The cow. The most industrious animal in the world. A beast central to human existence since time began, it has played a vital role in our history not only as a source of food, but also as a means of labor, an economic resource, an inspiration for art, and even as a religious icon. Prehistoric people painted it on cave walls; explorers, merchants, and landowners traded it as currency; many cultures worshipped it as a god. So how did it come to occupy the sorry state it does today more factory product than animal?In Beef, Andrew Rimas and Evan D. G. Fraser answer that question, telling the story of cattle in its entirety. From the powerful auroch, a now extinct beast once revered as a mystical totem, to the dairy cows of seventeenth-century Holland to the frozen meat patties and growth hormones of today, the authors deliver an engaging panoramic view of the cow's long and colorful history.Peppered with lively anecdotes, recipes, and culinary tidbits, Beef tells a story that spans the globe, from ancient Mediterranean bullfighting rings to the rugged grazing grounds of eighteenth-century England, from the quiet farms of Japan's Kobe beef cows to crowded American stockyards to remote villages in East Africa, home of the Masai, a society to which cattle mean everything. Leaving no stone unturned in its exploration of the cow's legacy, the narrative serves not only as a compelling story but as a call to arms, offering practical solutions for confronting the current condition of the wasteful beef and dairy industries. Beef is a captivating history of an animal whose relationship with humanity has shaped the world as we know it, and readers will never look at steak the same way again.

Prominent feminist author Barbara Walker has revamped, retold, and infused with life some of your favorite classic fairy tales. No longer are women submissive, helpless creatures in need of redemption through the princely male! Instead they are vibrantly alive, strong women who take fate into their own hands.

From the co author of the New York Times bestseller When Elephants Weep comes a book that uses true stories backed by scientific research to explore the way young animals discover their worlds and learn how to survive. How does a baby animal figure out how to get around in the worldHow much of what animals know is instinctive, and how much must they learnIn Becoming a Tiger, bestselling author Susan McCarthy addresses these intriguing matters, presenting fascinating and funny examples of animal behaviour in the laboratory and in the wild. McCarthy shows us how baby animals transform themselves from clueless kittens, clumsy cubs, or scrawny chicks into efficient predators, successful foragers, or deft nest builders. From geese to mice, dolphins to orang utans, bats to (of course) tigers, McCarthy's warm, amusing, and insightful examinations of animal life and developments provides a surprising window into the mental worlds of our fine fuzzy, furred, finned, and feathered friends. oReaders will be fascinated by a close look at animal intelligence, learning, and family life.

Marcia! Marcia! Marcia! Marcia Brady, eldest daughter on television's The Brady Bunch, had it all style, looks, boys, brains, and talent. No wonder her younger sister Jan was jealous! For countless adolescents across America who came of age in the early 1970s, Marcia was the ideal American teenager. Girls wanted to be her. Boys wanted to date her. But what viewers didn't know about the always-sunny, perfect Marcia was that offscreen, her real-life counterpart, Maureen McCormick, the young actress who portrayed her, was living a very different and not-so-wonderful life. Now, for the very first time, Maureen tells the shocking and inspirational true story of the beloved teen generations have invited into their living rooms and the woman she became.In Here's the Story, Maureen takes us behind the scenes of America's favorite television family, the Bradys. With poignancy and candor, she reveals the lifelong friendships, the hurtful jealousies, the offscreen romance, the loving support her television family provided during a life-or-death moment, and the inconsolable loss of a man who had been a second father. But The Brady Bunch was only the beginning. Haunted by the perfection of her television alter ego, Maureen landed on the dark side, caught up in a fast-paced, drug-fueled, star-studded Hollywood existence that ultimately led to the biggest battle of her life.Moving from drug dens on Wonderland Avenue to wild parties at the Playboy mansion and exotic escapades on the beaches of Hawaii, this candid, hard-hitting memoir exposes a side of a beloved pop-culture icon the paparazzi missed. Yet it is also a story of remarkable success. After kicking her drug habit, Maureen battled depression, reconnected with her mother, whom she nursed through the end of her life, and then found herself in a pitched battle for her family in which she ultimately triumphed.There is no question: Maureen McCormick is a survivor. After fifty years, she has finally learned what it means to love the person you are, insight that has brought her peace in a happy marriage and as a mother. Here's the Story is the empowering, engaging, shocking, and emotional tale of Maureen McCormick's courageous struggle over adversity and her lifelong battle to come to terms with the idea of perfection and herself.

