Kyle's bookshelf: all en-US Sun, 16 Jun 2024 11:32:07 -0700 60 Kyle's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[Gilgamesh: A New English Version]]> 15818859 In the ancient city of Uruk, the tyrannical King Gilgamesh tramples citizens "like a wild bull". The gods send an untamed man named Enkidu to control the ruthless king, but after fighting, Enkidu and Gilgamesh become great friends and embark on a series of adventures. They kill fearsome creatures before Enkidu succumbs to disease, leaving Gilgamesh despondent and alone. Eventually, Gilgamesh moves forward, and his quest becomes a soul-searching journey of self-discovery.

Mitchell's treatment of this extraordinary work is the finest yet, surpassing previous versions in its preservation of the wisdom and beauty of the original.

©2004 Stephen Mitchell (P)2004 Recorded Books LLC]]> 4 Anonymous Kyle 4 3.91 -1200 Gilgamesh: A New English Version
author: Anonymous
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.91
book published: -1200
rating: 4
read at: 2013/09/03
date added: 2024/06/16
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]]> <![CDATA[One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich]]> 17125 The only English translation authorized by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

First published in the Soviet journal Novy Mir in 1962, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich stands as a classic of contemporary literature. The story of labor-camp inmate Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, it graphically describes his struggle to maintain his dignity in the face of communist oppression. An unforgettable portrait of the entire world of Stalin's forced work camps, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is one of the most extraordinary literary documents to have emerged from the Soviet Union and confirms Solzhenitsyn's stature as "a literary genius whose talent matches that of Dosotevsky, Turgenev, Tolstoy"--Harrison Salisbury

This unexpurgated 1991 translation by H. T. Willetts is the only authorized edition available, and fully captures the power and beauty of the original Russian.]]> 182 Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Kyle 3 3.98 1962 One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
author: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1962
rating: 3
read at: 2019/11/18
date added: 2024/03/15
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]]> <![CDATA[Web Copy That Sells: The Revolutionary Formula for Creating Killer Copy That Grabs Their Attention and Compels Them to Buy]]> 15792121 Web Copy That Sells gives readers proven methods for achieving phenomenal success with their online sales and marketing efforts. They will learn to:

� Use psychological tactics that compel Web surfers to buy
� Create effective, highly-targeted Facebook ads
� Test copy to maximize response
� Write online marketing video scripts that sell
� Craft compelling copy for interactive advertising banners
� Produce high-converting video sales letters
� And more

Proven and practical, Web Copy That Sells shows how to quickly turn lackluster sites into “perpetual money machines,� streamline key messages down to irresistible “cyber bites”…and ensure that Web copy, e-mail, and marketing communications pack a fast, powerful—and sales generating—punch.]]> 304 Maria Veloso 0814432514 Kyle 2 3.77 2004 Web Copy That Sells: The Revolutionary Formula for Creating Killer Copy That Grabs Their Attention and Compels Them to Buy
author: Maria Veloso
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2004
rating: 2
read at: 2017/08/10
date added: 2023/02/15
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]]> <![CDATA[Industrial Society and Its Future]]> 225468 149 Theodore John Kaczynski Kyle 0 currently-reading 3.88 1995 Industrial Society and Its Future
author: Theodore John Kaczynski
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1995
rating: 0
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date added: 2022/01/15
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> Gaspard de la Nuit 927779 232 Aloysius Bertrand 0974071129 Kyle 0 to-read 3.77 1842 Gaspard de la Nuit
author: Aloysius Bertrand
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1842
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/08/18
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]]> The Elementary Particles 58314 The Elementary Particles is a frighteningly original novel–part Marguerite Duras and part Bret Easton Ellis-that leaps headlong into the malaise of contemporary existence.

Bruno and Michel are half-brothers abandoned by their mother, an unabashed devotee of the drugged-out free-love world of the sixties. Bruno, the older, has become a raucously promiscuous hedonist himself, while Michel is an emotionally dead molecular biologist wholly immersed in the solitude of his work. Each is ultimately offered a final chance at genuine love, and what unfolds is a brilliantly caustic and unpredictable tale.]]> 272 Michel Houellebecq 0375727019 Kyle 4 3.91 1998 The Elementary Particles
author: Michel Houellebecq
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1998
rating: 4
read at: 2021/08/09
date added: 2021/08/09
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]]> Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1) 6088007 Neuromancer is a cyberpunk, science fiction masterpiece—a classic that ranks with 1984 and Brave New World as one of the twentieth century’s most potent visions of the future.

The Matrix is a world within the world, a global consensus-hallucination, the representation of every byte of data in cyberspace...

Henry Dorsett Case was the sharpest data-thief in the business, until vengeful former employees crippled his nervous system. But now a new and very mysterious employer recruits him for a last-chance run. The target: an unthinkably powerful artificial intelligence orbiting Earth in service of the sinister Tessier-Ashpool business clan. With a dead man riding shotgun and Molly, mirror-eyed street-samurai, to watch his back, Case embarks on an adventure that ups the ante on an entire genre of fiction.

The winner of the Hugo, Nebula, and Philip K. Dick Awards, Neuromancer was the first fully-realized glimpse of humankind’s digital future—a shocking vision that has challenged our assumptions about our technology and ourselves, reinvented the way we speak and think, and forever altered the landscape of our imaginations.]]> 288 William Gibson Kyle 4 3.93 1984 Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1)
author: William Gibson
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1984
rating: 4
read at: 2021/07/27
date added: 2021/07/27
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]]> Paris Spleen 24601 The Flowers of Evil: the city and its squalor and inequalities, the pressures of time and mortality, and the liberation provided by the sensual delights of intoxication, art, and women. Published posthumously in 1869, Paris Spleen was a landmark publication in the development of the genre of prose poetry—a format which Baudelaire saw as particularly suited for expressing the feelings of uncertainty, flux, and freedom of his age—and one of the founding texts of literary modernism.]]> 118 Charles Baudelaire 0811200078 Kyle 5 4.35 1857 Paris Spleen
author: Charles Baudelaire
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.35
book published: 1857
rating: 5
read at: 2021/06/19
date added: 2021/06/19
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]]> Orthodoxy 87665 168 G.K. Chesterton 160096527X Kyle 0 to-read 4.17 1908 Orthodoxy
author: G.K. Chesterton
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1908
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/06/12
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]]> <![CDATA[Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream]]> 7745 Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is the best chronicle of drug-soaked, addle-brained, rollicking good times ever committed to the printed page. It is also the tale of a long weekend road trip that has gone down in the annals of American pop culture as one of the strangest journeys ever undertaken.]]> 204 Hunter S. Thompson 0679785892 Kyle 3 4.07 1971 Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream
author: Hunter S. Thompson
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1971
rating: 3
read at: 2021/06/05
date added: 2021/06/05
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]]> The Possibility of an Island 263985
Surprisingly poignant, philosophically compelling, and occasionally laugh-out-loud funny, The Possibility of an Island is at once an indictment, an elegy, and a celebration of everything we have and are at risk of losing. It is a masterpiece from one of the world's most innovative writers.]]> 352 Michel Houellebecq 0307275213 Kyle 4 3.85 2005 The Possibility of an Island
author: Michel Houellebecq
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at: 2021/05/15
date added: 2021/05/15
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]]> <![CDATA[Rilke's Book of Hours: Love Poems to God]]> 467164 166 Rainer Maria Rilke 1573225851 Kyle 4 4.35 1905 Rilke's Book of Hours: Love Poems to God
author: Rainer Maria Rilke
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.35
book published: 1905
rating: 4
read at: 2021/05/08
date added: 2021/05/08
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]]> <![CDATA[The Language of Creation: Cosmic Symbolism in Genesis]]> 40192316 354 Matthieu Pageau Kyle 5 4.46 2018 The Language of Creation: Cosmic Symbolism in Genesis
author: Matthieu Pageau
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2021/03/03
date added: 2021/03/03
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]]> <![CDATA[The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in An Age of Diminishing Expectations]]> 38212112 The Culture of Narcissism was first published in 1979, Christopher Lasch was hailed as a “biblical prophet� (Time). Lasch’s identification of narcissism as not only an individual ailment but also a burgeoning social epidemic was groundbreaking. His diagnosis of American culture is even more relevant today, predicting the limitless expansion of the anxious and grasping narcissistic self into every part of American life.


The Culture of Narcissism offers an astute and urgent analysis of what we need to know in these troubled times.]]> 368 Christopher Lasch 0393356175 Kyle 5 4.01 1978 The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in An Age of Diminishing Expectations
author: Christopher Lasch
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1978
rating: 5
read at: 2021/01/27
date added: 2021/01/27
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]]> <![CDATA[Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative?]]> 6763725 81 Mark Fisher 1846943175 Kyle 4 4.20 2009 Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative?
author: Mark Fisher
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at: 2021/01/22
date added: 2021/01/22
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]]> <![CDATA[World History of the Dance (The Norton Library)]]> 255331 516 Curt Sachs 0393002098 Kyle 0 to-read 3.65 1933 World History of the Dance (The Norton Library)
author: Curt Sachs
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.65
book published: 1933
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/01/16
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]]> <![CDATA[Ringside: A History of Professional Wrestling in America]]> 4149518
This chronological work begins with a brief account of wrestling's global history, and then proceeds to investigate the sport's growth as a specifically American institution. Wrestling has continued to survive in the face of technological developments, scandals, public ridicule, and a lack of centralized control, and today this supremely adaptable entertainment form represents, in sum, an international industry capable of attracting enormous television and pay-per-view audiences, along with massive amounts of advertising and merchandizing revenue. Ringside focuses on the business of wrestling as well as on the performers and their in-ring antics, and offers readers a fully nuanced examination of the development of professional wrestling in America.]]> 224 Scott M. Beekman 027598401X Kyle 3 3.38 2006 Ringside: A History of Professional Wrestling in America
author: Scott M. Beekman
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.38
book published: 2006
rating: 3
read at: 2021/01/16
date added: 2021/01/16
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]]> <![CDATA[Kill All Normies: Online Culture Wars from 4chan and Tumblr to Trump and the Alt-Right]]> 34858587 Kill All Normies explores some of the cultural genealogies and past parallels of these styles and subcultures, drawing from transgressive styles of 60s libertinism and conservative movements, to make the case for a rejection of the perpetual cultural turn.]]> 136 Angela Nagle 1785355449 Kyle 4 3.41 2017 Kill All Normies: Online Culture Wars from 4chan and Tumblr to Trump and the Alt-Right
author: Angela Nagle
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.41
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2020/10/09
date added: 2020/10/09
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]]> Serotonin 44453053
Deeply depressed by his romantic and professional failures, the aging hedonist and agricultural engineer Florent-Claude Labrouste feels he is "dying of sadness." His young girlfriend hates him, his career is pretty much over, and he has to keep himself highly medicated to cope with day-to-day city life.

