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'Breathtakingly original, and a captivating sense of place' Val McDermid, bestselling author of Still Life'Compelling and original, this glints with freshness' Daily Mail'A brilliantly inventive and twisty tale' Claire McGowan, bestselling author of The Push'A good detective story . . . intriguing' Guardian'A distinctive, intriguing, immersive debut' Mari Hannah, multi-award winning author of Without a Trace The Murder In the Gare do Oriente, a body sits, slumped, in a stationary train. A high-profile man appears to have died by throwing himself repeatedly against the glass. But according to witnesses, he may not have done this of his own accord. The City Lisbon 2021. A small percentage of the population are diagnosed as Gifted. Along with the power comes stigma and suspicion. The Detective In a prejudiced city, Gifted Inspector Isabel Reis is hiding her own secrets while putting her life on the line to stop an ingenious killer.A violent and mysterious crime. Suspected Gifted involvement. A city baying for blood. And a killer who has only just begun . . .'A bold, compelling police drama a step beyond the ordinary with writing to match' Helen Fields, bestselling author of The Shadow Man'This is crime fiction with a twist . . . This was a gripping and highly invented thrill ride. I can't wait for more' Nadine Matheson, author of The Jigsaw Man'An amazing genre-bending debut' David Jackson, bestselling author of The Resident

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Captain Malik and the crew of his spaceship are in search of the only resources that matter – and can only be found by harvesting the giant corpses of alien gods that are found on the edge of human space..and now they see an opportunity to finally break free from this system: by being the first to find a living god.THE GODS ARE ALWAYS BEAUTIFUL... ...AND THE GODS ARE ALWAYS DEAD. Captain Malik and the crew of the spaceship the Vihaan II are in search of the only resources that matter – and can only be found by harvesting the giant corpses of alien gods that are found on the edge of human space. While other autopsy ships and explorers race to salvage the meat, minerals, and metals that sustain the human race, Malik sees an opportunity to finally break free from this system: by being the first to find a living god. But Malik’s obsession with the gods will push his crew into the darkest reaches of space, bringing them face to face with a threat unlike anything they ever imagined, unless the rogue agent on their trail can stop them first... Superstars Al Ewing (Immortal Hulk) and Simone Di Meo (Mighty Morphin Power Rangers) present a new sci-fi epic about the search for meaning and the hard choices we make to find it, no matter the cost to the world – or universe – around us. Collects We Only Find Them When They’re Dead #1-5.

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'Nerve-shattering, enlightening and deeply moving' - JOHN NICHOL'A powerful and compelling read' - ROWLAND WHITEOn 5 December 2002, trainee pilot Nathan Gray walked away from an 'unsurvivable' crash at RAF Wittering in Cambridgeshire. His instructor, seated behind him, was killed instantly. Despite the physical pain and mental scars, he found the strength and resilience to continue his flying career. Today Commander Nathan Gray is one of the UK's elite test pilots - the best of the best. Hazard Spectrum allows us to share Nathan's dizzying journey to the top of the Fleet Air Arm. With over 140 combat missions to his name, he is among the most decorated pilots in the British armed forces - our very own Maverick. In an exhilarating first-person narrative, Nathan takes us inside the cockpit as he holds Taliban fighters at bay in Afghanistan, and leads a top-secret mission to seek out Osama Bin Laden in the mountains of the Hindu Kush.In 2018, Nathan was chosen to complete the first take-off and landing of the world's most advanced fighter aircraft - the F35 stealth jet - on the flight deck of the flagship HMS Queen Elizabeth. A television audience of millions held its collective breath as he geared up for the task. This is the inspiring and unforgettable story of a man with a supreme ability to fly the most sophisticated and deadly planes ever created, who overcomes his personal demons to push the hazard spectrum to the limit - and beyond.

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'I've been searching for this feeling all year: this book left me absolutely breathless.' New York Times bestselling author Christina Lauren 'All in is sexy, smart, and completely unputdownable. Breathtaking, from start to finish. I loved this book, and I can't wait to go whatever Simona Ahrnstedt takes her readers next.' New York Times bestselling author Tessa Dare'Everything a reader could want!' New York Times bestselling author Eloisa JamesA gripping, glittering novel of scandal and suspense that ranges from Sweden to New York City to Africa, from the bestselling author of All In . . .Alexander de la Grip is known in the tabloids and gossip blogs as a rich, decadent jet-setting playboy who spends most of his days recovering from the night before. With a string of beautiful conquests, he seems to care about nothing and no one.Isobel Sørensen has treated patients in refugee camps and war zones, and is about to depart Sweden for a pediatric hospital in Chad. Devoted to her humanitarian work, she cares almost too deeply. Especially when she learns that Alexander is withholding desperately needed funds from her aid foundation. Is it because she's the only woman who ever told him to go to hell?As the two push each other's boundaries to the breaking point, the truth turns out to be much more complicated.Pain, love, trust, betrayal. Which will triumph when safety is nothing but an empty word?

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A private eye turned moderately successful poet leads readers on a satiric, hopeful tour of how to make a life in the arts, while still having a life. Revealing, hilarious, and peppered with sly takes on the ins and outs of contemporary American poetry (chapters include "The Silence of the Iambs," "The Revisionarium, Ask Dr. Frankenpoem," and "The Periodic Table of Poetic Elements"), Jeffrey Skinner offers advice, candor, and wit. Revision is the process a poem endures to become its best self. Or, if you are the poet, you are the process a poem endures to become its best self. Endures because a first draft, like all other objects in the universe, has inertia and would prefer to stay where it is. The poet must not collaborate. Best self because the poem is more like a person than a thing, and does not strenuously object to personification. Yo, poem. But let's not get carried away. It's your poem and you can treat it as you wish; sweet talk it; push it around if that's what it takes. Alfred Hitchcock notoriously said of the actors in his movies, "They are cattle." Jeffrey Skinner is the author of five books of poetry, most recently Salt Water Amnesia (Ausable Press, 2005). His poems have appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Nation, The American Poetry Review, Poetry, BOMB, and The Paris Review, and his work has earned awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Ingram Merrill Foundation, and the Howard Foundation.

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The Fangirl s Journal: Finding Empowerment and Inspiration in Fandom is a guided journal for geeky girls. Based on Sam Maggs The Fangirl s Guide to the Galaxy, this wreckable, writeable, and loveable journal encourages girls to think about the things they love, why they love them, and what those things say about themselves. Fandom is an excellent way to discover who you really are as you re growing up. Your OTPs, NOTPS, and even OT3s actually say a lot about you, if you re willing to listen hard enough. With this journal, girls can have fun examining their current fandoms, explore those they haven t had a chance to love yet, and even push the boundaries of their own creativity. Each section opens with a personal essay by the author, followed by writing prompts made for fangirl self-reflection (like What are your favorite fanfic tropes? and What s a popular fantasy book you ve never read - and why?) Users can start their very own transformative works with prompts for fanfic and fanart, alongside inspirational quotes from famous women in fandom and kick-ass female characters from genre fiction. The Fangirl s Journal will also include visual guides to comics, movies, TV shows, and video games, checklists for what to watch or read next, definitions of fandom terms, and wisdom from their favorite geeky gals. The Fangirl s Journal encourages girls to be their very best, strongest, loudest, and nerdiest selves and helps them to figure out exactly who that might be along the way.

