A Founding Father, a Victorian novelist and a Russian revolutionary walk into a…stop me if you’ve heard this one. Thomas Jefferson (yes that one), Charles Dickens (the very same) and Count Leo Tolstoy (who else?) are brought together in a blistering battle of wits. From Scott Carter (executive producer of Real Time with Bill Maher), this whip-smart comedy examines what happens when great men of history are forced to repeat it.
"Darkly hilarious...an unexpected bundle of joy." -O, The Oprah Magazine Alice Cohen was happy for the first time in years. After a difficult divorce, she had a new love in her life, she was raising a beloved adopted daughter, and her career was blossoming. Then she started experiencing mysterious symptoms. After months of tests, x-rays, and inconclusive diagnoses, Alice underwent a CAT scan that revealed the truth: she was six months pregnant. At age forty-four, with no prenatal care and no insurance coverage for a high-risk pregnancy, Alice was besieged by opinions from doctors and friends about what was ethical, what was loving, what was right. With the intimacy of a diary and the suspense of a thriller, What I Thought I Knew is a ruefully funny, wickedly candid tale; a story of hope and renewal that turns all of the "knowns" upside down.
Originally published in 1885, What I Believe is part of series of books by novelist Leo Tolstoy that outline his personal interpretation of Christian theology. After a midlife crisis at age 50, he began to believe in the moral teachings of Christianity, while rejecting mysticism and organized religion. He believed that pacifism and poverty were the paths to enlightenment. His precepts of nonviolence even influenced Mohandas Gandhi. Students of religion, political science, and literature alike will gain new understanding from the ideas presented in this book. Students of literature will get to understand more deeply one of the greatest novelist in history, while those interested in religion and politics can see how Tolstoy's philosophy came to influence the world at large. Russian writer COUNT LEV ("LEO") NIKOLAYEVICH TOLSTOY (1828-1910) is best known for his novels War and Peace (1869) and Anna Karenina (1877).
Pastor Bobby has come to Harmony just in time for the 25th Annual Harmony Baptist Church Christmas Jubilee. As the town readies for the celebration, things start to fall apart. No one can decide who will play the angel in the pageant, the star on the Christmas tree won't light up, the fruitcake bake-off is a disaster, and worst of all the baby Jesus is missing. But as the town fights to hold on to their traditions, they learn that maybe progress isn't a dirty word.
A PBS NewsHour Best Book of the Year A Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year in Nonfiction A brilliant scholar imparts the lessons bequeathed by the Black community and its remarkable artists and thinkers. Farah Jasmine Griffin has taken to her heart the phrase "read until you understand," a line her father, who died when she was nine, wrote in a note to her. She has made it central to this book about love of the majestic power of words and love of the magnificence of Black life. Griffin has spent years rooted in the culture of Black genius and the legacy of books that her father left her. A beloved professor, she has devoted herself to passing these works and their wisdom on to generations of students. Here, she shares a lifetime of discoveries: the ideas that inspired the stunning oratory of Frederick Douglass and Malcolm X, the soulful music of Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder, the daring literature of Phillis Wheatley and Toni Morrison, the inventive artistry of Romare Bearden, and many more. Exploring these works through such themes as justice, rage, self-determination, beauty, joy, and mercy allows her to move from her aunt’s love of yellow roses to Gil Scott-Heron’s "Winter in America." Griffin entwines memoir, history, and art while she keeps her finger on the pulse of the present, asking us to grapple with the continuing struggle for Black freedom and the ongoing project that is American democracy. She challenges us to reckon with our commitment to all the nation’s inhabitants and our responsibilities to all humanity.
Statistically Speaking is a book of quotations. It brings together the best expressed thoughts that are especially illuminating and pertinent to the disciplines of probability and statistics. The book is an aid for the individual who loves to quote – and to quote correctly.
"Alf Evers, who completed this work months shy of his 100th birthday, is perhaps the foremost chronicler of the history and color of the Hudson Valley region. He has delved deeply through the historical record, as well as innumerable first-hand accounts and anecdotes, to provide readers with the full story of the city that played a vital part in the founding of the United States. Inhabited by Indians since pre-history, colonized by Dutch traders in the seventeenth century, oppressed by British Colonial rule, and an important locus of action during the American Revolution, Kingston was also the home of progressive thinkers in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries"--from front jacket flap.
By the fall of 1879, Count Leo Tolstoy, the 51-year-old author of War and Peace and Anna Karenina had arrived at the conclusion that he had achieved nothing of lasting value and that his life was meaningless and evil. From this point until his death in 1910, Tolstoy embarked on a spiritual journey, a search for God and the nature of truth, that became the dominant theme of his life and subsequent writings. The publications of his new-found religious and moral beliefs and his condemnation of capitalism, private property, and the division of labour eventually incited the anger of the tsarist government and led to his excommunication from the Russian Orthodox Church.
Thelma and Louise meets The First Wives Club in this fun and flirtatious comedy. Divorcées Mary and Jo are suspicious of their friend Liz’s new dentist boyfriend. He’s not just a weirdo; he may be a serial killer! After all, his hygienist just disappeared. Trading their wine glasses for spy glasses, imaginations run wild as the ladies try to discover the truth and save their friend in a hilarious off-road adventure.
