simon schuster jul 2013 (33 Ergebnisse)

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A BRILLIANT BIOGRAPHICAL ANTHOLOGY FROM ONE OF THE WORLD'S FOREMOST HISTORICAL NOVELISTS.Beautifully illustrated with rare portraits, The Women of the Cousins' War provides an accurate account of Elizabeth Woodline (The White Queen), Margaret Beaufort (The Red Queen), and Jacquetta (Lady Rivers) - the subjects of the first three novels in Philippa's beloved Cousins' War series. In this exciting addition to the Philippa Gregory ouevre,Philippa writes revealingly about the differences between history and fiction and examines the gaps in the historical record with the help of the two leading historical experts in their field who helpedPhilippa to research the novels.'An engrossing introduction to three courageous matriarchs who shaped English history.'Publisher's Weekly.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - As the Wanteds, Unwanteds, and Necessaries struggle to adjust to changes in their society, Mr. Today begins training 14-year-old Alex to replace him as Artime's leader one day while Alex's disgraced twin, Aaron, connives to take over Quill.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A light look at the Star Sign Cancer. Have you ever cared for a Cancer, literally or figuratively Do you know why being caring is so important to them Do you know why being able to express their emotions is so important to them This insider information will guide you through the process of easily making a natal chart using free on-line resources. You will discover how to find the three key points that will help you Care for a Cancer better. Drawing on her extensive client files and using real-life examples, Mary English gently guides you in learning 'How To Care for a Cancer'.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - Feisty fifteen-year-old Christina's parents don't like her biker boyfriend. They think he's too old and his hair is too long. She doesn't like her epilepsy but has to deal with it. An accident leaves her in a coma for several weeks. Whilst in the coma she visits another world where she starts to understand her own awakening sexuality and her illness. She also becomes more tolerant of other people, in particular of those who wear a hijab or burka. But Jan is still waiting for her at home and her new world is getting more real by the minute. Problems abound and she feels alone. She is still in love with Jan, but can she still reach him.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - In the aftermath of a cataclysmic event, 16-year-old Evie, from a well-to-do Louisiana family, learns that her terrible visions are actually prophecies and that there are others like herselfNembodiments of Tarot cards destined to engage in an epic battle.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - Jenny Madison was fired from her office job for an 'attitude problem' that resulted from, well, a disappointing life. Out of desperation and a need to pay her rent and car loan, she starts a business driving people home after a night on the town. Customer calls continue to put her in contact with Grant Tucker, an equally disillusioned entertainment executive whose life has been derailed due to a family incident of past years.Grant doesn't remember the young passenger in the car that killed his niece. He just knows the driver died. At the time, the family needed stability and he needed a job so he delved in to help keep the small entertainment company afloat while his aunt and uncle, the owners, dealt with the loss of a daughter. Years later, meeting Jenny seemed more an aggravation than salvation.Jenny faces significant personal challenges when a number of her clients, contacts, and friends end up associated to the haunting accident from her past that killed her father. Unfortunately, the little girl also killed in the accident has no intention of staying hidden in the dark. She makes her presence known in a most inconvenient way.Sensuality Level: Sensual.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - The life as Cat once knew has disappeared forever, bringing terror, blood, and death in its place. Until one man accepts the heritage he has forsaken and comes after her, making her his in every way.In order to fulfill destiny and obligation in saving their world, Dante has to walk straight into hell and unleash Cat's soul and passion.Together, they race through the darkness of hell, unleashing the light to save their love and race.Sensuality Level: Sensual.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - No woman ever really forgets her first love. Callie Sorenson is no exception. Hers was tall, tanned, and as her older brother's best friend completely off limits.Danny McCutcheon.It's a name that Callie hasn't spoken in years, even if the man to whom it belongs has never really been all that far from her thoughts. Or her heart. But now a twist of fate will bring her back to the childhood home she left behind years ago, and to the hometown boy for whom she secretly longed.When her mother takes a bad fall and breaks her hip, Callie leaves the bright lights of New York City to fly back west and help with the rehabilitation. It's a tense homecoming due to a long time estrangement between mother and daughter, and it drives Callie to confront both a painful personal loss and her unanswered questions about the father who abandoned her when she was just a child.It also brings her face to face with Danny again, and Callie quickly realizes that old feelings die hard.But for Danny, it's new feelings that are a problem. Callie is not the young girl he remembers but a woman now, and a very desirable one. They both have reasons to fight the growing attraction between them, but the temptation may just prove to be too much to resist, despite some very real risk to their hearts. The past casts a long shadow over the future, though, and Callie will have to overcome it or else face losing the one man who means the most to her.Sensuality Level: Behind Closed Doors.