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When Gail Campbell Woolley was seven, a pediatrician told her mother that Gail suffered from sickle cell anemia, a rare blood disease, and that she would be dead by age 35. While others may have responded to this horrifying news by descending into a fog of self-pity, Gail went in the opposite direction. She decided to live an eventful, exciting life that ultimately included—despite a troubled home life and the systemic racism and sexism of the late 20th century—academic success, an impressive career, a long and loving marriage, and the ability to leave her unmistakable stamp on every person she met. By the time she finally succumbed to her disease at age 58 in 2015, she had ground that doctor's words into dust.Soar, written in the last two years of her life, is Woolley's powerfully inspiring story, and its publication checks the last item off her extraordinary bucket list, which also included traveling to every continent except Antarctica.Gail writes that from the time she was a child, she awoke every morning with the sound of the famous 60 Minutes clock ticking in the back of her mind. But those ticking seconds also formed her indomitable spirit in ways that can inspire each of us who still draw breath. Written in an engaging, no-nonsense voice with a directness that reflects her many years in journalism, Woolley's remarkable story not only will move readers to root for this irrepressible, quietly heroic woman but also will push readers to reassess their own approach to life.

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DesignPOP is a survey of trends in contemporary furniture and products that reveals how design is not only changing with the times-it is inventing the future. The game-changing projects that compose DesignPOP push the boundaries of our expectations and show us new ideas, new possibilities, and ultimately new products that enrich our lives. The bar has been permanently raised as we enter the next century, and the proliferation of innovative designs continues. New materials and processes are being invented, convention and traditions are constantly being challenged, and sustainability and social responsibility are influencing new directions. Even the definition of designer is changing as the lines between disciplines begin to blur, with new technology from companies like Apple and Dyson radically altering both form and function. Historic boundaries disappear, designers innovate their way through roadblocks, and the twenty-first century is experiencing a design renaissance unparalleled in history. This book showcases a broad variety of these examples: from designs that pioneer a new material or a new production process, or reinvent the use for an existing one, to those that alter our expectations about the way something should look and create a whole new typology, or a thoughtful design added to products that traditionally were only considered for their functionality. It presents work from stars in the field, including Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid, Marc Newson, Marcel Wanders, Yves Behar, Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, the Campana brothers, Hella Jongerius, Tord Boontje, Philippe Starck, Karim Rashid, Ron Arad, Ross Lovegrove, Dror Benshetrit, Tokujin Yoshioka, Jasper Morrison, James Dyson, and Jonathan Ive.

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“It all began when architect Daniel, then a bachelor, built his own house on a wild hillside lot, developing his garden as next-door-neighbor, Ann, was developing a garden around natural springs in her backyard. We married, and together with our growing son, Benjamin, continued these gardens as we also fought through blackberries, horsetails, and morning glories to push intersecting paths through the adjacent two-lot wilderness we later purchased, creating a little park which we planted and nurtured and ultimately gave to the City of Seattle in 1996, with our promise to maintain it through our lifetimes.” -from the Introduction This richly illustrated book offers timely inspiration to gardeners in an increasingly urban world. In an engaging narrative, the Streissguths show the emergence of their gardening partnership during forty years of marriage, and their philosophy that developing a site along a public stairway gave them the opportunity to share their garden with neighbors and passersby. They offer practical insight into concepts of linking inside and outside rooms and of combining private and public spaces, and they describe the process through which they transformed a steep forested hillside in the heart of Seattle into a deciduous woodland garden with banks of perennials, a dell, vistas of the city and lake, and a site for ornamental and food-producing plants. Finally, they consider the future stewardship of the Streissguth Gardens, a park linking the wild and tamed sections of a unique greenbelt garden shared with joggers, strollers, fellow gardeners, schoolchildren, and those who call it “a touch of Eden in a big city.”

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If you take a chain, pile it up and then push it, what direction will it go? Nowhere you can predict and not very far. If you take it by the end and pull it, which way will it go? It will follow you. Leadership is not about what sets you apart from those you lead—it’s about what binds you together. It is not about controlling others—it’s about trusting others. It’s not about your achievements—it’s about unleashing your team’s greatness. In short, leadership really isn’t about you—it’s about your people. Take Bob Davids, co-author of this book and successful leader of six businesses in fields as diverse as engineering and winemaking. His achievements often came thanks to being able to refrain from acting when others might have found intervening irresistible. By trusting his employees to be better than him in their area of responsibility and letting them act, Bob unleashed the human greatness that no one else—including employees themselves—suspected. Yet to lead without acting does not mean doing nothing. It means creating conditions in which things happen by themselves. Leadership Without Ego is about a transformation of the concept of leadership in the past two decades: a change of beliefs about how best to lead, along with radically different leadership practices. The ideas in this book have already changed the fortunes of hundreds of businesses and the lives of tens of thousands of employees. They can do the same for your business, your people—and you.

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An experiment is under way in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem: a woman, recently widowed, is starting a trial period in assisted living, mainly to placate her over-anxious son, whilst in Jerusalem her daughter Noga, a young harpist, returns from her job with a Dutch orchestra to look after the family apartment.To enliven her stay, Noga's brother finds work for her - playing roles as an extra in film, TV, and in the opera Carmen. The random roles Noga is thrust into resonate strangely with her own life which she begins to re-evaluate. Central to her past is the fact that she refused to have children, resulting in the break-up of her marriage. No-one in her family understood her motives for not wanting children and everyone has a different explanation for it. Now, a chance encounter with her former husband reveals his continuing powerful, love as well as a shocking deed she committed during their marriage. But Noga is a free spirit neither tied to the past nor defined by it, and always keen to push boundaries. She lives for her music and is willing to go wherever it takes her. The three-month experiment proves as much of a test for her as for her mother and both are radically transformed by the end.A.B. Yehoshua is as creative, humorous and provocative as ever in The Extra, exploring themes familiar to him of love, family relationships and artistic ambitions, set mainly in an ever-changing Jerusalem.

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Post-war darkness may be the darkest of them all—Nazi-hunters reach deep into 1979 San Francisco. When a German businesswoman in 1979 San Francisco hires ex-con PI Colleen Hayes to find a missing relative, supposedly in town to visit, she thinks it’s a simple job. But she soon discovers that the “nephew” is linked to an international vigilante group hunting down ex-Nazis. Then the body of a mysterious woman turns up on San Francisco’s Municipal Railway, mirroring a murder committed the week before in Buenos Aires where the “nephew” had just been. Colleen’s search uncovers a World War II banknote and the 1942 SS ID of a German officer long thought dead. When Colleen fails to heed warnings to stop her investigation, her pregnant daughter is attacked. The so-called nephew is nowhere to be found. The German businesswoman has fled town. Colleen’s search leads her to Italy where the infamous Vatican Ratlines helped escaped ex-Nazis forge new identities around the globe. Deep in the Italian Alps, she uncovers a secret project hatched in a concentration camp. Colleen has no choice but to push ahead if the killing is to stop and justice prevail.Perfect for fans of Steve Berry and Harlan Coben. While all of the novels in the Colleen Hayes Mystery Series stand on their own and can be read in any order, the publication sequence is:Vanishing in the Haight Tie Die Bad Scene Line of Darkness Night Candy (coming 2023)

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The second novel in the dazzling Last Hundred Years trilogy, Early Warning follows the Langdon family from the 50s, through to the 1980s, in this stunning family saga from the winner of the Pulitzer Prize1953. When a funeral brings the Langdon family together once more, they little realize how much, over the coming years, each of their worlds will shift and change. For now Walter and Rosanna's sons and daughters are grown up and have children of their own.Frank, the eldest - restless, unhappy - ignores his troubled wife and instead finds himself distracted by a face from the past. Lillian must watch as her brilliant, eccentric husband Arthur is destroyed by the guilt arising from his secretive government work. Claire, too, finds that marriage is not quite what she expected it to be.In Iowa where the Langdons began, Joe sees that some aspects of life on the farm never change, while others are unrecognizable. And though a few members of the family remain mired in the past, others will attempt to move beyond the lives they have always known; and some will push forward as never before. The dark shadow of the Vietnam War hangs over every one . . .In sickness and health, through their best and darkest times, the Langdon family will live and love and suffer against the broad, merciless sweep of American history. Moving from the 1950s to the 1980s, Early Warning by Jane Smiley is epic storytelling at its most wise and compelling from a writer at the height of her powers.

