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Profiles in ignorance : how America's politicians got dumb and dumber / by Borowitz, Andy,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index.Andy Borowitz, "one of the funniest people in America" (CBS Sunday Morning), brilliantly examines the intellectual deterioration of American politics, from Ronald Reagan to Dan Quayle, from George W. Bush to Sarah Palin, to its apotheosis in Donald J. Trump. The winner of the first-ever National Press Club award for humor, Andy Borowitz has been called a "Swiftian satirist" (The Wall Street Journal) and "one of the country's finest satirists" (The New York Times). Millions of fans and New Yorker readers enjoy his satirical news column "The Borowitz Report." Now, in Profiles in Ignorance, he offers a witty, spot-on diagnosis of our country's political troubles by showing how ignorant leaders are degrading, embarrassing, and endangering our nation. Borowitz argues that over the past fifty years, American politicians have grown increasingly allergic to knowledge, and mass media have encouraged the election of ignoramuses by elevating candidates who are better at performing than thinking. Starting with Ronald Reagan's first campaign for governor of California in 1966 and culminating with the election of Donald J. Trump to the White House, Borowitz shows how, during the age of twenty-four-hour news and social media, the US has elected politicians to positions of great power whose lack of the most basic information is terrifying. In addition to Reagan, Quayle, Bush, Palin, and Trump, Borowitz covers a host of congresspersons, senators, and governors who have helped lower the bar over the past five decades. Profiles in Ignorance aims to make us both laugh and cry: laugh at the idiotic antics of these public figures, and cry at the cataclysms these icons of ignorance have caused. But most importantly, the book delivers a call to action and a cause for optimism: History doesn't move in a straight line, and we can change course if we act now.
Subjects: Politicians; Politicians;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Lady Tan's circle of women [sound recording] : a novel / by See, Lisa,author.; Chien, Justin,narrator.; Lim, Jennifer,narrator.; Simon & Schuster Audio (Firm),publisher.;
Read by Jennifer Lim, Justin Chien.According to Confucius, "an educated woman is a worthless woman," but Tan Yunxian--born into an elite family, yet haunted by death, separations, and loneliness--is being raised by her grandparents to be of use. Her grandmother is one of only a handful of female doctors in China, and she teaches Yunxian the pillars of Chinese medicine, the Four Examinations--looking, listening, touching, and asking--something a man can never do with a female patient. From a young age, Yunxian learns about women's illnesses, many of which relate to childbearing, alongside a young midwife-in-training, Meiling. The two girls find fast friendship and a mutual purpose--despite the prohibition that a doctor should never touch blood while a midwife comes in frequent contact with it--and they vow to be forever friends, sharing in each other's joys and struggles. No mud, no lotus, they tell themselves: from adversity beauty can bloom. But when Yunxian is sent into an arranged marriage, her mother-in-law forbids her from seeing Meiling and from helping the women and girls in the household. Yunxian is to act like a proper wife--embroider bound-foot slippers, pluck instruments, recite poetry, give birth to sons, and stay forever within the walls of the family compound, the Garden of Fragrant Delights. How might a woman like Yunxian break free of these traditions, go on to treat women and girls from every level of society, and lead a life of such importance that many of her remedies are still used five centuries later? How might the power of friendship support or complicate these efforts? Lady Tan's Circle of Women is a captivating story of women helping other women. It is also a triumphant reimagining of the life of a woman who was remarkable in the Ming dynasty and would be considered remarkable today.
