The first in a Trilogy, Hippie Chick Reunion represents a bold step in contemporary fiction. Contrasting the 60's experience with present day, cultural and spiritual themes are skillfuly woven into a traditional 'Sisterhood Styled' beach read. 300 pages along with access to online discussion guide, glossary of more than 500 entries, Synopsis Join six psychedelic sisters on the journey of their lives! Thirty years after trading her macramé bag for Prada, a popular self-help coach stages a nostalgic beachside weekend to reunite six formerly inseparable childhood friends. When her plan to replicate an authentic sixties experience stirs up vivid memories of bold, impassioned ideals, the women begin to wonder if the paths they¿ve chosen are leading them astray. As the story unfolds, each woman is offered a glimpse of a richer, more authentic life. But will they have the courage to live it? Profits go to Outreach Partners Network for Compassion in Action
In Hippie Chick, a rebellious teenager finds her mother dead in the bathroom. To save her from living alone with a difficult father, her older sister sends her a one-way plane ticket to leave New Jersey. Landing in San Francisco, she is thrust into a lifestyle way beyond what she is ready for, and that challenges all previous notions of how one behaves. It is 1963, and we are brought along as Ilene becomes immersed in the unfolding of the sixties during the earliest days of sexual freedom, psychedelic drugs, the jazz scene, and rock ’n’ roll. This is a deeply personal story of how one young woman manages to survive and even to thrive in the face of the whirlwind of experiences coming at her. It is filled with a rich tapestry of moments that run the gamut from the sublime to the ridiculous, and everything in between.
In making her selection for Pharos Editions, Dana Spiotta tells us how drawn she was by the work of Raymond Mungo. "[He] writes . . . about his own joy and his own pain, he is particularly good when he describes the land around him and how it feels on his body." Indeed, if Henry David Thoreau had downed a handful of liberty caps before penning Walden it would have read much like Mungo's Total Loss Farm, a rollicking memoir of the late 1960's back–to–the–earth movement. Written in a limber prose style formed by the tempo of the times, Mungo takes us into the cultural tsunami of a failed radical politics as it broke on the shoals of a drug–fueled personal freedom and washed inland across the farmlands of Vermont, leaving a trail of damage and redemption in its wake. Total Loss Farm attracted widespread critical and commercial attention in 1970, when the "back–to–the–land" hippie commune movement first emerged. The book's first section, "Another Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers," appeared as the cover article in the May 1970 issue of Atlantic Monthly. The hardcover first edition from Dutton was quickly followed by paperback editions from Bantam, Avon, and Madrona Publishers, keeping the book in print for several decades. Very recently, Dwight Garner in the New York Times Book Review cited Total Loss Farm as "the best and also the loopiest of the commune books."
NAMED ONE OF THE TOP 10 ROCK MEMOIRS OF ALL TIME BY ROLLING STONE From Chic to Daft Punk, Nile Rodgers is the creative force behind some of the biggest hits ever recorded. Here is the story of how global pop’s greatest genius transformed his own dramatic life into the brilliantly joyful playlist of a generation. You will hear a Nile Rodgers song today. It will make you happy. In the 1970s and 1980s, Nile Rodgers wrote and produced the songs that defined the era and everything that came after: “Le Freak,” “Good Times,” “We Are Family,” “Like a Virgin,” “Let’s Dance,” “I’m Coming Out,” “Rapper’s Delight”—and worked with every influential pop star to create a string of enduring hits, from Diana Ross and Madonna to Duran Duran and David Bowie. Even today, he is still musically relevant: writing and performing record-breaking hits like “Get Lucky” with Daft Punk and Pharrell. But before he reinvented pop music, Nile Rodgers invented himself. From jamming with Jimi Hendrix in a Greenwich Village haze to the decadence of the disco era to witnessing the birth of Madonna on the Danceteria dance floor, Le Freak traces one of the greatest musical journeys of our time. Praise for Le Freak “[An] amazing memoir . . . steeped in the incestuous energy of the times: Punk, funk and art rock mixed it up in the downtown clubs, where musicians partied together and shared ideas. . . . Le Freak has plenty of sex and drugs. But it’s the music that makes it essential. . . . Rodgers gave those dreams a beat—and helped invent pop as we know it today.”—Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone “This book is an absolute knockout: exhilarating, warm, and courageous, deeply moving and deeply funny. Le Freak is as much about the greatness of life as it is about Nile Rodgers’s extraordinary musical journey. As Rodgers well knows, the best music is the stuff we feel, the stuff that speaks to us and won’t let go. Le Freak does all that and much more. This is truly one of the best books ever written about art, music, life, and the way we grow to be exactly who we are. Actually, one of the best books period.”—Cameron Crowe “A coming-of-age tale every bit as impressive as the musical insights and star-time chronicles that follow.”—The New York Times Book Review “Consistently entertaining . . . His legacy as a funk-rock visionary is assured, and his autobiography serves as further proof that disco does not suck.”—San Francisco Chronicle “An unforgettable, gripping book.”