Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

Reyes is a man possessed. Bound by the demon of pain, he is forbidden to know pleasure. Yet he craves a mortal woman, Danika Ford, more than breath and will do anything to claim her—even defy the gods. Danika is on the run. For months she's eluded the Lords of the Underworld, immortal warriors who won't rest until she and her family have been destroyed. But her dreams are haunted by Reyes, the warrior whose... (more)

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How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed

by Jared Diamond

In his runaway bestseller Guns, Germs, and Steel , Jared Diamond brilliantly examined the circumstances that allowed Western civilizations to dominate much of the world. Now he probes the other side of the equation: What caused some of the great civilizations of the past to fall into ruin, and what can we learn from their fates? Using a vast historical and geographical perspective ranging from Easter Island... (more)

Eat, Pray, Love

One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia

by Elizabeth Gilbert

This beautifully written, heartfelt memoir touched a nerve among both readers and reviewers. Elizabeth Gilbert tells how she made the difficult choice to leave behind all the trappings of modern American success (marriage, house in the country, career) and find, instead, what she truly wanted from life. Setting out for a year to study three different aspects of her nature amid three different cultures,... (more)

Little Women

or, Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy

by Louisa May Alcott

Little Women is one of the best loved books of all time. Lovely Meg, talented Jo, frail Beth, spoiled Amy: these are hard lessons of poverty and of growing up in New England during the Civil War. Through their dreams, plays, pranks, letters, illnesses, and courtships, women of all ages have become a part of this remarkable family and have felt the deep sadness when Meg leaves the circle of sisters to be... (more)

The Cheese Monkeys: A Novel in Two Semesters

The Cheese Monkeys: A Novel in Two Semesters

by Chip Kidd

From People Who Liked It "It is rare for a book to produce uncontrollable laughter as loud as this one did. The narrator is at art college in the 1950s, and after failing to get the courses he wants, finds himself attending 'Introduction to Graphic Design,' taught by the inspiring, sadistic, and compelling Professor Winter Sorbeck. Through humiliation and excess he shows his naive young charges how to see the... (more)

The Very Persistent Gappers of Frip

by George Saunders

Three families live in the seaside village of Frip — the Romos, the Ronsens, and a little girl named Capable and her widowed father. The townspeople of Frip make their living raising goats, but they must fight off a daily invasion of gappers, bright orange, many-eyed creatures that cover goats and stop them from giving milk. When the gappers target Capable's goats, the Romos and the Ronsens turn their backs on the... (more)

Push.

by Sapphire

Relentless, remorseless, and inspirational, this "horrific, hope-filled story" ( Newsday ) is certain to haunt a generation of readers. Precious Jones, 16-years old and pregnant by her father with her second child, meets a determined and highly radical teacher who takes her on a journey of transformation and redemption.

On the Run

by Iris Johansen

For eight years, single mother Grace Archer has been living a picture-perfect life raising her daughter on a horse farm in the small town of Tallanville, Alabama. Watching Frankie grow into a talented and confident young girl has made Grace as happy as any mother could hope to be. Happy enough, even, to forget the past. But the past never quite goes away. Which is why a certain charismatic man also moved to... (more)

The Cannabis Grow Bible: The Definitive Guide to Growing Marijuana for Recreational and Medical Use

The Cannabis Grow Bible: The Definitive Guide to Growing Marijuana for Recreational and Medical Use

by Greg Green

This guide offers methods for growers who want to maximize the yield and potency of their crop. It explains the "Screen of Green" technique that gives a higher yield using fewer plants, an important development for American growers who, if caught, are penalized according to number of plants. The Cannabis Grow Bible is an authoritative source that features almost 200 color and black-and-white photographs, charts,... (more)

The Hedonism Handbook: Mastering the Lost Arts of Leisure and Pleasure

The Hedonism Handbook: Mastering the Lost Arts of Leisure and Pleasure

by Michael Flocker

By the best-selling author of The Metrosexual Guide to Style , an amusing tour of vice and its virtues and the anti-self help book of all time. In the age of Oprah, Dr. Phil, and countless other self-help disciplinarians, indulging in any kind of pleasurable pastime is on the brink of extinction. But it's not too late to revive those lost pleasures that make life worth living. The Hedonism Handbook can help put... (more)

