On a midsummer day in 1937, Boris Bibikov kissed his two daughters goodbye and disappeared. One of those girls, Lyudmila, was to fall in love with a tall young foreigner in Moscow at the height of the Cold War and embark on a dangerous and passionate affair. Decades later, a reporter in nineties Moscow, her son Owen Matthews pieces together his grandfather’s passage through the harrowing world of Stalin’s purges, and tells the story of his parents’ Cold War love affair through their heartbreaking letters and memories.Stalin’s Children is a raw, vivid memoir about a young man’s struggle to understand his parents’ lives and the history of the strange country in which they lived.

Five noted writers and thinkers profile five of the world's leaders. For some of us, these leaders are heroes; for others, villains; for all of us—strongmen.

In this short book, five brilliant artists and writers confront five strongmen:

• American playwright Eve Ensler (The Vagina Monologues) burrows beneath the skin of Donald Trump.

• Danish Husain, Indian storyteller and actor, finds himself recounting the story not only of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, but also of the ascension of the extremism of the Sangh Parivar.

• Burhan Sönmez, Turkish novelist, ferrets about amidst the bewildering career of the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

• Lara Vapnyar, Russian-American novelist and journalist, ponders the Stalinist origins of the Supreme Leader of All the Russias.

• Ninotchka Rosca, Filipina feminist novelist, unravels the macho world of Rodrigo Duterte.

These essays do not presume to be neutral. They are by partisan thinkers, magical writers, people who see not only the monsters but also a future beyond the ghouls. A future that is necessary. The present is too painful.

In 2014, after a brief orientation course and a few fingerprinting sessions, Nicholson Baker became an on-call substitute teacher in a Maine public school district. He awoke to the dispatcher's five-forty a.m. phone call and headed to one of several nearby schools; when he got there, he did his best to follow lesson plans and help his students get something done. What emerges from Baker s experience is a complex, often touching deconstruction of public schooling in America: children swamped with overdue assignments, overwhelmed by the marvels and distractions of social media and educational technology, and staff who weary themselves trying to teach in step with an often outmoded or overly ambitious standard curriculum. In Baker s hands, the inner life of the classroom is examined anew mundane worksheets, recess time-outs, surprise nosebleeds, rebellions, griefs, jealousies, minor triumphs, daily lessons on everything from geology to metal tech to the Holocaust to kindergarten show-and-tell as the author and his pupils struggle to find ways to get through the day. Baker is one of the most inventive and remarkable writers of our time, and "Substitute," filled with humor, honesty, and empathy, may be his most impressive work of nonfiction yet."

Я надеюсь, что моя книга поможет амбициозным людям, мечтающим стать «номер один» в чем угодно, не продать душу дьяволу – выйти из клетки излишних амбиций, подчиняясь Большой компании или Большому боссу, не потерять собственное достоинство. Быть эффективными, оставаясь при этом свободными, а самое главное – счастливыми. Потому что, когда ты бесконечно богат, но при этом – раб, ощущение счастья исчезает. А когда ты достиг карьерного успеха и удивительно при этом свободен – это кайф.Такая вот методика карьерного счастья: как совместить драйв, кайф и карьеру.

Перед вами невероятная история Марио и расцвета Nintendo.1981 год. Nintendo of America находилась на грани краха, и тогда Сигэру Миямото разработал игру о противостоянии гориллы и маленького прыгающего человечка. Это была знаменитая Donkey Kong, которая положила начало карьере пухлого водопроводчика по имени Марио. С тех пор он появился более чем в двух сотнях игр, принес компании миллиардную прибыль и стал более узнаваемым, чем Микки Маус.Вы узнаете:[ul]как Марио получил свое имя и внешность;когда в играх про Марио появились Луиджи, Боузер, Йоши и другие персонажи;как создавались и развивались Mario и другие франшизы Nintendo;обо всех трудностях, ошибках и триумфах компании;как Марио стал лицом Nintendo и помог ей покорить Америку и весь мир![/ul]

Sur l'eau est un récit de voyage écrit par Guy de Maupassant en 1888.Sur l’eau est le récit d’une croisière que fit l’auteur sur son yacht personnel le long de la côte d’Azur et en particulier à Saint-Tropez. C’est une Côte d’Azur encore inviolée qui n’est encore qu’une destination pour tuberculeux et un lieu de rencontre de têtes couronnées. L’auteur alterne le récit de sa croisière avec celui d’excursions menées à terre (en particulier à la chartreuse de la Verne) et de longues digressions sur la société de son époque, l’Histoire…Sur l'eau est aussi le titre d'un conte fantastique de Maupassant, publié initialement en 1876 sous le titre En canot, et intégré en 1881, sous ce nouveau titre, dans le recueil qui contient La Maison Tellier (voir Sur l'eau, 1876).

Robert D. Kaplan is one of our leading international journalists, someone who can explain the most complicated and volatile regions and show why they’re relevant to our world. In Surrender or Starve, Kaplan illuminates the fault lines in the Horn of Africa, which is emerging as a crucial region for America’s ongoing war on terrorism. Reporting from Sudan, Ethiopia, Somalia, and Eritrea, Kaplan examines the factors behind the famine that ravaged the region in the 1980s, exploring the ethnic, religious, and class conflicts that are crucial for understanding the region today. He offers a new foreword and afterword that show how the nations have developed since the famine, and why this region will only grow more important to the United States. Wielding his trademark ability to blend on-the-ground reporting and cogent analysis, Robert D. Kaplan introduces us to a fascinating part of the world, one that it would behoove all of us to know more about.

Сьюзен Зонтаг, американский литературный критик, режиссёр театра и кино, стала самым настоящим отражением эпохи, призмой, через которую мы разглядываем прошлый век, легендой своего поколения. Масштаб её личности восхищает, многогранность – покоряет и вызывает отрицание. Зонтаг писала философские и критические эссе, выступала на баррикадах в Сараево, ставила спектакль по Беккету, снялась в картине Вуди Аллена, тесно общалась с Иосифом Бродским и Энди Уорхолом. Её жизнь – это бесконечный внутренний поиск границы между искусством и искусственным, метафорой и реальностью, правдой и ложью.

Изданная осенью 2019 года и уже ставшая бестселлером Amazon, «Susan Sontag. Женщина, которая изменила культуру XX века» рассказывает обо всех гранях женщины, которая была истинным феноменом в американской и мировой культуре.

«Это самая подробная и авторитетная книга о «безгримовой» эре, и она часто несправедливо замалчивается в пользу эпохи «масок». TAKE IT OFF обязательна к прочтению для каждого члена Kiss Army».

Metal-Rules.comКнига, написанная музыкальным журналистом Грэгом Прато, расскажет вам об одной из ярчайших вех в истории KISS, времени, когда, по мнению многих фанатов, были созданы лучшие песни группы: Heaven’s On Fire, Lick It Up, Tears Are Falling, Crazy Crazy Nights и другие. Это эра, когда музыканты решились смыть свой фирменный грим и снять вычурные наряды, чтобы не только не затеряться среди других исполнителей, но и суметь вернуть себе место на олимпе рок-музыки 80-х.

Внутри книги собраны эксклюзивные интервью с людьми, сотрудничавшими с KISS в разное время: музыкантами, журналистами, продюсерами. Они и вспоминают первое появление группы «без масок» в эфире MTV, и рассказывают, как писали хиты с их альбомов, и делятся живыми воспоминаниями о концертах и турах. Также здесь перечислены вся дискография и самые яркие видеовыступления группы за этот период.В формате PDF A4 сохранен издательский макет.

После выхода в 1992 году фильма “Бешеные псы” на голливудском небосводе неожиданно и ярко зажглась звезда Квентин Тарантино, бывшего еще так недавно продавцом видеокассет ставшего знаменитым режиссером. О его триумфальном пути высшим ступеням “фабрики грез” рассказывает в этой книг Джефф Доусон.

