The classic USDA handbook to self-reliant living, now completely revised and updated.

In fifteen sharply engaging essays, acclaimed novelist and short story writer Brock Clarke examines the art (and artifice) of fiction from unpredictable, entertaining, and often personal angles, positing through a slant scrutiny of place, voice, and syntax what fiction can--and can't--do. ("Very: is there a weaker, sadder, more futile word in the English language?") Clarke supports his case with passages by and about writers who have both influenced and irritated him. Pieces such as "What the Cold Can Teach Us," "The Case for Meanness," "Why Good Literature Makes Us Bad People," and "The Novel is Dead; Long Live the Novel" celebrate the achievements of master practitioners such as Muriel Spark, Joy Williams, Donald Barthelme, Flannery O'Connor, Paul Beatty, George Saunders, John Cheever, and Colson Whitehead. Of particular interest to Clarke is the contentious divide between fiction and memoir, which he investigates using recent and relevant critical arguments, also tackling ancillary forms such as "fictional memoir" and the autobiographical novel. Anecdotal and unabashed, rigorous and piercingly perceptive--not to mention flat-out funny--I, Grape; or The Case for Fiction is a love letter to and a passionate defense of the discipline to which its author has devoted his life and mind. It is also an attempt to eff the ineffable: "That is one of the basic tenets of this book: when we write fiction, surprising things sometimes happen, especially when fiction writers take advantage of their chosen form's contrarian ability to surprise."

The worst thing possible has happened. Richard and Juliette Willoughby's son, Ewan, has died suddenly at the age of five. Starve Acre, their house by the moors, was to be full of life, but is now a haunted place. Juliette, convinced Ewan still lives there in some form, seeks the help of the Beacons, a seemingly benevolent group of occultists. Richard, to try and keep the boy out of his mind, has turned his attention to the field opposite the house, where he patiently digs the barren dirt in search of a legendary oak tree. Starve Acre is a devastating new novel by the author of the prize-winning bestseller The Loney. It is a novel about the way in which grief splits the world in two and how, in searching for hope, we can so easily unearth horror.

In this Western series debut,Fort Worth is the deadliest place on the Texas frontier. Good thing the new sheriff isn’t afraid to die—or kill. “Stay the hell out of Fort Worth.” Those were the last words uttered by the boomtown’s last sheriff. Rail-thin and half starved, desperate cowpuncher Jess Casey ignores the travel advice. Instead, Casey not only enters Fort Worth, he takes the dead man’s job. Now it’s up to him to keep the peace in a body-riddled slice of heaven known as Hell’s Half Acre—home of notorious outlaws like Kurt Koenig and his merciless gang. For Koenig, the only good lawman is a dead one, and he puts a pretty price on Casey’s head. For Casey, that means war. Against him are the frontier’s fastest draw and a host of murderous triggers. On his side are decades of rock-hard Texas living, a couple of ne’er-do-well deputies, and the good sense to do all his talking behind the barrel of a fast-blazing gun . . .

A passport to freedom that shows how to find fun, food, shelter, and income on land that may be within easy-driving distance of the city and suburbs. Why work a lifetime, asks Angier, to accumulate enough money to retire from the rat race during the last, least active years of life, when a little ground can provide healthful, relaxed living—now—and income too? One Acre and Security explains how “three-squares-a-day” and money to spend can come from the earth with instructions on: sheep or pig farming, raising bees for honey, keeping dairy herbs of cows or goats, making money with herb culture, raising and selling rabbits and earthworms, running a poultry farm, raising fish, frogs, and turtles for profit and fun. Angier, the man who has done it all himself, shares too what he has learned about some of the ways to eat from nature’s free banquet table, how to stretch country-living with hikes on famous trails or on any untrammeled path, where to find the best hunting and fishing, and how to catch bigger, healthier fish. “This book is written for those who want to move—not to the distant wilderness—but just far enough away from the smog and the screaming traffic to be where meat will be theirs for the raising, fish for the catching, fruit and vegetables for the picking, fuel for the cutting, home for the satisfaction of building…breathing cleaner air, beholden to none, doing what they want to do most and giving it their best,” says Bradford Angier in One Acre and Security…