A groundbreaking and inspiring exploration of the unique relationship between dogs and humans, from the bestselling author of Dogs Never Lie About Love Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson has long been interested in the relationships between humans and animals, and he's always been aware that there was something very special in our bond with dogs. No other animals love us in quite the same way as dogs love us. And it is mutual. Is it possible that we developed our capacity for love, sympathy, empathy, and compassion because of our long association with dogs?In The Dog Who Couldn't Stop Loving, Masson considers the far-reaching consequences of the coevolution of dogs and humans, drawing upon recent scientific research. Over the past forty thousand years a collective domestication has occurred that brings us to where we are today humans have formed intense bonds with dogs, and the adoration is almost always reciprocal. Masson himself has experienced a profound bond with his new dog, Benjy, a failed guide dog for the blind, who possesses an abundance of uninhibited love. Masson knows that the love he feels for Benjy the same feeling Benjy has for all the people and animals around him is not unique, but exemplifies a love affair unmatched in the animal world.With wisdom, insight, and a brilliant analysis of recent scientific findings, bestselling author Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson delivers a provocative and compelling book that will change the way we think about love and our canine companions.

The Word Made Flesh: Literary Tattoos from Bookworms Worldwide is a guide to the emerging subculture of literary tattoos a collection of more than 150 full-color photographs of human epidermis indelibly adorned with quotations and illustrations from Dickinson to Pynchon, from Shakespeare to Plath. With beloved lines of verse, literary portraits, and illustrations and statements from the bearers on their tattoos' history and the personal significance of the chosen literary work The Word Made Flesh is part collection of photographs and part literary anthology written on skin.

When Scott McKenzie was a young man, he thought he saw God . . .The deity was all in black with knee-high silver boots, a patent-leather breastplate, and full face makeup, clutching a beautiful, custom Les Paul guitar. Ace Frehley, lead guitarist for the rock group KISS, wasn't God but hearing his piercing, shrieking, screaming, outrageous guitar solos was a transcendent spiritual experience for a boy from rural Kentucky, making him feel uplifted, a witness to a higher power.Two decades later, a grown-up Scott McKenzie vowed to meet Ace Frehley in the flesh as well as the other gods and demigods who have held divine power over a generation of worshipful metal fans: legendary guitar champions like Glenn Tipton of Judas Priest and Phil Collen of Def Leppard, hallowed names like Steve Vai, Warren DeMartini, and John 5.Power Chord is a chronicle of Scott McKenzie's epic quest to stand in the presence of metal greatness to meet his omnipotent guitar gods face-to-face and get them to divulge their otherworldly secret.

In a career that has earned her accolades, honorary degrees, and awards from both fellow poets and everyday poetry lovers, Nikki Giovanni has established herself as a writer who can entertain and challenge, inform and inspire. Sometimes controversial, sometimes ethereal, but always beautiful, her poems move readers of all hues and generations. With Bicycles, she's collected poems that serve as a companion to her 1997 Love Poems. An instant classic, that book romantic, bold, and erotic expressed notions of love in ways that were delightfully unexpected. In the years that followed, Giovanni experienced losses both public and private. A mother's passing, a sister's, too. A massacre on the campus at which she teaches. And just when it seemed life was spinning out of control, Giovanni redis-covered love what she calls the antidote. Here romantic love and all its manifestations, the physical touch, the emotional pull, the hungry heart is distilled as never before by one of our most talented poets.

