A memoir of formative years spent on a series of communes: A "wonderful account of a frankly ghastly childhood . . . Hilarious and heartbreaking" ( Daily Mail).At the age of six, Tim Guest was taken by his mother to a commune modeled on the teachings of the notorious Indian guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. The Bhagwan preached an eclectic doctrine of Eastern mysticism, chaotic therapy, and sexual freedom, and enjoyed inhaling laughing gas, preaching from a den...

We’ve always dreamed of perfect places: Eden, heaven, Utopia. Imagine gambling without loss, love without heartbreak, sex without exposure, experience without risk. Welcome to the fascinating world of online virtual reality, the land of invented places and populations that is entered and inhabited every week by nearly fifty million people worldwide. Each participant creates a virtual body, works at virtual jobs, and makes virtual friends and family. In Second Lives, Tim Guest, an ...

**NEW YORK TIMES and WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLERONE OF THE WASHINGTON POST'S 10 BEST BOOKS OF 2015One of the world’s leading authorities on global security, Marc Goodman takes readers deep into the digital underground to expose the alarming ways criminals, corporations, and even countries are using new and emerging technologies against you—and how this makes everyone more vulnerable than ever imagined.**Technological advances have benef...

Chris Baty, founder of the wildly successful literary marathon known as National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), has completely revised and expanded his definitive handbook for extreme noveling. Chris pulls from over 15 years of results-oriented writing experience to pack this compendium with new tips and tricks, ranging from week-by-week quick reference guides to encouraging advice from authors, and much more. His motivating mix of fearless optimism and practical solutions to common excu...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER“The stories in this book make for a fascinating and remarkably complete pantheon of just about every common despair and every joy related to game development.” — Rami Ismail, cofounder of Vlambeer and developer of Nuclear ThroneDeveloping video games—hero's journey or fool's errand? The creative and technical logistics that go into building today's hottest games can be more harrowing and complex than the games themselves...

Winner of the Man Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Fiction Award, Kiran Desai’s extraordinary novel of love and loss, now reissued with a new introduction by the authorPublished to astonishing acclaim, The Inheritance of Loss heralds Kiran Desai as one of our most insightful novelists. In a crumbling, isolated house at the foot of Mount Kanchenjunga in the Himalayas, an embittered judge wants only to retire in peace when his orphaned grand...

More American children recognize Super Mario, the hero of one of Nintendo’s video games, than Mickey Mouse. The Japanese company has come to earn more money than the big three computer giants or all Hollywood movie studios combined. Now Sheff tells of the Nintendo invasion–a tale of innovation and cutthroat tactics.

This follow-up to the popular e-book 365 Prompts to Kickstart Your Writing features writing prompts geared for writers. Interspaced between prompts that are appropriate for anyone, every third prompt deals with some aspect about writing.Writing prompts can help you get into a writing groove. Instead of staring at a blank page, prompts give you the kick in the butt you need to get writing. Follow them in numerical order or jump around to a question that sparks your creativity. Use t...

Technology is rapidly moving into our bodies,” writes cyber expert Keenan, and this book gives a chilling look ahead into where that road may lead us on a one way trip to the total surrender of privacy and the commoditization of intimacy.” Here is the definitive dissection of privacy-eroding and life-invading technologies, coming at you from governments, corporations, and the person next door.Take, for example, Girls Around Me”: a Russian-made iPhone App that allowed anyone to...

Through the stories of gaming's greatest innovations and most beloved creations, journalist Harold Goldberg captures the creativity, controversy--and passion--behind the videogame's meteoric rise to the top of the pop-culture pantheon.Over the last fifty years, video games have grown from curiosities to fads to trends to one of the world's most popular forms of mass entertainment. But as the gaming industry grows in numerous directions and everyone talks about the advance of the mo...

"A broad and deep look at how electronic media are changing storytelling . . . . Completely fascinating." —Booklist, starred reviewNot long ago we were spectators, passive consumers of mass media. Now, on YouTube and blogs and Facebook and Twitter, we are media. No longer content in our traditional role as couch potatoes, we approach television shows, movies, even advertising as invitations to participate—as experiences to immerse ourselves in at will. Frank Rose ...

"[A] marvelous book about the vital importance of librarians in the cyber age. . . . Move over, Google—make way for the . . . all-knowing lady behind the desk." —Christopher Buckley, New York Times– bestselling author of Losing Mum and PupIn a world of streaming media, digital archives, and Google Everything, some think librarians are as obsolete as print on a page. Marilyn Johnson, acclaimed au...