Science Imagination

A rich, sweeping, and compelling work of botanical history, The Cabaret of Plants explores dozens of plant species that for millennia have challenged our imaginations, awoken our wonder, and upturned our ideas about history, science, beauty, and belief. Going back to the beginnings of human history, Richard Mabey shows how flowers, trees, and plants have been central to human experience not just as sources of food and medicine but as objects of worship, actors in creation myths, and symbols of war and peace, life and death.

Rooted in rhythm-and-blues pioneered by black musicians, 1950s rock and roll was racially inclusive and attracted listeners and performers across the color line. In the 1960s, however, rock and roll gave way to rock: a new musical ideal regarded as more serious, more artistic-and the province of white musicians. Decoding the racial discourses that have distorted standard histories of rock music, Jack Hamilton underscores how ideas of "authenticity" have blinded us to rock's inextricably interracial artistic enterprise.

When Columbus first returned to Spain from the Caribbean, he dazzled King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella with exotic parrots, tropical flowers, and bits of gold. Inspired by the promise of riches, countless seafarers poured out of the Iberian Peninsula and wider Europe in search of spices, treasure, and land. Many returned with strange tales of the New World. Curiosity began to percolate through Europe as the New World’s people, animals, and plants ruptured prior assumptions about the biblical description of creation.

The Angelic War rages as Satariel, the Prince of Darkness masterminds an insurgence that splinters and divides allegiances with a third of the angels embracing the Darkness joining him in an all-out rebellion against the Creator. Metatron, the Prince of Light, leads the faithful against his twin brother, Satariel, in a desperate effort to restore and unite the seven kingdoms that comprise Heaven.

The legislative attack on public sector unionism that gave rise to the uproar in Wisconsin and other union strongholds in 2011 was not just a reaction to the contemporary economic difficulties faced by the government. Rather, it was the result of a longstanding political and ideological hostility to the very idea of trade unionism put forward by a conservative movement whose roots go as far back as the Haymarket Riot of 1886. The controversy in Madison and other state capitals reveals that labor's status and power has always been at the core of American conservatism.

Sixth grade is finally over, and Annie is off to camp with her best friend Jay. After everything that happened last year, Annie’s looking forward to a relaxing summer. A little swimming and hiking sounds like a nice break from standing up to bullies and, you know, saving the world. Unfortunately for Annie, it’s not that simple.

From nineteenth-century abolitionism to Black Lives Matter today, progressive social movements have been at the forefront of social change. Yet it is seldom recognized that such movements have not only engaged in political action but also posed crucial philosophical questions about the meaning of justice and about how the demands of justice can be met. Michele Moody-Adams argues that anyone who is concerned with the theory or the practice of justice—or both—must ask what can be learned from social movements.

This highly understandable audiobook offers a contemporary interpretation of the political thought of Edmund Burke, drawing on his experiences to illuminate and address fundamental questions of politics and society that are of particular interest today. In Edmund Burke for Our Time, Byrne asserts that Burke's politics is reflective of unique and sophisticated ideas about how people think and learn, and about determinants of political behavior.

Our social conversation has gone awry. We are surrounded by noise and are retreating to social media bubbles. As conversations across ideological divides become increasingly difficult, we as a society need to rethink what it means to listen, to think, to create, and to be democratically engaged citizens. Fifteen Paths documents the journey of a disillusioned business professor who came to realize that in order to transcend the noise, we need more imaginative expressions and fewer argumentative ones.

Meghan, a 14-year-old girl, arrives on Parachute Island, a place for deceased children who can live out their dreams in the afterlife, thanks to a magical wishing tree. There, she befriends several teens, including the lovable Ham. But Meghan harbors a secret, one that eats her up in the inside. David is the only adult on the island, and sole caretaker of all the children. He arrived under mysterious circumstances, and slowly the mystery unravels. Soon, he wakes from a coma, paralyzed. Were his adventures on the island just a dream, or something else?

Pai dos jogos de aventura fantástica, Gary Gygax teve sua história de vida contada aos poucos e em partes, até agora. Em O império da imaginação, Michael Witwer apresenta uma biografia dinâmica de Gygax, desde a infância em Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, até sua morte em 2008.

Dr. Peter Andresen is a broken man. Once a highly respected psychiatrist, he lives alone, suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder that he steadfastly denies. As the story begins, Peter walks alone on a deserted beach. He doesn't know where he is or what he's doing until he encounters a beautiful young woman named Holly Be. She knows his story and it is her assigned mission to restore meaning to his life. But she fails to maintain the emotional distance required to prevent them from falling in love.

His mom engineered habitats for colonists on Mars and Europa. His dad ended a long war. But 13-year-old Dax Zander spends his days surfing Kawela Bay with his brothers, hitching rides with whales and exploring the reefs around his family's undersea home. Life's sweet, the future's bright. Then one morning in 2077, three aliens arrive pleading for humanity's help against a horrific threat to their distant oceanic homeworld. As Earth's leaders ponder a risky mission of mercy, Dax feels a stirring in his gut to leave behind childhood thrills and embrace a greater, more dangerous destiny.

What if every truth we hold began as a beautiful mistake? This book is a meditation on the nature of illusion—not as deception, but as one of the mind’s essential ways of knowing. Here, illusion is not debunked or dismissed; it is explored as a bridge between ignorance and understanding, a necessary fiction through which humans reach toward the incomprehensible.

Paleophilosophy: The Dawn of Thought is a book that restores to us the forgotten dignity of ancient humanity. It makes a simple and radical claim: philosophy is older than cities, temples, and alphabets; it begins not with libraries, but with silence around the fire, with palms pressed against stone, with the rhythm of the dance, with the care given to the dead, and with dreams in which humankind first encountered the “other.

No one has failed to notice that the current generation of youth is deeply - some would say totally - involved with digital media. Professors Howard Gardner and Katie Davis name today’s young people The App Generation, and in this spellbinding book they explore what it means to be “app-dependent” versus “app-enabled” and how life for this generation differs from life before the digital era.

As parents, we all go through a mini mutiny in the ranks once it’s time to get ready for bed. If you’re lucky, you could get your kids in bed by eight o’clock...but not without a fight! And definitely not without creating a stressful environment that negatively affects your child’s sleep quality. This is why bedtime meditation practices come in handy because they help create a warm, loving environment that lowers stress hormone levels.

In the enchanting floating city of Aetheris, eccentric professor William Pemberton discovers the Lexicon of Lost Words, a magical manuscript capable of reshaping reality. Alongside his spirited daughter, Sally, and a whimsical being named Luma, William embarks on a thrilling adventure to uncover the secrets of imagination and balance. As the trio navigates Aetheris' eccentricities—floating markets, mythical creatures, and unexpected allies—they grapple with the power of words, the weight of responsibility, and the joy of creativity.

In the third book of Imagination Street, Jason bonds with William, his father, with music. William's band and signature song called "Rummage Rubbish" strikes a positive chord inside of Jason's soul. This means a lot to William, as Jason doesn't often sing, let alone interact, with him. Dianne decides on whether to accept or decline a job offer after an unannounced visit from Carol, her mother.

It's supermarket adventure time. While shopping with William, Jason finds the supermarket experience less than desirable and escapes with his mind and shopping cart back to Imagination Street.