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  Nancy Mitford - The Biography...

  Nancy Mitford

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  The writer and poet Harold Acton was - like Nancy Mitford herself - one of the Bright Young Things, and a life-long friend with whom she stayed in touch. From the letters and materials she had been gathering for her autobiography, Acton draws an irresistibly sparkling portrait of the author of Love in a Cold Climate and The Pursuit of Love, who was so unhappy in love herself. Full of her waspish wit, gossip, and the drops of acid she liked to pour on the pretensions of her time, Acton paints a fresh portrait that is unlikely to be surpassed

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  The Kama Sutra

  VATSYAYANA

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  The Kama Sutra, or Aphorisms on Love, has survived at least 1400 years as a dominant text on sexual relations between men and women. Vatsyayana claimed to have written the Kama Sutra while a religious student, "in contemplation of the Deity"—but references to older works, shrewd disputations by Vatsyayana of those authors' recommendations, and careful cataloging of practices in various of the Indian states indicate much more emphasis on kama, or sensual gratification. Part of the book discusses the 64 arts of love employed by masters of coitus. Learning each of these and when and how to practice them, Vatsyayana affirms, not only leads to the best gratification, but makes the artist a person of great desirability.

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  Birding Under the Influence -...

  Dorian Anderson

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  At a personal and professional crossroads, a man resets his life and finds sobriety, love, and 618 bird species, cycling his way to a very Big Year. In Birding Under the Influence, Dorian Anderson, a neuroscience researcher on a pressure-filled life trajectory, walks away from the world of elite institutions, research labs, and academic publishing. In doing so, he falls in love and discovers he has freed himself to embrace his lifelong passion for birding. A North American Big Year—a continent-spanning adventure in which a birder attempts to see as many species as possible in twelve months—is a massive undertaking under any circumstances. But doing it on a bike while maintaining sobriety? That’s next level. As Dorian pedals across the country, describing the birds he sees, he confronts the challenges of long-distance cycling: treacherous weather, punctured tires, speeding cars, and injury. He encounters eccentric characters, blistering blacktop, dreary hotel rooms, snarling dogs, and an endless sea of smoking tailpipes. He also confronts his past struggles with alcohol, drugs, and risky behaviors that began in high school and followed him into adulthood. Birding Under the Influence is a candid, honest look at Dorian’s double life of academic accomplishment and addiction. While his journey to recovery is simultaneously poignant and inspiring, it is ultimately his love of birds and nature that provides the scaffolding to build a new and radically different life.

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  Like A River To The Sea -...

  Jack Grandcolas, Alan Shipnuck

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  The story of heartbreak to triumph in the wake of a tragedy. Their first date in college was a U2 concert and after that Lauren and Jack Grandcolas were inseparable. He was mesmerized by her sweetness, fierce intelligence and eyes that were as blue and alive as the ocean. They married and settled in San Francisco, each pursuing their dreams in the business world. After a decade of trying, Lauren finally got pregnant at the age of thirty-eight. On September 6, 2001, she flew to New Jersey—her beloved Little Grandma had died and following the funeral Lauren shared the joyous news of her pregnancy to lift her family’s spirits. Flying home to Jack on September 11th, she arrived at Newark airport early and walked on to a flight for which she hadn’t been ticketed: United 93. During that terrifying flight, Lauren left a calm and reassuring voice mail for Jack which remains a testament to her courage and selfless love, even in the face of her own mortality.Like a River to the Sea is a story of love overcoming loss. In this moving memoir, Jack Grandcolas brings to life his college sweetheart while taking the reader through his long journey to make peace with the loss of Lauren and their unborn child. Jack is honest about the depth of his despair and his battles with depression, PTSI, and heavy drinking. As he digs himself out of the deepest hole imaginable, Jack learns universal truths that will help anyone confronted with tragedy.Like a River to the Sea is also a deeply personal look at an event of historical importance. Jack takes us inside the White House to meet with President Bush and to the precipice of a still-smoldering hole in the earth outside of Shanksville, Penn. The book goes aboard United 93 in its final minutes, when this brave collection of Americans fought to retake control of the plane, ultimately preventing the hijackers from completing their mission and becoming the first heroes in the war against terror.As with Jack’s life, Like a River to the Sea is defined by the boundless depths of human love. Eighteen years after losing his wife and their unborn baby, Jack finally remarried, and his new bride so honors the love between him and Lauren that her wedding ring includes stones that Lauren once wore on her finger. This is the magic of Like A River To The Sea, which begins with heartbreak but becomes a story about the triumph of the human spirit.