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - Pride Donovan returns to her old home in the small Texas Gulf Coast town of Anahuac when her father dies, and somehow she is not surprised when her former lover, Flynn Sutherland, does not recognize her little boy as her child and his, even after spending an afternoon on his sailboat with the child.When Flynn tries to rekindle her feelings for him, she knows he is about to get the shock of his life, because Flynn firmly believes he is sterile. Instead, Pride finds herself in shock when Flynn accepts his son and researches her own 'Single Mommy' newspaper column for hints on how to coax her into marrying him.Pride thinks she has many good reasons why she shouldn't marry Flynn, including a childhood spent with a father who claimed she was not his child. She isn't about to allow such a thing to happen to her son, no matter how strongly Flynn declares he believes her.Can Pride overcome her hurt and learn to trust Flynn again Sensuality Level: Behind Closed Doors.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - She learns secrets with a touch. He has secrets to hide.Insurance investigator Gabrielle Healey uses her touch clairvoyance to learn the truth about disasters. But when the crippled Densmore building can't provide the answers she needs to deny the claim, surely the man who designed it can. The evidence points to a flawed design. A touch will confirm his guilt.Brilliant architect Christian Ziko has secrets he can't reveal, and not that he caused the building he created to collapse. With the victims' families howling for justice and a grand jury poised to indict him, he must uncover what happened so he can clear his name and his conscience. Yet his brother and business partner discourage him. When a clue unearths terrible truths about the people he trusts, Christian is forced to ask beautiful Gabrielle for help. But someone wants their investigation terminated.and is willing to kill to keep their secrets hidden.Sensuality Level: Sensual.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - Psychotherapist Maggie Collins has always been a little off the proverbial wall, but now she's also knee deep in a delayed quarterlife crisis. With her meager paychecks devoured by student loan debt, a car payment, and rent for office space, living at home with a flighty, folksinging mother seemed like a good idea . . . at first. Now Maggie's not so sure. She wants space to sort things out and launch a life of her own, but she needs a cushion of cash to get there. When an unexpected phone call brings an offer Maggie can't refuse, she's one deal with the devil away from moving out of her mother's house.The devil of contract negotiations, baseball agent Jordon Kemmons, has a problem the usual experts can't fix . . . his star pitcher is too depressed to throw strikes. Even worse, Jordon's postdivorce grudge against women is turning him into a raging mess. If desperate times call for desperate measures, then cynical Jordon has made the most desperate move of all. He's hoping sexy psychotherapist Maggie Collins is the answer to all his rusty prayers.Soon Maggie and Jordon are fighting an attraction that threatens everything they've ever believed. If it's not just physical attraction . . . if it's something more, maybe two wrongs can make a right.Sensuality Level: Sensual.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - 'What's he doing back in London after all this time 'Eight years ago, Lisa Darby's dancing partner and first love, Redmond Carrington, left London for a fun summer on the cruise ships - and never came back. Lisa's grown up a bit since then, and she'd like to think she's prepared for anything, but when Red comes back from America with a proposal for her, she's not sure she's ready for what he's suggesting.A TV studio is filming a knockout competition of six of the world's best couples - each of them partners both on and off the dance floor. Redmond wants Lisa to pose as his girlfriend so that they can compete. It's an unbelievable opportunity for an aspiring professional dancer, and the spectacular prize money would help save Lisa's beloved dance studio, which is in need of major renovation. Scooping the prize is going to take the performance of a lifetime from Lisa and Redmond, but with the sizzling tension between them, they might just pull it off.It turns out that putting on an act for the cameras is the least of Lisa's worries. As time goes on and she rediscovers her feelings for Redmond, she's left questioning what's really behind his offer, and where their partnership is heading this time.Sensuality Level: Sensual.