Struggling with "sex, male angst, solitude, consumerism, globalisation, urban planning, and more sex" (The Economist), Labrouste decides to head for the hills, returning to Normandy, where he once worked promoting regional cheeses, and where, too, he had once been in love, and even—it now seems—happy. There he finds a countryside devastated by globalization and European agricultural policies, and local farmers longing, like Labrouste himself, for an impossible return to what they remember as a golden age: the smaller world of the premodern era.

As the farmers prepare for what might be an armed insurrection, it becomes clear that the health of one miserable body and a suffering body politic are not so different, in the end, and that all concerned may be rushing toward a catastrophe a whole drugstore's worth of antidepressants won't be enough to make bearable.]]> 309 Michel Houellebecq 0374261024 Kyle 5 3.58 2019 Serotonin
author: Michel Houellebecq
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.58
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at: 2020/09/10
date added: 2020/09/10
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]]> The Buried Giant 22522805
The Buried Giant begins as a couple set off across a troubled land of mist and rain in the hope of finding a son they have not seen in years.

Sometimes savage, often intensely moving, Kazuo Ishiguro's first novel in nearly a decade is about lost memories, love, revenge, and war.

Included on TIME Magazine's "THE 100 BEST FANTASY BOOKS OF ALL TIME"]]> 317 Kazuo Ishiguro 030727103X Kyle 3 3.56 2015 The Buried Giant
author: Kazuo Ishiguro
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2015
rating: 3
read at: 2020/08/21
date added: 2020/08/21
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]]> <![CDATA[Radical: My Journey Out Of Islamist Extremism]]> 17572142 Ěý
He was sent to an Egyptian prison where he was, fortuitously, jailed along with the assassins of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. The 20 years in prison had changed the assassins� views on Islam and violence; Maajid went into prison preaching to them about the Islamist cause, but the lessons ended up going the other way. He came out of prison four years later completely changed, convinced that his entire belief system had been wrong, and determined to do something about it.

He met with activists and heads of state, built a network, and started a foundation, Quilliam, to combat the rising Islamist tide in Europe and elsewhere, using his intimate knowledge of recruitment tactics in order to reverse extremism and persuade Muslims that the â€narrativeâ€� used to recruit them (that the West is evil and the cause of all of Muslim suffering), is false.ĚýRadical, first published in the UK, is a fascinating and important look into one man's journey out of extremism and into something else entirely.

This U.S. edition contains a "Preface for US readers"Ěýand a new, updated epilogue.



Ěý]]> 296 Maajid Nawaz 0762791365 Kyle 4 3.98 2012 Radical: My Journey Out Of Islamist Extremism
author: Maajid Nawaz
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2020/05/29
date added: 2020/05/29
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]]> <![CDATA[Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future]]> 18050143
The great secret of our time is that there are still uncharted frontiers to explore and new inventions to create. In Zero to One, legendary entrepreneur and investor Peter Thiel shows how we can find singular ways to create those new things.

Thiel begins with the contrarian premise that we live in an age of technological stagnation, even if we’re too distracted by shiny mobile devices to notice. Information technology has improved rapidly, but there is no reason why progress should be limited to computers or Silicon Valley. Progress can be achieved in any industry or area of business. It comes from the most important skill that every leader must master: learning to think for yourself.

Doing what someone else already knows how to do takes the world from 1 to n, adding more of something familiar. But when you do something new, you go from 0 to 1. The next Bill Gates will not build an operating system. The next Larry Page or Sergey Brin won’t make a search engine. Tomorrow’s champions will not win by competing ruthlessly in today’s marketplace. They will escape competition altogether, because their businesses will be unique.

Zero to One presents at once an optimistic view of the future of progress in America and a new way of thinking about innovation: it starts by learning to ask the questions that lead you to find value in unexpected places.]]> 195 Peter Thiel 0804139296 Kyle 5 4.15 2014 Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future
author: Peter Thiel
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2014
rating: 5
read at: 2020/05/26
date added: 2020/05/26
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]]> <![CDATA[The Problem of the Puer Aeternus (Studies in Jungian Psychology by Jungian Analysts, 87)]]> 1404609


It is impossible to overstate the influence on both men and women of this classic study, originally a series of lectures at the Zurich Jung Institute. It is Jungian psychology in its most down-to-earth voice, telling it like it is so accurately and with such a depth of understanding that it is still much in demand even though it has been out of print for many years. This new edition features a Bibliography and an extensive Index.

]]> 288 Marie-Louise von Franz 0919123880 Kyle 3 4.27 1970 The Problem of the Puer Aeternus (Studies in Jungian Psychology by Jungian Analysts, 87)
author: Marie-Louise von Franz
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1970
rating: 3
read at: 2020/05/13
date added: 2020/05/13
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]]> The Inner Game of Music 848522
With more than 800,000 copies sold since it was first published thirty years ago, The Inner Game of Tennis became a touchstone for hundreds of thousands of people. Now, the bestselling co-author delivers a book designed to help musicians overcome obstacles, improve concentration, and reduce nervousness, allowing them to reach new levels of performing excellence and musical artistry.]]> 225 Barry Green 0385231261 Kyle 3 3.96 1986 The Inner Game of Music
author: Barry Green
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1986
rating: 3
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date added: 2020/03/24
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]]> Submission 25322084
Meanwhile, it’s election season. And although Francois feels “about as political as a bath towel,� things are getting pretty interesting. In an alliance with the Socialists, France’s new Islamic party sweeps to power. Islamic law comes into force. Women are veiled, polygamy is encouraged, and Francois is offered an irresistible academic advancement—on condition that he convert to Islam.

Adam Gopnik in The New Yorker has said of Submission that Michael Houellebecq is “not merely a satirist but—more unusually—a sincere satirist, genuinely saddened by the absurdities of history and the madnesses of mankind.� Houellebecq’s new book may be satirical and melancholic, but it is also hilarious, a comic masterpiece by one of France’s great novelists.]]> 246 Michel Houellebecq 0374271577 Kyle 4 3.68 2015 Submission
author: Michel Houellebecq
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2020/03/10
date added: 2020/03/22
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]]> <![CDATA[Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength]]> 11104933 One of the world's most esteemed and influential psychologists, Roy F. Baumeister, teams with New York Times science writer John Tierney to reveal the secrets of self-control and how to master it. In Willpower, the pioneering researcher Roy F. Baumeister collaborates with renowned New York Times science writer John Tierney to revolutionize our understanding of the most coveted human virtue: self-control.

In what became one of the most cited papers in social science literature, Baumeister discovered that willpower actually operates like a muscle: it can be strengthened with practice and fatigued by overuse. Willpower is fueled by glucose, and it can be bolstered simply by replenishing the brain's store of fuel. That's why eating and sleeping- and especially failing to do either of those-have such dramatic effects on self-control (and why dieters have such a hard time resisting temptation).

Baumeister's latest research shows that we typically spend four hours every day resisting temptation. No wonder people around the world rank a lack of self-control as their biggest weakness. Willpower looks to the lives of entrepreneurs, parents, entertainers, and artists-including David Blaine, Eric Clapton, and others-who have flourished by improving their self-control.

The lessons from their stories and psychologists' experiments can help anyone. You learn not only how to build willpower but also how to conserve it for crucial moments by setting the right goals and using the best new techniques for monitoring your progress. Once you master these techniques and establish the right habits, willpower gets easier: you'll need less conscious mental energy to avoid temptation. That's neither magic nor empty self-help sloganeering, but rather a solid path to a better life.