During the 1870s and '80s, a single bar-filled block in San Francisco called the Devil's Acre threw what may have been the most enduring party the world has ever seen. Duggan McDonnell is in love with the city of his forefathers and its ever-flowing cocktails, and it shows in this history-packed drinking tour through one of the most beloved cities in the world. Twenty-five iconic cocktail recipes made famous by the City by the Bay—from the legendary Pisco Punch, Mai Tai, and Irish Coffee to the Gold Rush–era Sazerac and more modern-day Lemon Drop—are accompanied by an additional 45 recipes that show the evolution of these classic elixirs, resulting in such contemporary favorites as the Revolver and the Last Word, guaranteeing to keep the party going and the liquor flowing.

When tragedy devastated a small town, an unlikely source of inspiration pieced the community back together in this dramatic true story. On a Sunday in May 2008, an F5 tornado hit the town of Parkersburg, Iowa, killing eight people and destroying 250 homes and businesses within a span of 34 seconds. The next day, Parkersburg's beloved football coach, Ed Thomas, made a stunning prediction: "God willing, we will play our first home game here on this field this season." One hundred days later, the home team scored a victory on the field they dubbed the Sacred Acre, serving as a galvanizing point for the town to band together and rebuild. But just as Parkersburg was recovering, another disaster struck. While working with a group of football and volleyball players early one morning, one of Thomas's former students walked in and gunned him down at point-blank range. Thomas was only 58 years old. The murder of this hometown hero spread across national news headlines, and Thomas's community reeled from the shock. But his story doesn't end there. As you discover more about this incredible town, you'll learn: That grief is no match for love The life-changing power of faith and forgiveness What it truly means to lean on your community How to use your God-given gifts for good Praise for The Sacred Acre: "Ed Thomas was a man who lived the gospel, loved his family, and believed in doing things the right way. He taught his players that there are no shortcuts and that you will ultimately be judged, not by what you did, but on how you did it. His heart, his faith, and his Christian character are evident in so many of them. I believe that reading this book will give you a better understanding of this special man and the example he left for all of us to follow." --Tony Dungy, former head coach of the Indianapolis Colts

"A thriller about a Black society with a secret"--

Thomas Philipp's study of Acre combines the most extensive use to date of local Arabic sources with commercial records in Europe to shed light on a region and power center many identify as the beginning of modern Palestinian history. The third largest city in eighteenth-century Syria—after Aleppo and Damascus—Acre was the capital of a politically and economically unique region on the Mediterranean coast that included what is today northern Israel and southern Lebanon. In the eighteenth century, Acre grew dramatically from a small fishing village to a fortified city of some 25,000 inhabitants. Cash crops (first cotton, then grain) made Acre the center of trade and political power and linked it inextricably to the world economy. Acre was markedly different from other cities in the region: its urban society consisted almost exclusively of immigrants seeking their fortune. The rise and fall of Acre in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Thomas Philipp argues, must be seen against the background of the decay of central power in the Ottoman empire. Destabilization of imperial authority allowed for the resurfacing of long-submerged traditional power centers and the integration of Arab regions into European and world economies. This larger imperial context proves the key to addressing many questions about the local history of Acre and its peripheries. How were the new sources of wealth and patterns of commerce that remade Acre reconciled with traditional forms of political power and social organization? Were these forms really traditional? Or did entirely new classes develop under the circumstances of an immigrant society and new commercial needs? And why did Acre, after such propitious beginnings as a center of export trade and political and military power strong enough to defy Napoleon, give way to the dazzling rise of Beirut in the nineteenth century? For centuries the object of the Crusader's fury and the trader's envy, Acre is here restored to its full significance at a crucial moment in Middle Eastern history.