From the environmental activist, consumer advocate, and renowned crusader comes a riveting book that is "part memoir, part non-fiction report, and part call-to-action—a plea to readers to engage with the water crisis in America because no one else is going to do the work for you" (InStyle Magazine). Clean water is as basic to life on planet Earth as hydrogen or oxygen. In her long-awaited book—her first to reckon with the condition of water on our planet—Erin Brockovich shows us what’s at stake. She writes powerfully of the fraudulent science disguising our national water crisis: Cancer clusters are not being reported. People in Detroit and the state of New Jersey don’t have clean water. The drinking water for more than six million Americans contains unsafe levels of industrial chemicals linked to cancer and other health issues. The saga of PG&E continues to this day. Yet communities and people around the country are fighting to make an impact, and Brockovich tells us their stories. In Poughkeepsie, New York, a water operator responded to his customers’ concerns and changed his system to create some of the safest water in the country. Local moms in Hannibal, Missouri, became the first citizens in the nation to file an ordinance prohibiting the use of ammonia in their public drinking water. Like them, we can each protect our right to clean water by fighting for better enforcement of laws, new legislation, and stronger regulations.
From New York Times bestselling author and internationally renowned environmental and consumer advocate Erin Brockovich comes Rock Bottom, a debut thriller and first in a series of novels that introduces one of the most fascinating and memorable characters in suspense fiction. Ten years ago, a pregnant seventeen-year-old, Angela Joy Palladino, fled her hometown, Scotia, West Virginia, as a pariah. Over time, AJ succeeded in establishing herself as an environmental activist, dubbed “The People’s Champion,” only to be forced to retreat from the spotlight in the wake of a crushing media disaster. When AJ is offered a job with a lawyer who is crusading against mountaintop removal mining, she is torn. As a single mother of a special needs nine-year-old boy, AJ can use any work she can get. But doing so will mean returning to the West Virginia hometown she left in disgrace so long ago. Upon arriving in Scotia, AJ learns of the sudden death of the lawyer who hired her. Soon after joining forces with his daughter, Elizabeth, threats begin to surface, bodies begin to pile up, and AJ discovers that her own secrets aren’t the only ones her mountain hometown has kept buried. Hitting rock bottom, AJ must face the betrayal of those once closest to her and confront the harrowing past she thought she had left behind. In Rock Bottom, Erin Brockovich combines passionate intensity, first-rate storytelling, and her real life experiences in a novel that will leave you breathless.
"An engaging wonderful story about how the powerful, rich, and famous can be brought down by an honest journalist determined to report the truth." -Honorable Mark Egerman, former mayor, Beverly Hills "Gutsy, inspiring reporting. Journalism schools everywhere should make Erin Brockovich and the Beverly Hills Greenscam required reading." -John H. Sullivan, president, Civil Justice Association of California "Zager may have been the most important element in the entire investigation . . . and that was establishing the confidence from the community that she would find the truth and report it." -Barry Brucker, former school board president and mayor, Beverly Hills This is a provocative account of Erin Brockovich's battle against the city and schools of Beverly Hills and various oil companies. When the high profile lawyer claimed oil wells were the cause of cancer in former students and community members, Norma Zager launched an investigation to prove her wrong. The journalist details the events that unfolded as a result and recalls the personal struggles of the community caught in the middle of the commotion. Zager's story serves as a cautionary tale, emphasizing the significance of checks and balances to ensure safety. In addition to providing the guidelines necessary to protect citizens, this handbook is helpful for anyone concerned about maintaining good health and a clean environment.
In this book, the real Erin Brockovich (played by Julia Roberts in the Oscar-winning film) shares her most personal challenges and shows how all of us, no matter how down-and-out, can call on our inner strength to achieve success.