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'A soaring gift of a book' Owen Sheers'Remarkable' Mark Vanhoenacker, author of Skyfaring'Stunning . . . a love letter to nature' Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of The Last Act of LoveThe day she flew in a glider for the first time, Rebecca Loncraine fell in love. Months of gruelling treatment for breast cancer meant she had lost touch with the world around her, but in that engineless plane, soaring 3,000 feet over the landscape of her childhood, with only the rising thermals to take her higher and the birds to lead the way, she felt ready to face life again. And so Rebecca flew, travelling from her home in the Black Mountains of Wales to New Zealand’s Southern Alps and the Nepalese Himalayas as she chased her new-found passion: her need to soar with the birds, to push herself to the boundary of her own fear. Taking in the history of unpowered flight, and with extraordinary descriptions of flying in some of the world’s most dangerous and dramatic locations, Skybound is a nature memoir with a unique perspective; it is about the land we know and the sky we know so little of, it is about memory and self-discovery.Rebecca became ill again just as she was finishing Skybound, and she died in September 2016. Though her death is tragic, it does not change what Skybound is: a book full of hope. Deeply moving, thrilling and euphoric, Skybound is for anyone who has ever looked up and longed to take flight.Shortlisted for the Edward Stanford Travel Writing Award 2018.

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The first decade of the 21st century saw a remarkable number of large-scale disasters. Earthquakes in Haiti and Sumatra underscored the serious economic consequences that catastrophic events can have on developing countries, while 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina showed that first world nations remain vulnerable. The Social Roots of Risk argues against the widespread notion that cataclysmic occurrences are singular events, driven by forces beyond our control. Instead, Kathleen Tierney contends that disasters of all types—be they natural, technological, or economic—are rooted in common social and institutional sources. Put another way, risks and disasters are produced by the social order itself—by governing bodies, organizations, and groups that push for economic growth, oppose risk-reducing regulation, and escape responsibility for tremendous losses when they occur. Considering a wide range of historical and looming events—from a potential mega-earthquake in Tokyo that would cause devastation far greater than what we saw in 2011, to BP's accident history prior to the 2010 blowout—Tierney illustrates trends in our behavior, connecting what seem like one-off events to illuminate historical patterns. Like risk, human resilience also emerges from the social order, and this book makes a powerful case that we already have a significant capacity to reduce the losses that disasters produce. A provocative rethinking of the way that we approach and remedy disasters, The Social Roots of Risk leaves readers with a better understanding of how our own actions make us vulnerable to the next big crisis—and what we can do to prevent it.

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Why has old-age security become less solidaristic and increasingly tied to risky capitalist markets? Drawing on rich archival data that covers more than fifty years of American history, Michael A. McCarthy argues that the critical driver was policymakers' reactions to capitalist crises and their political imperative to promote capitalist growth.Pension development has followed three paths of marketization in America since the New Deal, each distinct but converging: occupational pension plans were adopted as an alternative to real increases in Social Security benefits after World War II, private pension assets were then financialized and invested into the stock market, and, since the 1970s, traditional pension plans have come to be replaced with riskier 401(k) retirement plans. Comparing each episode of change, Dismantling Solidarity mounts a forceful challenge to common understandings of America’s private pension system and offers an alternative political economy of the welfare state. McCarthy weaves together a theoretical framework that helps to explain pension marketization with structural mechanisms that push policymakers to intervene to promote capitalist growth and avoid capitalist crises and contingent historical factors that both drive them to intervene in the particular ways they do and shape how their interventions bear on welfare change. By emphasizing the capitalist context in which policymaking occurs, McCarthy turns our attention to the structural factors that drive policy change. Dismantling Solidarity is both theoretically and historically detailed and superbly argued, urging the reader to reconsider how capitalism itself constrains policymaking. It will be of interest to sociologists, political scientists, historians, and those curious about the relationship between capitalism and democracy.

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What effects will the current economic crisis have on the long-term development of our societies? What does the future hold in store when we emerge from the crisis? These two questions lie at the heart of this important new book by the leading French sociologist Alain Touraine. In an era dominated by the global economy and the triumph of individualism, our society has broken away from the old model of integration in place since the industrial revolution. We no longer see ourselves as players in an economic system around which every aspect of society is ordered but rather as individuals with our own rights, capable of creating our own lives in a world in which cultural values prevail. The financial crisis and the growing autonomy of speculative and financial imperatives have exacerbated the rift between the economy and society and could push this long-term tendency in either of two directions. On the one hand, individuals who find themselves unemployed, impoverished and stripped of their savings may feel increasingly excluded and incapable of reacting politically, which would explain the silence of many victims of the crisis. On the other hand, individuals could also find themselves transformed into social actors who are defined increasingly in moral and universal terms, in which case the crisis could help to precipitate a long-term cultural evolution. We are facing a future as yet undecided, a future hovering between catastrophe and radical reform. This book explores the factors that could tip the balance.

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A bold new approach to combatting the inherent corruption of representative democracyThis provocative book reveals how the majority of modern liberal democracies have become increasingly oligarchic, suffering from a form of structural political decay first conceptualized by ancient philosophers. Systemic Corruption argues that the problem cannot be blamed on the actions of corrupt politicians but is built into the very fabric of our representative systems.Camila Vergara provides a compelling and original genealogy of political corruption from ancient to modern thought, and shows how representative democracy was designed to protect the interests of the already rich and powerful to the detriment of the majority. Unable to contain the unrelenting force of oligarchy, especially after experimenting with neoliberal policies, most democracies have been corrupted into oligarchic democracies. Vergara explains how to reverse this corrupting trajectory by establishing a new counterpower strong enough to control the ruling elites. Building on the anti-oligarchic institutional innovations proposed by plebeian philosophers, she rethinks the republic as a mixed order in which popular power is institutionalized to check the power of oligarchy. Vergara demonstrates how a plebeian republic would establish a network of local assemblies with the power to push for reform from the grassroots, independent of political parties and representative government.Drawing on neglected insights from Niccolò Machiavelli, Nicolas de Condorcet, Rosa Luxemburg, and Hannah Arendt, Systemic Corruption proposes to reverse the decay of democracy with the establishment of anti-oligarchic institutions through which common people can collectively resist the domination of the few.

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After forty years of largely cooperative Sino-U.S. relations, policymakers, politicians, and pundits on both sides of the Pacific see growing tensions between the United States and China. Some go so far as to predict a future of conflict, driven by the inevitable rivalry between an established and a rising power, and urge their leaders to prepare now for a future showdown. Others argue that the deep economic interdependence between the two countries and the many areas of shared interests will lead to more collaborative relations in the coming decades. In this book, James Steinberg and Michael O'Hanlon stake out a third, less deterministic position. They argue that there are powerful domestic and international factors, especially in the military and security realms, that could well push the bilateral relationship toward an arms race and confrontation, even though both sides will be far worse off if such a future comes to pass. They contend that this pessimistic scenario can be confidently avoided only if China and the United States adopt deliberate policies designed to address the security dilemma that besets the relationship between a rising and an established power. The authors propose a set of policy proposals to achieve a sustainable, relatively cooperative relationship between the two nations, based on the concept of providing mutual strategic reassurance in such key areas as nuclear weapons and missile defense, space and cyber operations, and military basing and deployments, while also demonstrating strategic resolve to protect vital national interests, including, in the case of the United States, its commitments to regional allies.