The California condor has been described as a bird "with one wing in the grave."Flying on wings nearly ten feet wide from tip to tip, these birds thrived on the carcasses of animals like woolly mammoths. Then, as humans began dramatically reshaping North America, the continent's largest flying land bird started disappearing. By the beginning of the twentieth century, extinction seemed inevitable.But small groups of passionate individuals refused to allow the condor to fade away, even as they fought over how and why the bird was to be saved. Scientists, farmers, developers, bird lovers, and government bureaucrats argued bitterly and often, in the process injuring one another and the species they were trying to save. In the late 1980s, the federal government made a wrenching decision -- the last remaining wild condors would be caught and taken to a pair of zoos, where they would be encouraged to breed with other captive condors. Livid critics called the plan a recipe for extinction. After the zoo-based populations soared, the condors were released in the mountains of south-central California, and then into the Grand Canyon, Big Sur, and Baja California. Today the giant birds are nowhere near extinct.The giant bird with "one wing in the grave" appears to be recovering, even as the wildlands it needs keep disappearing. But the story of this bird is more than the story of a vulture with a giant wingspan -- it is also the story of a wild and giant state that has become crowded and small, and of the behind-the-scenes dramas that have shaped the environmental movement. As told by John Nielsen, an environmental journalist and a native Californian, this is a fascinating tale of survival.

From the freewheeling rush of hijacking trucks to the brutal race wars that marked his decade-long stint in jail, former Mafia insider Louis Ferrante describes his remarkable journey from rising mobster to federal prison inmate to full-time writer. As Louis Ferrante tells it, the bottom line was money and his word was good. During his teenage years, Ferrante and his crew members hijacked delivery trucks and drove them to drop-offs all over New York, reselling the merchandise and pocketing thousands of dollars per load. For a seventeen-year-old who liked fist fighting and fast cars, it was the quickest money on the street, and it soon earned Ferrante the attention of the infamous Gambino crime family, led by late Mob boss John Gotti. In the early nineties, Ferrante's growing Mafia connections enabled him to pull off some of the most lucrative heists in American history all by the age of twenty-one.But the same handshakes that once sealed deals soon could no longer be trusted, and the betrayal by several of his close friends brought the feds banging down Ferrante's door. Symptomatic of the nation's larger crackdown on organized crime, indictments came from the Secret Service, the Nassau County Organized Crime Force, and the FBI. By 1994, Ferrante faced a life sentence in prison. He pleaded guilty and would serve nearly a decade in some of the most notorious penitentiaries in America. With raucous violence teeming around him, Ferrante relied on his Mob connections and street smarts to keep him alive until an unexpected exchange with a guard propelled him to a painful self-reckoning: Who am IWhat is it that makes me this wayDo I have a purpose?Desperate to escape from his bleak surroundings, Ferrante immersed himself in the study of history and literature. Over the term of his incarceration, each book became a much-needed sanctuary from the brutal chaos of his everyday existence, each page a challenge to his rapidly expanding knowledge of the world. Ferrante read voraciously a journey of the mind that took him from philosophy and ancient classics to nineteenth-century fiction. He also learned the art of writing and studied the major world religions, eventually deciding to become an Orthodox Jew. And with only limited access to legal texts, Ferrante taught himself enough about the American justice system to successfully appeal his own conviction, in a case that is now cited in courtrooms across the country. Gritty and hard-hitting, Ferrante's memoir recounts his rapid rise to the upper echelons of the Mafia hierarchy, his time in prison, and his struggle to turn his life around. Unlocked is an astonishing journey a true story of personal transformation that is both shocking and unforgettable.

France, 1940. The once glittering boulevards of Paris teem with spies, collaborators, and the Gestapo now that France has fallen to Hitler's Wermacht. For André Breton, Max Ernst, Victor Serge, Marc Chagall, Consuelo de Saint-Exupéry, Remedios Varo, Benjamin Péret, and scores of other cultural elite denounced as enemies of the Third Reich, fear and uncertainty define daily life. One wrong glance, one misplaced confidence, could mean arrest, deportation, and death. Their only salvation is the Villa Air-Bel, a ch?teau outside Marseille where a group of young people will go to extraordinary lengths to keep them alive. Financed by the Emergency Rescue Committee, a private American relief organization, unlikely heroes—feisty graduate student Miriam Davenport, Harvard-educated classical scholar Varian Fry, beautiful and compelling heiress Mary Jayne Gold, and brilliant young Socialist and survivor of the Battle of Dunkerque Danny Bénédite and his British wife, Theo—cajole, outwit, and use every means possible to stave off the Nazis and newly installed Vichy government officials circling closer with each passing day. The ch?teau was a vibrant artistic salon, home to lively debates and clandestine affairs, to Sunday art auctions and subversive surrealist games. Relationships within the house were tense and arguments were common, but the will to survive kept the covert operation under wraps. Beyond the ch?teau's luscious fa?ade war raged, yet hope reverberated within its halls. With the aid of their young rescuers, this diverse intelligentsia—intense, brilliant, and utterly terrified—was able to survive one of the darkest chapters of the twentieth century. Villa Air-Bel is a powerfully told, meticulously researched true story. Rosemary Sullivan explores the diaries, memoirs, and letters of the individuals involved while uncovering their private worlds and the web of relationships they developed. Filled with suspense, drama, and intrigue, Villa Air-Bel is an excellent work of narrative nonfiction that delves into a fascinating albeit hidden saga in our recent history.

