New Releases by Michael Bishop

I''ll tell you what this book isn''t about. It''s not about self-help and I''m not preaching to you. It''s also not for children. " Funk to Funky" is about my life and some people and events that I encountered along the way. I had some realizations like "you can have all the funk in the world and not be funky enough" or " you can''t make this stuff up." All you can do is try to come out the other side of the experience better than you were before. I also took some photos of myself at this time of my life rather than have someone else take them. I took the photos the same day I wrote the text that corresponds to the photo, so I was "in the moment." Funk to Funky is a metaphor for "in to out," "up to down," or "here to there." We all take a journey in life, this is a little bit of mine.

Ben Vautier, Niki De Saint Phalle, François Morellet, Louise Bourgeois, Alexandre Hollan, Claude Viallat, Sophie Calle, Bernard Pagès, Jean-Pierre Pincemin, Annette Messager, Gérard Titus-Carmel: eleven major French artists of the last forty years or so, examined in the light of their uniqueness and their rootedness, the specificities of their differing and at times overlapping plastic practices and the swirling and often highly hybridised conceptions entertained in regard to such practices. Thus does analysis range from discussion of the feisty, Fluxus-inspired, free-spirited funkiness of Ben Vautier’s work to the various modes of transcendence of trauma and haunting fear generated by the exceptional gestures of Niki de Saint Phalle and Louise Bourgeois, to the alyrical formalism yet imbued with irony and ludicity of François Morellet, through to the serene intensities of Alexandre Hollan’s vies silencieuses, the infinite a-signatures of Claude Viallat’s adventure in the sheer joy of a poiein of self-reflexive coloration, the powerfully elegant and muscular disarticulations of Bernard Pagès’ sculpture, the great sweep through art’s history implied by Jean-Pierre Pincemin’s chameleon-like gestures, the vast swirling programme of socio-psychological analysis the arts of Annette Messager and Sophie Calle offer in their radically distinctive manners, the obsessively serialised oeuvre of Gérard Titus-Carmel allowing a burrowing deep into the opaque logic of a real though dubious ‘presence to the world’.

From Smock To Cassock tells the fascinating story of a young boy who makes his career in farming but changes mid-life into the priesthood. Born in 1927, his father''s ill health brings him to London during the Second World War where he experiences the horrors of the Blitz. While he survives the bombings, the end of the war brings the death of his father. This deeply personal loss, combined with a change in family fortunes, results in Michael seeking his own way in the world. He soon finds his passion in farming. Michael gains experience working for a variety of farmers, learning different methods and skills. Ultimately, he is able to acquire his own farm. His life continues to flourish as he marries and starts a family. Sadly tragedy strikes in the form of a disabling injury, which brings an end to this career. Before long, Michael finds himself living in a caravan. Searching for a new purpose, Michael is drawn to the Church. Completing various educational requirements, he achieves ordination into the priesthood. This autobiography details this journey and provides a fascinating story about overcoming the odds, pursuing your dreams and following your heart.

The Endless Theory of Days: The Art and Poetry of Gérard Titus-Carmel seeks to set forth the case for the special, multiple genius of a man who, despite the experience of a biting melancholy resulting from loss, despite an ''indefectible feeling of estrangement from the world'', despite, too, the corrosive sense of art''s, of languages''s, deceptiveness, has never lost sight of a curious duty to the shadows that haunt and that, with now a strangeness that smiles, yet beckon toward ''the very place, finally clarified and recognised, of pure evidence. [The place, ] that is, where beauty is named''. This place, Gérard Titus-Carmel may feel, lies no doubt impossibly beyond the strict locus of his art and his writing, but it is a place he has struggled with dignity and unceasingly deployed energy to bring to a semblance of incarnation in a vast plastic and poetical oeuvre that has stirred, and will continue to stir, the minds and hearts of all those - from Derrida and Bonnefoy, Alain Robbe-Grillet and Pascal Quignard to Jacques Dupin and Marie-Claire Bancquart, and countless others - who have witnessed its exquisitely solemn unfolding over, today, more than forty years.

From the reviews: "Bishop and Schroder (both, Univ. of Nebraska at Omaha) have brought together an impressive group of practitioners in the relatively new application of geographic information science to mountain geomorphology. In doing so, they have produced valuable, first, overall coverage of a high-tech approach to mountain, three-dimensional research. More than 40 contributing authors discuss a wide range of related aspects.... The book is well bound and well produced; each chapter provides an extensive source of references. The numerous line drawings are clearly reproduced, although the mediocre quality of photographic reproduction limits the value of air photographs and satellite images. As is characteristic of many edited collections, there is some variation in chapter quality. Some of the writing is so dense that it requires minute concentration--one chapter, for instance, has 14 pages of references from a total of 43 pages. Nevertheless, this is a vital compendium for a rapidly expanding field of research. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through professionals." (J. D. Ives, Choice, March 2005)

Sonny Peacock comes of age in this poignant tale set in the Kansas heartland of the early 1960s. ''Apartheid, Superstrings, and Mordecai Thubana'' is set in 1980s Pretoria, South Africa, where a black man''s quest for the ''Theory of Everything'' is juxtaposed against the inhumanity of apartheid. In ''Cri de Coeur'', aboard a 21st century generation wheel ship, agrogeologist and poet Dr Abel Gwiazda and his Down''s-syndrome son Dean travel on course for a new home in Epsilon Eridani. In the final novella, ''Death and Designation Among the Asadi'', reprinted here for the first time in 20 years, ethnologist Egan Chaney''s private journals of his studies of the alien Asadi are the centrepiece of the story.

