An unstoppable collection of the most hardcore figures who ever strapped on chain mail and ran screaming into battle Throughout history from the bone-crushing age of antiquity to the sack-tearing modern era there have been larger-than-life ass-kickers with a natural talent for unleashing their epic bloodlust on anyone who crossed them. They built empires, smashed armies, and ravaged civilizations for wealth, glory, and ultimate supremacy. Sometimes villains, sometimes heroes, sometimes criminally insane, they had one thing in common: They were all . . . Badass!Chandragupta MauryaAn Indian warlord who commanded an army of drunken war elephants and employed an elite detachment of highly trained female bodyguardsPeter FranciscoAn unsung hero of the American Revolution, this powerful giant battled the British with a massive five-foot-long broadswordWolf the QuarrelsomeA mysterious barbarian leader who only appears in history twice and both times he's kicking someone's assBhanbhagta Gurung A fearless Gurkha who won the Victoria Cross by clearing out six Japanese foxholes with nothing more than grenades, a bayonet, and a knifeFrom Alexander the Great to George S. Patton, from Genghis Khan to Bruce Lee, this pantheon of ass-kicking awesomeness should inspire you to quit your stupid job and dive headfirst into a new career as a professional badass.

Rick Pitino is a basketball icon: the only coach in college history to lead three different schools to the Final Four, the winner of the 1996 NCAA championship, the owner of a sparkling career record, a bestselling author, and a lock for the College Basketball Hall of Fame. Yet Pitino's journey has not been without life-altering adversity: He's experienced profound personal and professional losses. In 2001, after three losing seasons as coach and president of the Boston Celtics, Pitino resigned, walking away from the $23 million left in his contract. And while recovering from the only breakdown in his extraordinary basketball career, Pitino who had previously suffered the devastating loss of his infant son, Daniel endured additional tragedies: His brother-in-law and best friend Billy Minardi, a trader at Cantor Fitzgerald, perished in the World Trade Center attacks of 9/11, less than a year after another brother-in-law had been fatally struck by a taxi. Pitino writes, "From that point on, my life changed forever. Nothing will ever be the same."This realization gave Pitino a new perspective. With it, the innovative leader felt the freedom to act even more dynamically than he ever had in the past. Returning to college basketball, he has rebuilt and revitalized the storied program at Louisville, guiding the Cardinals to a history-making Final Four appearance in 2005 that stamped him the only coach in history to take three schools that far. And in 2008, he rallied an injury-plagued Louisville team from a disappointing start and led it to the Elite Eight, setting the stage for greater success to come.The failures and tragedies he recounts make this book unique. More than just a recitation of what works and why, it's about how to succeed after you've failed; how to pick yourself up after being knocked down; and how to reframe yourself and see the world in a new light. This is a comeback story, a manual for overcoming life's difficulties. Pitino has experienced success as an author with his tremendously popular books Success Is a Choice and Lead to Succeed, but in Rebound Rules: The Art of Success 2.0, he's crafted a book that's more deeply personal, more inspiring, more practical, and more powerful than any he's written before.

New Ideas from Dead CEOs uncovers the secrets of success of great CEOs by giving readers an intimate look at their professional and personal lives. Why did Ray Kroc's plan for McDonald's thrive when many burger joints failedAnd how, decades later, did Krispy Kreme fail to heed Kroc's hard-won lessonsHow did Walt Disney's most dismal day as a young cartoonist radically change his careerWhen Estée Lauder was a child in Queens, New York, the average American spent $8 a year on toiletries. Why did she spot an opportunity in selling high-priced cosmetics, and why did she pound on Saks's doorsHow did Thomas Watson Jr. decide to roll the dice and put all of IBM's chips on computing, when his father thought it could be a losing ideaWe learn about these CEOs' greatest challenges and failures, and how they successfully rode the waves of demographic and technological change.New Ideas from Dead CEOs not only gives us fascinating insights into these CEOs' lives, but also shows how we can apply their ideas to the present-day triumphs and struggles of Sony, Dell, Costco, Carnival Cruises, Time Warner, and numerous other companies trying to figure out how to stay on top or climb back up. The featured CEOs in this book were not candidates for sainthood. Many of them knew "god" only as a prefix to "dammit." But they were devoted to their businesses, not just to their egos and their personal bank accounts and yachts. Extraordinarily fresh and deeply thoughtful, Todd G. Buchholz's New Ideas from Dead CEOs is a truly enjoyable and fun yet serious and realistic look at what we still have to learn and absorb from these decomposing CEOs.

Using the latest research in animal behavior, Dr. Milani has produced a wonderfully intriguing book about the body language of cats and what it reveals, including how body language displays can enhance or undermine relationships between cats and people.

Everything you thought you knew about saving, managing risk, and securing your financial future has changed. The world is very different in the wake of the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression. Retirement accounts have been eviscerated, risk appetites diminished, and questions raised about age-old personal finance strategies such as "buy and hold" and the efficacy of relying heavily on stock mutual funds.In The Wall Street Journal Guide to the New Rules of Personal Finance, Dave Kansas offers guidelines for understanding the new regulations for finance firms, the rising importance of international investing, and the very different environment that now exists for home buyers. With valuable chapters on debt reduction, diversification, retirement planning, real estate, commodities, and other vital topics, this essential volume is designed to help the individual determine which tenets of an investing strategy remain sound and which deserve re-examination. It is the ultimate guide to profitably investing your money in a world that has fundamentally changed.

A rare glimpse into the private lives of your favorite athletes and what gives these champion sportsmen and women a deeper satisfaction than any trophy or championship ring. It's no surprise that the stories in Wish Granted are profoundly inspiring. What is unexpected is how the life lessons have unfolded for the athletes with each wish granted. These athletes set about to make a difference for a child . . . but found, instead, that the child changed them.In Wish Granted, you'll become the confidant to twenty-five elite athletes as they share their most heartfelt thoughts. At the center of these stories, you'll find the victories, challenges, triumphs, and tears that sum up the experience of wish granting. Packed with compelling, never-before-published photos, Wish Granted focuses on the uplifting power people have to offer hope and joy to others both athlete to child, and child to athlete.Wish Granted celebrates the strength and courage of the human spirit in the face of adversity and a celebration you can be a part of. Every book sold will help grant life-changing wishes.

National Book Award Winner One Sunday in the spring of 1988, a woman living on a reservation in North Dakota is attacked. The details of the crime are slow to surface as Geraldine Coutts is traumatized and reluctant to relive or reveal what happened, either to the police or to her husband, Bazil, and thirteen-year-old son, Joe. In one day, Joe life is irrevocably transformed. He tries to heal his mother, but she will not leave her bed and slips into an abyss of solitude. Increasingly alone, Joe finds himself thrust prematurely into an adult world for which he is ill prepared. While his father, who is a tribal judge, endeavors to wrest justice from a situation that defies his efforts, Joe becomes frustrated with the official investigation and sets out with his trusted friends, Cappy, Zack, and Angus, to get some answers of his own. Their quest takes them first to the Round House, a sacred space and place of worship for the Ojibwe. And this is only the beginning. Written with undeniable urgency, and illuminating the harsh realities of contemporary life in a community where Ojibwe and white live uneasily together, The Round House is a brilliant and entertaining novel, a masterpiece of literary fiction. Louise Erdrich embraces tragedy, the comic, a spirit world very much present in the lives of her all-too-human characters, and a tale of injustice that is, unfortunately, an authentic reflection of what happens in our own world today.

"I've seen what the world does to the weak. It'll eat you alive." Tirio was cast out of the Takunami tribe at a very young age because of his disabled foot. But an American woman named Sara adopted him, and his life has only gotten better since. Now, as his thirteenth birthday approaches, things are nearly perfect. So why is he having visions and hearing voices calling him back to the AmazonLuka has spent his whole life preparing for his soche seche tente, a sixth-sense test all Takunami boys must endure just before their thirteenth birthday. His family's future depends on whether or not he passes this perilous test. His mother has dedicated herself to making sure that no aspect of his training is overlooked . . . but fate has a way of disturbing even the most carefully laid plans. Two young boys. An unforgiving jungle. One shared destiny.

