"In a world where mental health issues and loneliness are at an all-time high, it's more important than ever to find ways to cultivate joy, community, and meaning in our lives. Many of us feel trapped, struggling to find a way out of our own negative thoughts and emotions. Author and psychologist Richard Beck (Hunting Magic Eels) argues that we are struggling because our shape is 'curved inward.' We are self-focused, self-absorbed, ruminative. We're trapped inside ourselves. And we're not happy or filled with joy. So how do we control our egos and ambition when those drives have been useful to us in the past? How do we engage our imagination and our faith?
In The Shape of Joy, Beck offers a powerful argument for how we can break free and rediscover the transcendent and the sacred. Beck argues that to find true joy and fulfillment, we need to understand the importance of 'curving outward' and moving beyond the self to encounter true lovingness. Drawing from principles of positive psychology, Beck explores concepts like gratitude, mindfulness, ego volume, and the self to provide listeners with a road map toward a more fulfilling life. Whether you're struggling with mental health issues, yearning for a deeper connection with your faith, or simply seeking greater happiness and fulfillment, The Shape of Joy will offer you an inspiring vision for a better future."
"Trent Strong is back home in his northern Minnesota lake community after spending ten years working on a Chicago daily newspaper as an investigative journalist covering heinous crimes and traveling to war-torn countries. Sick of all the deaths, and content with returning to a slower pace, Trent buys the local weekly newspaper. But Trent is in town for only one week when an old friend asks him to investigate the Mammoth Paper Mill, which he suspects is polluting a small trout stream. Since the mill employs over half the town, the friend hasn't made many friends with his claim. The next day, a woman is found stabbed to death in town. Trent is compelled to investigate her death, as well as the paper mill. As Trent investigates, he runs across many people from his past. Some are potential suspects, and others make him question if his move back home was the right one. He starts a relationship with the motel manager, but even wonders if she is somehow involved with the murder. Trent must investigate around a small town sheriff and county attorney running for re-election, out-of-state thugs who want to shut him up, and an entire town that would like the whole thing to go away. What he finds will change his life forever . . ."
"In a world dominated by men, Marian McPartland distinguished herself as one of the greatest jazz pianists of her age.
Born in the UK as Margaret Marian Turner, Marian McPartland learned to play classical piano, but was passionately attracted to the rhythms of American jazz. Entertaining troops in WWII Europe, she met her future husband, Jimmy McPartland, a cocky young trumpet player who was the protege of the great Bix Beiderbecke. They were married and, together, they made jazz history. At first, Marian played second fiddle to Jimmy in Chicago, but when they moved to New York, Marian and her trio took up residence at the famous Hickory House where she thrilled the crowds from her perch on a stage in the middle of large oval bar. From there she went on to triumphs at places like the Montreaux Jazz Festival. Possibly, her greatest accomplishment was the creation of NPR's long-running show Piano Jazz.
More than the life story of one of our greatest artists, Shall We Play That One Together? by Paul de Barros chronicles an age when jazz was a vital art form. Just as inviting as Marian's signature question on Piano Jazz, Shall We Play That One Together? is an invitation to listeners everywhere to listen to the score of a bygone age."
"Why is it that in a world demanding constant connectedness, we somehow feel lonelier, more burned out, and more disengaged? Busy Idiots explores how and why we find ourselves constantly busy—but getting nothing done. This book will show you how to break free from unhealthy habits and focus on what counts. You'll discover strategies to help you manage technology, navigate daily demands, and collaborate more effectively. You'll learn how to boost efficiency, foster real connections, and cut through the noise. Busy Idiots is a roadmap for cultivating positive productivity, happiness, and growth.
● Understand how today's tech invades your brain and amplifies your busyness with insights from psychology and neuroscience
● Discover actionable tips and frameworks to help you take control of your time
● Learn how to build engagement and connections that not only foster high performance but boost your wellbeing
● Find your sweet spot when it comes to working from home, hybrid work, and teamwork
● Balance your career and your personal life with strategies to be more present at home and find joy
It's time to escape the busy trap. Busy Idiots will show you how."
"When Tony Caruso is hired to go undercover for the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, he has no idea that his life will change forever in the remote mountains of Oregon. He is tasked to track down an Asian ring of smugglers who are killing black bears for gallbladders and shooting elk and deer in velvet for their antlers. He narrowly escapes with his life, but follows the smugglers to Portland. Eventually, he ends up in the southern Cascades in the mushroom fields, where he must fight not only the Asian game smugglers, but Asian gangs from San Francisco and Seattle. As Tony tightens the noose around the smugglers, the case becomes personal. Now he must encounter these brutal killers in the remote forest, where his survival depends on his own military training and his favorite sidekick, Panzer, his giant schnauzer and former German military working dog."