Organised nonviolent struggle, using methods such as strikes, boycotts and noncooperation, is a possible alternative to military methods. However, compared to military funding, there has been hardly any financial and organisational support for nonviolent struggle. Putting a priority on nonviolent struggle would lead to significant differences in technological development and scientific method. Research and development relevant to a number of areas — especially communication and survival — are assessed in terms of their relevance to nonviolent struggle. The findings are used to suggest how science and technology used for the purposes of war and repression can be converted most effectively to serve the purposes of nonviolent struggle.Brian Martin lives in Wollongong, Australia. He trained and worked as an applied mathematician before switching to social science. He has been active for many years in the radical science, environmental and peace movements and is the author of numerous works in many fields.

Žymaus amerikiečių rašytojo, eseisto ir žurnalisto, kilimo iš Irano, trečiasis romanas. Tai intriguojantis pasakojimas apie Maleko, universiteto dėstytojo, grįžimą į Teheraną, iš kurio dar vaikystėje su tėvu pabėgo į Ameriką. Nepaprasti įvykiai Irane, išdavystės, korupcija, represijos, nuolatiniai persekiojimai, motinos paieškos ir baimė dėl geriausio draugo, įsivėlusio į militarizuotą grupuotę, sudaro siužeto pagrindą, kuris prikausto dėmesį išskirtiniais veikėjais, atsidūrusiais sunkiai nuspėjamoje egzotiško krašto aplinkoje. Retrospekcijų būdu skaitytojas nukeliamas ir į Antrojo pasaulinio karo laikotarpį, jungiant paralelinio pasakojimo grandis apie netolimos praeities neramumų draskomą Iraną. Atsiskleidžia sudėtingi žmonių likimai atsidūrus istorinių įvykių mėsmalėje, kai reikia perkainoti nusistovėjusias draugystės, meilės, sąžinės, tėvų ir vaikų santykių moralines kategorijas, prisitaikyti prie netvaraus pasaulio diktuojamų sąlygų ir nustatytų žmonių bendravimo normų arba žūti.

Never before has Gordimer, awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1991, published such a comprehensive collection of her nonfiction. Telling Tales represents the full span of her works in that field-from the twilight of white rule in South Africa to the fight to overthrow the apartheid regime, and most recently, her role over the past seven years in confronting the contemporary phenomena of violence and the dangers of HIV. The range of this book is staggering, and the work in totality celebrates the lively perseverance of the life-loving individual in the face of political tumult, then the onslaught of a globalized world. The abiding passionate spirit that informs "A South African Childhood," a youthful autobiographical piece published in The New Yorker in 1954, can be found in each of the book's ninety-one pieces that span a period of fifty-five years. Returning to a lifetime of nonfiction work has become an extraordinary experience for Gordimer. She takes from one of her revered great writers, Albert Camus, the conviction that the writer is a "responsible human being" attuned not alone to dedication to the creation of fiction but to the political vortex that inevitably encompasses twentieth- and twenty-first-century life. Born in 1923, Gordimer, who as a child was ambitious to become a ballet dancer, was recognized at fifteen as a writing prodigy. Her sensibility was as much shaped by wide reading as it was to eye-opening sight, passing on her way to school the grim labor compounds where black gold miners lived. These twin decisives-literature and politics-infuse the book, which includes historic accounts of the political atmosphere, firsthand, after the Sharpeville Massacre of 1960 and the Soweto uprising of 1976, as well as incisive close-up portraits of Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu, among others. Gordimer revisits the eternally relevant legacies of Tolstoy, Proust, and Flaubert, and engages vigorously with contemporaries like Susan Sontag, Octavio Paz, and Edward Said. But some of her most sensuous writing comes in her travelogues, where the politics of Africa blend seamlessly with its awe-inspiring nature-including spectacular recollections of childhood holidays beside South Africa's coast of the Indian Ocean and a riveting account of her journey the length of the Congo River in the wake of Conrad. Gordimer's body of work is an extraordinary vision of the world that harks back to the sensibilities-political, moral, and social-of Dickens and Tolstoy, but with a decidedly vivid contemporary consciousness. Telling Times becomes both a literary exploration and extraordinary document of social and political history in our times.

