Showing results by narrator "Michael Piotrasch" in All Categories

Most visitors arriving from the hustle and crowds of busy Florence cannot help but fall under the charm of Siena's gracefully winding (and pedestrianized) medieval streets. Laid out on the slopes of three steep hills (the historical terzi or "thirds" of the city), the center of town, geographically and emotionally, is the fan-shaped and gently sloping, redbrick Piazza del Campo, a wonderfully preserved monument to Siena's medieval heyday when merchants, bankers, and artists flocked here and some of the city's greatest monuments were constructed.

William Tecumseh Sherman holds a unique position in American history. Synonymous with barbarity in the South, Sherman is lauded as a war hero in the North, and modern historians consider him the harbinger of total war. As a Union general, Sherman was recognized for his outstanding command of military strategy but criticized for the harshness of the "scorched earth" policies that he implemented in conducting total war against the Confederate States, especially in 1864 and 1865. Military historian B. H. Liddell Hart famously declared that Sherman was "the first modern general."

For decades, medical science has believed that genes determined our biological destiny. Now the new genetics has changed that assumption forever. You will always have the genes you were born with, but genes are dynamic, responding to everything we think, say, and do. Suddenly they've become our strongest allies for personal transformation. When you make lifestyle choices that optimize how your genes behave, you can reach for a state of health and fulfillment undreamed of even a decade ago.

This is a summary of Robert B. Reich's Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few. This presents a myth-shattering breakdown of how the economic system that helped make America so strong is now failing us and what it will take to fix it. Perhaps no one is better acquainted with the intersection of economics and politics than Robert B. Reich, and now he reveals how power and influence have created a new American oligarchy, a shrinking middle class, and the greatest income inequality and wealth disparity in 80 years.

In this moving and inspirational fictional letter from a father to his young daughter, critically acclaimed poet, novelist, and travel writer William Graham tells the story of Brooks Montana, a successful author who suffers great loss but who is also inspired to leave behind a legacy for the world. Montana moves to the Patagonian Andes where he finds love and a new direction in his life as a conservationist and environmentalist.

From 4-time Mom's Choice Award winner Steve Burt and veteran middle-school teacher Jolyn Joslin comes this exciting book for kids that's also a fabulous tool for parents, grandparents, and teachers: 13 ghost stories and weird tales to help kids read, learn, and write their own stuff. These are the thought-provoking stories young readers love. A boy approaches an old woman tending a grave garden. On a dare a brother and sister enter a bone yard on Halloween to free a sea captain's earthbound spirit.