Subjects: Audiobooks.; Historical fiction.; Novels.; Aristocracy (Social class); Arranged marriage; Female friendship; Midwives; Women physicians;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Strangers to ourselves : unsettled minds and the stories that make us / by Aviv, Rachel,author.;
Includes bibliographical references."The highly anticipated debut from the acclaimed award-winning New Yorker writer Rachel Aviv compels us to examine how the stories we tell about mental illness shape our sense of who we are. Mental illnesses are often seen as chronic and intractable forces that take over our lives, that define us. But how much do the stories we tell about our illnesses--and the process of diagnosis--inform their course? In Strangers to Ourselves, a powerful and gripping debut, Rachel Aviv writes about how explanations for mental distress may shape our health, our sense of who we are, and the possibilities for who we can be in the world. Drawing on deep, original reporting and unpublished journals and memoirs, Aviv follows an Indian woman, celebrated as a saint, who lived in healing temples in Kerala; an incarcerated mother vying for her children's forgiveness after a period of psychosis; a man seeking revenge against a prominent psychoanalytic hospital through a lawsuit that dramatizes the clash between two irreconcilable models of the mind; an affluent young woman whose lifelong psychiatric treatment eventually leads her to go off her meds in a desperate attempt to figure out who she would be without them. Animated by a profound sense of empathy, Aviv's exploration is refracted through her own account of being institutionalized at the age of six and meeting Hava, a friend and fellow patient with whom her life runs parallel--until it no longer does. While the stories unfold in different eras and cultures, they converge in the psychic hinterlands, the outer edges of human experience. Aviv writes about people who have come up against the limits of psychiatric explanations and endeavor to recover a sense of agency, in search of new ways to understand a self in the world. Challenging conventional ideas of mental disease as something static, Aviv's accounts are testaments to the porousness and resilience of the mind"--
Subjects: Mental illness; Mentally ill;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Hester : a novel / by Lico Albanese, Laurie,1959-author.;
"A vivid reimagining of the woman who inspired Hester Prynne, the tragic heroine of Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, and a journey into the enduring legacy of New England's witchcraft trials. Who is the real Hester Prynne? Isobel Gamble is a young seamstress carrying generations of secrets when she sets sail from Scotland in the early 1800s with her husband, Edward. An apothecary who has fallen under the spell of opium, his pile of debts have forced them to flee Edinburgh for a fresh start in the New World. But only days after they've arrived in Salem, Edward abruptly joins a departing ship as a medic--leaving Isobel penniless and alone in a strange country, forced to make her way by any means possible. When she meets a young Nathaniel Hawthorne,the two are instantly drawn to each other: he is a man haunted by his ancestors, who sent innocent women to the gallows--while she is an unusually gifted needleworker, troubled by her own strange talents. As the weeks pass and Edward's safe return grows increasingly unlikely, Nathaniel and Isobel grow closer and closer. Together, they are a muse and a dark storyteller; the enchanter and the enchanted. But which is which? In this sensuous and hypnotizing tale, a young immigrant woman grapples with our country's complicated past, and learns that America's ideas of freedom and liberty often fall short of their promise. Interwoven with Isobel and Nathaniel's story is a vivid interrogation of who gets to be a "real" American in the first half of the 19th century, a depiction of the early days of the Underground Railroad in New England, and atmospheric interstitials that capture the long history of "unusual" women being accused of witchcraft. Meticulously researched yet evocatively imagined, Laurie Lico Albanese's Hester is a timeless tale of art, ambition, and desire that examines the roots of female creative power and the men who try to shut it down"--
Subjects: Historical fiction.; Novels.; Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 1804-1864; Man-woman relationships; Authors; Women;
Available copies: 2 / Total copies: 2
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Clean : the new science of skin / by Hamblin, James,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."The things we do every day to keep ourselves clean can have surprising and unintended effects, as this entertaining introduction to the new science of skin microbes and probiotics reveals Keeping skin healthy is a booming industry, and yet it seems like almost no one agrees on what actually works. What one person says is vital another says is toxic. We have not cured acne or eczema, allergies keep getting worse, and autoimmune conditions are becoming increasingly common. In Clean, doctor and journalist James Hamblin explores how we got here, examining the science and culture of how we care for our skin today. He talks to dermatologists, microbiologists, allergists, immunologists, aestheticians, bar-soap enthusiasts, venture