Jenny Nordbak takes us to a place that few have seen, but millions have fantasized about, revealing how she transformed herself from a USC grad lacking in confidence into an elite professional dominatrix who finds her own voice, power and compassion for others. On an unorthodox quest to understand her hidden fantasies, Jenny led a double life for two years. By day she was a construction manager, but at night she became Mistress Scarlett. Working at LA’s longest-running dungeon, she catered to the secret fetishes of clients ranging from accountants to movie stars. She simultaneously developed a career in the complex and male-dominated world of healthcare construction, while spending her nights as a sex worker, dominating men. Far from the standard-issue powerful men who pay to be helpless, Mistress Scarlett’s clientele included men whose fantasies revealed more complex needs, from “Tickle Ed” to “Doggie Dan,” from the “Treasure Trolls” to “Ta-Da Ted.” The Scarlett Letters explores the spectacularly diverse array of human sexuality and the fascinating cast of characters that the author encountered along the way.
Beautiful actress Martha Lawrence has a problem. Her once loving husband, Dirk, has become violent and controlling, and she doesn't know why. When she reaches out to their friend, mystery-solver Ellery Queen for help, Dirk interrupts their meeting in a drunken rage. He is convinced that the two are having an affair. Martha needs Ellery's help to convince Dirk that she's never cheated and never will. But from the clues he uncovers, it looks as if Martha might be two-timing after all. If Dirk is a cuckold, is his anger justifiable? And who is responsible if it results in murder? Ellery must figure out who is responsible for crippling a marriage before someone gets killed in the name of love.
Like its namesake, Scarlet Letters addresses the hard truths of life in an increasingly "progressive" America where the irrational prejudices of a group can crush the soul of the individual. In both the old and new puritanism, worshippers achieve a sense of moral worth simply by designating themselves among "the elect"--no good works required. To validate that uncertain status, they feel compelled to heap abuse upon the sinner lest they too be thought guilty of the sin. Rather than simply cataloging the neo-puritan assaults on reason and liberty, Scarlet Letters illustrates how the progressive movement came to mimic a religion in its structure but not at all in its spirit while profiling those brave individuals who dared to take a stand against this inquisition. In the neo-puritan world, all conservatives are an awkwardly worded tweet away from being branded a homophobe, a racist, a sexist, an Islamophobe or worse. Progressives force assumptions upon anyone who disagrees with their political and social agenda. Those who dare suggest a violent attack was committed by someone of Islamic faith is an Islamophobe. Those who identify the race of even a wanted criminal is a racist. Those who don't support gay marriage are homophobes with a capitol "H." In the eyes of the progressive neo-puritan, that word - that letter - becomes all that a person is. With real-life examples from sexist Clarence Thomas to Islamophobe Ayaan Hirsi Ali to racist Paula Deen to homophobe Phil Robertson, author Jack Cashill explains how a person's identity is reduced to the cruelest of stereotypes. Falsified narratives and manufactured outrage perpetuate the neo-puritan goals, whether they be affecting a presidential election, or simply undermining an individual's personal opinion in order to drag them down. Discover how progressive forces have eroded traditional American values and how the movement became inquisitional and vengeful. Find out how individuals and organization have found the courage to resist this movement and what you can do to fight back successfully.
In Puritan America, a married woman's illicit affair with a minister landed her in jail. After her release, Hester Prynne was sentenced to forever wear a big red "A" on her dress. Nearly 375 years later, the U.S. continues to be scandalized, tantalized, and perplexed by sex.This book offers:- Former offenders - inspiration and hope- Neighbors and families - knowledge and courage- Public agencies - best practices, leading to improved safety- Professionals - better outcomes for clients- Victims of assault - understanding and empowerment- Lawmakers - ideas about fair, effective policiesIt's time to bring the subject of sex crime out of the Dark Ages, time to help victims shed the shame and trauma of their experience. It's also time to allow offenders an opportunity to show they can change, make amends, and start to earn back trust and acceptance from society.
