A powerful, breathtaking memoir about a young man's descent into madness, and how running saved his life. “Voluntary or involuntary?” Asked the nurse who admitted Thompson to a San Francisco psychiatric hospital in January 2005. For years, Thompson had been tortured by his mind. First there was depression, then ineffective but highly addictive medication, and finally therapy, where he fell further into an inescapable darkness. After a suicide attempt, he spent weeks confined on the psych ward, feeling alone and trapped. One afternoon, during an exercise break on the hospital rooftop basketball court, he experienced a sudden urge. Run, I thought. Run before it’s too late and you’re stuck down here. Right now. Run.      The impulse that starts with sprints across a hospital rooftop turns into all-night runs in the  mountains. Through motion and immersion in the perfection of nature, Thompson finds a way out of the hell of depression and drug addiction. Step by step, mile by mile, his body and mind heal. In this lyrical, vulnerable, and breath-taking debut memoir, J.M. Thompson, now a successful psychologist, retraces the path that led him from despair to wellness, detailing the chilling childhood trauma that caused his mind to snap and sink, and the unorthodox treatment that finally saved him. Running Is A Kind Of Dreaming is a luminous literary testament to the universal human capacity to recover from our deepest wounds.

HUMANITY IS THE DEVIL is a deconstructed nightmare mixing David Lynch and snuff movies. The plot revolves around a central character, Seth, who is set about a crusade against humanity which, for him, represents pure evil. Through random killings he and his cronies try to accelerate the end of the world, in order to provoke and defeat the Demiurge, the false God that is ruling the earth. As in Burroughs, logical language is replaced here with cut-scenes – sometimes to be taken literally – that plunge the reader into an extreme experience. Both incredibly morbid and enthralling, HITD is a masterpiece of moral darkness and existentialist reflection upon our comfortable religion and morals.

Find yourself on a starship as it lumbers across the desert. Find yourself on a train looking out at the stars, the earth a blue marble in the infinite black abyss behind you. Find yourself overdosing on narcotics in a bathtub at home. The Red Planet. Pharmaceuticals. The Demiurge. Assassins. Suicide bombers. Underground railroads between worlds. What mysteries link them? Pull back the veil and see. In Beyond the Great, Bloody, Bruised and Silent Veil of this World author Jordan Krall creates a wholly unique experience; all at once revelatory, hypnotic, and hallucinatory. All literal, all parable, all a twisted drug-trip. So read on and know this; it's all true, and it's all in your head.

GORGONAEON, one in a proposed cycle of several books, is a fragmentary and hallucinogenic reading experience. Frequent shifts in time and perspective imbue this book with an atmosphere of paranoia and dread, but an optimistic and magical aura can be exhumed from Krall’s alchemical wordplay as well. The bizarre mages are poetically stitched to an odd narrative about mental and moral disintegration to create a curious doubling effect. Gorgonaeon is a challenging yet rewarding read that will appeal to fans of grotesque surrealism. PRAISE FOR JORDAN KRALL "Jordan Krall is one of the best of the next generation of writers looking askance at modern life and able to chart its absurdities and its dangers. His books conjure up uncomfortable visions with a lucid and alienating gaze." - Jeff Vandermeer, award-winning author of THE SOUTHERN REACH TRILOGY "A dark maze of the soul and mirror eyes that horror at its mythological best.” Seb Doubinsky, Author of OMEGA GRAY and GOODBYE BABYLON

A major source for the BBC drama The ReckoningWinner of the 2015 Gordon Burn Prize and the 2015 CWA Non-Fiction DaggerShortlisted for the Orwell Prize and the James Tait Black PrizeDan Davies has spent more than a decade on a quest to find the real Jimmy Savile, and interviewed him extensively over a period of seven years before his death. In the course of his quest, he spent days and nights at a time quizzing Savile at his homes in Leeds and Scarborough, lunched with him at venues ranging from humble transport cafes to the Athenaeum club in London and, most memorably, joined him for a short cruise aboard the QE2. Dan thought his quest had come to an end in October 2011 when Savile's golden coffin was lowered into a grave dug at a 45-degree angle in a Scarborough cemetery. He was wrong. In the last two and a half years, Dan has been interviewing scores of people, many of them unobtainable while Jimmy was alive. What he has discovered was that his instincts were right all along and behind the mask lay a hideous truth. Jimmy Savile was not only complex, damaged and controlling, but cynical, calculating and predatory. He revelled in his status as a Pied Piper of youth and used his power to abuse the vulnerable and underage, all the while covering his tracks by moving into the innermost circles of the establishment.