capitalists, Amish people, theologians, and straight-up scam artists, trying to figure out what it really means to be clean. He even experiments with giving up showers entirely, and discovers that he is not alone. Along the way he realizes that most of our standards of cleanliness are less related to health than most people think. In fact, our overuse of soap, sanitizers, and untested, misleading skin-care products may be to blame for many problems. But a little-known area of science is shining light on our skin microbiome-the trillions of microbes that live on our skin and in our pores. These microbes influence everything from acne, eczema, and dry skin to how we smell. The new goal of skin care will be to cultivate a healthy biome-and to embrace the meaning of "clean" in the natural sense. This can mean doing much less, saving time, money, energy, water, and plastic bottles in the process. Lucid, accessible, and deeply researched, Clean explores the ongoing, radical change in the way we think about our skin, introducing readers to the emerging science that will be at the forefront of health and wellness conversations in coming years"--
Subjects: Beauty, Personal.; Hygiene.; Self-care, Health.; Skin;
Available copies: 0 / Total copies: 1
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Orwell's roses / by Solnit, Rebecca,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."A fresh take on George Orwell as a far more nature-loving figure than is often portrayed, and a dazzlingly rich meditation on roses, gardens, and the value and use of beauty and pleasure in the face of brutality and horror. "In the spring of 1936 a man planted roses." That man was George Orwell, shortly before he went off to fight against fascism in Spain. Today, those rosebushes are still thriving. This is the starting point for Rebecca Solnit's new book, which presents another side of Orwell, a neglected arcadian Orwell who took enormous pleasure in the natural world and found great meaning and value in it. Orwell's planting of the roses is an axle from which Solnit's chapters radiate out like spokes as she brilliantly explores its various contexts, perspectives, and meanings, following the contours of Orwell's life and tracking how deeply enmeshed the love of nature is in all his writing. Journeying to the cottage in Wallingford where Orwell lived in 1936, she examines his desire to be agrarian and settled, how gardening restored him, and how planting something can be an act of fidelity and faith. Probing at the beauty and meaning of roses, she draws in the revolutionary photography and politics of Tina Modotti and makes a clandestine visit to a Columbian rose factory, where 80% of America's roses for sale are grown. She tracks the history of gardening, showing how the desire to garden is culturally determined and often rooted in class, recounts the immense battles over breeding and genetics in Russia during Stalin's time, and probes into the colonialist roots of Orwell's forebears, who worked in opium production in India and profiteered from sugar and slavery in Jamaica. Solnit shows how these points of intersection illuminate Orwell's work, and how that illumination shines forth on larger questions about beauty, pleasure, meaning, relationship, and hope. Her book establishes that "Orwellian" could stand for something more than ominous, corrupt, and sinister"--
Subjects: Biographies.; Orwell, George, 1903-1950; Orwell, George, 1903-1950.; Authors, English; Gardening.; Nature.; Roses.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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How civil wars start : and how to stop them / by Walter, Barbara F.,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."A leading political scientist examines the dramatic rise in violent extremism around the globe and sounds the alarm on the increasing likelihood of a second civil war in the United States. Political violence rips apart several towns in southwest Texas. A far-right militia plots to kidnap the governor of Michigan and try her for treason. An armed mob of Trump supporters and conspiracy theorists storms the U.S. Capitol. Are these isolated incidents? Or is this the start of something bigger? Barbara F. Walter has spent her career studying civil conflict in places like Iraq and Sri Lanka, but now she has become increasingly worried about her own country. Perhaps surprisingly, both autocracies and healthy democracies are largely immune from civil war; it's the countries in the middle ground that are most vulnerable. And this is where more and more countries, including the United States, are finding themselves today. Over the last two decades, the number of active civil wars around the world has almost doubled. Walter reveals the warning signs-where wars tend to start, who initiates them, what triggers them-and why some countries tip over into conflict while others remain stable. Drawing on the latest international research and lessons from over twenty countries, Walter identifies the crucial risk factors, from democratic backsliding to factionalization and the politics of resentment. A civil war today won't look like America in the 1860s, Russia in the 1920s, or Spain in the 1930s. It will begin with sporadic acts of violence and terror, accelerated by social media. It will sneak up on us and leave us wondering how we could have been so blind. In this urgent and insightful book, Walter redefines civil war for a new age, providing the framework we need to confront the danger we now face-and the knowledge to stop it before it's too late"--