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Seeking to historicize the 2007-2009 Great Recession, this volume of essays situates the current economic crisis and its impact on workers in the context of previous abrupt shifts in the modern-day capitalist marketplace. Contributors use examples from industrialized North America, South America, Europe, Asia, and Australia to demonstrate how workers and states have responded to those shifts and to their disempowering effects on labor. Since the Industrial Revolution, contributors argue, factors such as race, sex, and state intervention have mediated both the effect of economic depressions on workers' lives and workers' responses to those depressions. Contributors also posit a varying dynamic between political upheaval and economic crises, and between workers and the welfare state.The volume ends with an examination of today's "Great Recession": its historical distinctiveness, its connection to neoliberalism, and its attendant expressions of worker status and agency around the world. A sobering conclusion lays out a likely future for workers--one not far removed from the instability and privation of the nineteenth century.The essays in this volume offer up no easy solutions to the challenges facing today's workers. Nevertheless, they make clear that cogent historical thinking is crucial to understanding those challenges, and they push us toward a rethinking of the relationship between capital and labor, the waged and unwaged, and the employed and jobless.Contributors are Sven Beckert, Sean Cadigan, Leon Fink, Alvin Finkel, Wendy Goldman, Gaetan Heroux, Joseph A. McCartin, David Montgomery, Edward Montgomery, Scott Reynolds Nelson, Melanie Nolan, Bryan D. Palmer, Joan Sangster, Judith Stein, Hilary Wainright, and Lu Zhang.

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In the second half of the nineteenth century, local leaders around the Qing empire attempted to rebuild in the aftermath of domestic rebellion and imperialist aggression. At the same time, the enthronement of a series of children brought the question of reconstruction into the heart of the capital. Chinese scholars, Manchu and Mongolian officials, and writers in the press all competed to have their ideas included in the education of young rulers. Each group hoped to use the power of the emperor—both his functional role within the bureaucracy and his symbolic role as an exemplar for the people—to promote reform.Daniel Barish explores debates surrounding the education of the final three Qing emperors, showing how imperial curricula became proxy battles for divergent visions of how to restabilize the country. He sheds light on the efforts of rival figures, who drew on China’s dynastic history, Manchu traditions, and the statecraft tools of imperial powers as they sought to remake the state. Barish traces how court education reflected arguments over the introduction of Western learning, the fate of the Manchu Way, the place of women in society, notions of constitutionalism, and emergent conceptions of national identity. He emphasizes how changing ideas of education intersected with a push for a renewed imperial center and national unity, helping create a model of rulership for postimperial regimes. Through the lens of the education of young emperors, Learning to Rule develops a new understanding of the late Qing era and the relationship between the monarchy and the nation in modern China.

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There is currently a great need for introductory materials to help professionals of all types to understand and deploy Human Centred Design (HCD) methods. This compendium, written in simple everyday language by authors who are experts in automotive ergonomics, UX and HMI, is inclusive and easily accessible. The 21st century is characterised by ever greater reliance on the innovation paradigm of HCD. In many sectors, the practices of "technology push" and "market pull" have been giving ground to newer ways of innovating which are based more on careful attention to the characteristics and needs of people. Where ethnographic, ergonomic and UX practices were once the remit of only the design teams, the practices and values of HCD are now permeating widely, leading in many cases to business restructuring. The automotive sector, characterised by large and sophisticated organisations, and by more than a century of success, is one sector with extensive requirements for HCD methods. This introductory book links the philosophy of the Human Centred Design innovation to the basic methods and simple everyday steps which can be taken to better understand customers and to better define briefs and tests. The book will prove a valuable reference to automotive designers who wish to more deeply integrate HCD into their everyday work, and to any professional who wishes to widen her or his skill set and understanding of HCD. The information regarding the selection of HCD methods, and their deployment, will provide a gentle introduction to the world of Human Centred Design.

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The experimental provides architects with a vital means to test ideas and the untried. Like authors and artists, architects harness the power of fiction to explore alternative models of society and push the boundaries of the possible. Though these imaginings can be influential aesthetically, like the prisons of Piranesi or the cities of Lebbeus Woods, they remain largely confined to paper or the screen – unbuilt. By injecting the experimental with a new realism, however, speculative design has the potential to advance new inclusive, equitable and desirable futures. Showcasing cutting-edge insight, this Design Studio volume advocates the inclusion of the visionary in the architectural design process. It explores the real-world application of near-future fantastical storytelling and the power of imaginative literacy. Articles cover subjects such as plausible impossibilities, other worlds, terraforming, activism, democratising design, future innovations and education, to name but a few. Departing from unrealistic utopian or dystopian visions, they empower plural design reactions in response to real-life scenarios. What impacts might a generational wave of ethical non-monogamy have on the way we use space and the future design of our built environment? Or the introduction of a universal basic income? Or the ready availability of lab grown meat? Thinking, imagining, designing, storytelling … these are political acts. How will you use your vote? Features: Phil Balagtas, Nicolay Boyadjiev, Benjamin H. Bratton, Dana Barale Burdman, Tom Greenall, Anab Jain, Nicola Koller, Matteo Mastrandrea, César Reyes Nájera, Kathy Nothstine, Ethel Baraona Pohl, Anna Pompermaier, Ayesha Silburn, Phoebe Walton, Matt Ward and Liam Young.

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Winner, Mountain Literature (Non-Fiction) Award, Banff Mountain Book Festival 2018Nick Bullock is a climber who lives in a small green van, flitting between Llanberis, Wales, and Chamonix in the French Alps. Tides, Nick's second book, is the much-anticipated follow-up to his critically acclaimed debut Echoes. Now retired from the strain of work as a prison officer, Nick is free to climb. A lot. Tides is a treasury of his antics and adventures with some of the world's leading climbers, including Steve House, Kenton Cool, Nico Favresse, Andy Houseman and James McHaffie. Follow Nick and his partners as they push the limits on some of the world's most serious routes: The Bells! The Bells! and The Hollow Man on Gogarth's North Stack Wall; the Slovak Direct on Denali; Guerdon Grooves on Buachaille Etive Mor; and the north faces of Chang Himal and Mount Alberta, among countless others. Nick's life can be equated to the rhythm of the sea. At high tide, he climbs, he loves it, he is good at it; he laughs and jokes, scares himself, falls, gets back up and climbs some more. Then the tide goes out and he finds himself alone, exposed, all questions and no answers. Self-doubt, grieving for friends or family, fearful, sometimes opinionated, occasionally angry - his writing more honest and exposed than in any account of a climb. Only when the tide turns is he able to forget once more.Tides is a gripping memoir that captures the very essence of what it means to dedicate one's life to climbing.

