Marvin and Stuart get to sleep over at Nick Tuffle's house for Nick's birthday. They set out sleeping bags in the Tuffles' backyard. Stuart and Nick fall right to sleep, but Marvin tosses and turns. Then he hears a noise, and something glowing zooms over his head. Is it "really "a flying birthday cake? Or something else? The next day, a very strange new kid shows up at school. . . .

Johnny's in the basement where his parents won't bother him, sitting on top of The World's Greatest Bottle Cap Collection. He's just turned eleven and his parents have decided that it's time for him to grow up. Suddenly he has to wash the dishes and take out the garbage. And get rid of his bottle caps! His birthday presents are grown-up junk like socks and underwear and -- worst of all -- social-dancing lessons. Growing up certainly doesn't seem worth it -- until he meets Valerie Plum, who hates dancing school even more than Johnny does, but doesn't hate Johnny at all.

Marvin proves his bravery to himself and his friends and family after tackling the terrifyingly steep Suicide Hill on his bike.

Everyone is laughing at Marvin Redpost. Why? He picks his nose, at least that's what Clarence says and no one argues with Clarence - not even Marvin's so-called friends. So what can Marvin do to turn things around?

The collected works of the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award-winning writer explores her transfigured landscapes and offers insight into her unique form created to reflect the human drive to release the past in order to realize the yet-unimagined

"This splendid work was first published in 1953 and remains a classic of the literature on Michelangelo. It continues to be the only volume that contains illustrations of all the master's work excluding his drawings (the recently ascribed head from the Rondanini Pieta, now in a public collection in Italy, is also omitted). 'Michelangelo' is designed to serve both the student and the art lover; the fine quality of the reproductions and the beauty of the details empahtically prove Michelangelo's genius, while the text surveys the opinions of the leading Michelangelo scholars and povides a commentary with bibliographical notes. In all respects this volume is an indispensable and standard work on the one of the greatest masters of all time."--Jacket

The definitive biography of Sally Ride, America's first woman in space, with exclusive insights from Ride's family and partner, by the ABC reporter who covered NASA during its transformation from a test-pilot boys' club to a more inclusive elite

"Fast-paced prose, fit-for-Hollywood characterizations, science with a wow factor, and accessible descriptions of complex quantum concepts and experiments... hard science meets pop-science time-travel in this entertaining thriller." - Kirkus Reviews When the future ruins your life... From a USA Today bestselling author: After particle physics professor Michael discovers how to pierce time and space, he meets a student who has memories of her future - and the research they have yet to complete together... "You won't be disappointed" (New York Times bestselling author Kevin J. Anderson). ------ When Michael Salomon woke up Tuesday morning, he did so with a smile, knowing that today would be a positive turning point in his career. With his first child on the way, he couldn't shake the feeling that something bad was about to happen. As he drives into work, he feels a sudden wave of anguish wash over him, and he sees himself alone, at the gravesite of an unborn daughter. It feels like a crystal-clear memory, a waking nightmare that nearly sends him crashing into the car in front of him. The idea of faster-than-light particles has been a part of science fiction lore for fifty years, yet Michael had made a breakthrough discovery late last night. Tachyons do exist. Going back into the office, he hasn't even had a chance to tell anyone about what he's discovered when the men from DARPA came calling. The entirety of his research has suddenly become an object of national security. But it was only when a young college student intercepts him as he gets into his car that he knows the life he's looking forward to is over. The student has memories of her future self... a future where she's worked with Michael on extending his research. She knows things that he's only thought of as possibilities, and she speaks of them as if they'd already happened. And most chilling of all, she speaks of a future where they are both in hiding from the government that sees them as the enemy. MULTIVERSE is a story about a scientist who uncovers a way to pierce the veil of time and space, and has unwittingly opened Pandora's box. Is it even possible to undo what a future version of yourself has done, or is everyone doomed to the chaos that's been loosed on the world?

Pollster Mark Penn argues that the biggest trends in America are microtrends, the smaller trends that go unnoticed or ignored. One million people can create new market for a business, spark a social movement, or effect political change. In 1996, a microtrend identified by Penn ("soccer moms") helped re-elect Clinton. Now, Penn identifies the new microtrends sweeping the world, from Extreme Commuters and Working Retired to Old New Dads, from Bourgeois And Bankrupt to Uptown Tattooed. Highlighting everything from religion to politics, from leisure pursuits to relationships, this book will take the reader deep into the worlds of polling, targeting, and psychographic analysis.--From publisher description.

