Loud: Accept Nothing Less Than the Life You Deserve

Drew Afualo

Drew Afualo is best known as the internet’s 'Crusader for Women' and is at the head of a new generation of entertainment’s rising stars, with more than nine million followers across her social platforms. She soon realized that men on social media were creating sexist content aimed at disparaging women, and also containing rampant fatphobia, racism, and other forms of bigotry with very real-life consequences. It didn’t take long for her to step into the role of unofficial watchdog for misogyny, and her signature laugh is now recognized as a feminist call to arms.Loud is part manual, part manifesto, and part memoir. It is a summoning cry to rid the internet (and our hearts, minds, and lives) of 'terrible men' and create a space to fight outdated patriarchal ideals. Above all, it makes it clear that behind Drew’s fearsome laugh is a mission and a life philosophy, a strategy for self-confidence from the inside out, and a pathway to once and for all remove men from the centre of how women and fems think about themselves.

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Life on the Bridge: Linking My World to Yours as an Autistic Therapist – A Practical Insider's Guide to Autism and Communication

Kaelynn Partlow

You've heard from autistic authors. You've heard from therapists. Now hear from one extraordinary young woman who's both. Experience autism from the inside out through a rare fusion of professional skill and personal understanding. Reshape what you know about the autism spectrum and increase your ability to give support. Varied perspectives among autistic individuals, their families, and professionals have often been difficult to reconcile. Now, you can bridge that divide with guidance from someone who’s lived in multiple worlds. Find immediate, actionable options to build connections, foster communication, navigate challenges, and enhance interactions. SPECIFIC CONTENT: Part One, AUTISM BASICS, focuses on the definition of autism, what autism is not, and an overview of implications across the spectrum of neurodivergence. Part Two, COMMUNICATION, discusses effective communication with autistic people, reducing ambiguity, increasing specific content, parent tools for encouraging conversation, relying on verbs, how “Plain Language” helps, when to wait instead of speaking, and the overlooked power of writing to support verbal interaction. Part Three, BEHAVIOR, talks about the logistics of meltdowns and how to handle, cause and effects of stimming and perseveration; recognizing the basis of sensory distortion; outside help and self-advocacy for sensory seekers and sensory avoiders;, Theory of Mind and autistic people’s ability to “read rooms”; reconsidering the value of special interests; all or nothing perspective of “big feelings”; why eye contact can be hard and how to cope; and masking. Part Four, INTERACTIONS, features the truth and implications of loneliness; innate versus learned social skills; the hidden rules causing social complications; encouraging independence; challenges with executive function; a collaborative approach to goal setting; and understanding disability accommodations. Part Five, COMMON QUESTIONS, addresses the practical reality of DSM-5’s “Diagnostic Levels”; the why and how of therapy for autism; the value of Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA); and routes to autism advocacy. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Following her appearance on the Netflix series Love on the Spectrum, author Kaelynn Partlow, RBT, amplified her social media reach, establishing herself as an influential voice in autism understanding and actionable advocacy. Over almost ten years providing clinical autism services, she has worked with clients spanning different ages and vastly differing levels of ability. Partlow lives in South Carolina with two supportive roommates and her Labrador, Finn.

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Ice Bound: A Doctor's Incredible Battle For Survival at the South Pole

Jerri Nielsen

A physician stranded at a South Pole research station describes how she discovered a lump in her breast, treated herself with a biopsy and chemotherapy, and was rescued by the Air National Guard during a daring mission to Antarctica and reflects on the meaning of her experience and the dedication and support of her colleagues. Reprint. 150,000 first printing.