В новой книге Захара Прилепина собранны эссе, написанные за год, — о литературе и политике, о путешествиях по миру и любви…Захар Прилепин — открытие в прозе последних лет, один из самых перспективных, талантливых и неординарных молодых писателей нашего времени. Популярность Захара, особенно среди молодежи, растет с каждым днем.Человек «с биографией» (Чечня, участие в политическом движении), знаковая медийная фигура, финалист премий «Русский Букер» и лауреат премии «Национальный бестселлер».Пишет ярко, жестко, узнаваемо. Его книги интересны и читаемы не только в России, но и в Европе.

A grumpy expat sounds off on other expats and foreigners, penis worship, tourists, Bangkok’s bodysnatchers, piracy, backpackers, aphrodisiacs, fast elephants, dangerous elephants, rotten fish, a gay water buffalo, ghosts, scams and cons, shadow wives, sex-change operations and ladyboys, country music, fear and respect, drugs, the beer wars, bi-racial cool, street food, superlatives, denial, eating insects, violence, making movies, Thai time, learning the language, chili peppers, a heart attack, the rubber barons, the King’s music, Thai whisky, sex, and other amazing stuff you’ll never read about in any guide to Thailand.

“Hopkins is just the man to capture the magical, impossible carnival that is Thailand, his expat’s perspective putting the country’s traditions, customs and quirks in high relief. The author clearly has a voracious and adventurous appetite, and Thailand provides the perfect feast. He devours subjects ranging from the sex trade and local cuisine to magic tattoos and the kingdom’s ‘swinging monarch’. After over a decade in the country, Hopkins knows and loves his subject dearly—that much is obvious—and his vivid portrait projects that love from every page.”— Jann Wenner

“A loving exposé of everything that’s wonderful about Thailand, and much that isn’t. Should be required reading for all new comers”.— Joe Cummings

“Wanna stand in the face of a charging elephant, get hit by a motorcycle, eat giant water bugs, blowtorch your mouth on some of the hottest chili peppers on earth, then go watch a sex change operation? Of course you don’t, but, happily, Jerry Hopkins has done all that and more—lots more—in this darkly humorous, deeply affectionate, clear eyed but never patronizing portrait of Thailand, his adopted home. Highly recommended.”— Tim Cahill, author of Lost in My Own Backyard, Hold the Enlightenment, and Jaguars Ripped My Flesh

Dr. Joseph Goebbels’ book on the proposed policies and ideologies of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, or Nazi Party. First published in 1926, it was revised and reissued by the party’s Eher Verlag in 1931. It takes the form of a dialogue between Goebbels and a rather dense fellow German, whose comments are indented.

In February 1981, Spain was still emerging from Franco's shadow, holding a democratic vote for the new prime minister. On the day of the vote in Parliament, while the session was being filmed by TV cameras, a band of right-wing soldiers burst in with automatic weapons, ordering everyone to get down. Only three men defied the order. For thirty-five minutes, as the cameras rolled, they stayed in their seats.Critically adored novelist Javier Cercas originally set out to write a novel about this pivotal moment, but determined it had already gained an air of myth, or, through the annual broadcast of video clips, had at least acquired the fictional taint of reality television. Cercas turned to nonfiction, and his vivid descriptions of the archival footage frame a narrative that traverses the line between history and art, creating a daring new account of this watershed moment in modern Spanish history.The Anatomy of a Moment caused a sensation upon its publication in Spain, selling hundreds of thousands of copies. The story will be new to many American readers, but the book stands resolutely on its own as a compelling literary inquest of national myth, personal memory, political spectacle, and reality itself.

