Title search results
Showing 1 - 20 of 1596 items

Like a Bat Out of Hell: The Larger than Life Story of Meat Loaf
By Mick Wall. 2017
"I never wanted to be a big star. I just wanted to be the biggest at what I do! Powerful,…
unstoppable, heavy - when that word still meant something good!" - Meat Loaf, as told to Mick Wall Everything in the story of Meat Loaf is big. From the place he was born (Texas); to the family he was born into (his father weighed 22 stone, his uncle weighed over 40 stone, while Meat Loaf himself weighed 17 stone before he was even in his teens); to the sound he made (a colossal collision between Richard Wagner, Phil Spector and Bruce Springsteen); and of course the records he sold - nearly 50 million in Britain and America alone. Now, on the eve of the 40th anniversary of Bat Out of Hell, the album that gave rise to Meat Loaf's astonishing career, and the premiere of Bat Out Of Hell: The Musical, Mick Wall, who has interviewed Meat Loaf on numerous occasions throughout his career, pulls back the curtains to reveal the soft-hearted soul behind the larger-than-life character he created for himself. From a tumultuous childhood with an alcoholic father to the relentless abusive bullying from classmates and their parents alike, nobody could have predicted Meat Loaf's meteoric rise to fame. But when the messianic rock opera Bat Out of Hell was released in 1977, it became one of the biggest albums of all time, selling over 45 million copies worldwide to date. Its release marked the start of a rollercoaster ride of incredible highs and seemingly career-ending lows. By the 80s, Meat Loaf was battling with drug and alcohol addiction and escalating money problems that would eventually lead to a nervous breakdown. But just when it seemed like it was all over, the astonishing success of Bat Out of Hell II and the mega-hit 'I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)' marked an extraordinary new wave of success. Now, Mick Wall will bring this extraordinary story up to date, drawing on the hours he spent with Meat Loaf, both in interviews and on tour, as well as offering up a unique insight from those who have known him best.(p) Orion Publishing Group with Audible Ltd 2017
Becoming Baba: Fatherhood, Faith, and Finding Meaning in America
By Aymann Ismail. 2025
From Slate staff writer Aymann Ismail comes an exquisite memoir about fatherhood, religion, and the search for identity in an…
ever-shifting world.The son of Egyptian immigrants, Aymann Ismail came of age in the shadow of 9/11, tracking the barrage of predatory headlines pervading the media and influencing the popular consciousness about Muslims. After a series of bomb threats were directed at his Islamic school in Teaneck, New Jersey, just a few miles from downtown Manhattan, his parents—anxious that it was no longer safe to be so explicitly Muslim—enrolled him in public school, where he was the only Muslim his new friends had ever met. In the privacy of their home, they turned to their faith for guidance on how to live, adhering to traditional notions about gender roles, and avoiding the putative American dangers of alcohol, sex, and rebellion.And yet, Aymann is undeniably an American teenager, negotiating his place in multiple worlds while chafing against the structures of his upbringing. He eventually embarks on a career in political journalism, in part to establish his own version of things. In time, though, he also gains a deeper understanding and appreciation for his parents' values and sacrifices—his father&’s grueling work ethic as a town car driver, and his mother&’s adeptness at managing their itinerant family.When Aymann meets and falls in love with Mira, a woman with her own ideas about the modern Muslim family, his world shifts yet again. After Mira gets pregnant with their first child, Aymann begins to reckon with his past, future, and the beliefs that have shaped his life. What does it mean to be a Muslim man? More still, what does it mean to be any man—and a father to a baby boy and girl? And how best to honor one&’s cultural heritage while holding space for change and discovery? In lucid, confident prose, Aymann Ismail questions the sturdy frameworks of religion and family, the legacies of his childhood, and what will become his children's ethical and intellectual inheritance. To reckon unflinchingly with these questions offers him a road map for his young Muslim children on how to navigate the singular journey into adulthood.