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Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on The Decision Not To Have Kids

Meghan Daum

Sixteen Literary Luminaries On The Controversial Subject Of Being Childless By Choice, Collected In One Fascinating Anthology One of the main topics of cultural conversation during the last decade was the supposed "fertility crisis," and whether modern women could figure out a way to way to have it all--a successful, demanding career and the required 2.3 children--before their biological clock stopped ticking. Now, however, conversation has turned to whether it's necessary to have it all or, perhaps more controversial, whether children are really a requirement for a fulfilling life. The idea that some women and men prefer not to have children is often met with sharp criticism and incredulity by the public and mainstream media. In this provocative and controversial collection of essays, curated by writer Meghan Daum, sixteen acclaimed writers explain why they have chosen to eschew parenthood. Contributors Lionel Shriver, Sigrid Nunez, Kate Christiensen, Elliott Holt, Geoff Dyer, and Tim Kreider, among others, offer a unique perspective on the overwhelming cultural pressure of parenthood. Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed makes a thoughtful and passionate case for why parenthood is not the only path in life, taking our parent-centric, kid-fixated, baby-bump-patrolling culture to task in the process. What emerges is a more nuanced, diverse view of what it means to live a full, satisfying life.

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What I Was Doing While You Were Breeding

Kristin Newman

Kristin Newman spent much of her twenties and thirties buying dresses to wear to her friends' weddings and baby showers. Not ready to settle down and in need of an escape from her fast-paced job as a sitcom writer, Kristin instead traveled the world, often alone, for several weeks each year. In addition to falling madly in love with the planet, Kristin fell for many attractive locals, men who could provide the emotional connection she wanted without costing her the freedom she desperately needed. Kristin introduces readers to the Israeli bartenders, Finnish poker players, sexy Bedouins, and Argentinean priests who helped her transform into "Kristin-Adjacent" on the road–a slower, softer, and, yes, sluttier version of herself at home.

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The Ambition Decisions: What Women Know About Work, Family, and the Path to Building a Life

Hana Schank

A big idea self-help book about the decisions that shape women's lives, in the vein of Designing Your Life What happens to women's ambition in the years after college? The essays which were the catalyst for this book began as a series for the Atlantic, a project between two friends who had attended Northwestern University together in the early 1990s. What became of all the brilliant, hardworking women from their college days, they wondered as they shared work and family woes and triumphs over a glass of wine one evening. What did life look like for other midcareer, midlife women? The data Schank and Wallace culled from the group of women they interviewed--over forty of them in all--revealed a surprisingly clear road map, with consistencies and pitfalls the authors hadn't expected to find. The women fell into one of three categories: high achievers, those who were scaling back, and those who'd opted out. But, most important, no one woman stuck to a single track in the twenty-five years since graduation. Our culture and the popular media might seek to pin women into boxes, but real life is in fact more fluid. Those common moments of transition, crisis, and achievement reaped rich insights and strategies. Tackling topics like the changing meaning of ambition, the near-lethal combination of modern parenting and a 24/7 work culture, and what sexism in the workplace does and doesn't look like, the issues here are perennially topical. A love letter to a new generation of working women or anyone at a crossroads, from women who set out to rule the world and stumbled into various permutations of their best lives, The Ambition Decisions pinpoints the variables that push women toward making big decisions, and make those decisions easier.

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Motherhood

Sheila Heti

From the author of How Should a Person Be? (“one of the most talked-about books of the year”—Time Magazine) and the New York Times Bestseller Women in Clothes comes a daring novel about whether to have children. In Motherhood, Sheila Heti asks what is gained and what is lost when a woman becomes a mother, treating the most consequential decision of early adulthood with the candor, originality, and humor that have won Heti international acclaim and made How Should A Person Be? required reading for a generation. In her late thirties, when her friends are asking when they will become mothers, the narrator of Heti’s intimate and urgent novel considers whether she will do so at all. In a narrative spanning several years, casting among the influence of her peers, partner, and her duties to her forbearers, she struggles to make a wise and moral choice. After seeking guidance from philosophy, her body, mysticism, and chance, she discovers her answer much closer to home. Motherhood is a courageous, keenly felt, and starkly original novel that will surely spark lively conversations about womanhood, parenthood, and about how—and for whom—to live.