Combining the best of modern social science with practical wisdom, Baumeister and Tierney here share the definitive compendium of modern lessons in willpower. As our society has moved away from the virtues of thrift and self-denial, it often feels helpless because we face more temptations than ever. But we also have more knowledge and better tools for taking control of our lives. However we define happiness-a close- knit family, a satisfying career, financial security-we won't reach it without mastering self-control.]]> 291 Roy F. Baumeister 1594203075 Kyle 3 3.94 2011 Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength
author: Roy F. Baumeister
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2011
rating: 3
read at: 2020/03/20
date added: 2020/03/20
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]]> Notes from the Underground 52390003
Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, whose Dostoevsky translations have become the standard, give us a brilliantly faithful edition of this classic novel, conveying all the tragedy and tormented comedy of the original.]]> 132 Fyodor Dostoevsky 1618956361 Kyle 0 to-read 4.01 1864 Notes from the Underground
author: Fyodor Dostoevsky
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1864
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/03/14
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]]> Alchemical Active Imagination 729922 Ěý
Although alchemy is popularly regarded as the science that sought to transmute base physical matter, many of the medieval alchemists were more interested in developing a discipline that would lead to the psychological and spiritual transformation of the individual. C. G. Jung discovered in his study ofĚýalchemicalĚýtexts a symbolic andĚýimaginalĚýlanguage that expressed many of his own insights into psychological processes.
Ěý
In this book, Marie-LouiseĚývonĚýFranz examines a text by the sixteenth-century alchemist and physicianĚýGerhardĚýDornĚýin order to show the relationship of alchemy to the concepts and techniques ofĚýanalyticalĚýpsychology. In particular, she shows that the alchemists practiced a kind of meditation similar to Jung's technique of active imagination, which enables one to dialogue with the unconscious archetypal elements in the psyche.
Ěý
Originally delivered as a series of lectures at the C. G. Jung Institute in Zurich, the book opens therapeutic insights into the relations among spirit, soul, and body in the practice of active imagination.]]> 160 Marie-Louise von Franz 0877735891 Kyle 4 4.30 1979 Alchemical Active Imagination
author: Marie-Louise von Franz
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.30
book published: 1979
rating: 4
read at: 2020/03/06
date added: 2020/03/06
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]]> <![CDATA[The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life]]> 223556 912 Richard J. Herrnstein 0684824299 Kyle 3 3.62 1994 The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life
author: Richard J. Herrnstein
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.62
book published: 1994
rating: 3
read at: 2020/03/05
date added: 2020/03/05
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]]> <![CDATA[The Diversity Delusion: How Race and Gender Pandering Corrupt the University and Undermine Our Culture]]> 38492016 By the New York Times bestselling a provocative account of the attack on the humanities, the rise of intolerance, and the erosion of serious learningAmerica is in crisis, from the university to the workplace. Toxic ideas first spread by higher education have undermined humanistic values, fueled intolerance, and widened divisions in our larger culture. Chaucer, Shakespeare and Milton? Oppressive. American history? Tyranny. Professors correcting grammar and spelling, or employers hiring by merit? Racist and sexist. Students emerge into the working world believing that human beings are defined by their skin color, gender, and sexual preference, and that oppression based on these characteristics is the American experience. Speech that challenges these campus orthodoxies is silenced with brute force.The Diversity Delusion argues that the root of this problem is the belief in America’s endemic racism and sexism, a belief that has engendered a metastasizing diversity bureaucracy in society and academia. Diversity commissars denounce meritocratic standards as discriminatory, enforce hiring quotas, and teach students and adults alike to think of themselves as perpetual victims. From #MeToo mania that blurs flirtations with criminal acts, to implicit bias and diversity compliance training that sees racism in every interaction, Heather Mac Donald argues that we are creating a nation of narrowed minds, primed for grievance, and that we are putting our competitive edge at risk. But there is hope in the works of authors, composers, and artists who have long inspired the best in us. Compiling the author’s decades of research and writing on the subject, The Diversity Delusion calls for a return to the classical liberal pursuits of open-minded inquiry and expression, by which everyone can discover a common humanity.]]> 288 Heather Mac Donald 1250200911 Kyle 4 3.88 2018 The Diversity Delusion: How Race and Gender Pandering Corrupt the University and Undermine Our Culture
author: Heather Mac Donald
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2020/02/15
date added: 2020/02/15
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]]> <![CDATA[Thinking In Pictures: and Other Reports from My Life with Autism]]> 103408 240 Temple Grandin 0679772898 Kyle 5 4.10 1995 Thinking In Pictures: and Other Reports from My Life with Autism
author: Temple Grandin
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1995
rating: 5
read at: 2020/02/14
date added: 2020/02/14
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]]> Shackleton's Boat Journey 2456650 160 Frank A. Worsley 1589760905 Kyle 2 4.25 1933 Shackleton's Boat Journey
author: Frank A. Worsley
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1933
rating: 2
read at: 2020/02/05
date added: 2020/02/05
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]]> <![CDATA[Zombies in Western Culture: A Twenty-First Century Crisis]]> 35523766 The authors examine the essential features of the zombie, including mindlessness, ugliness and homelessness, and argue that these reflect the outlook of the contemporary West and its attendant zeitgeists of anxiety, alienation, disconnection and disenfranchisement. They trace the relationship between zombies and the theme of secular apocalypse, demonstrating that the zombie draws its power from being a perversion of the Christian mythos of death and resurrection. Symbolic of a lost Christian worldview, the zombie represents a world that can no longer explain itself, nor provide us with instructions for how to live within it.
The concept of 'domicide' or the destruction of home is developed to describe the modern crisis of meaning that the zombie both represents and reflects. This is illustrated using case studies including the relocation of the Anishinaabe of the Grassy Narrows First Nation, and the upheaval of population displacement in the Hellenistic period. Finally, the authors invoke and reformulate symbols of the four horseman of the apocalypse as rhetorical analogues to frame those aspects of contemporary collapse that elucidate the horror of the zombie.
Zombies in Western Culture: A Twenty-First Century Crisis is required reading for anyone interested in the phenomenon of zombies in contemporary culture. It will also be of interest to an interdisciplinary audience including students and scholars of culture studies, semiotics, philosophy, religious studies, eschatology, anthropology, Jungian studies, and sociology.]]> 104 John Vervaeke Kyle 4 4.11 Zombies in Western Culture: A Twenty-First Century Crisis
author: John Vervaeke
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.11
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2020/01/19
date added: 2020/01/19
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]]> <![CDATA[Bullying at School: What We Know and What We Can Do]]> 710301 158 Dan Olweus 0631192417 Kyle 0 to-read 4.02 1993 Bullying at School: What We Know and What We Can Do
author: Dan Olweus
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1993
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/01/16
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[A Billion Wicked Thoughts: What the World's Largest Experiment Reveals about Human Desire]]> 9551126 Two maverick neuroscientists use the world's largest psychology experiment-the Internet-to study the private activities of millions of men and women around the world, unveiling a revolutionary and shocking new vision of human desire that overturns conventional thinking.

For his groundbreaking sexual research, Alfred Kinsey and his team interviewed 18,000 people, relying on them to honestly report their most intimate experiences. Using the Internet, the neuroscientists Ogas and Gaddam quietly observed the raw sexual behaviors of half a billion people. By combining their observations with neuroscience and animal research, these two young neuroscientists finally answer the long-disputed question: what do people really like? Ogas and Gaddam's findings are transforming the way scientists and therapists think about sexual desire.

In their startling book, Ogas and Gaddam analyze a "billion wicked thoughts" on the Internet: a billion Web searches, a million individual search histories, a million erotic stories, a half-million erotic videos, a million Web sites, millions of online personal ads, and many other enormous sources of sexual data in order to understand the true differences between male and female desires, including:

?Men and women have hardwired sexual cues analogous to our hardwired tastes-there are sexual versions of sweet, sour, salty, savory, and bitter. But men and women are wired with different sets of cues.

?The male sexual brain resembles a reckless hunter, while the female sexual brain resembles a cautious detective agency.

?Men form their sexual interests during adolescence and rarely change. Women's sexual interests are plastic and change frequently.

?The male sexual brain is an "or gate": A single stimulus can arouse it. The female sexual brain is an "and gate": It requires many simultaneous stimuli to arouse it.

?When it comes to sexual arousal, men prefer overweight women to underweight women, and a significant number of men seek out erotic images of women in their 40s, 50s, and 60s.

?Women enjoy writing and sharing erotic stories with other women. The fastest growing genre of erotic stories for women are stories about two heterosexual men having sex.

?Though the male sexual brain is much more different from the female sexual brain than is commonly believed, the sexual brain of gay men is virtually identical to that of straight men.

Featuring cutting-edge, jaw-dropping science, this wildly entertaining and controversial book helps readers understand their partner's sexual desires with a depth of knowledge unavailable from any other source. Its fascinating and occasionally disturbing findings will rock our modern understanding of sexuality, just as Kinsey's reports did sixty years ago.]]> 416 Sai Gaddam 0525952098 Kyle 4 3.81 2011 A Billion Wicked Thoughts: What the World's Largest Experiment Reveals about Human Desire
author: Sai Gaddam
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2011
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Kingdom of Matthias: A Story of Sex and Salvation in 19th-Century America]]> 217248 240 Paul E. Johnson 0195098358 Kyle 3 3.67 1994 The Kingdom of Matthias: A Story of Sex and Salvation in 19th-Century America
author: Paul E. Johnson
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1994
rating: 3
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date added: 2020/01/11
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]]> <![CDATA[Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World--Told from the Inside by the Man Who Ran It]]> 21853893 ĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚý
For fifty years, while the world stood in terror of a nuclear war, Russian scientists hidden in heavily guarded secret cities refined and stockpiled a new kind of weapon of mass destruction—an invisible weapon that would strike in silence and could not be traced. It would leave hundreds of thousands dead in its wake and would continue to spread devastation long after its release. The scientists were bioweaponeers, working to perfect the tools of a biological Armageddon. They called it their Manhattan Project. It was the deadliest and darkest secret of the cold war.
ĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚý
What you are about to read has never before been made public. Ken Alibek began his career as a doctor wanting to save lives and ended up running the Soviet biological weapons program—a secret military empire masquerading as a pharmaceutical company. At its peak, the program employed sixty thousand people at over one hundred facilities. Seven reserve mobilization plants were on permanent standby, ready to produce hundreds of tons of plague, anthrax, smallpox, and Venezuelan equine encephalitis, to name only a few of the toxic agents bred in Soviet labs. Almost every government ministry was implicated, including the Academy of Sciences and the KGB.
ĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚý
Biohazard is a terrifying, fast-paced account of tests and leaks, accidents and disasters in the labs, KGB threats and assassinations. The book is full of revelations—evidence of biowarfare programs in Cuba and India, actual deployments at Stalingrad and in Afghanistan, experiments with mood-altering agents, a contingency plan to attack major American cities, and the true story behind the mysterious anthrax outbreak in Sverdlovsk. But beyond these is a twisted world of lies and mirrors, and the riveting parable of the greatest perversion of science in history.
ĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚý
No one knows the actual capabilities of biological weapons better than Dr. Alibek. Many of the scientists who worked with him have been lured away from low-paying Russian labs to rogue regimes and terrorist groups around the world. In our lifetime, we will most likely see a terrorist attack using biological weapons on an American city. Biohazard tells us—in chilling detail—what to expect and what we can do. Not since Arthur Koestler’s Darkness at Noon has there been such a book—a report from inside the belly of the beast.