—The Sunday Times (UK) “Name a star and you can bet they’re in this book, playing or partying with Rodgers. But far from being a succession of name-dropping anecdotes, this autobiography is a wonderfully funny, moving and wise reflection upon the important things in life: the people you love and the things you create.”—The Sunday Telegraph (UK) “Rodgers’s page-turning memoir is packed with emotionally charged vignettes of a tumultuous childhood and equally dramatic adulthood that found him awash in cash, cars, and celebrities. . . . His storytelling skills propel the reader through the book, making the ending all the more jarring. Remarkable for its candor, this rags-to-riches story is on the year’s shortlist of celebrity memoirs.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Therese Fowler's Exposure and a Reunion discussion guide. Blue Reynolds, celebrity talk show host and queen of daytime television, appears to have it all. But no one knows the secret she has harbored for the last twenty years—a secret that could destroy her image, her reputation, and her career. A week in Key West to do her show on location brings Blue a much-needed change of pace—and an unexpected reunion with an old flame, Mitch Forrester. Helping him launch a television series may help her recapture the kind of genuine romance long missing from her life. But it also means dealing with Mitch’s disapproving son, Julian, who is only nine years younger than Blue. Back from his years as a war photographer in the world’s most dangerous hotspots, Julian struggles to get close to his father while making his disdain for Blue crystal clear—which makes his desire for her all the more surprising. As serendipity and scandal collide, Therese Fowler’s passionate, illuminating novel takes a dramatic turn deep into our own hearts, as the healing power of love transforms regrets into new beginnings. Look for special features inside. Join the Circle for author chats and more. RandomHouseReadersCircle.com
Brianna Karp entered the workforce at age ten, supporting her mother and sister throughout her teen years in Southern California. Although her young life was scarred by violence and abuse, Karp stayed focused on her dream of a steady job and a home of her own. By age twenty-two her dream became reality. Karp loved her job as an executive assistant and signed the lease on a tiny cottage near the beach. And then the Great Recession hit. Karp, like millions of others, lost her job. In the six months between the day she was laid off and the day she was forced out onto the street, Karp scrambled for temp work and filed hundreds of job applications, only to find all doors closed. When she inherited a thirty-foot travel trailer after her father's suicide, Karp parked it in a Walmart parking lot and began to blog about her search for work and a way back.
This fascinating book is the first volume in a projected cultural history of the United States, from the earliest English settlements to our own time. It is a history of American folkways as they have changed through time, and it argues a thesis about the importance for the United States of having been British in its cultural origins. While most people in the United States today have no British ancestors, they have assimilated regional cultures which were created by British colonists, even while preserving ethnic identities at the same time. In this sense, nearly all Americans are "Albion's Seed," no matter what their ethnicity may be. The concluding section of this remarkable book explores the ways that regional cultures have continued to dominate national politics from 1789 to 1988, and still help to shape attitudes toward education, government, gender, and violence, on which differences between American regions are greater than between European nations.
THE STORY: Snowed in overnight at a middle-America airport, college lovers Elena Carson and Reed McAllister have an unexpected and life-altering reunion. Elena has stayed true to her hippie-ish, counter-culture path, while Reed has gone predictably
Hippie Chick is a fine art, hardcover coffee table book by famed rock and roll photographer Jay Blakesberg. Featuring 445 images shot over the past three decades, Hippie Chick celebrates the unique connection between the vibrant community of free-spirited women who are inspired by, and help inspire, live music. Blakesberg's visual anthropology beautifully captures the feminine festival and concert archetypes, and the individuals, who have graced the fields and performance halls of America since 1980. Earth mamas and fairy princesses, hula hoopers and whirling dervishes, front row regulars and flower crown makers; the entire tribe of dedicated, music-loving women-their fashion and their passion-is sensuously brought to life through Blakesberg's artful lens. Iconic rocker and pioneering hippie chick Grace Slick (Jefferson Airplane) provides the book's Foreword, offering a retrospective of women in the original hippie-era music scene. In the Afterword, modern-day hippie chick and freewheeling frontwoman Grace Potter considers how women today carry on the legacy of the demographic. Freelance journalist Edith Johnson contributes the book's Introduction and chapter essays, entitled "Love," "Devotion," and "Surrender." During the preparation of Hippie Chick, Johnson interviewed 81 different women from the live music scene. Their colorful anecdotes have been distilled into a series of quotes selected to accompany Blakesberg's images, bringing further dimension to the book's overarching theme of what it means to be a hippie chick.