Nice Girls Don't Win: How I Burned It All Down to Claim My Power
By Parvati Shallow. 2025
&“A bible for badass women.&”—SARAH MICHELLE GELLAR&“Gripping and liberating.&”—ADAM GRANT, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Hidden Potential and…
Think Again&“Survivor legend and gay icon, Parvati Shallow has won my heart all over again.&”—BOWEN YANGA bold, eye-opening memoir about survival, trauma, and healing, from one of reality television&’s most talked-about starsAt twenty-five years old, Parvati Shallow was plunged into fame and fortune after becoming the million-dollar winner of the reality television series Survivor. But despite her success, the ghosts of her traumatic past, coupled with the harsh glare of the public eye, kept her locked in a survival cycle of fear and shame that sabotaged her self-confidence and eroded her self-trust. It wasn&’t until a series of painful life events, including the death of her younger brother and a challenging divorce, that she found herself on a path of healing that would awaken her true power and reset the course of her life.In Nice Girls Don&’t Win, Shallow shares the stories that allowed her to transform her most difficult moments into potent catalysts for empowerment. From her childhood growing up in a Florida commune run by a tyrannical female guru, to her journey out of the South and into the L.A. casting rooms that would eventually drop her in the lush but brutal landscapes of Survivor, Shallow shows readers what it took to build herself into the ultimate survivor—for better and, more often, for worse. She then reveals what it took to rebuild herself into something much greater.As harrowing as it is healing, Parvati Shallow&’s story is a testament to the profound lessons that can be found in radical self-acceptance and self-love.
The Strangers: Five Extraordinary Black Men and the Worlds That Made Them
By Ekow Eshun. 1964
“Moving, thoughtful, redemptive. The Strangers is an important book. It will become a Black classic.”— Ben Okri, author of The…
Famished Road“Thrilling and ingenious, propulsive and genre-defying: The Strangers is an outstanding book. Compelling and imaginatively expansive, this is something very special—creative nonfiction that inspires, stirs and challenges.”—Bernardine Evaristo, Booker Prize-winning author of Girl, Woman, OtherA richly imaginative, powerfully empathetic, and intimate portrait of five remarkable Black men that is also a moving meditation on race, estrangement, and the search for home.In the western imagination, a Black man is always a stranger, outsider, foreigner, intruder, alien; one who remains associated with their origins irrespective of how far they have travelled from them. One who is not an individual in his own right, but the representative of a type.What kind of performance is required for a person to survive this condition? What happens beneath the mask—what is the cost to the mind and body, to one’s relationships and one’s sense of self?Searching for answers, Ekow Eshun channels the voices of five very different individuals. Each man a renowned trailblazer in his field. Each man haunted by a sense of isolation and exile. Each man a stranger in his own world:Ira Aldridge, nineteenth century British actor and playwright;Matthew Henson, the first Black man to reach the North Pole;Frantz Fanon, French-Martinican psychiatrist and political philosopher;Malcolm X, civil rights activist and leader;Justin Fashanu, Britain’s first openly gay professional footballer.Telling their stories, Eshun pushes the boundaries of genre to capture them in all their complexity, interweaving biography, fiction, historical record, and memoir, sharing his own experiences living as a Black Briton in the art world. The Strangers illuminates both the hostility and the beauty each man encountered in the world, positioning them all within a wider landscape of Black art, culture, history, and politics throughout the diaspora.
Sonita: My Fight Against Tyranny and My Escape to Freedom
By Sonita Alizada. 2025
Nearly 15 million girls, including many in the U.S., are forced into marriage each year. Each of these girls has…
a price tag—and a story. Sonita Alizada was almost sold twice. Her price tag was $9,000. The money her family received for selling her would pay for her brother’s wife. The first time Sonita was put up for sale, she was 10 years old and she thought that she was participating in a dress-up game. She quickly realized that, in her culture, a wedding is a kind of funeral for the bride. Sonita says, “It represents the loss of a future. The loss of a voice.” After the marriage fell through, she was placed on sale again. She was expected to form a family, sleep with a man she never met, and then repeat the terrible cycle with her own children. But Sonita wanted more.In Sonita, the Afghan rap artist and activist shares the story of how she fled Afghanistan to pursue her dreams and evolved into a woman who is changing the world. She shares incredible highs, like winning the song writing contest that gave her the opportunity of a lifetime, and unimaginable lows, like when the cruel Taliban regained control of Afghanistan, and how some of her family escaped, and how some were left behind. Sonita also shares photos and access to exclusive music.Sonita teaches us to hold onto hope. You were chosen to be part of this world and your dreams have power, too. You can be a difference maker. This book is more than Sonita's story. It is a love letter for anyone who has ever dreamed of more and held onto hope that their story would be different than the ones that came before them.
