Download : Growing Up Amish [Kindle Edition]

Growing Up Amish

Filmmakers, academics, and novelists have offered depictions of Amish life. This memoir offers a nuanced account from a man who straddled both Amish and English (non-Amish) worlds. Wagler recounts his Amish upbringing, from dating conventions and worship services to local gossip and schoolyard bullies.

The simplicity of everyday life may seem quaint on the surface. Yet Wagler bravely goes on to expose pervasive dissatisfaction among both youth and adult Amish living in what he characterizes as a stifling, formulaic world. Such unspoken displeasure sparked a cycle of coming and going for the author, who repeatedly crept away from his community only to return, if reluctantly, for its familiarity.

It was a paradox that would haunt me for almost ten years: the tug-of-war between two worlds. His tale of restlessness looks acutely at the clash of family ties with love of freedom. The memoir is worthwhile as much for its Amish insights as for its exploration of one man s emotional turmoil, regret, and shame. Wagler, who now works at a building and supply company in Lancaster County, Pa., deserves praise for his honesty. --Publisher's Weekly

 

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Download : A Vintage Affair by Isabel Wolff

A Vintage Affair: A Novel

When vintage clothing expert Phoebe Swift decides to abandon her career as a Sotheby’s auctioneer, she opens London’s Village Vintage, selling only the best recycled designer duds. However, it isn’t long before we discover that the cupcake dresses and alligator clutches that populate her quaint neighborhood shop aren’t Phoebe’s only baggage. Reeling from the death of a close friend and the subsequent collapse of her wedding engagement, Phoebe is in need of a change. 

She certainly loves the clothing she sells for its history, but it takes a new and profound friendship with the elderly client Mrs. Bell to show Phoebe to care for herself in the same way. Although the novel is sometimes predictable, UK best-seller Wolff keeps us entertained by sending a few courtiers Phoebe’s way and threading intriguing wartime historical fiction into Mrs. Bell’s backstory. 

Readers with a passion for couture fashion will appreciate (and feel vindicated by!) Wolff’s well-researched and intricate descriptions of beautiful, significant vintage pieces. While the dialogue is occasionally a bit bloated, this book is a smooth read with enough flair and fun for the beach or the pool.

Download : A Vintage Affair by Isabel Wolff

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Download | Man of Douglas, Man of Lincoln by: Ian Michael Spurgeon

In 1855, this former Mexican War colonel and Indiana congressman entered Kansas Territory to take a leading role in its quest for statehood, and over the next twelve years he followed a seemingly inconsistent ideological path from pro-Douglas Democrat to Free Stater to pro-Lincoln Republican.

His fiery stump speeches and radical ideas won him a Senate seat along with an army of critics and a cloud that hangs over his reputation to this day. Spurgeon reassesses both Lane s position swings and his role in history, finding a consistency in his ideals that few historians have recognized. He argues that Lane was a steadfast champion of both the Union and his own conception of democratic principles.

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Download | Napoleon and his Collaborators: The Making of a Dictatorship | Isser Woloch

This history explains how Napoleon forged a dictatorship and explores the dilemmas of collaboration, personal and political. The 18th Brumaire, November 9, 1799: with France in political and economic turmoil, a group of disaffected politicians enlisted the talented general Napoleon Bonaparte to lead a coup d'etat and establish "confidence from below, authority from above." This is the story of how Napoleon managed his ascent from general of the Republic and first consul to dictator and conqueror of Europe. 

Napoleon did not vault into the imperial throne but moved toward dictatorship gradually; each assertion of new power came gilded with a veneer of legality and a rhetoric of commitment to the ideals of 1789. In this fashion Napoleon not only gained the upper hand over his partners of Brumaire but also retained their loyalty and services going forward. Far from shunting aside those collaborators, he put them to use in ways that satisfied their most emphatic needs: political security, material self-interest, social status, and the opportunity for high-level public service.

