Speaker and New York Times best-selling author Andy Andrews shares a compelling and powerful story about a decision one man made over a hundred years ago, and the ripple effect it's had on us individually, and nationwide, today. It's a story that will inspire courage and wisdom in the decisions we make, as well as affect the way we treat others through our lifetime. Andrews speaks over 100 times a year, and The Butterfly Effect is his #1 most requested story.
Balousek presents a collection of some of the most baffling mysteries in Wisconsin history, including unsolved murders, haunted houses, UFO sightings, and strange environmental phenomena.
War between the stars. It was started by an AI, and few humans even knew there was a war at all. But now people are dying, not just robots and aliens—and the AI wants it to stop. But a war is easier to start than to stop, and the computer can't alter its course without outside help. When the Gnostic Control System searches for conspirators, it chooses its friends carefully... Pali: a public relations director, who broods far too much on her unfulfilled ambitions.Ramo: a flamboyant senso-dancer and sculptor, who prefers a musical jamdam to serious conversation.Sage: an awkward systems designer, for whom the AI rapture-field is realer than life.And three of the alien Ell: Harybdartt, who would rather die with dignity than betray his people; Lingrhetta, who tries to unravel the meaning of human dance and music, pain and love; and Moramaharta, the binder, who must persuade his fellow decision-makers to risk everything for the sake of a fragile bridge of understanding across the stars. A thought-provoking novel of the not-too-distant future, from the Nebula-nominated author of Eternity’s End and The Chaos Chronicles. REVIEWS: “The story is meaty and satisfying. I enjoyed this one greatly.” —Analog Science Fiction “An absorbing, suspenseful novel of first contact and interstellar war. It’s a complex book, requiring concentration from the reader, and is well worth the effort.”—Aboriginal SF “A lively dance of ideas—first contact, interstellar war, artificial intelligence, alien culture—and it moves at a rapid pace, from Earth through cyberspace to the Horsehead Nebula, and various points between. It’s well-worth the trip ticket.” —Roger Zelazny Originally published by Tor Books
'A great read and a fascinating insight into performance.' Sir Clive Woodward We all want to discover our hidden talents and make an impact with them. But how? Rasmus Ankersen, an ex-footballer and performance specialist, quit his job and for six intense months lived with the world's best athletes in an attempt to answer this question. Why have the best middle distance runners grown up in the same Ethiopian village? Why are the leading female golfers from South Korea? How did one athletic club in Kingston, Jamaica, succeed in producing so many world-class sprinters? Ankersen presents his surprising conclusions in seven lessons on how anyone - or any business, organisation or team - can defy the many misconceptions of high performance and learn to build their own gold mine of real talent.
Raymond Carver's fiction is widely known for its careful documentation of lower-middle-class North America in the 1970s and 80s. Building upon the realist understanding of Carver's work, Raymond Carver's Chronotope uses a central concept of Bakhtin's novelistics to formulate a new context for understanding the celebrated author's minimalist fiction. G. P. Lainsbury describes the critical reception of Carver's work and stakes out his own intellectual and imaginative territory by arguing that Carver's fiction can be understood as diffuse, fragmentary, and randomly ordered. Offering a fresh analysis of Carver's body of work, this book offers an extensive meditation on this major figure in postmodern U.S. fiction.
The Flying Dutchman of the stars! Rigger and star pilot Renwald Legroeder undertakes a search for the legendary ghost ship Impris—and her passengers and crew—whose fate is entwined with interstellar piracy, quantum defects in space-time, galactic coverup conspiracies, and deep-cyber romance. Can Legroeder and his Narseil crewmates find the lost ship in time to prevent a disastrous interstellar war? An epic-scale novel of the Star Rigger Universe, and a finalist for the Nebula Award, from the author of The Chaos Chronicles. Now with the original cover art by Stephen Youll. REVIEWS: “True love, cognitive dissonance, divisions among the enemy, ambitious schemes, another mission—this one deeper than anyone has ever gone before into the substrata of the Flux—and a final resolution that leaves the reader both breathless and satisfied.” —Analog “You don’t want to wait for the paperback.” —Science Fiction Chronicle “A mesmerizing tale of human perseverance and courage under pressure that updates the legend of the Flying Dutchman.” —Library Journal “Carver never runs out of new plot twists to keep the reader coming back for more.” —The Washington Post
Chains carved from a single block of wood, cages whittled with wooden balls rattling inside—all "made with just a pocketknife"—are among our most enduring folk designs. Who makes them and why? what is their history? what do they mean for their makers, for their viewers, for our society? Simon J. Bronner portrays four wood carvers in southern Indiana, men who had been transplanted from the rural landscapes of their youth to industrial towns. After retiring, they took up a skill they remembered from childhood. Bronner discusses how creativity helped these men adjust to change and how viewers' responses to carving reflect their own backgrounds. By recording the narratives of these men's lives, the stories and anecdotes that laced their conversation, Bronner finds new insight into the functions and symbolism of traditional craft. Including anew illustrated afterword in which the author discusses recent developments in the carver's art, this new edition will appeal to carvers, scholars, and anyone interested in traditional woodworking.
Beginning with Norman Borlaug and going back to those who influenced him directly or indirectly, shows how one ordinary boy came to develop "super plants" that helped save billions of people from starvation.