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The lack of affordable housing and the climate crisis are two of the most pressing challenges facing cities today. Green affordable housing addresses both by providing housing stability, safety, and financial predictability while constructing and operating the buildings to reduce environmental and climate impacts. Blueprint for Greening Affordable Housing is the most comprehensive resource on how green building principles can be incorporated into affordable housing design, construction, and operation. In this fully revised edition, Walker Wells and Kimberly Vermeer capture the rapid evolution of green building practices and make a compelling case for integrating green building in affordable housing. The Blueprint offers guidance on innovative practices, green building certifications for affordable housing, and the latest financing strategies. The completely new case studies share detailed insights on how the many elements of a green building are incorporated into different housing types and locations. The new edition includes basic planning tools such as checklists to guide the planning process, and questions to encourage reflection about how the content applies in practice. While Blueprint for Greening Affordable Housing is especially useful to housing development project managers, the information and insights will be valuable to all participants in the affordable housing industry: developers, designers and engineers, funders, public agency staff, property and asset managers, housing advocates, and resident advocates. Every affordable housing project can achieve the fundamentals of good green building design and practice. By sharing the authors’ years of expertise in guiding hundreds of organizations, Blueprint for Greening Affordable Housing, Revised Edition gives project teams what they need to push for excellence.

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When it comes to sizing up America’s public schools, test scores are the go-to metric of state policy makers and anxious parents looking to place their children in the “best” schools. Yet ample research indicates that standardized tests are a poor way to measure a school’s performance. It is time—indeed past time—to rethink this system, Jack Schneider says.Beyond Test Scores reframes current debates over school quality by offering new approaches to educational data that can push us past our unproductive fixation on test scores. Using the highly diverse urban school district of Somerville, Massachusetts, as a case study, Schneider and his research team developed a new framework to more fairly and comprehensively assess educational effectiveness. And by adopting a wide range of measures aligned with that framework, they were able to more accurately capture a broader array of school strengths and weaknesses. Their new data not only provided parents, educators, and administrators with a clearer picture of school performance, but also challenged misconceptions about what makes a good school.With better data, Schneider shows, stakeholders at the federal, state, and local levels can undo the damage of present accountability systems and build greater capacity in our schools. Policy makers, administrators, and school leaders can better identify where assistance is needed. Educators can engage in more evidence-based decision making. And parents can make better-informed choices for their children. Perhaps most importantly, better data can facilitate communication among all these groups, allowing them to take collective action toward shared, concrete goals.

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Knitting and crochet have long been considered forms of folk art, but in the 21st century, these time-honoured crafts are breaking away from the outdated stereotype of cosy domesticity. Whether miniature or oversized, multi-coloured or monochrome, abstract or naturalistic, intimate or exhibitionist, knitted works are now invading galleries, museums and other public spaces. Yarn has become a medium for artistic expression as valid and multifaceted as painting, sculpture or photography. Showcasing forty international artists who incorporate knitting, crochet and more into their practice, this book provides a survey of yarn work in contemporary art, illustrating the huge range of ways in which these techniques have been embraced as a form of creative expression. Some artists evoke a kind of nostalgia, rediscovering skills that have fallen from fashion or promoting the value of ancient handicrafts in an industrialized world of mass-production. Others push the boundaries of knitting by using non-traditional materials such as rope or wire, or by using its sculptural potential to tackle themes that are political, personal or transgressive. Although often associated with feelings of warmth, enclosure and familial love, yarn can also represent the ties that bind us together or a membrane that protects us from the world. Packed with striking images, this book demonstrates how knitting needles and crochet hooks can created works of art that are challenging and unique, forcing us to take a fresh look at our own lives and beliefs and at the objects that surround us every day.

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***THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER***The explosive new thriller featuring MI6 operative Luke Carlton on his most terrifying mission yet. Deep within the Arctic Circle, three scientists from the UK's Arctic Research Station trudge through a blizzard in search of shelter. They see a cabin ahead. It appears abandoned. No lights. No snowmobile outside. But as they push open the door, the smell hits them. Rank and foetid: there's something bad inside. Then movement. A man lies slumped, his face disfigured by livid pustules. Blood runs from his nostrils; his chest glistens blackly. The team's medic, Dr Sheila Mackenzie, pushes forward to examine him when the convulsions start. Blood, bile and mucus spray into the air. The doctor knows it's too late - she's been contaminated . . . Within hours, a full-scale operation to contain this contagion is underway. Samples are rushed to the laboratories at Porton Down on high alert. What they discover changes everything. Supported by phone and data intercepts, British Intelligence reaches a terrifying conclusion: that Russia has been developing a new generation of bio-weapons. Dispatched to investigate, MI6's Luke Carlton finds himself on a serpentine trail of lies and deception. From a mysterious factory in Lithuania, via arrest and imprisonment, and ultimately back to Britain, he discovers that they've been looking in the wrong place all along . . .Readers are raving about Outbreak***** 'A fast-paced espionage thriller with a timely premise'***** 'A sharp and fast-paced thriller'***** 'A great read for fans old and new'***** 'One of the best thrillers of 2021'

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The ninth book in the bestselling Chronicles of St Mary's series which follows a group of tea-soaked disaster magnets as they hurtle their way around History. If you love Jasper Fforde or Ben Aaronovitch, you won't be able to resist Jodi Taylor.They say you shouldn't push your luck. Max gives her own luck a massive shove every day - and it's only a matter of time until luck pushes back... January 1536 - the day of Henry VIII's infamous jousting accident. Historians from St Mary's are there in force, recording and documenting. And, arguing - obviously.A chance meeting between Max and the Time Police leads to a plan of action. And, it's one that will have very serious consequences - especially for Max. Her private life is already more than a little rocky. But with Leon recovering and Matthew safe in the future there will never be a better opportunity to bring down Clive Ronan, once and for all.From Tudor England to the burning city of Persepolis - and from a medieval siege to a very nasty case of 19th century incarceration - Max is determined that this time, he will not escape. Readers love Jodi Taylor: 'Once in a while, I discover an author who changes everything... Jodi Taylor and her protagonista Madeleine "Max" Maxwell have seduced me' 'A great mix of British proper-ness and humour with a large dollop of historical fun' 'Addictive. I wish St Mary's was real and I was a part of it' 'Jodi Taylor has an imagination that gets me completely hooked' 'A tour de force'

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"The narrative has its requisite share of mobsters, cops and bloodshed, but for Domini these are mainly pegs upon which to explore Risto’s sense of displacement and belonging. ... Domini’s novel is determined to push the noir—and us—out of well-worn ruts." —The Washington Post A disastrous earthquake has Naples reeling. While the government scrambles to maintain appearances, poverty and anarchy rack the people on Italy’s margins—the illegal immigrants out of Africa, known as the clandestini. One of whom has just been horrifically murdered. Enter Risto, a rare success story: a refugee from Mogadishu, orphaned in his teens, he’s now married the Neapolitan Paola and is the proprietor of a celebrated art gallery. The murder recalls the deaths of his loved ones years ago in Mogadishu, a trauma Risto can’t outrun. Thinking to force the hand of the white authorities, Risto begins his own investigation. But once he starts playing detective, he quickly gets in over his head. Worse, his digging seems to have brought on a strange hallucination: a golden halo only he can see, like a visionary’s foretelling of death. Everyone he knows, including the woman he loves, seems to brim with secrets; every discovery Risto makes drives him toward an earthquake of his own. A portrait of turmoil inside and out, The Color Inside a Melon explores race and class, belonging and exclusion in one of the world’s ancient cities. Prolific author, critic, and essayist John Domini delivers an unforgettable portrait of humanity’s endless struggle between moving on and making a home.

