In late seventeenth-century London, the most provocative images were produced not by artists, but by scientists. Magnified fly-eyes drawn with the aid of microscopes, apparitions cast on laboratory walls by projection machines, cut-paper figures revealing the "e;exact proportions"e; of sea monsters-all were created by members of the Royal Society of London, the leading institutional platform of the early Scientific Revolution. Wicked Intelligence reveals that these natural philosophers shaped Restoration London's emergent artistic cultures by forging collaborations with court painters, penning art theory, and designing triumphs of baroque architecture such as St Paul's Cathedral. ?Matthew C. Hunter brings to life this archive of experimental-philosophical visualization and the deft cunning that was required to manage such difficult research. Offering an innovative approach to the scientific image-making of the time, he demonstrates how the Restoration project of synthesizing experimental images into scientific knowledge, as practiced by Royal Society leaders Robert Hooke and Christopher Wren, might be called "e;wicked intelligence."e; Hunter uses episodes involving specific visual practices-for instance, concocting a lethal amalgam of wax, steel, and sulfuric acid to produce an active model of a comet-to explore how Hooke, Wren, and their colleagues devised representational modes that aided their experiments. Ultimately, Hunter argues, the craft and craftiness of experimental visual practice both promoted and menaced the artistic traditions on which they drew, turning the Royal Society projects into objects of suspicion in Enlightenment England.?The first book to use the physical evidence of Royal Society experiments to produce forensic evaluations of how scientific knowledge was generated, Wicked Intelligence rethinks the parameters of visual art, experimental philosophy, and architecture at the cusp of Britain's imperial power and artistic efflorescence.

All groups tell stories about their beginnings. Such tales are oft-repeated, finely wrought, and usually much beloved. Among those institutions most in need of an impressive creation account is the state: it's one of the primary ways states attempt to legitimate themselves. But such founding narratives invite revisionist retellings that modify details of the story in ways that undercut, ironize, and even ridicule the state's ideal self-representation. Medieval accounts of how Norway was unified by its first king provide a lively, revealing, and wonderfully entertaining example of this process.?Taking the story of how Harald Fairhair unified Norway in the ninth century as its central example, Bruce Lincoln illuminates the way a state's foundation story blurs the distinction between history and myth and how variant tellings of origin stories provide opportunities for dissidence and subversion as subtle-or not so subtle-modifications are introduced through details of character, incident, and plot structure. Lincoln reveals a pattern whereby texts written in Iceland were more critical and infinitely more subtle than those produced in Norway, reflecting the fact that the former had a dual audience: not just the Norwegian court, but also Icelanders of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, whose ancestors had fled from Harald and founded the only non-monarchic, indeed anti-monarchic, state in medieval Europe.?Between History and Myth will appeal not only to specialists in Scandinavian literature and history but also to anyone interested in memory and narrative.

Up until the end of the eighteenth century, the way Ottomans used their clocks conformed to the inner logic of their own temporal culture. However, this began to change rather dramatically during the nineteenth century, as the Ottoman Empire was increasingly assimilated into the European-dominated global economy and the project of modern state building began to gather momentum.In Reading Clocks, Alla Turca, Avner Wishnitzer unravels the complexity of Ottoman temporal culture and for the first time tells the story of its transformation. He explains that in their attempt to attain better surveillance capabilities and higher levels of regularity and efficiency, various organs of the reforming Ottoman state developed elaborate temporal constructs in which clocks played an increasingly important role. As the reform movement spread beyond the government apparatus, emerging groups of officers, bureaucrats, and urban professionals incorporated novel time-related ideas, values, and behaviors into their self-consciously "e;modern"e; outlook and lifestyle. Acculturated in the highly regimented environment of schools and barracks, they came to identify efficiency and temporal regularity with progress and the former temporal patterns with the old political order.Drawing on a wealth of archival and literary sources, Wishnitzer's original and highly important work presents the shifting culture of time as an arena in which Ottoman social groups competed for legitimacy and a medium through which the very concept of modernity was defined. Reading Clocks, Alla Turca breaks new ground in the study of the Middle East and presents us with a new understanding of the relationship between time and modernity.

