In some of these eight stories, there are people who discover too late that they shouldn't have looked too closely into a mirror, or believed what they saw and heard in it, or dared to wander into the dark side of a mirror.
This new commentary by Buddhist teacher and author David Brazier draws back the curtain revealing the deeper meaning of the text in language that will be as transparent to the general reader as it is informative to the specialist.
The classic Buddhist text in three engaging new translations, with commentary from contemporary Zen masters. One of the greatest religious practitioners and philosophers of the East, Eihei Dogen Zenji (1200–1253) is today thought of as the founder of the Soto school of Zen. A deep thinker and writer, he was deeply involved in monastic methods and in integrating Zen realization into daily life. At times The Shobogenzo was profoundly difficult, and he worked on it over his entire life, revising and expanding, producing a book that is today thought to be one of the highest manifestations of Buddhist thought ever produced. Dogen’s Genjo Koan (Actualization of Reality) is the first chapter in that book, and for many followers it might be thought to contain the gist of Dogen’s work—it is one of the groundwork texts of Zen Buddhism, standing easily alongside The Diamond Sutra, The Heart Sutra, and a small handful of others. Our unique edition of Dogen’s Genjo Koan contains three separate translations and several commentaries by a wide variety of Zen masters. Nishiari Bokusan, Shohaku Okamura, Shunryu Suzuki, Kosho Uchiyama. Sojun Mel Weitsman, Kazuaki Tanahashi, and Dairyu Michael Wenger all have contributed to our presentation of this remarkable work. There can be no doubt that understanding and integrating this text will have a profound effect on anyone’s life and practice.
With some corn syrup, drink mix powder and water, you can make a splendid concoction of stage blood--without spending an arm and a leg. From budget-friendly frights to sophisticated props, this book offers dozens of imaginative ways to haunt a house for Halloween. Readers will find generously illustrated step-by-step instructions for creating a barbecued skull, devil eyes, bonehead tableware, a magic bottle, a glowing brain and other projects. The book details ways to enhance an eerie ambiance with effects like blacklights and music. Props use many common household items and tools. Where specialty items are required, the author tells where they can be found at a reasonable cost. Projects take anywhere from a few hours to several days to complete. The chapters ooze with tips on topics like creating apprehension and surprise, using design to guide guests, creatively using plastic skulls, and making papier-mache masks and molded hands. There are recipes for fake blood and vomit and ideas for using them, and other creative and adaptable ideas. Appendices include "Merry Halloween," which advises, "One of the best times to look for bargains on Halloween prop-building materials is right after Christmas"; an alphabetical listing of props and supplies and where they can be found; a list of specialty suppliers; and an "epitaph" inviting comments.
Set in the universe of Star Trek: The Next Generation, a doorway is opened from another universe and the crew of the U.S.S Enterprise must battle their toughest enemy yet—themselves. One hundred years ago, four crewmembers of the U.S.S EnterpriseTM crossed the dimensional barrier and found a mirror image of their own universe, populated by nightmare duplicates of their shipmates. Barely able to escape with their lives, they returned, thankful that the accident which had brought them there could not be duplicated, or so they thought. But now the scientists of that empire have found a doorway into our universe. Their plan is to destroy from within, to replace a Federation Starships with one of their own. Their victims are the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701-D, who now find themselves engaged in combat against the most savage enemies they have ever encountered, themselves.
Bedeckt defined himself by the list of crimes he was unwilling to commit. It was such a short list. How could straying from it have gone so wrong? Now Bedeckt must undo the damage caused by wandering from his precious list. The Geborene god seeks to remake the world with his obsessive need for cleanliness and perfection, but Bedeckt is going to bring him down. Nothing can stop him. Not even death. The two friends he abandonded in the Afterdeath chase after Bedeckt, bent on revenge. Psychotic assassins hunt him. Something cold and evil follows, lurking in the clouds above, shredding reality with its delusions. Madness and sanity war, stretching and tearing the very fabric of existence. The dead shall rise.