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Free Download | The Captain: The Journey of Derek Jeter | Ian O'Connor

Every spring, Little Leaguers across the country mimic his stance and squabble over the right to wear his number, 2, the next number to be retired by the worlds most famous ball team. Derek Jeter is their hero. He walks in the footsteps of Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio, and Mantle, and someday his shadow will loom just as large. Yet he has never been the best player in baseball. In fact, he hasnt always been the best player on his team. But his intangible grace and Jordanesque ability to play big in the biggest of postseason moments make him the face of the modern Yankee dynasty, and of Americas game. 

In The Captain, best-selling author Ian OConnor draws on extensive reporting and unique access to Jeter that has spanned some fifteen years to reveal how a biracial kid from Michigan became New Yorks most beloved sports figure and the enduring symbol of the steroid-free athlete. OConnor takes us behind the scenes of a legendary baseball life and career, from Jeters early struggles in the minor leagues, when homesickness and errors in the field threatened a stillborn career, to his heady days as a Yankee superstar and prince of the city who squired some of the worlds most beautiful women, to his tense battles with former best friend A-Rod. We also witness Jeter struggling to come to terms with his declining skills and the declining favor of the only organization he ever wanted to play for, leading to a contentious contract negotiation with the Yankees that left people wondering if Jeter might end his career in a uniform without pinstripes. 

Derek Jeters march toward the Hall of Fame has been dignified and certain, but behind that leadership and heros grace there are hidden struggles and complexities that have never been explored, until now. As Jeter closes in on 3,000 hits, a number no Yankee has ever touched, The Captain offers an incisive, exhilarating, and revealing new look at one of the games greatest players in the gloaming of his career.

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Free Download | Knowledge in Later Islamic Philosophy: Mulla Sadra on Existence, Intellect, and Intuition | Ibrahim Kalin

This study looks at how the seventeenth-century philosopher Sadr al-Din al-Shirazi, known as Mulla Sadra, attempted to reconcile the three major forms of knowledge in Islamic philosophical discourses: revelation (Qur'an), demonstration (burhan), and gnosis or intuitive knowledge ('irfan). In his grand synthesis, which he calls the 'Transcendent Wisdom', Mulla Sadra bases his epistemological considerations on a robust analysis of existence and its modalities. His key claim that knowledge is a mode of existence rejects and revises the Kalam definitions of knowledge as relation and as a property of the knower on the one hand, and the Avicennan notions of knowledge as abstraction and representation on the other. For Sadra, all these theories land us in a subjectivist theory of knowledge where the knowing subject is defined as the primary locus of all epistemic claims. To explore the possibilities of a 'non-subjectivist' epistemology, Sadra seeks to shift the focus from knowledge as a mental act of representation to knowledge as presence and unveiling. The concept of knowledge has occupied a central place in the Islamic intellectual tradition. While Muslim philosophers have adopted the Greek ideas of knowledge, they have also developed new approaches and broadened the study of knowledge. 

The challenge of reconciling revealed knowledge with unaided reason and intuitive knowledge has led to an extremely productive debate among Muslims intellectuals in the classical period. In a culture where knowledge has provided both spiritual perfection and social status, Muslim scholars have created a remarkable discourse of knowledge and vastly widened the scope of what it means to know. For Sadra, in knowing things, we unveil an aspect of existence and thus engage with the countless modalities and colours of the all-inclusive reality of existence. In such a framework, we give up the subjectivist claims of ownership of meaning. The intrinsic intelligibility of existence, an argument Sadra establishes through his elaborate ontology, strips the knowing subject of its privileged position of being the sole creator of meaning. Instead, meaning and intelligibility are defined as functions of existence to be deciphered and unveiled by the knowing subject. This leads to a redefinition of the relationship between subject and object or what Muslim philosophers call the knower and the known.