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A war widow at twentysix, Linnea Reyes is haunted by the soulshattering fight she had with her husband just before he led his detachment into the ambush that killed him. When one of the wounded soldiers asks her to help save his family's farm, she jumps at the chance for redemption. Unfortunately, she runs straight into a sixfoot roadblock-the soldier's older brother who has plans of his own.After resigning from a promising army career to help his mother and wounded brother, Jesse McCormick is at the lowest point in his life. Now they are about to lose the family's organic farm and only one plan will earn him enough money to get his family out of debt and him out of the field-a dangerous assignment with a paramilitary group. He can brush aside the protests of his worried family, but the good intentions of Linnea Reyes prove too much to overcome.Sensuality Level: Sensual.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - Beyond God is the product of a scientist's decade-long journey through Eastern and Western philosophy and religion inspired by the dramatic changes in modern science. Beginning from the perspective of secular Western atheism and believing the world is largely as we see it, the author considers the nature of reality more deeply: what science really tells us, what that means for religion and philosophy, and what that implies for how we choose to live. The result is an exploration of the key ideas in religion and philosophy that are compatible with recent scientific developments, which form the basis for a synthesis of Eastern and Western thought on the path to happiness. Beyond God considers the purpose of existence, what science really means for our view of the 'meaning of life', and how we should live it.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - Unreachable. Dell Rosales gained her nickname, 'inalcansable,' or 'unreachable,'' the oldfashioned way, earning it with every new rip in her heart.Unwanted. Dell returns home to salvage her father's ranch by opening the place to a group of girls with problems and pain not unlike her own. With her outlook on love soured perhaps beyond salvation she clings to Becky, the tiny little girl whose own mother preferred a life of drugs and men to motherhood.Unwinnable. Former DEA agent Jovani Treviño has seen that the war isn't winnable: people keep dying. Drugs keep killing them. But pleas for help from the DEA make him agree to one last battle for the good cause checking out heiress Dell Rosales, whose ranch on the Rio Grande provides a perfect spot for traffickers to cross if she allows them to.Unattainable. Suspicions, passion, and their respective pasts draw Dell and Jovi into a tumultuous relationship that both must to avoid. Love seems distant, foolish to seek unattainable. When an epic flood threatens not only Dell's ranch but the surrounding area, will anything survive Sensuality Level: Behind Closed Doors.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - Discover a powerful new lens for viewing the world with fascinating implications for our companies, economies, societies, and planet as a whole.What causes one system to break down and another to rebound Are we merely subject to the whim of forces beyond our control Or, in the face of constant disruption, can we build better shock absorbersfor ourselves, our communities, our economies, and for the planet as a whole Reporting firsthand from the coral reefs of Palau to the back streets of Palestine, Andrew Zolli and Ann Marie Healy relate breakthrough scientific discoveries, pioneering social and ecological innovations, and important new approaches to constructing a more resilient world. Zolli and Healy show how this new concept of resilience is a powerful lens through which we can assess major issues afresh: from business planning to social development, from urban planning to national energy securitycircumstances that affect us all. Provocative, optimistic, and eye-opening, Resilience sheds light on why some systems, people, and communities fall apart in the face of disruption and, ultimately, how they can learn to bounce back.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - In this "inspiring memoir about the real power of courage and hope" (Kirkus Reviews), lifelong activist Shirley Sherrod explains why she was fired from the USDA under false charges and how she stood up against the politics of fear.Sherrod was a lifelong activist who served as Georgia's first black director of rural development. In the summer of 2010, a right-wing blogger disseminated an ill- conceived video clip of a speech Sherrod had given to the Georgia NAACP, intending to make her an example of "reverse racism." The media frenzy that ensued caused the Obama administration to demand her resignation. After hearing from Sherrod herself and learning the entire truth of what she said in that speech, the administration tried to backtrack. Public officials and media professionals admitted to being duped and apologized for their rush to judgment. Ultimately, Sherrod found herself the subject of a teachable moment. The Courage to Hope addresses this regrettable moment in American politics, but it also tells Sherrod's own story of growing up on a farm in southwest Georgia during the final violent years of Jim Crow.