A multicultural story full of heart and hilarity about what it means to be all-American. Lauren and her best friend, Tara, have always done absolutely everything together. So when they don't have any classes together in sixth grade, it's disastrous. The solution? Trying out for the school play. Lauren, who loves to sing, wonders if maybe, just maybe, she will be the star instead of Tara this time.But when the show is cast, Lauren lands in the ensemble, while Tara scores the lead role. Their teacher explains: Lauren just doesn't look the part of the all-American girl. What audience would believe that she, half-Jewish, half-Chinese Lauren, was the everygirl star from Pleasant Valley, USA?From amidst the ensemble, Lauren tries to support her best friend. But when she can't bring herself to sing anymore, her spot in the play and her friendship are in jeopardy. With the help of a button-making business, the music of Patsy Cline, and her two bickering grandmothers, can Lauren find her voice again?Acclaimed coauthors Madelyn Rosenberg and Wendy Wan-Long Shang return to the 1980s world of Sydney Taylor Honor Book This Is Just a Test with this laugh-out-loud coming-of-age story.

1980, hardcover book club edition, Knopf, NY. 433 pages. This talented author comes from good lineage. She is, in fact, the daughter of Gabriel Heatter, the famous radio commentator. For 8 years, she prepared all the desserts at a famous Miami Beach restaurant owned by her husband Ralph Daniels. Here it is, all chocolate, all the time. 400+ pages of chocolate this, chocolate that, prepared and worked out to the last detail. Oh my!!

""Growing up, I wanted to BE Mara Wilson. Where Am I Now? is a delight." --Ilana Glazer, cocreator and star of Broad City "Genuine and authentic, funny and heartbreaking, Where Am I Now? reminds you that no matter how unique your life is, some things bind us all together." --Jenny Lawson, author of Furiously Happy A former child actress best known for her starring roles in Matilda and Mrs. Doubtfire, Mara Wilson has always felt a little young and out of place: as the onlykid on a film set full of adults, the first daughter in a house full of boys, a Valley girl in New York and a neurotic in California, and a grown-up the world still remembers as a little girl. Tackling everything fromwhat she learned about sex on the set of Melrose Place, to discovering in adolescence that she was no longer "cute" enough for Hollywood, these essays chart her journey from accidental fame to relative (but happy) obscurity. They also illuminate universal struggles, like navigating love and loss,and figuring out who you are and where you belong. Honest, insightful, and hilarious, Where Am I Now? introduces Mara Wilson as a brilliant new chronicler of the experience that is growing up young and female"--

The amazing story of the trapped Chilean miners and their incredible rescue that Publishers Weekly calls “a riveting, in-depth recounting of the events that held the world rapt.” In early August 2010, the unthinkable happened when a mine collapsed in Copiapó, Chile, trapping thirty-three miners 2,000 feet below the surface. For sixty-nine days they lived on meager resources with increasingly poor air quality. When they were finally rescued, the world watched with rapt attention and rejoiced in the amazing spirit and determination of the miners. What could have been a terrible tragedy became an amazing story of survival. In Trapped, Marc Aronson provides the backstory behind the rescue. By tracing the psychological, physical, and environmental factors surrounding the mission, Aronson highlights the amazing technology and helping hands that made it all possible. From the Argentinean soccer players that hoped to raise morale, to NASA volunteering their expertise to come up with a plan, there was no shortage of enterprising spirit when it came to saving lives. Readers will especially appreciate the eight pages of full-color photos, timeline, glossary, notes, and more.

Marc Bloch said that his goal in writing Feudal Society was to go beyond the technical study a medievalist would typically write and dismantle a social structure. In this outstanding and monumental work, which has introduced generations of students and historians to the feudal period, Bloch treats feudalism as living, breathing force in Western Europe from the ninth to the thirteenth century. At its heart lies a magisterial account of relations of lord and vassal, and the origins of the nature of the fief, brought to life through compelling accounts of the nobility, knighthood and chivalry, family relations, political and legal institutions, and the church. For Bloch history was a process of constant movement and evolution and he describes throughout the slow process by which feudal societies turned into what would become nation states. A tour de force of historical writing, Feudal Society is essential reading for anyone interested in both Western Europe s past and present. With a new foreword by Geoffrey Koziol