This book is concerned with the notion of the "stranger" -the foreigner, outsider, or alien in a country and society not their own- as well as the notion of strangeness within the self -a person's deep sense of being, as distinct from outside appearance and their conscious idea of self. Kristeva begins with the personal and moves outward by examining world literature and philosophy. She discusses the foreigner in Greek tragedy, in the Bible, and in the literature of the Middle Ages, Renaissance, Enlightenment, and the twentieth century. She discusses the legal status of foreigners throughout history, gaining perspective on our own civilization. Her insights into the problems of nationality, particularly in France, are more timely and relevant in an increasingly integrated and fractious world.

In Black Sun, Julia Kristeva addresses the subject of melancholia, examining this phenomenon in the context of art, literature, philosophy, the history of religion, and culture, as well as psychoanalysis. She describes the depressive as one who perceives the sense of self as a crucial pursuit and a nearly unattainable goal and explains how the love of a lost identity of attachment lies at the very core of depression's dark heart. In her discussion she analyzes Holbein's controversial 1522 painting "The Body of the Dead Christ in the Tomb," and has revealing comments on the works of Marguerite Duras, Dostoyevsky and Nerval. Black Sun takes the view that depression is a discourse with a language to be learned, rather than just strictly a pathology to be treated.

"Kristeva is one of the leading voices in contemporary French criticism, on a par with such names as Genette, Foucault, Greimas and others. . . Powers of Horror is an excellent introduction to an aspect of contemporary French literature which has been allowed to become somewhat neglected in the current emphasis on paraphilosophical modes of discourse. The sections on Céline, for example, are indispensable reading for those interested in this writer and place him within a context that is both illuminating and of general interest." -Paul de Man

Twenty-five years after her classic On Photography, Susan Sontag returns to the subject of visual representations of war and violence in our culture today. How does the spectacle of the sufferings of others (via television or newspapers) affect us? Are viewers inured--or incited--to violence by the depiction of cruelty? In Regarding the Pain of Others, Sontag takes a fresh look at the representation of atrocity--from Goya's The Disasters of War to photographs of the American Civil War, lynchings of blacks in the South, and the Nazi death camps, to contemporary horrific images of Bosnia, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Israel and Palestine, and New York City on September 11, 2001. In Regarding the Pain of Others Susan Sontag once again changes the way we think about the uses and meanings of images in our world, and offers an important reflection about how war itself is waged (and understood) in our time. Features an analysis of our numbed response to images of horror. This title alters our thinking about the uses and meanings of images, and about the nature of war, the limits of sympathy, and the obligations of conscience.

Paul Robeson was an actor and performer, a champion athlete, a committed communist, a brilliant speaker, and a passionate activist for social justice in America, Europe, and Australia. Hailed as the most famous African American of his time, he sang with a voice that left audiences weeping, and, for a period, had the entire world at his feet – and then lost everything for the sake of his principles. Robeson’s storied life took him from North Carolina plantations to Hollywood; from the glittering stages of London to the coal-mining towns of Wales; from the violent frontiers of the Spanish Civil War to bleak prison cells in the Soviet Union; from Harlem’s jazz-infused neighbourhoods to the courtroom of the McCarthy hearings. Yet privately Robeson was a troubled figure, burdened by his role as a symbol for the African American people and an international advocate for the working class. His tragedy was to battle ambition and uncertainty, ultimately clinging to his beliefs even as the world changed around him. As optimistic ideals of communism turned to repression under the Cold War, his public decline mirrored that of the world around him. Today Robeson is largely unknown, a figure lost to footnotes and grainy archival footage. But his life, which followed the currents of the twentieth century, reveals how the traumas of the past still shape the present. Jeff Sparrow follows the ghosts and echoes of Robeson’s career, tracing his path through countries and decades, to explore the contemporary resonances of his politics and passions. From Black Lives Matter to Putin’s United Russia, Sparrow explores questions of race and representation in America, political freedom in Moscow, and the legacy of fascism and communism in Europe. Weaving travelogue with biography, In Search of Paul Robeson is a story of political ardour, heritage, and trauma — a luminous portrait of a man and an urgent reflection on the politics that define us today.

A stunning biography of "pure self-interest and cruelty, tempered only slightly by the great musical achievements of Mr. Spector's golden age in the early 1960s" ( The New York Times ). He had a number one hit at eighteen. He was a millionaire with his own record label at twenty-two. He was, according to Tom Wolfe, “the first tycoon of teen.” Phil Spector owned pop music. From the Crystals, the Ronettes (whose lead singer, Ronnie, would become his second wife), and the Righteous Brothers to the Beatles (together and singly) and finally the seventies punk icons The Ramones, Spector produced hit after hit. But then he became pop music's most famous recluse. Until one day in the spring of 2007, when his name hit the tabloids, connected to a horrible crime.  In this “bruising portrait of legendary music producer Phil Spector” ( Entertainment Weekly ) ,  the last journalist to interview him before his arrest tells the full story of the troubled genius.

