Retta Lee Jones is blessed with a beautiful voice and has big dreams of leaving her tiny Tennessee hometown. With a beaten down car, a pocketful of hard-earned waitressing money, and stars in her eyes, Retta sets out to make it big in Nashville. But the road to success isn?t a smooth one in a town filled with dreamers, and Retta begins to have doubts: can she make her mark while staying true to herslf? From the breakout author of Artichoke?s Heart, this bighearted novel is a must-read for anyone who has ever chased a dream (or hummed along with Taylor Swift).

Celebrate your individuality with this picture book that honors all the wonderful things that make you . . . you. “A picture-book celebration of individuality and diversity. . . . Affirming and welcome.” —Kirkus “In all the world over, this much is true: You’re somebody special. There’s only one YOU.” This feel-good book reassures kids that, whoever and whatever they are, it’s awesome being YOU! Expertly written to include all kinds of children and families, it embraces the beauty in a range of physical types, personalities, and abilities. Kids will love discovering and recognizing themselves in these pages—and they’ll feel proud to see their special qualities acknowledged. Adorable illustrations by Rosie Butcher show a diverse community that many will find similar to their own.

What if everybody were more thoughtful before they judged someone? If you see someone in a wheelchair, you might think he or she couldn't compete in a race. But...you might be wrong. What if you see a child with no hair? Do you think she is embarrassed all the time? How about a kid who has a really hard time reading? Do you think that means he's not smart? You might think so. But...you might be wrong. With clear prose and lighthearted artwork, this companion book to the bestseller What If Everybody Did That? explores the preconceived notions we have about the world and encourages kids to be more thoughtful.

"Text first published in 1990 by Children's Press, Inc."

Despite the statistics, any organisation can be sustained. How? By imagining the smallest step with teh biggest payoff, and then choosing that one step. This primer helps leaders imagine ways to free everybody in their organisation to do just that, by making it everybody's business to know and grow the enterprise.

“Bob Chapman, CEO of the $1.7 billion manufacturing company Barry-Wehmiller, is on a mission to change the way businesses treat their employees.” – Inc. Magazine Starting in 1997, Bob Chapman and Barry-Wehmiller have pioneered a dramatically different approach to leadership that creates off-the-charts morale, loyalty, creativity, and business performance. The company utterly rejects the idea that employees are simply functions, to be moved around, "managed" with carrots and sticks, or discarded at will. Instead, Barry-Wehmiller manifests the reality that every single person matters, just like in a family. That’s not a cliché on a mission statement; it’s the bedrock of the company’s success. During tough times a family pulls together, makes sacrifices together, and endures short-term pain together. If a parent loses his or her job, a family doesn’t lay off one of the kids. That’s the approach Barry-Wehmiller took when the Great Recession caused revenue to plunge for more than a year. Instead of mass layoffs, they found creative and caring ways to cut costs, such as asking team members to take a month of unpaid leave. As a result, Barry-Wehmiller emerged from the downturn with higher employee morale than ever before. It’s natural to be skeptical when you first hear about this approach. Every time Barry-Wehmiller acquires a company that relied on traditional management practices, the new team members are skeptical too. But they soon learn what it’s like to work at an exceptional workplace where the goal is for everyone to feel trusted and cared for—and where it’s expected that they will justify that trust by caring for each other and putting the common good first. Chapman and coauthor Raj Sisodia show how any organization can reject the traumatic consequences of rolling layoffs, dehumanizing rules, and hypercompetitive cultures. Once you stop treating people like functions or costs, disengaged workers begin to share their gifts and talents toward a shared future. Uninspired workers stop feeling that their jobs have no meaning. Frustrated workers stop taking their bad days out on their spouses and kids. And everyone stops counting the minutes until it’s time to go home. This book chronicles Chapman’s journey to find his true calling, going behind the scenes as his team tackles real-world challenges with caring, empathy, and inspiration. It also provides clear steps to transform your own workplace, whether you lead two people or two hundred thousand. While the Barry-Wehmiller way isn’t easy, it is simple. As the authors put it: "Everyone wants to do better. Trust them. Leaders are everywhere. Find them. People achieve good things, big and small, every day. Celebrate them. Some people wish things were different. Listen to them. Everybody matters. Show them."