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The Baby Decision: How to Make the Most Important Choice of Your Life

Merle Bombardieri

“A Warmly Empathic, Wide-Ranging Manual” – Kirkus Reviews"This valuable unbiased book skillfully shows readers how to stop fretting over the choice and take time to make the right one. –Blue Ink Starred Review and Notable BookFeatured in The Washington Post and The New York TimesBaby or Childfree? Which will it Be?Is this decision keeping you up at night? Do you feel terrified you will regret your decision? Are you paralyzed by this high-stakes choice? Now you can get off the fence and get on with your life. Imagine your relief when you discover the right choice and break free from obsession. Picture yourself enjoying the pleasures of parenthood or the freedom and spontaneity of living childfree. The Baby Decision is a powerful, unbiased guidebook by a professional coach/psychotherapist who has specialized in the topic for forty years. With wisdom, depth and humor Merle will help you take this overwhelming decision and break it down into a digestible sequence of five steps. During this discovery process you Dissolve fear and doubt.Use thirty visualization exercises and thought experiments to uncover your answer.Have deep talks with your partner, even if you disagree.Resist pressures from family and friends, and fully consider the rewards of the childfree choice.Learn the latest on one-child families, single, LGBTQI+ and older parents, fertility and adoption.Steal a few benefits from the opposite choice.Merle Bombardieri, MSW, LICSW is a psychotherapist, coach and workshop leader. Although she enjoyed raising her daughters, she has been a childfree advocate since 1978. She has contributed to Our Bodies Ourselves, The Boston Globe Magazine, Glamour, Self and Brides and has appeared on national news, talk show, and documentaries. Please see her Author Page for more information and to visit her blog for free advice and resources. Discover your personal answer to the baby question. Click “Play” on the Audible sample or “Look Inside” to preview the book.

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Tombs: Junji Ito Story Collection

Junji Ito

FRESH NIGHTMARES BROUGHT TO YOU BY HORROR MASTER JUNJI ITO. Countless tombstones stand in rows, forming a bizarre town. What fate awaits a brother and sister after a traffic accident in this town of the dead? In another tale, a girl falls silent, her tongue transformed into a slug. Can a friend save her? Then, when a young man moves to a new town, he finds the house next door has only a single window. What does his grotesque neighbor want, calling out to him every evening from that lone window?

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Kirby Manga Mania, Vol. 1

Hirokazu Hikawa

Jump into Dream Land with Kirby and gobble up some fun! Everyone’s favorite pink puff teams up with his friends to keep arch-frenemy King Dedede in line. Fans of all ages can enjoy this collection of classic Kirby comics—just take a deep breath and hop on in!

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Bunny

Mona Awad

Samantha Heather Mackey couldn't be more of an outsider in her small, highly selective MFA program at New England's Warren University. A scholarship student who prefers the company of her dark imagination to that of most people, she is utterly repelled by the rest of her fiction writing cohort--a clique of unbearably twee rich girls who call each other "Bunny," and seem to move and speak as one. But everything changes when Samantha receives an invitation to the Bunnies' fabled "Smut Salon," and finds herself inexplicably drawn to their front door--ditching her only friend, Ava, in the process. As Samantha plunges deeper and deeper into the Bunnies' sinister yet saccharine world, beginning to take part in the ritualistic off-campus "Workshop" where they conjure their monstrous creations, the edges of reality begin to blur. Soon, her friendships with Ava and the Bunnies will be brought into deadly collision. The spellbinding new novel from one of our most fearless chroniclers of the female experience, Bunny is a down-the-rabbit-hole tale of loneliness and belonging, friendship and desire, and the fantastic and terrible power of the imagination.

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The Gotham Grammarian

Garielle Lutz

Literary Nonfiction. The most brilliant writers occasionally stumble with grammar and punctuation, and the rest of us can learn from their missteps. THE GOTHAM GRAMMARIAN is a book of rules and guidelines for anyone who believes that correctness and precision still matter. The book discusses the ninety-five errors that most often go undetected by stellar writers, as well as by editors, copy editors, and proofreaders.

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