How far would you go to achieve ultimate power and have your every dream fulfilled? Would you steal for it? Would you torture for it? Would you kill for it? For Ramond Jamison these questions are all too real. In a world where he is surrounded by love and goodness, a darker path has revealed itself to him. A path that offers his every fantasy. A path that bestows his every want, and asks for only one thing in return... His soul. The lives he touches along the way will forever be changed. Each victim feels their own unique and distinct pain. A torment that not only causes them great suffering, but affects all those around them. The road that leads Ramond to his every desire is not paved with gold, but instead is formed with the blood and tears of all those who stand in his way. It''s a road of destruction and death, and in the end the one he hurts the most just may be himself. When playing Devil''s advocate is a way of life, be careful what you ask for, it just might get you!

Since its first publication in 1908, generations of adults and children have cherished Kenneth Grahame’s classic,The Wind in the Willows.For in this entrancing, lyrical world of gurgling rivers and whispering reeds live four of the wisest, wittiest, noblest, and most lovable creatures in all literature—Rat, Mole, Badger, and Toad of Toad Hall. Like true adventurers, they glory in life’s simplest pleasures and natural wonders. But it is Toad, cocky and irrepressible in his goggles and overcoat, whose passion for motorcars represents the free and fearless spirit in all of us; just as it’s Toad’s downfall that inspires the others to test Grahame’s most precious theme—the miracle of loyalty and friendship. From the Paperback edition.

Fifteen offbeat tales. They range from the title piece, on a man in the U.S. South who decides to commit harakiri, to God''s Hour, on a TV program hosted by God.

Few teams have enjoyed a more dramatic reversal of football fortunes than Baylor. From its first team in 1899 to the championship teams of the ''20s to Coach Grant Teaff''s revival of the program, Bears Handbook is a celebration of Baylor football.

Contemporary French Women Poetsoffers the first full-length study, divided into two volumes, of a wide range of women''s poetry in France written over the past forty years. Volume I provides a broad Introduction, eight chapters devoted to individual critical assessments of the work of Andrée Chedid, Heather Dohollau, Denise Le Dantec, Janine Mitaud, Jacqueline Risset, Anne Teyssiéras, Esther Tellermann and Marie-Claire Bancquart, followed by a provisional Conclusion and Bibliography. Volume II recentres the overall analysis via a brief Introduction, then proceeds to offer eight more individual critical evaluations of the work of Jeanne Hyvard, Jeannine Baude, Françoise Hàn, Céline Zins, Vénus Khoury-Ghata, Denise Borias, Marie Etienne and Anne-Marie Albiach. An overall Conclusion is then developed, followed by a Bibliography.

Science fiction-roman.

The acclaimed author of No Enemy But Time combines humor, tragedy, and suspense to tell a uniqely American story reminiscent of the film Field of Dreams. When 17-year-old Danny Boles joins a Class C farm club in Georgia, he forms some unusual friendships--but his mind is on making it to the big leagues.

The merchant mariner, naval officer, fisherman & small boatman all make critical decisions based on local weather & ocean conditions. Modern radiofacsimile & satellite technology can now bring accurate, timely weather information to them on a worldwide basis. Correct interpretation of weather charts will lead to increased safety, better fuel efficiency & even to a competitive edge in sailboat racing & commercial fishing. The book has been written to aid the mariner in developing a better understanding of the atmospheric & oceanic processes that are shown on the radiofacsimile weather charts. Examples of the practical applications of weather chart information to typical marine problems are presented in both text & illustrations. In short, this book will give the mariner a better understanding of facsimile weather charts, an increasingly valuable aid to safe, efficient navigation. This informative book has been published by Alden Electronics, Inc. Alden is a premier provider of weather data & information systems, specializing in complete solutions for the meteorological community. Alden continues its nearly five decade tradition of innovative weather data collection, distribution, display & manipulation systems. Customers in more than 120 countries rely on Alden as a dependable, single source supplier of weather data, custom products, commercial products, software, hardware & services. Call or write for information to order: Alden Electronics, Inc., publisher, 40 Washington Street, Westborough, MA 01581. Tel: 508-366-8851; FAX: 508-898-2427.

"Perhaps the most difficult task in undertaking a study of nineteenth-century French poetry would be the selection of poets to study: who among us would care to choose only one from among Mallarme, Vigny, Hugo - and literally dozens of others - who so thoroughly and powerfully interpreted, shaped, and challenged the art forever more? Author Michael Bishop, charged with that forbidding duty, has concentrated his study on ten central figures of that century: Desbordes-Valmore, Lamartine, Vigny, Baudelaire, Hugo, Mallarme, Verlaine, Rimbaud, Laforgue, and Lautreamont. And while the list of subjects is compact, Bishop''s intense critical and personal analysis of th ese extraordinary giants is astounding. Not only has he delved deeply into the complex structure of each of these ten poetic oeuvres, but in so doing has introduced to the discussion a number of those poets seemingly excluded from the book. Indeed, his thoughts on Nerval, Gautier, and others are frequently as perspicacious and comprehensive as those put forth in works devoted solely to those poets." "In examining the clearest and most distinct voices of nineteenth-century French poetry, Bishop has shrewdly probed a tradition, come to terms with modern criticisms, imparted truly fresh details of coherence resulting from intimate and informed readings, and joined hands across the ages - all the while preserving (and occasionally solidifying) the exquisite, individual integrity of particular oeuvres. As he canvasses the charm and strength of Desbordes-Valmore''s unaltered passion, Baudelaire''s unsurpassed powers of versification, the stunning descriptive-narrative specificity of Hugo''s lexicon, or the interplay of fiction and reality in Mallarme, Bishop constantly reflects the teeming fascinations and elan of the poets themselves."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved