What happens to independent thought in a socialized health system? This question is superimposed on the action in NOBLE VISION, a gripping love story between Nicole Hudson, a tragically injured ballerina, and Dr. David Lang, an innovative neurosurgeon who is determined to save her with a revolutionary new treatment that is prohibited by the state. Romantic thriller with philosophical depth.

Este libro narra las vivencias de un joven quien a la edad de 17 años, decide marcharse a escondidas de sus padres en busca del sueño americano. Viajaba con las manos vacías, con sus inquietudes e incógnitas. Mientras miraba el horizonte por la ventanilla del avión, se preguntaba si algún día lograría realizar el sueño americano...

In such modern classics as Chesapeake, Centennial, Hawaii, Alaska, and Texas, James A. Michener proved time and again that his understanding of and love for his country was unparalleled. This Noble Land is Michener’s most personal statement about America, an examination of the issues that threaten to fragment and undermine the nation—racial conflict, the widening gulf between rich and poor, the decline of education, the inadequacies of our health care system—as well as a thought-provoking prescription for sustaining our “outstanding success.” Infused with the wisdom and passion of a lifetime, This Noble Land stands as a wake-up call for a troubled era. BONUS: This edition includes an excerpt from James A. Michener's Hawaii. Praise for This Noble Land “A book-length essay on the often worrying, often inspiring course of America in the nine decades of Michener’s life.”—The Washington Post “Michener is more interested in fixing the problems than in fixing the blame.”—The Dallas Morning News “Michener’s are the beach books that, unlike most other beach books, leave you smarter than you were when you started reading. Each delivers the product of all that research, doled out to the reader at just the right rate. You know right away who the bad guys are—the petty ones, the stingy ones. The heroes are generous and energetic and smart and, above all, unprejudiced. The real-life villains in This Noble Land are the people Michener perceives as ‘petty, mean and vengeful.’”—St. Louis Post-Dispatch “Stirring . . . an admirable effort to define what has made our country great and how to preserve what is best about it.”—Kirkus Reviews

In its 114th year, Billboard remains the world's premier weekly music publication and a diverse digital, events, brand, content and data licensing platform. Billboard publishes the most trusted charts and offers unrivaled reporting about the latest music, video, gaming, media, digital and mobile entertainment issues and trends.

John Boyd was arguably the greatest American military theorist since the sea power strategist Alfred Thayer Mahan at the turn of the 20th Century. Best known for his formulation of the OODA Loop as a model for competitive decision making, Colonel Boyd was also an original thinker in developing tactics for air-to-air combat, designing warplanes, and the fluid, mobile warfare known to the Germans as blitzkrieg and to modern armies as "maneuver warfare." As much as anyone, John Boyd was the architect of the two great campaigns against Saddam Hussein's Iraq, both the 1991 liberation of Kuwait and the 2003 "March Up" to Baghdad by the U.S. Army and Marines. But what of the costly, drawn-out insurgency that baffled the invaders once Baghdad had fallen? In this short book, Daniel Ford applies Boyd's thinking to the problem of counter-insurgency. Unlike the U.S. military in 2003, it turns out that Boyd had indeed put considerable thought into what might transpire after an effective "blitz" campaign. Indeed, he found many similarities between "blitzers" and what he preferred to call guerrillas, and he thought that they might be defeated by turning their own tactics against them. This is an expanded version of a dissertation submitted in the War Studies program at King's College London.

The Eightfold Path is the most widely known formulation of the Buddha's teaching. It is ancient, reaching back to the Buddha's very first discourse, and it is highly venerated as a unique treasury of wisdom and practical guidance. The teaching of the Eightfold Path challenges us to grasp the implications of that vision, and asks us to transform ourselves in its light. Like the teaching itself, this work covers every aspect of life.

Blending numerous heritages, wisdoms, and teachings, this powerfully wrought book encourages people to take charge of their lives, heal themselves, and grow. Movingly rendered, The Book of the Vision Quest is for all who long for renewal and personal transformation. In this revised edition—with two new chapters and added tales from vision questers—Steven Foster recounts his experiences guiding contemporary seekers. He recreates an ancient rite of passage—that of “dying,” “passing through,” and “being reborn”—known as a vision quest. A sacred ceremony that culminates in a three-day, three-night fast, alone, in a place of natural power, the vision quest is a mystical, practical, and intensely personal journey of self-knowledge.

In 1936, when he was just twenty-four years old, Alan Turing wrote a remarkable paper in which he outlined the theory of computation, laying out the ideas that underlie all modern computers. This groundbreaking and powerful theory now forms the basis of computer science. In Turing's Vision, Chris Bernhardt explains the theory, Turing's most important contribution, for the general reader. Bernhardt argues that the strength of Turing's theory is its simplicity, and that, explained in a straightforward manner, it is eminently understandable by the nonspecialist. As Marvin Minsky writes, "The sheer simplicity of the theory's foundation and extraordinary short path from this foundation to its logical and surprising conclusions give the theory a mathematical beauty that alone guarantees it a permanent place in computer theory." Bernhardt begins with the foundation and systematically builds to the surprising conclusions. He also views Turing's theory in the context of mathematical history, other views of computation (including those of Alonzo Church), Turing's later work, and the birth of the modern computer. In the paper, "On Computable Numbers, with an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem," Turing thinks carefully about how humans perform computation, breaking it down into a sequence of steps, and then constructs theoretical machines capable of performing each step. Turing wanted to show that there were problems that were beyond any computer's ability to solve; in particular, he wanted to find a decision problem that he could prove was undecidable. To explain Turing's ideas, Bernhardt examines three well-known decision problems to explore the concept of undecidability; investigates theoretical computing machines, including Turing machines; explains universal machines; and proves that certain problems are undecidable, including Turing's problem concerning computable numbers.

Be a Better Dad Today! is a global bestseller for a reason: it's one of the best books on fatherhood you will ever read. Warmly endorsed by dozens of America's best-known and most respected fathers, the book lays out the "Ten Tools of Fatherhood" that will help every dad who uses them. The book is the product of Slayton's thirty-year study of fatherhood on five different continents, his research, and his own experience raising four children with his wife of twenty-six years. Slayton's easy-to-read, friendly style makes it a fun read, and the many great real-life stories bring it to life. Be a Better Dad Today! is an inspirational, encouraging, and down-to-earth guidebook for every father who wants to be a better dad--for his family's sake and his own. With humor, empathy, common sense, and engaging stories, Slayton reveals proven and powerful tools and techniques that will help every dad fulfill his God-given responsibilities. Whether parenting younger or older kids, boys or girls, blended families or as a single dad (or even as a father-to-be), readers will find wise insights and practical, doable action steps for becoming the best dad they can be. The book makes a great gift for Father's Day, Christmas, birthdays, or any day. And since the Slaytons are dedicating 100 percent of all royalties from the book to fatherhood and family charities serving the US Military and at-risk families, your purchase will a blessing to the fathers and families who serve our nation every day.