A History of the World in 100 Objects

Neil MacGregor's radio series 'A History of the World in 100 Objects' has been a unique event that has set a benchmark for public service broadcasting in the UK and across the world. This book will be the tie-in to that event, reproducing the scripts describing the objects that made us who we are. (Check Catalog)

Slash and Burn

Dr. Siri might finally be allowed to retire (again). Although he loves his two morgue assistants, he's tired of being Laos's national coroner, a job he never wanted in the first place. Plus, he's pushing eighty, and wants to spend some time with his wife before his untimely death (which has been predicted by the local transvestite fortune teller).
But retirement is not in the cards for Dr. Siri after all. He's dragged into one last job for the Lao government: supervising an excavation for the remains of U.S. fighter pilot who went down in the remote northern Lao jungle ten years earlier. The presence of American soldiers in Laos is a hot-button issue for both the Americans and the Lao involved, and the search party includes high-level politicians and scientists. But one member of the party is found dead, setting off a chain of accidents Dr. Siri suspects are not completely accidental. Everyone is trapped in a cabin in the jungle, and the bodies are starting to pile up. Can Dr. Siri get to the bottom of the MIA pilot's mysterious story before the fortune teller's prediction comes true? (Check Catalog)

Liberty Defined: 50 Essential Issues That Affect Our Freedom

In Liberty Defined, congressman and #1 "New York Times "bestselling author Ron Paul returns with his most provocative, comprehensive, and compelling arguments for personal freedom to date. The term "Liberty" is so commonly used in our country that it has become a mere clich . But do we know what it means? What it promises? How it factors into our daily lives? And most importantly, can we recognize tyranny when it is sold to us disguised as a form of liberty? Dr. Paul writes that to believe in liberty is not to believe in any particular social and economic outcome. It is to trust in the spontaneous order that emerges when the state does not intervene in human volition and human cooperation. It permits people to work out their problems for themselves, build lives for themselves, take risks and accept responsibility for the results, and make their own decisions. It is the seed of America. This is a comprehensive guide to Dr. Paul's position on fifty of the most important issues of our times, from Abortion to Zionism. Accessible, easy to digest, and fearless in its discussion of controversial topics, LIBERTY DEFINED sheds new light on a word that is losing its shape. (Check Catalog)

The World of Downton Abbey

A lavish look at the real world--both the secret history and the behind-the-scenes drama--of the spellbinding Emmy Award-winning Masterpiece TV series "Downton Abbey""" "April 1912. The sun is rising behind Downton Abbey, a great and splendid house in a great and splendid park. So secure does it appear that it seems as if the way it represents will last for another thousand years. It won't.
" Millions of American viewers were enthralled by the world of "Downton Abbey, " the mesmerizing TV drama of the aristocratic Crawley family--and their servants--on the verge of dramatic change. On the eve of Season 2 of the TV presentation, this gorgeous book--illustrated with sketches and research from the production team, as well as on-set photographs from both seasons--takes us even deeper into that world, with fresh insights into the story and characters as well as the social history. (Check Catalog)

H.G. Wells: Another Kind of Life

An unlikely lothario, one of the most successful writers of his time, a figure at the heart of the age's political and artistic debates--H. G. Wells' life is a great story in its own right. When H. G. Wells left school in 1880 at 13 he seemed destined for obscurity--yet he defied expectations, becoming one of the most famous writers in the world. He wrote classic science-fiction tales such as "The Time Machine," "The Invisible Man," and "The War of the Worlds"; reinvented the Dickensian novel in "Kipps" and "The History of Mr Polly"; pioneered postmodernism in experimental fiction; and harangued his contemporaries in polemics which included two bestselling histories of the world. He brought equal energy to his outrageously promiscuous love life--a series of affairs embraced distinguished authors such as Dorothy Richardson and Rebecca West, the gun-toting travel writer Odette Keun, and Russian spy Moura Budberg. Until his death in 1946 Wells had artistic and ideological confrontations with everyone from Henry James to George Orwell, from Churchill to Stalin. He remains a controversial figure, attacked by some as a philistine, sexist, and racist, praised by others as a great writer, a prophet of globalization, and a pioneer of human rights. Setting the record straight, this authoritative biography is the first full-scale account to include material from the long-suppressed skeleton correspondence with his mistresses and illegitimate daughter. (Check  Catalog)

Girl Land

Caitlin Flanagan's essays about marriage, sex, and families have sparked national debates. Now she turns her attention to girls: the biological and cultural milestones for girls today, and how they shape a girl's sense of herself.
The transition from girl to woman is an experience that has changed radically over the generations: everything from how a girl learns about her period to how she expects to be treated by boys and men. Girls today observe these passages very differently, and yet the landmarks themselves have remained remarkably constant-proof, Flanagan believes, of their significance. In a world where protections of girls' privacy and personal freedom seem to disappear every day, the ultimate challenge modern parents face is finding a way to defend both. (Check Catalog)

The Sense of an Ending ( Borzoi Books )

Winner of the 2011 Man Booker Prize
By an acclaimed writer at the height of his powers, "The Sense of an Ending" extends a streak of extraordinary books that began with the best-selling "Arthur & George" and continued with "Nothing to Be Frightened Of" and, most recently, "Pulse."
This intense new novel follows a middle-aged man as he contends with a past he has never much thought about--until his closest childhood friends return with a vengeance, one of them from the grave, another maddeningly present. Tony Webster thought he'd left all this behind as he built a life for himself, and by now his marriage and family and career have fallen into an amicable divorce and retirement. But he is then presented with a mysterious legacy that obliges him to reconsider a variety of things he thought he'd understood all along, and to revise his estimation of his own nature and place in the world.
A novel so compelling that it begs to be read in a single sitting, with stunning psychological and emotional depth and sophistication, "The Sense of an Ending" is a brilliant new chapter in Julian Barnes's oeuvre. (Check Catalog)