Praise for Biohazard
Ěý
“Harrowing . . . richly descriptive . . . [an] absorbing account.��The New York Times Book Review
Ěý
“Remarkable . . . terrifying revelations . . . [Ken Alibek’s] overall message is ignored at great national peril.â€� —N±đ·É˛ő»ĺ˛ą˛â
Ěý
“Read and be amazed.Ěý.Ěý.Ěý. An important and fascinating look into a terrifying world of which we were blissfully unaware.â€�—Robin Cook, author of Contagion


From the Hardcover edition.]]> 302 Ken Alibek 0804152659 Kyle 3 4.28 1999 Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World--Told from the Inside by the Man Who Ran It
author: Ken Alibek
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.28
book published: 1999
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Riding Windhorses: A Journey into the Heart of Mongolian Shamanism]]> 766470
� A thorough introduction to Mongolian and Siberian shamanic beliefs and practices, which, until the collapse of the Soviet Union, were banned from being practiced.

� Includes rituals for healing and divination techniques.

In traditional Mongolian-Buryat culture, shamans play an important role maintaining the tegsh, the "balance" of the community. They counsel a path of moderation in one's actions and reverence for the natural world, which they view as mother to humanity. Mongolians believe that if natural resources are taken without thanking the spirits for what they have given, those resources will not be replaced. Unlike many other cultures whose shamanic traditions were undermined by modern civilization, shamans in the remote areas of southern Siberia and Mongolia are still the guardians of the environment, the community, and the natural order.

Riding Windhorses is the first book written on Mongolian and Siberian shamanism by a shaman trained in that tradition. A thorough introduction to Mongolian/Siberian shamanic beliefs and practices, it includes working knowledge of the basic rituals and various healing and divination techniques. Many of the rituals and beliefs described here have never been published and are the direct teachings of the author's own shaman mentors.]]> 224 Sarangerel 0892818085 Kyle 0 to-read 4.15 2000 Riding Windhorses: A Journey into the Heart of Mongolian Shamanism
author: Sarangerel
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2000
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]]> <![CDATA[The Great Leveler: Violence and the History of Inequality from the Stone Age to the Twenty-First Century (The Princeton Economic History of the Western World)]]> 31951505 How only violence and catastrophes have consistently reduced inequality throughout world history

Are mass violence and catastrophes the only forces that can seriously decrease economic inequality? To judge by thousands of years of history, the answer is yes. Tracing the global history of inequality from the Stone Age to today, Walter Scheidel shows that inequality never dies peacefully. Inequality declines when carnage and disaster strike and increases when peace and stability return. The Great Leveler is the first book to chart the crucial role of violent shocks in reducing inequality over the full sweep of human history around the world.

Ever since humans began to farm, herd livestock, and pass on their assets to future generations, economic inequality has been a defining feature of civilization. Over thousands of years, only violent events have significantly lessened inequality. The "Four Horsemen" of leveling—mass-mobilization warfare, transformative revolutions, state collapse, and catastrophic plagues—have repeatedly destroyed the fortunes of the rich. Scheidel identifies and examines these processes, from the crises of the earliest civilizations to the cataclysmic world wars and communist revolutions of the twentieth century. Today, the violence that reduced inequality in the past seems to have diminished, and that is a good thing. But it casts serious doubt on the prospects for a more equal future.

An essential contribution to the debate about inequality, The Great Leveler provides important new insights about why inequality is so persistent—and why it is unlikely to decline anytime soon.]]> 528 Walter Scheidel 0691165025 Kyle 0 to-read 3.78 2017 The Great Leveler: Violence and the History of Inequality from the Stone Age to the Twenty-First Century (The Princeton Economic History of the Western World)
author: Walter Scheidel
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2017
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]]> <![CDATA[St. Ephrem the Syrian: Hymns On Paradise]]> 555083 240 Ephrem the Syrian 0881410764 Kyle 0 to-read 4.49 St. Ephrem the Syrian: Hymns On Paradise
author: Ephrem the Syrian
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.49
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]]> <![CDATA[Dataclysm: Who We Are (When We Think No One's Looking)]]> 21480734
An audacious, irreverent investigation of human behavior—and a first look at a revolution in the making
Ěý
Our personal data has been used to spy on us, hire and fire us, and sell us stuff we don’t need. In Dataclysm , Christian Rudder uses it to show us who we truly are.
Ěý
For centuries, we’ve relied on polling or small-scale lab experiments to study human behavior. Today, a new approach is possible. As we live more of our lives online, researchers can finally observe us directly, in vast numbers, and without filters. Data scientists have become the new demographers.
Ěý
In this daring and original book, Rudder explains how Facebook "likes" can predict, with surprising accuracy, a person’s sexual orientation and even intelligence; how attractive women receive exponentially more interview requests; and why you must have haters to be hot. He charts the rise and fall of America’s most reviled word through Google Search and examines the new dynamics of collaborative rage on Twitter. He shows how people express themselves, both privately and publicly. What is the least Asian thing you can say? Do people bathe more in Vermont or New Jersey? What do black women think about Simon & Garfunkel? ( they don’t think about Simon & Garfunkel.) Rudder also traces human migration over time, showing how groups of people move from certain small towns to the same big cities across the globe. And he grapples with the challenge of maintaining privacy in a world where these explorations are possible.
Ěý
Visually arresting and full of wit and insight, Dataclysm is a new way of seeing ourselves—a brilliant alchemy, in which math is made human and numbers become the narrative of our time.]]> 304 Christian Rudder 0385347375 Kyle 0 to-read 3.70 2014 Dataclysm: Who We Are (When We Think No One's Looking)
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average rating: 3.70
book published: 2014
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]]> Shake Hands with the Devil 215758
When Lt-Gen. Roméo Dallaire was called to serve as force commander of the UN intervention in Rwanda in '93, he thought he was heading off on a straightforward peacekeeping mission. Thirteen months later he flew home from Africa, broken, disillusioned & suicidal, having witnessed the slaughter of 800,000 Rwandans in 100 days.

In Shake Hands with the Devil, he takes readers with him on a return voyage into hell, vividly recreating the events the international community turned its back on. This book is an unsparing eyewitness account of the failure by humanity to stop the genocide, despite timely warnings. Woven thru the story of this disastrous mission is his own journey from confident Cold Warrior, to devastated UN commander, to retired general engaged in a painful struggle to find a measure of peace, hope & reconciliation.

This book is a personal account of his conversion from a man certain of his worth & secure in his assumptions to one conscious of his own weaknesses & failures & critical of the institutions he'd relied on. It might not sit easily with standard ideas of military leadership, but understanding what happened to him & his mission to Rwanda is crucial to understanding the moral minefields peacekeepers are forced to negotiate when we ask them to step into dirty wars.]]> 562 Roméo Dallaire 0786715103 Kyle 0 to-read 4.24 2003 Shake Hands with the Devil
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name: Kyle
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2003
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]]> <![CDATA[Louder Than Words: The New Science of How the Mind Makes Meaning]]> 13587146 312 Benjamin K. Bergen 0465028292 Kyle 4 3.83 2012 Louder Than Words: The New Science of How the Mind Makes Meaning
author: Benjamin K. Bergen
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2012
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Medium is the Massage Publisher: Gingko Press]]> 22318974 McLuhan's remarkable observation that "societies have always been shaped more by the nature of the media by which men communicate than by the content of the communication" is undoubtedly more relevant today than ever before. With the rise of the internet and the explosion of the digital revolution there has never been a better time to revisit Marshall McLuhan.]]> Marshall McLuhan Kyle 5 4.20 1967 The Medium is the Massage Publisher: Gingko Press
author: Marshall McLuhan
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1967
rating: 5
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]]> Metaphors We Live By 34459 The now-classic Metaphors We Live By changed our understanding of metaphor and its role in language and the mind. Metaphor, the authors explain, is a fundamental mechanism of mind, one that allows us to use what we know about our physical and social experience to provide understanding of countless other subjects. Because such metaphors structure our most basic understandings of our experience, they are "metaphors we live by", metaphors that can shape our perceptions and actions without our ever noticing them.

In this updated edition of Lakoff and Johnson's influential book, the authors supply an afterword surveying how their theory of metaphor has developed within the cognitive sciences to become central to the contemporary understanding of how we think and how we express our thoughts in language.]]> 276 George Lakoff 0226468011 Kyle 5 4.10 1980 Metaphors We Live By
author: George Lakoff
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1980
rating: 5
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]]> The Master and Margarita 117833 The first complete, annotated English Translation of Mikhail Bulgakov's comic masterpiece.

An audacious revision of the stories of Faust and Pontius Pilate, The Master and Margarita is recognized as one of the essential classics of modern Russian literature. The novel's vision of Soviet life in the 1930s is so ferociously accurate that it could not be published during its author's lifetime and appeared only in a censored edition in the 1960s. Its truths are so enduring that its language has become part of the common Russian speech.

One hot spring, the devil arrives in Moscow, accompanied by a retinue that includes a beautiful naked witch and an immense talking black cat with a fondness for chess and vodka. The visitors quickly wreak havoc in a city that refuses to believe in either God or Satan. But they also bring peace to two unhappy Muscovites: one is the Master, a writer pilloried for daring to write a novel about Christ and Pontius Pilate; the other is Margarita, who loves the Master so deeply that she is willing literally to go to hell for him. What ensues is a novel of inexhaustible energy, humor, and philosophical depth, a work whose nuances emerge for the first time in Diana Burgin's and Katherine Tiernan O'Connor's splendid English version.]]> 372 Mikhail Bulgakov 0679760806 Kyle 0 to-read 4.31 1967 The Master and Margarita
author: Mikhail Bulgakov
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.31
book published: 1967
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]]> <![CDATA[The Varieties of Religious Experience]]> 28820
When William James went to the University of Edinburgh in 1901 to deliver a series of lectures on "natural religion," he defined religion as "the feelings, acts, and experiences of individual men in their solitude, so far as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they may consider the divine." Considering religion, then, not as it is defined by--or takes place in--the churches, but as it is felt in everyday life, he undertook a project that, upon completion, stands not only as one of the most important texts on psychology ever written, not only as a vitally serious contemplation of spirituality, but for many critics one of the best works of nonfiction written in the 20th century. Reading The Varieties of Religious Experience, it is easy to see why. Applying his analytic clarity to religious accounts from a variety of sources, James elaborates a pluralistic framework in which "the divine can mean no single quality, it must mean a group of qualities, by being champions of which in alternation, different men may all find worthy missions." It's an intellectual call for serious religious tolerance � indeed, respect � the vitality of which has not diminished through the subsequent decades.]]> 519 William James 1402199031 Kyle 0 to-read 3.99 1902 The Varieties of Religious Experience
author: William James
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average rating: 3.99
book published: 1902
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]]> <![CDATA[Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World]]> 337517 Totem and Taboo, the subtext Girard refutes with polemic daring, vast erudition, and a persuasiveness that leaves the reader compelled to respond, one way or another.