Subjects: Civil war.; Democratization.; Domestic terrorism.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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No more nice girls : gender, power, and why it's time to stop playing by the rules / by McKeon, Lauren,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."In the age of girl bosses, Beyoncé, and Black Widow, we like to tell our little girls they can be anything they want when they grow up, except they'll have to work twice as hard, be told to "play nice," and face countless double standards that curb their personal, political, and economic power. Today, long after the rise of girl power in the 90s, the failed promise of a female president, and the ubiquity of feminist-branded everything, women are still a surprisingly, depressingly long way from gender and racial equality. It's worth asking: Why do we keep trying to win a game we were never meant to play in the first place? Award-winning journalist and author Lauren McKeon examines the varied ways in which our institutions are designed to keep women and other marginalized genders at a disadvantage and shows us why we need more than parity, visible diversity, and lone female CEOs to change this power game. She uncovers new models of power-- ones the patriarchy doesn't get to define-- by talking to lawyers insisting on gender-neutral change rooms in courthouses, programmers creating apps to track the breakdown of men and women being quoted in the news media, educators illustrating tampon packaging with pictures of black bodies, mixed martial artists teaching young girls self-empowerment, entrepreneurs prioritizing trauma-informed office cultures, and many other women doing power differently. As the toxic, divisive, and hyper-masculine style of leadership gains ground, threatening democracy here and abroad, McKeon underscores why it's time to stop playing by the rules of a rigged game. No More Nice Girls charts a hopeful and potent path forward for how to disrupt the standard (very male) vision of power, ditch convention, and build a more equitable world for everyone."--
Subjects: Equality.; Feminism.; Power (Social sciences); Sex discrimination against women.; Social control.; Women; Women's rights.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The Wonder : a novel / by Donoghue, Emma,1969-author.;
Set in the Irish Midlands in the 1850s, 'The Wonder' - inspired by numerous cases of 'fasting girls' between the sixteenth century and the twentieth - is a psychological thriller about a child's murder. Pitting all the seductions of fundamentalism against sense and love, this book is a searing examination of what nourishes us, body and soul.
Subjects: Thrillers (Fiction); Psychological fiction.; Historical fiction.; Fasting; Murder;
Available copies: 3 / Total copies: 3
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Magnificent rebel : Nancy Cunard in Jazz Age Paris / by De Courcy, Anne,author.; container of (work):De Courcy, Anne.Five love affairs and a friendship.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."Anne de Courcy, the author of Husband Hunters and Chanel's Riviera, examines the controversial life of legendary beauty, writer and rich girl Nancy Cunard during her thirteen years in Jazz-Age Paris. Paris in the 1920s was bursting with talent in the worlds of art, design and literature. The city was at the forefront of everything new and exciting; there was no censorship; life and love were there for the taking. At its center was the gorgeous, seductive English socialite Nancy Cunard, scion of the famous shipping line. Her lovers were legion, but this book focuses on five of the most significant and a lifelong friendship. Her affairs with acclaimed writers Ezra Pound, Aldous Huxley, Michael Arlen and Louis Aragon were passionate and tempestuous, as was her romance with black jazz pianist Henry Crowder. Her friendship with the famous Irish novelist George Moore, her mother's lover and a man falsely rumored to be Nancy's father, was the longest-lasting of her life. Cunard's early years were ones of great wealth but also emotional deprivation. Her mother Lady Cunard, the American heiress Maud Alice Burke (who later changed her name to Emerald) became a reigning London hostess; Nancy, from an early age, was given to promiscuity and heavy drinking and preferred a life in the arts to one in the social sphere into which she had been born. Highly intelligent, a gifted poet and widely read, she founded a small press that published Samuel Beckett among others. A muse to many, she was also a courageous crusader against racism and fascism. She left Paris in 1933, at the end of its most glittering years and remained unafraid to live life on the edge until her death in 1965. Magnificent Rebel is a nuanced portrait of a complex woman, set against the backdrop of the City of Light during one of its most important and fascinating decades"--
Subjects: Biographies.; Personal narratives.; Cunard, Nancy, 1896-1965; Authors, English; Publishers and publishing; Women journalists; Women political activists;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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