On a late March morning in the spring of 1942, Elaine Yoneda awoke to a series of terrible choices: between…
her family and freedom, her country and conscience, and her son and daughter. She was the child of Russian Jewish immigrants and the wife of a Japanese American man. On this war-torn morning, she was also a mother desperate to keep her young mixed-race son from being sent to a US concentration camp. Manzanar, near Death Valley, was one of ten detention centers where our government would eventually imprison every person of Japanese descent along the West Coast—alien and citizen, old and young, healthy and sick—or, in the words of one official, anyone with even "one drop" of Japanese blood. Elaine's husband Karl was already in Manzanar, but he planned to enlist as soon as the US Army would take him. The Yonedas were prominent labor and antifascist activists, and Karl was committed to fighting for what they had long cherished: equality, freedom, and democracy. Yet when Karl went to war, their son Tommy, three years old and chronically ill, would be left alone in Manzanar—unless Elaine convinced the US government to imprison her as well. The consequences of Elaine's choice did not end there: if she somehow found a way to force herself behind barbed wire with her husband and son, she would leave behind her white daughter from a previous marriage. Together in Manzanar tells the story of these painful choices and conflicting loyalties, the upheaval and violence that followed, and the Yonedas' quest to survive with their children's lives intact and their family safe and whole.
Che Guevara Presente: Una antología mínima (The Che Guevara Library)
By David Deutschmann, María del Carmen Ariet García. 2005
Textos seleccionados --discursos, ensayos y cartas-- de uno de losguerrilleros, teóricos y organizadores políticos más reconocidos, CheGuevara. Ampliamente venerado como un…
verdadero revolucionario, esta colección de textos de Ernesto "Che" Guevara resalta sus principios políticos y praxis en la lucha contra el capitalismo y el imperialismo estadounidense. Discursos incisivos, ensayos críticos, y cartas personales no solo sirven como un resumen del movimiento revolucionario cubano, sino que también analizan la importancia de practicar solidaridad internacional, reflexionar sobre la resistencia violenta y explicar los peligrosos fracasos del capitalismo. Acompañado por una extensiva bibliografía de la escritura de Guevara, una cronología de su vida y un amplio glosario de individuos, organizaciones, y publicaciones, el Che Guevara Presente provee conocimiento del contexto histórico, político y cultural que llevo a la radicalización de Guevara. De sus discursos más famosos tales como "Crear dos, tres, muchos Vietnam" a sus intimas cartas personales dirigidas a camaradas alrededor del mundo y a sus propios hijos, este libro extiende el legado del Che y pinta un retrato deslumbrante de un revolucionario luchando por un mundo mejor.
Radical Tenderness: The Value of Vulnerability in an Often Unkind World
By Gisele Barreto Fetterman. 2025
An inspiring manifesto from philanthropist and advocate Gisele Barreto Fetterman that explores her surprising source of power and strength—vulnerability—and how…
we can all harness it to effect meaningful change.As a society, we shy away from public expressions of vulnerability, mistaking it for weakness or a lack of grit. To even talk about crying, much less shed tears publicly, is seen as shameful or cringeworthy. But for Gisele Barreto Fetterman, accessibility advocate and wife of Senator John Fetterman, showing strong emotions has always been her default—at events, during speeches, in her car or even at the grocery store. Friends and family warned Gisele that the world would eat her alive if she didn&’t toughen up. But over the years Fetterman came to a realization: her emotional tenderness was not her downfall, but her strength—one that could be incorporated into her leadership style to show a different way to create true social and cultural change.In Radical Tenderness, Gisele Barreto Fetterman courageously shares her story of power through vulnerability—from her childhood survival years as a Brazilian-American undocumented immigrant, to the prejudice she experienced in corporate and political settings, to her hardships and resilience stepping into her husband&’s role when he suffered a stroke. Through it all Gisele learned that leading with tenderness—whether at the office, as a boss, or as a human being—can help us face challenges in a healthier, more authentic way, and in turn guides others to do the same.Ultimately, Gisele redefines strength and leadership for our modern times, presenting tools for surviving and thriving in a world designed to wreck the tender-hearted. Because by embracing those emotions publicly—laughter, vulnerability, and, yes, even tears—we not only honor ourselves but open a path toward changing the world.
A Marriage at Sea: A True Story of Love, Obsession, and Shipwreck
By Sophie Elmhirst. 2024
&“Gird your loins and line up your couple&’s therapist.&” – New York Times Book Review podcast&“This is nonfiction that reads…
like fiction – the best kind. Elmhirst&’s retelling is a triumph, second only to the seemingly impossible feat of Maurice and Maralyn themselves. You won&’t be able to put it down.&” – USA Today&“Such an emotionally vivid portrait of a couple in isolation that I was shocked it wasn&’t fiction. How could a writer get so deeply into the minds of two real people in such extraordinary circumstances? … So brilliantly depicted.&” – Elle, Best Books of Summer&“A beautiful meditation on endurance, codependence, and the power of love. A dazzling book.&” – Patrick Radden Keefe&“An enthralling, engrossing story of survival and the resilience of the human spirit.&” —Bill BrysonThe electrifying true story of a young couple shipwrecked at sea: a mind-blowing tale of obsession, survival, and partnership stretched to its limits.Maurice and Maralyn make an odd couple. He&’s a loner, awkward and obsessive; she&’s charismatic and ambitious. But they share a horror of wasting their lives. And they dream – as we all dream – of running away from it all. What if they quit their jobs, sold their house, bought a boat, and sailed away?Most of us begin and end with the daydream. But in June 1972, Maurice and Maralyn set sail. For nearly a year all went well, until deep in the Pacific, a breaching whale knocked a hole in their boat and it sank beneath the waves.What ensues is a jaw-dropping fight to survive in the wild ocean, with little hope of rescue. Alone together for months in a tiny rubber raft, starving and exhausted, Maurice and Maralyn have to find not only ways to stay alive but ways to get along, as their inner demons emerge and their marriage is put to the greatest of tests. Although they could run away from the world, they can&’t run away from themselves.Taut, propulsive, and dazzling, A Marriage at Sea pairs an adrenaline-fueled high seas adventure with a gutting love story that asks why we love difficult people, and who we become under the most extreme conditions imaginable.
Mainline mama: A memoir
By Keeonna Harris. 2025
A powerful exploration of self-resilience, family, and community from activist and prison abolitionist Keeonna Harris. Keeonna and Jason met as…
young teens. Only fourteen, Keeonna had never had a boyfriend before, dreamed of attending Spelman to become an obstetrician, and thought she was "grown." Within a year she was pregnant and Jason was in prison, convicted of a carjacking and sentenced to twenty-two years. Overnight Keeonna had become a "mainline mama," a parent facing the task of raising a child—while still growing up herself—with an incarcerated partner. In this triumphant memoir, Keeonna recalls her challenging journey as a mainline mama, from learning to overcome the exhausting difficulties of navigating the carceral system in the United States to transforming herself into an advocate for women like her—the predominantly Black and Brown women left behind to pick up the pieces of their families and fractured lives. Keeonna speaks frankly about the forces that threatened to defeat her, how she learned to re - build her broken relationship with a mother who had lost trust in her, and how time eased the shame, guilt, and stigma of being a young Black teen mom with a partner behind bars. She offers inspiration and solace, showing how to create moments of beauty, humanity, and love—such as picking the perfect wedding dress for a ceremony in a state prison visiting room—in a place de - signed to break spirits. Mainline Mama is about creating self-love and community—crucial acts of radical resistance against a prison industrial complex designed to dehumanize and to separate and shut away incarcerated individuals and their loved ones from the world
Food for thought: Essays and ruminations
By Alton Brown. 2025
This instant New York Times bestseller by Alton Brown, the acclaimed cookbook author, beloved culinary personality, and food science expert,…
is a "must-read" (Gaby Dalkin, New York Times bestselling author of What's Gaby Cooking ) debut collection of food essays, cooking tips, kitchen stories, and behind-the-scenes insights, all infused with his signature wit and flair. From cameraman to chef, musician to food scientist, Alton Brown has had a diverse and remarkable career. His work on the Food Network, including creating Good Eats and hosting Iron Chef America and Cutthroat Kitchen , has resonated with countless viewers and home cooks. Now, he shares exactly what's on his mind, mixing compelling anecdotes from his personal and professional life with in-depth observations on the culinary world, film, personal style, defining meals of his lifetime, and much more. With his whip-smart and engaging voice, Brown explores everything from wrestling a dumpster full of dough to culinary appropriation to his ultimate quest for the perfect roast chicken. Deliciously candid and full of behind-the-scenes stories fans will love, this "fabulous read" (Michael Ruhlman, New York Times bestselling author of The Soul of a Chef ) is the ultimate reading experience for anyone who appreciates food and the people that prepare it