This is the single fullest summation of Girard's ideas to date, the book by which they will stand or fall. In a dialogue with two psychiatrists (Jean-Michel Oughourlian and Guy Lefort), Girard probes an encyclopedic array of topics, ranging across the entire spectrum of anthropology, psychoanalysis, and cultural production.

Girard's point o departure is what he calls 'mimesis,' the conflict that arises when human rivals compete to differentiate themselves from each other, yet succeed only in becoming more and more alike. At certain points in the life of a society, according to Girard, this mimetic conflict erupts into a crisis in which all difference dissolves in indiscriminate violence. In primitive societies, such crises were resolved by the 'scapegoating mechanism,' in which the community, en masse, turned on an unpremeditated victim. The repression of this collective murder and its repetition in ritual sacrifice then formed the foundations of both religion and the restored social order.

How does Christianity, at once the most 'sacrificial' of religions and a faith with a non-violent ideology, fit into this scheme? Girard grants Freud's point, in Totem and Taboo, that Christianity is similar to primitive religion, but only to refute Freud—if Christ is sacrificed, Girard argues, it is not because God willed it, but because human beings wanted it.

The book is not merely, or perhaps not mainly, biblical exegesis, for within its scope fall some of the most vexing problems of social history—the paradox that violence has social efficacy, the function of the scapegoat, the mechanism of anti-semitism.]]> 470 René Girard 0804722153 Kyle 0 to-read 4.26 1978 Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World
author: René Girard
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.26
book published: 1978
rating: 0
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]]> Infidel 81227
Infidel shows the coming of age of this distinguished political superstar and champion of free speech as well as the development of her beliefs, iron will, and extraordinary determination to fight injustice. Raised in a strict Muslim family, Hirsi Ali survived civil war, female mutilation, brutal beatings, adolescence as a devout believer during the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood, and life in four troubled, unstable countries ruled largely by despots. She escaped from a forced marriage and sought asylum in the Netherlands, where she earned a college degree in political science, tried to help her tragically depressed sister adjust to the West, and fought for the rights of Muslim women and the reform of Islam as a member of Parliament. Under constant threat, demonized by reactionary Islamists and politicians, disowned by her father, and expelled from family and clan, she refuses to be silenced.

Ultimately a celebration of triumph over adversity, Hirsi Ali’s story tells how a bright little girl evolves out of dutiful obedience to become an outspoken, pioneering freedom fighter. As Western governments struggle to balance democratic ideals with religious pressures, no other book could be more timely or more significant.]]> 353 Ayaan Hirsi Ali 0743289684 Kyle 0 to-read 4.17 2006 Infidel
author: Ayaan Hirsi Ali
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2006
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]]> Brave New World 5129 Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold an authoritarian ruling order–all at the cost of our freedom, full humanity, and perhaps also our souls. “A genius [who] who spent his life decrying the onward march of the Machine� (The New Yorker), Huxley was a man of incomparable talents: equally an artist, a spiritual seeker, and one of history’s keenest observers of human nature and civilization. Brave New World, his masterpiece, has enthralled and terrified millions of readers, and retains its urgent relevance to this day as both a warning to be heeded as we head into tomorrow and as thought-provoking, satisfying work of literature. Written in the shadow of the rise of fascism during the 1930s, Brave New Worldd likewise speaks to a 21st-century world dominated by mass-entertainment, technology, medicine and pharmaceuticals, the arts of persuasion, and the hidden influence of elites.

"Aldous Huxley is the greatest 20th century writer in English." —Chicago Tribune]]> 268 Aldous Huxley 0060929871 Kyle 0 to-read 3.99 1932 Brave New World
author: Aldous Huxley
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1932
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]]> <![CDATA[Van Gogh's Letters: The Mind of the Artist in Paintings, Drawings, and Words, 1875-1890]]> 10083004 Now in paperback, this beautiful and important collection of more than 150 of Van Gogh's letters paired with more than 250 works of artĚý

Vincent Van Gogh wrote hundreds of letters to his brother Theo as well as to family members and fellow artists including Paul Gauguin and Emile Bernard. In many of them he described, in painstaking detail and beautiful prose, the progress of his work. Van Gogh's Letters presents more than 150 of these stirring letters, excerpted and newly translated, and set side-by-side with the art it describes, including sketches, drawings, and paintings. The result is an elegantly rendered collection that allows us to see the world through the eyes of one of the greatest artists of all time.

Previously published in hardcover as Vincent van Gogh: A Self-Portrait in Art and Letters
]]> 320 Vincent van Gogh 1579128599 Kyle 4 4.55 2006 Van Gogh's Letters: The Mind of the Artist in Paintings, Drawings, and Words, 1875-1890
author: Vincent van Gogh
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.55
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at: 2019/11/17
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]]> Satyrica 40734197 Satyrica 0 Petronius 0460877666 Kyle 4 3.62 60 Satyrica
author: Petronius
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.62
book published: 60
rating: 4
read at: 2018/12/28
date added: 2019/11/13
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]]> <![CDATA[The Poet's Guide to Life: The Wisdom of Rilke]]> 49459 –RAINER MARIA RILKE

In this treasury of uncommon wisdom and spiritual insight, the best writings and personal philosophies of one of the twentieth century’s greatest poets, Rainer Maria Rilke, are gleaned by Ulrich Baer from thousands of pages of never-before translated correspondence.

The result is a profound vision of how the human drive to create and understand can guide us in every facet of life. Arranged by theme–from everyday existence with others to the exhilarations of love and the experience of loss, from dealing with adversity to the nature of inspiration, here are Rilke’s thoughts on how to live life in a meaningful

Life and “How good life is. How fair, how incorruptible, how impossible to not even by strength, not even by willpower, and not even by courage. How everything remains what it is and has only this to come true, or to exaggerate and push too far.�

“The work of art is adjustment, balance, reassurance. It can be neither gloomy nor full of rosy hopes, for its essence consists of justice.�

“I personally feel a greater affinity to all those religions in which the middleman is less essential or almost entirely suppressed.�

“To be loved means to be ablaze. To love to shine with inexhaustible oil. To be loved is to pass away; to love is to last.�

Intimate, stylistically masterful, brilliantly translated, and brimming with the wonder and passion of Rilke, The Poet’s Guide to Life is comparable to the best works of wisdom in all of literature and a perfect book for all occasions.]]> 215 Rainer Maria Rilke 0679642927 Kyle 5 4.12 2005 The Poet's Guide to Life: The Wisdom of Rilke
author: Rainer Maria Rilke
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge]]> 865516 Medical Tribune said might herald "a Copernican revolution for the life sciences," leads the reader through unexplored jungles and uncharted aspects of mind to the heart of knowledge.In a first-person narrative of scientific discovery that opens new perspectives on biology, anthropology, and the limits of rationalism, The Cosmic Serpent reveals how startlingly different the world around us appears when we open our minds to it.]]> 257 Jeremy Narby 0874779642 Kyle 4 4.18 1998 The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge
author: Jeremy Narby
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1998
rating: 4
read at: 2019/11/06
date added: 2019/11/06
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]]> <![CDATA[Sex at Dawn: The Prehistoric Origins of Modern Sexuality]]> 7640261
How can reality be reconciled with the accepted narrative? It can't be, according to renegade thinkers Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jethá. While debunking almost everything we "know" about sex, they offer a bold alternative explanation in this provocative and brilliant book.

Ryan and Jethá's central contention is that human beings evolved in egalitarian groups that shared food, child care, and, often, sexual partners. Weaving together convergent, frequently overlooked evidence from anthropology, archaeology, primatology, anatomy, and psychosexuality, the authors show how far from human nature monogamy really is. Human beings everywhere and in every era have confronted the same familiar, intimate situations in surprisingly different ways. The authors expose the ancient roots of human sexuality while pointing toward a more optimistic future illuminated by our innate capacities for love, cooperation, and generosity.

With intelligence, humor, and wonder, Ryan and Jethá show how our promiscuous past haunts our struggles over monogamy, sexual orientation, and family dynamics. They explore why long-term fidelity can be so difficult for so many; why sexual passion tends to fade even as love deepens; why many middle-aged men risk everything for transient affairs with younger women; why homosexuality persists in the face of standard evolutionary logic; and what the human body reveals about the prehistoric origins of modern sexuality.