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - "An enthusiastic, example-rich argument for innovating in a particular wayby deliberately experimenting and taking small exploratory steps in novel directions. Light, bright, and packed with tidy anecdotes" (The Wall Street Journal).What do Apple CEO Steve Jobs, comedian Chris Rock, prize-winning architect Frank Gehry, and the story developers at Pixar films all have in common Bestselling author Peter Sims found that rather than start with a big idea or plan a whole project in advance, they make a methodical series of little bets, learning critical information from lots of little failures and from small but significant wins. Reporting on a fascinating range of research, from the psychology of creative blocks to the influential field of design thinking, Sims offers engaging and illuminating accounts of breakthrough innovators at work, and a whole new way of thinking about how to navigate uncertain situations and unleash our untapped creative powers.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A fun and funny guide to dating from the New York Times bestselling authors of IT'S CALLED A BREAKUP BECAUSE IT'S BROKEN and HE'S JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU. 'The book is jam-packed with straight-talking tips on how to bag your man, and quite frankly, we can't put it down.' The Sun Why does dating have to be so hard It doesn't! Stop trying to out-game the system and relax. IT'S JUST A F\*\*\*ING DATE presents the tools, not the rules, for bringing back the art of the date. The ordeals of 21st century dating, from online dating and hooking up to pulling the plug when it isn't working, will soon be easy to navigate. With tips to define what is and isn't a date, how to get asked out, and setting your own dating standards, dating won't seem old-fashioned, it will be fun. Bestselling authors Greg Behrendt and Amiira Ruotola return to the minefield of modern relationships with this revised and updated edition.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - An award-winning reporter chronicles the calamitous story of Washington Mutual, the single-largest bank failure in American history, in this fast-paced, compelling, and gripping saga of greed and excess.During the most dizzying days of the financial crisis, Washington Mutual, a bank with hundreds of billions of dollars in its coffers, suffered a crippling bank run. The story of its final, brutal collapse in the autumn of 2008, and its controversial sale to JPMorgan Chase, is an astonishing account of how one bank lost itself to greed and mismanagement, and how the entire financial industryeven the entire countrylost its way as well. Written as compellingly as the finest fiction, The Lost Bank introduces readers to the regulators and the bankers, the home buyers and the lenders who together created the largest bank failure in American history. The result is a magisterial and gripping account of the incredible rise and the precipitous collapse of not only an institution but of trust, fortunes, and the marketplaces for risk across the world.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - Lily Bachman has the largest dowry the haut ton has seen in years. Her fortune is meant to secure her marriage to a titled gentleman, but instead it has sent every fortune hunter in London into a frenzy. Despite her father's insistence that she choose a husband, Lily swears she won't marry any of these 'Leeches.' Instead, she focuses on her dreams of opening a charity school. She has everything well in hand - until a devilishly handsome rake sweeps her into a scandalous waltz.Ethan Helling, Viscount Thorburn, never claimed to be a good man. A well-known rogue, he's over his ears in gaming debts and is tempted by a friend's demanding mistress. To continue indulging his appetites, he needs to marry a fortune. The lovely Miss Bachman just so happens to have one, and Ethan vows to win her dowry for himself.When the seducer becomes the seduced, Lily and Ethan are forced into a hasty marriage. Now, to gain her fortune, Ethan must find a way to make his unwilling bride happy. As he fights to win her affection, Ethan finds himself falling in love with his spirited wife - despite her determination to keep her money, and her heart, out of his hands. With her dreams in ruins and her illusions shattered, can Lily afford to gamble on love Sensuality Level: Sensual.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - 'As if Kevin Phillips's American Theocracy were being narrated by Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi,' Chuck Thompson's 'viciously funny and thoroughly tasteless' examination of Southern secession was one of the most controversial books of the year (Washington Monthly).Chuck Thompsondubbed "savagely funny" by the New York Times and "wickedly entertaining" by the San Francisco Chroniclespent two years traveling the American South to determine whether, as he'd long suspected but not yet proven, the whole country might be better off letting Dixieland make good on its two-hundred-years-old threat to secede. The result is a long overdue and serious inquiry into national divides that is deliberately provocative and uproariously funny while making a compelling case for "a kind of no-fault divorce for nation-states: no hard feelings, just two adults who can't quite make the relationship work, shaking hands and walking away" (The Oxford American).

