Cerro Gordois a photographic study of Los Angeles, California, created over the span of a year. Inspired by depictions of the city in motion pictures of the 1970s and early 1980s, photographer and director David Black (born 1980), noted for his work with musicians such as Daft Punk, Cat Power and Kendrick Lamar, explores various noir themes that cut through Los Angeles’ sunshine veneer. Black’s photographs examine the complex existence between light and dark and its role in our modern mythologies, visually appraising Los Angeles’ archetypes and identity in popular culture and exposing the city’s paradoxical bent as a land of dreams and disillusionment. Cerro Gordois Black’s first monograph.

The days grow colder. The nights grow longer. And every time the moon rises, the wolf inside her grows a little stronger. Cheyenne Clark—a woman whose hatred for werewolves has turned her into the very beast she most despises—prowls the Arctic Circle on the trail of an ancient secret, hunting for the one thing that could remove the lycanthropic curse and make her human again. Yet standing between Chey and her goal are a werewolf hunter armed with a diabolically brilliant weapon, a centuries-old werewolf with her own mysterious agenda…and Chey’s own complicated feelings for the man who doomed her to this existence but on whom her life now depends. Worse, with every hour that passes, the wolf inside Chey becomes more powerful. It won’t be long before the woman disappears completely, and only the beast is left.

Little known and interesting true stories from California's favorite Highway-395.

Shunryu Suzuki is known to countless readers as the author of the modern spiritual classic Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind. This most influential teacher comes vividly to life in Crooked Cucumber, the first full biography of any Zen master to be published in the West. To make up his intimate and engrossing narrative, David Chadwick draws on Suzuki's own words and the memories of his students, friends, and family. Interspersed with previously unpublished passages from Suzuki's talks, Crooked Cucumber evokes a down-to-earth life of the spirit. Along with Suzuki we can find a way to "practice with mountains, trees, and stones and to find ourselves in this big world."

A sweeping history of the 1840s, Manifest Destinies captures the enormous sense of possibility that inspired America’s growth and shows how the acquisition of western territories forced the nation to come to grips with the deep fault line that would bring war in the near future. Steven E. Woodworth gives us a portrait of America at its most vibrant and expansive. It was a decade in which the nation significantly enlarged its boundaries, taking Texas, New Mexico, California, and the Pacific Northwest; William Henry Harrison ran the first modern populist campaign, focusing on entertaining voters rather than on discussing issues; prospectors headed west to search for gold; Joseph Smith founded a new religion; railroads and telegraph lines connected the country’s disparate populations as never before. When the 1840s dawned, Americans were feeling optimistic about the future: the population was growing, economic conditions were improving, and peace had reigned for nearly thirty years. A hopeful nation looked to the West, where vast areas of unsettled land seemed to promise prosperity to anyone resourceful enough to take advantage. And yet political tensions roiled below the surface; as the country took on new lands, slavery emerged as an irreconcilable source of disagreement between North and South, and secession reared its head for the first time. Rich in detail and full of dramatic events and fascinating characters, Manifest Destinies is an absorbing and highly entertaining account of a crucial decade that forged a young nation’s character and destiny.