Broader Bookshelf 2026 - Read a Nonfiction Book with "Lost" or "Found" in the Title

"The Lost Art of Silence encourages us to embrace this pursuit and allow the warm light of silence to glow. Invoking the wisdom of many of the greatest writers, thinkers, contemplatives, historians, musicians, and artists, Sarah Anderson reveals the sublime nature of quiet that's all too often undervalued. Throughout, she shares her own penetrating insights into the potential for silence to transform us. This celebration of silence invites us to widen our perspective and shows its power to inspire the human spirit in spite of the distracting noise of contemporary life"-- Provided by publisher.

"Lost Literacies is the first full-length study of US comic strips from the period prior to the rise of Sunday newspaper comics. Where current histories assume that nineteenth-century US comics consisted solely of single-panel political cartoons or simple "proto-comics," Lost Literacies introduces readers to an ambitious group of artists and editors who were intent on experimenting with the storytelling possibilities of the sequential strip, resulting in playful comics whose existence upends prevailing narratives about the evolution of comic strips. Over the course of the nineteenth century, figures such as artist Frank Bellew and editor T. W. Strong introduced sequential comic strips into humor magazines and precursors to graphic novels known as "graphic albums." These early works reached audiences in the tens of thousands. Their influences ranged from Walt Whitman's poetry to Mark Twain's travel writings to the bawdy stage comedies of the Bowery Theatre. Most importantly, they featured new approaches to graphic storytelling that went far beyond the speech bubbles and panel grids familiar to us today. As readers of Lost Literacies will see, these little-known early US comic strips rival even the most innovative modern comics for their diversity and ambition." -- Publisher's description.

"Science fiction and fantasy reign over popular culture now. Lost Transmissions is a rich trove of forgotten and unknown, imagined-but-never-finished, and under-appreciated-but-influential works from those imaginative genres, as well as little-known information about well-known properties. Divided into sections on Film & TV, Literature, Art, Music, Fashion, Architecture, and Pop Culture, the book examines Jules Verne's lost novel; AfroFuturism and Space Disco; E.T.'s scary beginnings; William Gibson's never-filmed Aliens sequel; Weezer's never-made space opera; and the 8,000-page metaphysical diary of Philip K. Dick. Featuring more than 150 photos, this insightful volume will become the bible of science fiction and fantasy's most interesting and least-known chapters." --Amazon.com.

Lost in America chronicles the life and death of great American buildings. It's the first book that documents in words and pictures the destruction of more than 100 structures. A number were fought for. Some were mourned. Most slipped away unnoticed.

Examines the role federal borrowing played in the economic collapse of 2008, describing the economic and political causes of the collapse, and discussing what the continuing impact of the debt and foreign borrowing will be on the United States in the twenty-first century.

"This volume examines the movements that comprised the conflict of Argonne Forrest. The focus of the work is the five-day isolation and besiegement of the "Lost Battalion." Bringing this tale to a more personal level, the work creates a picture of the men who lived, fought and died in the all-consuming battle of World War I"--Provided by publisher.

"You swab your cheek or spit in a vial, then send it away to a lab somewhere. Weeks later you get a report that might tell you where your ancestors came from or if you carry certain genetic risks. Or the report could reveal long-buried family secrets and upend your entire sense of identity. Soon a lark becomes an obsession, a relentless drive to find answers to questions at the core of your being, like "Who am I?" and "Where did I come from?" Welcome to the age of home genetic testing. In The Lost Family, journalist Libby Copeland investigates what happens when we embark on a vast social experiment with little understanding of the ramifications. She explores the culture of genealogy buffs, the science of DNA, and the business of companies like Ancestry and 23andMe, all while tracing the story of one woman, her unusual results, and a relentless methodical drive for answers that becomes a thoroughly modern genetic detective story. Gripping and masterfully told, The Lost Family is a spectacular book on a big, timely subject"--Goodreads.com

As a young music journalist in 1975, Stephen Davis got the opportunity of a lifetime: an invitation to cover the sold-out 1975 North American tour of Led Zeppelin, the biggest and most secretive rock band in the world, for a national magazine. He received a backstage pass, interviews with band members, and even a seat on the band's luxurious tour jet. While on duty, he chronicled the Zeppelin tour in three notebooks, but after writing his article in 1975 he misplaced them. After three decades of searching, in 2005 he finally found the notebooks and unearthed an amazing amount of new information from the tour.--From publisher description.