I think my father's rage at the trenches took me over, when I was very young, and has never left me. Do children feel their parents' emotionsYes, we do, and it is a legacy I could have done without. What is the use of itIt is as if that old war is in my own memory, my own consciousness.In this extraordinary book, the 2007 Nobel Laureate Doris Lessing explores the lives of her parents, each irrevocably damaged by the Great War. Her father wanted the simple life of an English farmer, but shrapnel almost killed him in the trenches, and thereafter he had to wear a wooden leg. Her mother, Emily, spent the war nursing the wounded in the Royal Free Hospital after her great love, a doctor, drowned in the Channel.In the fictional first half of Alfred and Emily, Doris Lessing imagines the happier lives her parents might have made for themselves had there been no war; a story that begins with their meeting at a village cricket match outside Colchester. This is followed by a piercing examination of their relationship as it actually was in the shadow of the Great War, of the family's move to Africa, and of the impact of her parents' marriage on a young woman growing up in a strange land."Here I still am," says Doris Lessing, "trying to get out from under that monstrous legacy, trying to get free." Triumphantly, with the publication of Alfred and Emily, she has done just that.

In the fall of 2009, with the publication of her #1 national bestselling memoir, Sarah Palin had the privilege of meeting thousands of everyday Americans on her extraordinary 35-city book tour. Inspired by these encounters, her new book, America By Heart: Reflections on Family, Faith, and Flag, celebrates the enduring strengths and virtues that have made this country great.Framed by her strong belief in the importance of family, faith, and patriotism, the book ranges widely over American history, culture, and current affairs, and reflects on the key values both national and spiritual-that have been such a profound part of Governor Palin's life and continue to inform her vision of America's future. Written in her own refreshingly candid voice, America By Heart will include selections from classic and contemporary readings that have moved her-from the nation's founding documents to great speeches, sermons, letters, literature and poetry, biography, and even some of her favorite songs and movies. Here, too, are portraits of some of the extraordinary men and women she admires and who embody her deep love of country, her strong rootedness in faith, and her profound love and appreciation of family. She will also draw from personal experience to amplify these timely (and timeless) themes themes that are sure to inspire her numerous fans and readers all across the country.

From Steven V. Roberts comes My Fathers' Houses, a memoir of growing up in Bayonne, New Jersey, an immigrant community in the shadow of the Statue if Liberty, and the story of how his father and his grandfather's dreams and their own passion for writing and ideas influenced Steven's future, and inspired him to seek his fortune in New York City, the media capital of the world. This is a story of a town and a time and a boy who grew up there, a boy who became a New York Times correspondent, TV and radio personality, and best selling author. The town was Bayonne, New Jersey, a European village so close to New York that Steve could see the Statue of Liberty from his bedroom window. The time was the forties and fifties, when children of immigrants were striving to become American and find a place in a booming post war world. The core of Steve's world was one block, where he lived in a house his grandfather, Harry Schanbam, had built with his own hands. But the story starts back in Russia, where the family business of writing and ideas began. Steve's other grandfather, Abraham Rogowsky, stole money to become a Zionist pioneer in Palestine before moving to America. The tale continues through the Depression, when Steve's parents lived one block apart in Bayonne, wrote letters to each other and married in secret. During the war years, Steve's father wrote children's books and based one of his best sellers on outings he took with his twin sons to the local train station. As his byline, he used his boys' middle names Jeffrey Victor so Steve got his first writing credit before he was two. The story concludes with the boy leaving Bayonne, going on to Harvard, meeting the Catholic girl who became his wife, and starting work at the New York Times across the river, and worlds away, from where he began. Now a grandfather of five, Steve Roberts looks in the mirror and sees his own father and grandfather looking back at him–a family chain that started in 19th century Russia and thrives today in 21st century America.