In the tradition of the best historical and scientific writing, Sex at Dawn unapologetically upends unwarranted assumptions and unfounded conclusions while offering a revolutionary understanding of why we live and love as we do.]]> 416 Christopher Ryan Kyle 0 to-read 3.95 2010 Sex at Dawn: The Prehistoric Origins of Modern Sexuality
author: Christopher Ryan
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2010
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]]> Beautiful Losers 102908
First published in 1966, Beautiful Losers demonstrates that its author is not only a superb songwriter but also a novelist of visionary power. Funny, harrowing, and fiercely moving, it is a classic erotic tragedy, incandescent in its prose and exhilarating for its risky union of sexuality and faith.]]> 243 Leonard Cohen 0679748253 Kyle 0 to-read 3.62 1966 Beautiful Losers
author: Leonard Cohen
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.62
book published: 1966
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business]]> 74034 184 Neil Postman 014303653X Kyle 4 4.16 1985 Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
author: Neil Postman
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1985
rating: 4
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date added: 2019/10/19
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]]> <![CDATA[King, Warrior, Magician, Lover: Rediscovering Masculinity Through the Lens of Archetypal Psychology - A Journey into the Male Psyche and Its Four Essential Aspects]]> 91781 Moore and Gillette identify four archetypes of masculine energies from myth and literature: the Lover, brimming with vitality and sensitivity; the Magician, guider of the processes of inner and outer transformation; the selfless and wise King identified with Adam or primordial man; and the Warrior, whose energies often go awry in destructive activity. Dream analysis, meditation, Jungian "active imagination" and ritual processes are among the tools set forth in a clear, concise map to territories of masculine selfhood.]]> 180 Robert L. Moore 0062506064 Kyle 0 to-read 4.12 1990 King, Warrior, Magician, Lover: Rediscovering Masculinity Through the Lens of Archetypal Psychology - A Journey into the Male Psyche and Its Four Essential Aspects
author: Robert L. Moore
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1990
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/14
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]]> American Psycho 28676 American Psycho is a bleak, bitter, black comedy about a world we all recognize but do not wish to confront.]]> 399 Bret Easton Ellis 0679735771 Kyle 0 to-read 3.82 1991 American Psycho
author: Bret Easton Ellis
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.82
book published: 1991
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/10
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Gedichte (Kommentierte Gold Collection) (German Edition)]]> 8478865 Further solidifying Hölderlin’s place in history, this thorough collection of poetry ranges from the odes of his developmental period to the majestic hymns and strangely prophetic modern compositions created in his later years. Considered one of the founders of European romanticism, Hölderlin had a mere 10 years to develop his distinctive style before falling prey to a debilitating mental illness, whose resultant works are the heartbreakingly sweet and melancholy pieces of the Späteste Gedichte (Last Poems). Each poem is presented in both its original German and a new English translation, while an illuminating introduction explores Hölderlin’s significance in the realm ofĚýliteratureĚýas well as the tumultuous world in which he lived.

]]> 468 Friedrich Hölderlin Kyle 0 to-read 3.40 1826 Gedichte (Kommentierte Gold Collection) (German Edition)
author: Friedrich Hölderlin
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.40
book published: 1826
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> Liber Kaos 420571 224 Peter J. Carroll 0877287422 Kyle 0 to-read 4.01 1992 Liber Kaos
author: Peter J. Carroll
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1992
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[No Boundary: Eastern and Western Approaches to Personal Growth]]> 449818 149 Ken Wilber 1570627436 Kyle 0 to-read 4.29 1979 No Boundary: Eastern and Western Approaches to Personal Growth
author: Ken Wilber
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1979
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> Dune (Dune, #1) 44767458
When House Atreides is betrayed, the destruction of Paul’s family will set the boy on a journey toward a destiny greater than he could ever have imagined. And as he evolves into the mysterious man known as Muad’Dib, he will bring to fruition humankind’s most ancient and unattainable dream.]]> 658 Frank Herbert 059309932X Kyle 0 to-read 4.33 1965 Dune (Dune, #1)
author: Frank Herbert
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.33
book published: 1965
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hobbit, or There and Back Again]]> 3484996
This stirring adventure fantasy begins the tale of the hobbits that was continued by J.R.R. Tolkien in his bestselling epic The Lord of the Rings.]]> 80 J.R.R. Tolkien Kyle 0 to-read 4.35 1937 The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.35
book published: 1937
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> The Ghost in the Machine 30677 400 Arthur Koestler 0140191925 Kyle 0 to-read 4.03 1967 The Ghost in the Machine
author: Arthur Koestler
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1967
rating: 0
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shelves: to-read
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]]> The Selfish Gene 61535
Chapters:
1. Why are people?
2. The replicators
3. Immortal coils
4. The gene machine
5. Aggression stability and the selfish machine
6. Genesmanship
7. Family planning
8. Battle of the generations
9. Battle of the sexes
10. You scratch my back, I'll ride on yours
11. Memes: the new replicators
12. Nice guys finish first
13. The long reach of the gene]]> 360 Richard Dawkins 0199291152 Kyle 0 to-read 4.15 1976 The Selfish Gene
author: Richard Dawkins
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1976
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> Guns, Germs, and Steel 8117484 140 Frederic P. Miller 6130738285 Kyle 0 to-read 4.10 2010 Guns, Germs, and Steel
author: Frederic P. Miller
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values (Phaedrus, #1)]]> 629 Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is an examination of how we live, a meditation on how to live better set around the narration of a summer motorcycle trip across America's Northwest, undertaken by a father & his young son.]]> 540 Robert M. Pirsig 0060589469 Kyle 0 to-read 3.78 1974 Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values (Phaedrus, #1)
author: Robert M. Pirsig
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1974
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Animals and Psychedelics: The Natural World and the Instinct to Alter Consciousness]]> 428184
� Offers a completely new understanding of the role psychedelics play in the development of consciousness in all species.

� Reveals drug use to be a natural instinct.

From caffeine-dependent goats to nectar addicted ants, the animal kingdom offers amazing examples of wild animals and insects seeking out and consuming the psychoactive substances in their environments. Author Giorgio Samorini explores this little-known phenomenon and suggests that, far from being confined to humans, the desire to experience altered states of consciousness is a natural drive shared by all living beings and that animals engage in these behaviors deliberately. Rejecting the Western cultural assumption that using drugs is a negative action or the result of an illness, Samorini opens our eyes to the possibility that beings who consume psychedelics--whether humans or animals--contribute to the evolution of their species by creating entirely new patterns of behavior that eventually will be adopted by other members of that species. The author's fascinating accounts of mushroom-loving reindeer, intoxicated birds, and drunken elephants ensure that readers will never view the animal world in quite the same way again.]]> 112 Giorgio Samorini 0892819863 Kyle 0 to-read 3.83 2000 Animals and Psychedelics: The Natural World and the Instinct to Alter Consciousness
author: Giorgio Samorini
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/09/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Fruit, the Tree, and the Serpent: Why We See So Well]]> 6451309 224 Lynne A. Isbell 0674033019 Kyle 4 3.75 2009 The Fruit, the Tree, and the Serpent: Why We See So Well
author: Lynne A. Isbell
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at: 2019/09/22
date added: 2019/09/22
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]]> <![CDATA[So You Want to Be an Interpreter: An Introduction to Sign Language Interpreting]]> 243222 423 Janice H. Humphrey 0964036770 Kyle 0 3.98 1995 So You Want to Be an Interpreter: An Introduction to Sign Language Interpreting
author: Janice H. Humphrey
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1995
rating: 0
read at: 2019/07/07
date added: 2019/07/07
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion]]> 22080127 From the "The reader will very soon realize that sacred & profane are two modes of being in the world, two existential situations assumed by man in the course of his history. Our primary concern is to present the specific dimensions of religious experience, to bring out the differences between it & profane experience of the world...may serve as a general introduction to the history of religions."]]> 256 Mircea Eliade Kyle 5 4.08 1957 The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion
author: Mircea Eliade
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1957
rating: 5
read at: 2019/06/23
date added: 2019/06/23
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Virgil Finlay's Women of the Ages]]> 648090 147 Virgil Finlay 088733136X Kyle 5 4.58 Virgil Finlay's Women of the Ages
author: Virgil Finlay
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.58
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2019/01/01
date added: 2019/06/02
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II]]> 95784
This book tells the story from three perspectives: of the Japanese soldiers who performed it, of the Chinese civilians who endured it, and of a group of Europeans and Americans who refused to abandon the city and were able to create a safety zone that saved many.]]> 290 Iris Chang 0140277447 Kyle 4 4.23 1997 The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II
author: Iris Chang
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1997
rating: 4
read at: 2019/05/19
date added: 2019/05/22
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]]> The Denial of Death 2761 The Denial of Death is Ernest Becker's brilliant and impassioned answer to the "why" of human existence. In bold contrast to the predominant Freudian school of thought, Becker tackles the problem of the vital lie -- man's refusal to acknowledge his own mortality. In doing so, he sheds new light on the nature of humanity and issues a call to life and its living that still resonates more than twenty years after its writing.]]> 336 Ernest Becker Kyle 4 4.07 1973 The Denial of Death
author: Ernest Becker
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1973
rating: 4
read at: 2019/05/08
date added: 2019/05/08
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]]> Man's Search for Meaning 4069 Man's Search for Meaning has become one of the most influential books in America; it continues to inspire us all to find significance in the very act of living.]]> 165 Viktor E. Frankl 080701429X Kyle 5 4.38 1946 Man's Search for Meaning
author: Viktor E. Frankl
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.38
book published: 1946
rating: 5
read at: 2019/03/16
date added: 2019/03/16
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[The Great Mother: An Analysis of the Archetype]]> 10783780
Through a wealth of descriptive passages and reproductions of artistic works ranging from Paleolithic stone carvings to the sculptures of Epstein and Moore, Neumann shows how the feminine has been represented: as goddess, monster, gate, pillar, tree, moon, sun, vessel, and every animal from snake to bird. In studying this array of both static and transformative images, Neumann discerns a universal experience of the Maternal as a dual source of life support and fear: an experience rooted in the dialectical relation of growing consciousness, symbolized by the child, to the unconscious and the unknown, symbolized by The Great Mother.]]> 616 Erich Neumann 0415136733 Kyle 4 3.80 1955 The Great Mother: An Analysis of the Archetype
author: Erich Neumann
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.80
book published: 1955
rating: 4
read at: 2019/02/22
date added: 2019/02/22
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Finding Zoe: A Deaf Woman's Journey of Love, Identity, and Adoption]]> 20702909
Despite being head over heels for her boys, Brandi kept dreaming that she’d have a daughter someday. She didn’t know when or how, but she knew a little girl was out there waiting for her.

When Zoe was born to Jess, a high school student who knew she couldn’t raise a baby on her own, Jess did her best to find the ideal couple to raise her little girl. But when the adoptive family discovered Zoe’s increasing hearing loss, they made the agonizing decision to let her go.