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  Female Short Story The - A...

  Louisa May Alcott, Mary...

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  A wise man once said ‘The safest place for a child is in the arms of his mother’s voice’.  This is a perfect place to start our anthology of female short stories. 
   
  Some of our earliest memories are of our mothers telling us bedtime stories. This is not to demote the value of fathers but more to promote the often-overshadowed talents of the gentler sex. 
   
  Perhaps ‘gentler’ is a word that we should re-evaluate. In the course of literary history it is men who dominated by opportunity and with their stranglehold on the resources, both financial and technological, who brought their words to a wider audience.  Men often placed women on a pedestal from where their talented words would not threaten their own.   
   
  In these stories we begin with the original disrupter and renegade author Aphra Behn.  A peek at her c.v. shows an astounding capacity and leaves us wondering at just how she did all that. 
   
  In those less modern days to be a woman, even ennobled, was to be seen as second class.  You literally were chattel and had almost no rights in marriage.  As Charlotte Smith famously said your role as wife was little more than ‘legal prostitute’.  From such a despicable place these authors have used their talents and ideas and helped redress that situation.   
   
  Slowly at first.  Privately printed, often anonymously or under the cloak of a male pseudonym their words spread.  Their stories admired and, usually, their role still obscured from rightful acknowledgement. 
   
  Aided by more advanced technology, the 1700’s began to see a steady stream of female writers until by the 1900’s mass market publishing saw short stories by female authors from all the strata of society being avidly read by everyone.  Their names are a rollcall of talent and ‘can do’ spirit and society is richer for their works.   
   
  In literature at least women are now acknowledged as equals, true behind the scenes little has changed but if (and to mis-quote Jane Austen) there is one universal truth, it is that ideas change society.  These women’s most certainly did and will continue to do so as they easily write across genres, from horror and ghost stories to tender tales of love and making your way in society’s often grueling rut.  They will not be silenced, their ideas and passion move emotions, thoughts and perhaps more importantly our ingrained view of what every individual human being is capable of.    
   
  It is because of their desire to speak out, their desire to add their talents to the bias around them that we perhaps live in more enlightened, almost equal, times.   
   
  Within these stories you will also find very occasional examples of historical prejudice.  A few words here and there which in today’s world some may find inappropriate or even offensive.  It is not our intention to make anyone uncomfortable but to show that the world in order to change must reconcile itself to the actual truth rather than put it out of sight.  Context is everything, both to understand and to illuminate the path forward.  The author’s words are set, our reaction to them encourages our change. 
   
  01 - The Female Short Story. A Chronological History - An Introduction - Volume 3 
  02 - A Witch's Den by Helena Blavatsky 
  15 - The Ghost in the Clock Room by Hesba Stretton 
  04 - The Last of Squire Ennismore by Charlotte Riddell 
  05 - The Brothers by Louisa May Alcott 
  06 - Carnivorine by Lucy Hamilton Hooper 
  04 - The Face in the Glass by Mary Elizabeth Braddon 
  08 - The Moonstone Mass by Harriet Prescott Spofford 
  09 - The General's Will by Vera Jelihovsky 
  10 - The Story of the RipplingTrain by Mary Louisa Molesworth 
  11 - The Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing But the Truth by Rhoda Broughton 
  12 - A Twin Identity by Edith Stewart Drewery&

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  The Life of Kings - The...

  Frederic B Hill, Stephens Broening

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  In an age when local daily papers with formerly robust reporting are cutting sections and even closing their doors, the contributors to The Life of Kings celebrate the heyday of one such paper, the Baltimore Sun, when it set the agenda for Baltimore, was a force in Washington, and extended its reach around the globe. Contributors like David Simon, creator of HBO’s The Wire, and renowned political cartoonist Kevin Kallaugher (better known as KAL), tell what it was like to work in what may have been the last golden age of American newspapers -- when journalism still seemed like “the life of kings” that H.L. Mencken so cheerfully remembered. The writers in this volume recall the standards that made the Sun and other fine independent newspapers a bulwark of civic life for so long. Their contributions affirm that the core principles they followed are no less imperative for the new forms of journalism: a strong sense of the public interest in whose name they were acting, a reverence for accuracy, and an obligation

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