Fresh water has become scarce and will become even more so in the coming years, as continued population growth places ever greater demands on the supply of fresh water. At the same time, options for increasing that supply look to be ever more limited. No longer can we rely on technological solutions to meet growing demand. What we need is better management of the available water supply to ensure it goes further toward meeting basic human needs. But better management requires that we both understand the history underlying our current water regulation regime and think seriously about what changes to the law could be beneficial.For Golden Rules, Mark Kanazawa draws on previously untapped historical sources to trace the emergence of the current framework for resolving water-rights issues to California in the 1850s, when Gold Rush miners flooded the newly formed state. The need to circumscribe water use on private property in support of broader societal objectives brought to light a number of fundamental issues about how water rights ought to be defined and enforced through a system of laws. Many of these issues reverberate in today's contentious debates about the relative merits of government and market regulation. By understanding how these laws developed across California's mining camps and common-law courts, we can also gain a better sense of the challenges associated with adopting new property-rights regimes in the twenty-first century.

Geographies of Philological Knowledge examines the relationship between medievalism and colonialism in the nineteenth-century Hispanic American context through the striking case of the Creole Andres Bello (1781-1865), a Venezuelan grammarian, editor, legal scholar, and politician, and his lifelong philological work on the medieval heroic narrative that would later become Spain's national epic, the Poem of the Cid. Nadia R. Altschul combs Bello's study of the poem and finds throughout it evidence of a "e;coloniality of knowledge."e;?Altschul ?reveals how, during the nineteenth century, the framework for philological scholarship established in and for core European nations-France, England, and especially Germany-was exported to Spain and Hispanic America as the proper way of doing medieval studies. She argues that the global designs of European philological scholarship are conspicuous in the domain of disciplinary historiography, especially when examining the local history of a Creole Hispanic American like Bello, who is neither fully European nor fully alien to European culture. Altschul likewise highlights Hispanic America's intellectual internalization of coloniality and its understanding of itself as an extension of Europe. A timely example of interdisciplinary history, interconnected history, and transnational study, Geographies of Philological Knowledge breaks with previous nationalist and colonialist histories and thus forges a new path for the future of medieval studies.

Authoring the Past surveys medieval Catalan historiography, shedding light on the emergence and evolution of historical writing and autobiography in the Middle Ages, on questions of authority and authorship, and on the links between history and politics during the period. Jaume Aurell examines texts from the late twelfth to the late fourteenth century-including the Latin Gesta comitum Barcinonensium and four texts in medieval Catalan: James I's Llibre dels fets, the Crnica of Bernat Desclot, the Crnica of Ramon Muntaner, and the Crnica of Peter the Ceremonious-and outlines the different motivations for the writing of each.?For Aurell, these chronicles are not mere archaeological artifacts but rather documents that speak to their writers' specific contemporary social and political purposes. He argues that these Catalonian counts and Aragonese kings were attempting to use their role as authors to legitimize their monarchical status, their growing political and economic power, and their aggressive expansionist policies in the Mediterranean. By analyzing these texts alongside one another, Aurell demonstrates the shifting contexts in which chronicles were conceived, written, and read throughout the Middle Ages.The first study of its kind to make medieval Catalonian writings available to English-speaking audiences, Authoring the Past will be of interest to scholars of history and comparative literature, students of Hispanic and Romance medieval studies, and medievalists who study the chronicle tradition in other languages.

First established 150 years ago, Chicago Sinai is one of America's oldest Reform Jewish congregations. Its founders were upwardly mobile and civically committed men and women, founders and partners of banks and landmark businesses like Hart Schaffner & Marx, Sears & Roebuck, and the giant meatpacking firm Morris & Co. As explicitly modern Jews, Sinai's members supported and led civic institutions and participated actively in Chicago politics. Perhaps most radically, their Sunday services, introduced in 1874 and still celebrated today, became a hallmark of the congregation.In Sundays at Sinai, Tobias Brinkmann brings modern Jewish history, immigration, urban history, and religious history together to trace the roots of radical Reform Judaism from across the Atlantic to this rapidly growing American metropolis. ?Brinkmann shines a light on the development of an urban reform congregation, illuminating Chicago Sinai's practices and history, and its contribution to Christian-Jewish dialogue in the United States. Chronicling Chicago Sinai's radical beginnings in antebellum Chicago to the present, Sundays at Sinai is the extraordinary story of a leading Jewish Reform congregation in one of America's great cities.