"People often associate fairy tales with Disney films, and with the male authors from whom Disney often drew inspiration -- notably Charles Perrault, the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen. In these portrayals the princess is a passive, compliant figure. By contrast, 'The Lost Princess' shows that classic fairy tales such as 'Cinderella', 'Rapunzel' and 'Beauty and the Beast' have a much richer, more complex history than Disney's saccharine depictions. Anne E. Duggan recovers the voices of women writers such as Marie-Catherine d'Aulnoy, Marie-Jeanne L'Héritier and Charlotte-Rose de La Force, who penned popular tales about ogre-killing, pregnant, cross-dressing, dynamic heroines who saved the day. This new history will appeal to anyone who wants to know more about the lost, plucky heroines of historic fairy tales."-- Dust jacket.

In Cambodia, between 1975 and 1979, two million people died at the hands of the Khmer Rouge. Twenty years later, not one member had been held accountable for the genocide. Haunted by the image of one of them, Comrade Duch, photographer Nic Dunlop set out to bring him to life, and thereby to account. "I needed to understand how a seemingly ordinary man ... could turn into one of the worst mass murderers of the twentieth century." Dunlop unfolds the history of Cambodia as a filter for understanding its tragic last forty years. Guided by witnesses, he teases out the details of Duch's transformation from sensitive schoolchild and dedicated teacher to the revolutionary killer who later slipped quietly back into village life. This result is a vivid reminder that, whether in the killing fields of Cambodia or the deserts of Darfur, if we turn our backs on genocide, we must bear a collective guilt.--From publisher description.

"Joining the ranks of Rebecca Skloot's The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and Zora Neale Hurston's rediscovered classic Barracoon, an immersive and revelatory history of the Clotilda, the last slave ship to land on US soil, told through the stories of its survivors-the last documented survivors of any slave ship-whose lives diverged and intersected in profound ways"-- Provided by publisher.

"An award-winning journalist and Pulitzer Prize nominee who has covered homelessness for decades and spent extensive time on the streets for his reporting, Fagan experienced it himself as a young man and brings a deep understanding to the crisis. He introduces us to Rita and Tyson, telling the deeply moving story of two unhoused people rescued by their families with the help of Fagan's reporting, and their struggle to pull themselves out of homelessness and addiction, ending with both enormous tragedy and triumph. But [this book] is not just a story of individuals experiencing homelessness--it is also a compelling look at the link between homelessness and addiction, and [a] commentary on housing and equality"-- Provided by publisher.

"The Island that Disappeared tells, for the first time, the story of the passengers aboard the Mayflower's sister ship (the Seaflower) who in 1630 founded a rival Puritan colony on an isolated Caribbean island called Providence--so small it doesn't appear on most maps. Chaos ensued, and the great experiment failed. One-hundred years later the disaster repeated itself. Traveling to the island today, Tom Feiling finds a new mix of Puritans and pirates that make Providence a symbol of how the Western world took shape."--Provided by publisher.

Acclaimed popular science writer Kitty Ferguson investigates little-explored byroads in the history of science, from Johannes Kepler's nearly disastrous venture into the realm of science fiction to a mid-twentieth-century experiment involving EEGs and rocket fuel. She introduces such underappreciated geniuses as Mary the Jewess, the first-century ancestress of modern chemistry; and Lise Meitner, who escaped Nazi Germany only to have her role in the discovery of nuclear fission ignored by the Nobel committee. Ferguson also takes us on astounding adventures with the likes of Jesuit astronomer Ferdinand Verbiest, who invented the first automobile as a clever toy to amuse the Chinese emperor in seventeenth-century Beijing and then saved his own life by winning a bizarre astronomy competition against his former torturer. --from Publisher's description.

