Tuesday, July 19, 2011

White Tie and Decorations: Sir John and Lady Hope Simpson in Newfoundland, 1934-1936



A collection of excerpts from letters between Sir John and Lady Hope Simpson to relatives in England, written during the 1930s when Simpson was in charge of fishing, forestry, mining, and agriculture in Newfoundland.

The letters detail life in the region during the Great Depression, and reveal the Simpsons' progressive and utopian ideas. Includes b&w photos and maps

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Into That Darkness: An Examination of Conscience



Based on 70 hours of interviews with Franz Stangl, commandant of Treblinka (the largest of the extermination camps), this book bares the soul of a man who continually found ways to rationalize his role in Hitler's final soulution.

A Grateful Heart: Daily Blessings for the Evening Meal from Buddha to the Beatles




     A Grateful Heart is a tool to help readers reclaim and enrich the tradition of pausing before the evening meal to give thanks. Drawing from a range of religious and cultural practices, these 365 blessings celebrate friendship, love, peace, reconciliation, the body, nature, joy, and appreciation of the moment.

This illustrated feast for the mind includes quotations from Martin Luther King Jr., Thich Nhat Hanh, Gandhi, Rumi, Mother Teresa, Helen Keller, Denise Levertov, the Bible, and the Tao Te Ching.

After the War Zone: A Practical Guide for Returning Troops and Their Families


       Many readers first became acutely aware of both the devastating effects of the conflicts in the Middle East and the shortcomings of our government in addressing the needs of our surviving service members through Penny Coleman's Flashback: Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Suicide, and the Lessons of Vietnam(for an author interview, Here, Friedman, a physician, and Slone (VA National Ctr. for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs) further help us understand and support our service members. They begin with a chapter titled "Understanding the Emotional Cycle of Deployment," progress through "Common Reactions to the Trauma of War," and conclude with chapters on community support and support for "those focusing unique challenges." The reader is able to share a journey with three service members and their respective families as they encounter new situations, struggles, and opportunities. Far more than a practical guide, this is an informative, insightful, and riveting text that should be required reading for everyone because no one is left untouched by war. Essential for all libraries.

Portrait of an Age


     

G.M. Young was a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford. '
I was born when the Queen had still nearly nineteen years to reign; I saw her twice, Gladstone once;

I well remember the death of Newman and Tennyson, and my earliest recollection of the Abbey brings back the flowers fresh on Browning's grave.'

Masonry Unmasked: An Insider Reveals the Secrets of the Lodge

Lifelong Catholic, John Salza was initiated into Wisconsin's Masonic Lodge, lured by the group's camaraderie and philanthropies. Yet, as he rose through the ranks, he became increasingly troubled by its dangerous teachings, mysterioius rituals, and complete incompatibility with the Catholic Faith.

Saturday, July 9, 2011

THE KON-TIKI EXPEDITION By Raft Across the South Seas

Heyerdahl believed that people from South America could have settled Polynesia in pre-Columbian times. His aim in mounting the Kon-Tiki expedition was to show, by using only the materials and technologies available to those people at the time, that there were no technical reasons to prevent them from having done so. (Although the expedition carried some modern equipment, such as a radio, watches, charts, sextant, and metal knives, Heyerdahl argued they were incidental to the purpose of proving that the raft itself could make the journey.)

Video Bookmans Does Book Dominoes

Bookmans Does Book Dominoes

Friday, July 8, 2011

Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill


For four years, Jessica Stern interviewed extremist members of three religions around the world: Christians, Jews, and Muslims. Traveling extensively—to refugee camps in Lebanon, to religious schools in Pakistan, to prisons in Amman, Asqelon, and Pensacola—she discovered that the Islamic jihadi in the mountains of Pakistan and the Christian fundamentalist bomber in Oklahoma have much in common.Based on her vast research, Stern lucidly explains how terrorist organizations are formed by opportunistic leaders who—using religion as both motivation and justification—recruit the disenfranchised. She depicts how moral fervor is transformed into sophisticated organizations that strive for money, power, and attention.Jessica Stern's extensive interaction with the faces behind the terror provide unprecedented insight into acts of inexplicable horror, and enable her to suggest how terrorism can most effectively be countered.A crucial book on terrorism, Terror in the Name of God is a brilliant and thought-provoking work.

A Voyage for Madmen


 In the psychedelic summer of 1968, as Apollo 8 soared toward the moon and the Democratic Convention crashed in Chicago, nine men tried finally to accomplish the sailor's age-old ultimate goal: a solo, nonstop circumnavigation of the world. Nichols (Sea Change) deftly introduces myriad aspects of a voyage that promised "dubious, unquantifiable" rewards. He insightfully contextualizes the endeavor as an offshoot of Sir Francis Chichester's famous 1967 A voyage for madman solo circumnavigation (with one stop), which represented to England a "longed-for" heroism. Detailing the British media's successful exploitation of the so-called race, he approaches the voyage as the remarkable result of nine men wishing to outdo Chichester. Nichols painstakingly describes the enormous difficulty of solo navigation in the pre-global positioning system of the 1960s. These "hardcase egomaniacs driven by complex desires and vainglory to attempt an extreme, life-threatening endeavor" used only rudimentary equipment and their wits. Nichols is at his liveliest when describing the only two participants who "were really happy aboard their boats": the French-Asian Bernard Moitessier, the most skilled sailor, whose mystical seamanship brings surprises, and the British Robin Knox-Johnson, who was energized during his journey by the memory of "the Elizabethan sea heroes of his youth." Nichols also delivers a compelling portrait of English Donald Crowhurst, an electronics engineer whose "supercharged personality" wreaked havoc on the entire race.

Healing Suicidal Veterans: Recognizing, Supporting and Answering Their Pleas for Help


Veterans are suffering a mental breakdown  epidemic, often linked to post traumatic stress from the terrors of combat, traumatic brain injury, and drug and alcohol abuse. The problems triggered by an excessive number of deployments, financial and family trouble, fragmented or nonexistent support systems, and increased domestic stress have caused a mass depression among vets. Healing Suicidal Veterans takes readers firsthand into the situation room  where crisis intervention and addiction therapist Victor Montgomery explores the psychological wounds of war and the ways they contribute to the tragedy of suicidal veterans. He presents the Montgomery Model for ending veterans' suffering and anguish and putting them on solid paths to healing.

A Theory of Everything: An Integral Vision for Business, Politics, Science and Spirituality



This is all new, and so much fun. Sharing my passion for books and art. A little French "Quel plaisir de lire" what fun too read.
Now about this book
Here is a concise, comprehensive overview of Wilber's revolutionary thought and its application in today's world. In A Theory of Everything, Wilber uses clear, nontechnical language to present complex, cutting-edge theories that integrate the realms of body, mind, soul, and spirit. He then demonstrates how these theories and models can be applied to real-world problems in areas such as politics, medicine, business, education, and the environment. Wilber also discusses daily practices that readers take up in order to apply this integrative vision to their own everyday lives