At the turn of the fifteenth century, Rome was in the midst of a dramatic transformation from what the fourteenth-century poet Petrarch had termed a "e;crumbling city"e; populated by "e;broken ruins"e; into a prosperous Christian capital. Scholars, artists, architects, and engineers fascinated by Rome were spurred to develop new graphic modes for depicting the city-and the genre known as the city portrait exploded.In Rome Measured and Imagined, Jessica Maier explores the history of this genre-which merged the accuracy of scientific endeavor with the imaginative aspects of art-during the rise of Renaissance print culture. Through an exploration of works dating from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries, her book interweaves the story of the city portrait with that of Rome itself.Highly interdisciplinary and beautifully illustrated with nearly one hundred city portraits, Rome Measured and Imagined advances the scholarship on Renaissance Rome and print culture in fascinating ways.

How did the British come to conquer South Asia in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuriesAnswers to this question usually start in northern India, neglecting the dramatic events that marked Britain's contemporaneous subjugation of the island of Sri Lanka. In Islanded, Sujit Sivasundaram reconsiders the arrival of British rule in South Asia as a dynamic and unfinished process of territorialization and state building, revealing that the British colonial project was framed by the island's traditions and maritime placement and built in part on the model they provided.?Using palm-leaf manu*s from Sri Lanka to read the official colonial archive, Sivasundaram tells the story of two sets of islanders in combat and collaboration. He explores how the British organized the process of "e;islanding"e;: they aimed to create a separable unit of colonial governance and trade in keeping with conceptions of ethnology, culture, and geography. But rather than serving as a radical rupture, he reveals, islanding recycled traditions the British learned from Kandy, a kingdom in the Sri Lankan highlands whose customs-from strategies of war to views of nature-fascinated the British. Picking up a range of unusual themes, from migration, orientalism, and ethnography to botany, medicine, and education, Islanded is an engaging retelling of the advent of British rule.

The fledgling United States fought a war to achieve independence from Britain, but as John Adams said, the real revolution occurred "e;in the minds and hearts of the people"e; before the armed conflict ever began. Putting the practices of communication at the center of this intellectual revolution, Protocols of Liberty shows how American patriots-the Whigs-used new forms of communication to challenge British authority before any shots were fired at Lexington and Concord. ?To understand the triumph of the Whigs over the Brit-friendly Tories, William B. Warner argues that it is essential to understand the communication systems that shaped pre-Revolution events in the background. He explains the shift in power by tracing the invention of a new political agency, the Committee of Correspondence; the development of a new genre for political expression, the popular declaration; and the emergence of networks for collective political action, with the Continental Congress at its center. From the establishment of town meetings to the creation of a new postal system and, finally, the Declaration of Independence, Protocols of Liberty reveals that communication innovations contributed decisively to nation-building and continued to be key tools in later American political movements, like abolition and women's suffrage, to oppose local custom and state law.

Perfect for fans of Diary of a Wimpy Kid and The Strange Case of Origami Yoda, John Kloepfer's hilarious and stomach-churning Zombie Chasers tween series is overflowing with uproarious middle school humor, dead-on illustrations, and high-action adventure that will leave readers moaning for more. This collection contains the first four books in the series.The Zombie Chasers: Zombie Attack! When brain-gobbling zombies invade, a sleep?over at Zack Clarke's house quickly turns into a Level-3 creep-over. The undead have infested the streets, filling the air with deathly moans and the stench of rotting flesh. The Zombie Chasers are on a mission to save the world, but first they have to survive their flesh-eating, half-dead neighbors—and one another.The Zombie Chasers #2: Undead Ahead: Zack's sister is a zombie and his parents might be goners. Rice has uncovered the source of the zombie outbreak, and Madison's health-drink habit may be the key to a cure. Ozzie, the newest zombie chaser, is a nunchaku-wielding, monster-fighting machine who's ready to kick some undead butt. The whole country—from their parents to the president—is counting on them. Can the Zombie Chasers save the nation from brain-gobbling ghoulsOr will the US of A become the US of Z?The Zombie Chasers #3: Sludgment Day: Zack and his crew of Zombie Chasers—Rice, Madison, Ozzie, and Zoe—are ready to end this nightmare once and for all! With the antidote in hand, the gang sets off on a wild cross-country road trip to defeat the evil genius behind the zombie apocalypse.The Zombie Chasers #4: Empire State of Slime: Six months after Zack Clarke, his sister, Zoe, and pals Rice, Ozzie, and Madison saved the country from brain-gobbling ghouls, life is finally heading back to normal. But while the kids are busy exploring the Big Apple's sites on a class trip to New York City, things go from sublime to slime when millions of people suddenly rezombify! The Zombie Chasers are back on undead duty, but can they escape the crowded city streets and find a new cure, or is Z-Day here to stay?