Set against the backdrop of Deaf America, Finding Zoe is story about a remarkable family and gives us a poignant insight into their culture and its history. It’s a story about doing what is right and watching how the pieces can just fall into place, as it did when Zoe found her true family.]]> 288 Brandi Rarus 1940363225 Kyle 4 3.78 2014 Finding Zoe: A Deaf Woman's Journey of Love, Identity, and Adoption
author: Brandi Rarus
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2019/02/20
date added: 2019/02/20
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]]> <![CDATA[Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human]]> 11148989 The Descent of Man, the existence of humans has been attributed to our intelligence and adaptability. But in Catching Fire, renowned primatologist Richard Wrangham presents a startling alternative: our evolutionary success is the result of cooking. In a groundbreaking theory of our origins, Wrangham shows that the shift from raw to cooked foods was the key factor in human evolution. when our ancestors adapted to using fire, humanity began.

Once our hominid ancestors began cooking their food, the human digestive tract shrank and the brain grew. Time once spent chewing tough raw food could be used instead to hunt and to tend camp. Cooking became the basis for pair bonding and marriage, created the household, and even led to a sexual division of labor.

Tracing the contemporary implications of our ancestors' diets, Catching Fire sheds new light on how we came to be the social, intelligent, and sexual species we are today. A pathbreaking new theory of human evolution, Catching Fire will provoke controversy and fascinate anyone interested in our ancient origins--or in our modern eating habits.

--from the dustjacket]]> 309 Richard W. Wrangham Kyle 4 3.87 2009 Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human
author: Richard W. Wrangham
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at: 2019/02/09
date added: 2019/02/09
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]]> <![CDATA[Unit 731 Testimony: Japan's Wartime Human Experimentation Program (Tuttle Classics)]]> 1616552 This is a riveting and disturbing account of the medical atrocities performed in and around Japan during WWII.

Some of the cruelest deeds of Japan's war in Asia did not occur on the battlefield, but in quiet, antiseptic medical wards in obscure parts of the continent. Far from front lines and prying eyes, Japanese doctors and their assistants subjected human guinea pigs to gruesome medical experiments.

In the first part of Unit 731: Testimony author Hal Gold draws upon a painstakingly accumulated reservoir of sources to construct a portrait of the Imperial Japanese Army's most notorious medical unit, giving an overview of its history and detailing its most shocking activities. The second half of the book consists almost entirely of the worlds of former unit members themselves, taken from remarks they made at a traveling Unit 731 exhibition held around Japan in 1994�95. These people recount their vivid first–hand memories of what it was like to cut open pregnant women as they lay awake on the vivisection table, inject plague germs into healthy farmers, and carry buckets of fresh blood and organs through corridors to their appropriate destinations.

Unit 731: Testimony represents an essential addition to the growing body of literature on the still unfolding story of one of the most infamous "military" outfits in modern history. By showing how the ethics of normal men and women, and even an entire profession, can be warped by the fire of war, this important book offers a window on a time of human madness, in the hope that such days will never come again.]]> 256 Hal Gold 0804835659 Kyle 4 3.74 1996 Unit 731 Testimony: Japan's Wartime Human Experimentation Program (Tuttle Classics)
author: Hal Gold
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.74
book published: 1996
rating: 4
read at: 2019/02/09
date added: 2019/02/09
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]]> <![CDATA[A Basic Course in American Sign Language]]> 1512809


It is the perfect written complement to the award-winning CD-ROM, Sign Langauge for Everyone. The lessons include:

Pronouns Adjectives Negatives Yes/No Questions and their responses Negative Questions Past, Present and Future Tense Directional and Non-Directional Verbs Using Numbers Use of "This"/"That" Quantifiers Time Measurements Conditional Sentences Motion, Shape and Detail ]]> 288 Terrence J. O'Rourke 0932666248 Kyle 4 4.22 1980 A Basic Course in American Sign Language
author: Terrence J. O'Rourke
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1980
rating: 4
read at: 2019/01/01
date added: 2019/01/06
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[The Gulag Archipelago 1918�1956 (Abridged)]]> 70561 The Gulag Archipelago 1918�1956—a grisly indictment of a regime, fashioned here into a veritable literary miracle—has now been updated with a new introduction that includes the fall of the Soviet Union and Solzhenitsyn's move back to Russia.]]> 512 Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 0060007761 Kyle 4
One thing I will say is that without a lot of background knowledge of Soviet history this might be a difficult read - I had to do a lot of online consulting, which helped a lot. There's a lot of references to people, places, and events that you might know very little about unless you're familiar with the topic. ]]> 4.31 1973 The Gulag Archipelago 1918–1956 (Abridged)
author: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.31
book published: 1973
rating: 4
read at: 2018/09/07
date added: 2019/01/05
shelves:
review:
A lot of people review this book and say: "It really put things in perspective for me, looking at my own life" - I feel the same way. Solzhenitsyn is such a good writer and uses the aesthetic environment of the Archipelago to describe his experiences of hunger and exhaustion, the ruthlessness of the guards and interrogators, the camaraderie he felt with his fellow "zeks", and of the general feeling of slavery, suffering, and the spiritual redemption that he experienced as a result of spending 8 years in camp.

One thing I will say is that without a lot of background knowledge of Soviet history this might be a difficult read - I had to do a lot of online consulting, which helped a lot. There's a lot of references to people, places, and events that you might know very little about unless you're familiar with the topic.
]]> <![CDATA[The Time of the Assassins: A Study of Rimbaud]]> 254 163 Henry Miller 0811201155 Kyle 5 3.99 1946 The Time of the Assassins: A Study of Rimbaud
author: Henry Miller
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1946
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/01/05
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]]> <![CDATA[The Adding Machine: Selected Essays]]> 81601 205 William S. Burroughs 1559702109 Kyle 5
]]> 4.10 1985 The Adding Machine: Selected Essays
author: William S. Burroughs
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1985
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/01/05
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William Burroughs always has such an interesting perspective on everything. I find his approach to writing, reading, language, anthropology, and science very appealing, because it has less to do with any sort of objective truth and more to do with presenting things in a way that simply makes you see it differently; and this new way of seeing it being a form of truth. He kind of proves that there really is no such thing as an "objective truth" because the world is still always seen through our own blind eyes. He says language is a virus, almost discrediting any practical use language may have, so his own use of language often becomes satirical. He outlines his 'cut up' process which I myself have used in some of my own writing, and speaks about many occult subjects such as precognition, voice phenomena on electronic devices, and magick. I have an interest in the occult but rarely can I find an author who can so eloquently outline the purpose of occult studies and the benefit that these taboo subjects may have on our education.


]]> <![CDATA[50 Jobs in 50 States: One Man's Journey of Discovery Across America (BK Life (Paperback))]]> 10066123 274 Daniel Seddiqui 1605098256 Kyle 4 3.45 2011 50 Jobs in 50 States: One Man's Journey of Discovery Across America (BK Life (Paperback))
author: Daniel Seddiqui
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2019/01/05
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Liber Null and Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic]]> 249715 224 Peter J. Carroll 0877286396 Kyle 5 3.97 1987 Liber Null and Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic
author: Peter J. Carroll
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1987
rating: 5
read at: 2017/02/12
date added: 2019/01/05
shelves:
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I thought this was a great book. I read a lot of reviews on here from people who probably know more about this kind of stuff than I do - saying that it's more geared towards beginners and that it doesn't explain certain things in-depth enough. I was absorbed in every page and this entire book seemed to be what I had always been searching for - ideas that I had always been flirting with. It validated a lot of things for me. But this is coming from someone pretty new to occult studies in the first place.
]]> <![CDATA[Psychocybernetic Principles for Creative Living]]> 614069 This book is incredible... 0 Maxwell Maltz 0671476203 Kyle 5 4.23 1979 Psychocybernetic Principles for Creative Living
author: Maxwell Maltz
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1979
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/01/05
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Hypnotic Writing: How to Seduce and Persuade Customers with Only Your Words]]> 53348
"The principles of hypnosis, when applied to copywriting, add a new spin to selling. Joe Vitale has taken hypnotic words to set the perfect sales environment and then shows us how to use those words to motivate a prospect to take the action you want. This is truly a new and effective approach to copywriting, which I strongly recommend you learn. It's pure genius."
-Joseph Sugarman, author of Triggers

"I've read countless book on persuasion, but none come close to this one in showing you exactly how to put your readers into a buying trance that makes whatever you are offering them irresistible."
-David Garfinkel, author of Advertising Headlines That Make You Rich

"I am a huge fan of Vitale and his books, and Hypnotic Writing (first published more than twenty years ago), is my absolute favorite. Updated with additional text and fresh examples, especially from e-mail writing, Joe's specialty, Hypnotic Writing is the most important book on copywriting (yes, that's really what it is about) to be published in this century. Read it. It will make you a better copywriter, period."
-Bob Bly, copywriter and author of The Copywriter's Handbook

"I couldn't put this book down. It's eye opening and filled with genuinely new stuff about writing and persuading better. And it communicates it brilliantly and teaches it brilliantly-exemplifying the techniques by the writing of the book itself as you go along."
-David Deutsch, author of Think Inside the Box,

"Hypnotic Writing is packed with so much great information it's hard to know where to start. The insights, strategies, and tactics in the book are easy to apply yet deliver one heck of a punch. And in case there's any question how to apply them, the before-and-after case studies drive the points home like nothing else can. Hypnotic Writing is not just about hypnotic writing. It is hypnotic writing. On the count of three, you're going to love it. Just watch and see."
-Blair Warren, author of The Forbidden Keys to Persuasion]]> 288 Joe Vitale 0470009799 Kyle 2 3.86 Hypnotic Writing: How to Seduce and Persuade Customers with Only Your Words
author: Joe Vitale
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.86
book published:
rating: 2
read at: 2017/08/23
date added: 2018/12/20
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]]> Panzram: A Journal of Murder 8578795
Carl Panzram, who called himself the "world's worst murderer," wrote these words in a full autobiography and confession he prepared for the one friend in his life-a young prison guard named Henry Lesser. PANZRAM: A JOURNAL OF MURDER, combines these brutally forthright memoirs with the commentary of authors Gaddis and Long, into a compelling chronicle of the forces that engender hate. The authors provide a historical and sociological framework for Panzram's own words, using this uniquely detailed self-analysis by a mass murderer to depict what happens when an intelligent and unbreakable personality that has been interminably and unmercifully abused strikes back in vengeance.