NATIONAL BESTSELLER Marc Maron is “a master of spinning humor out of anguish” ( Bookforum ), even when that anguish is pretty clearly self-inflicted. In Attempting Normal, he threads together twenty-five stories from his life and near-death, from his first comedy road trips (with a fugitive junkie comic with a missing tooth) to his love affair with feral animals (his cat rescues are bloody epics) to his surprisingly moving tales of lust, heartbreak, and hope. The stories are united by Maron’s thrilling storytelling style—intensely smart, disarmingly honest, and explosively funny. Together, they add up to a hilarious and moving tale of failing, flailing, and finding a way. Praise for Attempting Normal “I laughed so hard reading this book.” —David Sedaris “Funny . . . surprisingly deep . . . laced with revelatory insights.” —Los Angeles Times “Superb . . . A reason that [it] is a superior example of an overcrowded genre—the comedian memoir—is Mr. Maron’s hardheaded approach to his history, the wisdom of experience.” — The New York Times “Marc Maron is a legend because he is both a great comic and a brilliant mind. Attempting Normal is a deep, hilarious megashot of feeling and truth as only this man can administer.” —Sam Lipsyte Praise for Marc Maron and WTF “The stuff of comedy legend.” — Rolling Stone “Marc Maron is a startlingly honest, compelling, and hilarious comedian-poet. Truly one of the greatest of all time.” —Louis C.K. “I’ve known Marc for years and I can tell you first hand that he’s passionate, fearless, honest, self-absorbed, neurotic, and screamingly funny.” —David Cross “Revered among his peers . . . raw and unflinchingly honest.” — Entertainment Weekly “Devastatingly funny.” — Los Angeles Times “For a comedy nerd, this show is nirvana.” —Judd Apatow

"First written by Marcel Mauss and Henri Humbert in 1902, A General Theory of Magic gained a wide new readership when republished by Mauss in 1950. As a study of magic in 'primitive' societies and its survival today in our thoughts and social actions, it represents what Claude Le;vi-Strauss called, in an introduction to that edition, the astonishing modernity of the mind of one of the century's greatest thinkers. The book offers a fascinating snapshot of magic throughout various cultures as well as deep sociological and religious insights still very much relevant today. At a period when art, magic and science appear to be crossing paths once again, A General Theory of Magic presents itself as a classic for our times."--Back cover.

From the French intellectual, novelist, essayist, critic, and one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century: the second volume of Proust's monumental achievement Remembrance of Things Past , collecting The Guermantes Way and Cities of the Plain. In C. K. Scott Moncrieff's heralded original English translation, as revised by Terence Kilmartin based on the definitive French Pléiade edition. Marcel Proust's masterpiece is one of the towering literary works of the twentieth century. Relating its narrator's experiences in Belle Epoque France as he grows up, falls in love, and lives through the First World War, it has mesmerized generations of readers with its profound reflections on art, time, and memory.

In this dramatic true account about the power of sensationalized crime, one woman's case is exposed for its sexism, flagrant disregard for the truth, and, ultimately, the dangers posed by an unbridled prosecution. Unwanted and neglected from birth, Barbara Graham had to overcome the odds just to survive. Her beauty was both a blessing and a curse--offering her too many options of all the wrong kind. Her innate sensitivity left her vulnerable to the harsh realities of the street, where she was left to fend for herself before she reached double digits. Her record of petty crimes spoke to a life that constantly teetered on the brink of disaster. But in 1953, a catastrophic twist of fate would catapult her out of obscurity and into the headlines. When a robbery spiraled out of control and escalated into a brutal murder, Barbara became the centerpiece of a media circus. Her beauty enraptured the press, and they were quick to portray her as a villainous femme fatale despite abundant evidence to the contrary--a fiction the prosecution eagerly promoted. The frenzy of public interest and willful distortion paved a treacherous path for Barbara Graham. In Trial by Ambush , author and criminal lawyer Marcia Clark investigates the case exposing the fallacies in the demonizing picture they painted and the critical evidence that was never revealed.

Margaret S. Mahler and her collaborators break new ground in developmental psychology and present the first complete theoretical statement of Dr. Mahler's observations on the normal separation-individuation process.Separation and individuation are presented in this major work as two complementary developments. Separation is described as the child's emergence from a symbiotic fusion with the mother, while individuation consists of those achievements marking the child's assumption of his own individual characteristics. Each of the subphases of separation-individuation is described in detail, supported by a wealth of clinical observations which trace the tasks confronting the infant and his mother as he progresses toward achieving his own individuality.A number of chapters are devoted to following five children epigenetically through their subphase development. A separate section describes the authors' methodology, the importance of the research setting, and the effects of changes in the setting. The extensive appendices by Fred Pine discuss the uniqueness of the data-gathering techniques used by the authors. In addition, a useful glossary of concepts defines the new terms that Dr. Mahler has introduced.This book represents an important breakthrough in understanding the human infant and makes a unique contribution to the science of human behavior.