From the three-time Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the New York Times bestseller Angler, who unearthed the deepest secrets of Edward Snowden's NSA archive, the first master narrative of the surveillance state that emerged after 9/11 and why it matters, based on scores of hours of conversation with Snowden and groundbreaking reportage in Washington, London, Moscow and Silicon Valley Edward Snowden chose three journalists to tell the stories in his Top Secret trove of NSA documents: Barton Gellman of The Washington Post, Glenn Greenwald of The Guardian and filmmaker Laura Poitras, all of whom would share the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. Poitras went on to direct the Oscar-winning Citizen Four. Greenwald wrote an instant memoir and cast himself as a pugilist on Snowden's behalf. Barton Gellman took his own path. Snowden and his documents were the beginning, not the end, of a story he had prepared his whole life to tell. More than 20 years as a top investigative journalist armed him with deep sources in national security and high technology. New sources reached out from government and industry, making contact on the same kinds of secret, anonymous channels that Snowden used. Gellman's old reporting notes unlocked new puzzles in the NSA archive. Long days and evenings with Snowden in Moscow revealed a complex character who fit none of the stock images imposed on him by others. Gellman now brings his unique access and storytelling gifts to a true-life spy tale that touches us all. Snowden captured the public imagination but left millions of people unsure what to think. Who is the man, really? How did he beat the world's most advanced surveillance agency at its own game? Is government and corporate spying as bad as he says? Dark Mirror is the master narrative we have waited for, told with authority and an inside view of extraordinary events. Within it is a personal account of the obstacles facing the author, beginning with Gellman's discovery of his own name in the NSA document trove. Google notifies him that a foreign government is trying to compromise his account. A trusted technical adviser finds anomalies on his laptop. Sophisticated impostors approach Gellman with counterfeit documents, attempting to divert or discredit his work. Throughout Dark Mirror, the author describes an escalating battle against unknown digital adversaries, forcing him to mimic their tradecraft in self-defense. Written in the vivid scenes and insights that marked Gellman's bestselling Angler, Dark Mirror is an inside account of the surveillance-industrial revolution and its discontents, fighting back against state and corporate intrusions into our most private spheres. Along the way it tells the story of a government leak unrivaled in drama since All the President's Men.
A dazzlingly original and ambitious book on the history of female self-portraiture by one of today's most well-respected art critics. Her story weaves in and out of time and place. She's Frida Kahlo, Loïs Mailou Jones and Amrita Sher-Gil en route to Mexico City, Paris or Bombay. She's Suzanne Valadon and Gwen John, craving city lights, the sea and solitude; she's Artemisia Gentileschi striding through the streets of Naples and Paula Modersohn-Becker in Worpswede. She's haunting museums in her paint-stained dress, scrutinising how El Greco or Titian or Van Dyck or Cézanne solved the problems that she too is facing. She's railing against her corsets, her chaperones, her husband and her brothers; she's hammering on doors, dreaming in her bedroom, working day and night in her studio. Despite the immense hurdles that have been placed in her way, she sits at her easel, picks up a mirror and paints a self-portrait because, as a subject, she is always available. Until the twentieth century, art history was, in the main, written by white men who tended to write about other white men. The idea that women in the West have always made art was rarely cited as a possibility. Yet they have - and, of course, continue to do so - often against tremendous odds, from laws and religion to the pressures of family and public disapproval. In The Mirror and the Palette, Jennifer Higgie introduces us to a cross-section of women artists who embody the fact that there is more than one way to understand our planet, more than one way to live in it and more than one way to make art about it. Spanning 500 years, biography and cultural history intertwine in a narrative packed with tales of rebellion, adventure, revolution, travel and tragedy enacted by women who turned their back on convention and lived lives of great resilience, creativity and bravery.
Lutoyia, an eighteen-cycle old girl, has always lived a life of torment and ridicule for a past she could do nothing about. Living in a city of humans that hate her, Lutoyia passes each day by escaping the brutal hunt of a pack of teenagers. One day, the hunt forces Lutoyia to an unknown forest where she meets the unbelievable a dragon. This dragon, Falkor, offers Lutoyia a chance to escape from the torment of her human city and enter the magical side of their world, Karida. In return, Lutoyia must help Falkor in his quest to defeat a Dark Mage called Lakardos, who plans to bleed a demonic dimension into their world. But before Lutoyia can accept the deal, she must prove something to Falkor. She has to be the vessel to his dead brothers soul a DragonSoul. Along their quest, Lutoyia meets magnificent creatures she never dreamed of, faces incredible challenges and hardships and even begins to build allies; all in the attempt to save their world. Will they succeed