Warning!* This book contains the following:Unsafe use of powerful firearms in combination with explosivesCultivation of illegal crops Impressionable minors being exposed to illicit activitiesPiloting of automobiles under impaired conditionsTransporting large sums of cash across national borders *Stunts performed in this book were undertaken by professionals. Do not attempt them at home.

Out of Bounds: Inside the NBA's Culture of Rape, Violence, and Crime is a searing indictment of professional basketball players who live in a world where criminal laws and social norms don't exist, a world where they are given license to act above the law.On the court, they dazzle us with their spectacular physical feats. They generate millions of dollars of revenue for the NBA and their teams. They inspire adulation. But underneath all the glitz, the money, and alley-oops is a seamy underbelly, a rash of lawlessness that is gripping the NBA.Based on a first-of-its-kind investigation into the criminal histories of 177 NBA players from the 2001,2002 season, Out of Bounds shows that an alarming four out of every ten NBA players have a police record involving a serious crime. They are All-Stars and they are journeymen, involved in crimes ranging from armed robbery to domestic violence to gun possession to rape.Out of Bounds takes a hard look at shocking cases, with graphic accounts of physical and sexual violence and other outrageous conduct by players. In all, more than 250 people are named, including many prominent NBA players. It exposes the environment and culture that encourages such criminal behavior. It also explains the unique challenges these cases pose for law-enforcement agencies and prosecutors. And Out of Bounds takes readers inside the hidden yet critically vital role that lawyers, agents, and fame play in insulating criminally accused players from accountability.Author Jeff Benedict, an expert on athletes and crime, draws his conclusions from exhaustive research. In addition to his criminal-background checks, the author retrieved documents from law-enforcement agencies, courts, and private attorneys. He conducted more than 400 interviews with police officers, prosecutors, defense lawyers, players, agents, victims, witnesses, and coaches. What emerges is a disturbing and appalling picture of men who live above the law. A seminal and important work, Out of Bounds will forever change how we look at the NBA and its stars' lives of excess and privilege.

Here's the Real Deal! The same Washington politicians who took control of Congress by promising to balance the federal budget are now bankrupting America by launching the biggest spending spree in the history of the United States.With big-spending Democrats at their side, President George Bush and his "conservative" Republican Congress have controlled the government's checkbook while the national debt has skyrocketed past seven trillion dollars. That's right, $7,000,000,000,000. How has the party of Reagan become the party of big- government spending?Now former Republican congressman Joe Scarborough delivers a scathing indictment of Republicans and Democrats alike in the same informed, hard-hitting, and entertaining style fans of Scarborough Country have come to admire. Having had a ringside seat during his four terms in the House of Representatives, Scarborough gives the inside scoop on how Washington really works and on the spending orgy the Republicans have fueled the last ten years.The story begins with Newt Gingrich's Contract with America and the Republicans promising to balance the budget and reform Washington. It culminates with a Republican president continually rubber-stamping pork-filled appropriations bills that squander taxpayer dollars. That is, unless you think it's necessary to spend millions of dollars on research into "alternative salmon products" in Alaska, or the study of crickets in Utah, or of sea turtles in Hawaii.Sadly, these instances merely hint at the gross spending by Congress.

