What if our dead remain with us? What if closure is not the goal? No matter what you believe about the afterlife, what if the hereafter intersects with the here and now?Caleb Wilde, author of the acclaimed memoir Confessions of a Funeral Director, was a skeptic. The baffling stories people told him--deathbed visions of long-dead parents, visits from the other side--must be hallucinations or wishful thinking, he thought. But the more stories he heard, and the more he learne...

"Wise, vulnerable, and surprisingly relatable . . . funny in all the right places and enormously helpful throughout. It will change how you think about death." — Rachel Held Evans, New York Times–bestselling author of Searching for SundayWe are a people who deeply fear death. While humans are biologically wired to evade death for as long as possible, we have become too adept at hiding from it, vilifying it, and—when it can...

A sixth-generation funeral director and writer of the popular "must read" (Time magazine) blog Confessions of a Funeral Director reflects on mortality and the powerful lessons death holds for every one of us in this compassionate and thoughtful spiritual memoir that combines the humor and insight of Smoke Gets in Your Eyes with the poignancy and brevity of When Breath Becomes Air.Death. It happens to everyone, yet most of us don’t want to talk ab...

What if our dead remain with us? What if closure is not the goal? No matter what you believe about the afterlife, what if the hereafter intersects with the here and now?Caleb Wilde, author of the acclaimed memoir Confessions of a Funeral Director, was a skeptic. The baffling stories people told him—deathbed visions of long-dead parents, visits from the other side—must be hallucinations or wishful thinking, he thought. But the more stories he heard, and the more he learned ...

Copyright is everywhere. Your smartphone incorporates thousands of items of intellectual property. Someone owns the reproduction rights to photographs of your dining table. At this very moment, battles are raging over copyright in the output of artificial intelligence programs. Not only books but wallpaper, computer programs, pop songs, cartoon characters, snapshots, and cuddly toys are now deemed to be intellectual properties—making copyright a labyrinthine construction of laws with color...

Ella Fitzgerald (1917–1996) possessed one of the twentieth century's most astonishing voices. Historian Judith Tick offers a sublime portrait of this ambitious risk-taker whose exceptional musical spontaneity made her a transformational artist.Becoming Ella Fitzgerald clears up long-enduring mysteries. Archival research and in-depth family interviews shed new light on the singer's difficult childhood, the tragic death of her mother, and the year she spent in a girls' refor...

The digital era is beset by distraction, and it feels like things are only getting worse. At times like these, the distant past beckons as a golden age of attention. We dream of recapturing the quiet of a world with less noise. We imagine retreating into solitude and singlemindedness, almost like latter-day monks.But although we think of early monks as master concentrators, a life of mindfulness did not, in fact, come to them easily. As historian Jamie Kreiner demonstrates in T...

2022 Audie Award Finalist for Best Narration by the Author(s)Why do you believe what you believe?You’ve been lied to. Probably a lot. We’re always stunned when we realize we’ve been deceived. We can’t believe we were fooled: What was I thinking? How could I have believed that?We always wonder why we believed the lie. But have you ever wondered why you believe the truth? People tell you the truth all the time, and you believe them; a...

In this ambitious global project, two hundred women share inspiring stories of success and courage, love and pain, redemption, and generosity.This updated, abridged edition includes powerful new interviews and stirring quotes alongside selections from the original book, all answering the same five questions. Featuring empowering stories, this new edition is an illuminating listen for the modern woman.• Equality is explored through diverse interviews with wo...

Award-winning historian David Pietrusza boldly steers clear of the past narrative regarding Franklin Roosevelt’s unprecedented 1936 reelection landslide, weaving an enormously more intricate, ever more surprising tale of a polarized nation; of America’s most complex, calculating, and politically successful president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, at the very top of his Machiavellian game; and the unlocking of the puzzle of how our society, our politics, and our parties fitfully reinvented themsel...

A compelling standalone dark fantasy set in a gritty post-WWI Britain that has been overrun by the fae, from the award-winning author of Altered Carbon“One of my favorite books of the year, destined to be a classic.”—Tim Lebbon, New York Times bestselling author of Secret Lives of The DeadThe Great War was supposed to be the war to end all wars—and maybe it would have been, had an even greater, otherworldly foe no...

In this audiobook, acclaimed actor Simon Callow narrates the gripping untold story of Michelangelo's final decades—and his transformation into one of the greatest architects of the Italian RenaissanceAs he entered his seventies, the great Italian Renaissance artist Michelangelo despaired that his productive years were past. Anguished by the death of friends and discouraged by the loss of commissions to younger artists, this supreme painter and sculptor began carving...