"Comprised of the sons and grandsons of runaway American slaves, the Coloured Hockey League of the Maritimes was formed in 1895 in Halifax. Twenty-five years before the negro baseball leagues in the United States and twenty-two years before the birth of the National Hockey League, the Coloured League helped to pioneer the emerging sport of ice hockey. In an era when many believed blacks could not endure cold and possessed ankles too weak to effectively skate, these men defied the established myths. With colorful names such as the Africville Sea-Sides and the New Glasgow Speed Boys, the Coloured League would emerge as a premier force in Canadian hockey."--pub. desc.

"As child, Meryl Frank was the chosen inheritor of family remembrance. Her aunt Mollie, a formidable and cultured woman, insisted that Meryl never forget who they were, where they came from, and the hate that nearly destroyed them. Over long afternoons, Mollie told her about the city, the theater, and, above all else, Meryl's cousin, the radiant Franya Winter. Franya was the leading light of Vilna's Yiddish theater, a remarkable and precocious woman who cast off the restrictions of her Hasidic family and community to play roles as prostitutes and bellhops, lovers and nuns. Yet there was one thing her aunt Mollie would never tell Meryl: how Franya died. Before Mollie passed away, she gave Meryl a Yiddish book containing the terrible answer, but forbade her to read it. And for years, Meryl obeyed. Unearthed is the story of Meryl's search for Franya and a timely history of hatred and resistance. Through archives across four continents, by way of chance encounters and miraculous discoveries, and eventually, guided by the shocking truth recorded in the pages of the forbidden book, Meryl conjures the rogue spirit of her cousin-her beauty and her tragedy. Meryl's search reveals a lost world destroyed by hatred, illuminating the cultural haven of Vilna and its resistance during World War II. As she seeks to find her lost family legacy, Meryl looks for answers to the questions that have defined her life: what is our duty to the past? How do we honor such memories while keeping them from consuming us? And what do we teach our children about tragedy?"-- Provided by publisher.

"Nearly forgotten by history, this is the story of the Wereth Eleven, African-American soldiers who fought courageously for freedom in WWII--only to be ruthlessly executed by Nazi troops during the Battle of the Bulge, "--Amazon.com.

"New York Times bestselling crime writer John Glatt tells the true story behind the kidnappings and long-overdue rescue of three women found in a Cleveland basement. The Lost Girls tells the truly amazing story of Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight, who were kidnapped, imprisoned, and repeatedly raped and beaten in a Cleveland house for over a decade by Ariel Castro, and their amazing escape in May 2013, which made headlines all over the world. The book has an exclusive interview and photographs of Ariel Castro's secret fiance, who spent many romantic nights in his house of horror, without realizing he had bound and chained captives just a few feet away. There are also revealing interviews with several Castro family members, musician friends and several neighbors who witnessed the dramatic rescue"-- Provided by publisher.

Poetry. Hybrid Genre. LGBTQIA Studies. Science Fiction. Drawing on the work of such thinkers as John McPhee, Rachel Carson, Timothy Morton, Frank White, and others, LOST CITY HYDROTHERMAL FIELD explores philosophies of nature old and new through poetry and science fiction. The anthropocene crisis and the crisis of humanity-as-invasive-species are framed in this text as global, as well as personal, misadventures. A mixed-genre work, readers encounter poems and stories--islands and continents--in a rapid succession of speculative geography, and readers are invited to join its beleaguered, psychozoic populations.

"Many of us are worried (or at least we should be) about the impacts of globalization, pollution, and biotechnology on our diets. Whether it's monoculture crops, hormone-fed beef, or high-fructose corn syrup, industrially-produced foods have troubling consequences for us and the planet. But as culinary diversity diminishes, many people are looking to a surprising place to safeguard the future: into the past. The Lost Supper explores an idea that is quickly spreading among restaurateurs, food producers, scientists, and gastronomes around the world: that the key to healthy and sustainable eating lies not in looking forward, but in looking back to the foods that have sustained us through our half-million-year existence as a species"-- Publisher's website.

This is the story of London as told through the buildings, parks and other features that are no longer with us. The author covers everything from buried rivers to demolished landmarks, long-shut Tube stations to overgrown cemeteries, underground Roman streets to abandoned bunkers and tunnels, demolished churches and long-defunct pleasures and sights and sounds.