Five complete books in one! Noah, Megan, Richie, and Ella are the Action Scouts: friends whose tree house overlooks the Clarksville City Zoo. When they discover a magical world hidden within the zoo, they are swept away on an adventure in which penguins can fly, a mysterious figure lurks in the shadows, and the scouts are enlisted to help Mr. Darby, who is in charge of the Secret Zoo.The Secret Zoo: Noah, his sister Megan, and their best friends, Richie and Ella, live next door to the zoo. Megan is the first to notice the puzzling behavior of some of the animals. One day Megan disappears, and her brother and their friends realize it's up to them to find her. Once inside, will they discover there's much more to the Clarksville City Zoo than they could ever have guessed?The Secret Zoo: Secrets and Shadows: Noah and his must train to become Crossers, members of a secret society who freely travel to the Secret Zoo and back, helping to defend its borders. But now that the monstrous sasquatches are on the loose and the evil Shadowist is plotting destruction, will Noah, Megan, Ella, and Richie have what it takes to survive?The Secret Zoo: Riddles and Danger: Will the scouts be able to fight against the dangerous sasquatches who have escaped the zoo and threaten their town?The Secret Zoo: Traps and Specters: On Halloween night, Noah and his friends must battle terrifying sasquatches that have attacked their own elementary school. Little do they know the sasquatches are a trap! When DeGraff captures three of Noah's friends, can the kids ally with their rivals in order to save every person and animal in the zoo—all while dodging the town's police?The Secret Zoo: Raids and Rescues: Even in the Secret Zoo, there are dangers . . . and forbidden places. When the scouts' friends are held in the off-limits sector—a never-ending maze of aquariums—Noah, Megan, Richie, and Ella must be at their most courageous.

This collection contains the first two novels in Sara Shepard's New York Times bestselling Pretty Little Liars and Lying Games series, plus a sneak peek at The Perfectionists, the first book in a brand-new Sara Shepard series!Pretty Little Liars: This page-turning start to the Pretty Little Liars series introduces readers to Rosewood and the pretty little liars who call it home. High school juniors Spencer, Hanna, Aria, and Emily thought their darkest secrets vanished when their best friend, Alison, went missing three years ago. But now someone named "A" is sending them notes and threatening to reveal their ugliest secrets—things only Alison knew.Pretty Little Liars #2: Flawless: Four pretty little liars have been very bad girls. But their most horrible secret yet is so scandalous that the truth would ruin them forever.The Lying Game: Separated at birth, twin sisters Emma Paxton and Sutton Mercer never had a chance to meet. And now they never will. Someone murdered Sutton and forced Emma into taking her place.The Lying Game #2: Never Have I Ever: The deeper Emma digs, the more suspects she uncovers. It turns out Sutton and her friends played a lot of games—games that ruined people's lives. Anyone could want revenge . . . anyone could want Sutton—and now Emma—dead.Plus, a sneak peek at The Perfectionists, another series full of Sara Shepard's trademark juicy secrets, nail-biting suspense, and beautiful girls who will do anything to hide the ugly truth.

This collection contains the first three books in the thrilling prequel arc in Erin Hunter's #1 nationally bestselling Warriors series! Discover how the warrior Clans came to be.Dawn of the Clans #1: The Sun Trail: Long before Firestar left his kittypet home to join ThunderClan, a band of cats from the mountains set off on a dangerous journey in search of a new home.Dawn of the Clans #2: Thunder Rising: The mountain cats from the Tribe of Rushing Water followed the sun trail to a new territory, convinced that in a land with more prey, their lives would be free from strife. But while no cat has gone hungry, tensions are rising.Dawn of the Clans #3: The First Battle: The rivalry between Gray Wing and Clear Sky has driven a bitter wedge between all of the forest cats. As Thunder and Gray Wing struggle to find a peaceful path for the future, tensions are growing—and soon more blood will be shed.

