Higher Worlds

Ayn Rand's famous 1957 classic, Atlas Shrugged, has become more widely read and influential with each passing year, thanks in part to its brilliant dramatization of Rand's Objectivist philosophy and its celebration of self-reliance, integrity, rationality, and productive effort.

The product of painstaking research and countless interviews, A High Price offers a nuanced, definitive historical account of Israel's bold but often failed efforts to fight terrorist groups. Israel's debacles in Lebanon against groups like the Lebanese Hizballah are examined in-depth, as is the country's problematic response to Jewish terrorist groups that have struck at Arabs and Israelis seeking peace.

When Xarona the witch, Callum the crusader, Seamus the magician and Jase the hunter, a group of neophyte adventurers, are hired to escort a family through the wild lands between the southern kingdom Vallus and the Sapphire mountains of Colos, what they thought would be a routine and simple assignment turns out to be anything but.

David Bodanis demystifies the world's most famous equation, explaining its science and bringing it to life. He makes clear the astonishing array of discoveries and consequences it made possible and its impact on our daily lives. At last, the masses can understand that Einstein did nothing less than open the door to the inner structure of the universe.

Five oceans—the Atlantic, the Pacific, the Indian, the Arctic, and the Southern—cover approximately 70 percent of the earth. Yet we know little about what lies beneath them. By the early 2020s, less than twenty-five percent of the ocean’s floor has been charted, most close to shorelines, and over three quarters of the ocean lies in in what is called the Deep Sea, depths below a thousand meters.

Established by the leaders of the country's only successful slave revolt in the mid-19th century, Cross River still evokes the fierce rhythms of its founding. In lyrical prose and singular dialect, a saga beats forward that echoes the fables carried down for generations - like the screecher birds who swoop down for their periodic sacrifice, and the water women who lure men to wet deaths.

Some men just won't take no for an answer. My life was good. Simple. I had a cushy job in the Falcon Army baking bread and fancy desserts for our warlord. But ever since I saved the Falcon Lord's life, he won't stop hounding me to become his valorian. He doesn't even know if it will work; I might end up with an extended lifespan and that's it. But he insists that I'm meant to be his, and damn if I don't want it to be true. I just wish that becoming the Falcon Lord's valorian didn't include all that other stuff. You know, like immortality and the likelihood that being immortal won't save me ...

Inspired by the consciousness-shifting traditions that have moved seekers for generations, Material Girl, Mystical World is a fabulous adventure in the "Now Age": a sophisticated upgrade on cosmic thinking for women who know that a closetful of designer shoes can happily coexist with a deeply meaningful life.

Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. But as they settle into the routine of their life together, they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy is arrested and sentenced to 12 years for a crime Celestial knows he didn't commit. Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself bereft and unmoored, taking comfort in Andre, her childhood friend, and best man at their wedding.

In the second elven world of Naz'arán, chaos reigns in the south as the demi-god Arzen and his revenant army threaten to destroy everything in their path. Only one elf has the power to turn the tide of war—but he can't even remember who he is. Feldar was brought back to life by the Master Dominie, but his memories are slow to return. In time, he must join the Order of Shirán and find a way to stop Arzen from annihilating Elvendom. But first, he must win the greatest battle of all: the battle raging in his own mind.

For Merl Code, basketball was life. In college he played point guard for Clemson before turning pro. Later, when he pivoted to marketing, he found himself thrust into a startling world of profit-driven college basketball programs. He realized that the NCAA's amateurism rules could be used to exploit young athletes, and athletes of color in particular.

Everything changed the day a faerie fell into my tomatoes. I thought I had my life planned out. My farm was prosperous, and I was on the verge of proposing to my childhood sweetheart. I'd have a family. A normal life. And then the Eagle Lord crashed into my crops—a giant bird with a broken wing. I foolishly tried to save him from the monster who was stalking him, and he repaid me by giving me immortality. Sounds good, doesn't it? Except immortality isn't free, even when it's a gift. Taryn Savagas wants me to fight beside him. To give up everything I have and everything I am to be his ...

While on the Felspar, James Stone has learnt some terrible truths about the artificial constellation of Evigone. Giant, murderous insects, a great war and a secret the quasi-human spider Sanidine is prepared to kill to keep; all lead him and the human crew to mutiny. But worse still, James Stone has discovered he can read minds – and now they suspect he’s an emissary of the ancient enemies, the tsars of technology or Zarktek. While Bulsar tries to get help from the people of Aagau, the remaining crew trick him into leaving the ship and abandon him to the fate of the security forces of ...

This is a revised edition of Courting Danger by Dale Leatherman, who co-authored the original with Alice Marble in 1990. It corrects minor errors that have come to light during the past three decades. Alice Marble was a rebel in her time--outspoken, bold and beautiful, a tennis champion whose powerful game and glamorous exploits captivated the public and press in the 1930s. Her public life was filled with success. Championships at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open made her the top-ranked player in the U.S. from 1936 to 1940. And Hollywood friendships with Carole Lombard, Clark Gable, Errol Flynn,...

While mediums sometimes resist the flow of communications they receive from the "other side", the best of them - like Bill Philipps - know what solace such messages can provide. The truly gifted also know that their gifts are not unique, that they can be cultivated by anyone with a sincere and open heart. Philipps illuminates all of this for listeners by demystifying what he does, sharing more than 20 inspiring stories of people receiving signs, and, most wonderfully, by providing step-by-step guidance that allows listeners to receive afterlife communications themselves.

Dr. Elisha Waldman's years at Jerusalem's Hadassah Medical Center were filled in equal measure with a deep sense of accomplishment, with frustration when regional politics sometimes got in the way of his patients' care, and with tension over the fine line he would have to walk when the religious traditions of some of his patients' families made it difficult for him to give these children the care he felt they deserved. Navigating the baffling Israeli bureaucracy, the ever-present threat of war, and cultural clashes, Waldman learned to be content with small victories.

Arianna Warsaw-Fan Rauch’s life-long fascination with classical music has taken her through Juilliard and into the shiny world of symphony halls and international concert tours. She’s loved classical music her whole life. But she’s also hated classical music her whole life. After all, if you can like Beyoncé without liking Bieber, you can certainly like Brahms without liking Bach—especially since they were born 148 years apart and the thing we call “classical music” is really just centuries of compositions shoved into one hodge-podge of a genre.

Over a remarkable career Bernard Bailyn has reshaped our understanding of the early American past. Illuminating History is the most personal of Bailyn's works. It is in part an intellectual memoir of the significant turns in an immensely productive and influential scholarly career. It is also alive with people whose actions touched the long arc of history: a struggling Boston merchant tormented by the tensions between capitalist avarice and a constrictive Puritan piety; a charismatic German Pietist who founded a cloister in the Pennsylvania wilderness; and more.

A detailed look into ancient advanced technology, science, and medicine - some of which has yet to be reproduced today.

Master of Thin Air opens with a fall that the author very nearly could not stop down an almost vertical rock ramp leading to a 3,000-foot drop. The qualities that saved him then on K2 - in addition to his mountaineering know-how and sheer good luck - drove his 16-year journey to summit all of the world's 8,000ers, the 14 peaks that exceed 8,000 meters (26,000-plus feet) and take climbers into the death zone. Incredibly, he accomplished that feat without the aid of bottled oxygen for every mountain but one.