From the dawn of the photographic era, Lost Charleston chronicles the markets, mansions, hotels, restaurants, church towers and cherished businesses that time, progress, and fashion have swept aside. The miracle of Charleston is that despite the very worst that man and nature has thrown at it--from earthquakes to hurricanes, great fires to Civil War bombardment--so much of the city has been preserved. Lost Charleston shows what else could have been on display for tourists to visit had events been otherwise. Using classic archive images, Charleston's greatest architectural and cultural losses are documented in chronological order from 1861 through to 2018. Apart from the grand buildings there are also elements of Charleston life precious to Charlestonians that have disappeared over time, many of which will still resonate with the local community. These include beloved local restaurants, annual festivals, the fishing fleet that DuBose Heyward wrote about in his novel Porgy, a famed local football team, trolley cars, and the Piggly Wiggly store. Plus there's the Jenkins Orphanage Band whose dance moves gave the city its most famous export: The Charleston!

"A rare and timely parenting memoir by a queer Black mother, Mama follows the impact of incarceration on a family, exploring the generational trauma and pulling back the curtain on the foster care system"-- Provided by publisher.

"For more than a millennium, the Byzantine Empire presided over the juncture between East and West, as well as the transition from the classical to the modern world. Jonathan Harris, a leading scholar of Byzantium, eschews the usual run-through of emperors and battles and instead recounts the empire's extraordinary history by focusing each chronological chapter on an archetypal figure, family, place, or event. Harris's action-packed introduction presents a civilization rich in contrasts, combining orthodox Christianity with paganism, and classical Greek learning with Roman power. Frequently assailed by numerous armies--including those of Islam--Byzantium nonetheless survived and even flourished by dint of its somewhat unorthodox foreign policy and its sumptuous art and architecture, which helped to embed a deep sense of Byzantine identity in its people. Enormously engaging and utilizing a wealth of sources to cover all major aspects of the empire's social, political, military, religious, cultural, and artistic history, Harris's study illuminates the very heart of Byzantine civilization and explores its remarkable and lasting influence on its neighbors and on the modern world."

Author becomes a bird watcher, and sets record for number of birds counted.

The heavily illustrated book includes a short history of the city and chapters on Main Street, the Assembly Street Market, the Civil War, and lost institutions and neighborhoods.

"Long before GPS, Google Earth, and global transit, humans traveled vast distances using only environmental clues and simple instruments. John Huth asks what is lost when modern technology substitutes for our innate capacity to find our way. Encyclopedic in breadth, weaving together astronomy, meteorology, oceanography, and ethnography, The Lost Art of Finding Our Way puts us in the shoes, ships, and sleds of early navigators for whom paying close attention to the environment around them was, quite literally, a matter of life and death. " --- page [4] of cover.

"A descendant of a slave named Coreen, and-according to oral tradition-her owner, President James Madison, finally shares her family's story."-- Provided by publisher.

"In the wake of the financial crisis, the number of anchor-outs living in Richardson Bay more than doubles as their long-simmering feud with the wealthy residents of Marin County--one of the richest counties in the country--finally boils over. Many of the shoreline's well-heeled yacht club members and mansion owners blame their unhoused neighbors for rising crime on the waterfront. Meanwhile, local politicians accuse them of destroying the Bay Area's marine ecosystem and demand their eviction. When the pandemic breaks out, a slew of city and regional authorities heed the call: they seize and crush the anchor-outs' boats, arresting dissenters as they dismantle one of the nation's oldest unhoused communities. Kloc's near-decade-long firsthand account of the joys, hardships, and eventual demise of the anchor-outs is in many ways the story of being poor in America. Examining the profit-driven policies that exacerbate the contemporary housing crisis, Lost at Sea weaves together tales of comradery and survival on the anchorage with the rich history of the region, from the creation of unspeakable wealth during the San Francisco Gold Rush era to the aftermath of the devastating earthquake and fire of 1906, when the first unhoused people dropped their anchors in Marin County. Along the way, Kloc discovers the quiet beauty of the world the anchor-outs built: how they've learned to care for each other, band together to fend off real estate developers and NIMBY neighbors, and fight for a way of life that is entirely unrecognizable to those on shore. Lost at Sea explores the often overlooked world of poverty and homelessness that exists in even the wealthiest enclaves of America, where people who have fallen on hard times struggle to rebuild their lives among those who would rather just wish them away"-- Provided by publisher.