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A comprehensive history of Henry George and the single tax movement.In 1912, Sun Yat-sen announced the birth of the Chinese Republic and promised that it would be devoted to the economic welfare of all its people. In shaping his plans for wealth redistribution, he looked to an American now largely forgotten in the United States: Henry George. In Land and Liberty, Christopher William England excavates the lost history of one of America's most influential radicals and explains why so many activists were once inspired by his proposal to tax landed wealth. Drawing on the private papers of a network of devoted believers, Land and Liberty represents the first comprehensive account of this important movement to nationalize land and expropriate rent. Beginning with concerns about rising rents in the 1870s and ending with the establishment of New Deal policies that extended public control over land, natural resources, and housing, "Georgism" served as a catalyst for reforms intended to make the nation more democratic. Many of these concerns remain relevant today, including the exploitation of natural resources, rising urban rent, and wealth inequality. At a time when class divisions sparked fears that capitalism and democracy were incompatible, hopes of building a social welfare state using the rents of idle landlords revitalized the middle class's conviction that democracy and liberty could be reconciled. Against steep odds, George made land nationalization vital to the politics of a nation dominated by small farmers and helped push liberalism leftward through his calls for collective rights to land and natural resources.

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Uncover the latest developments in leadership development and coaching with insights from two of the most respected voices on the subject In this provocative book, leadership experts and authors of the best-selling The Leadership Challenge, Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner take on a unique challenge and explore questions of leadership and legacy. In 22 stand-alone chapters, Kouzes and Posner examine the critical questions all leaders must ask themselves before they can leave a lasting impact. These powerful essays are grouped into four categories: Significance, Relationships, Aspirations, and Courage. In each essay the authors consider a thorny and often ambiguous issue with which today’s leaders must grapple—such as how leaders serve and sacrifice, why leaders need loving critics, why leaders should want to be liked, why leaders can't take trust for granted, why it’s not just the leader’s vision that matters, why failure is always an option, why it takes courage to “make a life,” how to liberate the leader in everyone, and ultimately, how the legacy you leave is the life you lead. In the book, you’ll find: A free-flowing discussion of leadership topics and lessons Incisive explorations of ambiguous issues and paradoxes that have bedeviled leaders for generations Concise and to-the-point essays representing new approaches to familiar themes, new stories, and new experiences A Leader’s Legacy is an indispensable resource for managers, executives, and other business leaders looking for insightful new ways to push their leadership development further than they ever thought possible.

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Powerful sound clips from twelve Black leaders amplified by bold illustrations and background facts illuminate pivotal moments of Black history in America. With the touch of the button, hear impactful quotes spoken by inspiring Black Americans in primary source audio files. Aimed at children ages 7–12, a succinct profile of the speaker alongside an explanation of the significance of the quote and moment provide the context for each audio clip. A vibrant illustration of the speaker completes the picture. Through the included quotes, kids gain an age-appropriate understanding of the strides made in the ongoing journey for equality, from the early days of sound recording to modern day.Lift Every Voice and Change features the voices of: Booker T. Washington Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr John Lewis Stokely Carmichael James Baldwin Stacey Abrams Toni Morrison Katherine Johnson Jay-Z Gladys Mae West Faith Ringgold Ayo Tometi The voices chosen represent an equal number of men and women, historical and modern figures, across a variety of disciplines. Some are household names and others may very well be introduced to children for the first time! Inspire the next generation of leading voices by inviting them to listen to and learn from the Black leaders of yesterday and today.Manufacturer’s note: Please pull the white tab out of the back of the book before use. Sound buttons require a firm push in the exact location to work, which may be hard for young children. Sound clips range in length, but are an average of 12 seconds long.

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Historic Myanmar elections in November 2015 paved the way for an NLD government led by Aung San Suu Kyi to take office in March 2016, and saw the country deepen its graduated transition away from authoritarian rule. Nevertheless, military forces that for decades dominated national politics remain privileged in a constitutional framework designed to deliver 'discipline-flourishing democracy'. In August 2017, the military intensified its campaign of ethnic cleansing of Myanmar's Rohingya Muslim minority, and more than 750,000 refugees fled to neighbouring Bangladesh. One critical question that now confronts the fifty million people of this Southeast Asian nation is whether their push for greater democracy is strong enough to prevail over the resistance of a powerful military machine and swelling undercurrents of intolerance. What are the prospects for liberal democracy in Myanmar? This book addresses this question by examining historical conditions, constitutionalism, popular support for democracy, major political actors, group relations and tolerance, and transitional justice. To probe the meaning and purchase of key concepts it presents a rich array of evidence, including eighty-eight in-depth interviews and three waves of surveys and survey experiments conducted by the authors between 2014 and 2018, all of which are triangulated with constitutional and legal texts and reports issued locally and globally. The analysis culminates in the concept of limited liberalism, which reflects an at times puzzling blend of liberal and illiberal attitudes. The book concludes that a weakening of liberal commitments among politicians and citizens alike, allied with spreading limited liberal attitudes, casts doubt on the prospects for liberal democracy in Myanmar.

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A soul’s journey through the night, a missing woman: time and narrative bend and interlock across a play of poetic forms and voices to make one story of love and loss. In And She Was Corbett combines the fictional spell-making of Haruki Murakami, with the filmic neo-noir of Atom Egoyan (Exotica) and David Lynch (Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive), to push the boundaries of poetic genre, asking us to renegotiate the way we encounter and reconfigure ourselves through trauma, in desire, or as we seek to reassemble ourselves and our past. November, 3am, and two young lovers are about to meet on the Heathrow Express. A side street in an unknown city: Felix Morning wakes with no memory. In his pocket is a membership card for a nightclub, The Bunker. With the help of the beautiful Flick, he must recover what he has lost. Deep into a dangerous love affair, Esther and Iain believe the other can replace what they each have lost – a heart, a gift – but is Esther’s price too high for Iain to pay, and can their love survive? Who is Esther, where has she come from, and what has she got to do with the woman in the labyrinth? Does Flick belong to the past or to the future? What is memory, and what remains of us without it? And She Was demands our attention, its startling and dazzling writing asking us to be carried away as we read, but returning us by its end to a place both resolved and transformed.

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Examines the bleak television comedies that illustrate the obsession of the white left with its own anxiety and suffering At the same time that right-wing political figures like Donald Trump were elected and reactionary socio-economic policies like Brexit were voted into law, representations of bleakly comic white fragility spread across television screens. American and British programming that featured the abjection of young, middle-class, liberal white people—such as Broad City, Casual, You’re the Worst, Catastrophe, Fleabag, and Transparent—proliferated to wide popular acclaim in the 2010s. Taylor Nygaard and Jorie Lagerwey track how these shows of the white left, obsessed with its own anxiety and suffering, are complicit in the rise and maintenance of the far right—particularly in the mobilization, representation, and sustenance of structural white supremacy on television. Nygaard and Lagerwey examine a cycle of dark television comedies, the focus of which are “horrible white people,” by putting them in conversation with similar upmarket comedies from creators and casts of color like Insecure, Atlanta, Dear White People, and Master of None. Through their analysis, they demonstrate the ways these non-white-centric shows negotiate prestige TV’s dominant aesthetics of whiteness and push back against the centering of white suffering in a time of cultural crisis. Through the lens of media analysis and feminist cultural studies, Nygaard and Lagerwey’s book opens up new ways of looking at contemporary television consumption—and the political, cultural, and social repercussions of these “horrible white people” shows, both on- and off-screen.

