist politician of Maharashtra, a region of western India, was one of the first Congress Party leaders to adopt the strategy of mass politics. Interpretations of his role and his achievement differen greatly. Some historians depict Tilak as India's first mass politician who was a creative nationalist myth-maker; other suggest that he was an opportunist who manipulated politics for selfish, elitist purposes. With an eye to resolving these conflicting opinions, Cashman related Tilak's ideology to his political organization. the author concentrates on four mass movements, studying the Lokamanya when he was engaged in political action and comparing his public statements with his political tactics. This approach provides a means of examining the manner in which Tilak redefined myths and of assessing the value of myths for purposes of political mobilization. Cashman suggests deficiencies in previous interpretations of Tilak. Arguing that the limitations of the mass movements need not be explained by the inadequacies of myths, he demonstrates that instead they reflected the transitional state of Maharashtraian society, which lacked a broad consensus. Tilak was active at a time when there was no common goal, no broader objective, in which sectional interests might be subsumed. He symbolized the uncertain striving of his society for some new direction, whose nature was yet unknown. He did not create the myth of the Lokamanya or the ideology of nationalism but, responding to social and political pressures, became a prisoner of the myths. Much writing of Indian history has been influenced either by a narrow ideological approach or by a retreat to arithmetical pragmatism. Cashman attempts to restore a balance by reexamining the relationship of myth to politics. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1975.

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Engaging ‘Hard to Reach’ Parents “This is a readable yet academically rigorous book that draws together findings from contemporary theory, research and practice. It provides a range of positive and constructive approaches for schools and other organizations which will help them to meet the challenge of engaging effectively with parents, and in so doing improve the quality of education for all children, especially those from disadvantaged communities.”Peter Farrell, Sarah Fielden Professor of Special Needs and Educational Psychology, School of Education, University of Manchester “Clarity and integrity permeate this important book. An excellent variety of real-life examples of school–parent collaboration is discussed, and the balance of policy, theory and practice is outstandingly well-handled. This highly readable book will appeal to both practitioners and education students from the UK and from international contexts.”Professor Gary Thomas, Head of School of Education, University of Birmingham Teachers often comment that the parents they most want to speak to have least contact with the school. There are many reasons why families’ participation in schooling may be low – from difficulties with English to pressures of work – but there is consistent evidence that all parents are acutely interested in their children’s education and want to know how to help. Parents are a child’s first and most enduring teachers, and they create home environments where children spend much of their waking lives. Their involvement has an impact throughout children’s school careers. In Engaging ‘Hard to Reach’ Parents, Anthony Feiler emphasizes what schools can do to facilitatethe communication process, rather than adopting a ‘blaming’ or ‘deficit’ view of families. Real-world case studies of initiatives that promote effective cooperation between parents and teachers are presented, allowing readers to learn about successful strategies rooted in practical experience. Feiler highlights the particular benefits of home–school collaboration in circumstances that are challenging, and focuses on tactics that schools can adopt in order to better engage with so-called ‘hard to reach’ parents. By supporting the drive for stronger relationships between schools and the communities they serve, this book makes an important contribution to the development of inclusive education.

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One of the great transformations presently sweeping the Muslim world involves not just political and economic change but the reshaping of young Muslims’ styles of romance, courtship, and marriage. Nancy J. Smith-Hefner takes up the personal lives and sexual attitudes of educated Muslim Javanese youth in the city of Yogyakarta to explore the dramatic social and ethical changes taking place in Indonesian society. Drawing on more than 250 interviews over a fifteen-year period, her vivid, well-crafted ethnography is full of insights into the real-life struggles of young Muslims and framed by a deep understanding of Indonesia’s wider debates on gender and youth culture.The changes among Muslim youth reflect an ongoing if at times unsteady attempt to balance varied ideals, ethical concerns, and aspirations. On the one hand, growing numbers of young people show a deep and pervasive desire for a more active role in their Islamic faith. On the other, even as they seek a more self-conscious and scripture-based profession of faith, many educated youth aspire to personal relationships similar to those seen among youth elsewhere—a greater measure of informality, openness, and intimacy than was typical for their parents’ and grandparents’ generations. Young women in particular seek freedom for self-expression, employment, and social fulfillment outside of the home. Smith-Hefner pays particular attention to their shifting roles and perspectives because it is young women who have been most dramatically affected by the upheavals transforming this Muslim-majority country. Although deeply personal, the changing aspirations of young Muslims have immense implications for social and public life throughout Indonesia.The fruit of a longitudinal study begun shortly after the fall of the authoritarian New Order government and the return to democracy in 1998–1999, the book reflects Smith-Hefner’s nearly forty years of anthropological engagement with the island of Java and her continuing exploration into what it means to be both “modern” and Muslim. The culture of the new Muslim youth, the author shows, through all its nuances and variations, reflects the inexorable abandonment of traditions and practices deemed incompatible with authentic Islam and an ongoing and profound Islamization of intimacies.

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