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Free Download | The Forgotten Palestinians: A History of the Palestinians in Israel | Ilan Pappe

For more than 60 years, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have lived as Israeli citizens within the borders of the nation formed at the end of the 1948 conflict. 

Occupying a precarious middle ground between the Jewish citizens of Israel and the dispossessed Palestinians of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, the Israeli Palestinians have developed an exceedingly complex relationship with the land they call home; however, in the innumerable discussions of the Israel-Palestine problem, their experiences are often overlooked and forgotten.

In this book, historian Ilan Pappé examines how Israeli Palestinians have fared under Jewish rule and what their lives tell us about both Israel's attitude toward minorities and Palestinians' attitudes toward the Jewish state. 

Drawing upon significant archival and interview material, Pappé analyzes the Israeli state's policy towards its Palestinian citizens, finding discrimination in matters of housing, education, and civil rights. Rigorously researched yet highly readable, The Forgotten Palestinians brings a new and much-needed perspective to the Israel-Palestine debate.

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Free Download | Bayou Moon (The Edge, Book 2) | Ilona Andrews

There are problems with this book--I think the pacing is off, almost as if the story needs to be a hundred pages shorter or a hundred pages longer (I'd prefer longer). Also, the title could be more memorable; I'm not sure they ever mention bayou...it just seems kind of generic. And this is picky, but I frequently have to spend time analyzing the punctuation around the dialogue to determine who's talking and if that character is speaking out loud. Finally, I always have a little trouble with their verb tenses. The authors often go from past perfect to past and it throws me off my groove. Still, those are picky things that could be caught by an editor.

With all that said, I still really like this world and these characters. I love the male lead, William. They do a wonderful job with giving him a definite otherness without turning him into a freak. I just REALLY like this book. I just really like Ilona Andrews and will be waiting for more Edge stories and more Kate Daniels.

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Free Download | Gabriel Garcia Marquez: The Early Years | Ilan Stavans

This long-awaited biography provides a fascinating and comprehensive picture of García Márquez's life up to the publication of his classic 100 Years of Solitude. Based on nearly a decade of research, this biographical study sheds new light on the life and works of the Nobel Laureate, father of magical realism, and bestselling author in the history of the Spanish language. As García Márquez's impact endures on well into his ninth decade, Stavans's keen insights constitute the definitive re-appraisal of the literary giant's life and corpus. The later part of his life will be covered in a second book.

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Free Download | A Shadow on the Glass | Ian Irvine

Ian Irvine begins the saga of The View from the Mirror, a brilliant epic fantasy that rivals the works of Robert Jordan and J. V. Jones. "Once there were three worlds, each with its own human race. Then, fleeing from out of the void came a fourth race, the Charon. Desperate, on the edge of extinction, they changed the balance between the worlds forever..." THE TALE OF THE FORBIDDING In ancient times the Way Between the Worlds was shattered, leaving bands of Aachim, Faellem, and Charon trapped with the old humans of Santhenar. Now Llian, a Chronicler of the Great Tales, uncovers a 3,000-year-old secret too deadly to be revealed-while Karan, a young sensitive, is compelled by honor to undertake a perilous mission. Neither can imagine they will soon meet as hunted fugitives, snared in the machinations of immortals, the vengeance of warlords, and the magics of powerful mancers. For the swelling deluge of a millennial war is rising, terrible as a tsunami, ready to cast torrents of sorcery and devastation across the land..

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Free Download | Dark Is the Moon | Ian Irvine

As he amasses a conquering army of telepathic monsters, the other immortal mancers scatter in desperate quests to control or re-create the terrible, arcane magics of the Forbidding. But young Llian, his mind controlled by Rulke, becomes an unwilling spy against all who've befriended him-while Karan, the tormented daughter of three human species, discovers her beloved homeland of Gothryme has become the center of a sorcerous vortex. For there, in a mystic, ancient citadel built by a madman, Rulke plans to wield powers that will reconnect worlds-or unleash the insatiable horrors of The Void. And the key to the Charon's scheme...is Karan herself.