“For Erin Brockovich fans, a David vs. Goliath tale with a twist” (The New York Times Book Review)—the incredible true story of the lawyer who spent two decades building a case against DuPont for its use of the hazardous chemical PFOA, uncovering the worst case of environmental contamination in history—affecting virtually every person on the planet—and the conspiracy that kept it a secret for sixty years. The story that inspired Dark Waters, the major motion picture from Focus Features starring Mark Ruffalo and Anne Hathaway, directed by Todd Haynes. 1998: Rob Bilott is a young lawyer specializing in helping big corporations stay on the right side of environmental laws and regulations. Then he gets a phone call from a West Virginia farmer named Earl Tennant, who is convinced the creek on his property is being poisoned by runoff from a neighboring DuPont landfill, causing his cattle and the surrounding wildlife to die in hideous ways. Earl hasn’t even been able to get a water sample tested by any state or federal regulatory agency or find a local lawyer willing to take the case. As soon as they hear the name DuPont—the area’s largest employer—they shut him down. Once Rob sees the thick, foamy water that bubbles into the creek, the gruesome effects it seems to have on livestock, and the disturbing frequency of cancer and other health problems in the area, he’s persuaded to fight against the type of corporation his firm routinely represents. After intense legal wrangling, Rob ultimately gains access to hundreds of thousands of pages of DuPont documents, some of them fifty years old, that reveal the company has been holding onto decades of studies proving the harmful effects of a chemical called PFOA, used in making Teflon. PFOA is often called a “forever chemical,” because once in the environment, it does not break down or degrade for millions of years, contaminating the planet forever. The case of one farmer soon spawns a class action suit on behalf of seventy thousand residents—and the shocking realization that virtually every person on the planet has been exposed to PFOA and carries the chemical in his or her blood. What emerges is a riveting legal drama “in the grand tradition of Jonathan Harr’s A Civil Action” (Booklist, starred review) about malice and manipulation, the failings of environmental regulation; and one lawyer’s twenty-year struggle to expose the truth about this previously unknown—and still unregulated—chemical that we all have inside us.
The biopic presents a profound paradox—its own conventions and historical stages of development, disintegration, investigation, parody, and revival have not gained respect in the world of film studies. That is, until now. Whose Lives Are They Anyway? boldly proves a critical point: The biopic is a genuine, dynamic genre and an important one—it narrates, exhibits, and celebrates a subject's life and demonstrates, investigates, or questions his or her importance in the world; it illuminates the finer points of a personality; and, ultimately, it provides a medium for both artist and spectator to discover what it would be like to be that person, or a certain type of person. Through detailed analyses and critiques of nearly twenty biopics, Dennis Bingham explores what is at their core—the urge to dramatize real life and find a version of the truth within it. The genre's charge, which dates back to the salad days of the Hollywood studio era, is to introduce the biographical subject into the pantheon of cultural mythology and, above all, to show that he or she belongs there. It means to discover what we learn about our culture from the heroes who rise and the leaders who emerge from cinematic representations. Bingham also zooms in on distinctions between cinematic portrayals of men and women. Films about men have evolved from celebratory warts-and-all to investigatory to postmodern and parodic. At the same time, women in biopics have been burdened by myths of suffering, victimization, and failure from which they are only now being liberated. To explore the evolution and lifecycle changes of the biopic and develop an appreciation for subgenres contained within it, there is no better source than Whose Lives Are They Anyway?
A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK • The dramatic story of the Flint water crisis, by a relentless physician who stood up to power. “Stirring . . . [a] blueprint for all those who believe . . . that ‘the world . . . should be full of people raising their voices.’”—The New York Times “Revealing, with the gripping intrigue of a Grisham thriller.” —O: The Oprah Magazine Here is the inspiring story of how Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, alongside a team of researchers, parents, friends, and community leaders, discovered that the children of Flint, Michigan, were being exposed to lead in their tap water—and then battled her own government and a brutal backlash to expose that truth to the world. Paced like a scientific thriller, What the Eyes Don’t See reveals how misguided austerity policies, broken democracy, and callous bureaucratic indifference placed an entire city at risk. And at the center of the story is Dr. Mona herself—an immigrant, doctor, scientist, and mother whose family’s activist roots inspired her pursuit of justice. What the Eyes Don’t See is a riveting account of a shameful disaster that became a tale of hope, the story of a city on the ropes that came together to fight for justice, self-determination, and the right to build a better world for their—and all of our—children. Praise for What the Eyes Don’t See “It is one thing to point out a problem. It is another thing altogether to step up and work to fix it. Mona Hanna-Attisha is a true American hero.”