When you're ready: A love story
By Kareem Rosser. 2025
This unforgettable and "beautifully written" ( The Seattle Times ) memoir explores first love, unthinkable loss, and the toll of…
grief. Kareem Rosser and Lee Lee Jones were young, beautiful, and deeply in love. Their love was a real-world romance that felt like a fairy tale: Kareem was raised in the Bottom—one of the most impoverished neighborhoods in Philadelphia—while Lee Lee was raised in the wealth of the Pennsylvania suburbs. The world was at their feet, a lifetime of joy and adventure ahead of them. But their love story was interrupted by a devastating accident, which almost cost Lee Lee her life, and destroyed every plan and dream that Lee Lee and Kareem had made together. In the months and years that follow, while Lee Lee struggles to heal, Kareem is crippled by ambiguous grief, for the woman that he loves and for the future he imagined for them both. In the space between debilitating depression and bursts of anxiety, he's forced to finally face his demons: his tumultuous childhood, his latent mental health issues, the murders of his older brother and his best friend, and a life constantly lived in the grip of panic and fear. "Relatable, powerful, and transformative" ( Booklist , starred review), When You're Ready is a narrative that honors love in all its forms: first love, parental love, renewed love, and, most importantly, self-love. With notes on unresolved loss and second chances, it's a story that will grab you by the heartstrings and uplift your soul
In the tradition of Evicted and Invisible Child , a "moving, real-life saga" ( The New Yorker ) that follows…
a single mother of six in Los Angeles courageously struggling to keep her family together and her children in school amid the devastating housing crisis—from the bestselling author of The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace . In 2018, poverty and domestic violence cast Evelyn and her children into the urban wilderness of Los Angeles, where she avoids the family crisis network that offers no clear pathway for her children to remain together and in a decent school. For the next five years, Evelyn works full time as a waitress—yet remains unable to afford legitimate housing or qualify for government aid. All the while, she delivers her children to school every day and strives to provide them with loving memories and college aspirations. Eventually Evelyn encounters Wendi, a recently trained social worker who, decades earlier, survived her own relationship trauma and housing crisis. Evelyn becomes one of Wendi's first clients, and the relationship transforms them both. Told from the perspectives of Evelyn, Wendi, and Evelyn's teenaged son Orlando, Seeking Shelter is a "remarkably vivid and...deeply empathetic" ( Los Angeles Times ) exploration of homelessness, poverty, and education in America—a must-read for anyone interested in understanding not just social inequality and economic disparity in our society but also the power of a mother's love and vision for her kids
Fearless and free: A memoir
By Josephine Baker. 2025
A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE YEAR: The TODAY Show, Vanity Fair, Financial Times , W Magazine, Oprah Daily, LibraryReads…
Praised as “funny and witty” by Kwame Alexander on the TODAY show, now published in the US for the first time, Fearless and Free is the memoir of the “trailblazing” ( People ), rule-breaking, one-of-a-kind Josephine Baker, the iconic dancer, singer, spy, and Civil Rights activist . “A gorgeous, captivating gem of a memoir… Josephine Baker’s as enthralling on the page as she was on the stage.” —Abbott Kahler, New York Times bestselling author of Eden Undone and Sin in the Second City After stealing the spotlight as a teenaged Broadway performer during the height of the Harlem Renaissance, Josephine then took Paris by storm, dazzling audiences across the Roaring Twenties. In her famous banana skirt, she enraptured royalty and countless fans—Ernest Hemingway and Pablo Picasso among them. She strolled the streets of Paris with her pet cheetah wearing a diamond collar. With her signature flapper bob and enthralling