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - In this award-winning debut mystery novel, the chief of police of a small town is also an unreliable drunk. So when Dora Lee Parjeter is murdered, her old friend and former police chief Samuel Craddock steps in to investigate. He discovers that a lot of people may have had it in for Dora Lee-the conniving rascals on the farm next door, her estranged daughter, and her live-in grandson. And then there's that stranger Dora Lee claimed was spying on her. As Craddock digs to find the identity of the killer, the human foibles of Jarrett Creek's residents-their pettiness and generosity, their secret vices and true virtues-are also revealed.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - The author of the acclaimed biography of President James Polk, A Country of Vast Designs, offers a fresh, playful, and challenging way of playing "Rating the Presidents," by pitching historians' views and subsequent experts' polls against the judgment and votes of the presidents' own contemporaries. Merry posits that presidents rise and fall based on performance, as judged by the electorate. Thus, he explores the presidency by comparing the judgments of historians with how the voters saw things. Was the president reelected If so, did his party hold office in the next election Where They Stand examines the chief executives Merry calls "Men of Destiny,'' those who set the country toward new directions. There are six of them, including the three nearly always at the top of all academic pollsLincoln, Washington, and FDR. He describes the "Split-Decision Presidents'' (including Wilson and Nixon)successful in their first terms and reelected; less successful in their second terms and succeeded by the opposition party. He describes the "Near Greats'' (Jefferson, Jackson, Polk, TR, Truman), the "War Presidents'' (Madison, McKinley, Lyndon Johnson), the flat-out failures (Buchanan, Pierce), and those whose standing has fluctuated (Grant, Cleveland, Eisenhower). This voyage through our history provides a probing and provocative analysis of how presidential politics works and how the country sets its course. Where They Stand invites readers to pitch their opinions against the voters of old, the historians, the pollstersand against the author himself. In this year of raucous presidential politics, Where They Stand will provide a context for the unfolding campaign drama.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - From the bestselling author of Pistol and Namath, a vivid, revealing, and fast-paced biography of the great boxer Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini.Frank Sinatra fawned over him. Warren Zevon wrote a tribute song. Sylvester Stallone produced his life story as a movie of the week. In the 1980s, Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini wasn't merely the lightweight champ. An adoring public considered him a national hero, the real Rocky. But it all came apart on November 13, 1982, in a brutal battle at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. Mancini's obscure Korean challenger, Duk Koo Kim, went down in the fourteenth round and never regained consciousness. Three months later, Kim's despondent mother took her own life. The deaths would haunt Ray and ruin his carefully crafted image, suddenly transforming boxing's All-American Boy into a pariah. With the vivid style and deep reporting that have earned him renown as a biographer, Mark Kriegel has written a fast-paced epic. The Good Son is an intimate history, a saga of fathers and fighters, loss and redemption.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - After the death of their father and the transfer of the family home to their half brother John and his horrid wife Fanny, Marianne and Elinor Dashwood, along with their mother and younger sister, must find someplace new to live. While they search for a new home, however, Fanny's brother Edward Ferrars comes to visit and forms an intense connection with Elinor a connection that is severed when the Dashwood women move away.While Elinor pines for the love she's lost, Marianne finds herself the object of affection of not one but two gentlemen in her new town the reserved, thirtyfiveyearold bachelor Colonel Brandon and the young, handsome John Willoughby.In this new twist on a beloved classic, Lauren Lane throws propriety to the wind and seamlessly weaves in the other side of the story the story of what happens when the Dashwood sisters get their men behind closed doors. This Sense and Sensibility is chockfull of sex, and will finally give modern readers of Austen answers to all their biggest and most salacious questions. How do Elinor and Mr. Ferrars really say goodbye to each other What exactly happens between Marianne and Mr. Willoughby during their first meeting Has Colonel Brandon's extended bachelorhood taught him a thing or two about how to please a woman And who says a wild and wanton fling can't lead to a happilyeverafter Sensuality Level: Hot.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - From the author of Happy Birthday or Whatever, an outright hilarious and heartfelt collection of personal essays about everything from underwear to musical theater.ANNIE CHOI HATES MUSICAL THEATER. SHE THINKS SANDWICHES ARE BORING. She likes camping, except for the outdoors part. At fifteen, her father made her read the entire car manual before allowing her to sit in the driver's seat. Her neighbor, who has no curtains, is always naked. And she once chased down a man who stole her handbag. All this is to say that Choi is one part badass and one part curmudgeon, with a soft spot for savage bears. Mostly she wants to ask the world: WTF ! Written in Choi's strikingly original and indignant voice, Shut Up, You're Welcome paints a revealing portrait of Annie in all her quirky, compelling, riotous glory. Each of Choi's personal essays begins with an open letter to someone (babies) or something (the San Fernando Valley) she has a beef with. From the time her family ditched her on Christmas to her father's attachment to the World's Ugliest Table, Choi weaves together deeply personal experiences with laugh-out-loud observations, all of which will delight and entertain you.