In a city that runs on a dwindling supply of magic, a young boy is drawn into a life of wizardry and adventure. Author Sarah Prineas works her own spells as she transports us to an extraordinary world where cities are run on living magic and even a thief can become a wizard's apprentice. Diana Wynne Jones, author of Howl's Moving Castle, praised this middle grade fantasy series filled with magic and wonder, saying of the first, "I couldn't put it down. Wonderful, exciting stuff." This collection contains all four novels in the series, plus the digital original novella The Magic Thief: A Proper Wizard.The Magic Thief: Conn should have dropped dead the day he picked Nevery's pocket and touched the wizard's locus magicalicus, a stone used to focus magic and work spells. But for some reason he did not. Nevery finds that interesting, and he takes Conn as his apprentice on the provision that the boy find a locus stone of his own. But Conn has little time to search for his stone between wizard lessons and helping Nevery discover who—or what—is stealing the city of Wellmet's magic.The Magic Thief: Lost: Conn may only be a wizard's apprentice, but even he knows it's dangerous to play with fire . . . especially around magic. But Conn is drawn to the murmurs he hears every time he sets off an explosion—something is trying to talk to him, to warn him. When none of the wizards listen, Conn takes matters into his own hands. His quest to protect everything he loves brings him face-to-face with a powerful sorcerer-king and a treachery beyond even his vivid imagination.The Magic Thief: Found: Sneaking out of prison isn't easy, unless you are a thief, or a wizard. Luckily, Conn is both! Trouble is, once he's out, where does he goHis home is a pile of rubble since he blew it up doing magic. His master, the wizard Nevery, is not happy with him. Worst of all, Conn's been exiled, and staying in the city will mean his death.The Magic Thief: A Proper Wizard: When Verent, a young apprentice from neighboring Danivelle, comes to Wellmet to ask for Conn's help with his city's magical problems, he is less than impressed with Conn. Will Verent be able to overcome his misgivings about Conn in order to help his townAnd with Conn's help, will Verent become a proper wizard?The Magic Thief: Home: Duchess Rowan has promoted Conn to ducal magister, but the other wizards see him only as a thief. But something sinister is brewing, as magicians' locus stones are being stolen and magical spells are going awry. As Conn faces old enemies and powerful magical forces, is he strong enough to save the city he calls home?

All three volumes of Rae Carson's New York Times?bestselling The Girl of Fire and Thorns trilogy plus the three novellas set in the same world, available together! An insecure princess with an unclear destiny becomes a secret bride, a revolutionary, a queen, and—finally—the champion her world so desperately needs in this epic fantasy series that Tamora Pierce called "engrossing" and that Veronica Roth said was "intense, unique . . . definitely recommended."This complete collection includes the three volumes of the trilogy: book one, The Girl of Fire and Thorns; book two, The Crown of Embers; and book three, The Bitter Kingdom. It also includes the three novellas set in the world of the series: The Shadow Cats, The Shattered Mountain, and The King's Guard.Once every century, one person is chosen for greatness. But the prophecy is vague, and Elisa has no idea why she was chosen or how she will fulfill the expectations. Her future is unknown and her potential is tremendous—even if she doesn't realize it. A sweeping fantasy series about a young woman finding her true strength, this is perfect for fans of Kristin Cashore's Graceling and George R. R. Martin's Game of Thrones.

Romantic and action packed, The Seventh Miss Hatfield is a 300-page novel about a young girl with the ability to travel through time—and the secret she must protect. With an epic romance that cannot be stopped by the bounds of time, as well as deeper questions regarding immortality, The Seventh Miss Hatfield is the beginning of a series perfect for fans of love stories such as The Time Traveler's Wife as well as historical fiction with a fantastical twist like The Diviners by Libba Bray.As a child, Cynthia was lured into the home of her mysterious neighbor, Miss Hatfield. There, Miss Hatfield tells her they are both part of a long line of immortal women able to travel through time. But this gift might be more of a curse, and it comes with a price. Cynthia is beginning to lose herself: she is becoming the next Miss Hatfield.But before the process goes too far, Cynthia must travel back in time to turn-of-the-century New York and steal a painting. This picture might provide a clue to the whereabouts of the source of immortality, a clue that must remain hidden from the world.Her assignment isn't as easy as it appears, especially when Cynthia meets an attractive yet sullen boy named Henley. As their friendship grows into something stronger, Cynthia is hesitant to leave. But how can she stay with the boy she cares for when she must return to her own time before the time travel has a fatal effect on her bodyAnd would she rather stay and die in love or leave and live alone?And who is the mysterious stranger who shadows her from place to placeA hunter for the secret of immortality—or someone who has already found it?Epic Reads Impulse is a digital imprint with new releases each month.