The author of The Modern Girl's Guide to Life asks fifty experts, artists, business leaders, trendsetters, doctors, athletes, environmentalists, and intellectualsWhat will the next decade look likeWhere are we headedThat is the question professional trendspotter Jane Buckingham posed to fifty influential leaders in a wide variety of fields and their responses are surprising, provocative, compelling, and important. The result of her conversations with some of the most fascinating men and women in America today, What's Next is an essential collection of highly individual perspectives on tomorrow's world, including: Our world is changing faster than ever. The essential insights offered in What's Next can help us keep up and stay ahead.Acclaimed writer Reza Aslan's belief that American Islam may become the model for Islam throughout the rest of the worldAttorney Alan Dershowitz's views on the very scientific future of criminal defense lawCampaign adviser Joe Trippi's thoughts on how politics will be turned upside down . . . and more Our world is changing faster than ever. The essential insights offered in What's Next can help us keep up and stay ahead.

What Does It Mean To Grow Up Chicana/o?When I was growing up, I never read anything in school by anyone who had a "Z" in their last name. This anthology is, in many ways, a public gift to that child who was always searching for herself whithin the pages of a book.from the Introduction by Tiffany Ana LopezLouie The Foot Gonzalez tells of an eighty-nine-year-old woman with only one tooth who did strange and magical healings...Her name was Dona Tona and she was never taken seriously until someone got sick and sent for her. She'd always show up, even if she had to drag herself, and she stayed as long as needed. Dona Tona didn't seem to mind that after she had helped them, they ridiculed her ways.Rosa Elena Yzquierdo remembers when homemade tortillas and homespun wisdom went hand-in-hand...As children we watched our abuelas lovingly make tortillas. In my own grandmother's kitchen, it was an opportunity for me to ask questions within the safety of that warm room...and the conversation carried resonance far beyond the kitchen...Sandra Cisneros remembers growing up in Chicago...Teachers thought if you were poor and Mexican you didn't have anything to say. Now I know, "We've got to tell our own history...making communication happen between cultures."

General Kamel Sachet was a favorite of Saddam Hussein's, a hero of the Iran-Iraq war, head of the army in Kuwait City during Desert Storm, governor of the province of Maysan, and father of nine children. When author Wendell Steavenson became intrigued by his story, she began with a few questions about Sachet and his fellow Baathist loyalists: "Why had they served such a regimeHow had they accommodated their own moralityHow had they livedHow had they lived with themselves?" Her journey to find these answers took five years, and an accumulation of facts, opinions, fears, confessions and suspicions from Sachet's family, friends, and enemies. The result is not just a gripping account of one man's rise and fall, but a vivid and compassionate portrayal of the Iraqi people.As Sachet rose from policeman to Special Forces officer and then General, he made more and more sacrifices to remain in Saddam's good favor. Steadfast in his loyalty to God and his President, Sachet attended military executions and endured his own imprisonment as Saddam's behavior took increasingly paranoiac and power-crazy turns. But when it came time for Sachet's sons to do their military service, he refused to let them join the "criminal" organization to which he had given his life. Kamel Sachet realized, too late, that he'd become a participant in the terror regime that had strangled his county and destroyed its people. Through his story and the stories of those around him, Wendell Steavenson shows the choices Iraqis have had to make between exile and collaboration, God and jihad. Here are the Iraqis behind the headlines and the tragedy begotten of unintended consequences. And here is the first full-length narrative from an immensely talented journalist who has already been compared by critics to Bruce Chatwin and Ryszard Kapucinksi.

When journalist Dennis Cass was nineteen years old his stepfather, Bill, suffered from a psychotic break. Cass tried to commit him to a mental institution only to watch Bill escape from a cab en route to a Harlem hospital and run raving down the streets of Manhattan. Some fifteen years later, a bout of writer's block turned Cass's thoughts toward the brain. A complete stranger to science, Cass immersed himself in the world of neuroscience, subjecting himself to brain scans, psychological tests, and scientific conferences, as he attempted to gain a better understanding of ADHD, anxiety, stress, motivation and reward, and consciousness. Then things got a little weird. What began as a more clinical effort to understand himself soon became a personal and emotional journey into the fragile, mysterious workings of the mind and the self. Head Case is a charming, hilarious, and at times harrowing memoir of scientific experimentation. It's a story of science and society, of fathers and sons, and of how the past lives on in the present. Along the way the book asks timeless questions: What do we know about ourselvesWhat can we know about ourselvesAnd how much self-knowledge can a single person handle?