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  Steel Drivin' Man: John Henry...

  Scott Reynolds Nelson

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  The ballad "John Henry" is the most recorded folk song in American history and John Henry--the mighty railroad man who could blast through rock faster than a steam drill--is a towering figure in our culture. 
  In Steel Drivin' Man, Scott Reynolds Nelson recounts the true story of the man behind the iconic American hero, telling the poignant tale of a young Virginia convict who died working on one of the most dangerous enterprises of the time, the first rail route through the Appalachian Mountains. Using census data, penitentiary reports, and railroad company reports, Nelson reveals how John Henry, victimized by Virginia's notorious Black Codes, was shipped to the infamous Richmond Penitentiary to become prisoner number 497, and was forced to labor on the mile-long Lewis Tunnel for the C&O railroad. Equally important, Nelson masterfully captures the life of the ballad of John Henry, tracing the song's evolution from the first printed score by blues legend W. C. Handy, to Carl Sandburg's use of the ballad to become the first "folk singer," to the upbeat version by Tennessee Ernie Ford. 
  Attractively illustrated with numerous images, Steel Drivin' Man offers a marvelous portrait of a beloved folk song--and a true American legend.

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  Neon Girls - A Stripper's...

  Jennifer Worley

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  A riveting true story of a young woman’s days stripping in grunge-era San Francisco where a radical group of dancers banded together to unionize and run the club on their own terms.  
   
  When graduate student Jenny Worley needed a fast way to earn more money, she found herself at the door of the Lusty Lady Theater in San Francisco, auditioning on a stage surrounded by mirrors, in platform heels, and not much else. So began Jenny’s career as a stripper strutting the peepshow stage as her alter-ego “Polly” alongside women called Octopussy and Amnesia. But this wasn’t your run-of-the-mill strip club—it was a peepshow populated by free-thinking women who talked feminist theory and swapped radical zines like lipstick. 
  As management’s discriminatory practices and the rise of hidden cameras stir up tension among the dancers, Jenny rallies them to demand change. Together, they organize the first strippers’ union in the world and risk it all to take over the club and run it as a co-operative. Refusing to be treated as sex objects or disposable labor, they become instead the rulers of their kingdom. Jenny’s elation over the Lusty Lady’s revolution is tempered by her evolving understanding of the toll dancing has taken on her. When she finally hangs up her heels for good to finish her Ph.D., neither Jenny nor San Francisco are the same—but she and the cadre of wild, beautiful, brave women who run the Lusty Lady come out on top despite it all.  
  A first-hand account as only an insider could tell it, Neon Girls paints a vivid picture of a bygone San Francisco and a fiercely feminist world within the sex industry, asking sharp questions about what keeps women from fighting for their rights, who benefits from capitalizing on desire, and how we can change entrenched systems of power.

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  Naja - From their pens to your...

  Ksaver Šandor Gjalski

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  The bookshelves of European literature are incredible collections that have gathered together centuries of very talented authors.  From this continent their fame spread and whilst among their number many are now forgotten or neglected their talents endure.  Among them is Ksaver Šandor Gjalski.

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  They - From their pens to your...

  Rudyard Kipling

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  Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born in Mumbai, India on 30th December 1865.   
  As was the custom in those days, he and his sister were sent back to England when he was 5.  The ill-treatment and cruelty by the Portsmouth couple they boarded with Kipling said contributed to the onset of his literary life.  
  At 16 he returned to India to work on a local paper where he was soon contributing and writing.  It also exposed him to the issues of identity and national allegiance which pervade much of his work.  
  In 1886, his ‘Departmental Ditties’, collection of verse appeared in print followed by 39 short stories for his newspaper over only 8 months.  These were then published as ‘Plain Tales from the Hills’, shortly after his 22nd birthday.  
  He continued his prolific pace of writing before being dismissed in a dispute and, taking his pay-off and the profits from the sale of some publishing rights, decided to return to London, travelling via Rangoon, Hong Kong, Japan and the United States, all the while writing articles, and arriving at Liverpool in October 1889. 
  Over the next two years he saw further works published as books and in magazines, as well as a nervous breakdown for which he was prescribed a sea voyage, to South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and India.  
  Happier times came with marriage to Caroline Starr Balestier in January 1892.  The honeymoon began in Vermont and ended in Yokahama where they heard their bank had failed.  They returned to Vermont and settled.  Caroline was now pregnant and he was planning the ‘Jungle Books’.  
  A failed arbitration between the US and England resulted in an argument between Caroline’s brother and Kipling, and then his arrest.  At the hearing he was mortified by the exposure of his private life and after settling the matter they returned to England and life in Torquay.  ‘Kim’ was published in 1902, and ‘Just So Stories for Little Children’, a year later.  
  In 1907 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature with the citation “in consideration of the power of observation, originality of imagination, virility of ideas and remarkable talent for narration which characterise the creations of this world-famous author”.   
  When the Great War erupted, he scorned those who refused conscription.  His son enlisted and was killed at the Battle of Loos in September 1915, at 18, an exploding shell had ripped his face apart.  This death inspired Kipling’s writing thereafter, but the tragedy broke his life and by 1930 his prolific pen had almost ceased. 
  Rudyard Kipling died on 18th January 1936 from a perforated duodenal ulcer.  He was 70.  His ashes are buried at Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey.

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  White Nights & Other Stories

  Fyodor Dostoevsky

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  White Nights and Other Stories by Fyodor Dostoyevsky is a compilation published in 1918 by The MacMillan Company, NY (USA) and Heinemann (UK). It contains these 7 works:- White Nights- Notes from the Underground- A Faint Heart- A Christmas Tree and a Wedding- Polzunkov- A Little Hero- Mr. Prohartchin

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  Uneasy Silence - An activist...

  Mary Fisher

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  “Mary Fisher is a woman of extraordinary courage and hope, inspiring generations of Americans from her groundbreaking as a person with AIDS to the 1992 Republication National Convention to her decades of work helping others with AIDS live openly and with dignity.  
  Mary Fisher has broken the Uneasy Silence that too many people with AIDS have had to bear. Because of Mary’s example, millions of AIDS/HIV patients are living fearlessly with compassion and activism in the face of discrimination and despair. Reading her inspiring words teaches all of us that each of us can make a difference.” —Nancy Pelosi, former Speaker of the House of Representatives 
  “Mary Fisher has inspired millions of people with the quiet power of her art and her words. In Uneasy Silence, she does it again, bearing eloquent witness to cries for justice and compassion.” —Darren Walker, President, the Ford Foundation 
  With humility and candor, artist activist Mary Fisher inspires us when, in her eighth decade, she creatively takes on disease, poverty, hunger, injustice, racism and the role of women. 
  Uneasy Silence tells her story of speaking truth to power while living with AIDS, journeying through cancer and surviving a near-death experience. She navigates global relationships while creating visual art and serving her various communities. Her constant concern for The Other enables her to find the strength to stand up, speak up and make a difference, inspiring us to do the same. 
  Across the pages of this book, Mary Fisher bears witness with humor, courage, compassion and grace, conquering the uneasy silence we all know too well, showing the way to finally be heard and be free.

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