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Free Download | The Way Between the Worlds | Ian Irvine

In the conclusion to this series, Karan, the young Sensitive who holds the Mirror of Aachen, which has the power to heal or permanently destroy the rift between Worlds, is held captive. Her lover, Llian, is in chains, falsely accused of betraying her. With the dark moon rising, the Charon Rulke is unstoppable as he prepares to open the Way between the Worlds.

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Free Download | Trainspotting | Irvine Welsh

Irvine Welsh's controversial first novel, set on the heroin-addicted fringe of working-class youth in Edinburgh, is yet another exploration of the dark side of Scottishness. The main character, Mark Renton, is at the center of a clique of nihilistic slacker junkies with no hopes and no possibilities, and only "mind-numbing and spirit-crushing" alternatives in the straight world they despise. This particular slice of humanity has nothing left but the blackest of humor and a sharpness of wit. American readers can use the glossary in the back to translate the slang and dialect--essential, since the dialogue makes the book. This is a bleak vision sung as musical comedy.

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Free Download | Foundation and Empire | Isaac Asimov Novel

The Foundation novels of Isaac Asimov are one of the great masterworks of science fiction. Unsurpassed for their unique blend of nonstop action, daring ideas, and extensive world-building, they chronicle the struggle of a courageous group of men and women to preserve humanity’s light against an inexorable tide of darkness and violence.Led by its founding father, the great psychohistorian Hari Seldon, and taking advantage of its superior science and technology, the Foundation has survived the greed and barbarism of its neighboring warrior-planets. Yet now it must face the Empire—still the mightiest force in the Galaxy even in its death throes. When an ambitious general determined to restore the Empire’s glory turns the vast Imperial fleet toward the Foundation, the only hope for the small planet of scholars and scientists lies in the prophecies of Hari Seldon.But not even Hari Seldon could have predicted the birth of the extraordinary creature called The Mule—a mutant intelligence with a power greater than a dozen battle fleets…a power that can turn the strongest-willed human into an obedient slave.From the Paperback edition.

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Free Download | Azazel - Fantasy Stories | Isaac Asimov Novel

Isaac Asimov is quite well known translator from Japanese to Russian. He conducted life of intelectual indulging himself only in his job and writing some high-brow pieces of literature, not for ordinary people. And then he decided to do something with his skills and wrote Azazel, his first detective story. It's great, with atmosphere dating back to Doyle and Christie. And it's not only intriguing, gluing, interesting, thirillind, crisp etc. but also perfectly written with a hand of Russian intelectual. This is a collection of funny short stories by the author, all about the two-centimeter high demon Azazel (not its real name, but the real name cannot be pronounced easily). Azazel rides about in the pocket of a friend (descended from magicians and able to summon a demon), and the friend narrates the adventures. The problem is that Azazel wants to be helpful, but the wishes people have in mind are not always translated well in their directions. It is like programming a computer - you must be very careful (garbage in means garbage out, or in this case bad or incomplete directions may have unexpected results).

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Free Download | The Naked Sun | Isaac Asimov Novel

A millennium into the future, two advancements have altered the course of human history: the colonization of the Galaxy and the creation of the positronic brain. On the beautiful Outer World planet of Solaria, a handful of human colonists lead a hermit-like existence, their every need attended to by their faithful robot servants. To this strange and provocative planet comes Detective Elijah Baley, sent from the streets of New York with his positronic partner, the robot R. Daneel Olivaw, to solve an incredible murder that has rocked Solaria to its foundations. The victim had been so reclusive that he appeared to his associates only through holographic projection. Yet someone had gotten close enough to bludgeon him to death while robots looked on. Now Baley and Olivaw are faced with two clear impossibilities: Either the Solarian was killed by one of his robots--unthinkable under the laws of Robotics--or he was killed by the woman who loved him so much that she never came into his presence!

