"I started writing books about and for my friend George Miles because whenever I would speak about him honestly like I am doing now I felt a complicated agony beneath my words that talking openly can't handle."For most of his life, Dennis Cooper believed the person he had loved the most and would always love above all others was George Miles. In his first novel in ten years, Dennis Cooper writes about George Miles, love, loss, addiction, suicide, and how fiction ca...

This seminal monograph provides the essential guidance that we need to act as responsible ecological citizens while we expand our reach beyond Earth. The emergence of numerous national space programs along with several potent commercial presences prompts our attention to urgent environmental issues like what to do with the large mass of debris that orbits Earth, potential best practices for mining our moon, how to appropriately search for microscopic life, or whether to alter the ecology o...

The Deerslayer (1841) is the last-written of Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales, but the first in the development of the hero, Natty Bumppo. Here, Cooper returns Leatherstocking to his youth and to a pristine wilderness that D. H. Lawrence said was perhaps `lovelier than any place created in language'. This novel, and the contemporaneous The Pathfinder, mark Cooper's return to historical romance after more than a decade given largely to social and political commentary. Writte...

Living the Dream tells the history behind the establishment of Martin Luther King Jr. Day and the battle over King's legacy that continued through the decades that followed. Creating the first national holiday to honor an African American was a formidable achievement and an act of resistance against conservative and segregationist opposition.Congressional efforts to commemorate King began shortly after his assassination. The ensuing political battles slowed the progress of...

I probably shouldn't be in the office of someone I don't know, filming content for my site, but I quite like the view it affords me, and I really like that leather chair.I like it even more when the owner of the office turns out to be my grumpy, buttoned-up boss, and he catches me in the act. Literally.He's not happy about it, but he doesn't leave, and I don't stop.Suddenly, he's around all the time. Watching me. Taunting me. Teasing me.It s...

How can finite minds approach an infinite and ultimately unknowable God? Is it true that Christianity is a religion of love and Judaism a religion of law? Can a Jew accept the Orthodox Christian veneration of holy images? How much do Jews and Orthodox Christians have in common when they worship God? What can be done about Christian prayers that Jews find offensive? How much responsibility do Christians carry for antisemitism? These and other questions are addressed in this book which is in...

A narrative-driven exploration of policing and the punishment of disadvantage in Chicago, and a new vision for repairing urban neighborhoodsFor people of color who live in segregated urban neighborhoods, surviving crime and violence is a generational reality. As violence in cities like New York and Los Angeles has fallen in recent years, in many Chicago communities, it has continued at alarming rates. Meanwhile, residents of these same communities have endured deca...

In Travel Narratives, Travel Fictions, Daniel Cooper Alarcón argues that travel literature performs important social and cultural criticism often overlooked in studies of the genre. By examining non-fiction and fiction novels and short stories that purposefully examine different types of travel in relationship to each other, Cooper Alarcón documents and highlights the sophisticated ways that both types of writing have anticipated and contributed ideas central to critical studies o...

A girl who doesn't fit in befriends a blind horse who also struggles to find his place in the herd. A beautiful picture book that helps readers celebrate the qualities that challenge us and make us different.Moon cannot see but he hears sounds that other horses ignore: the eggshell crack of a meadow lark hatching. The glide of a salamander into the pond. Clara does not speak but she hears sounds that other children ignore: the hum of the oven when her mother bakes ...

Born in Newgate Prison and abandoned soon after, Moll Flanders is searching for a secure place in society. Her desire to belong propels her into all kinds of trouble from numerous marriages, bigamy and incest to theft. Charting her progress from an innocent but determined young girl to a contentedly resigned elderly woman, Defoe’s novel casts a light on the splendours and iniquities of life in 18th century England and America. It is a tale of sin and repentance, portrayed through a rich pa...

Susan Cooper talks with Symphony Space's education director about The Dark Is Rising sequence, her series of five thrilling fantasy novels for young readers, among them The Dark Is Rising and 1976 Newbery Medal winner The Grey King.The heroic series, originally published in the 1960s and 70s, is inspired by Arthurian myths and depicts an epic struggle between good ("The Light") and evil ("The Dark") in which children like 11-year-old Sign-Seeker Will Stanton take ...

Moll Flanders is the epitome of a "bawdy" woman, who makes few excuses for herself and is unashamed of her shady past. Now converted to religion, Moll recounts her history, which includes thievery, prostitution, incest, and deception amongst a list of other necessary evils. Often shocking and always funny, Moll's story is poignant and captivating, and our charismatic narrator is sure to bring joy to a listener's ears and heart.