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Examines the bleak television comedies that illustrate the obsession of the white left with its own anxiety and suffering At the same time that right-wing political figures like Donald Trump were elected and reactionary socio-economic policies like Brexit were voted into law, representations of bleakly comic white fragility spread across television screens. American and British programming that featured the abjection of young, middle-class, liberal white people—such as Broad City, Casual, You’re the Worst, Catastrophe, Fleabag, and Transparent—proliferated to wide popular acclaim in the 2010s. Taylor Nygaard and Jorie Lagerwey track how these shows of the white left, obsessed with its own anxiety and suffering, are complicit in the rise and maintenance of the far right—particularly in the mobilization, representation, and sustenance of structural white supremacy on television. Nygaard and Lagerwey examine a cycle of dark television comedies, the focus of which are “horrible white people,” by putting them in conversation with similar upmarket comedies from creators and casts of color like Insecure, Atlanta, Dear White People, and Master of None. Through their analysis, they demonstrate the ways these non-white-centric shows negotiate prestige TV’s dominant aesthetics of whiteness and push back against the centering of white suffering in a time of cultural crisis. Through the lens of media analysis and feminist cultural studies, Nygaard and Lagerwey’s book opens up new ways of looking at contemporary television consumption—and the political, cultural, and social repercussions of these “horrible white people” shows, both on- and off-screen.

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The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has a complex position in international relations, being the guardian of international humanitarian law but often acting discretely to advance human dignity. Treated by most governments as if it were an inter-governmental organization, the ICRC is a non-governmental organization, all-Swiss at the top, and it is given rights and duties in the 1949 Geneva Conventions for Victims of War.Written by two formidable experts in the field, this book analyzes international humanitarian action as practiced by the International Red Cross, explaining its history and structure as well as examining contemporary field experience and broad diplomatic initiatives related to its principal tasks. Such tasks include: ensuring that detention conditions are humane for those imprisoned by reason of political conflict or war providing material and moral relief in conflict promoting development of the humanitarian part of the laws of war improving the unity and effectiveness of the movement Fully updated throughout, the new edition will also include brand new material on: armed actors who do not accept humanitarian restrictions on their actions, including expanded coverage of the Islamic State (ISIL, ISIS), Al Shabab, and Boko Haram, among others Syrian internationalized civil war issue of drone strikes and targeted killings, and the continuing push for regulation of what is called cyber war the question of the field of application of international humanitarian law (what is the battlefield?). Particularly when states declare "war" on "terrorist groups" operating inside other states regulation of new weapons and new uses of old weapons

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Delve into your data for the key to success Data mining is quickly becoming integral to creating value and business momentum. The ability to detect unseen patterns hidden in the numbers exhaustively generated by day-to-day operations allows savvy decision-makers to exploit every tool at their disposal in the pursuit of better business. By creating models and testing whether patterns hold up, it is possible to discover new intelligence that could change your business's entire paradigm for a more successful outcome. Data Mining for Dummies shows you why it doesn't take a data scientist to gain this advantage, and empowers average business people to start shaping a process relevant to their business's needs. In this book, you'll learn the hows and whys of mining to the depths of your data, and how to make the case for heavier investment into data mining capabilities. The book explains the details of the knowledge discovery process including: Model creation, validity testing, and interpretation Effective communication of findings Available tools, both paid and open-source Data selection, transformation, and evaluation Data Mining for Dummies takes you step-by-step through a real-world data-mining project using open-source tools that allow you to get immediate hands-on experience working with large amounts of data. You'll gain the confidence you need to start making data mining practices a routine part of your successful business. If you're serious about doing everything you can to push your company to the top, Data Mining for Dummies is your ticket to effective data mining.

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This study of foresters and forestry in Nova Scotia presentsprofiles of seven forestry professionals, whose careers run from the1920s to the present. Including figures from the interwar, postwar, andcontemporary periods, the sample reflects issues and experiences inindustrial, government, and civil-sector forestry. It points to a richtradition of alternative and dissenting practices that is intertwinedwith the professional and political orthodoxies of the day. Too often, the ideas and practices of professional foresters havebeen viewed as monolithic. This book argues that forestry is a morediverse and complex activity than has been generally recognized. Italso underlines the political character of the profession. Differencelies at the root of politics, and Nova Scotia forestry has beenpunctuated by fundamental debates on matters of science, policy, andmanagement. In different ways, the subjects of this volume all have run"against the grain," raising challenges in pursuit of newforestry practice. Many of their challenges have failed, in the face ofa determined consensus. Nonetheless, the plurality of views andexperiences they reveal are an apt reflection of the inherentlypolitical character of modern forestry and of the need to push beyondappearance to find the foundations of both orthodoxy and dissent. Against the Grain speaks to the concerns of foresters,social scientists and resource managers in a variety of fields.Sandberg and Clancy draw upon archival materials, public records, andpersonal interviews with the subjects to set their seven protagonistsin a wider historical context. The profiles and the conclusions thatfollow from them have relevance well beyond the province of NovaScotia, giving deeper perspective to the public and environmentalchallenges that have engulfed contemporary forestry.

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This book analyses how independent documentaries are forging a new public sphere in today's China. Since the turn of the twenty first century there has been an explosion in Chinese independent documentary filmmaking. But how are we to understand this vibrant burst of activity? Are these films brave expressions of dissidence, or are they part of a broader, more complex push to expand the terms of public discourse in the People's Republic? Considering the relationship between independent documentaries and China's official film and television sectors, this timely study explores the ways in which independent films probe, question and challenge the dominant ideas and narratives circulating in the state sanctioned public sphere. Based on detailed interviews with Chinese documentary filmmakers that are rarely available in English, the author draws on his own insights as a journalist working in Beijing to provide a detailed analysis of key contemporary documentaries. This groundbreaking book reveals a sustained attempt to forge an alternative public sphere, where the views and experiences of petitioners, AIDS sufferers, dispossessed farmers and the victims of Mao's repression can be publicly aired for a small but steadily growing public. Offers a detailed account of one of the world's most active, vibrant and challenging contemporary documentary sectors; It draws extensively on first hand interviews with filmmakers; offers in depth, critical analyses of China's most challenging contemporary independent documentaries and discusses China's state sanctioned film and television sectors to cast new light on how the official public sphere is shaped and guided by the state.

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How do terrorist groups control their members? Do the tools groups use to monitor their operatives and enforce discipline create security vulnerabilities that governments can exploit? The Terrorist's Dilemma is the first book to systematically examine the great variation in how terrorist groups are structured. Employing a broad range of agency theory, historical case studies, and terrorists' own internal documents, Jacob Shapiro provocatively discusses the core managerial challenges that terrorists face and illustrates how their political goals interact with the operational environment to push them to organize in particular ways. Shapiro provides a historically informed explanation for why some groups have little hierarchy, while others resemble miniature firms, complete with line charts and written disciplinary codes. Looking at groups in Africa, Asia, Europe, and North America, he highlights how consistent and widespread the terrorist's dilemma--balancing the desire to maintain control with the need for secrecy--has been since the 1880s. Through an analysis of more than a hundred terrorist autobiographies he shows how prevalent bureaucracy has been, and he utilizes a cache of internal documents from al-Qa'ida in Iraq to outline why this deadly group used so much paperwork to handle its people. Tracing the strategic interaction between terrorist leaders and their operatives, Shapiro closes with a series of comparative case studies, indicating that the differences in how groups in the same conflict approach their dilemmas are consistent with an agency theory perspective. The Terrorist's Dilemma demonstrates the management constraints inherent to terrorist groups and sheds light on specific organizational details that can be exploited to more efficiently combat terrorist activity.

