From culinary desert to gastro heaven: The Spaghetti Tree shows how the transformation of Britain's food culture was sparked by two extraordinary Italians. Mario and Franco opened La Trattoria Terrazza in London's Soho in 1959. It soon became the most famous and influential restaurant in London, launching a social and gastronomic revolution.

How do you grow a spaghetti tree? Who saw fairies down by the creek? A fake is something that is not what it seems to be. Fakes are meant to trick people.

"See if the truth triumphs as you encounter suspicious stories, fishy facts, lying lists, and more"--

A surprisingly wide-ranging journey into the story of this beloved dish and “an utterly fascinating discourse on food history” (The Daily Beast). Intellectually engaging and deliciously readable, this is a stereotype-defying history of how one of the most recognizable symbols of Italian cuisine and national identity is the product of centuries of encounters, dialogue, and exchange. Is it possible to identify a starting point in history from which everything else unfolds—a single moment that can explain the present and reveal the essence of who we are? According to Massimo Montanari, this is just a myth. Historical phenomena can only be understood dynamically—by looking at how events and identities develop and change as a result of encounters and combinations that are often unexpected. As he shows in this lively, brilliant, and surprising essay, finding the origin of spaghetti—or anything else—is not as simple as it may seem. By tracing the history of the one of Italy’s “national dishes” —from Asia to America, from Africa to Europe; from the beginning of agriculture to the Middle Ages and up to the twentieth century—he reveals that in order to understand our own identity, we almost always need to look beyond ourselves to other cultures, peoples, and traditions. “Montanari’s research will delight readers and provide plenty of fodder for dinner-table discussion.” —Booklist “Full of delicious details.” —Publishers Weekly

As the horror subgenre du jour, found footage horror's amateur filmmaking look has made it available to a range of budgets. Surviving by adapting to technological and cultural shifts and popular trends, found footage horror is a successful and surprisingly complex experiment in blurring the lines between quotidian reality and horror's dark and tantalizing fantasies. Found Footage Horror Films explores the subgenre's stylistic, historical and thematic development. It examines the diverse prehistory beyond Man Bites Dog (1992) and Cannibal Holocaust (1980), paying attention to the safety films of the 1960s, the snuff-fictions of the 1970s, and to television reality horror hoaxes and mockumentaries during the 1980s and 1990s in particular. It underscores the importance of The Blair Witch Project (1999) and Paranormal Activity (2007), and considers YouTube's popular rise in sparking the subgenre's recent renaissance.

"What do Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, Richard Gere, untalented American Idol singers, former FBI agent Robert Hanssen, former baseball player Jose Conseco, "dead-beat" fathers, and drunken college students all have in common? They have all engaged in some type of shameful behavior." "Seemingly, an increasing number of people are acting rudely, displaying poor etiquette, and acting shamelessly in an increasing number of social situations. In fact, it appears as though there is a rising culture of shamelessness in the United States. Shameful Behaviors presents a unique look at American culture based on the premise that not only is there a rising culture of shamelessness, there is also a corresponding rise in formal and informal resistance against this trend." "Author Tim Delaney provides the reader with an informative and entertaining analysis of contemporary American culture."--BOOK JACKET.

Due to today's nonstop news cycle and the omnipresence of the internet, the search for facts can be more difficult than ever. A rumor or untruth can be shared at the touch of a button. This volume analyzes the various types of hoaxes that appear online and in the news, providing readers with a comprehensive set of tools to discover whether or not a story, image, or quotation is true. Hoaxes covered range from the historical Piltdown Man to the recent Pizzagate. This book fosters critical thinking and media literacy skills that can be applied to content of all kinds.

We all like to feel good. Sometimes that is difficult these days. This book is meant as a mini coffee-table book that you can pick up and read a few pages at a time. Anybody who is visiting could read a few pages while you are making the coffee. It would be a wonderful gift for those having a bad time, for holidays and birthdays, for graduations and people whose lifestyles are changing due to age or illness, or for people who could use a good laugh. In short, everyone could find something to brighten their day. It is even written in larger print than usual, so you do not have to go looking for those ever-missing glasses. Everyone has times when they need to feel the gift of happiness. My hope is to bring a little happiness to every reader and to give their lives more meaning. Just sit on your favorite chair and open the book at any page, and as you read, I hope a calmness comes over you--a calmness we all need in these crazy, busy, complicated days. Read on!