—Erin Brockovich “A clarion call to live a life of purpose.”—The Washington Post “Gripping . . . entertaining . . . Her book has power precisely because she takes the events she recounts so personally. . . . Moral outrage present on every page.”—The New York Times Book Review “Personal and emotional. . . She vividly describes the effects of lead poisoning on her young patients. . . . She is at her best when recounting the detective work she undertook after a tip-off about lead levels from a friend. . . . ‛Flint will not be defined by this crisis,’ vows Ms. Hanna-Attisha.”—The Economist “Flint is a public health disaster. But it was Dr. Mona, this caring, tough pediatrican turned detective, who cracked the case.”—Rachel Maddow
Rebel in High Heels is a memoir about Dr. Charlotte Laws—“the Erin Brockovich of revenge porn”—who was voted one of the “30 fiercest women in the world.” She fought a dangerous war against “the most hated man on the Internet” to protect her daughter and other victims. She was bombarded with death threats and computer viruses and targeted by a stalker who appeared at her home. But who is this woman that MSNBC calls a hero? In addition to detailing her gripping revenge porn fight, this book chronicles the first 22 years of Laws’ life. Her adoptive mother committed suicide, her little brother was killed, and her father’s only comment was he wished it had been her. Laws’ first boyfriend was pop idol Tom Jones. She has hobnobbed with the rich and famous. Though not born with VIP access, she taught herself how to gate-crash any event, anywhere, anytime. Rebel in High Heels details Laws’ intriguing—sometimes scandalous—encounters with Bill Cosby and other stars. At age 20, Laws earned 300k per year as a Las Vegas chip-chatter. She also worked as a bandit cab driver, a backup singer for an Elvis imitator and bodyguard for a prostitute. Laws—a former Southern California politician and weekly NBC commentator—has appeared on “The Late Show,” Fox News, “Oprah,” “Nightline,” CNN, “Dr. Drew” and “Larry King Live.” She has a Ph.D. in Social Ethics, as well as two Master’s degrees and two BAs. Her articles have been published in The Huffington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, Jezebel, Salon and the L.A. Daily News. Rebel in High Heels is mostly about perseverance and looking beyond oneself. It is about fighting for ones dreams, while striving to better the world. Laws is the little Atlanta girl who could. And did. _____ “Dr. Charlotte Laws became the ‘Erin Brockovich of revenge porn.’” —CBS News “Never underestimate a former Buckhead debutante.” —The Atlanta Journal-Constitution “This book is two for the price of one. Rebel in High Heels provides a gripping account of Charlotte Laws’ dangerous battle against revenge porn. But it also details Laws’ roller-coaster early years: dating a superstar, dealing with suicide, hobnobbing with celebrities, fighting racism and being thrust into the glitzy world of ‘sex for sale.’ By following Laws’ bold, life-crashing adventures, the reader learns how to become a rebel and a relentless advocate for victims. This memoir is about persistence, leading an active life and helping others. Laws invents her own recipe for success. She reveals her secrets in this mesmerizing tell-all book, tidbit by tasty tidbit.” —Every Way Woman Show “I didn’t realize how brave Charlotte Laws is until I see her in action.” —The Guardian "Charlotte Laws singlehandedly dismantled the empire of pure evil that earned Hunter Moore the title of ‘Most Hated Man on the Internet.’” —MSNBC “Charlotte Laws… a very appropriate last name. Trying to get laws passed in a number of states.” —Fox News "If you care about women, you need this book. Charlotte Laws is the Erin Brockovich of ‘revenge porn,’ and she will change your life just like she changed mine. Buy this for your daughters, your sisters, your mother and yourself.” —Mandy Stadtmiller, deputy editor, xojane “Charlotte Laws [is] a prominent anti-revenge porn activist.” —Washington Post “I am glad that Charlotte is sharing her story in writing this book. It is important that we educate people about revenge porn and the devastating effects on victims.” —Senator Anthony Cannella, California “In spite of the risks, Laws took up the sword.” —YES! Magazine “When Charlotte gets something in mind, nothing can stop her…She has embarked upon lots of activities in her life but with one purpose: to fight for her beliefs.” —Stylist Magazine “My goodness, she does a lot!” —LA Talk Radio
Presenting a wide scope of problems caused by B12 deficiency, this comprehensive guide provides up-to-date medical information about symptoms, testing, diagnosis, and treatment. Written for both the patient and the interested layperson, this detailed book outlines how physicians frequently misdiagnose B12 deficiency as Alzheimer's disease, multiple sclerosis, heart disease, mental retardation, Parkinson's disease, depression, or other mental illnesses. Now in the second edition, this resource has been thoroughly updated with the latest research, diagnostic tests, treatment options, case studies, and testimonials.