Evelina (Broadview Literary Texts)

by Fanny Burney

Frances Burney (1752-1840) is often remembered for her connections with such eighteenth-century figures as Johnson, Burke, Reynolds, Garrick, and Mrs. Thrale. She was famous in her own day, however, for her literary oeuvre, and her reputation was established largely on the grounds of her first novel, Evelina. Published anonymously in 1778, it is an epistolary account of a sheltered, orphaned young woman’s entrance... (more)

Wikinomics

How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything

by Don Tapscott, Anthony D. Williams

In just the last few years, traditional collaboration—in a meeting room, a conference call, even a convention center—has been superseded by collaborations on an astronomical scale. Today, encyclopedias, jetliners, operating systems, mutual funds, and many other items are being created by teams numbering in the thousands or even millions. While some leaders fear the heaving growth of these massive... (more)

McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader (McGuffey's Readers)

McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader (McGuffey's Readers)

by William Holmes McGuffey

Since 1836, children have been delighted by these volumes filled with exotic adventures, exciting stories, beautiful poems, and funny fables. The Fourth Eclectic Reader includes "Try, Try Again," "Robinson Crusoe's House," and "The Wreck of the Hesperus."

Eat Mangoes Naked: Finding Pleasure Everywhere (and dancing with the Pits)

Eat Mangoes Naked: Finding Pleasure Everywhere (and dancing with the Pits)

by Sark

This book is your traveling pleasure companion. I want to remind you to seek out pleasure and lightly scoop it up! It is also a guide to finding pleasure in all of the difficult places: during illness, at the periodontist, facing our aging and mortality... I share my explorations into pleasure, and the places I get lost. Let's magnify our pleasures together, no matter what else is happening in our lives.

The Perfect Egg

by Aldo Buzzi

A witty and erudite little book about the joys of food, with line drawings by New Yorker artist Saul Steinberg. “The writer who never talks about eating, about appetite, hunger, food, about cooks and meals, arouses my suspicion, as though some vital element were missing in him.” Scholarly, playful, idiosyncratic, and witty, Aldo Buzzi’s The Perfect Egg is an excursion into the food that has obsessed,... (more)

King-Maxwell: Book 3

Simple Genius

by David Baldacci

David Baldacci's much-loved protagonists Sean King and Michelle Maxwell are having trouble adjusting to life in the wake of the terrible events that drove them to the brink in HOUR GAME. Dogged by hidden demons from her past, then almost killed in a barroom brawl, Michelle agrees to try therapy at a mental-health facility, where she simultaneously busts a criminal drug-dealing ring! Meanwhile, to... (more)

The Friday Night Knitting Club

by Kate Jacobs

A charming and moving novel about female friendship and the experiences that knit us together-even when we least expect it. Walker and Daughter is Georgia Walker's little yarn shop, tucked into a quiet storefront on Manhattan's Upper West Side. The Friday Night Knitting Club was started by some of Georgia's regulars, who gather once a week to work on their latest projects and to chat-and occasionally... (more)

Becoming Jane: The Wit and Wisdom of Jane Austen

Becoming Jane: The Wit and Wisdom of Jane Austen

by Jane Austen

Inspired by Becoming Jane , the romantic film that could only make you want to know more about Jane Austen, here is a delightful collection of some of her most famous and quotable quotes -- pearls of wit and wisdom on topics like family, the sexes, friends, money, marriage, and of course love -- that are as true today as they were in Austen's time. Jane Austen on Marriage: "My being charming, Harriet, is... (more)

A Dying Art II

by Julie Powell

Julie Powell thought cooking her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking was the craziest thing she'd ever do--until she embarked on the voyage recounted in her new memoir, CLEAVING. Her marriage challenged by an insane, irresistible love affair, Julie decides to leave town and immerse herself in a new obsession: butchery. She finds her way to Fleischer's, a butcher shop where she buries... (more)

Love, Pleasure and Pain

by Corlis; Martin

Love, Pleasure and Pain is a unique collection of erotic stories that are sure to titillate the most discriminating of sexual palates. Blending the three elements as a main theme for each story, gives a range of every aspect of love and pleasure, from shocking to downright freaky. Once you experience the world of Corlis you'll truly understand that unfortunately, sometimes along with love there is pain.

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Tags: pleasure

by Gena Showalter