EVERYONE FOR EVERYONE the book (volumes I & II) by Samuel A. Nigro, M.D. The Everybody for Everybody Book is the accumulation of what was learned over 70 plus years of life, over 45 years of marriage, over 40 years as a psychiatrist, 3 years in the U.S. Navy Submarine Service, and as a first generation American with five children and ten grandchildren. The planet and mankind are amazing. To limit ourselves to behaviors as if there is nothing more, is contradicted by an accurate comprehensive understanding of the planet and the universe. Basically, love is superior to all and the universe is the entropy necessary for the expression of love. Love itself requires there to be more. Nothing more is a cruel joke that life and love are meaningless. All logic and reason demand there be more, and we should act as if there is even much more love in anticipation. And if there isn t, then there ought to be! Regardless, the world would be better by believing in such and acting as such. The book provides some articles but most of it is the way to live a transcendental life: organized matter sanctified and given a soul by identity, truth, oneness, good and beauty for everyone s life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness partially the subtitle of the book. You get substance and the transcendental principles for living that save by actuality for a change. This is in contrast to the virtual reality culture of the unreliable manipulating self-discrediting noisy glitzy press&media imposed substanceless non-being which, by suggestibility, turns us into choiceless aliens instead of free persons for the planet. By the self-worshiping self-discrediting press&media, we are on the madman road-rage race to the bottom culture of pollution, disgust, death, and decline. Not by this book. Against vulgar suggestibility and glitz caused gullibility, this book gives real being by teaching six analogous ways of living the wisdom-filled eight categories of metaphors of love in the cone of space-time: As a human particle by elementary physics event, spectrum, field, quantum, singularity, dimension, uncertainty, and force. As a human being by community universals dignity, unity, integrity, identity, spirituality, life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. As a C/catholic, Roman or otherwise, by the sacraments Baptism, Penance, Holy Communion, Extreme Unction, Holy Orders, Matrimony, and Grace. As a Christian by the virtues faith, hope, charity, prudence, justice, courage, temperance, and holiness. As a patient by the universal variables of all therapy living things are precious, selective ignoring, subdued spontaneity non-self excluded, affect assistance, detached warmth & gentleness, non-reactive listening, C2CC centered candidness, and peace & mercy. And as sanctified by the last words of the crucified Christ. Take your pick or combine them all. Except for the quantity, it is simple. Thousands of aphorisms and concepts about every imaginable topic are offered to teach ancient secrets from nature and nature s God (to quote the Founding Fathers of America). Interspersed in the book are the world s first SEX SATIRES...fiery hilarious...which will help all cope with the prurience flooding the world as entertainment, advertisement and games. SEX SATIRE, properly applied to those exploiting sex, will free you from sex craziness and help keep society s prurience from disrupting your transcendental life. Read it through once; then a few pages or a chapter daily; and problem-solve as needed by index and perusal. You will be better. The world will be better. You will learn to be a real human being for everyone. And you will have your soul back by embracing the universal Mass mantra: life-sacrifice-virtue-lovehumanity- peace-freedom-death.

An award-winning journey through Johann Sebastian Bach’s six cello suites and the brilliant musician who revealed their lasting genius. One fateful evening, journalist and pop-music critic Eric Siblin attended a recital of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Cello Suites—an experience that set him on an epic quest to uncover the mysterious history of the entrancing compositions and their miraculous reemergence nearly two hundred years later. In pursuit of his musicological obsession, Siblin would unravel three centuries of intrigue, politics, and passion. Winner of the Mavis Gallant Prize for Non-fiction and the McAuslan First Book Prize, The Cello Suites weaves together three dramatic narratives: the disappearance of Bach’s manuscript in the eighteenth century, Pablo Casals’s discovery and popularization of the music in Spain in the late nineteenth century, and Siblin’s infatuation with the suites in the present day. The search led Siblin to Barcelona, where Casals, just thirteen and in possession of his first cello, roamed the backstreets with his father in search of sheet music and found Bach’s lost suites tucked in a dark corner of a store. Casals played them every day for twelve years before finally performing them in public. Siblin sheds new light on the mysteries that continue to haunt this music more than 250 years after its composer’s death: Why did Bach compose the suites for the cello, then considered a lowly instrument? What happened to the original manuscript? A seamless blend of biography and music history, The Cello Suites is a true-life journey of discovery, fueled by the power of these musical masterpieces. “The ironies of artistic genius and public taste are subtly explored in this winding, entertaining tale of a musical masterpiece.” —Publishers Weekly “Siblin’s writing is most inspired when describing the life of Casals, showing a genuine affection for the cellist, who . . . used his instrument and the suites as weapons of protest and pleas for peace.” —Booklist, starred review