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“Huzza for the new World and farewell to the Old One,” John Adams wrote in late 1787, wrapping up a decade’s worth of diplomatic service in Europe. Volume 19 of the Papers of John Adams chronicles Adams’s last duties in London and The Hague. In the twenty-eight months documented here, he petitioned the British ministry to halt impressment of American sailors, toured the English countryside, and observed parliamentary politics. Adams salvaged U.S. credit by contracting two new Dutch loans amid the political chaos triggered by William V’s resurgence. Correspondents like Thomas Jefferson and the Marquis de Lafayette mulled over the Anglo–American trade war that followed the Revolution and reported on the French Assembly of Notables—topics that Adams commented on with trademark candor. He wrote the final two volumes of his work, A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America.Adams yearned to return home and see the American republic take shape. “For a Man who has been thirty Years rolling like a stone,” Adams wrote, the choice was whether to “set down in private Life to his Plough; or push into turbulent scenes of Sedition and Tumult; whether be sent to Congress, or a Convention or God knows what.” Back on his native soil of Massachusetts in June 1788, Adams settled into rural retirement with wife Abigail and watched the U.S. Constitution’s ratification evolve. By volume’s end, John Adams again resumes public life, ready to serve as America’s first vice president.

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If you’re as excited as we are about the Rebel XSi/450D, you probably can’t wait to start shooting. Canon EOS Digital Rebel XSi/450D For Dummies will show you how to make every shot count! Even if you’re new to digital SLR cameras or are unfamiliar with general photography terms and techniques, this handy guide will show you how to feel comfortable with the controls and start taking beautiful photographs. Don’t worry if you’ve never heard the words aperture, white balance, or ISO. You’ll soon be switching easily between automatic and manual modes, managing exposure, and using the all-important Quality setting! You’ll learn everything about the lenses, from how to choose the ones you need to how to handle them. You’ll finally know how to push just the right buttons to achieve the results that you desire. In a snap, you will find out how to unleash your creativity by manipulating exposure and lighting. You will find out how to: Control picture quality Adjust resolution for image quality and size Shoot in automatic and manual modes Review photos using Playback Mode and the histogram, delete unwanted photos, and protect valuable photos from accidental deletion Manipulate exposure, color, focus, and lighting Download, organize, archive, print, and share photos with family and friends Complete with lists of ten fast photo-editing tricks and ten special-purpose features to explore on a rainy day, Canon EOS Digital Rebel XSi/450D For Dummies is your one-stop guide to setting up, working with, and making the most of your new Canon digital SLR camera.

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Our government is failing us. From health care to immigration, from the tax code to climate change, our political institutions cannot deal effectively with the challenges of modern society. Why the dysfunction? Contemporary reformers single out the usual suspects, including polarization and the rise in campaign spending. But what if the roots go much deeper, to the nation's founding?In Relic , William G. Howell and Terry M. Moe point to the Constitution as the main culprit. The framers designed the Constitution some 225 years ago for a simple, agrarian society. But the government they created, with a parochial Congress at its centre, is ill-equipped to address the serious social problems that arise in a complex, postindustrial nation. We are prisoners of the past, burdened with an antiquated government that cannot make effective policy, and often cannot do anything at all.The solution is to update the Constitution for modern times. This can be accomplished, Howell and Moe argue, through reforms that push Congress and all its pathologies to the periphery of the lawmaking process, and bring presidents,whose concern for their legacy drives them to seek coherent policy solutions,to the centre of decision making. As Howell and Moe reveal, the key to effective government for modern America is a more powerful presidency. Relic is a provocative and essential book for our era of political dysfunction and popular despair. It sheds new light on what is wrong with our government and what can be done about it, challenging us to reconsider the very foundation of the American experiment.

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In 1974, the Hughes Glomar Explorer, ostensibly an advanced deep-sea mining vessel owned by reclusive billionaire Howard Hughes, lowered a claw-like contraption to the floor of the Pacific Ocean. This high-tech venture was only a cover story for an even more improbable scheme: a CIA mission to retrieve a sunken Soviet submarine. Like a Jules Verne novel with an Ian Fleming twist, the saga of the Glomar Explorer features underwater espionage, impossible gadgetry, and high-stakes international drama. It also marks a key moment in the history of transparency—and not just for what became known as the Glomar response: “We can neither confirm nor deny. . . . ”M. Todd Bennett plumbs the depths of government secrecy in this new account of the Glomar mission and its consequences. Trawling through recently declassified documents, he explores the logistics, media fallout, and geopolitical significance of one of the most ambitious operations in intelligence history. Glomar, Bennett argues, played a pivotal but underappreciated role in helping the CIA ward off oversight amid a push for transparency and accountability. He reframes the operation’s history to offer an alternative perspective on the 1970s, a decade known for expansive openness, as well as the persistent tension between the demands of democracy and the need for secrecy in foreign policy. Combining keen historical analysis and gripping storytelling, Neither Confirm nor Deny brings to the surface fresh insights into the history of the security state, the politics of intelligence, and the CIA’s relationship with the media and the public.

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You've got a good idea. You know it could make a crucial difference for you, your organization, your community. You present it to the group, but get confounding questions, inane comments, and verbal bullets in return. Before you know what's happened, your idea is dead, shot down. You're furious. Everyone has lost: Those who would have benefited from your proposal. You. Your company. Perhaps even the country. It doesn't have to be this way, maintain John Kotter and Lorne Whitehead. In Buy-In, they reveal how to win the support your idea needs to deliver valuable results. The key? Understand the generic attack strategies that naysayers and obfuscators deploy time and time again. Then engage these adversaries with tactics tailored to each strategy. By "inviting in the lions" to critique your idea--and being prepared for them--you'll capture busy people's attention, help them grasp your proposal's value, and secure their commitment to implementing the solution. The book presents a fresh and amusing fictional narrative showing attack strategies in action. It then provides several specific counterstrategies for each basic category the authors have defined--including: * Death-by-delay: Your enemies push discussion of your idea so far into the future it's forgotten. * Confusion: They present so much data that confidence in your proposal dies. * Fearmongering: Critics catalyze irrational anxieties about your idea. * Character assassination: They slam your reputation and credibility. Smart, practical, and filled with useful advice, Buy-In equips you to anticipate and combat attacks--so your good idea makes it through to make a positive change.

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How scientists through the ages have conducted thought experiments using imaginary entities—demons—to test the laws of nature and push the frontiers of what is possible Science may be known for banishing the demons of superstition from the modern world. Yet just as the demon-haunted world was being exorcized by the enlightening power of reason, a new kind of demon mischievously materialized in the scientific imagination itself. Scientists began to employ hypothetical beings to perform certain roles in thought experiments—experiments that can only be done in the imagination—and these impish assistants helped scientists achieve major breakthroughs that pushed forward the frontiers of science and technology.Spanning four centuries of discovery—from René Descartes, whose demon could hijack sensorial reality, to James Clerk Maxwell, whose molecular-sized demon deftly broke the second law of thermodynamics, to Darwin, Einstein, Feynman, and beyond—Jimena Canales tells a shadow history of science and the demons that bedevil it. She reveals how the greatest scientific thinkers used demons to explore problems, test the limits of what is possible, and better understand nature. Their imaginary familiars helped unlock the secrets of entropy, heredity, relativity, quantum mechanics, and other scientific wonders—and continue to inspire breakthroughs in the realms of computer science, artificial intelligence, and economics today.The world may no longer be haunted as it once was, but the demons of the scientific imagination are alive and well, continuing to play a vital role in scientists' efforts to explore the unknown and make the impossible real.

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