When we heard that a political refugee had been killed in London by an assassin using an umbrella gun, we wondered what was behind it. This book is the story, and Georgi Markov was the refugee. He was a member of Bulgaria's ruling elite, and moved in the highest circles. When he wrote his memoirs, not complimentary, his life was forfeit. His cosmopolitan scholarship, world-class wit, and devastating revelations about the workings of Bulgaria's puppet regime make this a rollicking and astonishing read. The umbrella-gun assassination is the least of it.

Winner of the Sidewise Award for Alternate History: Nineteen-forties Hollywood is dazzlingly transformed and recreated in this alternate history fantasy noir about former screen actor–turned–private eye Clark Gable who investigates a deadly conspiracy in a neo-fascist Tinsel Town In a different 1940, with Europe in flames and an anti-Semitic America creeping towards fascism, movie making has been revolutionized: A wondrous technological advancement made possible by the discovery of the Bechmeir field now transmits actors’ emotions directly into the minds of the audience—effectively ending the acting career of a cynical loner named Clark Gable. No longer a handsome screen idol, Clark now makes his living as an unlicensed matrimonial private eye. When gorgeous April Lamotte contacts the low-rent gumshoe, he sees a golden opportunity to make some quick and easy cash. All he has to do is impersonate April’s wealthy,reclusive screenwriter husband, sign a contract for a new biopic, and then slip back into the shadows. But when someone tries to assassinate Clark and pass it off as a suicide, he realizes he’s gotten too deep into something deadly. And as more and more of the Hollywood elite start turning up dead, Clark must race to uncover the shocking truth behind the Bechmeir field’s origins, and expose a terrible secret that someone’s all too willing to kill for.

In a society where lies are law, a simple act of honesty can become the ultimate rebellion. When does silent compliance with an oppressive regime become unbearable? For Charlie Simpkins, the manager of a small vegetable shop in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley, part of the West Coast People’s Democratic Republic, the breaking point comes when he is asked to display a meaningless propaganda poster in his shop window. It is a seemingly insignificant act in a lifetime of obedience. But Charlie just can’t bring himself to doing it. This minor act of defiance, however, show too much independent thinking on Charlie’s part, setting off a chain of escalating consequences for Charlie and his wife and two children. Powerless is a haunting dystopian tale of how even the smallest act of defiance can spiral into disaster in a society that demands total conformity. It serves as a chilling reminder of how easily standing up for one’s principles can lead to crushing consequences, erringly echoing the challenges we face today for speaking our truth, even in societies that claim to uphold freedom.

Reconsidering the power of anger as a positive and necessary tool for achieving spiritual liberation and social change.For many Buddhists, anger is often thought of as a root cause for suffering and lasting, negative repercussions. In American culture at large, anger--particularly among people of color--is delegitimized, demonized, or "supposed to be" suppressed. Social activist and Kagyu lama Rod Owens offers a different understanding. For Owens, the coauthor of Radical Dharma, anger is one of the most important aspects of his personal identity as a Buddhist, social activist, African American, and gay man. Anger serves as a bodyguard for our personal pain and suffering. When recognized and handled with attention, love, and compassion, it can be a powerful mobilizing factor in our solidarity and commitment to enacting social change. However, too many activist communities have an ill-informed, immature, and romanticized relationship to it. What is needed, says Owens, is a relationship to the heartbreak of anger that is embodied, nondestructive, and deeply healing for all. Here he offers personal insights, stories from others, as well as Buddhist teachings and meditations for tapping into anger's liberating potential.

One part intellectual and one part private eye, Ron Rosenbaum takes readers into "the secret parts" of the great mysteries, controversies, and enigmas of our time, including: * the occult rituals of Skull and Bones, the legendary Yale secret society that has produced spies and presidents, including George Bush and George W. Bush. * the Secrets of the Little Blue Box, the classic story of "Captain Crunch" and the birth of hacker culture. * the "unorthodox" cancer-cure clinics of Tijuana. * the Great Ivy League Nude Posture Photo Scandal. * the unsolved murder of JFK's mistress. * Also including sharp, funny cultural critiques that range from Elvis to Elisabeth KÜbler-Ross, Bill Gates to Oliver Stone, and J.D. Salinger to the Zagat® guide, The Secret Parts of Fortune is a vital record of American culture.