High Art

Music composed for television had, until recently, never been taken seriously by scholars or critics. Catchy TV themes, often for popular weekly series, were fondly remembered but not considered much more culturally significant than commercial jingles. Yet noted composers like John Williams, Henry Mancini, and Jerry Goldsmith learned and/or honed their craft in television before going on to major success in feature films.

With a connoisseur's insight and an offbeat sensitivity perfectly tailored to his subjects, Gifford's brief essays cover a hundred of the noir buff's favorites. His highly polished impressions take the listener through five decades of noir to find both the heart and the art of the plotline.

Kling's autobiographical tales are as enchanting as they are true to life: hopping freight trains, getting hit by lightning, performing his banned play in Czechoslovakia, growing up in Minnesota, and eating things before knowing what they are. In the comical yet poignant title story, Kling straddles the world of the ordinary and one rivaling Dante's inferno as he learns how to use voice-recognition software after a life-threatening motorcycle accident.

Ayesha Scott has a perfect life. Home is an art-filled Cornish castle with her stratospherically wealthy titled husband and their beloved daughter. But behind every realised dream lurks an unexploded nightmare and in the course of one day Ayesha discovers that she will be penniless, homeless and powerless unless she can outwit the international mafia, infiltrate the world of high finance and make backstreet deals with the shadiest members of the art world.

Bobby was happy with colony life on Nibiru. His job at the Colonial Security Force and his family were all the man needed. Then two renegades escaped confinement in stasis and teleported from the LARC1 colony to Earth’s Stone Age to wipe humanity and its primordial cousins from existence. Now, armed only with a shugarra, Bobby must journey across our prehistoric world and through the realms that our extinct cousins once ruled. Can he and a band of misfit hominins overcome two dangerous aliens with god-like magic and their army of cannibals? High fantasy has long ventured through the ...

Along Comes the Association is the story of how Russ Giguere and his fellow band members in the legendary and influential pop group The Association came together to create unparalleled music, unique to the time and place, and never again to be repeated.

Everyone knows Steve Madden's name and his shoes, but few are familiar with his story. Over the past 30 years, Steve Madden has taken his eponymous shoe company from the fledgling start-up he founded with a mere $1,100 to a global, multibillion-dollar brand. But Madden's mistakes, from his battle with addiction to the financial shortcuts that landed him in prison, are as important to his story as his most iconic shoes. In this raw, intimate, and ultimately inspiring book, Madden holds nothing back as he shares what it took to get here and the lessons he's learned along the way.

Michael Krasny has been telling Jewish jokes since his bar mitzvah, and it's been said that he knows more of them than anyone on the planet. He certainly states his case in this wise, enlightening, and hilarious book that not only collects the best of Jewish humor passed down from generation to generation but explains the cultural expressions and anxieties behind the laughs.

From anonymous 10th-century troubadours to world-renowned 20th-century composers, this comprehensive commentary explores the roots of the most influential music genres of our time. Essential listening for students and lovers of great music, A History of Music in Western Civilization features music performed by world-renowned orchestras and enlightening discussions by 15 prominent music authorities, including Christopher Hogwood, Dr. Wilfrid Mellers, and others.

Unlock the secrets to becoming a master closer with "Fanatical Closing", a transformative guide to elevating your sales game. Written by seasoned sales expert Ryan Everett, this book equips you with the tools, strategies, and mindset needed to navigate objections, inspire action, and close deals like never before. In today’s fast-paced sales environment, simply pitching a product is no longer enough. Buyers demand authenticity, empathy, and clear value. "Fanatical Closing" shows you how to deliver all three—and more. What You'll Learn: Objection Mastery: Reframe objections as ...

Dive into the world of dividend investing with "Dividend Dynamos: Mastering the Art of Dividend Investing." This comprehensive guide offers investors a step-by-step approach to building and managing a robust dividend portfolio. Learn the fundamentals of dividend stocks, strategies for selecting high-yield investments, and the power of reinvesting dividends for compounding growth. With practical insights on portfolio diversification, tax-efficient investing, and risk mitigation, this book equips both novice and seasoned investors with the tools to achieve long-term financial success through ...

Everest and K2 are among the Earth's most dangerous places, yet the world's best climbers can't stay away from them. This audio program offers a unique perspective on climbing these two peaks, from early exploration disasters, to the modern tragedies. You'll hear writing from Matt Dickinson, Chirs Bonington, David Roberts, and others whose stories remind us, in vivid accounts, why Everest and K2 are so feared yet so irresistable to climbers.

Rhiannon Broderick grew up knowing New York City as one word: home. That is, until her world comes crashing down, leaving her with no love-of-her-life and no best-friend-forever. Even her parents have no idea how to deal with their daughter. With one last hope, Mom and Dad take drastic measures: sending her to live with Aunt Vicky on the outskirts of Cleveland, Ohio. That’s okay for Rhiannon, though. The fewer people, the better. With her graduation happening soon – only 270 days and counting - she plans to travel far away in isolation where no one knows where she is. But on the first ...

In today’s fast-paced and ever-changing business environment, exceptional executives face unprecedented challenges. The demands of leadership have evolved, requiring a new set of skills and a mindset that embraces change. "The Adaptive Leader" is your essential guide to mastering transformative leadership in a VUCA world—where volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity are the new normal. Authored by renowned executive coach Ammanuel Santa Anna, this book is tailored specifically for high-performing leaders who are ready to elevate their game. Through actionable strategies, real...

In this comprehensive yet easy-to-read book, Michael Fox-Rabinovitz, Managing Partner of Chartwell Capital LLC, and a successful investor with over 25 years of experience, decodes the secrets, nuances, and benefits of collectible assets. He also provides a road map on how best to leverage fractional ownership to include collectible investments in your long-term financial plan.

In August of 1966, Jim Grimsley entered the sixth grade in the same public school he had attended for the five previous years, in his small eastern North Carolina hometown. But he knew that the first day of this school year was going to be different: For the first time he'd be in a classroom with Black children. That was the year federally mandated integration of the schools went into effect, at first allowing students to change schools through "freedom of choice", replaced two years later by forced integration.

A compendium of quotes and riffs by P.J. O'Rourke on subjects ranging from government to fishing to apps, to be published on what would have been his seventy-fifth birthday.

Northern Lights: High Strangeness in Sweden is the first book written in English entirely devoted to the subject of high strangeness, UFOs, and other mysteries in Sweden. While Sweden is known as a secular, rational country where stories of the paranormal are considered something of the past, the truth is quite the opposite. The country has a long history of weirdness, unexplained observations, and eerie encounters, often connected to the countryside, desolate roads, and empty fields. From gnomes, elves, and trolls of the past to UFOs and aliens in modern times. Perhaps they're all ...

In How to Get High: The Key to Escaping Vocal Prison and Making Singing High Notes Easy Again, Joshua Dennis goes through his tried and true method of vocal production that he learned from Master Teacher W. Stephen Smith. Mixed with his own methodology, Joshua not only tackles basic vocal principals, this book also tackles his struggles with the music industry and mental and physical help for singers.

In the winelands of 16th-century Germany, Obsopoeus witnessed the birth of a poisonous new culture of bingeing, hazing, peer pressure, and competitive drinking. Alarmed, and inspired by the Roman poet Ovid's Art of Love, he wrote The Art of Drinking (1536), a how-to manual for drinking with pleasure and discrimination. In How to Drink, Michael Fontaine offers the first proper English translation of Obsopoeus' text, rendering his poetry into spirited, contemporary prose and uncorking a forgotten classic that will appeal to drinkers of all kinds and (legal) ages.