PANZRAM arrives as a gripping warning from America's recent past to our newly repressive era of prison-industrial complex, death penalty abuse, and unprecedentedly high rates of incarceration from a man who walked the halls of Death Row with a blindingly clear vision.

Introduction by Harold Schechter, author of Deranged and Deviant.

(ISBN 1-878923-14-5)
(ISBN 13: 9781878923141)

NOTE: There are 2 different versions of this book with the same ISBN numbers. Different cover and amount of pages.]]> 295 Thomas E. Gaddis Kyle 3 4.18 1970 Panzram: A Journal of Murder
author: Thomas E. Gaddis
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1970
rating: 3
read at: 2018/12/20
date added: 2018/12/20
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]]> <![CDATA[Illuminatiam: The First Testament Of The Illuminati]]> 24311656
Now is the time to prepare. Open your mind to learn of the power that gives authority to kings and queens but lives hidden inside every human. The Illuminati's first testament is your life's guide to all that is ahead:

- Revelations about the Illuminati's role in history
- Decades-old secrets of wealth and prosperity
- How to join the Illuminati in the coming age
- Your true purpose in this world.

Fear not for the bursting sounds that echo across your red horizons. We are always watching out for you.]]> 200 Illuminatiam 0692351310 Kyle 3 4.22 2014 Illuminatiam: The First Testament Of The Illuminati
author: Illuminatiam
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2018/12/15
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[The Full Facts Book of Cold Reading: A Comprehensive Guide to the Most Persuasive Psychological Manipulation Technique in the World]]> 3327264 237 Ian Rowland 0955847605 Kyle 4 4.02 1998 The Full Facts Book of Cold Reading: A Comprehensive Guide to the Most Persuasive Psychological Manipulation Technique in the World
author: Ian Rowland
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1998
rating: 4
read at: 2016/11/19
date added: 2018/12/15
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]]> <![CDATA[The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists]]> 900 not fiction. These men really exist. They live together in houses known as Projects. And Neil Strauss, the bestselling author, spent two years living among them, using the pseudonym Style to protect his real-life identity. The result is one of the most explosive and controversial books of the year—guaranteed to change the lives of men and transform the way women understand the opposite sex forever.

On his journey from AFC (average frustrated chump) to PUA (pick-up artist) to PUG (pick-up guru), Strauss not only shares scores of original seduction techniques but also has unforgettable encounters with the likes of Tom Cruise, Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, Heidi Fleiss, and Courtney Love. And then things really start to get strange—and passions lead to betrayals lead to violence. The Game is the story of one man's transformation from frog to prince—to prisoner in the most unforgettable book of the year.]]> 452 Neil Strauss 0060554738 Kyle 3 3.74 2005 The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists
author: Neil Strauss
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2005
rating: 3
read at: 2016/11/20
date added: 2018/12/15
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland]]> 647492
Ordinary Men is the true story of Reserve Police Battalion 101 of the German Order Police, which was responsible for mass shootings as well as round-ups of Jewish people for deportation to Nazi death camps in Poland in 1942. Browning argues that most of the men of RPB 101 were not fanaticalĚýNazis but, rather, ordinary middle-aged, working-class men who committed these atrocities out of a mixture of motives, including the group dynamics of conformity, deference to authority, role adaptation, and the altering of moral norms to justify their actions. Very quickly three groups emerged within the battalion: a core of eager killers, a plurality who carried out their duties reliably but without initiative, and a small minority who evaded participation in the acts of killing without diminishing the murderous efficiency of the battalion whatsoever.

While this book discusses a specific Reserve Unit during WWII, the general argument Browning makes is that most people succumb to the pressures of a group setting and commit actions they would never do of their own volition. Ěý

Ordinary Men is a powerful, chilling, and important work, with themes and arguments that continue to resonate today. Ěý]]> 271 Christopher R. Browning 0060995068 Kyle 4 4.10 1992 Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland
author: Christopher R. Browning
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1992
rating: 4
read at: 2018/11/29
date added: 2018/11/29
shelves:
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]]> Deaf Again 427644
Join Mark Drolsbaugh in his fascinating journey from hearing toddler� to hard of hearing child� to deaf adolescent� and ultimately, to culturally Deaf adult. The struggle to find one’s place in the deaf community is challenging, as Drolsbaugh finds, yet there is one interesting twist: both his parents are also deaf. Even though the deaf community has always been there for him, right under his nose, Drolsbaugh takes the unbeaten path and goes on a zany, lifelong search� to become Deaf Again.

“This is an excellent and highly readable autobiography that will soon find a place in the classics of deaf writing.�

� The Forest Bookshop
Gloucestershire, England


“A book that’s hard to put down� easy to read and
łó±đ˛ą°ůłŮ·É˛ą°ůłľľ±˛Ô˛µ.â€�

� Dr. Harry Blackmore
Center for Auslan and Deaf Studies
Perth, Western Australia


“This book is a MUST read for any hearing parent
whose child has been identified with a hearing loss.�

� MaryAnne Kowalczyk, President
The Communication Connection
Manahawkin, New Jersey


“A terrible thing happened to this book � it ended!�

� Callie Cesarini
Ontario, Canada]]> 203 Mark Drolsbaugh 0965746003 Kyle 4 3.81 1997 Deaf Again
author: Mark Drolsbaugh
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1997
rating: 4
read at: 2018/11/24
date added: 2018/11/24
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]]> <![CDATA[The Origins and History of Consciousness (Princeton Classics)]]> 21981694 The Origins and History of Consciousness draws on a full range of world mythology to show how individual consciousness undergoes the same archetypal stages of development as human consciousness as a whole. Erich Neumann was one of C. G. Jung's most creative students and a renowned practitioner of analytical psychology in his own right. In this influential book, Neumann shows how the stages begin and end with the symbol of the Uroboros, the tail-eating serpent. The intermediate stages are projected in the universal myths of the World Creation, Great Mother, Separation of the World Parents, Birth of the Hero, Slaying of the Dragon, Rescue of the Captive, and Transformation and Deification of the Hero. Throughout the sequence, the Hero is the evolving ego consciousness.

Featuring a foreword by Jung, this Princeton Classics edition introduces a new generation of readers to this eloquent and enduring work.]]> 552 Erich Neumann 0691163596 Kyle 5 4.34 1949 The Origins and History of Consciousness (Princeton Classics)
author: Erich Neumann
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.34
book published: 1949
rating: 5
read at: 2018/10/18
date added: 2018/10/18
shelves:
review:
Good introduction to archetypal thinking and Jungian psychology. I tried to read a few books by Jung before but was unable to understand the ideas. Neumann walks you through the archetypal stages and the process of individuation and gives a good overview of mythological thinking and action by giving examples from primitive to modern culture.
]]> The Sheltering Sky 243598 The Sheltering Sky is at once merciless and heartbreaking in its compassion. It etches the limits of human reason and intelligence—perhaps even the limits of human life—when they touch the unfathomable emptiness and impassive cruelty of the desert.]]> 342 Paul Bowles 0141023422 Kyle 4 3.92 1949 The Sheltering Sky
author: Paul Bowles
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1949
rating: 4
read at: 2017/12/02
date added: 2017/12/02
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]]> Ogilvy on Advertising 641601
Told with brutal candor and prodigal generosity, David Ogilvy

•ĚýHow to get a job in advertising
•ĚýHow to choose an agency for your product
•ĚýThe secrets behind advertising that works
•ĚýHow to write successful copy—and get people to read it
•ĚýEighteen miracles of research
•ĚýWhat advertising can do for charities

And much, much more.]]> 224 David Ogilvy 039472903X Kyle 4 4.14 1983 Ogilvy on Advertising
author: David Ogilvy
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1983
rating: 4
read at: 2017/09/01
date added: 2017/09/01
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]]> <![CDATA[On Wine and Hashish (Hesperus Classics)]]> 24605 88 Charles Baudelaire 1843910179 Kyle 4 3.97 1851 On Wine and Hashish (Hesperus Classics)
author: Charles Baudelaire
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1851
rating: 4
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date added: 2017/08/05
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]]> <![CDATA[The Celery Stalks at Midnight (Bunnicula, #3)]]> 183436
Bunnicula is missing! Chester is convinced all the world's vegetables are in danger of being drained of their life juices and turned into zombies. Soon he has Harold and Howie running around sticking toothpicks through hearts of lettuce and any other veggie in sight. Of course, Chester has been known to be wrong before...but you can never be too careful when there's a vampire bunny at large!]]> 144 James Howe 1416928146 Kyle 4 3.93 1983 The Celery Stalks at Midnight (Bunnicula, #3)
author: James Howe
name: Kyle
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1983
rating: 4
read at: 2017/07/28
date added: 2017/07/28
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]]> <![CDATA[Conversations with William S. Burroughs (Literary Conversations)]]> 1332656
When he died in 1997, Burroughs was likely one of the most widely recognizable figures in contemporary American literature. His image circulated on album jackets, in Nike commercials, and in films, as though proving his notion that pictures and words are viruses, invading any receptive host, taking hold, and replicating themselves.

Not surprisingly, the topics Burroughs touches upon are his relationships to the Beats, legends surrounding his personal life, drugs, gay liberation, collaboration, the cut-up technique, science fiction, politics, conspiracy theory, censorship, cats, guns, David Cronenberg's movie adaptation of Naked Lunch , shotgun art, dreams, and life in Lawrence, Kansas, where he spent his last years. From these interviews emerges a full, undiluted portrait of a writer who is difficult to capture in biography.

Speaking of the Paris Review interview Alfred Kazin calls Burroughs “an engineer of the pen, a calmly interested specialist of the new processes. When Burroughs makes philosophic and scientific claims for his disorderly collections of data, we happily recognize under the externally calm surface of the interview, the kind of inner frenzy that is his genius―and which, in all of us, his books make an appeal.� Kazin's view applies as well for the other interviews in this collection.]]> 234 Allen Hibbard 1578061830 Kyle 5 4.04 2000 Conversations with William S. Burroughs (Literary Conversations)
author: Allen Hibbard
name: Kyle
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2000
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2017/07/05
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