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Free Download | Foundation and Earth | Isaac Asimov Novel

The fifth novel in Asimov's popular Foundation series opens with second thoughts. Councilman Golan Trevize is wondering if he was right to choose a collective mind as the best possible future for humanity over the anarchy of contentious individuals, nations and planets. To test his conclusion, he decides he must know the past and goes in search of legendary Earth, all references to which have been erased from galactic libraries. The societies encountered along the way become arguing points in a book-long colloquy about man's fate, conducted by Trevize and traveling companion Bliss, who is part of the first world/mind, Gaia.

What are some of the more interesting topics covered by Asimov's brain? Well, so far, mind expansion and ability to the point of that only dreamed of by the lustiest dreamers (thank goodness for that!). The 3 Robot Laws and the Positronic brain. He takes what the term "robot" suggests and lets it run its (un)natural course. He borrows the Gaia legend (first introduced by Teilhard de Chardin I believe) and takes it to its boldest extreme. He plays Earths future as .... to understand these references you will have to read this 5th addition to the Foundation Series and, hopefully, have read a wide variety of sci and not so sci-fi literature to really get it and enjoy this wonderful masterpiece of things seen and not seen of things dreamt and not dreamt.

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Free Download | Foundation 06 Foundation's Edge | Isaac Asimov Novel

At last, the costly and bitter war between the two Foundations had come to an end. The scientists of the First Foundation had proved victorious; and now they retum to Hari Seldon's long-established plan to build a new Empire that the Second Foundation is not destroyed after all-and that its still-defiant survivors are preparing their revenge. Now the two exiled citizens of the Foundation-a renegade Councilman and the doddering historian-set out in search of the mythical planet Earth. . .and proof that the Second Foundation still exists. Meanwhile someone-or something-outside of both Foundations sees to be orchestrating events to suit its own ominous purpose. Soon representatives of both the First and Second Foundations will find themselves racing toward a mysterious world called Gaia and a final shocking destiny at the very end of the universe!

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Free Download | Foundations 02 Forward the Foundation | Isaac Asimov Nove

A stunning testament to his creative genius. Forward The Foundation is a the saga's dramatic climax -- the story Asimov fans have been waiting for. An exciting tale of danger, intrigue, and suspense, Forward The Foundation brings to vivid life Asimov's best loved characters: hero Hari Seldon, who struggles to perfect his revolutionary theory of psychohistory to ensure the survival of humanity; Cleon II, the vain and crafty emperor of the Galactic Empire. In terms of Asimov's writing, this is the last work exploring the Foundation; the copyright date is actually after his death. However, in terms of the Foundation chronology, it comes early on in the series of novels exploring the Foundation and Second Foundation. Over the past few months, I have felt a need to go back and reread the Asimov works again (it's been quite awhile since I last read these), and this review is one of the byproducts of that.

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Free Download | The Robots of Dawn | Isaac Asimov Stories

Robots of Dawn is the third entry in the Robot series and was written quite a few years after the second volume saw print. The story follows Elijah Bailey once again as he tries to solve a murder but this time it is not a human who has been killed but a robot. The leading suspect is a character from the first novel, the leading roboticist on the planet Aurora. Bailey travels off world and goes through his usual routine of interviewing the interested parties and accusing most of them of committing the crime in the process. His old robot partner, R Daneel Olivaw, aids Bailey in his investigation. Perhaps due to the long delay in writing Robots of Dawn, there are some rather glaring errors in story continuity from the prior novel, The Naked Sun. Early in the story, Olivaw tells Bailey that no robot could impersonate a human on the Spacer worlds and get away with it for even a moment. They have a lengthy conversation on this point and the point is considered proven by the time they are done. Yet, in The Naked Sun, Olivaw himself impersonated a human on the Spacer world of Solaris and no one even suspected him. Bailey witnessed this, yet both characters seem to have forgotten the entire affair.

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