Less Than What You Once Were begins in a pivotal moment for the speaker—during the 2008 "Battle of N'Djamena" in Chad's capital. This destabilizing experience—in which the speaker's home is broken into—results in the family embarking on a months-long departure from the place, and the narrative begins to cycle through childhood memories, from the first night when Brown lands at N'Djamena's airport as an eight-year-old boy to the failed attempt at bird hunting with ...

Love & Profanity features more than forty brief, brilliant, and unforgettable true stories from writers both renowned and on the rise. Discover strange and surprising scenes of people coming of age amidst the everyday intensity of teenage life. Witness transformative moments arising from the mundane. Behold the young adult in full splendor and horror, bursting with love and profanity.

Linnie Mae is a 9 year old girl who lives a comfortable life in the suburbs with her parents. She has not spent much time in the city and definitely does not understand the homeless. Her mind is filled with negative stereotypes and scary images of those who sleep on streets. In one night, her attitude completely changes. During a volunteer excursion with her family, Linnie Mae meets some interesting people and hears some intriguing stories. In the end, she makes a connection with those she...

A collection that alternates between celebration and lament, Winnower traces the experiences of an American poet growing up in war-torn Chad, Africa.

An innovative guide that identifies what distinguishes the best financial risk takers from the restFrom 1987 to 1992, a small group of Wall Street quants invented an entirely new way of managing risk to maximize success: risk management for risk-takers. This is the secret that lets tiny quantitative edges create hedge fund billionaires, and defines the powerful modern global derivatives economy. The same practical techniques are still used today by risk-takers in f...

Wall Street is where poker and modern finance?and the theory behind these "games"?clash head on. In both worlds, real risk means real money is made or lost in a heart beat, and neither camp is always rational with the risk it takes. As a result, business and financial professionals who want to use poker insights to improve their job performance will find this entertaining book a "must read." So will poker players searching for an edge in applying the insights of risk-takers on Wall Street....

Dig deep to discover the truth about numbers and statistics in the mediaWrong Number: How to Extract Truth From a Blizzard of Quantitative Disinformation shows readers how to diagnose statistical errors in journal articles and media accounts of prominent public issues. In addition to the mistakes or tricks with numbers other people use to lose the truth, this book also offers more positive material, showing how to use numbers to find truth.Written ...

Telling Tales explores the lived experiences of Christian women, parish clerics, and church officials in Italy during the later Middle Ages through one previously unpublished historical source – a register prepared in 1421/1422 for a Dominican inquisitor in the northern Italian city of Ferrara that includes interrogations about the lives, work, and domestic arrangements of otherwise-obscure women.The book provides both a translation of the source from the original Latin an...

Let barbecue superstar Aaron “AB” Brown guide you out of the grilling rut and into a big, colorful, and fantastically flavored world of new possibilities.Is there any kind of cooking that gets more stuck in a repetitive routine than grilling? If you’ve ever wanted to elevate your grilling beyond the endless parade of burgers, hot dogs, and steaks, Smokin’ and Grillin’ with Aaron Brown is the cookbook you need for the journey. And author Aaron “AB” Brown is...

During the late twentieth century, many Americans expressed concern about the security surrounding the U.S.-Mexico border due to the lack of progress in achieving meaningful and effective immigration regulation and an inability to control growing drug trafficking. Despite publicly and privately striving for cooperation on these issues, Mexican and American policymakers struggled to arrive at viable and sustainable solutions. In The 1970s and the Making of the Modern US-Mexico Border: F...

“God pummeled me. My most horrific experience. Also my best.”The Oracle is the enlightenment of a profound principle the author learned during a desperate season of his life. The power to transform a life finally awakened him. Embracing its message on one of his darkest days, he wrote The Oracle to revive hope and inspiration for the prosperity God offers each of us.The Oracle assures prosperity to the soul who observes its message, and a curse to the one who rejects it. Pr...

    The 2014 AuthorsFirst writing contests brought submissions from a wide range of profound and wildly entertaining talent. From this group of nearly a thousand entrants, we have chosen seventeen works of short fiction that will dazzle the imagination and thrill the heart. What happens when the most remarkable woman you’ve ever met disappears for weeks at a time leaving only magic and mystery in her wake? What happens when a hostel worker slowly loses his sense o...