"This volume collects over 200 poems from out-of-print books, literary journals, and those left in typescript and notebook form hidden away in university archives. The lost Etheridge attempts to serve as a companion to The essential Etheridge, an indispensable, albeit slim, volume of poetry published 35 years ago by University of Pittsburgh Press"--Editor's note, page xv.

"Award-winning investigative reporter Robert Kolker delivers a haunting and humanizing account of the true-life search for a serial killer still at large on Long Island, in a compelling tale of unsolved murder and Internet prostitution. One late spring evening in 2010, Shannan Gilbert, after running through the oceanfront community of Oak Beach screaming for her life, went missing. No one who had heard of her disappearance thought much about what had happened to the twenty-four-year-old: she was a Craigslist prostitute who had been fleeing a scene--of what, no one could be sure. The Suffolk County Police, too, seemed to have paid little attention--until seven months later, when an unexpected discovery in a bramble alongside a nearby highway turned up four bodies, all evenly spaced, all wrapped in burlap. But none of them Shannan's. There was Maureen Brainard-Barnes, last seen at Penn Station in Manhattan three years earlier, and Melissa Barthelemy, last seen in the Bronx in 2009. There was Megan Waterman, last seen leaving a hotel in Hauppage, Long Island, just a month after Shannan's disappearance in 2010, and Amber Lynn Costello, last seen leaving a house in West Babylon a few months later that same year. Like Shannan, all four women were petite and in their twenties, they all came from out of town to work as escorts, and they all advertised on Craigslist and its competitor, Backpage. In a triumph of reporting--and in a riveting narrative--Robert Kolker presents the first detailed look at the shadow world of escorts in the Internet age, where making a living is easier than ever and the dangers remain all too real. He has talked exhaustively with the friends and family of each woman to reveal the three-dimensional truths about their lives, the struggling towns they came from, and the dreams they chased. And he has gained unique access to the Oak Beach neighborhood that has found itself the focus of national media scrutiny--where the police have flailed, the body count has risen, and the neighbors have begun pointing fingers at one another. There, in a remote community, out of sight of the beaches and marinas scattered along the South Shore barrier islands, the women's stories come together in death and dark mystery. Lost Girls is a portrait not just of five women, but of unsolved murder in an idyllic part of America, of the underside of the Internet, and of the secrets we keep without admitting to ourselves that we keep them"-- Provided by publisher.

"Elizabeth Kolbert is one of today's leading environmental journalists."--Abebooks.com viewed Jan. 23, 2023.

Many scientists believe that we are currently living through the Earth's sixth mass extinction, with species disappearing at a rate not seen for tens of millions of years a trend that will only accelerate as climate change and other pressures intensify. What does it mean to live in such a time? And what exactly do we lose when a species goes extinct? In a series of fascinating encounters with subjects that are now nowhere to be found on Earth from giant tortoises to minuscule snails the size of sesame seeds, from ocean-hopping trees to fish that wag their tails like puppies Tom Lathan brings these lost wonders briefly back to life and gives us a tantalising glimpse of what we have lost within our own lifetime. Drawing on the personal recollections of the people who studied these species, as well as those who tried but ultimately failed to save them, and with beautiful illustrations, Lost Wonders is an intimate portrait of the species that have only recently vanished from our world and an urgent warning to hold on all the more tightly to those now slipping from our grasp.

When the most recent edition of the Oxford Junior Dictionary - widely used in schools around the world - was published, a sharp-eyed reader soon noticed that around forty common words concerning nature had been dropped. The words were no longer being used enough by children to merit their place in the dictionary. The list of these "lost words" included acorn, adder, bluebell, dandelion, fern, heron, kingfisher, newt, otter, and willow. Among the words taking their place were attachment, blog, broadband, bullet-point, cut-and-paste, and voice-mail. The news of these substitutions - the outdoor and natural being displaced by the indoor and virtual - became seen by many as a powerful sign of the growing gulf between childhood and the natural world. In response, Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris set out to make a "spell book" that would conjure back twenty of these lost words, and the beings they name, from acorn to wren. By the magic of word and paint, they sought to summon these words again into the voices, stories, and dreams of children and adults alike, and to celebrate the wonder and importance of everyday nature. You hold that book in your hands - a book that has already cast its extraordinary spell on hundreds of thousands of people and begun a grassroots movement to re-wild childhood across Britain, Europe, and North America. -- From back cover

Surveys Antarctica's diverse plant and animal life while raising awareness about how its fragile ecosystems are being threatened by global warming.