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - In a post-apocalyptic wasteland, two women seek to preserve the small treasury of books available to them - a gift of knowledge and hope for future generations. '[A] poignant expression of the durability, grace, and potential of the human spirit.' Jean M. Auel, author of the Earth's Children series In the 21st Century, civilization is crumbling under the burden of overpopulation, economic chaos, petty wars, a horrific pandemic, and finally, a nuclear war that inevitably results in a deadly nuclear winter. On the Oregon Coast, two women, writer Mary Hope and painter Rachel Morrow, scratch out a minimal existence as farmers. In what little time is available to them, they embark on the project that they hope will offer the gift of knowledge to future generations of survivorsthe preservation of the books: those available from their own collections and any they find at nearby abandoned houses. For years, Mary and Rachel are satisfied to labor at this task in their solitude, but a day comes when they encounter a young man who comes from a group of survivors on the southern coast. They call their community the Ark. An incredibly hopeful meeting, it might seem, until Rachel and Mary realize that the Arkites believe in only one bookthe Judeo-Christian bibleand regard all other books as blasphemous. 'Wren's post-nuclear world rings true, as do her compelling depictions of the subsistence-level daily life.' Publisher's Weekly '[Wren's] passionate concern with what gives life meaning carries the novel.' Library Journal.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - From the author of The Meryl Streep Movie Club, 'a heartwarming, spirit-lifting read just in time for beach season' (Kirkus Reviews), comes a new novel about three women, connected in secret and surprising ways, who are in for a life-changing summer when rumor has it that actor Colin Firth is coming to their Maine town to film a movie. After losing her job and leaving her beloved husband, journalist Gemma Hendricks is sure that scoring an interview with Colin Firth will save her career and marriage. Yet a heart-tugging local story about women, family ties, love, and loss captures her heart- and changes everything. The story concerns Bea Crane, a floundering twenty-two-year-old who learns in a deathbed confession letter that she was adopted at birth. Bea is in Boothbay Harbor to surreptitiously observe her biological mother, Veronica Russo-something of a legend in town-who Bea might not be ready to meet after all. Veronica, a thirty-eight-year-old diner waitress famous for her 'healing' pies, has come home to Maine to face her past. But when she's hired as an extra on the bustling movie set, she wonders if she is hiding from the truth . . . and perhaps the opportunity of a real-life Mr. Darcy. These three women will discover more than they ever imagined in this coastal Maine town, buzzing with hopes of Colin Firth. Even the conjecture of his arrival inspires daydreams, amplifies complicated lives, and gives incentive to find their own romantic endings.

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - With a new Introduction by the author, this "erudite and brilliantly readable book" (The Observer, London) expertly dissects the political, economic, and social origins of Western civilization to reveal a culture cripplingly enslaved to crude notions of rationality and expertise.With a new introduction by the author, this "erudite and brilliantly readable book" (The Observer, London) astutely dissects the political, economic and social origins of Western civilization to reveal a culture cripplingly enslaved to crude notions of rationality and expertise. The Western world is full of paradoxes. We talk endlessly of individual freedom, yet we've never been under more pressure to conform. Our business leaders describe themselves as capitalists, yet most are corporate employees and financial speculators. We call our governments democracies, yet few of us participate in politics. We complain about invasive government, yet our legal, educational, financial, social, cultural and legislative systems are deteriorating. All these problems, John Ralston Saul argues, are largely the result of our blind faith in the value of reason. Over the past 400 years, our "rational elites" have turned the modern West into a vast, incomprehensible, directionless machine, run by process-minded experts"Voltaire's bastards"whose cult of scientific management is empty of both sense and morality. Whether in politics, art, business, the military, entertainment, science, finance, academia or journalism, these experts share the same outlook and methods. The result, Saul maintains, is a civilization of immense technological power whose ordinary citizens are increasingly excluded from the decision-making process. In this wide-ranging anatomy of modern society and its originswhose "pages explode with insight, style and intellectual rigor" (Camille Paglia, The Washington Post)Saul presents a shattering critique of the political, economic and cultural establishments of the West.