dance moves, she was one of the most recognizable women in the world. When World War II broke out, Josephine became a decorated spy for the French Résistance. Her celebrity worked as her cover, as she hid spies in her entourage and secret messages in her costumes as she traveled. She later joined the Civil Rights movement in the US, boycotting segregated concert venues, and speaking at the March on Washington alongside Martin Luther King Jr. First published in France in 1949, her memoir will now finally be published in English. At last we can hear Josephine in her own voice: charming, passionate, and brave. Her words are thrilling and intimate, like she’s talking with her friends over after-show drinks in her dressing room. Through her own telling, we come to know a woman who danced to the top of the world and left her unforgettable mark on it
Malcolm lives!: The official biography of malcolm x for young listeners
By Ibram X Kendi. 2025
As a youth, Malcolm endured violence, loss, hunger, foster care, racism, and being incarcerated. He emerged from it all to…
make a lasting global impact. As a Muslim. As a family man. As a revolutionary. Malcolm's life story shows the promise of every human being. Of you ! To trace Malcolm's childhood and adult years, Kendi draws on Malcolm's stirring oratory style, using repetition and rhetoric. Short, swift chapters echo Malcolm's trademark fast walk. An abundance of never-before published letters, notes, flyers, extensive source notes, and more give young listeners a front-row seat to his life. One hundred years after his birth in 1925, Malcolm's antiracist legacy lives on in this thoughtful and accessible must-read for all Americans. For you ! Just like history, Malcolm lives
Leurs drôles de vies: une histoire décalée de la chanson française
By Catherine Pépin. 2024
Ils s'appelaient Aznavour,Piaf,Ferré, Leclerc, Robi,Julien,Vian... Ils avaient de curieux animaux domestiques, leurs parents en fuite se sont croisés quelque part…
aux confins de l'Europe et de l'Asie, ils ont fait de la prison, ont survécu à de tragiques accidents de la route, ils ne savaient pas lire la musique, leurs objets fétiches étaient leurs marques de commerce... Autant de petites histoires cocasses, dramatiques ou touchantes qui grouillent autour des grands noms de la chanson française des années 1920 aux années 1970. Autant d'anecdotes qui permettent de restituer dans leur splendide humanité ces icônes aux destins extraordinaires auxquelles Catherine Pépin voue un amour inconditionnel
I am nobody's slave: How uncovering my family's history set me free
By Lee Hawkins. 2025
"Harrowing and insightful. . . . A profound work about the Black experience and white oppression."—Kirkus Reviews (starred review) "This…
work is vitally important and essential to understanding the magnitude of the impact of racism and violence."—Library Journal (starred review) "Gripping, thought-provoking, and personal, I Am Nobody's Slave will inspire discussion and action in response to its powerful message of inner healing and social justice."—Booklist A 2022 Pulitzer Prize finalist and former Wall Street Journal writer exhaustively examines his family's legacy of post-enslavement trauma and resilience, in this riveting memoir—a soulful, shocking, and spellbinding read that blends the raw power of Natasha Tretheway's Memorial Drive and the insights of Clint Smith's How the Word is Passed. I Am Nobody's Slave tells the story of one Black family's pursuit of the American Dream through the impacts of systemic racism and racial violence. This book examines how trauma from enslavement and Jim Crow shaped their outlook on thriving in America, influenced each generation, and how they succeeded despite these challenges. To their suburban Minnesotan neighbors, the Hawkinses were an ideal American family, embodying strength and success. However, behind closed doors, they faced the legacy of enslavement and apartheid. Lee Hawkins, Sr. often exhibited rage, leaving his children anxious and curious about his protective view of the world. Thirty years later, his son uncovered the reasons for his father's anxiety and occasional violence. Through research, he discovered violent deaths in his family for every generation since slavery, mostly due to white-on-Black murders, and how white enslavers impacted the family's customs. Hawkins explores the role of racism-triggered childhood trauma and chronic stress in shortening his ancestors' lives, using genetic testing, reporting, and historical data to craft a moving family portrait. This book shows how genealogical research can educate and heal Americans of all races, revealing through their story the story of America—a journey of struggle, resilience, and the heavy cost of ultimate success