"Set during the roaring twenties, Corey Mead's The Lost Pilots is the saga of two star crossed pilots who soar to the greatest heights of fame, tailspin into scandal and crime, and go the ultimate lengths for a chance at redemption" -- Provided by publisher.

Examines the movies and artists of film noir, describing the social climate and artistic skills that contributed to the genre.

"In 2014, Russia annexed the Crimea and attempted to seize a portion of Ukraine. While the world watched in outrage, this blatant violation of national sovereignty was only the latest iteration of a centuries-long effort to expand Russian boundaries and create a pan-Russian nation. In Lost Kingdom, award-winning historian Serhii Plokhy argues that we can only understand the confluence of Russian imperialism and nationalism today by delving into the nation's history. Spanning over 500 years, from the end of the Mongol rule to the present day, Plokhy shows how leaders from Ivan the Terrible to Joseph Stalin to Vladimir Putin exploited existing forms of identity, warfare, and territorial expansion to achieve imperial supremacy. An authoritative and masterful account of Russian nationalism, Lost Kingdom chronicles the story behind Russia's belligerent empire-building quest"-- Provided by publisher.

"What's it like to be the first to enter an Egyptian burial chamber that's been sealed for thousands of years? What horrifying secret was found among the prehistoric ruins of the American Southwest? Who really was the infamous the Monster of Florence? Douglas Preston's journalistic explorations have taken him from the haunted country of Italy to the jungles of Honduras. He was granted exclusive journalistic access to the largest tomb in Egypt's Valley of the Kings, broke the story of an extraordinary mass grave of animals killed by the asteroid impact that ended the Cretaceous period and caused the extinction of the dinosaurs, and explored what lay hidden in the booby-trapped Money Pit on Oak Island. When he hasn't been co-authoring bestselling thrillers featuring FBI Agent Pendergast, Preston has been writing about some of the world's strangest and most dramatic mysteries. The Lost Tomb brings together an astonishing and compelling collection of true stories about buried treasure, enigmatic murders, lost tombs, bizarre crimes, and other fascinating tales of the past and present"-- Provided by publisher.

The evolution, biology, and discovery of the dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals that lived in South America. Inspired by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Lost world.

"The fateful days and weeks surrounding 6 June 1944 have been extensively documented in histories of the Second World War, but less attention has been paid to the tremendous impact of these events on the populations nearby. The Lost Paratroopers of Normandy tells the inspiring yet heartbreaking story of ordinary people who did extraordinary things in defense of liberty and freedom. On D-Day, when transport planes dropped paratroopers from the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions hopelessly off-target into marshy waters in northwestern France, the 900 villagers of Graignes welcomed them with open arms. These villagers - predominantly women - provided food, gathered intelligence, and navigated the floods to retrieve the paratroopers' equipment at great risk to themselves. When the attack by German forces on 11 June forced the overwhelmed paratroopers to withdraw, many made it to safety thanks to the help and resistance of the villagers. In this moving book, historian Stephen G. Rabe, son of one of the paratroopers, meticulously documents the forgotten lives of those who participated in this integral part of D-Day history"-- Provided by publisher.

"In the summer of 1967, nineteen-year-old Brenda Joyce Holland disappeared. She was a mountain girl who had come to Manteo to work in the outdoor drama 'The Lost Colony.' Her body was found five days later, floating in the sound. This riveting narrative, built on unique access to the state investigative file and multiple interviews with insiders, searches for the truth of her unsolved murder. This island odyssey of discovery includes séances, a suicide and a suppposed shallow grave. Journalist John Railey cuts through the myths and mistakes to finally arrive at the long-hidden truth of what happened to Brenda Holland that summer on Roanoke Island."--Back cover.