Ellery Queen was both fictional detective and literary pseudonym, created in 1929 by cousins Frederic Dannay and Manfred Lee. Ellery Queen starred in over 30 novels and short story collections, along with a popular radio show, several television adaptations, and numerous films. Ellery Queen received the Grand Master Award of the Mystery Writers of America, and founded and edited Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, the most important magazine in the field. These three Dell Four Color comics (published in 1961 and 1962) were the fourth appearance of Ellery Queen in comic book format.
One month after her novel Gone With the Wind was published, Margaret Mitchell sold the movie rights for fifty thousand dollars. Fearful of what the studio might do to her story—“I wouldn’t put it beyond Hollywood to have . . . Scarlett seduce General Sherman,” she joked—the author washed her hands of involvement with the film. However, driven by a maternal interest in her literary firstborn and compelled by her Southern manners to answer every fan letter she received, Mitchell was unable to stay aloof for long. In this collection of her letters about the 1939 motion picture classic, readers have a front-row seat as the author watches the Dream Factory at work, learning the ins and outs of filmmaking and discovering the peculiarities of a movie-crazed public. Her ability to weave a story, so evident in Gone With the Wind,makes for delightful reading in her correspondence with a who’s who of Hollywood, from producer David O. Selznick, director George Cukor, and screenwriter Sidney Howard, to cast members Clark Gable, Vivien Leigh, Leslie Howard, Olivia de Havilland and Hattie McDaniel. Mitchell also wrote to thousands of others—aspiring actresses eager to play Scarlett O’Hara; fellow Southerners hopeful of seeing their homes or their grandmother’s dress used in the film; rabid movie fans determined that their favorite star be cast; and creators of songs, dolls and Scarlett panties who were convinced the author was their ticket to fame and fortune. During the film’s production, she corrected erring journalists and the producer’s over-the-top publicist who fed the gossip mills, accuracy be damned. Once the movie finished, she struggled to deal with friends and strangers alike who “fought and trampled little children and connived and broke the ties of lifelong friendship” to get tickets to the premiere. But through it all, she retained her sense of humor. Recounting an acquaintance’s denial of the rumor that the author herself was going to play Scarlett, Mitchell noted he “ungallantly stated that I was something like fifty years too old for the part.” After receiving numerous letters and phone calls from the studio about Belle Watling’s accent, the author related her father was “convulsed at the idea of someone telephoning from New York to discover how the madam of a Confederate bordello talked.” And in a chatty letter to Gable after the premiere, Mitchell coyly admitted being “feminine enough to be quite charmed” by his statement to the press that she was “fascinating,” but added: “Even my best friends look at me in a speculative way—probably wondering what they overlooked that your sharp eyes saw!” As Gone With the Wind marks its seventy-fifth anniversary on the silver screen, these letters, edited by Mitchell historian John Wiley, Jr., offer a fresh look at the most popular motion picture of all time through the eyes of the woman who gave birth to Scarlett.
It's 1699, and the salons of Paris are bursting with the creative energy of fierce, independent-minded women. But outside those doors, the patriarchal forces of Louis XIV and the Catholic Church are moving to curb their freedoms. In this battle for equality, Baroness Marie Catherine D'Aulnoy invents a powerful weapon: 'fairy tales'. When Marie Catherine's daughter, Angelina, arrives in Paris for the first time, she is swept up in the glamour and sensuality of the city, where a woman may live outside the confines of the church or marriage. But this is a fragile freedom, as she discovers when Marie Catherine's close friend Nicola Tiquet is arrested, accused of conspiring to murder her abusive husband. In the race to rescue Nicola, illusions will be shattered and dark secrets revealed as all three women learn how far they will go to preserve their liberty in a society determined to control them. This keenly-awaited second book from Melissa Ashley, author of The Birdman's Wife, restores another remarkable, little-known woman to her rightful place in history, revealing the dissent hidden beneath the whimsical surfaces of Marie Catherine's fairy tales. The Bee and the Orange Tree is a beautifully lyrical and deeply absorbing portrait of a time, a place, and the subversive power of the imagination.