Here are two adventure-packed novels perfect for introducing middle grade readers to the work of #1 New York Times bestselling author Gordon Korman.Ungifted: When Donovan Curtis pulls a major prank at his middle school, he thinks he's finally gone too far. But thanks to a mix-up by one of the administrators, instead of getting in trouble, Donovan is sent to a special program for gifted and talented students. The program couldn't be a more perfectly unexpected hideout for someone like him. But as the students and teachers grow to realize that Donovan may not be good at math or science (or just about anything), he shows that his gifts may be exactly what these students never knew they needed.Masterminds: In idyllic Serenity, New Mexico, honesty and integrity are valued above all else. The thirty kids who live there never lie—they know it's a short leap from that to the awful problems of other, less fortunate places. Then one day Eli Frieden bikes to the edge of the city limits and something so crazy and unexpected happens, it changes everything. Action-packed and full of unexpected twists, this new series is perfect for young fans of James Patterson and John Grisham.

Here are two epic, adventure-packed novels for middle grade readers, from #1 New York Times bestselling author Gordon Korman and award-winning author Ted Sanders in his first book for younger readers.Masterminds: Action-packed and full of unexpected twists, this new series from Gordon Korman is perfect for young fans of James Patterson and John Grisham. In idyllic Serenity, New Mexico, honesty and integrity are valued above all else. The thirty kids who live there never lie—they know it's a short leap from that to the awful problems of other, less fortunate places. Then one day Eli Frieden bikes to the edge of the city limits and something so crazy and unexpected happens, it changes everything.The Keepers: The Box and the Dragonfly: Experience the fantastic adventure filled with magical objects, secret sects, and life as we know it on the line! Mixing magic and physics, Ted Sanders has created an epic story that has the feel of classic fantasy but twists it into something new and innovative. When Horace F. Andrews finds the Box of Promises in the curio shop, he quickly discovers that ordinary-looking objects can hold extraordinary power. From the enormous, sinister man shadowing him to the gradual mastery of his newfound abilities to his encounters with Chloe—a girl who has an astonishing talent of her own—Horace follows a path that puts the pair in the middle of a centuries-old conflict between two warring factions in which every decision they make could have disastrous consequences.

Short, funny, true-to-life stories from Katherine Applegate, the author of the Newbery Medal winning The One and Only Ivan, the Roscoe Riley books are perfect for kids new to reading chapter books. They're filled with appealing art, and they star good-hearted first grader Roscoe Riley.This collection includes all seven books in the series: Never Glue Your Friends to ChairsNever Swipe a Bully's BearDon't Swap Your Sweater for a DogNever Swim in ApplesauceDon't Tap-Dance on Your TeacherNever Walk in Shoes That TalkNever Race a Runaway Pumpkin

Twelve-year-old Joe Stoshack is an average kid with two amazing talents: getting his hands on rare baseball cards, and traveling through time to meet the famous players they depict. Sports buffs and fans of authors like Tim Green and Jon Scieszka will love this imaginative series.Together for the first time, this collection includes:Honus & Me, featuring Honus Wagner, the greatest shortstop ever, from the turn of the century. Honus Wagner’s baseball card is the rarest and most expensive of all; one specimen sold for $2.8 million in 2007. Jackie & Me, featuring Jackie Robinson, the first African-American player in Major League Baseball, six-time All-Star, and recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal. Babe & Me, featuring Babe Ruth, all-time great batter and seven-time World Series champion, who set records that still stand today. Shoeless Joe & Me, featuring Shoeless Joe Jackson, who was banned from baseball in the prime of his career and whose involvement in the Black Sox Scandal is still disputed.