"In 1876, in a mountainous region to the west of Lake Victoria, Africa, what is today Ruwenzori Mountains National Park in Uganda, the famed explorer Henry Morton Stanley encountered Africans with what he was convinced were light complexions and European features. Stanley's discovery of this African 'white tribe' haunted him and seemed to substantiate the so-called Hamitic Hypothesis: the theory that the descendants of Ham--the son of Noah--had populated Africa and other remote places, proving that the source and spread of human races around the world could be traced to and explained by a Biblical story. In [this book], Michael Robinson traces the rise and fall of the Hamitic Hypothesis"--Amazon.com

Ronson investigates the strange things we are willing to believe in, from lifelike robots programmed with the personalities of our loved ones to indigo children to hyper successful spiritual healers. He looks at ordinary lives that take on extraordinary perspectives, for instance a pop singer whose greatest passion is the coming alien invasion, and the scientist designated to greet those aliens when they arrive. Ronson throws himself into the stories. In a tour de force piece, he splits himself into multiple Ronsons (Happy, Paul, and Titch, among others) to get to the bottom of predatory tactics of credit card companies and the murky, fabulously wealthy companies behind those tactics. Amateur nuclear physicists, assisted-suicide practitioners, the town of North Pole, a Christmas-induced high school mass-murder plot: Ronson explores all these tales with a sense of higher purpose and universality, and suddenly, mid-read, they are stories not about the fringe of society or about people far removed from our own experience, but about all of us.

"Learn the secrets of creating paint from the ground beneath your feet; from the rocks, clay and soil of the earth itself. Author and artist Caroline Ross explains when, where and how to forage as she shares her sustainable and fulfilling approach to painting. Covering every aspect of making natural paints, from finding the raw materials of stones and soils, to the techniques needed to refine them into beautiful pigments and paints, this book is suitable for the complete beginner as well as those with some expertise in art"--Page 4 of cover.

An exploration into the world of dinosaurs, presented by paleontologist Armin Schmitt. Through firsthand experiences and groundbreaking research, Schmitt delves into the lives of these ancient creatures, showcasing global excavations and remarkable discoveries. While familiar favorites like Tyrannosaurus rex make appearances, Schmitt also addresses intriguing questions, such as the excavation process, the survival of birds during extinction events, the evolution of paleontology since the Bone Wars era, and parallels between past climate changes and contemporary environmental challenges.

Explores language, music, and dance as interpreted though the author's works, combining memoir and essay to explore her deconstruction of English in her celebrated play "For colored girls" and her views on life as a woman and a black individual.

Hamburg is perhaps South Carolina's most famous ghost town. Founded in 1821, it grew to four thousand residents before transportation advances led to decline. During Reconstruction, recently freed slaves reshaped Hamburg into a freedmen's village, where residents held local, county and state offices. These gains were wiped away after the Hamburg Massacre in 1876, a watershed event that left seven African Americans dead, most of them executed in cold blood. Yet more than a century after Hamburg, the one white supremacist killed in the melee is canonized by the racially divisive Meriwether Monument in downtown North Augusta. Author Michael Smith details the amazing events that created this unique community with a lasting legacy.--From back cover.

