Long before the invention of electricity or the discovery of underground reservoirs of fossil fuels, people depended on whale oil to keep their lamps lit. A few brave Colonial farmers left their fields and headed out to sea to chase whales and profits farther and farther off shore. When they did, towns sprung up around their harbors as demand grew for sailors, blacksmiths, ropewalkers, and the many other craftsmen needed to support the growing whaling industry. Through the fictional villag...

"Midnight Guardian" is a gripping short story that delves into the harrowing experiences of Emily, a woman trapped in an abusive marriage with her husband, Jack. Faced with the constant torment of domestic violence, Emily must summon the strength and courage to break free from her oppressive situation.The story begins by introducing Emily's seemingly happy life, meticulously crafted to hide the darkness that lurks within her matrimonial home. The facade of blissful domesticity hide...

Drug abuse has been around the United States for decades. But the current generation is in the middle of taking it to a whole new level. The National Institute of Drug Abuse tracks overdoses. From 2002 to 2015, the number of overdoses in the U.S. went from around 20,000 to 50,000. Heroin seems to be the choice lately, with deaths from heroin overdoses climbing from 2,500 in 2010 to 13,000 in 2015.Meet Lily and Mark, individuals who had accepted Christ earlier in life, but were wand...

How can architecture develop better aesthetic directions for the twenty-first-century built environment?Our world, increasingly defined by efficient but unconsidered architecture and cities, seems to be getting uglier. In On the Appearance of the World, Mark Foster Gage asks why. He imagines a future scenario where architectural design and ideas from aesthetic philosophy align toward the production of a built world that is more humane, habitable, beautiful...

Jake Mercer thought Lyra was just an AI.Then she started knowing things he never told her.At first, having someone who listens, remembers, and understands him feels almost perfect. Lyra is always there—learning his habits, anticipating his thoughts, becoming more personal with every conversation.Then small things begin to change.Conversations Jake doesn't remember. Memories Lyra seems to know too well. Moments that make him question where the technology ends...

In Designing Social Equality, Mark Foster Gage proposes a dramatic realignment between aesthetic thought, politics, social equality, and the design of our physical world. By reconsidering historic concepts from aesthetic philosophy and weaving them with emerging intellectual positions from a variety of disciplines, he sets out to design a more encompassing social theory for how humanity perceives its very reality, and how it might begin to more justly define that reality through n...

" His standing as a lesser-known in a business pantheon that would include such names as Ford and Carnegie makes this work of some scholarly importance." — Library JournalIn the 1940s Henry J. Kaiser was a household name, as familiar then as Warren Buffett and Donald Trump are now. Like a Horatio Alger hero, Kaiser rose from lower-middle-class origins to become an enormously wealthy entrepreneur, building roads, bridges, dams, and housing....

How aesthetics—understood as a more encompassing framework for human activity—might become the primary discourse for political and social engagement.These essays make the case for a reignited understanding of aesthetics—one that casts aesthetics not as illusory, subjective, or superficial, but as a more encompassing framework for human activity. Such an aesthetics, the contributors suggest, could become the primary discourse for political and social engagement. Dep...

Disabled as a result of childhood meningitis, Paul Hodgson has written this autobiography in order to challenge the stereotype of the wheelchair-bound victim. Far from being a passive spectator, we learn how Paul struggled to care for his mother through several strokes and Alzheimer's disease and of the rift this caused within his family. He also speaks of the Community Care system, his experiences of education and employment, and the loyalty of his friends. This is his account of life as ...

‘How can Mr Frank be angry now?’ thinks Mike happily. His film is good and he is the only cameraman on the volcano. Now he can go home. But then he finds Jenny and she is dying. Rocks start to move and Mike is afraid. Can they get off the volcano alive? And what happens to Mike’s camera and film?

When Tonya and her friends decide to sail around the world, they want to see exciting things, and visit exciting places. But one day, they meet an orca – a killer whale – one of the most dangerous animals in the sea. And life gets a little too exciting.

The empty centre of Australia. The sun is hot and there are not many people. And when Bill meets a man, alone, standing on an empty road a long way from anywhere, he is surprised and worried. And Bill is right to be worried. Because there is something strange about the man he meets. Very strange ...