There are times when a tree can no longer withstand the pain inflicted on it, and the wind will take pity on that tree and topple it over in a mighty storm. All the other trees who witnessed the evil look down upon the fallen tree with envy. They pray for the day when a wind will end their suffering. I pray for the day when God will end mine. In a time and place without moral conscience, fourteen-year-old Ansel knows what is right and what is true. But it is dangerous to choose honesty, and so he chooses silence. Now an innocent man is dead, and Ansel feels the burden of his decision. He must also bear the pain of losing a friend, his family, and the love of a lifetime. Coretta Scott King Award winner and Newbery Honoree Julius Lester delivers a haunting and poignant novel about what happens when one group of people takes away the humanity of another.

The United States and its Freedom Coalition allies are conducting serial invasions across the globe, including an attack on the anti-capitalist rebels of Northern California. The Middle East—now a single consumerist Caliphate led by Lebanese pop singer Caliph Fred—is in an uproar after an attack on the al-Aqsa Mosque gets televised on the Holy Land Channel.The world is on the brink of a total radioactive, no-survivors war, and human?kind's last hope is Eliot R. Vanderthorpe, Jr., celebrity heir, debauched party animal, and Elvis impersonation scholar. But Eliot's got his own problems. His evangelical dad is breeding red heifers in anticipation of the Rapture. Eliot's dissertation is in the toilet. And he has a doppelg?nger. An evil doppelg?nger.

Alessandra is desperate to escape.Desperate to escape her stepmother, who's locked her away for a year; to escape the cloister that awaits her and the marriage plans that have been made for her; to escape the expectations that limit her and every other girl in fourteenth-century Italy. There's no tolerance in her quiet village for Alessandra and her keen intelligence and unconventional ideas.In defiant pursuit of her dreams, Alessandra undertakes an audacious quest, her bravery equaled only by the dangers she faces. Disguised and alone in a city of spies and scholars, Alessandra will find a love she could not foresee -- and an enduring fame.In this exquisite imagining of the centuries-old story of Alessandra Giliani, the world's first female anatomist, acclaimed novelist Barbara Quick gives readers the drama, romance, and rich historical detail for which she is known as she shines a light on an unforgotten -- and unforgettable -- heroine.

It has been twenty years since the time of The Fairies of Nutfolk Wood, and grownup Willa has returned to Plunkit with her daughter, Zelly. Willa can't see the fairies anymore, but Zelly can, and she meets an unusual boy—the last remaining fairy child living in Nutfolk Wood, Ronald Whistle Bright.Hard times have befallen the fairy town of Nutfolk Wood, but Whistle Bright is determined to stay in his forest village, even though humans are sure to destroy it. And Zelly wants to stay in the small town of Plunkit, even though her mother insists that they return to their lives in the big city. Zelly is convinced that she belongs in Plunkit, and only there will she find out more about her father, who disappeared when she was three.In their quest to stay in the place that they love, the tiny Nutfolk boy and the human girl become allies, and both are surprised by the unexpected things that can happen in life.Barb Bentler Ullman's follow-up to The Fairies of Nutfolk Wood is another charming story infused with magic and hopefulness.

