Showing results by publisher "Phoenix Books" in All Categories

The Last Empire is a collection of provocative, witty, and eloquent essays by Gore Vidal about all things USA. In more than two dozen essays, Vidal brings his keen intellect, experience, and razor-edged wit to bear on an astonishing range of subjects, offering incisive observations about terrorism, civil liberties, the CIA, Al Gore, and the Clintons—interwoven with a rich tapestry of personal anecdote, critical insight, and historical detail.

Tom Peters sees a problem with the way people do business today: Those who like to get things done are thwarted by absurd organizational barriers and by the egos of petty tyrants. His vision: Employees who dance from project to project; enterprise that reduces the bureaucracy to almost nothing; societies that educate their young to break the rules and invent vivid new futures. Re-Imagine! focuses on how the business climate has changed and how the new world of business works. Peters explores innovative strategies for overcoming outdated company values and procedures.

Beaufort, South Carolina is home to the Smallwoods, a family closely knit but fiercely at odds. Georgie, the youngest, is tormented by worry for her son, who vanished two years earlier, and by her anger at her father. An unforgiving patriarch and ex-Marine, Georgie's father neglects her mother, belittles her brother Ashby, and denies her sister Claire the financial support she needs after a trying divorce.

Why should we forgive? Why is it so difficult to forgive? How can we forgive? These questions and more are explored in a unique and easy-to-understand manner that shows us the power of forgiveness. This simple, down-to-earth guide explains the toxic, negative side effects of being unforgiving and the havoc it can play on our body, our relationships, and on our life. It also shows the physical and spiritual benefits of forgiving. It's time to choose forgiveness, develop a peaceful sense of well-being, and discover a quiet mind.

Whether on the job or at home, we've all yearned for a way to simplify our lives and become more organized. In A Simpler Way, authors Margaret J. Wheatley and Myron Kellner-Rogers use the latest scientific research to develop new structures to help us become more cooperative, creative, and free. By simplifying our individual worlds, Wheatley and Kellner-Rogers explain that we will inevitably increase our self-assurance, resulting in a continuous cycle of creativity, accomplishment, and learning.

Daniel, a successful author-psychiatrist, awakens to discover he has survived his death. Two spiritual "greeters" introduce Daniel to the afterlife, guiding him in this new environment. He learns that each soul projects what it wishes to experience, and each must learn to let go of attachments through loving psychotherapy. Throughout his journey, Daniel moves from one stage of the afterlife to another, as his understanding of the spiritual realm gradually increases, and he strives to fulfill his destiny.

More than once, friends of Carl Reiner said, “You ought to write those things down.” And at the age of eighty, Carl finally did. In this funny and engaging memoir, Reiner recounts his show business life in short comic takes....

Humans have long sought to comprehend the enormities of cosmic space and time. Here, best selling science writer Timothy Ferris tells the story of that quest. He interweaves the majestic themes of astronomy, physics, religion, and philosophy with fresh and lasting portraits of the men and women who created what has been called our society's most precious treasure - its conception of the universe at large.

First published in the 1930s, The Berlin Stories contains two novels, The Last of Mr. Norris and Goodbye to Berlin. Classics of modern fiction, these novellas capture 1931 Berlin—charming, grotesque, and dangerous, as Hitler was ascending to power. The Berlin Stories is inhabited by a wealth of characters, in particular the nightclub performer Sally Bowles, whose misadventures were popularized on stage and screen in I Am a Camera and Cabaret.

Does it seem that good ideas go nowhere at your company, that meetings are often a waste of time, and that nobody seems to be in charge? In Getting It Done, Roger Fisher and Alan Sharp tackle the inertia that afflicts many groups. The authors advance the idea of lateral leadership as a means of breaking apart the logjams that inhibit collaboration in organizations, and they offer surefire ways to help anyone get better results from coworkers.

Middle-aged Lucas Corso is a tired and cynical book detective, a mercenary hired to hunt down rare editions for wealthy and unscrupulous clients. When a well-known bibliophile is found hanged, leaving behind part of the original manuscript of Alexandre Dumas' The Three Musketeers, Corso is brought in to authenticate the fragment. Soon the unsuspecting Corso is drawn into a swirling plot involving devil worship, occult practices, and swashbuckling derring-do among a cast of characters bearing a suspicious resemblance to those of Dumas' masterpiece.

Susanna Kaysen takes on another taboo subject: her vagina—which suddenly and inexplicably starts to hurt. The Camera My Mother Gave Me takes us through Kaysen's often comic, sometimes surreal encounters with all kinds of doctors—internists, gynecologists, and "alternative health" experts—as well as with her boyfriend and her friends as she seeks a cure—but nothing works. As sex becomes more and more painful, Kaysen's relationship with her boyfriend disintegrates and she turns to her best friends, her wicked sense of humor, and her wry self-reflection to cope.

During Desert Storm, Major Darren Mace made a fateful decision to go against orders—to abort a secret mission that was, in his judgment, ill-advised. His actions landed him in military exile. Now Mace has moved on to the Air Force Reserves. There's a new US president, a new era, and a new war is escalating along the Ukraine border. And this time Mace has a partner—Rebecca Furness, the military's first woman combat flyer—while the chains of command tighten around him.

This baker's dozen of speeches capture historic moments and feature some of the most compelling orators of all time—from Socrates, Queen Elizabeth, Patrick Henry, and Abraham Lincoln to such twentieth century icons as Susan B. Anthony, Winston Churchill, and Martin Luther King, Jr. In addition to the recreation of speeches, this collection includes original recordings by four American presidents— Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, and most recently, Barack Obama.

Anna has been assigned a three-week posting on Georgia's isolated Cumberland Island. Despite the breathtaking natural setting, Anna finds time weighing heavily as she works tedious fire pre-suppression duty. Her boring routine is shattered when a sudden plane crash in the inland palmetto thickets calls her and the other members of the fire crew to action. When Anna and the crew investigate, they discover the plane was sabotaged. Suspicions smolder over the accident which killed both the pilot and his passenger, Cumberland's lone law enforcement ranger.

There is perhaps no more compelling example of the power of words than Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. In merely 272 words, Lincoln gave the nation "a new birth of freedom" by tracing its history to the Declaration of Independence, as well as incorporating elements of the Greek revival and Transcendentalism. Garry Wills breathes news life into words we thought we knew and reveals much about a President so easily mythologized but often misunderstood.

Martin Buber, a Jewish philosopher, spoke directly to the most profound human concerns in all his works. Included in his discussions was Hasidism, a mystical-religious movement founded in Eastern Europe by Israel ben Eliezer, called the “Baal-Shem” (the Master of God's Name).

Murder for Love: Murder for Women is a collection of wickedly witty crime-of-passion short stories by some of the best women writers inside and out of the mystery field.

Sita Dulip has missed her flight out of Chicago. But instead of listening to garbled announcements in the airport, she discovers a method of bypassing the crowds at the desks, a nasty lunch, whimpering children, their punitive parents, and the blue plastic chairs bolted to the floor: she changes planes—literally. Sita discovers entire planes of existence and visits societies not found on Earth—bizarre societies that share similarities with Earth's cultures and sometimes open doors into the alien.

Crimes of passion are as old as love itself. A man, a woman, a weapon: it's the perfect recipe for love gone wrong. And Murder for Love: Murder for Men is the perfect—and only—collection of love stories with a delectable devious twist: Murder. Eight works of short fiction from the very best male writers inside—and out—of the mystery field provide compelling listening in this distinctive collection.