Showing results by narrator "Mark Owens" in All Categories

Written as an introductory story to The Piazza Tales, the protagonist of The Piazza idealizes a radiant spot on the mountain that he looks upon from his piazza. Traveling to the spot he realizes it is a house, occupied by the unhappy girl Marianna, who longs to see the lucky individual who lives in the white house she looks upon from her window. The narrator realizes he has been the object of a fantasy like his own, and leaves thinking how all idealism is an illusion.

Bannadonna is an eccentric artist and architect who dreams up plans for a magnificent bell tower. After receiving approval from the city, Bannadonna happily begins construction, but local citizens begin to notice strange occurrences associated with the bell-tower, and complaints eventually reach the city magistrates. While touring the magistrates around the tower, Bannadonna shows off his work and readily answers their questions, but one curiosity remains unanswered—what lies beneath the shroud in the bell-tower.

Humans now spend most of their free time submerged in screen life - and that’s taking a toll on real life. The good news is there’s a way back. Best-selling author David Murrow provides a rescue plan for parents, adults, teachers, and ministers who want to help others (or themselves) achieve screen-life/real-life balance. Drowning in Screen Time shows you what screens are doing to your family and relationships, why screen content is so addictive, and how to find freedom and confidence in real life.

One crew takes the long route, sleeping for 1,000 years, in secret, on a ship called The Human Frontier. The other crew set off hundreds of years later, at hyper speed. When the sleepers wake as they approach the planet, the hyper-speed crew have been living there for 300 years already - and they have no clue the ‘sleepers’ are about to arrive.

Will true artificial intelligences be able to appreciate or even create art? Explore dystopian societies, where AI generates most of the content and human artists must eke out an existence, and utopias where artificial minds help unlock and enhance human creativity.

David Steinman, the director of the Chemical Toxin Working Group and one of America’s premier environmental activists, shows how today’s most popular items—from bubble bath to cereal to cleaning products to snack foods—are contaminated with unacceptable levels of chemical toxins and pesticides, and he proposes alternatives and substitutes to keep your family safe. Steinman reveals never-before-seen test results for major brands like Johnsons & Johnsons, Kellogg, Tide, Clairol, and General Mills that identify exactly which products contain dangerous ingredients.