One of the most admired and honored of our contemporary literary artists, author John Crowley now brilliantly re-creates a time in America when ordinary people were asked to sacrifice their comforts and uproot their lives for the cause of freedom.In the early years of the 1940s, as the nation's young men ship off to war, the call goes out for builders of the machinery necessary to defeat the enemy. To this purpose, a city has sprung up seemingly overnight in the windswept fields of Oklahoma: the Van Damme airplane factory, a gargantuan complex dedicated to the construction of the B-30 Pax, the largest bomber ever built. Laborers—some men, but mostly women, many of whom have never operated a rivet gun or held a screwdriver—flock to this place, eager to earn, to grow, to do their part. Many are away from home for the very first time, enticed by the opportunity to be something more than wife and homemaker. In the middle of nowhere they will live, work, and earn their own money, fearing for the safety of their absent fighting men as the world around them changes forever.Vi, with her gun of a pitching arm, finds Van Damme after fleeing a dying ranch and a stubborn, broken father to chase a future built on something stronger than poison earth. Connie, once fragile and helpless, follows an unfaithful husband here with their little boy in tow—and inadvertently discovers who she is and what she's capable of achieving. Before Diane can enter the factory's gates, the restless young woman must leave behind the hot music and soldier boys she followed, taking a sudden, bold, and dangerous step in pursuit of something different, adult, and real.Their journeys will be liberating in ways they couldn't imagine, and will lead each of them to Prosper Olander. Disabled, an artist, a forger, a friend—a surprising lover and compassionate listener—Prosper has followed unlikely opportunity down a painfully twisting path to take his place as the true heart and soul of a temporary city. And before the B-30 Pax takes flight, he will change the lives of four women in profound and unexpected ways.Destined to stand tall among his previous acclaimed fiction—including Little, Big; The ?gypt Cycle; The Translator; and Lord Byron's Novel—John Crowley's Four Freedoms is perhaps his most heartfelt and compelling novel to date. It is a moving, evocative, and unforgettable saga of wives, mothers, and lovers—of strangers, outcasts, and damaged Quixotes—who, unmoored by conflict's unpredictable tides, find community, purpose, identity, independence . . . and one remarkable man who will touch them all.

Switching seamlessly between the chaos and bloodshed of 1940s India and the multicultural mélange of twenty-first-century Britain, Glen Duncan's sublime new novel finds love in both. Ross Monroe is a boxing railwayman with a weakness for get-rich-quick schemes. Kate Lyle is a headstrong young woman desperate to escape a sexually predatory household. Both are Anglo-Indians, members of a race that helped turn the wheels of Empire for years. But Empire days are numbered, and as India sheds its colonial skin, the young lovers must face their own tryst with destiny.In twenty-first-century England, Owen Monroe is writing this story of his parents' lives in an effort to avoid the problems in his own: lost love, relentless libido, dreams of death, and a world full of headlines he can't understand and doesn't want to. But keeping past and present apart isn't as easy as it seems, and before long Owen is deep in the one story he never wanted to tell....Epic in its scope yet never losing sight of the telling, gorgeous detail, The Bloodstone Papers is an extraordinarily rich and beautiful read that manages to ask the big questions without fuss and to accept that the big answers aren't always what we want to hear.

Unconditional love is the most powerful stimulant of the immune system. The truth is: love heals. Miracles happen to exceptional patients every day—patients who have the courage to love, those who have the courage to work with their doctors to participate in and influence their own recovery.

Helene Wecker's dazzling debut novel tells the story of two supernatural creatures who appear mysteriously in 1899 New York. Chava is a golem, a creature made of clay, brought to life by a strange man who dabbles in dark Kabbalistic magic. When her master dies at sea on the voyage from Poland, she is unmoored and adrift as the ship arrives in New York Harbor. Ahmad is a jinni, a being of fire, born in the ancient Syrian Desert. Trapped in an old copper flask by a Bedouin wizard centuries ago, he is released accidentally by a tinsmith in a Lower Manhattan shop.Struggling to make their way in this strange new place, the Golem and the Jinni try to fit in with their neighbors while masking their true natures. Surrounding them is a community of immigrants: the coffeehouse owner Maryam Faddoul, a pillar of wisdom and support for her Syrian neighbors; the solitary ice cream maker Saleh, a damaged man cursed by tragedy; the kind and caring Rabbi Meyer and his beleaguered nephew, Michael, whose Sheltering House receives newly arrived Jewish men; the adventurous young socialite Sophia Winston; and the enigmatic Joseph Schall, a dangerous man driven by ferocious ambition and esoteric wisdom.Meeting by chance, the two creatures become unlikely friends whose tenuous attachment challenges their opposing natures, until the night a terrifying incident drives them back into their separate worlds. But a powerful menace will soon bring the Golem and the Jinni together again, threatening their existence and forcing them to make a fateful choice.Marvelous and compulsively readable, The Golem and the Jinni weaves strands of folk mythology, historical fiction, and magical fable into a wondrously inventive and unforgettable tale.

