Caution: This story has no vampires. The bloodsucking' is done by an ex-wife and state divorce laws. Experience one man's ordeal in an unwanted divorce."

Cool. The concept has distinctly American qualities and it permeates almost every aspect of contemporary American culture. From Kool cigarettes and the Peanuts cartoon's Joe Cool to West Side Story (Keep cool, boy.) and urban slang (Be cool. Chill out.), the idea of cool, in its many manifestations, has seized a central place in our vocabulary. Where did this preoccupation with cool come from? How was Victorian culture, seemingly so ensconced, replaced with the current emotional status quo? From whence came American Cool? These are the questions Peter Stearns seeks to answer in this timely and engaging volume. American Cool focuses extensively on the transition decades, from the erosion of Victorianism in the 1920s to the solidification of a cool culture in the 1960s. Beyond describing the characteristics of the new directions and how they altered or amended earlier standards, the book seeks to explain why the change occured. It then assesses some of the outcomes and longer-range consequences of this transformation.

The problem of child abuse seems to have escalated in recent years. Were there any 'battered babies' before the 1960s? Is the sexual abuse of children a recent phenomenon? The subject is often discussed in the media with little or no awareness that it has a long history. Confronting Cruelty examines our changing understanding of what cruelty is, the continuing neglect and abuse of children in our society, and the struggle between philanthropists, social workers and other professional groups for the right to identify and treat the children who are abused. Through the rich case records of the Children's Protection Society, Dorothy Scott and Shurlee Swain document a hundred years of child abuse, and explore how the community has responded to this ever-present social problem.