‘I can’t imagine a nicer Christmas present’ Lionel Shriver, Observer

‘A passionate, hilarious, joyful love letter to Russian literature’ Allison Pearson, Sunday Telegraph

‘A delightful primer and companion to all the authors you are ashamed to admit you haven’t read’ The Times

Viv Groskop has discovered the meaning of life in Russian literature. As she knows from personal experience, everything that has ever happened in life has already happened in these novels: from not being sure what to do with your life (Anna Karenina) to being in love with someone who doesn’t love you back enough (A Month in the Country by Turgenev) or being socially anxious about your appearance (all of Chekhov’s work). This is a literary self-help memoir, with examples from the author’s own life that reflect the lessons of literature, only in a much less poetic way than Tolstoy probably intended, and with an emphasis on being excessively paranoid about having an emerging moustache on your upper lip, just like Natasha in War and Peace.

A SPECTATOR Book of the Year

An OBSERVER Book of the Year

A TIMES Book of the Year

Near the beginning of The Autobiography of an Execution, David Dow lays his cards on the table. “People think that because I am against the death penalty and don’t think people should be executed, that I forgive those people for what they did. Well, it isn’t my place to forgive people, and if it were, I probably wouldn’t. I’m a judgmental and not very forgiving guy. Just ask my wife.”It this spellbinding true crime narrative, Dow takes us inside of prisons, inside the complicated minds of judges, inside execution-administration chambers, into the lives of death row inmates (some shown to be innocent, others not) and even into his own home—where the toll of working on these gnarled and difficult cases is perhaps inevitably paid. He sheds insight onto unexpected phenomena—how even religious lawyer and justices can evince deep rooted support for putting criminals to death—and makes palpable the suspense that clings to every word and action when human lives hang in the balance.From Publishers WeeklyIn an argument against capital punishment, Dow’s capable memoir partially gathers its steam from the emotional toll on all parties involved, especially the overworked legal aid lawyers and their desperate clients. The author, the litigation director of the Texas Defender Service and a professor at the University of Houston Law Center, respects the notion of attorney-client privilege in this handful of real-life legal outcomes, some of them quite tragic, while acknowledging executions are not about the attorneys, but about the victims of murder and sometimes their killers. While trying to maintain a proper balance in his marriage to Katya, a fellow attorney and ballroom dancer, he spells out the maze of legal mumbo-jumbo to get his clients stays or released from confinement in the cases of a hapless Vietnam vet who shot a child, another man who beat his pregnant wife to death and another who killed his wife and children. In the end, Dow’s book is a sobering, gripping and candid look into the death penalty.Review“I have read much about capital punishment, but David Dow’s book leaves all else behind.”Anthony Lewis“In an argument against capital punishment, Dow’s capable memoir partially gathers its steam from the emotional toll on all parties involved, especially the overworked legal aid lawyers and their desperate clients. The author, the litigation director of the Texas Defender Service and a professor at the University of Houston Law Center, respects the notion of attorney-client privilege in this handful of real-life legal outcomes, some of them quite tragic, while acknowledging executions are ‘not about the attorneys,’ but ‘about the victims of murder and sometimes their killers.’ While trying to maintain a proper balance in his marriage to Katya, a fellow attorney and ballroom dancer, he spells out the maze of legal mumbo-jumbo to get his clients stays or released from confinement in the cases of a hapless Vietnam vet who shot a child, another man who beat his pregnant wife to death and another who killed his wife and children. In the end, Dow’s book is a sobering, gripping and candid look into the death penalty.”Publishers Weekly“For a lot of good reasons, and some that are not so good, executions in the U.S. are carried out in private. The voters, the vast majority of whom support executions, are not allowed to see them. The Autobiography of an Execution is a riveting and compelling account of a Texas execution written and narrated by a lawyer in the thick of the last minute chaos. It should be read by all those who support state sponsored killing.”John Grisham, author of The Innocent Man“Defending the innocent is easy. David Dow fights for the questionable. He is tormented, but relentless, and takes us inside his struggle with candor and insight, shudders and all.”Dave Cullen, author of Columbine“David Dow’s extraordinary memoir lifts the veil on the real world of representing defendants on death row. It will stay with me a long time.”Jeffrey Toobin, author of The Nine