The funny, fast-paced second book in The Lightning Catcher series! Science, weather, and the fantastical combine for a school adventure story, part Storm Chasers and part Percy Jackson, about twelve-year-old Angus and his dangerous gift of predicting catastrophic weather.Angus has a lot on his plate. He's attending the Perilous Exploratorium for Violent Weather and Vicious Storms, learning how to battle all sorts of extreme weather. He's a Storm Prophet—one of the rare people with the ability to predict catastrophic weather. His parents—world renowned Lightning Catchers themselves—have been kidnapped. And now Perilous has been slammed by a ferocious winter storm, artifacts from the Great Fire of 1666 have been stolen, and the evil Scabious Dankheart has released deadly spores called Ice Diamonds to plague the population. Angus and his friends must find the legendary Lightning Heart—a bloodred, heart-shaped stone of great power—in order to put everything right. Action-packed, lighthearted, and perfect for reluctant readers!

Can dandelion and her raptor friends save Sword mountain?Nancy Yi Fan, the New York Times bestselling author of Swordbird, is back with her richly imagined fantasy bird world.On her sky-born day, Dandelion is injured and separated from her parents. The exiled musician prince, Fleydur, comes to her rescue and brings her to the Castle of Sky. But the court life of the golden eagles is still dominated by rigid traditions and intrigue, and now a new threat is looming. As flying, swordplay, and music enter her life, Dandelion will have the chance to show that a valley eaglet can be a true princess and a heroine, too. Bravery, equality, and the gift of music triumph over all.

Mike Linderman is a teen therapist unlike any other. A real-life cowboy, he wakes up at the crack of dawn, works the cattle on his ranch, and then counsels some of the country's most troubled teens, approaching them with a unique blend of down-home honesty, straight-talk discipline, and pure intention that is rarely found in a therapist's office. Most of the teens Mike treats are angry, abused, violent, and dangerous, yet despite their difficult pasts, he has achieved extraordinary success with them, helping to turn their lives around and earning him the nickname the "Teen Whisperer." In this book, he shares the secrets behind his success with parents everywhere, demonstrating how his regimen of hard work, integrity, and effective communication has turned seriously at-risk kids into loving, well-balanced, and productive teens. More than just a plan to rein in bad behavior, The Teen Whisperer deconstructs the emotional barriers that adolescence has placed between you and your child, helping you work with teens on their level instead of simply treating them as subordinates. With this straightforward and open perspective, both you and your teen will learn to offer each other mutual respect and kindness, as you work together to heal the troubled hearts of your family.

The exhilarating final book in the Otherworld Chronicles trilogy, which School Library Journal called "a surefire hit with the legions of Rick Riordan fans."Artie Kingfisher, his sister, Kay, and the New Knights of the Round Table have finally reached the legendary isle of Avalon. But before Artie can take his place as King Arthur reborn, he must recover nothing less than the mythical Holy Grail. And as the greatest battle of his life looms, Artie finds himself facing off against the one person he never dreamed he'd be fighting.In The Dragon King, Artie's life-changing quest comes to a spectacular close as the young king discovers what it truly means to be a hero. Rich in mythology and bursting with twenty-first-century fun, this high-spirited spin on Arthurian legend is perfect for middle grade fans of Percy Jackson, the Alex Rider Chronicles, and House of Secrets.

From the New York Times bestselling author of the Faerie Wars Chronicles, Herbie Brennan, comes this heart-pounding middle-grade adventure—think The Da Vinci Code for tweens. Reminiscent of the Percy Jackson and Artemis Fowl series, this edge-of-your-seat thriller involves an ancient curse, a murder, and a conspiracy by a secret society.When Edward Michael “Em” Goverton uncovers the key to a five-hundred-year-old deadly prediction by the prophet Nostradamus, personal tragedy morphs into international crisis. Soon Em finds himself enmeshed in a sinister web of shocking events where nothing is quite as it seems. But the ominous forces behind the plot are not about to sit back and let their plans be ruined, and soon their net begins to close in on Em.It’s a race against the clock for Em and his friends to prevent a catastrophe that threatens the lives of an entire generation.