"Poet Alan Bernheimer provides a long overdue English translation of this French literary classic -- Lost Profiles is a retrospective of a crucial period in modernism, written by co-founder of the surrealist movement. Opening with a reminiscence of the international Dada movement in the late 1910s and its transformation into the beginnings of surrealism, Lost Profiles then proceeds to usher its readers into encounters with a variety of literary lions. We meet an elegant Marcel Proust, renting five adjoining rooms at an expensive hotel to "contain" the silence needed to produce Remembrance of Things Past; an exhausted James Joyce putting himself through grueling translation sessions for Finnegans Wake; and an enigmatic Apollinaire in search of the ultimate objet trouve. Soupault sketches lively portraits of surrealist precursors like Pierre Reverdy and Blaise Cendrars, a moving account of his tragic fellow surrealist Rene Crevel, and the story of his unlikely friendship with right-wing anti-Vichy critic George Bernanos. The collection ends with essays on two modernist forerunners, Charles Baudelaire and Henri Rousseau. With an afterword by Ron Padgett recounting his meeting with Soupault in the mid 70's and a preface by Breton biographer Mark Polizzotti, Lost Profiles confirms Soupault's place in the vanguard of twentieth-century literature. "Philippe Soupault was a central figure in both the Dada and Surrealist movements but throughout his long life walked under no banner except the one of artistic freedom. In this previously untranslated book, he gives us a collection of richly remembered portraits of some of his best-loved friends from the old days of the new modernism. As a glimpse into that time, these lost portraits are invaluable -- and often deeply moving."--Paul Auster, author of Report from the Interior "Reading Alan Bernheimer's splendid translation of Soupault's memoir, I forgot that it was a translation, that it was Soupault writing or talking about another time, about his friends of one century past. I read myself into these vivid and virile (so, sue me!) assaults on time, and Time stopped."-Andrei Codrescu, author of The Posthuman Dada Guide: Tzara and Lenin Play Chess "Philippe Soupault was present at the creation of both Dada and Surrealism-collaborating with Andre Breton to produce The Magnetic Fields, the first book of automatic writing-before going his own way as a poet, novelist, and journalist. In this present volume, Soupault's fierce independence, deep wit, and generous heart shine through a set of sharply observed portraits of European writers-fellow geniuses, most of them known to him personally. Alan Bernheimer's fine translation allows Soupault's vibrant voice to come to life in our time, and to reanimate in turn some of the greatest spirits of the past century's literature -- a marvelous and much-needed apparition."-Andrew Joron, author of Trance Archive: New and Selected Poems "In this dazzling book-adroitly, smoothly & accurately translated by poet Alan Bernheimer-poet & co-founder of Surrealism Philippe Soupault trains his great secret eye & ear to auscultate an astounding range of core 20th century literary figures he knew personally. And does so with serenity, humor & profound insight. Like none of the academic histories covering this period, no matter how well written and documented, this book makes you say as you devour it: 'Wish I had been there.' Enough said, I'm going to call Rene Crevel right now."-Pierre Joris, author of Barzakh: Poems 2000-2012. Philippe Soupault (1897-1990) served in the French army during WWI and subsequently joined the Dada movement. In 1919, he collaborated with Andre Breton on the automatic text Les Champs magnetiques, launching the surrealist movement. In the years that followed, he wrote novels and journalism, directed Radio Tunis in Tunisia, and worked for UNESCO"-- Provided by publisher.

"A riveting and elegant story of climate change on one city street, full of surprises and true stories of human struggle and dying local trees - all against the national backdrop of 2023's record heat domes and raging wildfires and hurricanes. In 2023, author and activist Mike Tidwell decided to keep a record for a full year of the growing impacts of climate change on his one urban block right on the border with Washington, DC. A love letter to the magnificent oaks and other trees dying from record heat waves and bizarre rain, Tidwell's story depicts the neighborhood's battle to save the trees and combat climate change: The midwife who builds a geothermal energy system on the block, the Congressman who battles cancer and climate change at the same time, and the Chinese-American climate scientist who wants to bury billions of the world's dying trees to store their carbon and help stabilize the atmosphere. The story goes beyond ailing trees as Tidwell chronicles people on his block sick with Lyme disease, a church struggling with floods, and young people anguishing over whether to have kids, all in the same neighborhood and all against the global backdrop of 2023's record heat domes and raging wildfires and hurricanes. Then there's Tidwell himself who explores the ethical and scientific questions surrounding the idea of "geoengineering" as a last-ditch way to save the world's trees - and human communities everywhere - by reflecting sunlight away from the planet. No book has told the story of climate change this way: hyper local, full of surprises, full of true stories of life and death in one neighborhood. The Lost Trees of Willow Avenue is a harrowing and hopeful proxy for every street in America and every place on Earth"-- Provided by publisher.

"After his father tells him the story of archaeological treasure hunter Moses Wilhelm Shapira, who, in 1883, committed suicide after the biblical scrolls he found were denounced by his long-time enemy, an award-winning journalist sets out to determine Shapira's guilt or innocence, in a modern-day mystery,"--NoveList.

"In the epic tradition of Eyes on the Prize and with the cultural significance of John Lewis's March trilogy, an ambitious and harrowing account of the devoted black educators who battled Southern school segregation and inequality"-- Provided by publisher.