Bright Colours from the Past: The History, Chemistry, Characterisation and Application of Synthetic Dyes Between 1856 and 1914 (Cultural Heritage Science)
By Matthijs De Keijzer, Maarten R. van Bommel. 2025
The invention of Mauveine by Perkin in 1856 led to a revolution in the world of textile dyeing. In the…
second half of the 19th century, natural dyes were quickly replaced by newly developed synthetic dyes which resulted in a bright palette of colours. The synthetic dyes were not only cheaper to produce, but also easier to apply on textiles due to new dyeing mechanisms. As a result, production costs decreased tremendously and brilliantly dyed textiles became available to the larger public. The introduction of synthetic dyes had a strong impact in fashion; in addition, these colourants were also used as stains on furniture, as inks and in paints. In this publication, the development of these vivid colourants is presented. It brings together information about the history of synthetic dyes, including the first attempts, the so-called semi-synthetic dyes, and presenting the most relevant dyes and dye classes, such as nitro dyes, tri-arylmethanes, azo dyes, xanthenes, sulfur dyes, synthetic alizarin and synthetic indigo. It contains a wealth of information regarding the numerous synonyms, trade names, manufacturers and patents. International trade and competition, which was fierce, are discussed. The chemistry behind the synthetic dyeing is explained, including new dyeing technologies developed. The application of dyes and their fastness properties are also presented. An overview of analytical techniques used for characterisation is given. Many case studies are included, expressing the importance of the dyes and the creativity of mankind when applying these colourants. As such, this publication can be seen as a colourful journey through history, relevant for conservators, curators, historians, chemists and all who are interested in the history and development of synthetic dyes.
Bibliophobia: A memoir
By Sarah Chihaya. 2025
“A wise, tremendously moving exploration of what it means to seek companionship and understanding, in books and in life.”—Hua Hsu,…
author of Stay True “[A] stirring and sparkling new memoir.”— The Washington Post ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE MONTH: Time, Los Angeles Times, Cosmopolitan Books can seduce you. They can, Sarah Chihaya believes, annihilate, reveal, and provoke you. And anyone incurably obsessed with books understands this kind of unsettling literary encounter. Sarah calls books that have this effect “Life Ruiners”. Her Life Ruiner, Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye, became a talisman for her in high school when its electrifying treatment of race exposed Sarah’s deepest feelings about being Japanese American in a predominantly white suburb of Cleveland. But Sarah had always lived through her books, seeking escape, self-definition, and rules for living. She built her life around reading, wrote criticism, and taught literature at an Ivy League University. Then she was hospitalized for a nervous breakdown, and the world became an unreadable blank page. In the aftermath, she was faced with a question. Could we ever truly rewrite the stories that govern our lives? Bibliophobia is an alternately searing and darkly humorous story of breakdown and survival told through books. Delving into texts such as Anne of Green Gables, Possession, A Tale for the Time Being, The Last Samurai , Chihaya interrogates her cultural identity, her relationship with depression, and the intoxicating, sometimes painful, ways books push back on those who love them
Connecting Science Education with Cultural Heritage: Selected Papers from the ESERA 2023 Conference (Contributions from Science Education Research #15)
By Gultekin Cakmakci, Mehmet Fatih Tasar. 2025
This edited volume presents groundbreaking research in science education, focusing on the intersection of science and cultural heritage. Showcasing 23…
high-quality studies, it draws from presentations at the 15th Biennial ESERA Conference held in Cappadocia, Türkiye, organized by Hacettepe University, Gazi University, and Nevşehir Hacı Bektaş Veli University. Under the theme "Connecting Science Education with Cultural Heritage," the chapters offer fresh perspectives on advancing science education literature from diverse viewpoints. With contributions spanning continents, this book delivers an exceptional collection of international studies featuring original and rigorous methodologies. Scholars and researchers in science education will find this compilation an invaluable resource, making it a vital addition to academic libraries worldwide.