"Herrmann 'Zeke' Walter's life is falling apart. His father has just died and he has lost his job hosting a hunting show called Zeke Hunts the Big Boys. When he finds a package of letters from his grandfather among his father's belongings, he embarks on a journey to discover his ancestry. What initially starts as a simple mid-life rediscovery, quickly turns into a Pandora's box of murder and secret societies. As Zeke begins to understand his own past, his very existence and the future of his family becomes tenuous. The Nature of Man is a psychological murder mystery that questions man's humanity and inhumanity."
"Still living out of the back of his Ford pickup truck in the Pacific Northwest, Tony Caruso is hired to find his old Navy buddy, missing for a week in the Puget Sound area of Washington. Tony is on the case for less than a day when someone blows up a forest service building, killing a man, and attracting the attention of FBI special agent Bob McCallum, Tony's old nemesis, who was now in charge of the Seattle office. Curious as usual, Tony goes to the fire site with his bomb-sniffing giant schnauzer, Panzer. McCallum suspects the Environmental Defense League, a radical group responsible for everything from setting fire to SUV lots to releasing animals from fur farms. But this is their first murder. When Tony suspects his Navy buddy might be involved, he is conflicted on how to proceed. As more EDL incidents occur across the Puget Sound, Tony has no choice but to ratchet up his investigation. And now his own life is in danger."
"Private Investigator Tony Caruso lives out of his rolling office, an old Ford pickup truck, with his German-trained bomb-sniffing dog, Panzer, a Giant Schnauzer. Tony retired after twenty years in the Navy as an aviation ordnanceman, but this training might not be enough when he is hired by an old friend to look into a murder suicide in Bend, Oregon, a resort Boom Town in the high desert east of the Cascades. Was it a murder suicide as the local sheriff thinks? Or has this idyllic community been ripped apart by not only murder but scandalous sexual deviance, lust, jealousy and the quest for the almighty dollar? Follow Tony as he wades through a cast of characters as diverse as the Oregon landscape to solve this mystery."
"Jesus calls us to make disciples of all the nations. Many Christians believe this means enlisting soldiers in a culture war. But putting faith in the service of politics risks remaking God in our own image. How can the church help bring God's kingdom to earth without relying on the political structures of this world?
Critiquing our idolization of the values of classical Western liberalism, Steven Félix-Jäger seeks a renewal of the church's public witness. He points out the pitfalls that stem from our obsession with individual freedom—from the prosperity gospel to Christian nationalism to conformity with secular progressivism. True freedom is not about individual liberty or free market economics but about flourishing in covenant with God. Félix-Jäger offers a public theology that challenges the church to be a holy, loving, and generous witness to a world bound by visions of self-absorbed autonomy and materialism. Inspired by Jubilee and Pentecost, he ultimately constructs an alternative model for public witness rooted in the abundance of the Spirit.
The Problem and Promise of Freedom not only serves as an indispensable resource for students of religion and society but also offers urgent and clear-sighted witness to the church today."
"'One of the most comprehensive histories of modern capitalism yet written.' —Michael Hirsh, New York Times
An authoritative, insightful, and highly engaging history of the twentieth-century global economy, updated with a new chapter on the early decades of the new century. Global Capitalism guides the listener from the globalization of the early twentieth century and its swift collapse in the crises of 1914–45, to the return to global integration at the end of the century, and the subsequent retreat in the wake of the financial crisis of 2008."
"An enormous, mysterious box descends upon small-town Minnesota, spelling trouble for the world, in this classic adventure from a Science Fiction Grand Master.
Forestry student Jerry Conklin is fly-fishing when something huge lands on his car, crushing it into the earth. It looks like a big black box—about fifty feet high and two hundred feet long—and the object stirs up quite a commotion among the townspeople of Lone Pine, Minnesota. One of them even shoots at it—and quickly pays for it with his life.
Around the country, people scramble to determine what exactly the box is. Is it a machine? Or maybe a sentient being? What does it want? They have no way of knowing.
Jerry, meanwhile, has firsthand knowledge after the visitor abducts him. Then, just as he discovers it is a living, intelligent creature, it releases him into the darkness of night.
As Jerry searches for a way back to civilization, more visitors descend upon Earth. They seem harmless enough. Then they begin eating trees, and that's only the beginning . . ."
